The Game Awards | What's going wrong with the MCU? | One Geek Thing

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hello, welcome to Geeky Brummy year seven, episode eight, I believe. Think it's eight. We're on eight. [00:00:06] Speaker B: Is it eight? [00:00:07] Speaker A: One of those some we're there, we're live at new news snobs. No, we're not. But welcome to the Geeky Brummy show. It is November issue. Coming up today, we'll be talking all about the marvels about game nominations and our favorite one geek thing. But of course, with me today, ms. Lee Price. [00:00:27] Speaker B: Hello. [00:00:27] Speaker A: Miss Keith Bloomfield. [00:00:28] Speaker C: Hi. [00:00:29] Speaker A: Miss Sam Edwards. [00:00:30] Speaker D: Hello. [00:00:30] Speaker A: And I'm Mr. Ramparrish. And we shall join you again very soon. It's Jeff Keeley's annual payday, the game awards. [00:00:58] Speaker B: He gets three paydays a year. [00:01:00] Speaker A: Three paydays. [00:01:01] Speaker B: Summer games. Fest and gamescom. True. [00:01:04] Speaker A: But they're not his, though, are they? Well, Summer Games Fest is his biggest payday then, put it that way. So it's a game Awards nomination, the time when game studios say, oh, look. [00:01:15] Speaker B: Here'S all the fun stuff that's coming. [00:01:16] Speaker A: Up which will never be released, like Nights, the old Republic three mastered edition. So, yes, the nominations are on. So I'm going to hand over to gaming expert Lee, and Lee, you're going to tell us about what's coming up and what do you think we should be to win? [00:01:31] Speaker B: Okay, the game awards obviously are held every year in December, celebrating the best games of the year and in 2023, that is a lot of games because it has been just a ridiculous year for games. As I've mentioned before, it's the post COVID boom. Yes, it's basically all the projects that got delayed during COVID have all come out towards the last six months of this year. But there's been a lot of really great stuff. Obviously, there's like 31 categories for nominations. We are not going to go through every single one of them because, look, I know that you guys really want to talk about the best esports athletes. [00:02:14] Speaker A: I'm sure Matt would, but Matt's unfortunately not with us. So keep an eye on his Twitter. [00:02:18] Speaker B: And he'll probably have an opinion. The only opinion I have on the esports thing is the best esports event is EPO. So that's because it's the only one I actually have heard of because it's the fighting game one and that's it. Never actually watched it, but, you know oh, wait, no, I did watch the one bit that revealed a new Tekken. [00:02:36] Speaker A: Character and that was I'm sorry, I'm very disappointed that the XL tournament is not in the esports category. That is one of the greatest esports of all time. And if you've not watched esports excel battle, watch it. Seriously, it gets very intense. [00:02:54] Speaker B: Yeah, I was going to say, moving back along, I was thinking like I was thinking of the associate of the fact that Excel is now officially integrated into Eve Online as well, which is just insane. But anyway, the big award, obviously for the game awards is the game of the year. And as always, there are six nominations. There is Alan Wake, Two Ballscape, Three Spiderman, Two Resident Evil four Super Mario Bros. Wonder and The Legend of Zelda tears the Kingdom. [00:03:23] Speaker A: I take, umbridge, that Resident Evil Four is in here. [00:03:26] Speaker B: Yeah, it should be Hi Fi Rush, but, you know well, it's a remaster. [00:03:30] Speaker A: For a start off. [00:03:30] Speaker B: It's a remake. It does make changes. I think of all of the Resident Evil remakes, it's probably the one that does the least different to the Resident. [00:03:41] Speaker A: Evil Four was the Game of the Year on release. That's why. Because it was already an amazing game. So why bother celebrating a remaster in a year where there's lots of original stuff coming out? [00:03:52] Speaker B: But of course, the two of those in there are, in fact, the most nominated of all of them, which is Alan White Two and Bold Skate Three. Both of them have eight nominations total. In addition to the Game of the Year, both of them have been nominated for best game Direction, best Narrative, Best Score in Music, and Best performance for Melanie Liebird in Alanwaite Two as Saga Anderson, the FBI agent that is one of the playable characters. And for Ballscape Three, it is Neil Newborn, who plays Asterian, who is the vampire guy who's in your party should be the narrator personally, but I didn't pick it. Allen wait. Two is nominated for best audio design, best action adventure and best art direction, while boulders gate three is nominated for best community support, best RPG and best multiplayer. [00:04:46] Speaker A: So Boulders Gate Three, although it was a hotly anticipated game, I don't think Larry and Studios have ever really come. [00:04:52] Speaker B: Across them before they did the Divinity original Sin games. You say that it was a hotly anticipated game. I don't think they expected the attention that it has got at all. Even though it's got the D D license and Larian's like a trusted studio. Based on the fact that people do rave about the Divinity games. I've never personally played them, but it had that attention. But it got more attention than they ever possibly thought they would get. [00:05:25] Speaker A: Was it BioWare or obsidian? [00:05:27] Speaker B: Did the original. BioWare did the bio did the original too. But, yeah, I've enjoyed the hell out of Boltsgate Three. It is fully deserving of all of those things. As I said, I have an opinion on the best performance just because it should be the narrator. Just because the sheer amount of lines she would have had to have recorded. And it's just that the voice of that narrator is just so good. It's just like you could listen to it for hours. It's that kind of perfect narrative voice where it's soothing. But, yeah, both of those, I'm very glad that they are the most nominated because they are, personally my two best games of the year. [00:06:12] Speaker A: Shall we give a little bit of time to the other three? Because we've talked about Resident Evil Four, so Marvel, Spiderman Two. So I've heard this is still a bit of a buggy mess and it feels rather rushed out the door. [00:06:23] Speaker B: Honestly, I haven't really paid much attention to it because it's Spiderman. I don't care. But to be fair, though, it is actually like the second most nominated. Well, the third if you can top two because it's got seven nominations, which is also best Game direction, best Narrative, best Audio design, best performance for Yuri Lowenthal as Peter Parker. I need to not say Spider Man because there are two of them, innovation and accessibility and Best Action Adventure. So it's been nominated for those. Again, I have no real opinion on Spiderman, too, if you're into that sort of thing. I imagine it's pretty good, but I'm not into that sort of thing. [00:07:00] Speaker A: There's been quite a lot of talk about the latest Suicide Squad game trainer and Harley Quinn is basically just doing Spiderman across the entire map for some weird reason. It's like, that's not your role. [00:07:13] Speaker B: Harley Quinn well, people liked the 2018 Spiderman so much, so clearly Warner Brothers are just like we'll do. That doesn't make any sense, but we'll do that. [00:07:24] Speaker A: It's quite interesting. Nintendo with two titles here as well. So, I mean, Sam is our resident Legend of Zelda fanboy. [00:07:31] Speaker D: That is the only one of the games that's been nominated that I've actually played, I think. But I thoroughly enjoyed it. Well, I say enjoyed past tense. I'm still working my way through it because it is a big old game. But yeah, I think it's beautifully designed. I love the music in it. I think it's been nominated for music. [00:07:51] Speaker B: As well, hasn't yes, best Gore and music. It's also been nominated for best game direction, best art direction and best action adventure. [00:07:57] Speaker D: And art direction. It's a very pretty looking game. I obviously can't speak to the others, but yeah, I think it deserves to be where it is. Whether it's going to beat some of the others, I don't know. [00:08:11] Speaker B: Well, what's interesting about Tears of the Kingdom is like, at the start of the year, I was absolutely certain that it was going to be considered the game of the year. If anyone who sort of pays attention to our website knows that every year I do like the top 50 most notable games of the year and I collect that list as the year goes on. So when Tears of the Kingdom came out, naturally it shot right to the top of that list based on its Metacritic score and how it's trending and all this sort of stuff. And I was like, it's going to stay here for the whole year. And then Balders Gate Three came out, got the same score as it, and they were running neck and neck. Now Baldersgate Three is way ahead of it and it's like, all right, fine. But yeah, Mario Wonder is definitely an interesting one. I did not expect it. [00:08:53] Speaker A: The drug diversion of Mario. Yeah, basically that's all I can tell. I've not played it. But every time we look at the trailer, it's like Mario eats a plant based material and everything gets trippy and he turns into an elephant. [00:09:07] Speaker C: Yeah, but he has been in the Mushroom Kingdom for like a long time. [00:09:10] Speaker D: Yes. [00:09:11] Speaker A: I think Shigaru Miyamoto went to the Mushroom Kingdom. And this is the problem. I think he went out to the forest in Japan and started picking it out random items and went, oh, here's an idea for a game. [00:09:21] Speaker B: But I mean, it is really good, though. That's the thing. I've seen people dismiss it because, oh, it's just a 2D Mario game. And it's like, yeah, but have you played it, though? It is really good. [00:09:31] Speaker A: It's got four player co op as well. [00:09:33] Speaker B: Got four player co op with like I'm trying to remember how many playable characters. It's a lot of playable characters. I can't remember the exact number. [00:09:40] Speaker A: But this is the other thing. Every single one of those other games is a single player experience. And this is the only game, and they seem to be coming very thin on the ground, is having multiplayer experiences, but local multiplayer experience. [00:09:54] Speaker C: I mean, how does the game win in these game awards? [00:09:59] Speaker B: Is it all public vote? So 10% of it is public vote. The other 90% is a jury of Jack Keely's wallet. It's a jury of people within the press, basically. I think I can't remember, it does say on the site, like, which sites are involved in the voting process. I know that there's a few from the UK, there's a few from the US. And there's a few from around the world here and there. So it's not just know Jeff Keeley's. [00:10:26] Speaker C: Mates are voting because at least that alleviates the danger of just public block voting. Because literally, if I was thinking, if this is down to the public, everybody's just going to vote for Baltis Gate Free and nobody's there'll be one or two people that vote for Mario. [00:10:40] Speaker B: But to be fair, the press are probably going to vote heavily in favor of Baltis Gate Three as well. [00:10:44] Speaker C: But it's kind of weird that Game of the Year's list, because I'm thinking it shows where I am in my gaming life to the fact that the only Game of the Year that I've played, I played it in 2005, so I haven't played any of the other games. And Resident Evil Four I played on the GameCube when it came out. [00:11:00] Speaker A: As I said, apart from Super Mario Brothers. Super Mario Brothers Wonder, every single one of those is at least 40 hours worth of time investment. And if you haven't got the time right. [00:11:12] Speaker B: It'S more 20 hours. [00:11:14] Speaker A: But that's still a considerable time investment. [00:11:17] Speaker B: Is what I'm saying. [00:11:18] Speaker C: But when you say that and then it's like you see people who binge watch TV shows that are like 15, 16 hours, and it's like, well, you're just sitting there passively. At least with a game I can't binge watch anything anyway. So I've struggled to find games time, but it's the cost of them as well. [00:11:35] Speaker A: Now. [00:11:36] Speaker C: It's like, it's a bit of a like I'm thinking, am I going to drop down 70 quid for a digital release because I've got an Xbox Series S, so I'm kind of limited to what I digital releases so I can't pick up cheap physical copies. So you kind of think, well, it's going to take me six months to play it. I probably won't actually play it for six months anyway. So am I going to drop 70 quid now or shall I wait until there's a sale? It's what I did with Cyberpunk. I mean, I've recently picked that up when it was like 20 quid. I don't think I'd have bought it at the time. I've still hardly even touched it. [00:12:09] Speaker A: But it's amazing how much that game's turned around. Me and Lee was talking about it before we started recording it's. Like with a 2.0 update. It has fixed quite a lot of the grumbles that I had when I first played it on release. It's