Podcast appearances and mentions of mike why

Today we're checking out a couple of Jessika's latest estate sale finds: Superboy 109 & 110. Are these swingin' sixties stories about the Boy of Steel any good? Well, no. Not really. But they certainly gave us something to talk about! ----more---- Episode 13 Transcript Jessika: [00:00:00] Dude. It's always fucking Florida, Mike: I can't think of anything that comes out of Florida that's good. Jessika: Hello. Welcome to Ten Cent Takes, the podcast where we traverse tumultuous time continuities, one issue at a time. My name is Jessika Frazier and I am joined by my cohost, the dastardly dog dad, Mike Thompson.  Mike: That's a fair description.  Jessika: That was a segue. We need to talk about your newest acquisition.  Mike: What, Mo?  Jessika: No. We've talked about Mo. What was your newest acquisition in relation to the squad?  Mike: Oh, right. We bought a dog wagon over the weekend.  Jessika: Yeah, you did! Mike: And then, uh, already busted it out and taking them all over the neighborhood [00:01:00] and to the beach. I think it was proven to be a wise investment when this neighbor who we'd never seen before stopped his car in the middle of the road and yelled at us about how cute he thought it was. He was like, “that's the cutest thing I've ever seen!” He was this big old dude. I'm like, alright, I'm on board with this. All right. Success.  Jessika: Amazing.  Mike: It was very wholesome.  Jessika: Well, I think Mike'll have to post at least one or two pictures of the dogs  in this week's transcript. Mike: Yeah, no, we  can absolutely post photos of the dogs in this episode's transcript.  Jessika: Yes. Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: Well, the purpose of this podcast is to study comic books in ways that are both fun and informative. We want to look at their coolest, weirdest and silliest moments, as well as examine how they're woven into the larger fabric of pop culture and history. Today we'll be discussing the boy of steel, Superboy. While there are many variations of this character, we are going to be focusing on the OG [00:02:00] comics from 1944 to 69 as the ones that we talk about, but we will also just briefly touch upon the other comics, TV shows, and movies sporting the same character, as well as touch upon the absolute nightmare that is the timeline continuity, or lack thereof, that is Superman's life story. But before we do that, what is one cool thing that you've read or watched lately?  Mike: Sarah and I have been watching a show called Motherland: Fort Salem. Have you heard of this?  Jessika: I have, I was interested. Should I start it?  Mike: Yeah, we really dig it. It's on FreeForm, but it's streaming on Hulu. It takes place in this world where the United States stopped hunting witches 300 years ago and there was something called the Salem Accords signed. So now we have a world that's dominated by the USA and witches make up, as far as I can tell, the entirety of its armed forces. Jessika: [00:03:00] Oh, snap.  Mike: It's really cool. And the whole thing is magic is based on sound and resonance. And it's really a unique spin on things, but the show follows these three young witches who are recruited into the army and then start navigating their way through it. And the larger society, that's a part of the military and it's very comic book-y in terms of its plotting and character development and then the meta narrative as well. It's really cool. And it's really diverse in terms of casting. The storylines are really thoughtful in a lot of ways, and it's very queer. Like, extremely queer.  Jessika: Yes.  Mike: And the shows in the middle of its second season. And it's gotten much better. Like, I mean, it was already, it was already very good, but it feels like the second season, they really got the kick things up and they've really upped the creep factor. There's a whole thing about witch hunters re-emerging in kind of striking back at witches and riling up public sentiment. It feels very topical. [00:04:00] And then the whole thing is that because which is get their powers from the sound of their voice, what these witch hunters are doing is they're actually like cutting out witches' voice boxes and then weaponizing them. It's really cool and really creepy. And I really like it. Jessika: Oh, damn. That is like horrific. And like wow, that's an interesting concept.  Mike: Yeah. Sarah and I have been really, really enjoying it. And it's definitely something that we put on when the kids aren't around obviously, but,  Jessika: Oh, yeah.  Mike: but it's really solid. So yeah, not a comic book this time. But certainly something that I think a lot of comic book fans would enjoy.  How about you? Jessika: Well, once again, Lauren from Outer Planes in Santa Rosa comes through on the recommendations. Because she suggested the Image series, Man Eaters: The Cursed.  Mike: Hm.  Jessika: It's so fun. It starts off with 15 year old Maude being forced to go to summer camps. So her parents can go on this romantic vacation by themselves without her.  Mike: [00:05:00] Relatable.  Relatable, mom and dad.  Jessika: Absolutely. Well, and it's so funny because they put these fun little, like. It's almost like little artifacts in there , for you. So they have the registration card where they're registering her. And so it's like, will you be on vacation while your child is at camp? And it's like, YES. Like it literally asked that as a question like it's expected.  Mike: Good.  Jessika: It's pretty funny. Another thing I found that's really funny is they have the campers have these buttons. They're like warning buttons for insurance purposes. And they say things like sleepwalker or lice, or like Gemini. Which like big Gemini myself, like absolutely issue some warnings.  Mike: I love it. Jessika: And I love that there is one male character so far in this, and he's the least prepared for everything and Maude totally [00:06:00] roasts him a couple of times.  Mike: Again, relatable. Because the one who does all the home repairs around here, it ain't me. Jessika: Oh my gosh. So yeah, no, I added that to my pull list.  Mike: Yeah, that sounds great. Jessika: All right. Well, welcome to another episode of Jessika's estate sale fines. This week we'll be looking at Superboy, the comics, and I'm going to run us through the timeline of the comics as they came out, along with the TV shows and movies that were associated with those. So a lot of this is going to be like informational about when the comic came about and the character, Superboy  as Kal-El Mike: I'm super excited.  Jessika: there was a lot to it. And actually there was a  lot of different weirded consistencies that we're definitely gonna get into. As I've already hinted at that, I think you'll find very [00:07:00] funny,  Mike: I'm so excited.  Jessika: Okay. before I get too deep into this topic, I want to give a shout out to the resources that I use to compile my information today: An article from DC on DC comics.com fan news blog by Megan Downey, titled “Reign of the Superboys: The strange history of the Boy of Steel,” the Wikipedia article on Superboy, a blog post on captaincomics.ning.com in a forum called the comics round table by username commander Benson titled “deck log entry, number 176 Superboy: the time of his life,” and IMDB. for those of you who are. For those of you who are somehow unfamiliar with the basic storyline of Superboy's origins. not to be confused with Superman's origins, which he swoops in a little bit differently initially in the comics than this. but Kal-El in this instance was sent to earth by his parents before their home planet of Krypton [00:08:00] was destroyed. He was discovered in the crater left by his arrival by locals Martha and Jonathan Kent, who adopted him, raising him as their own son and naming him Clark. At age eight, Clark is told how he was found and finds out more about his origins from Krypton. Martha makes him an indestructible suit out of a blanket that he was found with one that came from Krypton and is imbued with the same powers that he himself holds. And it's basically just like Superman fucking around and not being in school.  Mike: Yeah, it almost entirely takes place in Smallville, which… it's kind of like the DC universe version of Cabbot Cove from Murder, She Wrote, where you're just like, how many fucking people die in this town? You know, in Smallville, it's, it's more along the lines of how many fucking supervillains hang out in this town in the middle of nowhere, Kansas,  Jessika: That's just it. What is it? A convention?  Mike: I guess. Jessika: Oh, so Superboy as a character was created by Joe Schuster and [00:09:00] Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel in 1938, but was rejected twice by Detective Comics before the growing popularity of the comic Robin, the Boy Wonder, finally convinced them to change their stance and they then decided to use it to try to relate to a younger readership with a younger character, which makes sense. Thus, Superboy made his comic debut in 1945, but just as a feature in the anthology, More Fun Comics issue 101. Now, of course, it wouldn't be comics without a little bit of drama. Schuster had assistance from Don Cameron instead of Siegel, as Siegel was serving in World War II and stationed in Hawaii. And he actually had to hear about Superboy's and inaugural publication through a letter from Schuster. DC didn't send them any notification nor was he able to actively participate in the trajectory of the plot line  since he was serving. It [00:10:00] was kind of a fuck you.  Mike: considering how heavily Superman was a part of propaganda. There is literally a cover of Superman running a printing press that says, I think it says, like, “help slap a Jap.” Jessika: Oh, that hurt me.  Mike: Yeah. Like, I mean, Superman was very much part of World War II propaganda, and that's insane that they wouldn't let one of his creators participate in the storylines because he was serving in the, uh, okay. Whatever. Jessika: Yeah. Yeah. It's pretty, it's pretty rough. So apparently there was already a rift in Siegel and Schuster's relationship. And so this just increased that strain. After that first issue, Superboy appeared in More Fun Comics, bimonthly issues through number [00:11:00] 107, but was picked up by Adventure Comics debuting in April of 1946. So he was bouncing around, that was issue number 103. And he was the lead feature for the anthology on this one Mike: Hm  Jessika: and remained the headlining feature for over 200 issues and continued being featured in Adventure Comics until 1969.  Mike: That's such a huge, just, that's an incredible run. Jessika: Yeah. It's a ton of time. And especially considering like he had, this was just like a side gig for Superboy. Really. He had other stuff going that he was doing.  Mike: Yeah, I do know that at one point in the sixties, Superboy was I believe the number two comic in America and the only one that was doing more than that was Superman. Jessika: It's like you were reading ahead. No, seriously. That's in my notes.  Mike: Oh, really? Okay, cool.  Jessika: Yeah, Yeah, yeah, no. And actually was frequently number two. We'll just  get to it now. It was frequently number two for a lot of it's run.[00:12:00]  So notable storylines that we got from Adventure Comics were intro to Krypto, the super dog, the origin story of his rivalry with Lex Luther, which that continues pretty far. So it's interesting that they, like, created the origin story.  Mike: Yeah. They had like teenage Lex Luther show up in Smallville, right?  Jessika: Yeah, yes, yes. Correct.  Mike: I think he had hair  Jessika: Back when he had hair, yeah.  Mike: Yeah. And that's something that's continued up until modern times as well. Mark Waid's Birthright, I know, did that… where it basically revealed that Clark Kent had been for a short time friends with Lex.  Jessika: Oh, wow. Of course. They had to be friends before they were enemies. Frenemies. There was also the the debut of the 30th century superhero team, the Legion of superheroes.  As Superboy, continue to frequent the pages of anthology comics in April of 1949, he became the sixth superhero to get his own comic book. and was the first new superhero [00:13:00] title to succeed after World War II. Mike: Oh, wow. That's crazy.  Jessika: Right?  Mike: I had no idea that there were only six superhero comics back then. Jessika: Yeah. Not with our own titles.  Mike: I mean, that's wild.  Jessika: Totally. I didn't realize that either.  Mike: yeah Jessika: notable storylines from this namesake comic were intro to Ilana Lang and Pete Ross, the storyline of the first Bizarro and first appearances of Legion of superheroes characters, Mon-El and Ultra Boy.  He also appeared in Legion of superheroes volume. One, which was printed as an anthology. Superboy itself continued until 1976 when the comic was renamed Superboy and the Legion of superheroes. Superboy was involved in the storyline until issue number 2 59. When he leaves after learning new information regarding the death of his parents.[00:14:00]  Dramatics. Mike: Yeah, I haven't read a lot of those, but the idea is that he's displaced through time and he winds up hanging out with the Legion for a while. And then if I remember right, Supergirl winds up joining the Legion after a while, too. Basically, so they can have kind of a headliner. Jessika: I smell them trying to fix a time continuum. But that's maybe I'm biased. Based on the research I've been doing,     The series was then retitled Legion of superheroes volume two, and ended with issue number 354 and 1979. There was also a three-part mini series called Secrets of the Legion of Superheroes that was published in 1981. And despite the general decline of superhero readership, Superboys' popularity continued to grow and adventure comics and Superboy frequently sold over a million copies combined.  Mike: That's an insane amount of comics these days. You know, back then that [00:15:00] was wild. Jessika: I mean, it definitely groundbreaking for its time. I would say it was, it sounded like it was huge. The popularity may also have been due to the fact that Superboy was found on more than just comic book stands. He was also on the TV and in the movies, he appeared in a 26 minute movie called the Adventures of Superboy and multiple six-minute episodes airing with the New Adventures of Superman, which aired for 1966 to 70, the Superman Aquaman Hour of Adventure from 67 to 68 and the Batman Superman Hour 68 to 69. All of which were just continuations are within that same world as the initial comic book.  Mike: Right. And those were all animated series too, I think, right?  Jessika: they were. They were. And here's something fun for you to watch if you wanted to click on that link.  Mike: Okay.  [Superboy INTRO AUDIO PLAYS] I love the image of like infant CBRE, boy, just lifting a piano. All right.  Jessika: Very patriotic.  Mike: Yeah. I love the fact that they have Krypto in there. Like I've always had a soft spot for Krypto. I am a little offended that his cowlick isn't in the shape of an S though. Come on guys. You know, this is an amateur hour.  Jessika: Missed opportunity. Mike: Right. But yeah, that was super cute.  Jessika: Wasn't that fun? Yeah. So I can,  I could see kids get getting really excited about seeing that. And then they walk by the newsstand and they go, I just saw that on TV.  Mike: yeah, exactly.  Jessika: [00:17:00] So I think they had a good thing going with that at that point. Mike: Oh, a hundred percent. So that was in the sixties, you said, right?  Jessika: Yes.  Mike: So that was right when television was becoming the dominant form of entertainment in the United States. I think by 1959 or 1960, it was something like 90% of households in America had televisions. And Saturday morning cartoons were starting to become a thing, which by the way, you guys should go back and listen to that episode about Saturday morning cartoons. It's our first episode. And we talk all about the evolution of that and how it connected with Comics. Jessika: It was a fun one. So pretty much right after the Legion of Superheroes volume two ended, the New Adventures of Superboy was published in 1984. That had 54 published issues,  Mike: Okay. That's a respectable run.  Jessika: Yeah. It's not anything too wild. Yeah. In 1985, DC tried to tie up some of those pesky plot holes that we're going to discuss later [00:18:00] on, for sure, by creating a comic that told the story of Clark Kent's transitional years in college at Metropolis University, going from Superboy effectively to Superman. And while this was supposed to last for 12 installments, they only ended up publishing six, mostly due to the fact that Crisis on Infinite Earths was published  Mike: I was about to ask. Yeah.  Jessika: Yep. That actually featured the eraser of Superboy  and yet another attempt to correct a timeline.  Mike: Well, Crisis on Infinite Earths was the first real attempt by DC to sit there and stream everything into a coherent timeline. And at the same time they had John Byrne's The Man of Steel, which came out I think right after. Crisis on infinite earths. And that also streamlined Superman's very convoluted history. The problem is is that by that point in time, you had almost 50 years of continuity, which made no fucking [00:19:00] sense. Jessika: And we'll discuss it later, but there wasn't necessarily a need for continuity back in the day. I mean, they didn't have to have it. They were just there for like, we're doing this adventure. This is fun. They're going to enjoy it. And there wasn't a feeling that you had to necessarily link it with what came before it or what was going, coming after it in the same way that we want now as readers and as fans, we want everything to make sense because we want more of the story in that  way. Mike: We want that overarching meta plot. Jessika: Exactly. Exactly. So despite DC's attempt to write Superboy out of the universe completely, he appeared once again in Legion of Superheroes Volume Three, which ran from 86, 87 and while Crisis on Infinite Earths had erased Superboy. To some extent in other time, continuations, they now needed to recreate him in order to have a cohesive storyline for [00:20:00] Legion of Superheroes. Mike: God. Jessika: So they were like, what are we going to do? Oh, I know pocket universe.  Mike: Why not?  Jessika: Why not? So in this version, it's set in a pocket universe created by the villain Time Trapper.  Mike: I think the Time Trapper… so the Time Trapper is like a villain who has had multiple identities. It's the same villain ultimately, but it's different people wind up becoming the Time Trapper. And I think, Superboy became the time trapper point.  Jessika: This doesn't surprise me at all. What the hell?  Mike: Yeah, don't, don't quote me on this, but I'm pretty sure I'm pretty sure that it happened, uh, during one of their big, crossovers,  Jessika: Oh, no, Mike: Comic books are dumb and I love them.  Jessika: I do, too. This is actually part of the  reason I really do like them. Because I like seeing all of these little differences. It doesn't make me mad. I just find it very funny.  Mike: Yeah. so the Time Trapper created a pocket [00:21:00] universe and then they used him to bring Superboy back.  Jessika: Yeah, exactly. And so he, but here's the funny part. He was really just like a sideline character in this. He came in and issued 24 and he was killed off in 38. Mike: Superboy was going. Okay. I'm not going to ask question.  Jessika: Yeah. Cause he had to like sacrifice himself to save the world. I mean,  that's, you know, common trend in these, right.  Mike: Of course.  Jessika: Yeah.  It was convenient. If not obvious.  Mike: Okay.  Jessika: Superboy apparently would not, could not be stopped. As was apparent in 1988 with not only a comic publication, but also a TV appearance. Once again, this time live action.  Mike: I remember that show.  Jessika: Yeah, it was here and that was gone.  Mike: It lasted for a couple of seasons, but I think they had a couple of different actors play Superboy. Jessika: They did. Yeah. So it was four seasons and it started out starring John Hames Newton for season one [00:22:00] and then recast replaced for the remainder of the four seasons. So the rest of the three by Gerard Christopher.  Mike: Oops.  Jessika: So that was a 22 minute runtime, pretty normal for that time. but there again, it went along with the same year that the Superboy volume two hit shelves. You know, they did another one of those timing things thinking, Hey, it worked what? 30 years ago.  Let's do it again.  Mike: Yeah. It's that whole transmedia thing. Jessika: Yeah, exactly. the show ultimately lasted until 1992, the same year a one-shot comic called the last Superboy was published. But that seemed to be the last dying ember from the fire that is Superboy, as we've talked about up until this point, except one thing. And I know that we want to talk about it a little bit, which is Smallville. And I know we've mentioned it, but I didn't watch that. Did you watch that show?  Mike: Oh, yeah. Are you kidding me? I, I was all over that show for the first few seasons. Jessika: Okay. I [00:23:00] just really, it was just cause I had a crush on Kristin Kruek, but unfortunately she got involved with that horrific NXIVM cult.  Mike: I thought It wasn't her. It  was the… Jessika: It was Alison Mack, but  like, but  she was involved for a few years,  unfortunately. Big. Yikes.  Mike: I don't know too much about it. I just know that Alison Mack was one of the big ringleaders for it and it was wild. Jessika: She was, yeah.  Mike: Like she, I think she left Smallville to like devote herself full-time to that cult.  Jessika: That sounds right. Yeah, she was, she was definitely a big part of it. yeah, it was rough. I've been following it.  Mike: I really liked Smallville when it first came out. I remember getting so excited when they had a little teaser ad for it where I think it's Krystin Kreuk is wandering through the darkness and she hears something and turns and then you see Tom Welling step out of the shadows and he says something along the lines “Oh, Hey, it's just me. It's it's Clark.” and then it just says Smallville, and I was like, oh mother fucker. That's amazing. [00:24:00] And yeah, it was, it was fine. It was very teen angsty, but they had a lot of deep cuts for comic fans. And, I think I stopped watching around season four  because it just started to, it felt like it really sort of jumped the shark,  Jessika: Oh, okay. Yeah. I was going to, ask if it's  something I should rewatch. I don't know. Stuff from that. Timeframe is so cringey these days.  Mike: A lot of it's cringey. I remember a whole thing with his heat vision was tied to like him being horny.  Jessika: No. Why do you have to do that?  It's so unnecessary.  Mike: But you know, what's funny is they actually brought Tom Welling back in the whole DC Arrowverse recently where they have a version of Lex Luther. Who's traveling the multi-verse and he shows up at, he shows up at the Kent farm and Tom welling is there. I thought it was just, it was great. It was, it was just, it was a really cute little nod. Jessika: That is pretty cute. I do like that.  Mike: And then he got all mad because he was trying to suck Superman's powers [00:25:00] away. And then it turns out Superman gave up his power so that he can have a family and a normal life. And then the now powerless Superman pops him in the nose. It was kind of good.  Jessika: That is cute.  Mike: I was fine with this. It was very, it was very wholesome. Jessika: So there are other iterations of Superboy, but they're not necessarily Clark Kent and some of them are, but they kind of stray off into different timeline. And I could have gone down that rabbit hole, but Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: you know, I didn't. Here we are.  Mike: that's fine.  Jessika: So I also know that I, more than hinted, we've talked about a little bit, uh, the continuity troubles that plagued Superboy.  Mike: Right,  Jessika: I, I gotta say some of these transgressions are just capital B A D bad. But they get a bit of a pass again, you know, like I said, because Comics at that point [00:26:00] really didn't hinge on a time continuum.  Mike: Right. That wasn't a thing.  Jessika: No, it wasn't. So, we got to give them a little bit of credit except when they actually started figuring it out and they still did absolutely nothing about it, which is what we're going to talk about. Mike: Okay.  Jessika: Because after Superman, they kind of figured out, oh, people are wanting more of a storyline and we've already given Superman kind of a timeframe. And now this has to be Superboy. So it needs to be earlier. So they were like, Okay. Superboy is from the 30s.  Mike: Right.  Jessika: But Superman at that time, I think was supposed to be set in the 60s or the 50s. And the math did not add  Mike: Right.  Jessika: at all to get to that point. So right off the bat. You've just you're wrong about the dates. what's even more funny to me is that in the first iterations of the Superman comic, the origin story is always [00:27:00] that the first time he came to earth was when he came to metropolis, like as a full ass adult.  Mike: Right.  Jessika: So what's, what's up, you know, so that's where it's like, all Right. this is already… Mike: This is convoluted. Yeah. Jessika: exactly. So you and I read a couple of comics from the time period of those original comics, and we read them from specifically from 1963. What I love about these is you could actually, at that, I don't, maybe they still do this. I haven't seen it yet in my Comics. You could write in and they would publish the comments and the editor … Mike: they still do this.  Jessika: Okay, cool. So the editor writes a comment back,  Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: So we have a few of these.  Mike: Okay.  Jessika: And I would love for you to read them for us.  Mike: Okay. So we have a few of these here. the first one says dear editor, since Superman was a Superboy before World War II and television sets, weren't perfected and [00:28:00] sold to the public until after World War II. How come you show TV roof antennas, and Superboy stories. Kevin Herron, Tiffin, Ohio. And the editor responded with you're right, Kevin, we're wrong. We made a booboo. Editor. Jessika: Okay. Mike: The next one is dear editor. How come in Superboy comics. You illustrate such modern inventions as a bombs, atomic subs, jet planes, television, et cetera, all devices, which weren't invented until 1945 for later. And which certainly weren't around when Superman was born, Ken parent Wheaton, Illinois. The response is historians refer to such inconsistency as anachronisms. They are a necessary form of literary license required to achieve dramatic effects. Movies exercise this option very often. For example, the first umbrella was invented in 1740 yet numerous period films devoted to the life in the middle ages have shown heroines protecting themselves from the sun with a parasol. Editor Jessika: I love how he's getting like a little salt here with his answers.  Mike: Just a little bit. [00:29:00]  Jessika: He's like, but Webster's dictionary says…  Mike: God. Yeah. I don't miss those days. These days. Usually when you see the letters section of a comic, it's usually people talking about how much something meant to them, or at least in the ones that I read it. It's always really nice. So.  Jessika: That's sweet.  Mike: All right. So the last one: dear editor in the recent story, the amazing bizarro you had Superboy dropping an atomic bomb on bizarro. How is this possible, as Superboys adventures. They're supposed to have happened before 1945 and scientists had not perfected the H-bomb until  1945. Steve Spangler, Sonoma, California,  Jessika: Boom representation. That's right down the road from us.  Mike: the response is “we goofed! From now on no more a bombs in Superboy. Editor.”  Jessika: Well, that's easy.  Mike: Oh, that's great. At some point it's like, come on guys, it's a comic book.  Jessika: Yeah,  Mike: I think it's, are you [00:30:00] really expecting the science fiction comic, starring an alien who just happens to look exactly like a human, but has more super powers than God is going to be historically and scientifically accurate all the time. Okay. Whatever. I don't…  Jessika: I know. I know. I know. I hear you. I do well. And what's funny too, is at one point, Lana Lang is in a beauty competition and it says 1952.  Mike: Well, it's reassuring to know that nerds were always this nitpicky. Jessika: Absolutely. That really is.  Mike: Yeah. Jessika: So the time in consistencies didn't end there. As I mentioned, there have been multiple timelines that have been created and destroyed to ensure some kind of consistency in the Superman universe. But whether or not that was actually a success is really anybody's opinion. It's up to the listener. [00:31:00] But if you're interested in finding out more about this travesty of a timeline, go check out that blog post I mentioned at the top of the episode, I'm on Captain Comics Presents, it's got a lot more examples of the inconsistencies from those OG comics. Mike: Yeah. Well, okay. One thing I will note is that DC kind of figured this out recently where they, ran a series called doomsday clock, and it's Dr. Manhattan from the Watchman universe with Superman. And the very end of it is revealing that there is now a “metaverse” in DC. Where it's like, oh yeah. So Superman arrived in the 30s and started being a superhero, you know? And then also he also arrived in the 60s and then he also arrived in the 80s and so on and so forth. And so it,  it sort of makes sense of that for those people who care. Jessika: Well, and it's like the same kind of Marvel multi-verse that we have going on with that, with the  Spider-Man is pointing to each other.  