still missing massive chunks of stuff like the whole Metro system still missing. But I think modders are pretty much taking the ball with that and running and they're fixing all the stuff. But that's the PC only experience limiting if you're on console. [00:12:33] Speaker B: But the whole thing. But Cyberpunk is another one that's got a lot of nominations this year. It's got four separate nominations and a big chunk of it is because of Phantom Liberty coming out and they obviously hadn't done all the update. I do disagree with it being nominated for best Ongoing game because it isn't ongoing game, that's usually the category, which is like your Final Fantasy Fourteen S and your genshin impacts and that sort of thing where it's like stuff that receives regular updates all the time. Whereas like, Cyberpunk 27 Seven just had like one really big one this year but fixed it. But that was Best Community Sport I would maybe argue in favor of. It was also nominated for best narrative for the DLC specifically and best performance for Idris Elba in Fantasy Liberty as well. But yeah, other sort of big games that have done quite a few nominations. Very pleased to see the Hi Fi Rich, the correct Bethesda game got five nominations. So best art direction, best score in music, best audio design, innovation and accessibility. And best action game. So it got nominated for all of those. And it is one of my personal favorites this year. Like it came out of nowhere in January. So I was genuinely like, everyone's going to forget about that game by the time the award season rolls around. It's just not going to get a look in and then to see that it got five nominations, like good, but I've played it and just the cafeteria fight set to the Prodigy is one of the best moments of gaming this year. Plus that and the door gag. So it was very good to see that, which is very funny as well, that I'm seeing a lot of the weird, immature Xbox fanboys who are basically going like, well, Starfield's only got like best RPG. There's an anti Xbox bias I'm like, but that's an Xbox exclusive and it got five nominations. There is no Xbox. It's just that Starfield wasn't as good as the other ones. [00:14:37] Speaker A: I think it's the problem with every Bethesda RPG, it's when they get released, it's very much a bare bones vanilla experience and it relies on a lot of DLC to improve the endgame experience. If you think back to Skyrim, when that first came out, the original game, decent storyline because it's based in the older Scrolls universe, but it was massively bug heavy, wasn't really that much to do outside of the main quest. And then they put loads of other stuff onto it to enhance it to the stage and then I think it's being released more than any other game of all time now, I think possibly other than Resident Evil Four. Yeah, but Starfield is very much this is the vanilla experience and it will be enhanced over the next five to ten years. [00:15:19] Speaker B: I think the thing from what I've seen about Starfield is it's a perfectly fine game. [00:15:27] Speaker A: It's so many loading screens. [00:15:29] Speaker B: Yeah, but if you're looking for Elder Scrolls or Fallout in Space, that's basically what you're getting. If you're looking for literally anything else, you're probably not going to get into it. Which with everything coming out this year and so many games doing so much more than that, I think that's why it's gotten this sort of I was. [00:15:56] Speaker A: Hoping it would peak my Mass Effect itch, but yeah, it's not close. [00:16:01] Speaker B: Well, the thing that's interesting about that specifically is Mass effect. Obviously, one of the big things I hear people talking about that is the characters, because the cast is really good. I have played the first one and I definitely can attest to how good the cast is. I did see someone point out probably about a month ago, I think it was at this point, that it's interesting how Starfield's been out a few months and I've heard no one talk about a single character in it. But Balders Gate Three came out and people who've never played the game basically know the whole cast because people won't. [00:16:34] Speaker A: Of Shadowheart and Asterion, which apparently are the two thirsty characters. Everybody wants a bit of more. Asterion, I think, is definitely a thirsty character with a silhouette. [00:16:44] Speaker C: It's that difference between those games that are narratively driven because I kind of dislike Sandbox games because I'm like it just seems weird that they're introducing games which basically are just encouraging people to go, this is all you play. You only play this one game and you just play it constantly throughout. It's not like you could dip in and out of games. I was interested in Starfield. And then I thought, I'm going to play for a few hours and I'm going to get nowhere, and I'm just going to get bored and I'm going to ditch it. And it's on game pass. So I could try it, but it's like there's nothing driving me forwards to do that other than the kind of like, go here, get this. Go here, get that. Upgrade your ship, upgrade your thing. I can do that kind of stuff with animal Crossing much more interestingly that fetch and build kind of stuff. I'm like, well, I'm not really interested in that. [00:17:39] Speaker A: And a lot of it is the main quest is very short, but a lot of it is kind of locked behind the new game plus experience. They're expecting you to play for it at least two to three times to get like, the top end gear, the top end upgrades, the better ships. [00:17:52] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:17:53] Speaker A: So it kind of forces you to say, right, keep playing this. There is a lot of radiant quests, there's lots of good side quests and most of the really good stories in all the side quest stuff. So there's kind of career paths you can do. Like you can go and join the UCS, become a Guardian, you can go and join the freestyle collective, become a Ranger, which is kind of like a cowboy in space. There's lots of different things you can do a lot of different missions, go and join a corporation and work your way up through that, and that's where you get access to different things and you get different dialogue based on that. [00:18:23] Speaker C: So that's really cool, but you just make it sound like another job. [00:18:27] Speaker A: But it is kind of like all of it's hidden in these kind of job quests of you start off as a low level person, so it's a bit like if you think about Skyrim, it's like joining the guilds, like the League of Assassin and stuff like that. You have to work your way up through it to get to the good stuff and the good storylines. And there are some fantastic bits of storylines and story creation. It cribs a lot of classic Sci-Fi. There's a whole mission which is just a complete ripoff of Alien, and there's another one which is very Star Trek based, where it's a lot about negotiation, diplomacy, so if you want a TNG, but it's just one quest, and that's what annoys me. It's like if you build this out as the actual game, this would have been fantastic. [00:19:08] Speaker C: I'm just thinking, wouldn't it have been much more interesting if I had the option to just be the guy who mops up after everybody's been through the space for and that's that's my time. Every game I just go I'm just mopping up, going out for a beer, and we're slagging off all the space captains. [00:19:22] Speaker B: That game already exists twice because you've. [00:19:25] Speaker A: Got the power wash simulator. And what was the other one that they did? [00:19:28] Speaker B: Visceral cleanup. [00:19:29] Speaker C: The power wash simulator. That was just ridiculous because who gets their crap that dirty? I mean, that was seriously like literally. [00:19:36] Speaker A: Everything wall to wall. [00:19:37] Speaker C: You're just going to go in there and go, no, I'm not cleaning this up. You've got a serious problem if this entire room is covered in brown, you should change your diet. [00:19:46] Speaker B: The good news is you can clean the DeLorean now. That just came out. [00:19:50] Speaker A: So much DLC for that game. [00:19:53] Speaker C: It's basically limitless. What else can we clean? Just any character, model or thing. It's like Empire State Building, statue of Liberty. [00:20:01] Speaker B: It made me so happy that the first DLC they announced was like, here's Lara Croft's Manor. I was like, yes, I will. [00:20:09] Speaker A: But yes, best adaptation I wanted to talk about as well. [00:20:13] Speaker B: Yes. So best adaptation is so this is basically the best adaptation of a video game into another medium. So there are five nominations. So we've got Castlevania Nocturne, which is the new Castlevania series on Netflix. [00:20:28] Speaker A: Nothing to do with the last Castlevania series. We'll put that to one side. [00:20:31] Speaker B: Well, they've got grand tourismo, the movie. We've got the last of us on HBO. We've got the Super Mario Brothers movie, and we've got Twisted Metal, the Peacock show that literally only people in America can watch because it's on Peacock, which. [00:20:44] Speaker C: I've heard a lot of good things about, apparently. [00:20:47] Speaker A: I thought it was a very curious franchise to pick. This basically just wasn't that based on Death Race 2000 itself? [00:20:54] Speaker B: Sony forget that exists. They haven't released a new Twisted Metal game for over ten years. So, you know, it's like a robber thing. [00:21:01] Speaker A: It's gone for the full circle of we'll base a game based on this kind of culty trash movie, and then we'll make a series based on said game, which is now based on the film. It's very weird. The only reason I wanted to say it was because grand tourismo was, of course, your favorite film of the year that you enjoyed so much. [00:21:18] Speaker B: My opinion on grand tourismo being nominated is because they I believe there are five nomination slots and five adaptations got released this year. [00:21:28] Speaker D: I feel I should add. My mum really, really enjoyed grand tourismo and kept recommending it to me. I never got round to watching it, but she really wanted me to go and see it because she thought it was that good. [00:21:39] Speaker C: But strictly speaking, it's not an adaptation. It's the story of some kid who played a game, who got to drive a car. So he's got absolute adaptations of a. [00:21:51] Speaker A: Competition, not about the game itself. [00:21:53] Speaker C: Yeah. So it's not an adaptation. So that shouldn't be there at all. [00:21:56] Speaker B: And also, if you look into it, you find it that the timelines are just all over the place. They don't make any sense in regards to the actual events? [00:22:04] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, there was an actual competition they ran I think it was around the PS Two era. Was it PS Two or PS three? [00:22:09] Speaker B: It was grunt Tourismo Five that they competed on. [00:22:11] Speaker C: It's based on a real thing that happened. [00:22:15] Speaker B: The guy is still a professional racing driver. I think he races for Nissan in Japan now, I think. So he's doing well for himself, but his story isn't that interesting. [00:22:29] Speaker A: I think everybody knows Last of US is going to win. [00:22:31] Speaker D: Yeah, it has to be. [00:22:32] Speaker B: Yeah. I'm trying to think like I'm trying to remember what actually won last year, because I know there was the category did exist before, but yeah, The Last of US is almost certainly going to win it. I think the Super Mario Brothers movie has done incredibly well, but I don't think critics are going to push for it as much as The Last of US. I've seen both, and of the two, The Last of US is the better. [00:23:00] Speaker A: Arcane, which, of course yeah, no arguments there. [00:23:05] Speaker B: But yeah, the Last of US show is great. It's a great adaptation of its source material, but it's also just great in its own right as well. So it'd be very interesting to see very interesting to see the season two and how they're going to handle what comes next. [00:23:25] Speaker A: Any big surprises for you? [00:23:27] Speaker B: I'm trying to think what Diablo Four. [00:23:30] Speaker A: Has not really had much. I think they're in multiplayer and yeah. [00:23:34] Speaker B: Diablo Four is in did I write those down? Innovation and accessibility and best multiplayer I know. Diablo Four has kind of had a bit of an interesting journey because when it came out, people were like, oh, this is really, really good. And then people kind of got to the end game and then went, oh, no, this is really, really bad. So it's kind of had this weird mixed life of being on one hand, some bits of it are really, really good, and then other bits are just not great. I think most of what I've seen has probably been sort of expected. I'm surprised to see Jedi Survivor in a couple of categories just because I do remember the launch of that. It was a mess. I don't know if they'd fixed it yet. [00:24:17] Speaker A: Well city Skylines Two is in best SIM, and that's breaking everybody's PC. [00:24:23] Speaker B: Yeah, the story behind that is great because they decided, let's have every single person in your city be a high res