Mike: Yeah. It [00:32:00] basically, it takes the concept of a multi-verse and then it adds another layer and it does it in a way that feels, hm, I'm not going to say plausible, but it just, it kind of works and, you know, I actually liked it, but that's just me. Jessika: Yeah. you know what, and what's funny about Superman is I don't like Superman, so it's funny that we're doing this whole episode. I just thought it, was interesting. These Superboy comics when I saw them, well and I picked them up because like, honestly, like the titles were horrific and I will have some very liberal things to say about them, but yes, I, you know, but honestly, what's very funny, even though I hate Superman, I don't know what it was about the Superman symbol that I used to love.  And I didn't read the comics. I'd watch the show from the eighties. And I'd seen the Christopher Reeves movies. We loved those. But other than that, I wasn't like huge in the Superman, but if I had gotten a tattoo, when I was 18 years old, it would have been a Superman symbol. So I'm very glad my mom never, she never [00:33:00] listens to this. So she will never know that I'm confessing that, she talked me out of making a very bad tattoo decision because she doesn't need any more gloating rights,  Mike: Yeah. I don't know. I kind of viewed him like Captain America, where I thought he was really boring. And then I realized that if you find the right writer, Superman really, really works. I've come to really enjoy a lot of Superman stories, but you know, it depends.  Jessika: And I think you're right. That I, I probably just haven't found the right writer or the right style. And I did recently start do I start birthright? I started something recently.    Mike: I think it was  Birthright, based on our conversations. Jessika: yeah. So I will get back into that at some point in time. I just have such a stack now will obsessed. Oh no. Mike: Oh no,  Jessika: Oh, no. more Comics. So Mike, you and I read a couple of these issues that I found at that estate sale. That was Superboy boys. Numbers, 109 [00:34:00] and 110. So do you want to recap 109 us?  Mike: Yeah. Okay. You've mentioned that these are anthology comics and so Superboy at this point in time, apparently was having two or three storylines per issue. based on the two that we read, each one had two different stories in it.  Superboy 109 has the first story is the Super Youth of Brozz. The title story about the rival super dogs doesn't show up until later, which that always surprises me, when the cover action isn't the first story and everything else is in a backup, but whatever.  Jessika: It's a little confusing.  Mike: the Super Youth of Brozz is about how a young Clark Kent winds up sort of becoming friends with another teenage orphan in Smallville named Fred who's, quote, timid that's his like defining character trait. That's all that anybody used to describe him. And he gets picked on by the towns in crowd of teenagers. It's revealed that he lives in the [00:35:00] Smallville orphanage, which okay. He literally walks back to the orphanage and then Superboys spies on him and he's crying because he overheard people talking about how they didn't want to adopt him  because he was too much of a wimp I'm just like, oh, okay.  Jessika: Thanks for being super toxic Superboy. That's so great.  Mike: Superboy winds up deciding to give him confidence. And so he takes him to a planet called Brozz where Fred gains super powers from the atmosphere. And then Superboy actually loses his overtime for reasons that are not really well explained because you know, Superboy, he gets his powers from the yellow sun. And then later on, he gets his powers back sort of from the little spacecraft that they brought Fred over in, because it had some remnants of Earth's atmosphere, which that's not how science works. I was a history major and even I can tell you that. Superboy has this whole convoluted plot about how if he can get Fred to have super power's he'll gain confidence, which Fred sort of does. He eventually saves Superboy's life and then decides to stay on the planet and be a superhero. And he gets offered to be adopted, but he declines the offer for some bizarre reason, something about like, you know, basically he doesn't want to put his, foster parents at risk. And Superboy heads home to earth and has a final thought about how he wouldn't be the person he was, if it hadn't been for the Kents. The end. Jessika: Yeah. Yup.  Mike: Yep. But the title story, which is the Super Dog That Replaced Krypto is basically at some point, Superboy rescues a dog named Swifty, which looks like a Greyhound. Swifty winds up months later, tracking down Superboy in Smallville, which means that Superboy didn't [00:37:00] even drop this dog off at a shelter. Apparently he just got him out of harm's way and then just left him. So strike one, Supes.  Jessika: Yeah. It's not.  Mike: Then Superboy winds up temporarily granting Swifty the same powers that Krypto has. And then it seems like he's testing them out, but it doesn't quite work out that way. Swifty loses his powers and then he's, again, I guess, left alone. He's just as far as I can tell, he's a homeless dog in Smallville. Jessika: Yeah. There's  a lot of orphans in the story.  Mike: after his powers fade some villains who were trapped in the Phantom zone, but crossover and are sort of the Phantom zone wind up trying to take mental control of Superboy and Krypto, they don't have any luck. They are able to influence Swifty. And then they guide him through a process that grants him super powers. And then I think it also makes them evil, but it's not really well explained.  Jessika: Oh, it's because the Phantoms were  influencing him. [00:38:00]  And so their intentions were like his intention. So  because they had negative vibes against Superboy. That's what I got out of it, but it's, it's really vague.  Mike: Super vague.  Superboy decides to randomly hold a series of tests for Swifty and Krypto to be the new super dog. And like, he does this as opposed to like, just like letting  them both help him out. Jessika: that's what I'm saying. Like, it wasn't even to like, be the next super dog. It was like to  go be the ambassador on this trip  Mike: Oh, is that it? Okay.  Jessika: yeah. And then , why wouldn't  you want like an entourage of fucking, like super dogs with you? Why would you two super dogs is way better than one super dog. Like, I don't know what the fuck his problem  was Mike: 100%. So anyway, the Phantom zone criminals helps Swifty, win the contest, Swifty becomes the super [00:39:00] dog for at least this instance. And then he leads both Krypto and Superboy into a kryptonite death trap. Like there's literally a spring that like hurls kryptonite at them. And then at the last second Krypto manages to blast Swifty with the duplicate Ray, which creates a bizarro Swifty, who's good as opposed to the original version. Superboy comes up with a potion or, sorry, the Bizarro Swifty saves them. And then Superboy comes up with a potion that strip Swifty's powers and restores his good nature. And then he creates a collar that repels the Phantom zone ghosts so they can't control the dog again. And that's it like, Swifty's apparently the sad homeless dog in Smallville who just gets sad every time that he sees Superboy and Krypto fly by. And he thinks about how he wants to be Superboys' dog again. Jessika: It's really depressing. And I would never do that to Carl for the record. I would never. Okay.  Mike: I mean, [00:40:00] yeah, this, this issue definitely rubbed me the wrong way. Just for that, where I'm like, God, Superboy. it couldn't even find a home for the dog who tracked you down across the country and just wanted to be your friend. Jessika: You're fucking Superboy have two fucking dogs. Like, I don't know how difficult this is. Like, well, where Martha. Martha is like, no, we've already gotten one super dog in the house.  Mike: Yeah, right.  Jessika: No, this one's just normal, now! I swear. Mike: between the two of us, we have four dogs. So, I  mean, we're definitely the wrong audience for this, Jessika: for sure. And I bought this comic for the fact that there were like super dogs on there. I got very excited.  Mike: yeah. And the thing is, is that there's a whole menagerie, a super pets like you eventually get like Comet the super horse. Like it's no, there, there was a monkey. There was, I think, I think it was Streaky the super cat too.  Jessika: Oh, no.  Mike: It's not like, you know, [00:41:00] there wasn't a whole collection of super pets. But whatever.    Jessika: Yeah. What did you think of this since you haven't told, since you haven't started telling me already. Mike: It reminded me that Superman and Superboy stories from this era just a lot of times don't make any sense.  I have a collection from the late eighties called the Greatest Superman Stories Ever Told, and It's got stories from the forties to the eighties and even those early great stories, in quotes, they're pretty out there. And neither of these stories are anywhere close to what's contained in that book. I don't know. My biggest complaint is how Superboys' logic is always terrible. Like why does Fred need to be made into another version of the Superboy in order to gain confidence? Why not just help them with the core issue, which is that nobody wants to adopt them  from the Smallville orphanage, which again, lawl. Jessika: Yeah. Like what does it have two orphans in there?  Mike: It just, it seems like helping them find a [00:42:00] family would do a lot more good. And likewise, why not just adopt Swifty too? Like  it's shitty and it's dumb, but all of this reminded me of the site called Super Dickery, which I showed you.  Jessika: Yes.  Mike: It was the site that's originally focused on the absolute insanity of Superman comic covers. So many of these comics would feature things like Superman, just fucking over his friends. That was a repeated theme for years. There's one where he has Lois lane strapped to the grill of a truck and he's flying out after he drove it off a cliff. And just saying something to the effect “I'll see you later, Lois.” Jessika: Holy shit.  Mike: And there's another one where Aquaman, Jimmy Olsen are dying of thirst in the desert and Superman's just lording over them with this pitcher of water. the site was around at least in 2005, which is when I first came across it. It's kind of defunct. Now. I don't think has been updated for a couple of years, but you can go back on archive.org and just scroll through all these things. The [00:43:00] tagline was Superman's a Dick and here's the evidence and it's great. Like that is a way to kill an afternoon. Let me tell ya. Jessika: Oh, I definitely checked out a few of those today and I was  rolling. Rolling. He definitely came off  as an asshole in this comic. Like, no question, no question.  You know, what makes me the most mad is that he has the ability to give Swifty super powers. He has the ability to make both dogs talk.  Mike: Oh my God. Yeah. Jessika: What the fuck are you doing?  Mike: there was a cover on Super Dickery where it's young Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne, and they've created a computer that lets them see the future and like, Hey, we're going to grow up to be crime fighters and superheroes. So we're going to be best friends. It's like cool. You know, what also would be useful? I don't know. Maybe telling Bruce Wayne that his parents are going to get murdered and it can be avoided.  Jessika: Seriously. Holy shit. Oh my God. Yeah. But then he wouldn't have his [00:44:00] homie. Superboy's  just all in it for himself.  Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: And like, why does he just have something lying around the  has fandoms as I can get out? Why does he have that? Doesn't make any sense. Mike: We don't have another two hours to discuss the Phantom Zone. Jessika: Kal-El you silly boy. So let's, let's move on to the other comic we read, which, uh, we're just be just as angry about, by the way. Spoiler case you were wondering. So what happened in issue? Number 110? Cause I did get sequential ones, which is great, kind of.  Mike: Right. Okay. So again, we have two stores. We have the Surrender of Superboy and the runt of steel, the surrender of supervise story is the one that we actually get on the cover. It's Superboy in Krypto losing a tug of war match to some old man. And we're basically told, well, you won't believe who the old man is. In the Surrender of Superboy, Clark [00:45:00] Kent, and Lana Lang traveled to South America to accompany her, I guess he's a college professor, dad on an archeological dig. One of the flowers recovered is this legendary hate flower, which causes any living, being that smells it to hate the first human they see after smelling it. They're like very specific that it's, you will hate the first human. Jessika: Yeah.  Mike: When they get back to Smallville, Lana smells the hate flower by accident. She sees Superboy flying outside and then dun, dun dunnnn winds up developing an intense hatred for the boy of steel. She grabs. I think it's like, it's… do we ever get a name for this thing? It's like a devil's mask? Jessika: I think she just calls it devil's mask. Cause it's a devil's witch mask or something like that on the wall. It's very vague again.  Mike: So she's in this museum, she grabs this thing off the wall because there's no fucking security anywhere. And it specifically says what it does, where it's says the person who wears this can summon souls , or spirits from the past and have them obey them for an hour. And then she [00:46:00] starts using it to cause trouble. Sir Lancelot and then George Washington are her first minions, but they refuse to help because they claim that they've heard about Superboy's heroic  deeds and even in the past, which Jessika: No, no, no, It's not a thing. No.  Mike: I just, I can't, man, it's so dumb. Jessika: When I read that, I was like, what, what is actually going on right now? I literally stopped reading for a few minutes.  Mike: Everything about the story it feels like monkeys at a typewriter.  Jessika: Yes,  Mike: So then she summons Merlin to humiliate Superboy at this super strength exhibition that he's doing in order to benefit the old folks home and Merlin, it turns out is the old man who beats him in the tug of war on the cover. Which by the way, this is like three panels in the comic. And it's not that big a deal.  Jessika: it's really not.  