model. [00:24:31] Speaker D: Yes. [00:24:31] Speaker A: And they'rendered in real time, even to the state of they rendered the teeth on the models, bearing in mind they're. [00:24:37] Speaker B: Going to be like tiny on your screen. [00:24:41] Speaker A: So you've got people with, like, RTX 40, like one 3900 K's going, this is unplayable. [00:24:47] Speaker B: Get 20 unsurprisingly. It crashes all the time. But SIM strategy is definitely an interesting category because I've seen people who are deep into strategy games say this category is awful. You clearly didn't have a single person who plays strategy games on this jury because obviously, like you said, City Sky has two. I think I've heard mixed things. That company of Hero has three. [00:25:14] Speaker A: Pikmin Four, which was a massive title when the cube came out, is now just, well, we released this. [00:25:20] Speaker B: Well, Pikmin Four has done pretty well and it is a good strategy game from what I've heard. It's just probably not where you'd immediately think of in terms of people have pointed I'm trying to remember what I saw someone suggest instead. But there's definitely been like, more. I think Age of Wonders Four is one of the big ones that sort of hasn't shown up, but it's an interesting one. And again, yeah, you can kind of tell that they didn't. It's similar to best fighting as well. It's got the two obvious ones, which is Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter. Of course you're going to have those two. The rest of them are very OD, including Nickelodeon All Star Brawl. [00:26:00] Speaker A: I was going to say you're going to put down Nickelodeon All Stars Brawl, too. [00:26:04] Speaker C: I've heard lots of good things about that game. [00:26:06] Speaker B: The thing about that, though, is it's just come out and from what I've seen of both the first one and this one is they kind of kind of bare bones. They're not brilliant. They're okay if you're there to sort of just have Nickelodeon characters fight each other. But it's definitely not on the same level as the other fighting games in this category. [00:26:28] Speaker A: Whatever happened to that Warner Brothers game. [00:26:31] Speaker C: Multiversal or whatever it was, died of death. [00:26:37] Speaker B: They said that what was available was like a Beta. And now they've closed it because they're going to work on it a bit more behind the scenes, which means that we're going to can it in six months. [00:26:50] Speaker A: Because I've heard Mortal Kombat one, a lot of people are very annoyed because all the preorder stuff, they've just shoved it in the store. It's really microtransaction heavy and it's kind of ruining the game for a lot of people. [00:27:01] Speaker B: I mean, best fighting is almost certainly going to go street Fighter straight A. Street Fighter six. I've seen people raving about Street Fighter Six and it's Street Fighter. Everyone knows Street Fighter and it's iconic and it's just another good game in that series. So it's going to win that category. [00:27:20] Speaker A: Sorry. This is now an instant purchase for me, Nickelodeon all Star War because you can have Nigel Thornberry versus Reptar Game Lee. [00:27:29] Speaker C: I wanted to just get your thoughts on the two independent game categories because when I scroll through all of the big game categories, I'm like, I ain't played none of these yet. Pretty much I've played most of the games that are in the independent categories, which just goes to show where my. [00:27:46] Speaker A: Gaming likes it's, where the innovation? [00:27:50] Speaker C: But what are your thoughts on the games that have been. [00:27:52] Speaker B: Listed there. I've not played Viewfinder, but I'm very interested in it just because it's doing very interesting things. Because it's like you take pictures and you place them into the environment and it shapes the environment. It's very like MC Escher painting, kind of in how it's done. Sea of Stars is really good. I've been playing through that. That's the virtue of it releasing on both PlayStation Plus and Game Pass is like, well, I have an option here. I played it on PlayStation just because it's like I've got more space on my PS Five than I do on my PC. Dredge is supposed to be really good. It's a fishing game, but it's a horror fishing game. So you are going out and you're fishing, but the waters are basically haunted. There are eldritch horrors living in it. Some of the fish you drag up are definitely not normal fish. Yeah, I've played Cocoon. I really liked Cocoon. [00:28:50] Speaker A: I'm assuming that's not a licensed title. [00:28:52] Speaker B: Because. [00:28:54] Speaker A: No, Wilfred Brimley. [00:28:57] Speaker B: I've actually reviewed Cocoon and it was just such a good experience. So you're playing this weird little bug man and you can kind of come out of the world and then carry the world around in a little orb. And you can place the orbs inside each other and kind of create weird little effects with all the world stacked together. I don't know what kind of mind thought of all that at all. But then there's the controversial one, which is Dave the Diver, not because it's a bad game, but because it's not an indie game because it's made by a developer who are owned by the Korean corporation Nexon, I believe. [00:29:36] Speaker A: And I think they're like billion in the billion dollars category. [00:29:40] Speaker B: Yeah, they're massive. So it's absolutely not an indie game by any stretch of the imagination. A lot of the same games are in the debut indie, but we've also got Pizza Tower, which I've seen people rave about. I've not played it myself, but I. [00:29:53] Speaker C: Haven'T played that one. [00:29:54] Speaker B: But I think I'm slightly put off by the art style. It's very sort of like Nickelodeon in the art style for it, but it's the kind of stuff that I really didn't latch onto as a kid. And there's Venba, which is basically like it's the story of kind of being an immigrant, like an Indian immigrant in Canada and sort of how you kind of maintain your cultural heritage. And the game focuses on food, so it's basically a cooking game. So it's just about that. And again, I've heard people sort of talk very positively about that. [00:30:35] Speaker C: It was on game pass. I'm not sure if it's still there, but it looks really cool. [00:30:40] Speaker B: The art style is really nice, I think. And it's one of those sort of stories where it's a good, nice little personal story. [00:30:49] Speaker C: It just feels for me that all these indie games have got so much more interesting things going on in terms of gameplay and story and representation. Any other major. [00:30:58] Speaker B: It's very good, Keith, but it's like. [00:31:01] Speaker C: 64 quid or something on Xbox at the moment. [00:31:04] Speaker A: That was going to touch on mobile game as well, because I think it's the only mention of Hong Kai Star Al, which is surprising because it's available on Epic Game Store, I believe. I think you can get it on Steam as well. [00:31:17] Speaker B: I think on PC, it's just as its own launcher because I have it as its own launcher, but it's also on PS Five as well now. [00:31:25] Speaker A: But it's massive. It's absolutely massive. And I was expecting it to pop a few more, even in possibly best game category, because I think it's one. [00:31:35] Speaker B: Of these things, though, where because it's predominantly a mobile gacha game, it's got the stigma of being like oh, we can't put it in Game of the Year because it's a niche audience and it's why you don't see racing games in that category as well. Or you don't see fighting games in that category. [00:31:52] Speaker A: I can't say it's a niche audience, though, because it's one of the biggest. [00:31:54] Speaker B: Massive selling I know. But as far as the Game Awards and stuff is concerned, the Game of the Year has to be like it has to appeal to a lot of different people. It's got to fit into this weird. It's an OD one. [00:32:11] Speaker A: It's just weird because it's in the category with Hello Kitty Island Adventure. [00:32:16] Speaker B: Apparently, no joke. Apparently, Hello Kitty Island adventure is supposed to be really good. [00:32:22] Speaker C: I'm quite surprised that the only mobile game I'm playing isn't in that category. And that's marvel. Snap. [00:32:28] Speaker B: Oh, it was dominated last year. [00:32:30] Speaker C: Has it been going for more than a year? Oh, God, did not get the first. [00:32:34] Speaker A: Anniversary special card for 6 million credits or whatever it was. [00:32:37] Speaker C: I can't believe I've been playing that. [00:32:39] Speaker B: I think it actually won last year, now that I think about it. [00:32:42] Speaker C: I was thinking, I'd only started been playing that for a while, that year has gone quick. [00:32:47] Speaker A: Yeah. But, yeah, I was just quite surprised because, as you said, it's the stigma of being a mobile game. But it's not just a true mobile experience. [00:32:54] Speaker B: It is a really good RPG in its own right with the writing quality it has. It has no right being a free to play game. [00:33:03] Speaker D: No. [00:33:04] Speaker A: Well, it's basically very similar to yeah, it did win best mobile game last year, mobile snap, by the way, but it's the same team you do the other one, Genshin Impact, so no surprise there. But it's quite surprising that the amount of content you can get for free in that game. [00:33:22] Speaker B: One thing I do want to highlight as well is the best VR and AR game, the game that I would pick because I played it and it's really good. It's ridiculous. It's humanity, which is basically like you're a shiba inu and you do queue management. It's a very bizarre game that sounds like a great game, but I saw it in there and I was like, it had a VR version. I genuinely didn't even know that there was a VR version. So I'm like, okay, that was the. [00:33:54] Speaker A: Other thing as well, the last game because we were running out of time, but Armored Call Six, I was expecting a lot more because it's from Software and the Game Awards love From Software so much. [00:34:05] Speaker B: Yeah, it only got best action game. And I find that I do find it interesting. I think it is just because. [00:34:13] Speaker A: I. [00:34:13] Speaker B: Think the armored core stuff isn't quite as wide reaching in its appeal as like Dark Souls Raldom Ring and stuff. And I think, again, it's one of those things where there's so many good games that have come out that it's. [00:34:26] Speaker A: Like because it had quite a bit. [00:34:29] Speaker B: Of noise around it when it came out. [00:34:32] Speaker A: It's a From Software game and a. [00:34:34] Speaker B: Lot of people are putting it on their personal Game of the Year list. But I think when you're weighing it up, I think I would maybe make an argument of putting it in Game of the Year, but taking either Spiderman or Resident Evil Four out of those, those are the two that as we've said, Resident Evil Four is a remake and that's the problem. But I think the Spiderman Two as well isn't really doing anything. [00:34:56] Speaker A: It's just Spiderman, but more yeah, it's. [00:34:58] Speaker C: Just more if we're rounding up, I just wanted to get your thoughts on what was in the most anticipated game, which I'm reading here, as the description is recognizing an announced game that has demonstratedly illustrated potential to push the gaming medium forward. And I'm looking at that collection of five games going, really the only one. [00:35:19] Speaker A: I would actually and I know it's a company you hate being ubisoft, but I'd say Star Wars Outlaws is the only trader I've seen this year and went, that is a game I want to play. [00:35:29] Speaker C: But they've deliberately done that by going, look, you can get in your ship and fly from the ground to space. And I reckon that's just basically covering up a loading screen and it's like, you're not going to have that much control and it's just going to look cool the first two times you do it and then going to go, oh God. I just want to get to be. [00:35:45] Speaker A: Honest, with the amount of loading screens in Starfield, it would be nice just. [00:35:48] Speaker B: To have a little bit no control. But I think in that category it is very interesting because I would play four out of five of those and the only reason that I wouldn't touch Hades two is because I haven't played the first one. [00:36:02] Speaker C: But you say you'd play four out. [00:36:03] Speaker B: Of five forward to four because it's the anticipated yeah, but would you say. [00:36:09] Speaker C: That those games have the potential to push the gaming medium forward. I think that wording makes me go, yeah, I could understand you're excited to play these games because they're cool. If you did have said games that we think are going to look cool. [00:36:21] Speaker A: It'S marketing speak, isn't it? Marketing speak. [00:36:25] Speaker B: So I've played the betas for Tekken Eight, and it's just a better Tekken, right? It's Tekken. [00:36:31] Speaker C: They should call it that, not Tekken Eight. Just go better tekken. [00:36:34] Speaker B: You missed over the best thing. [00:36:35] Speaker A: What was the beta? [00:36:37] Speaker B: Oh, well, there were two. There was the CNT, which if you look at that on paper, you can very easily read Tekken Eight CNT, but very strong brand. Then they had the closed beta test after that. So they had CBT. And considering what that's also an acronym for, but yeah, of those Star Wars Outlaws does actually look interesting. I think part of the reason that it caught my attention is because I saw the little robot and I went, oh, I want to hang out with that little robot. [00:37:08] Speaker A: Well, they did that with Jedi Survivor and Fallen Order, wasn't it? It was like, oh, it's cute. [00:37:14] Speaker B: Like a dragon. Infinite wealth. It's a Yakuza game, so it's going to be great. But again, it's a Yakuza game, so it's being more yakuza, aren't they? [00:37:22] Speaker A: They're no longer yakuza. They've completely gone back and they're all like a Dragon now. [00:37:26] Speaker B: They're all like a Dragon, which is the original Japanese title. But it is very confusing. But I mean, the big innovation that Infinite Wealth is going to have is it's going to have an entire animal crossing game inside of it. [00:37:41] Speaker A: Keith's like, I've heard about this because in the latest like a Dragon game, they put a Sega rally racing game, Daytona USA Two, which was never released over outside of Japan, I think it was. So everybody's like buying like a Dragon just to play the Daytona racing game. [00:38:02] Speaker B: What I like about this, animal crossing, so it's not actually Animal Crossing, obviously, because this is not releasing on the switch at all. But it's basically if you take the concept of animal crossing and have Yakasa characters, that's what you're getting. So you're still playing as Ichiban, and you're going around your little island and you're building your houses. [00:38:25] Speaker C: That sounds horrendous. I get enough trash talk from characters on Animal Crossing when I haven't picked up leaves for six months. Imagine what yakaza are going to be doing to you. [00:38:37] Speaker B: And then obviously, you got Final Fantasy Seven, Rebirth, which is basically just the second part of a remake from 1997. It's very good. Like, I played the first part. [00:38:47] Speaker A: We need to have a debate about this at some point. Are remakes and remasters worth it? I know we've touched on it previously, but I am getting kind of bored now. It's like we're just going to remaster another game. And then they'll promise a game, which I actually want remastered, like Nights of the Old Republic, and then Embrace a group implodes. Yeah. [00:39:06] Speaker B: No more nights. [00:39:07] Speaker A: But anyway. [00:39:08] Speaker C: Game awards. [00:39:09] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:39:10] Speaker A: Content, creator of the year. I have not a single clue of any of those people. [00:39:15] Speaker B: I know one of them and they absolutely deserve to win it, which is people make games and I will shout them out on this, which is basically like they are some of the best games journalism out there right now. They do proper investigative journalism. They recently did a thing about Disco Elysium and some of the trouble development that went on behind that, and they also did a massive expose on Roblox and how they're basically exploiting children. So it is a very good channel and I think it deserves to win. But it won't win because there's a VTuber in there that's absolutely going to win instead. [00:39:53] Speaker A: Yeah, cool. Any surprising trolls? Both in the list? [00:40:01] Speaker C: The list of content creators? [00:40:03] Speaker A: No, the list of everything. [00:40:05] Speaker C: Not really. It's kind of what you'd expect, really. I've got to the point with games where I'm like, yeah, there's nothing really innovative and new. There's cool games that you want to play that are kind of like, you're going to be good, but it's like, I don't feel the excitement that I used to about a big game that. [00:40:27] Speaker B: Alan Wake Two has a musical in it. [00:40:32] Speaker A: But isn't this just remedy entertainment slowly just inserting themselves of their own bottom? [00:40:38] Speaker B: Yeah, and that's why it's great. [00:40:40] Speaker C: I think once it drops in Price or comes to Game Pass, I'll definitely pick it up and play it. [00:40:45] Speaker A: Oh, it's obviously going to come to Game Pass at some point, probably. Control was one of the most popular titles last year on Game Pass. [00:40:52] Speaker C: Yeah. And Control Definitive edition is cheap in the Black Friday sale on Xbox at the moment as well. [00:40:59] Speaker A: Tempted? [00:41:01] Speaker C: Well, I didn't finish it when it was on Game Pass, so I was gutted that they took it off before I finished it. [00:41:07] Speaker A: Yeah, I think it is very much more of the same and it seems to be little innovation. [00:41:13] Speaker C: Yeah. I think the indie categories are where it's most interesting for me at least. It's highlighting some games that I've played. [00:41:18] Speaker A: That I've enjoyed is one thing I want to say as well, the best performance. It is interesting now that that's a proper category, because we have got to the stage of where Mocap is pretty much capturing proper full performances. I know Cameron Monahan from Jedi Survivor is pretty much now part of the Star Wars universe himself. I'm expecting him to turn up in a live action show at some point. [00:41:41] Speaker C: Because oh, it'll happen. [00:41:44] Speaker A: Yeah. Really, really good stuff. [00:41:45] Speaker D: Cool. [00:41:46] Speaker B: Thank you very much. [00:41:50] Speaker A: So we are slap bang in the middle of Marvel Cinematic Universe phase Five. Lee, you can cover your ears now. [00:41:59] Speaker B: I'll leave. [00:42:00] Speaker A: So we've had Antman and the wasp Quantumania. We've had Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. Three and The Marvels. And we got two more movies left after this one, which is Deadpool three. Captain America, Brave New World. And then we're into phase six. Interestingly. I think this is the worst opening weekend of any Marvel movie in the MCU to date. And I'm going to argue the point that I think it's undeserved that that's performed that badly. [00:42:30] Speaker D: Entirely agree. [00:42:31] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:42:33] Speaker A: It's a solid film. [00:42:38] Speaker D: Yeah, it was a lot of fun. I've seen some people review it quite highly. Some people review it less highly, but I've seen enough decent reviews of it that there should be people going to see it. And there were lots of scenes in there where I sort of thought, without wanting to spoil anything, if I just say the cat scene, for example, I can imagine in sort of, heyday, phase one, marvel a packed out cinema just being in absolute stitches for that entire scene. And, yeah, we went to see it. There was, like eight of us in the screen. And it was good fun, but it just didn't have the same atmosphere. And it did feel a bit sad. [00:43:24] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:43:24] Speaker A: So it's the 33rd Marvel movie, which I think is part of the reason why we're 33 movies in now. Directed by Nida DeCosta, starring Brie Larson, Tiona Paris, Iman Valini, and what's her face. The bad person can't remember her name. Well, Samuel Jackson's in it as well. And sorry, obviously not Red Runettes properly enough. Zari Ashton as Darben, the big villain of the piece, which is probably the weakest character developed in that entire bit. [00:43:58] Speaker D: Wasn'T one of the top tier Marvel villains. Definitely. [00:44:00] Speaker A: I think part of the issue is it's a continuation of the Marvel's Ms Marvel TV series. So if you've not watched that, you're probably going to be already a bit confused with what's going on. And I think Captain Marvel wasn't well received at the time it came out because it's like, oh, Captain Marvel the most powerful character in the MCU. And it's like, oh, it's got to be a female. And there was the whole backlash. And it was at the time of Game Gate, I think, as well. So it was really it was a. [00:44:31] Speaker B: Bit after that, but it was the remnants of it, I think. [00:44:33] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:44:34] Speaker C: I think there's been a touch of the Ghostbusters 2016 on this as well. The other place of like, oh, it's a female led movie. [00:44:40] Speaker A: Female directed. [00:44:42] Speaker C: Yeah. And it's like, seriously, because I'm still not suffering from Marvel fatigue. And I thought it was a perfectly entertaining movie. It was funny, where it gets ropey. It's where it's down to like, the effects aren't quite as good as they could be. A little bit of kind of narrative jumble that you kind of go, it's not quite as tight story wise as it could be. Things leap around a little bit. I think they did quite a good job of using the animation sequence to kind of fill you in on the Ms marvel story moniker's is a little bit more kind of, like, not as filled in because they don't really go into what happens. They kind of touch, know, show you what happens to her in kind of wonder vision. But I think that one is less monica's kind of role is a little less kind of focused, although she plays quite a big part in it. And I kind of like her character development through that of her kind of learning her powers. And there was a couple of lines in there that I'm just thinking, I imagine some kind of, like, misogynistic right wingers would have hated the idea of Samuel L. Jackson shouting out, yeah, use your black woman power, or whatever it. [00:45:56] Speaker A: Is that he said. [00:45:56] Speaker C: And it was like, it was fun. It was fine. I just know I like her whole. [00:46:02] Speaker A: Rejection of the superhero thing as well. It's like, she is a superhero, but she refuses to have, like, a superhero. And I was like, no, my name's Monica Rambeau, and that's what you're going to call me by. I don't need a stupid name. [00:46:12] Speaker C: Yeah, that was quite a good running gag throughout the thing, because obviously Kamala is so hyped on the idea of, like, we're all superheroes now. This is so cool. And we've all got to have superhero names. I thought that was great. I mean, she kind of powered the whole movie through. [00:46:27] Speaker D: She absolutely made it for me. Yeah, her fangirling over everything that happened, just never got tired of that at all. [00:46:36] Speaker C: And the whole kind of towards the end where you get that kind of throwback to the end of Iron Man and you just go, that's just so cool. And it feels so natural for it to be that character doing it as well, that you just go, oh, yeah, that's really cool. [00:46:49] Speaker B: It's been talked quite a lot about. [00:46:50] Speaker A: Aman Falani as the highlight of this movie, and I fully agree with that. I think it really helps that she herself has been such a fan of Marvel all the way through, and it comes across in interviews that she's so enthused and she fully enjoys being in the universe. She loves that character, she is fully invested into it, and she wants to bring out the best of it. [00:47:13] Speaker C: I think that's where Marvel needs to go now with that. It's too bogged down in its history. 