Mike: yeah, after that she summons Edgar Allen Poe and [00:47:00] Sherlock Holmes. She says they're the two greatest detective minds of the past. So they help her solve a jewel highs that Superboy can't and then she framed Superboy by having Hercules, Samson, and Atlas tear apart the Smallville Scientific Institute. Um, let's see, she summons Venus, Helen of Troy, and Juliet to basically seduce Superboy. And then she spurns him at a dance. And also I'm sorry, but really? JULIET? Like, come on. Jessika: Juliet was a child who fell into a situation and was a tragic  figure.  Mike: Juliet was a stupid teenager. Like, I can't, I can't even,  I'm sorry.  Jessika: She probably had acne and Superboy definitely had that hair where it was brushed forward and then spiked up in the front. Mike: Yep.  Jessika: Absolutely. Yep.  Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: Fuckin' assholes. All of them, Mike: So she [00:48:00] spurns them at this dance and her dad gets mad at her. He's like, I heard you were very rude to Superboy.  Jessika: Which by the way, the fact that he wears that fucking suit to every occasion, like,  come on, dude.  Mike: I just love that idea. Jessika: Can you have like a literal suit, like, a super suit. That actually looks nice?  Mike: Just get something, like, get a nice Navy blue, kind of slim fitting suits have an Ascot popping out with your Superman logo.   All the girls would be all over you. It'd be great. Jessika: Oh, my gosh. Can you imagine the Kent's first trip to a fancy restaurant where they have to like, get the borrow jacket, like the  loaner jacket from the restaurant, because he's wearing his stupid ass suit and they're  like, Oh, Sir, excuse me.  Mike: He's just walking around with his Cape, sticking out from under the jacket. I would read that  comic.  Jessika: I would too. [00:49:00]  Mike: Anyway. So finally Lana decides to pull Jor-El, Superboy's dad from the past, in order to help her discover Superboys' secret identity. Instead of, I don't know, reuniting Jor-El with his son who he never got to see, but whatever. Okay. Jor-El gives you this device that's supposed to detect Kryptonians. It leads her to a closet where Krypto the Superdawg is Krypto shakes himself, and basically gives off a bunch of dust. Actually counteracts the flowers' hate pollen. And it turns out that Superboy and Lana's dad switched the mask with a dummy, once they realized what was going on and then her dad disguised himself as GRL and then everything just  goes back to normal and nothing matters. Jessika: Yeah, we're again, they have access to these devices that are like powerful and they like have instructions on the wall, but don't use them. Like he literally says to his daughter at one point like, oh, well stay away from the superstition side of things. It's quite dangerous. And she's like, oh, what's that?[00:50:00]  Let me check out this mask. So fricking ridiculous.  Mike: So then we get the second story, which is the Super Runt of Steel, which is about a criminal named Peewee Reagan, who we don't know who this dude is, but he shows up at this dilapidated house, he pays some amoral super scientist to grant him super powers. Peewee goes on a crime spree that even Superboy can't stop because Superboys' powers are weirdly fading for no real reason. Peewee flies away to a distant planet because he spotted treasure inside it. He gets to the planet, he wrecks a bunch of the alien robots that are there and then goes inside this vault that's full of space gems and minerals, and he winds up screaming in pain. Superboy finds out the scientist it turns out leached his powers and transfer them over to Peewee. And he's able to track the criminal to the aforementioned planet. And it turns out Peewee died because the vault also contained kryptonite and then Superboy [00:51:00] buries Peewee and flies away the end. Jessika: Because he somehow gets his powers back by just being around him. It was weird.  Mike: Everything about this issue just made me roll my eyes. And a lot of the stories from this era, if you go back and read a lot of these things, they had those kinds of surprise endings. That just feel so dumb these days. Like it was that weird, ironic twist. They're not really ironic because they don't really make a lot of sense.  Jessika: Yeah, they're just kind of like a left field thought.  Mike: Yeah, there's a lot that just doesn't work. And it's like if you go down this very specific logic train that these writers force you along, it's like, you know, the whole thing. Having Lana's dad disguise himself as Jor-El, like Superboy, just, knew that this was going to be the next step. You're like, all right. Well, I don't know, and then also, I'm sorry. But she's supposed to be calling all of these characters from history, all these spirits or people from history and then it's gods and fictitious characters like [00:52:00] Lancelot and Juliet and uh, whatever. Jessika: No, they were really contrived figures. I mean, even when they had real people in there, they weren't used to their purpose.  Mike: No, and it's one of those things where you read it and you're like, this is just, this is so dumb. Oh, it's Samson and Hercules. Okay. Whatever, why not? Random characters from the Bible and Greek mythology. Why not? Jessika: Dude, where do I even start on this issue though?  They had so many problems. The beginning, when the scientists negate the word of the locals as superstition, even though it actually did have dangerous poisonous properties to it. They're like, oh, it's just a myth.  Mike: Because there's a whole thing where one of the boroughs winds up attacking a guide and then when they sit there and say, oh, it must have like gotten near the hade flower and they're like, oh no, it just got bit by a fly. All right.  Jessika: Yeah. And the scientists are like, I mean, gosh, darn. How big of a [00:53:00] supremacist asshole do you have to be to not trust the people who live there to know anything about the plants that they have been living with their whole lives. I truly don't understand that.  Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: Then the scientists were like, oh, woopsie, Daisy. I guess they were right. Chuckle, chuckle. Mike: This was also still a period in time where anyone who was not white, especially native populations were viewed with a healthy degree of just kind of, well, like you said, it like supremacy. Like if you go back and read those old Tintin books, woof.  Jessika: Oh,  yeah. I've read someof those in the original French and they're... Yeah.  Mike: Yeah. And if you go back and read those and then like up until really, I want to say the 70s or 80s was one thing started to get a little bit better, but even mainstream in the 60s were still pretty awful when it came to depicting people who weren't [00:54:00] white. Jessika: Yeah. There was that whole segregation thing. You know, just that.  Mike: Yeah. Jessika: Yeah, I, it was really gross when the quote unquote historical women came to give her beauty advice so that she could do seduce Superboy, like that was so contrived and odd and sexist and strange,  Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: Or the part where Superboy is not only supposed to be earning money for an old person's home. He's also making agist jokes about the quote unquote old man that ends up beating him. Both him and his dog, a tug of war.  Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: But  then the comic itself is so obviously like they so obviously made it agistly clear that this man only be Superboy because he was Merlin, the wizard, which yikes guys,  I know people way older than me that could kick my ass at most anything. So that's pretty [00:55:00] ridiculous.  Mike: yeah.  Jessika: Oh. Or the fact that the little guys or men that are like smaller and stature or timid, they are constantly the ones that need quote, unquote saving by Superboy in these really odd, like vague ways. Like they need to get physical strength to be appreciated.  And it's super toxic.  Mike: Yeah. And I mean, that kind of hinges on the old ideas of masculinity as well. Jessika: Oh, and I'm sorry, why Lana's dad keeping again, keeping legit magic items where people can access them. It just, I can not get past that because they just have all this shit sitting around where people are like, oh, let me touch it. Mike: look, here's the thing, like gun control, wasn't a thing back then you think they're going to seriously guard supernatural weapons of destruction. Jessika: that is a valid point. That is so valid.  at least he wasn't mistreating his dog in this issue, I guess.  Mike: I guess. I don't know. He locked him in the closet for a few hours.  Jessika: Shit. That's right. [00:56:00] Nevermind. Fuck. So that wraps up our Superboy conversation.  Let's move on to our brain wrinkles. And this is the one thing comics are comics adjacent that's just been rattling around in your brain. Since the last time we talked.  Mike: Yeah. So I was going to talk about free comic book day and how I was originally pretty excited about it. But now, we're recording this a couple of weeks before free comic book day is going to happen. And we are still in the middle of a pandemic when we record this, the Delta strain has started to rear its ugly head and lead to cases spiking all over the place, including here in the Bay Area. So, As someone who has immunocompromised kids who are too young to get the vaccine still, we're not going to be able to participate. Um, so yeah, I don't know. I think I'm instead going to talk about The Suicide Squad and actually how I'm really [00:57:00] excited about that movie. And it's getting rave reviews and it's opening this week on HBO max and in theaters. And then, because people can't leave shit well, enough alone, David Ayer, the director of the original Suicide Squad movie talked about how this one is great, but then he proceeded to shit all over Warner Brothers and talked about how the version of just Suicide Squad that got released back in 2016, was not his version of the film and how it's terrible. And he wants, vindication now. And I just, I can't go through another Snyder Cut. I just, I don't  have… Jessika: Alright like, you know, at least, okay. At least it's not the Justice League.  At least it's Suicide Squad,  Mike: But like the Snyder Cut almost broke me. Jessika: No, I hear you. I already don't like, I already wasn't like on board and I had to watch like so much Justice League that weekend.  Mike: I remember.  Jessika: Then I had prequel films I had to [00:58:00] watch. No, I don't want to do this again. I don't. Mike: I can't.  I am happy to talk about Suicide Squad. And I'm pretty sure there'll be jazzed up to talk about it after this movie. But I just, I can't bring myself to care about these auteur directors who are just… when I was working in the video games industry, we had this term that we used for certain people who were on the development side, who were all about their vision and how, they wouldn't compromise anything. And we, we just refer to them as the genius babies, because they would have these ungodly meltdowns. I can't bring myself to just, I can't bring myself to care about another genius baby throwing a temper tantrum. Jessika: I don't want it.  Mike: How about you?  What is, uh, what is sitting in your head these days? Jessika: I've been thinking a lot about representation in the media, including comic books. [00:59:00] And that's partially because we've been reading all these old comics where we don't see a lot of different representation. Versus the comics that I'm drawn to, which are full of representation, because that's what I prefer to read. I want to see everyone and it's been really nice to read destiny, New York and some of these other recent comics that actually show different types of bodies, different skin tones, different sexualities and genders. But I think there's so much more that we need to do, and that can be done to add and continue to build upon that representation. Like just in general, it's 2021. And we're still shaming people for being a certain size and, you know, airbrushing people who are already considered to be the epitome of beauty in our society. Like what is it going to take for us to allow people to just exist as we are. I mean, you know, besides the whole capitalist bullshit [01:00:00] game, telling women, they need more and more products to achieve beauty. But aside from that, but it's giving me, it's definitely making me feel better to see all of the representation, but there, again, it just reminds me that we need more. Mike: I was gonna say, it's that reminder of we've come a long way, but we need to go further. Jessika: Yep. It is. It is. You had mentioned, your inability to go to free comics day. and I feel like there are probably a lot of people who had a really difficult time getting anywhere. To go to something like that, you know? And so thinking about accessibility in that way of, what about those readers? Like what are we doing about them? So you know, it's just something I think about I've worked at social services too. I mean, I'm just, I'm a bleeding heart, but we need people like me or else, I don't know, get rid of that. We don't need people like me. So that's, that's, what's been rattling for me. [01:01:00] It's just more of a continuous disappointed buzz in my brain that we don't respect all people.  Mike: Yeah. Well, we do on this podcast.  Jessika: So on that uplifting note, that's it for today, but stay tuned for another episode in two weeks and until then we'll see it in the stacks.  Mike: Thanks for listening to Ten Cent Takes. Accessibility is important to us. So text transcriptions of each of our published episodes can be found on our website. Jessika: This episode was hosted by Jessika Frazier and Mike Thompson, written by Jessika Frazier and edited by Mike Thompson. Our intro theme was written and performed by Jared Emerson Johnson of Bay Area Sound, our credits and transition music is Pursuit of Life by Evan McDonald and was purchased with a standard license from premium beat. Our banner graphics were designed by Sarah Frank, who goes by. Look, mom draws on Instagram.[01:02:00]  Mike: If you'd like to get in touch with us, ask us questions or tell us about how we got something wrong. Please head over to Tencent takes.com or shoot an email to Tencent akes@gmail.com. You can also find us on Twitter. The official podcast account is Tencenttakes. Jessika is Jessika with us, and Jessika is spelled with a K and I am Vansau: V A N S A U Jessika: If you'd like to support us, be sure to download, rate and review wherever you listen.  Mike: Stay safe out there.  Jessika: And support your local comic shop  . 