33 films is a lot of history to drag with you to every new film that you're going to be going to watch. So the idea of going, we're just going to ditch all of that and go off with a bunch of new characters who are exciting and fresh and new and just go, yeah, we've done that. Let's go somewhere else. And I think that could turn Marvel's fortunes around in terms of getting away from this idea of people going to a movie, going, oh, it's the 33rd. Do I need to know I don't want to do homework for anything. [00:47:49] Speaker A: It's $275,000,000 budget, and it grossed 117, almost $118,000,000. So it's made half its money back. [00:47:59] Speaker C: But it's only in one week. You can't write off a movie on its box office takings in a deck. [00:48:04] Speaker A: Keith we went less than a week after release. We went on a Tuesday, went for the IMAX screening. There was eight people in the screening. [00:48:12] Speaker D: We were half of them. [00:48:14] Speaker A: Yeah, that's kind of quite worrying going forward. [00:48:18] Speaker C: I think over the course of its life, it won't be a flop because I really dislike that idea that the news venues were, like, two days after its release going, Marvel's, biggest flop ever. This is, like, disastrous for Marvel. [00:48:30] Speaker B: The problem is the attitude actually comes from the studios up front, because if it doesn't perform well in those opening weeks, they'll just be like, oh, well, it's terrible because, remember, the whole point of companies like Disney is that we want to make all the money now at all times. And what are DVD sales? What are streaming things? [00:48:54] Speaker A: Instant reaction to that is there's talks to bring Robert Downey Jr. Back as Iron Man and get Chris Evans back as Captain America, and that's the instant kind of, oh, we need to go back to the glory days of The Avengers because it's peaked, and that's not going to work. It's not going to work. [00:49:09] Speaker C: Yeah. Marvel need to leave that behind entirely because I did that sequence where it's alluding to a young Avengers. I'm like, that's cool. [00:49:20] Speaker A: I want to go the original plan. And I always assumed that was the original plan. It was nice to see that come through, and it was kind of like for them to go back, oh, we need to get Robert Downey Jr. Back. It's like, that is the worst possible decision you could make. It kind of debases the character to a certain extent. He had a really good character arc. Leave it as it is. [00:49:39] Speaker D: Really good character arc and a really good way to end it, as well. [00:49:42] Speaker C: He had a proper heroic send off. That story's been told. [00:49:49] Speaker B: But stories don't matter, Keith. It's profit that matters. And since we made more profit during The Avengers, we need to do that again. [00:49:57] Speaker C: But then they'll just get themselves into that kind of weird loop of trying to chase it, and it never actually. [00:50:02] Speaker B: Like, they never learn, but they keep doing it. [00:50:06] Speaker A: But this is the other thing. So, Loki has just finished. I think we're all up to date. I'm hoping we're all up to date. [00:50:12] Speaker C: I've got two episodes left to go. [00:50:14] Speaker A: But Loki not to spoil it. Great ending. Nice bow on top of it. That's it. And then we got what if? And then we've got Echo coming up, and then we've got the Agatha Darkhold Darkness series. Then we've got Iron Heart, and then we've got Daredevil born again. That's all part of this. And we've had secret invasion. I hated Secret Invasion. I don't think there's any kind of lie to that one. It was probably one of the worst Marvel series. Probably the worst Marvel series by quite a margin. [00:50:49] Speaker D: Yeah, I don't think it didn't feel like it added anything that's going to contribute much to the story. Although, technically, it added the most powerful character now in the entire MCU, which no one cares about, and it's going to be completely forgotten. But she's just wandering around, presumably, somewhere, happily having all of the powers of all of the heroes all at once. [00:51:10] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:51:10] Speaker A: And they've just completely ignored it. Where they've had flops, like Eternals was classed as a flop. They've just ignored the entire plotlines and just well, no, you can't do that if you're building this out, this cohesive universe. All right, they're moving into the multiverse now. But if your plan is always to have this cohesive universe, you can't have a giant celestial poking out the Earth and ignore it for the next ten movies. No, I'll put a throwaway reference in SheHulk that it's a holiday destination now, and that was it. [00:51:42] Speaker B: So this is where the remedy connected universe is better, just for the simple fact that the one game that they've written off, which is American Nightmare, is basically just like, oh, well, that was just like Alan imagined it or something. [00:51:54] Speaker C: It was a dream you could get. [00:51:57] Speaker B: Away with because you could just be like, oh, yeah, it was a weird thing that happened. It was a different universe. Whatever, ignore it. [00:52:04] Speaker C: But, I mean, what I liked about the Marvels was that it tried some different stuff. I kind of liked the musical planet as well, which kind of just comes from nowhere, but you just kind of go, yeah, I want to see you doing more of this kind of thing. It was fun. [00:52:21] Speaker A: And marbles hasn't been fun for a while. It's been entertaining, but it hasn't been fun. So you think about Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. Three. There are jokes in that, but that is not a fun movie to watch. That is kind of heart wrenching. In certain scenes, everything since the endgame has been pretty much a downer on the movie film. This was fun. This was allowing the characters to breathe, right? There is a serious threat, as there always has to be a threat, but was allowing them to have some breathes and some pauses and have stuff like the musical scene. [00:52:56] Speaker C: I mean, in a way, you could have written out the villain part of this story and focused on the problem they had with the power switching. And that was the dilemma they had to resolve, was how do we? Because we can't live a life where every time we use our power, we get zapped across the universe. For me, that would have been, that's all you need. How do you solve this? Maybe some other bits and pieces so that there's some reason for them to be together and resolve all of that. So the villain in this just becomes a side part that's kind of like it's an inconvenient thing that we need to deal with over here, but also it's an inconvenient thing that's been introduced to do something further down the line, because the result of her actions are setting up the next thing. So it's kind of like she needed to be there, but doesn't really do anything. And it's only the repercussions of her actions that have impact. [00:53:51] Speaker A: As you said, they could have tossed the entire villain away, and it would have had zero impact on the movie. And it was more I would need to relate this back to Captain Marvel. So we'll show a little bit of the Krul in there. Just scroll. Sorry. And the Kree empire. We'll put that in just so it's got a tie back. It wasn't needed at all. [00:54:10] Speaker C: I mean, you could have had the reasons the Skrull needed to evacuate or just some kind of natural disaster or a planet or killing. [00:54:17] Speaker A: The whole thing gone crazy. [00:54:19] Speaker C: Yeah. They could have introduced a more natural element to it of why this is happening. It could have been some kind of cosmic climate change was causing the jump gate network to break down, or the fact that their power switching was causing it. In fact, it's the kind of stuff that Star Trek would have done. It was some kind of, like, quantum flux anomaly or something, because Star Trek love and anomaly, they don't need to have villains. It's just some kind of random subspace. [00:54:47] Speaker B: I think that space is weird. [00:54:48] Speaker D: We've got to fix it. [00:54:50] Speaker A: This is the whole thing. Amanda Velardi, I think she was the one who bought the fun to it, and she made it sure that it didn't get too sodden and dumped down in everything's wrong and everything's bad, but it's the problem as well that Marvel just have this Thanos template for every single one of the MCU villains. It's got to be oh, you might agree with the cause why, but you don't agree with the methods. [00:55:14] Speaker C: I thought all the main performances were really good. I thought Brie Larson's Carol needed to lighten up a little bit because she seemed a bit dower to begin with. And I think it was nice having the three of them bounce off each other, because that whole training montage sequence with the power switching, that was one of the best. Apart from the emergency station evacuation sequence, which is just genius. We've only got one escape pod and 150 people to get in it. Yeah, got an idea. But that whole power switching thing and the double Dutch and stuff, and it was like, man, this is great. [00:55:50] Speaker A: This is really kind of cool fun. [00:55:53] Speaker C: You can feel the characters starting to become alive. [00:55:59] Speaker A: Said, I enjoyed it. And I was looking at phase six, so we've. Got Fantastic Four, which Pedro Pascal's possibly being announced. I never trust Twitter. [00:56:09] Speaker B: Really? [00:56:11] Speaker A: As I said, he's quite old to be announced as it worries me that. [00:56:14] Speaker C: He'S an older version of Know, because that kind of indicates he's going to get pulled in from an alternative universe somewhere. [00:56:24] Speaker A: Well, I think there was spoilers, massive spoilers. Now the mid credits scene with the whole X Men universe and having good old Kelsey Grammar back as Beast and Tayona Paris's character stuck in the multiverse. We've introduced the multiverse now because every film gets to a multiverse point, it's kind of going on from multiverse of madness to a certain extent, isn't it? [00:56:46] Speaker D: The multiverse stuff is the closest thing they have at the moment to the issue with Kang. [00:56:52] Speaker A: That's the problem. [00:56:52] Speaker C: I mean, I kind of like deadpool free to end up being deadpool kills the Marvel Universe. And basically it's like, I'm just going to kill everybody that is not from the cool universe, the one that's really good, that makes money. So I'm going to off Jared Leto. [00:57:07] Speaker A: Yeah. So we've got Fantastic Four. We've got Thunderbolts, which is is that going to be kind of Avengers B team as well? So we're going to have avengers. Young avengers. And the thunderbolt. [00:57:17] Speaker C: I think if they just do it based on the characters they've got and just make it, I mean, in a sense, it'll be a Marvel suicide squad. They're kind of mostly not the most heroic of characters, but that could be funny if they just make it, it's a bunch of random people who are quite unpleasant coming together to have to work together. That would be fine. Have it totally disconnected to the rest of the Marvel Universe other than they're all in it. [00:57:43] Speaker A: Yeah. And then you've got Blade, which we know is already having issues. Marsha Charlie Ali didn't like the script, so they've already had to go and rewrite that as well. And then we're into the next two Avengers movies, which is Kang Dynasty and then Secret Wars, which I believe are possibly being rewritten. [00:58:02] Speaker C: Yeah. There's a good chance that we might not get those films in the form that they'd envisioned them a year ago. [00:58:09] Speaker D: Yes. [00:58:10] Speaker C: So it could all change going down. But I think this is the other thing that is worrying about both the Marvel universe and the Star Wars universe is this total thing of like, we're going to announce the next ten films that we haven't written or made or have any idea what they're about, but we got some cool titles. [00:58:29] Speaker A: It's exactly the same problem they're having with Star Wars as well. So Tyco waititi's. Already said, like his Star Wars film's low priority. The reggae quadrant movie was already cancelled, I think. Patty Jenkins afterwards. [00:58:42] Speaker C: Kevin Feige Star Wars films. Trash. Now. Just stop announcing it and just go, there's a film. And I'll be like, I'll call, write the film. Write the film, make it. [00:58:52] Speaker A: And then market said product, put a. [00:58:54] Speaker C: Trailer out a few months before, and I'll be like, oh my God, there's a new Marvel. Fantastic. I'm down for it. [00:59:00] Speaker A: But this is the thing now. They've got so invested in keeping the core fans, the people who've been there for all 33 movies, which, okay, I'm part of that, they've ignored the rest of the audience. [00:59:15] Speaker D: I think it's a tricky balance to find because, as I say, the problem I'm having with the MCU at the moment is it doesn't feel like it's really going anywhere. With the Infinity War saga, you knew relatively early on that Thanos was sort of looming in the background. The Infinity Stones were a thing. People were coming together. It was all building towards something, whereas now it feels more like it's just kind of ambling along. I know the multiverse and Kang are kind of popping up, but it doesn't feel cohesive in the same way that it did at the beginning. [00:59:52] Speaker A: I think the other thing as well is if you think about the Infinity War saga, there wasn't the importance of having to watch the TV alongside it. [01:00:02] Speaker D: No, that's true. [01:00:03] Speaker A: You had agents of SHIEDL, and that was off to one side, and you could watch it. You don't have to watch it if you want a little bit more backstory, if you wanted more Clark, Gregg, go and watch that. The Netflix stuff completely standalone. So Daredevil, Iron Fist, all that stuff. Go and watch that if you want to. Doesn't really impact the films. All you had to do was watch film. Film, film, film, film. Now at the state of all the backstory is so enveloped into, we need to watch every single bit of content to get the full picture. [01:00:37] Speaker C: It's the definite move they've made away from the first few Marvel movies because the build up to Avengers was really nothing. There wasn't really pretty much all of those films were standalone films that would work on their own. There was the kind of tease at the end. It wasn't mainly part know. Captain America is a brilliant example of what Marvel should be doing. And it's like, here's an action packed World War II adventure story. Boom. Film done. I think they need to move away from the idea of it's all interconnected. Just have it interconnected in a way that these are all characters living the same. You know, they can be cross references. We can say, oh, I heard that Captain Marvel was doing this, or whatever, but just tell one good story in and of yourself. The TV series do that in your six episodes a film, tell one story. You could still build it together. You could still do kind of like an Avengers film where you go right in the