Imagine being confronted with your next chapter without any preparation. Today’s guest was only in his late 50’s when he was handed a severance package by his employer. He had to face the reality of being laid off late in his career, without the benefit of planning the next transition.   Mike Drak turned his experience into a wonderfully relatable book, Retirement Heaven or Hell: 9 Principles for Designing Your Ideal Post-Career Lifestyle. He joins me today to share what he’s learned—and how you can aim your thoughts and actions towards living your best life.     In this episode, we’ll hear from Mike on setting goals, finding your tribe, and why he carries a focus on quality of time.   We covered:   The exact moment when retirement shock started to hit Mike Why he spent close to a year in “retirement hell”...and how he reached the turning point Walking through Mike’s 9 principles for designing your ideal post-career lifestyle Identifying what independence and independence personally means to you The idea of getting out of survival mode (and shifting into adventure mode) One simple way Mike makes planning the next year exciting   Links Retirement Heaven or Hell: 9 Principles for Designing Your Ideal Post-Career Lifestyle Victory Lap Retirement

March Movie Madness Part 2 (of 3). Welp. It's here. We watched it. Is it better than the theatrical version? How did it get here? Did we like it? Tune in for all these answers, plus a lot of swearing. Also! Come back in a couple of weeks for our final "March" movie episode!  Have questions/comments/concerns? Shoot us an email: tencenttakes@gmail.com ----more---- Episode Transcript Mike: Ancient Lamentation is my new favorite type of music. Jessika: Warning: this is a spoiler full episode, discussing Zack Snyder's newly released Cut of DC's Justice League. If you haven't already seen this film and don't want to be completely spoiled, we'd recommend you check that out before joining us. You can't say we didn't warn you. Mike: Hello. This is Ten Cent Takes, the podcast where we ruin your favorite fandoms one issue at a time. My name is Mike Thompson. I am joined by my cohost of chaos, Jessika Frazier. Jessika: Hey, Mike. No I'm. That was hysterical. I did. Yeah, I know. Did you see my face? I was like, okay, don't breathe in too heavily. You're being recorded.  Mike: Yeah. Everything is forever on a podcast. If you're joining us for the first time, the purpose of this podcast is to talk about comic books and the things that connect to them in ways that are fun and informative. We want to look at the coolest, weirdest and silliest moments as well as examine how they are woven into the larger fabric of pop culture and history. Today, we are going to continue our run of March movie madness and talk about. Dun dun duh, the Snyder Cut, which just dropped a few days ago. Before we get to that topic though: Jess, what is one cool thing that you've read or watched recently?  Jessika: I grabbed some original print used comics from an absolute time capsule of an estate sale. I went to recently -masked of course- I hope everyone is staying safe. We are still mid- pandemic. So I didn't even look at the comics prior to purchasing them. But ooh boy, I found some treasures and we will talk about a couple of them later in a, probably a couple of upcoming episodes. But the one I looked through this week was an issue of Archie and friends from 1975. And this one just has this awful one- pager that it took me a really long time to get what it meant. I'm going to send it to you.  Mike: Okay.  Jessika: And then I'll tell you why I didn't understand it at first.  Mike: W- what?  Jessika: That was my reaction.  Mike: Huh? Okay. Should I describe this?  Jessika: Yeah, absolutely. Please. I've given you the worst thing.  Mike: This is a, a one-page comic call called little jinx, you know, L I apostrophe L jinx with an X and then "Weak End" as in W-E-A-K as in not strong end. So it's this little blonde girl in floral print bell-bottoms running up to her dad who is apparently painting a cupboard or something in the garage. And she says, "daddy, it hurts when I swallow." And the dad -who I guess is a relative of Archie based on his hair color and style- he says, come on little jinx," we'll get, we'll let our doctor look at it." And she goes, "er... Do I have to?" "Don't you want him to fix up your sore throat? "And then she says, "sure. But when he fixes this end" and she points at her throat, she then is like gesturing at her butt in the final panel. And she goes, "I have trouble with my other end when I sit down," which raises so many questions. Why namely, why would you take your child to the proctologist for a sore throat?  Jessika: I don't think that, yeah, well that too. I, you know, and I was trying to figure out, okay, wait, first of all, I'll get around. What's funny. It's probably not funny to us in this modern day. Um, and then I realized, Oh, wait, it's casual child abuse abuse. So it's it really, isn't funny because she's saying basically when she's able to talk, she says things that displeases her dad, which causes her. Uh, to be physically abused by him. So I just, you know, this has caused me to think, wow, I keep getting really upset at these old comics.  Mike: I interpreted it in a way that I think is arguably worse, which is that when she goes to the doctors, she gets the rectal thermometer, which is, I think still a thing back then. Jessika: Yeah. I think you're probably right about that too. So I don't know if it's both.  Mike: I don't, I don't know. I, it could, it could be either. It could be both.  Jessika: It's a million times awful either way.  Mike: It's terrible. I hate it. Thanks. I hate it.  Jessika: You're welcome. I had to see it. So, so did you, God, what about you?  Mike: Mine's a little less traumatizing. A couple of months ago. A friend of mine from college reached out to me.  He revealed that he was getting rid of stuff that free up some storage space. And so he sent me down a couple of boxes of comics from, you know, the eighties and early nineties. So I've been going through those and I came across the miniseries from Marvel GI Joe and Transformers. So it is a cross up of two of my favorite franchises. And it has the two most popular characters on the cover. It's got Snake Eyes and Bumblebee and the cover itself is kind of traumatizing. It's it's got Bumblebee getting blown apart by the GI Joes. So yeah, it's very much an eighties comic. It's a lot of fun though. And it feels like I'm a little kid again, mashing up my favorite action figures to have an adventure with my friends on a Saturday afternoon. So yeah.  Jessika: Well that's cool. Everybody wanted to see Transformers: Soldiers in Disguise, so...  Mike: Oh, that's so good. All right. You ready to do this?  Jessika: Oh, let's turn this page. Flip a table while we're at it.  Mike: Before we actually start talking about the Snyder Cut. I think we need to take a couple of minutes and talk about how we actually got to this point. Let's start at the beginning. How familiar with Zack Snyder and by extension his work in the DC universe are you?  Jessika: I mean peripherally, honestly, every time I hear "oh yeah, that was a Zack Snyder," I'm like, Oh, that makes sense. Yeah, that makes sense. But I don't, I don't know, like I wouldn't be able to point to any of his movies and be like, "those are classic Snyder, man."  Mike: Okay. Zack Snyder is pretty much synonymous with the DC Extended Universe at this point. And it's largely because he directed the first two movies, Man of Steel and Batman Versus Superman. Before that he was originally doing music videos and commercials. He wound up hitting a home run when he directed the 2004 version of Dawn of the Dead, which is still I think his best- reviewed movie. You know, and he's done adaptations of things like Watchman and 300, which is again, another, it was another big success for him. And then he did Man of Steel and Batman v Superman. And those movies are pretty divisive. And in fact, I would say that they're incredibly divisive. Everyone agrees that they're good looking movies. They're really beautiful. They're, you know, they're gorgeously shot, they've got amazing special effects, but they're really divisive amongst the fans and have you seen these? Jessika:  I've seen some of them and, I would... I'm gonna admit. I am more of a Marvel fan girl than I am DC for some, for some reasons, not that I'm opposed to seeing DC films, but I don't see them with as much enthusiasm. Let's just call it as I do Marvel films typically.  Mike: So which, which of the DC extended universe have you seen?  Jessika: I just recently had a whole, I've gone down a rabbit hole. I, so I've...  Mike: Yeah. You, you did your homework out of this. I think you've seen more than I have at this point. Jessika:  I recently watched Aquaman just because my brother and I wanted to watch it and I was like, okay, present this movie anyway. So might as well check it out. Mamoa is up. Then I watched... I was thinking, Oh, I'll just jump into Justice League. But then I realized I hadn't seen Batman Versus Superman, and I didn't realize how those correlated, like I didn't realize it was like, it was a one into another situation. And so my brother and I started watching it, I was looking down at my phone and the newspaper with "Superman is dead!" floats across the screen. And my brother turns it off and he's like, "wait a second. Have you seen...?"  And I was like, "shit, here we go." Because I'd been avoiding seeing that film just for the reason that I had been told "maybe, maybe skip that one" by multiple parties, which in the end I would have to agree except for the plot line tie-ins.  Mike: Right. What was your big complaint about Batman Versus Superman?  Jessika: The whole thing was just ridiculous. Honestly, the plot for me, it just, I had moral issues with a lot of the characters to start off with. Ben Affleck. I love Ben Affleck as Batman. Ben Affleck is a great Batman. I actually really like him as Batman. I do not like the writing choice to make him branding people.  Mike: Oh, that was a whole thing. That was fucking gross.  Jessika: I did not, I did not enjoy that at all. And having conversations with people, it frustrated me even more because they didn't see some of the people I was talking to. You didn't see any moral issues with that because quote unquote, they were bad guys anyway, kind of a vibe. And I was like, no, no, no, no, we don't let one person decide who's going to be the arresting officer, the judge, the jury and the execution, or that's, that's not the way this works. And there's a lot of implications for, you know, innocent. People being killed. And I mean, it, it, it is a really good allegory for our own justice system. Like a really intense version of it.  It bothered me so much that it wasn't done in a way that made people more negatively reactive to it, I would say.  Mike: The good news is that I think more people didn't like it, than you would assume based on the internet. I mean, first of all, like so many people that I know have huge problems with the DC Extended Universe and primarily to tone set by both Man of Steel and Batman Versus Superman, because they're so grim. In Man of Steel, you have a fairly joyless story, and then at the very end, you have this huge battle with all the Kryptonians that winds up leveling Metropolis. And it's, you know, the result is thousands of people die and then Batman Versus Superman kind of tries to correct for that, where it's like, "Oh, they're trying to hold Superman accountable." In turn Batman is -just in the few hours that we watch him- a mass murderer. Jessika: Yeah.  Mike: And then to your point, not only is he  murdering people, but also he will sit there and survivors of like the criminals that he takes down, he will then brand them with like a heated up batarang or something. It's been a while since I saw it, I just remember the shape of the batarang on the skin. And then when they go to jail, they get like beaten to death for no explained reason. The label that started circulating as soon after this came out was  the DC Murderverse. It came from a really funny article that was written as a spoiler FAQ for io9 by Rob Bricken. And he founded the blog topless robot and then he was an editor for, for io9 for awhile. And it is both one of the funniest things that you will ever read and also one of the most damning. And one of the best, one of the best lines in it is "welcome to the DC Murderverse. Hope you survive." And then in parentheses: "you won't, Batman will murder you." But I mean, there's another scene in it where, you know, you see Batman drive the Batmobile up I think, uh, the back of a truck. And the bumper is within an inch of a dude's head and then it cuts away. But it is very heavily implied that his head did a very realistic imitation of an overripe pumpkin getting smashed with a baseball bat. And so a lot of people have massive problems with Zack Snyder, taking a fairly brutal nihilistic approach with the fandoms. I'm not going to lie. I'm one of those people. I spent a long time thinking that he just didn't understand these characters and we'll come back to that later on. Batman Versus Superman wound up causing a pretty big course correction and Warner Brothers acknowledged that it was problematic.  I think they would have written it off. It had a massive opening, like I think it was the top. It was the number nine grossing film of the year or something like that. But what happened was, if you look at the actual box office data, it also featured the most extreme drop-off I think in film history at the time of the Friday to Sunday box office, like it was very front-loaded. It took in a heinous amount of money on Friday. And by that Sunday word of mouth that started to get around. And so it was just dropping off fast and it was a movie that, that did really well at the box office, when you stop and think about it. I think it, I think it earned around $350-400 million, but it was all front-loaded. People weren't going back to see it. And the other thing is that -based on the elements that we've discussed- people with kids weren't going to see it. They weren't taking their kids. Jessika: Yeah, you're removing an entire demographic. And not only that, a lot of the times parents don't get the opportunity to go to the movie theater to see these things. So if they're not going as a family, you're also losing those parents as, as part of that demographic. In my opinion, I don't know if that's actually factually based.  Mike: Well, I mean, I don't think you're wrong. Speaking of someone who has step-kids and the other thing is that so many kids with little parents will take their kids to a movie because we just want fucking five minutes of silence and quiet and calm, and we will take those children -depending on what's available- we will take those kids to go see the same movie multiple times. I mean, my mom took me to see the original Ninja turtles movie four times in the theater. And I've since talked to her, uh, having watched it since then it acknowledging it's not nearly as good as I remember it. And I remember when I talked to her about it and I apologized for making her take me to see it so many times the last time she was like, "meh, it was fine. I just sat in the lobby and read a book and wait until you came out. I wasn't worried." Jessika: That's amazing. Can you imagine parents these days doing that?  Mike: Oh my God. I don't want to. CPS would be called on your ass so fast.  Jessika: Yeah, no, it was a different, different time. I sound so old.  Mike: Yeah. The seventies and eighties were that, that golden age of latchkey kids.  Batman Versus Superman came out, it didn't make nearly as much money as they wanted it to. I think it wound up at the, at the worldwide box office making about $200 million less than they expected it to. Meanwhile, Suicide Squad came out and actually overperformed, they sorta evened out. Wonder Woman came out between all these and Justice League, and performed gangbusters business. And then Snyder started to shoot Justice League. So he's shot the principal footage for Justice League and then in March, 2017, he very understandably stepped away from the movie because his daughter committed suicide.  Jessika: Oh, I wasn't aware of this.  Mike:  Yeah. It's one of those things where you have to acknowledge that this happened because the man suffered a horrifying personal tragedy that you would not wish on anyone. And after this happened, Joss Whedon stepped in Zack Snyder apparently actually asked for Joss Whedon to take over. DC and Warner Brothers brought him in. And it was really big news at the time, because this was the guy who had singlehandedly, you know, in fan's eyes unified, the Marvel Cinematic Universe. He had created the Avengers movie. He had then done Age of Ultron, which wasn't as well received, but he was really popular at this point. And people were really enthusiastic about this. In fact, some people were so enthusiastic that it was actually really gross, how a lot of outlets treated it. So a lot of the more fan- oriented websites and outlets were treating this with, with headlines like Zack Snyder is out shall sweeten is in, and they were really trying to frame it as Oh, "DC fired Zack Snyder and brought in Joss Whedon to fix Justice League," which wasn't the case. It was absolutely vital the way that some of those outlets played it, none of the major ones did. In fact, I was doing a search on the web and it's really hard to find those sites with those stories because they got so much backlash that a lot of them got taken down. But I remember it circulating on Twitter, on film Twitter and comics Twitter at the time that it all happened. And it was really gross not to go into too much detail, but it's since been revealed that Whedon fostered a pretty toxic environment on set as did DC's chief creative officer, Geoff Johns. Cyborg actor, Ray Fisher, was really outspoken about this and wound up potentially nuking his film career. This was his first big role and it took a lot of guts for him to come out and not only make the public accusations, but then stick with them for a long period of time. And it wound up creating an investigation which ultimately left him pretty vindicated. Joss, I think has wound up if I remember right, he wound up losing a TV deal with Warner Brothers, you know, and now he is kind of persona non grata. Eight months after he stepped in his version of the movie came out and it was really underwhelming, both in terms of reviews and in box office take, in fact it was the lowest box office take out of the entire DC Extended Universe. Yeah. As opposed to the Avengers, which I think set box office records, I think it was the top grossing domestic movie or  the second top second highest. It was a pretty notable fall from grace. And we'll talk about that later on, especially our issues with the film, but a section of Snyder's fans immediately started to latch onto the idea that there was a director's cut out there. And it was something true to his vision as the grand culmination of the DCEU and that it was just sitting on a shelf somewhere. And Warner Brothers was screwing over their favorite director by not letting his fans experience his vision because they got scared of how brilliant it was or, or something. Um, side note that didn't exist. It wasn't real. Snyder has since acknowledged to Vanity Fair that he had the footage for a director's cut on his laptop, but it didn't have visual effects. It didn't have music, it wasn't refined at all. It was just something that he would show to friends when they were over at his house. So this group of outraged fans started the hashtag "release the Snyder Cut," and it began spreading all over the internet and picking up steam. And eventually even Snyder and the movie star started sharing the hashtag. But the movement was really problematic because of how toxic the campaigns. A lot us champions were Joanna Robinson wrote a really excellent article for Vanity Fair about the campaign noting, and this is a direct quote, "plenty of earnest pleas came with the hashtag, but also vitriol was extreme even for Twitter, including harassment campaigns targeted at critics, HBO Max, Warner Brothers, and its employees. Former DCEU film chief Geoff Johns left the platform entirely after receiving endless Twitter attacks and director James Gunn, who was hired to write and direct a Suicide Squad Sequel for the studio discovered that his new gig came with at least one death threat from a user with a Batman avatar.  Jessika: Not a good luck. Mike: No, the movement from my end, as someone who has no connection to the film industry reminded me a lot of Gamergate, which I had a lot more connection to. Because at the time I was working in the video games industry and I'd come over from the side of being a tech slash games journalist. And it was really worrisome to watch this whole Snyder Cut thing go on, because I had seen a lot of my friends, especially that were women from the parts of the industry that I was involved with, really awfully treated and it really made my stomach turn. And it was really upsetting because at the time my company that I was working for basically told us not to talk about Gamergate. And it was really upsetting. So there was this weird Venn diagram kind of miasma between the two groups and it continued to drive home how toxic nerd culture can be.  Jessika: Yeah. Mike: Anyway.  Jessika: That's why we love all the nerds here. Just however you want to be a nerd, but just don't be mean to others. That's the whole thing you don't need to, you don't need to be mean in your nerdom. It doesn't have to be a contest either. Like you can just like things.  Mike: Yeah. It makes me really sad to watch these really toxic elements, shout the loudest and thus they get the most attention. And most of the nerds that I know are lovely, wonderful people. It just bums me out. And that is an understatement in an extreme regard, but it's just so upsetting to watch this continue to happen over and over again. And it's been really picking up steam over the past decade. We're going to fast forward now to February of last year. So Warner brothers has just announced that they're going to commit another $70 million to letting Zack Snyder complete his vision. And then he's going to release the Snyder Cut exclusively on HBO max, which I can't remember at the time, if it was actually live or not. I think they had three different versions of streaming HBO platforms and then they also had the DC universe. And there was also the AT&T acquisition of Warner Brothers going on at the time. So they were trying to sit there and centralize all these different fandoms into one platform that would pay 15 bucks a month or whatever. So they need exclusive content. And now here we are a year later and the Snyder Cut dropped about four days ago and we both watched it. What was your reaction first of all, to Joss Whedon's version, because I remember you, you watched that recently, right?  Jessika: So not only did I, I love torturing myself. Not only did I watch it the day before I watched the Snyder Cut. I also watched it the day after I watched the Snyder Cut. And I'll tell you why as I was watching the Snyder Cut.  (You lost a bet?)  No. Yeah, I know. Right. It feels like it, um, to myself, maybe I couldn't, I really had to identify. What exactly had been removed from that other, you know, to make the Whedon, the Whedon version of it.  Mike: And I mean, a lot seemed to have been removed.  Jessika: How did it get this diluted?  Mike: Yeah. And I mean like the, the Joss Whedon version was two hours long, you know, as opposed to the four hours that we get with a Snyder Cut. Jessika: Yes. I would say that when I first watched it, it was confusing. It took a while for the narrative to tell the story of the mother boxes. And even then the explanation felt really flimsy. The new Justice League characters felt like they were just sandwiched into the movie to push the plot narrative. And we didn't really get the chance to get invested in their well-being enough to care what ultimately happened to them. In my opinion, we just didn't know enough about them. I mean, I don't kind of, didn't give a fuck about Cyborg at the end of the movie. I'm not going to lie. We didn't get enough of him. And he just seemed like this stoic non- character. He just seemed like a filler. Yeah. He was a red shirt.  Mike: Yeah. Except he didn't die.  Jessika: Except he didn't die, but he was, he could have died and nobody would have cared. Mike: No, no one would have. And I mean, it's funny that you bring up the thing about the mother boxes because when Justice League came out, I was actually really grumpy about the mother boxes because I felt it was again a colossal misunderstanding of a very important piece of DC cannon lore. And I remember I actually wound up texting with Sarah. We'd only been dating for about a month by that point. And I had this whole rant. Talking about how mother boxes are generally these neutral, good things from the comics, from the bonkers, Jack Kirby, New Gods/Fourth World continuity that he created, which is where Darkseid comes from and all that. And largely they're these neutral to kind of neutral, good benevolent self-aware supercomputers that can perform all these tasks. They open up boom tubes, which are how the New Gods get around the universe and everything. They also can repair and heal, and they are defined by this definition of love, where when their user dies, they actually commit suicide. It felt kind of like peak Zack Snyder, where he took a thing that was known in DC comics as a relatively benign creation, defined by love and turning it into a weapon of mass destruction. Jessika: Wow.  Mike: They made it better in this version. I felt.  Jessika: Agreed.  Mike: But I was so angry about it. And I remember texting Sarah about this whole thing. And then I went and saw the movie. I was just so grumpy about that one element for the longest time. I, I have not seen it since it came out in theaters, you know, and at the time it was really remarkable that it looked as cheap as it did considering it had a $300 million budget, which means that now Justice League has cost AT&T 400 million or Warner brothers 400 million to make. I don't... film finances are very weird, but, but ultimately we are looking at a movie that costs 400, almost $400 million to make, not including any of the marketing costs, which are just astronomical at this point. You know, and I, I described it back then as a solid five out of 10 And that rating's kind of slipped over time. Like, I I'd say it's a three or a four now. There there's just, there's so much stuff that didn't make sense. And none of the new characters really felt like characters. Like you said, that said, I will say it looks even a weaker now when you compare it to what just came out and, you know, I, I have my own quibbles about that version of the movie, but it's certainly a lot better than what was released in 2017. Jessika: Yeah. Doing a side-by-side I'm going to have to agree with you on that too.  Mike: Moving into my reactions to the Snyder Cut. I have to say I was pleasantly surprised overall. I really didn't go in expecting much, but this was a much more coherent film that took the time to develop its characters and felt... not a lot, but a bit more faithful to canonical DC lore. Like I told you about the mother boxes, I thought that was a pretty vast misunderstanding. But then in this one, there's the line where Cyborg. It says that they're changed engines. They don't really perceive good or evil. They're all about changing things and it's not great, but I didn't have a problem with that as a comic book fan, that said a pretty big problem with how Snyder's movies are just so violent and Justice League really continued that trend. Jessika: Yeah. Mike: I mean, at the end of the day, these are comic book movies and they have a ton of merchandise marketed towards kids, but none of them are things that I would want to take my kids to that said some of the other DC extended universe, I would totally take the kids to go see, I I've shown my stepson. Shizam it's one of his favorite movies. We've let him watch Wonder Woman. Which you know, you and I have discussed it. It's got its own issues, but it's still a pretty kid friendly movie as opposed to Superman recreating 9/11 on his own or, or Batman terrorizing an entire city for two decades.  Jessika: Yeah.  Mike: Also like, can we talk about how Batman outfits, all of his vehicles with guns, which is just fucking weird. Jessika: That is a very strange choice.  Mike: It continued in this, like we saw Wonder Woman, literally murdering terrorists. I'm still kind of floored at how lazy that scene was, where they're just like, Oh, we don't have any goals to this. These terrorists move into a, I guess, a government building or something like that. I don't know where it was. It was somewhere in there.  Jessika: Not very well explained. Yeah.  Mike: Yeah. Yeah. And then when she sits there and tries to interrogate them with her lasso it's, "we don't have goals. We're just extremists who..." something about resetting Europe back to the middle ages and it's not well explained. And then she just. Drops down and goes completely ham on all of these dudes. And it is not subtle the whole, like she, you see her kick a dude in the wall and there is a very vivid red stain on the wall behind him afterwards. And it's literally in front of a group of school girls.  Jessika: That's exactly it. And I, I feel like with this scene, one of the things that I preferred in this cit over the Whedon version is that at least at the end, she was trying to calm everybody down and they showed that piece of it. That kind of more human piece of you expect Diana to do, but that was completely removed from the first version, that theatrical version of it.  