story. There's a reason for us to pull all these characters together to deal with a problem, but we don't need to be doing that problem through the previous five films that all have to interconnect. And it just hinders your ability to tell a good story because all the writers are like, thinking, how do I make this connect? How do I relate this to everything else that's going on? And I think that's a bad thing for the films to be doing and for the creators involved, rather than just going, we've got great characters who can be involved in great stories. It's like, I would love to have more Captain Americas that are set during the Second World War or more Adventures of Carol as Captain Marvel off in. [01:02:19] Speaker A: The galaxy worth of place where they could slot stuff in for now, haven't they? [01:02:24] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:02:24] Speaker C: I mean, to a certain extent, the Guardians of the Galaxy's films did that because pretty much apart from the first one, it's mostly disconnected from the rest of the Marvel universe. It's just doing its own thing. [01:02:37] Speaker A: Thor films have done that. Yeah, where it's just been Thor's doing something he's off in space doing. [01:02:43] Speaker C: And the characters are good enough to be able to carry it by themselves. They don't need to know. The audience don't need to be like, oh, yeah, but this is building to this. You've got to watch it. You got to watch it's. Just watch it on its own merits. [01:02:54] Speaker B: As like someone obviously looking in on it. I don't know how anyone can have the energy to just keep up with it all. You know what I mean? Something like Guidance of the Galaxy does appeal to me because it's like a bunch of weirdos in space just going on goofy adventures. But it's that idea of like but in order to watch it, you need to go watch all these other things that you don't care about. And that's probably why we're seeing lower numbers because now you've got to keep up with it's, everything in order to just understand what's going on. Like you said, you can put in little nods to sort of connect the universe and have it all happen together. But I think this idea of like, you've got to do all your homework before you can go see this movie, it's a bit tedious. And with what, 33, you said 33. [01:03:39] Speaker A: Movies, plus at least ten TV series, if you count the Netflix stuff on top. That's a year's worth of viewing on its own if you didn't watch nothing else. [01:03:51] Speaker C: But I think in terms of the Marvels, I think if you're on the fence about going to see it, get off on the side, that leads you to the cinema to go and watch the Marvels. It's definitely worth going. It's not 4 hours of turgid cobblers. It's less than 2 hours of some fun, some cool characters, cute cats, samuel L. Jackson just being Samuel L. Jackson in his closest to his usual persona. Because I was thinking at some point he's going to drop a mother effort here because he's getting to that point where he's just going to do it. He's just going to do it. Because if Chris Pratt can give us the F bomb in Guardians of the Galaxy, samuel L. Jackson has got to drop. [01:04:37] Speaker B: We've got to wrap up. [01:04:38] Speaker A: But the other thing was mentioned is we haven't really discussed about is having the family dynamic in there as well and having Marvel's family coming into the film. I love her parents, the overbearing mother. Being in there is the best thing about it. [01:04:52] Speaker C: Brother as well. He's like, I love as well. [01:04:55] Speaker D: There's absolutely no reason for them to be brought onto the space station. They're just there for fun. [01:05:00] Speaker A: Absolutely no reason at all. And then you've got the dad, who's an accountant with this guy, and explained to him how to set up a Roth IRA and it's one of the best scenes in the movie. And it's like, and how old are you? And this guy looks like 20, and he's like, I'm 375. [01:05:14] Speaker C: Stuff like that exactly why it's worth watching, because it just goes, who cares about the serious stuff? Here's some fun with some characters you can relate to. [01:05:24] Speaker A: Yeah. And that is good. Yeah, it's just fun. As I said, it's less than 2 hours, which is weird for a Marvel movie nowadays. We're all expecting them to be at least two and a half hours long. So it's nice to just have something where you can just sit down, watch it and kind of just breathe for a little while. It all goes dark and moody again. [01:05:44] Speaker C: You genuinely smile and smirk and laugh at points in this movie. You kind of go, that's cool. I like, it. [01:05:57] Speaker A: Is time for wow. One geek thing. What have you up to since we all were last in Lee? Let's go with you. I think your T shirt probably tells us what your one geek thing might be. [01:06:08] Speaker B: Maybe. So I went to the because I wasn't on the last show, which I probably would have talked about it then, but I went to the Sonic Symphony World Tour opening date in London. In fact, the day that I went was when I was last on the show was the exact day I went from recording this to that concert. And yeah, so basically, it is a big symphony orchestra. This was at the barbican and they were playing music from Sonic the Hedgehog. So it was split into two halves, the show. So you had the first half was just orchestral stuff. It was taking instrumental music from across the series and just doing sort of getting an orchestra to perform it. So you had medleys of the original sort of mega drive games, because obviously those individual pieces are quite short, so they smushed them all together into a big medley to make it an actual symphonic piece. There was like a Chow Garden medley at one point, which was bizarre. I did not expect them to do that. I think they did like, a few things from Sonic Collars, a few things from Unleashed and things like that. So that was like The First Half and The Second Half, they Brought On A Rock Band in Addition To The Orchestra, and they Performed A Lot Of The Vocal Themes from Across The Series, because Inexplicably Sonic has for years had just butt Rock theme Tunes that Just are There All The Time, and this Specific date as well. They actually brought out the original composers to some of the stuff, so they had Junson Iowa, who did a lot of the Crush 40, a lot of that was rock themes, but he's done a few things within the series here and there in addition to that. But they also brought out Tamaya Artani, who does a lot of the music these days. I think he's like largely the lead composer for a lot of the Sonic projects and it was a lot of fun. They did a really good job with the sort of background screen and they were putting like little clips of the games to go along with it, but they sort of timed things in there to the music and they put little very clear in jokes and things. So, like, during the Sonic One medley, they were shown Labyrinth Zone, and there was a whole montage of deaths during the Labyrinth Zone, because anyone who's played the original Sonic and played through the Labyrinth Zone remembers just dying a million times in it. So everyone you could hear the crowd just chuckling at that because it was like, yeah, that's relatable. And then the second half was like, obviously the vocal themes, so everyone's like singing along. And I think the last three songs the singer was like, everyone needs to be on their feet, everyone needs to get up and sing along and sort of dance around to all this because obviously they ended on Live and Learn, which is like the big thing from Sonic Adventure Two. It's sort of like considered like the theme of the series these days. So that was kind of what ended it. But it's just a really fun time. First time I've ever been to a video game concert of any kind. I did consider going to the Final Fantasy concert. That was on my birthday in Birmingham, and I was like, Nah, I don't know if I want to go to that. And then regretted it. So that's why I went. [01:09:32] Speaker C: You're just going to go to all of them now? Yeah, you're going to be hooked. [01:09:34] Speaker B: There's a last of us. One at the Albert Hall next year. It's in May. And I'm like, I kind of need to go because I love the last of us. [01:09:40] Speaker C: Just do it. [01:09:41] Speaker A: So do I. Think it's part of the BBC proms. They usually have at least one video game evening. [01:09:46] Speaker B: They did it once and never again. I don't know why. [01:09:51] Speaker A: That was really popular I think. [01:09:53] Speaker B: Yeah. Last year they did one and then for some reason this year, they just didn't bother. [01:09:57] Speaker C: Yeah, they kind of put it in and out with the kind of phil one. So there's like, usually like a more popularist one. So the game one they did, it was okay. I think the curation of the music. [01:10:11] Speaker B: They had some weird choices. There was definitely like some weird I think there was one they did like a medley of something from, like, the Commodore 64 and I think you could kind of feel the crowd being like, Why is it? [01:10:25] Speaker C: But I think it's one of those things that's just going to become more and more popular as popular culture embraces it. [01:10:30] Speaker B: The BBC does cover a lot of video game music through its output. I think BBC Three does have a show dedicated to video game music, I. [01:10:40] Speaker A: Think classic FM style. [01:10:43] Speaker B: But, yeah, it was definitely a fun experience just to get to hear this music performed by an orchestra. [01:10:51] Speaker A: Was there any veiled references to Michael Jackson? [01:10:54] Speaker B: No, not at all. [01:10:57] Speaker A: Surprising that, because as soon as anybody mentions Sonic music well, the thing, incidentally. [01:11:02] Speaker B: The Michael Jackson reference thing with Sonic Three, which obviously is where we've got that. I think there's weird issues around the Sonic Three soundtrack as a result of all this, and I think they just don't touch on it at all. I know there's a bit of controversy around Sonic origins, changing the soundtrack a. [01:11:17] Speaker C: Bit. [01:11:20] Speaker A: Which is surprising because it's one of the better. [01:11:23] Speaker B: But the only sort of reference to that sort of Sonic Three was the Sky Sanctuary theme from Sonic and Knuckles, which Sonic and Knuckles is the side of it that's very much not mired in the Michael Jackson stuff. They kind of perform that a bit more often than they do anything from the bass. Sonic Three. Yeah, it was a good time. [01:11:45] Speaker D: Yeah. [01:11:45] Speaker A: I mean, as I said, video game music is often overlooked, but it's probably where a lot of composers probably make. [01:11:51] Speaker B: Their bread and butter nowadays. [01:11:52] Speaker A: If it's not on TV, it's in gaming. [01:11:55] Speaker B: And the thing with the Sonic series as well, is it's a series that's been had its highlights and low lights? Yes, it's been very inconsistent quality. But one thing that is consistent is the music. [01:12:07] Speaker C: It's always good, it's memorable. That's the thing. Even the most it's something that you would place somebody and they'd go, I kind of recognise that, and would probably be able to place it. Yeah. [01:12:18] Speaker B: Green Hill Zone, especially, is one of the most iconic bits of video game music. So it's sort of up there with, like, the Mario theme and things like that. [01:12:25] Speaker A: Did they play the Love theme where Sonic gets his kiss? [01:12:30] Speaker B: They did play his world from Sonic Six, but that's not the romantic thing. [01:12:35] Speaker A: That's cool. Awesome. But, yeah, I think if there are events like that, go out and enjoy it. Yeah, cool. Sam, how about yourself? [01:12:45] Speaker D: So slightly late. I probably would have talked about this last time as well if we weren't doing a Halloween one. But last month it was the 100 year anniversary of Walt Disney Studios, sort of. So the date they've chosen for their 100 year anniversary is the anniversary of some technical legal theme where they signed a contract where they were being commissioned to make regular cartoons. So it's a slightly OD thing that that's, by the way, but as part. [01:13:22] Speaker B: One of those things that they sort of technically existed before then. [01:13:25] Speaker D: Yeah, and they didn't really yeah, they existed before then, and they didn't actually start putting films out and the stuff that people really know them for, for a little while after that as well. But they took it as an excuse to do a range of sort of celebratory things. And one of the things they did was released a short film on Disney Plus called Once Upon a Studio. And it's a really lovely thing for anyone who's, like me, a big fan of the animated output of Walt Disney. It's basically the concept is one of the animation studios closes up for the day and just as the last of the animators leaves, it's got pictures and images from all the different Disney films sort of lining the halls. They all come to life, all the characters jump out and they're basically meeting up to do a big group photo to celebrate the 100 year anniversary. And it's really cleverly done because literally there's at least one character from every Disney film ever, plus a lot of the shorts and some really kind of deep cut, weird little interesting characters wandering around. [01:14:50] Speaker B: So is there a character from Make Mind Music? [01:14:53] Speaker D: Yes, even the really early yeah, those kind of package films. There's a few like that. [01:15:02] Speaker A: The great mouse detective. [01:15:03] Speaker D: Yeah, there are characters from that. But the clever thing about it is it's obviously all different animation styles, all superimposed onto real live footage of the actual animation studio where it's filmed, all interacting in a really believable way. Like there's CGI stuff and 2D stuff happily interacting together. They have a lot of fun with the way the different characters would interact if they met each other. So there's like a big tea party with Merlin from Sword and the Stone and the March Hare and Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland drinking tea from Mrs. Potts from Beauty and the Beast and that sort of thing. And then the photo at the end, which you can look up online as well. Got it open on my phone here. So it is literally several characters from all the films. But again, though, a lot of the kind of interaction between them is quite clever. So, for example, there's a really, really early Disney short called The Flowers and the Trees. It's got a couple of the trees in there. One of them has a paper aeroplane stuck in the branches, which has obviously been thrown by the guy from Paperman, which is one of the more recent and better shorts that they've done, who's stood right next to them. You've got Peter Pan riding on Pete's Dragon, which I thought was quite a nice touch. And the rescuers. So there's two rescuers films in each. One, the mice rescuing a child, one in America and one in Australia. You've got the two children, each holding one of the mice and just sort of looking at each other. The other lovely thing about the film is they used archive footage and recordings of some of the actors and casts that obviously are no longer with us. So, for example, there's a bit where the genie comes out and it's Robin Williams'voice saying words that were recorded for his performance as the genie, but never used in the films. And then other characters as well, where the cast are still alive. Even if they've only got one or two lines, they've been brought in to do this. So, yeah, just really it's only about 1015 minutes long, but so much attention to detail and care and thought has gone into it and things like, oh, yeah. The other bit I like is as they're all sort of coming together, there's a bit where Mickey Mouse sees Oswald the lucky rabbit, walk past. [01:18:21] Speaker B: I remember I picked Mickey, too, but. [01:18:24] Speaker D: He steps back and goes, oh, after you, sir, and shows him a bit of respect as the one that came before him. So, yeah, it's very short, easy to watch on Disney Plus. And if you have any love of the Disney films, I'd heartily recommend it. [01:18:42] Speaker A: Probably slightly airbrushed history. Yeah, it's celebrating the art, not the art. [01:18:50] Speaker D: Exactly. [01:18:51] Speaker C: It's a great example of regardless of what you think of Disney as a company, it's the impact of those characters on literally every person on this planet has some Disney character that they either adore or associate with. And this is a brilliant way of just going, this is the history, these are the characters that we've created. And everybody in that whole film, there's ones that you just go, I'm so glad that's there or you just go. [01:19:21] Speaker A: There'S something for everyone. [01:19:22] Speaker C: Yeah. It just shows how much that Disney legacy has actually had an impact on popular culture entirely. [01:19:30] Speaker D: Yeah. I think the closest it comes to perhaps the murkier stuff is there is a bit where Mickey Mouse does sort of look at a photo of Walt Disney and just has a little kind of sentimental, sort of thank you kind of thing. But it's done in a very sweet way. Regardless of what you think about Disney himself, like you say, he did create this thing that has impacted lots of people. It would be difficult not to have some reference to him in there. But then, as well as a big portrait of Walt Disney, they've also got portraits of all the animators and the people who actually put a lot of the work into it. So, yeah, it's done well, awesome. Thank you. [01:20:15] Speaker A: Worth checking out. How about yourself? [01:20:19] Speaker C: Well, I'm going to focus on something I've not watched yet, but I am looking forward to. It's a new show on Apple TV Plus, and it's Monarch Legacy of Monsters, which is a TV show based around the legendary pictures versions of Godzilla and King Kong, which also happens to feature some of my favorite actors as well. Kurt Russell happens to be the lead, which is quite interesting because it's set in various time periods. So it goes back to some of the stuff that was happening in School Island. We get some flashbacks to John Goodman and his visit to School Island, but also Kurt Russell's son Wyatt, who you might also remember being John Walker in Captain America and the Winter Soldier plays the younger Kurt Russell in a bit. [01:21:21] Speaker A: Of strong bit of cast. [01:21:23] Speaker D: It's brilliant. [01:21:24] Speaker C: So this is kind of like the first time, really, we've had anything like this where I'm getting loads of Godzilla. And so I'm kind of looking forward to this because we've got toho doing Godzilla minus one, which is kind of. [01:21:41] Speaker A: A follow on to Shin. Or is it? [01:21:44] Speaker C: It's not really a follow up as such because it's set in the past. So it's more going back towards the kind of origin stories of the original Godzilla. So it's a different version of the character. So it's not the same. So the one in Shin was massive. This one's a bit smaller and it's set in a different time period. But I'm quite happy that this legendary series is kind of doubling down, and I'm hoping that it will give us more of the monsters than we've had in the films to date, which has always been my kind of bugbear with the previous films, apart from King of the Monsters, which doubled down and just went, yeah, we're just giving you all the monsters all the time. Which is my favorite one of the series so far. But Apple are releasing it on a weekly basis. So there's none of that naughty binge watching stuff. You're going to have to wait. [01:22:35] Speaker B: Well, I mean, you can wait and just binge watch it when it's all out. [01:22:37] Speaker C: Yeah, you're going to have to wait and then people haven't got that self control. So I'm just hoping we get more Godzilla, more King Kong. I would like to see them pull back some of the other characters as well. And I'd like to see less of the MUTOs, which aren't as interesting character designs as the kind of original Toho stuff. So I'd like them to bring in more of the Toho monsters because there's loads that they haven't touched on yet. I kind of want to see how the time flipping stuff goes and what they do with kind of what happened in Godzilla versus Kong and whether it will lead into whatever the next one's called the Godzilla versus Somebody versus Somebody, whatever it is. But I'm kind of excited. I just want more like I want more monster movies. We've not really had as many kind of Pacific Rim kind of died a death after the second one. [01:23:34] Speaker A: So don't get rid of the main person. [01:23:38] Speaker C: This legendary series has been pretty I've quite enjoyed most of the movies. [01:23:43] Speaker B: I do want to state because I double checked. I don't know Wyatt Russell from the Marvel thing that you mentioned. I know from black mirror. [01:23:50] Speaker C: Okay. [01:23:51] Speaker B: Because he was in that one. [01:23:52] Speaker C: Yeah, but I mean, that's just a bit of genius casting that you cast your son as Hugh. [01:23:57] Speaker B: Well, they did the same thing. Was it straight out of Compton where they got Ice Cube's? Son played ice cube. So it looks quite good because you. [01:24:05] Speaker C: Could take Wyatt as a younger Kurt. And I kind of like Kurt Russell because he's just a dude. And I watch movies where he's, you know and I've enjoyed both of Goldie Horn is Mrs. Claus. So there's a whole he likes to keep it in the families as Kurt. But yeah, I'm just kind of really psyched because I've heard a lot of good things about it. That it's actually a good series, solid series that builds on what's been going on in the films and that it's not cutting corners because it's a TV show by kind of like it's all humans wandering around and occasionally you might see Godzilla's tail or whatever it is. [01:24:45] Speaker A: We are Godzilla cinematic universe together. Would you say, Chris? Would you? [01:24:51] Speaker C: Yes. Yeah. [01:24:53] Speaker D: They have been for a while. [01:24:54] Speaker C: There haven't been kind of since Kong. [01:24:57] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:24:58] Speaker A: Well, Skull Island wasn't. [01:25:00] Speaker D: Yeah. [01:25:00] Speaker C: Yeah. Skull island and the kind of. [01:25:04] Speaker B: King. [01:25:05] Speaker C: Of the Monsters kind of was like. [01:25:07] Speaker B: While we're on the subject, I do think it's a travesty that Skull Island rise of Kong. [01:25:10] Speaker C: Didn't get it. [01:25:11] Speaker B: Nominated the game for Worst Game because that was terrible. [01:25:17] Speaker A: Still got my favorite thing ever is the guy the VTuber was streaming it and he got to this cutscene where they didn't put the cutscene in. There was just somebody holding a photograph and that's the actual placehold they left it. Is somebody just going like this? [01:25:31] Speaker C: But it's another kind of example of how Apple TV are very good at doing quality shows because when it was first announced, I didn't realize what they. [01:25:41] Speaker B: Should do is consider putting it on making channels that people can see. [01:25:45] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:25:46] Speaker A: I mean, I'm still not forgiving them for ruining foundation. [01:25:51] Speaker C: But I mean, we've also had the fourth series of For All Mankind which. [01:25:56] Speaker B: Is a great, great show that I know I really want to see that Tetris movie which is a phrase that at the start of the year, I never thought I'd say, but here we are. [01:26:06] Speaker C: You say Elsa Johnson. Johnson. It's a good movie in itself, but. [01:26:13] Speaker B: They did what grant well, they did what Gran Turismo did but did it back, which is we didn't adapt the game. We adapted the thing around the game. [01:26:21] Speaker C: Yeah. And did it quite interestingly. But so I haven't seen it yet. So I'm kind of not able to the first two episodes dropped this week and then it's going on a weekly Wednesday schedule. But I'm kind of excited. I've got to carve time out to watch this and the other show that I could have mentioned, which I also haven't watched, which is the Scott Pilgrim Takes Off show. So I'm kind of like fully serviced for kind of like fanboy kind of explosion that I'm just going to be like, oh, my god, it's Godzilla and Scott Pilgrim. It's like what I need now is a Scott Pilgrim versus Godzilla movie. Because that could happen. [01:27:01] Speaker A: You think they would have done that at some point during the Scott Pilgrim as had just like a full on monster episode. [01:27:07] Speaker C: Yeah, they could do that. It's like, this will work. [01:27:10] Speaker B: I mean, the game has you fighting like the Nagy twins is like in a giant mech. [01:27:17] Speaker A: Why don't they just put Scott Pilgrim well, why don't they put Sex Bomb on in a giant mech like Power Rangers and have them fight in Godzilla? [01:27:24] Speaker C: I'm quite happy for it to be a comic as well because Godzilla has done a few crossover comics recently which have been pretty good. He's currently in one, which is Justice League versus Godzilla versus Kong, which sounds ridiculous, but I think we've had one issue so far and we're about to get the second. And it's utter nonsense, but at least they have some kind of sense of how it all happens. So I'd be quite happy for Brian Leo Malley to do a Godzilla versus Scott Pilgrim comic. I'd be all over that like a rash. It'd be terrible. Yeah. So if you have got access to Apple TV or you've got one of the ways of getting one of the three, like you said, you'll probably have to wait till all of the episodes are out. But if you can get one of these, like, free month week free trial, yeah, just binge. Not that I advocate binging, but it's Godzilla, so I'll let you off. So you have to watch Godzilla. Well, it's not Godzilla. It's monarch legacy of monsters. So yeah, on Apple TV right now. [01:28:26] Speaker A: Cool. [01:28:27] Speaker C: And yourself? Ryan? [01:28:29] Speaker A: I'm going to steal another TV show because something's came back recently which I. [01:28:33] Speaker B: Really, really enjoyed the first series of. [01:28:35] Speaker A: And it's a Robert Kirkman franchise, which isn't Walking Dead related, which has now spun off into its own kind of death spiral of spin off shows. Now, isn't it like