Mike: Yeah, absolutely. And the theatrical version was also going for that PG- 13 rating so that they could be as marketable as possible. And, you know, I guess Diana showcasing her kindness was just deemed something that could hit the chopping room floor in order to get that much more time back. And then they could squeeze in one more showing of the film in the theater for the day. But I mean, this was a recurring theme. Like Superman comes back and then he tries to murder Batman with his heat vision. That was something that wasn't in the, in the Joss Whedon version, but he straight up tries to murder Batman. And as he's doing so the police and the national guard that are there that are trying to contain the situation, get caught in the crossfire and would have straight up died if not for the other members of the League. And then also, you know, Steppenwolf keeps on popping up and going bonkers with his ax and just lopping people in half right and left. Like that scene where he teleports into Atlanta's you see multiple people bisected with that act?  Jessika: Yeah. It's really, really graphic.  Mike: How did you feel about all the exposition? Cause there was a lot of it.  Jessika: It was too much. I mean, I think back to your point about over-correcting this was an overcorrection, you know, we, yeah, we needed a little bit more. We needed slightly more, but it's like, please sir, can I get s'more? And they threw the whole bucket on us and that's not what we asked for. You know, I, I don't know. Maybe some people asked for that. I didn't necessarily need that in my life. It just was such an overabundance of, "Oh, it's this person to tell you what's happening right this second and what's going on." And uh, it's just, ugh.  Mike: It was a fire hose. There wasn't even a bucket.  Jessika: Yeah, I agree. Mike: And I mean, like that was the flip side of the plot being a lot more coherent, but so much of it came in the form of exposition. Like that whole giant battle scene with Apokolips was a lot of fun, but we didn't need constant narration from Diana. Explaining everything that was happening. And then on top of that, the placement of it was so random where she just shows up and Bruce Wayne is working on his plane thing and then she's like, "Oh, and then this happened." And then it's this whole scene that feels incredibly out of place. I don't understand why they didn't pull a Lord of the Rings and just put this all at the beginning.  Jessika: Yeah. Agreed, agreed. It would've made a lot more sense at that point to, you know, bringing it back to if you're trying to make it more coherent. Mike: I mean, this is the way that I felt, but I like to be taken on a narrative ride and we never got that this time around, we were just shown a lot of what happened and then these omniscient narrators were explaining it to us.  Jessika: Yeah. Yeah. I'd agree with that.  Mike: The other thing is that you mentioned that like these new characters were really kind of sandwiched in and the Joss Whedon version. And in this one, they got a lot more screen time and development time. How did you feel about the Flash, Aquaman, and Cyborg and what the movie did with them this time around as opposed to last time? Jessika: So what I wanted out of this, if you're going to keep it in this direction, I think that if you were going to have so many new characters, yes, you absolutely have to explain where they come from, especially for folks who aren't familiar with the DC universe and comics or other, you know, other forms. That being said, I really wish they had done this in a mini series where they could have really focused on "this is what happened with Victor in Cyborg's perspective," and maybe told a portion of the story, or, you know, did you see House on Haunted Hill or Haunting of Hill house? That's what it was. Each  Mike: Yeah.... The Netflix series, right? Yeah. That was really good.  Jessika: And what I liked about that, and I really think they could have done a really good job of doing it this way is each episode they layered in new person's perspective that told you just a little bit more of the story. I feel like this plot line had all of the makings of that and it would have been really cool to see it build up. And I feel like you could have gained a lot of really good fan base excitement around, okay, we're going to show you episode one and then you get a week to talk about it. And then we're going to show you episode two, and then you get a week to talk about it. And I think in the same way that Wandavision had such good presence and such good reaction from the fan base, I feel like in a way there's the potential that there could have been the same thing that being said. When I think of. DC TV shows. I think of the CW, which is not necessarily a good correlation, you know, alternatively, I don't know that I would have necessarily had full faith in the making a TV show because of what they have produced in TV shows in the past, unless you were to make it... I think if you would put Snyder's name on it regardless, you probably could have amplified it to a place where it needed to be, to kind of outgrow that. And actually that maybe would've been a good direction for their TV shows to kind of get a good spotlight into, but what do I know?  Mike: Yeah. Going off on a, on a side tangent, I have generally enjoyed the, the CW shows. I haven't watched all of them, but they're fun. They're disposable Legends of Tomorrow really became a fun experience after it turned into Doctor who, but with superheroes.  You know, the Flash at this point, I think they're on what season seven or something like that. Now I haven't watched for awhile. But something they actually did was during their big crossover, which, you know, you normally don't see in TV shows and they turned it into an annual thing. They did, uh, I think it was Crisis on Infinite Earths. And at the end of it, they actually had Ezra Miller show up in his Snyder Flash costume, and then there's Grant Gustin on the other side, it's really a charming scene where they're sitting there and talking about how much they like each other's costumes. Jessika: Yeah. That's actually really wholesome.  Mike: It actually makes me really happy when I think about that. Yeah. It's really fun. I think the new character is definitely benefited in this version of the movie. I really liked Barry Allen's intro. Actually. I thought it was really solid. We'll get into this because the Snyders' movies are always very male gazey. Women are not really well done as characters in his movies. That said, I thought as her Miller's Flash, was pretty fun. I loved the sequence where he was applying for jobs. And then we see him talking to his dad. And there's the little bit where his dad's like, "you know, where's the, where did this interest in criminal justice come from?" And he goes, "Oh yeah, where did this interest come from? It couldn't be the fact that my dad was committed for murdering my mom, which he didn't do. And I want to prove that he didn't do it." And I was like, that's fine. That's great. The whole Cyborg thing where he's getting the training montage narrated by his dad. I was okay with that too. I thought it was actually really neat when it was showing him wandering through the internet and he looks human and then he winds up helping out that for waitress who is just getting screwed over by the system. Aquaman, I thought was kind of the least interesting character in terms of backstory, because they were trying to do a backdoor pilot basically for his movie that was coming up. And so they have Willem Defoe show up as Volko. And we were like, we don't fucking know who this guy is. The only reason that we know who he is now is because Aquaman has come out since Justice League. And Amber Heard as Mera, which whatever, the less said, the better, but they're sitting there and providing so much exposition about his brother or about his mother and how Mera's using his Tridents and who cares? The only thing that saved this for me was the fact that Aquaman has played by everybody's future ex-husband Jason Mamoa Jessika: Mhm. Never wearing a shirt nor do I want him to. Mike: I will forgive Zack Snyder for so much just for the fact that he gave us so much shirtless Jason Mamoa  Jessika: It's true. That was a heavy pause. You were, I might leave in part of that pause. Cause you were like, you were thinking heavily on it. There was, it was weighted. Mike: I'm not sorry. Jessika: Don't be. Aquaman as the fun, loving the surfer, bro. Was such a great casting decision and direction. I mean, I was so glad that they kept in the bit where he, in that final scene in Russia, he stabs a Parademon and then surfs him through the sky, into a building and then surfs him out of the building and jumps off and does a hair flip. And I was so happy they kept that in.  Mike: I was too, although my one qualm with, with Jason Mamoa and how they, they wrote him, this is such a little nitpicky thing, but there's no way he would have like thrown a glass bottle into the ocean with such reckless lack of care. Like he did. There's no way. And it was in bold cuts. And I was like, come on, Snyder Well, right. That kind of goes back to my earlier point where I used to think that Snyder doesn't understand the major DC characters that he's putting on the film because he pulls shit like that. Or he gives Batman guns or he has Superman try to murder the police or Wonder Woman killing people in front of children, you know, or... well, the flashy actually I felt got pretty good, but it just, it always felt like this thing where I was like, Oh, I think you see these comic book panels that you really like, and then you decide to recreate them on film. And then his brand is a very traditional over the top type of masculinity. Like you look at the movies he's done and they are all super male gazey. Like they are all about women as objects and men as power fantasies. It's not even up for discussion. 300 and Sucker Punch, I think are the two movies I hold up as examples of that. And they're really pretty, but they don't hold up too much scrutiny in terms of depth.  Jessika: Speaking of it, being for the male gaze Barry, I find low key cringey in both films, but like in different ways, which is interesting.  Mike: Right?  Jessika: And the attrical Barry has that really gross moment of falling directly onto Wonder Woman's breasts that was cut out of Snyder's version. And like that's not the characters fault, but it's how it was written. Was it knocked out?  Mike: No. So actually that is a scene that's pretty controversial. Apparently Joss Whedon was recreating a scene from Avengers: Age of Ultron, where Bruce falls onto Natasha, the black widow. You know, he was apparently really bitter about how Age of Ultron was not as well received. So he was kind of just recreating things from Age of Ultron that he thought were going to play really well this time around. This isn't confirmed, but at least a couple of journalists have commented on this, on Twitter at that scene, Gal Gadot refuse to film it. So they had a body double actually do that sequence. Jessika: Okay. Yeah. I know what that actually, the way I'm like thinking of how her head was with, I think her head was to the side. It was. Wow. Wow. Wow. Well that I, that makes me feel a little bit better. Good for you girl. That's, that's amazing that they had this whole infatuation with Barry, this random woman he's just met or he's just kind of run into, we didn't even meet her. Mike: No. And the thing is, you wouldn't know this, but like the thing is that they had announced her casting and all that. So that's supposed to be Iris West, who is the woman that he winds up marrying. And, you know, in comics cannon, they are one of, you know, the, the, the fa- their marriage is one of the foundations of the DC universe. It's like them and Superman and Lois lane, and a couple of others, but Barry Allen and Iris West are one of those really just kind of like permanent foundations of the DC cosmos.  Jessika: Well, then this is a really unfortunate choice and how it was chosen to, I don't know, I get Barry being infatuated and kind of watching after her. And that would have been all well and good. That's whatever you're going to do. My dude, you saw a pretty lady. That's fine, but it was them feeling the need to also make her as she's driving look like in a completely different direction to the side, watching him as well. And somehow that also felt like it contributed to the accident, even though that other guy also had something going on, you know, really coincidentally, you know, it just, it felt really, um, contrived and it felt very gazey in that way. But then also he does that thing where he gets closer instead of just fucking saving her. He has to like brush the fucking hair out of her face and like fucking touch her face. And it just was so gross to me. She didn't have a choice, like, yes, maybe he was helping her, but that doesn't mean you have the right to touch her as well.  Mike: Yeah. And I think if they had taken that one bit out of that scene, I think it would have been perfect because he's this kind of socially awkward weirdo, which I actually really enjoyed because you don't see that a lot. And then there's the whole bit where he grabs the hot dog and then he uses it with the dogs afterwards, which I thought was clever and funny, I thought that was really cute. But the thing is, is everything about this movie, every time they did stuff, I liked, I would then wind up throwing my hands into the air about 10 seconds later because of some weird cringey decision that they did for whatever.  Jessika: That was exactly how I felt. Mike: And that said, other than that one moment where it's like, Hmm, okay. So I knew who that was supposed to be. And I was like, yeah, they're supposed to be, you know, destined to be together. And again, they're trying to set that backdoor pilot information up for Barry Allen and the Flash, which that movie is never fucking happening. It's had so many production problems, but Oh my God, everything else about that scene. That was great. I, I thought one of the coolest things was the bit where he rips out of his shoes because he's moving so fast. I thought that was such a great little touch and  Jessika: exactly.  Mike: I mean, that's something that Zack Snyder does really well is he makes these incredibly visually arresting sequences. And I, I also love the bit where they show, how Barry all he does is he just very lightly touches things because he's moving so fast that if he does anything more than that, it will destroy whatever he's interacting with. And so you saw that initially with the glass window in, and then later on where you see him very gently taking her down, you know, and it's, it's like a tender embrace, which with that setup makes a lot of sense. I really liked that though the whole bit where, where he has to be so gentle with everything, because he's moving so fast that it made sense that he would save Iris in a way that looked almost like a gentle embrace. And that part didn't feel gross.  