walking dead? Daryl walking Dead, the dog from episode one is going to be back in. [01:28:50] Speaker B: There have been two Walking Dead games this year. [01:28:53] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:28:54] Speaker B: No one's paid any attention to there. [01:28:56] Speaker D: Are enough Walking dead cast in what I think you're talking about, that you. [01:29:00] Speaker B: Can almost say because the main character. [01:29:03] Speaker A: Is from Walking Dead, which is Steven Yin, which is Invincible. Season two is back on, which is pretty much the antithesis of Disney animation, probably. [01:29:11] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:29:13] Speaker A: So Invincible is back, if you've not heard of it. It is a very gory pastiche of the superhero genre. [01:29:21] Speaker C: I wouldn't say it was pastiche. Yeah, it's just that kind of 90s superhero thing where it's like we're all grim and gritty and everybody has to die, basically. [01:29:32] Speaker A: So if you've not watched it, go and watch it. And I'll put spoilers in now. So, like, the first episode starts off with one of the characters killing the rest of their version of the Justice League, that's episode one. So it's like you spend the entire episode going, oh, I really like these characters. I'm going to look forward to seeing them in the future. No, they are dead by the end of it. And Omni Man, played by J. K. Simmons, who to just get all the voice acting roles when you have a big grumpy old guy, kills them all and then it's his son. And it's the whole the series one is how he deals with that relationship about that all coming out and that all gets investigated. And then it ends with him and his dad having a big old fisty fight and his dad zooming off to go and get the rest of his grumpy mates at season two is basically him dealing with the aftermath of that. So there's a new superhero group made out of kids and the Immortal the Immortal gets beaten on quite a lot in this show for no apparent reason. He's just like the punching bag. He ends one of the episodes in season one as a head, but his character is the Immortal, so he always keeps coming back, basically. But it's quite hilarious that he always gets beaten down for no reason, even being yeah, it's such a fantastic cast. Mention stephen Yuen, J. K. Simmons, Sandra O's. Easy beats. Walton Goggins. Jillian Jacobs. Jason Mantukis. Zachary Quinto. Fred Tetescuri. Mark Hamill. Clancy Brown appears quite a lot. So there's pretty much some voice casting royalty in there. [01:31:03] Speaker D: They have John Hamm as a brief cameo. Very brief, because why not? And the new series also has what's his face, his name's gone, but optimus. [01:31:21] Speaker C: Peter Cullen. [01:31:22] Speaker D: Thank you. Yes. Peter Cullen. [01:31:24] Speaker A: And the guy who I can never remember his name of from this Is US is in it as well. [01:31:31] Speaker C: Milo? [01:31:34] Speaker A: No, not him. One of the sons. [01:31:37] Speaker C: Oh, you mean Green Arrow. Justin hall. Yes. Just in something. Yes, him. His green arrow. [01:31:44] Speaker A: Yes. [01:31:46] Speaker C: Did you watch the atom? Eve special that came out? [01:31:49] Speaker B: I really enjoyed that. [01:31:49] Speaker A: I'd actually quite like them to do one of those between each one of the series, like introduce the other characters because they have a fantastic cast list. I appreciate it's a superhero thing, but I think you would enjoy it because most of the footage is just superheroes being ripped apart and killed. [01:32:04] Speaker C: Next year we are getting the Atom Eve video game. Yes. [01:32:08] Speaker B: Right. [01:32:08] Speaker C: So you could play the video game version. [01:32:10] Speaker B: I mean, to be fair, omni man is also in Mortal Kombat One And. [01:32:14] Speaker A: They'Re coming to Fortnite, I believe. [01:32:16] Speaker B: Probably. [01:32:17] Speaker A: They're doing Invincible crossover, which is kind of like Fortnite's for kids. This isn't really the characters you want to be introducing. [01:32:22] Speaker B: I know. John Wiggs also in Fortnite. [01:32:26] Speaker C: I think there's no rules in Fortnite. [01:32:28] Speaker B: Alan wakes in fortnite. [01:32:29] Speaker A: Yeah, but could you imagine, like, Omni Man just comes and starts ripping mean? [01:32:33] Speaker C: Don't forget, in Fortnite you had the Emperor has. [01:32:39] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:32:40] Speaker C: All bets are off. [01:32:42] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:32:42] Speaker B: Basically. [01:32:42] Speaker A: So it's the outcome of what happened in season one. You're the son of the most powerful superhero on the Earth, and basically you're the insurance one about him going crazy. Anyway, that's the only reason he exists. [01:32:53] Speaker C: And you failed to mention your favorite actor that has a voice over in it as well. Seth Rogen. [01:32:58] Speaker D: Yes. [01:33:00] Speaker A: He even does the laugh during it. [01:33:03] Speaker C: He doesn't even attempt to be anything other than Seth Rogen. It's so funny. [01:33:07] Speaker A: I'm surprised he just doesn't light up a spliff halfway through. [01:33:11] Speaker C: You read the comic and you go, that is not the voice I heard in this character. [01:33:15] Speaker A: At yeah. I mean, it's a fantastic cast. I mean, Robert Kirkman's been heavily involved in it. You can tell that as well. But it's taken a completely different parallel to the comics. [01:33:25] Speaker C: It's not a straight adaptation of the. [01:33:28] Speaker A: Which I enjoy sometimes because sometimes that's what you want. Sometimes you want some variety. And I know some people get really annoyed when comics get transformed. It doesn't stick to the whole mythos. But I think if you're getting someone like Robert Kirkman involved and he's kind of well, I wrote the comic, so I can do what I want with it. [01:33:45] Speaker C: I think it's good to do it that way and not just be a straight adaptation to actually take the premise and make it interesting and different. The same with the boys. There's another example of, like, I detest the comics, yet I thought the TV show was great. [01:34:01] Speaker A: Genji has just finished well, which I'm also watching. So I've got two shows about superheroes and very bloody and gory kind of horrible things happen. The first episode of Gen V is sets the scene. [01:34:17] Speaker D: It does. But episode I want to say three or four, there's something that it's stuck with me for a while. If you watch the last series of. [01:34:28] Speaker A: The boys, I think they've surpassed that with the whole superhero orgy episode. That was bad enough. [01:34:34] Speaker D: That was pretty bad. Yeah. The particular scene I'm thinking of from Gen V, I don't want to spoil anything, but if I say as a man, it made me rather squeamish, and I will leave it at that. [01:34:51] Speaker A: Yeah, there's things in that that stay with you for a while. But it's nice to see people playing with the superhero genre to a certain extent. And I know The Boys is quite old as a comic book itself. [01:35:05] Speaker C: Invincible is quite an old series as. [01:35:07] Speaker A: Well, but very two very different ways of doing exactly the same thing, of what if actual superheroes were what normal people would be like. Yeah, there's a whole again, massive spoilers. There's a whole bit in season one where Omni Man goes about, yeah, I'm married. I have a wife, but she's like a dog to me. It's like having a pet. And it's like, I love for her, but I love for her in the same way that I'd love having a cat. And you're like, wow. [01:35:35] Speaker D: Yes. [01:35:36] Speaker A: But that's exactly what happens in The Boys and Gen V of if you're a superhero, you don't really have any kind of reality around life for normal people. [01:35:46] Speaker D: It's just they are Fodder and Homelander and The Boys is basically what if Donald Trump had what was Superman, which is a horrific concept. But, yeah, like you say, it's subversive, but somehow more realistic in a way. It's how people would behave if you randomly gave people superpowers. [01:36:10] Speaker C: What's nice about the Invincible show as well is animated. But it's animated, it's bright, it's not all dark, and kind of like they've. [01:36:20] Speaker A: Taken Marvel color and just made it adult. [01:36:26] Speaker D: Lots of red, but they've stuck with. [01:36:30] Speaker A: Like, traditional design superhero costumes. There's a whole episode where it's like, there's a guy where they make Invincible suit, which is one of my favorite scenes in season one. And it's like, I'm just trying to pass off some old designs that nobody else wanted. [01:36:43] Speaker B: It's like, you sure you don't want this one? [01:36:45] Speaker A: And then that suit turns up in this season as well. [01:36:49] Speaker D: There's a lovely bit as well in the Atom Eve special where Omni Man shows up and he's obviously like, they mentioned that he's just changed his costume, and he's like, oh, yeah, apparently everyone's walking around with the first letter of their name on their chest now, and the immortal looks down. Oh, is that what that is? [01:37:09] Speaker C: I like as well the fact that Amazon are eking it out as well, that it's like an episode every week rather than dropping it all at once. So I do like that model of releasing a show. Make us wait for it. [01:37:22] Speaker A: It's fun sometimes to have that. It's fun to decompress and think about something afterwards, because that's the problem with binge watching it's like, next episode, next episode, next episode, next episode. So I did that because they've just dropped Bleach for the Thousand Year War on Disney, the season two, and I watched it all in one day. So Bleach, it was a very popular anime, early to mid 2000s, which really worth going and watching if you've not seen it. But this was kind of like they got to the stage where they'd run out of comics to make well, they run out of manga to continue the series because Kubo Toto was writing at the same time. So the studio went like, yeah, we've done like three filler seasons, we're just going to stop making it now. So now 20 years later, they finally got to the stage of, well, we're going to go and remake going to go and continue the series. So it's really good. If you enjoyed Bleach, it's one of the big five shodans at the time it was Bleach one piece naruto Dragon Ball and I can never remember the other one. But they were like the big series back in those days. But yeah, if you like Shodan, go and watch that as well. [01:38:30] Speaker C: Yeah. I recommend if you can pick up the Invincible omnibuses. The comic's really good and shows the versatility of Kirkman as a writer as well because he has done some other stuff that I've quite liked. He's done one with dinosaurs in which I quite liked going for the old. [01:38:48] Speaker A: Kids favorites, isn't it? Zombies, superheroes, dinosaurs. [01:38:52] Speaker C: Dinosaurs, werewolves. It's like, yeah, he's all the cowboys that I like. [01:38:55] Speaker A: Cowboys. [01:38:56] Speaker C: I'm trying to think, has he done something with cowboys? In probably has. But yeah, the comic Comic Convincible is worth reading and it won't really spoil the TV show. No. [01:39:06] Speaker A: It's kind of really diverged off. [01:39:07] Speaker C: There's themes that are similar, but it's not the same story as such. [01:39:12] Speaker A: But yeah. Recommended both on Amazon Prime at the minute. [01:39:18] Speaker C: Thank you for joining us on the Geek Rum Show. [01:39:19] Speaker A: This is Lee. Where can we find you online? [01:39:22] Speaker B: You can find me on YouTube at Pubper Pet Ferret, and you can find me doing freelance writing work mostly with Silicon era around the internet. You can also find me on Twitter at the Jeep Ferret and on Geeky bromie, usually on Fridays doing a gaming roundup. [01:39:42] Speaker A: Awesome. Thank about yourself. [01:39:45] Speaker D: I'm on Twitter at Dragonsam 89 and on Instagram at SD. Edwards 89. [01:39:51] Speaker C: Keith. You can find me on Twitter. Blue sky threads. Instagram hardlock hotel. Just add the underscore between Hardlook and hotel on Twitter. But otherwise it's every Wednesday on the Geeky premiere website with my Comics of the weeks and the Geeky for me Twitter handle on Wednesdays with all the other books that I recommend you check out. [01:40:15] Speaker A: And you can find me at Ryan Parrish at Random things on the Internet. I ain't going to go for the fullest, but you can find us all at Geeky brummy on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Blue Sky at some point when I'm not lazy enough to finish setting that up. [email protected] as I said, game roundup and comics roundup every week. And YouTube, which Keith started doing the comic of the week on as well. [01:40:40] Speaker C: Attempting a YouTube short every week, folks. Yeah. [01:40:43] Speaker A: But it's a fantastic way to get your comic pick and fill up your long books. But, yeah, wherever you get your podcast, I reach out. You either listening or watching this on. But, yeah, thanks very much for joining us, and we'll see you again soon. But for now, bye, everybody. Bye.