Jessika: No, exactly. That felt necessary. And to your point, it felt like he was doing what needed to be done so that she was safe in the end. Mike: Yeah. Jessika: Okay. Wait, there was one other Berry thing that I didn't like though. One more. And then I'll and then I'm done with Barry for now. It was so unnecessary and just why there was the point in the movie where Barry's talking to Victor and he goes, so what do you think, do you think Diane is into younger men? It was so unnecessary. And especially after you telling me about this whole Iris business. Okay. If you've already got your eye on someone, why are you trying to get at Wonder Woman?  Mike: No. And again, okay. So this goes back to my earlier point of like, I don't think Zack Snyder understands DC characters. I think he thinks he does and that we don't.  Jessika: Zack, honey.  Mike: You could have cut that scene out. It served no real purpose. It's like, yeah, they're digging up the mother box, whatever who fucking cares. You could have cut that out. And it would have been fine. Barry scamming on Wonder Woman was just kind of an eye-roll moment. And I was like, this is dumb. I will say that overall, I did like Flash, Cyborg and Aquaman. I actually, I really liked the fact that Joe Morton, the guy who played Cyborg's dad, he was on the show Smallville in a recurring role as Professor Hamilton, who was another STAR Labs employee, you know, almost 20 years ago. And I thought that was actually kind of a nice little throwback and overall the moments of levity, I generally, like, I felt like most of them hit pretty well. And a lot of that levity was delivered by Barry or by Aquaman.  Jessika: I would agree.  Mike: And I also have to say it's a really good-looking movie. Like, especially when you compare it to the theatrical version, I wish Zack Snyder would learn to use color a little more. Sarah described it as "we get it, dude. You like to film things in, black."  Jessika: Open his wardrobe. That's all he has.  Mike: What were your favorite things about the movie?  Jessika: Well, I felt like this version definitely felt more narratively succinct. And with the caveat that I agree that it's too much. So, you know, I, I know that I already went through that a little bit, so I won't focus on that too much, but I felt like the boss scenes, there was so much taken away from them because we spent so much time that we had what we're supposed to be, these big, epic battle scenes that felt really diminished because of the rest of the exposition that was kind of taking place around it. Things that I did like, yeah, I did like that the Amazons got a larger and more Epic battle added bonus. My goal Robin Wright was back.  Mike: That was so good. Yeah. All of that was so good.  Jessika: What was such a bummer was that we didn't see the temple fall in that first one. And I, I think that was such a, that was such a big moment then it, I think it meant so much more that there was actual physical destruction. It was such a good representation of the metaphor of them being physically destroyed by the fact that they failed to protect this mother box. This was their one job that temple's one job to protect this. It could not do it. It is gone now.  Mike: I'm actually really excited about the Amazon spinoff movie that they're planning to do. Cause I'm like, yeah, I'm, I'm fine with just two hours of the Amazons being a bunch of bad-asses.  Jessika: Absolutely. Which means could it be possible that this will be a movie completely devoid of men? There's a very good possibility, which just puts my heart a flutter. There are plenty of movies -before everyone gets all uppity- there are plenty of movies with literally no women in them.  Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: You know, let's throw one in our direction. Why not?  Mike: Exactly. I don't know, but I'm really excited about it. It's funny because we still have these movies on the slate, you know, that's coming down the pipeline. And people keep on screaming about how the Snyderverse needs to be restored. The Snyderverse is still here. Wonder Woman is still part of the Snyderverse Shazam is still part of the Snyderverse. But the thing is that the Snyderverse is not actually the Snyderverse. It's the DCEU; Zack Snyder started it, but he's not the person that gets to define what the DCEU is. It's it's Warner Brothers and AT&T ultimately kind of like, you know, how Disney gets to determine, the MCU. What were your biggest problems with the movie? I'm curious,  Jessika: You know, the movie's already so damn long. We did not need those stupid ass post-apocalyptics cenes. Those were stupid. They didn't make it a no, you know, we get it. You want to make another movie. Fuck off and make another movie, but you don't have to show us a half an hour of it in this movie. This is this movie.  Mike: No. And you know that Zack Snyder was really gearing up to make that it's quote "the knightmare sequence" that knight as in K N I G H T. Because of course it is. The fact that he's included both the sequences in his movies, you know that he really wanted to make an entire movie set with that as the backdrop. And this was all the lead-up. Again, these are movies for kids. I don't want to see Superman murder the entire fucking planet because his girlfriend died, which they're like, "Oh no, Lois Lane died and, you know, he's going crazy."  Jessika: Sorry, but Superman is a fucking alien. Who's going to live so much longer than Lois Lane. The very best he can hope for is that she is going to grow old and die in his arms. And I hate to be that way, but it is the truth. And you know, what's more realistic because of his line of work. And her line of work quite frankly, is that she is probably going to lose her life a lot earlier than most people, most healthy white women, let's say yes.  Mike: Yes. And I'm gonna jump in with one of my big problems with a movie, which is, I feel that the Snyderverse does Lois Lane real fucking dirty. She exists to be put in danger and then to be sad about Superman then, I mean, that, that's kind of going back to the whole male gazy thing. It's like women in this movie other than Diana exist to be threatened, which is what happened with the Amazons -even though they got a bad-ass action sequence, it was all about them being used to wipe the floor by Steppenwolf- to be sad, which was the whole dialogue scene between Lois and Martha -which by the way, not even Martha, we'll get to that in a second- or to be put in danger and just saved like, you know, like Iris West and  Barry Allen, or Mira and Aquaman, that whole thing where Aquaman comes in out of the blue and saves her at the last minute from Steppenwolf. Jessika: Hey, going back really quick to the post-apocalyptic stuff, are we to assume now that Brucey boy has some sort of like future vision. What the fuck is that like, he's just some normal ass rich dude.  Mike: It's not explained, but it's really implied that he's suddenly receiving visions of the future for no fucking reason. Jessika: Nah, that's stupid as fuck. Mike:  I don't understand.  Jessika: Come at me, Zack Snyder, that's stupid as fuck.  Mike: It's ridiculous. I am going to say I did like one thing out of that, which was I -ugh-, I mean, like the first episode I talked about how Jared Leto, I was like, Oh God, he looks like the nun on his day off.  Jessika: Um, I mean, no lie.  Mike: The other thing is that in Suicide Squad, his character and acting was just insufferable. I couldn't stand it. And in this one in the two minutes of footage of the Joker that we saw, I actually really enjoyed it. I liked the whole speech that he gave. I liked the bit where he was talking about the losses that Batman had suffered both as a son and as a father, I thought that was great. And the whole bit where he's like, "Oh, so I'm gonna present a truce. It's going to be in the form of this card. And when you want to end it, just tear it up."  And I thought that was such a cool moment and they fucking ruined it again, where Bruce Wayne immediately goes, "well, when Harley Quinn died in my arms, she begged me to kill you. And I will-" and this is what he actually says, "and I will fucking kill you." And I'm like, wuh- I'm out.  Jessika: I hate about that situation. It's like, if you want to off him, you clearly don't have any issues offing people just get rid of him, stop terrorizing him. But I guess that's Batman's MO. He literally told somebody in both versions, I believe I want you to fear me or whatever the fuck he says, he's going for active fear and terrorization. Yeah.  Mike: Yeah. Well, and that kind of ties into what happened right after the knightmare sequence vision, which is Bruce Wayne wakes up. And then we get the most useless, goddamn cameo in the entire movie of the Martian Manhunter, who is portrayed by Harry Lennix. And he has one other scene, which again, going back to my earlier point, Martha Kent, after she leaves Lois's apartment, when they bonded over being sad about Superman being dead turns into the Martian Manhunter and there, I don't remember what the line was that Lois said, it was something about like, well, the world needed Superman or something like that. And then, and then the Martian Manhunter you see him... Martha turns into the green-skinned Martian Manhunter who, by the way, it looks like ass. I'm sorry. I think it's one of the ugliest character designs I've ever seen. And then it turns into Harry Lennix in a military uniform and Harry Lennix has some line of like, well, the world needs you to Ms. Lane.  And then he walks off with no further explanation. And then he shows up at the very end of the movie and delivers a speech about, Oh, well, you know, you handled Darkseid well, but I'll be around. And by the way, you can call me Martian Manhunter.  Jessika: It was a barbershop quartet of exposition for sure. Mike: It's such bullshit. It is, again, it goes back to that thing of like Zack Snyder clearly wanted to do another movie. He was trying to set it up. So he had another movie to use this as a jumping off point from, but Martian Manhunter in this movie, but he's Tuxedo Mask like, well, first of all, he liked delivers all this random exposition, but then it's, it's that Tuxedo Mask meme where he's like," my work here is done" and everyone's like, "but you didn't do anything." He's like, AWAY!" So come at me Zack Snyder fanboys. Martian Manhunter in this movie is Tuxedo Mask.  Jessika: Yeah. Yeah. I didn't love it.  Mike: Let's compare the two. I think it was better than what we got in the theatrical version. There's no question about that.  Jessika: Yeah. Agreed. Agreed.  Mike: I think it was fine. I don't think it was good. It's not something that I'm going to rewatch. It's something that I'm certainly not going to show to any of my kids anytime soon.  Jessika: No.  Mike: It reminds me of this experience I had when I was working as a writer at a game studio where one of the CEOs wound up haranguing me in the lead designer for this digital card game we were working on because the latest expansion we had put out didn't feel epic enough. And that was the thing they kept pushing was they wanted something epic and people like that just don't understand that when your story is epic all the time, people get burnout and they stop caring about it. And the Snyder Cut was just, it was four hours of "epicness."  Jessika: Agreed. I, there was only ramping up. There were no dips or anything to take you on, you know, an interesting narrative journey. There just wasn't anything like that. It was, we are full steam ahead. We are headed in one direction. You are going there, whether you want to or not. It was, it felt very forced.  Mike: Yeah. And I think it's also really tainted because this thing only exists because a conspiracy theory morphed into a harassment campaign. And then AT&T and Warner Brothers wound up caving to it because they were trying to harness that movement and that's not up for debate. It probably won't be the last time we see something like this happen now that it's proven to be a successful formula. And that really fucking sucks. Yeah. Set a precedent for sure. Oh, and Young Justice, the cartoon, season three, does this whole storyline way better go watch that on HBO max. Jessika:  Oh, well there you go then. Shoot. I mean, not that I want to even touch this storyline, like after sitting through arguably eight hours of it in the last couple of days, since I watched the Whedon version twice. Mike: Why, why would you do that to yourself? Like...  Jessika: Because I just, I, I, you know what, here's the full transparency I fell asleep the first time I watched it. So I felt like I couldn't really accurately gauge. And you know what? I felt like I woke up pretty quickly. Like I was watching my brother and he was like, Hey, you know, so he'd like, if he noticed. He'd like, say something, if you see something, say something, my friends, but about people waking up in movies, I'm saying no. So I just, I decided I needed to, like, as I was watching the Snyder Cut, I just couldn't remember was wait a second. Was this in the movie? And I was live tweeting as I was doing it. And then I was like, I'm going to look real stupid if Robin Wright was in this other movie and I'm like saying she wasn't, you know, because I was about to like tweet at Robin Wright? God damn. I wish I had.  Mike: Hey man. She's like a Bay Area native isn't she?  Jessika: Probably. She's amazing.  Mike: Well, I know that she was when she was married to Sean Penn, they've lived right down the road from us. They were down on Fairfax or, or Greenbrae. Yeah, that's a, that's a marriage that I don't envy. Ugh, imagine marrying Sean blech.  Jessika: No, I can't even imagine watching one of his movies right now without pausing it several times.  Mike: Hmm. Do you have any final thoughts? I mean, we've kind of run the gamut, but you know, is there anything else that you want to talk about with the Snyder Cut? Jessika: Well, I would say that, you know, I'm glad I was able to pause it. I did pause it like seven times while I was needed to get like snacks and things. You know, this is not a movie. That I would casually watch. I would not just sit down and be like, Oh, I think I'll watch the Snyder Cut tonight. It is a full ass time commitment. I planned my day out.  Mike: Yeah.  Jessika: Yes. I got to get really baked and watch the Snyder Cut. Here we go. You know, I do want to say two more things in comparison about the films though, in both films, speaking of the male gaze, I could not even count the amount of times the camera was aimed so that it got a shot up Wonder Woman skirt in the bathroom. Mike: I remember the one sequence where she's jumping off that people mover and you see ass cheek.  Jessika: Oh yeah. And it happened several times in the Snyder Cut as well. It's not just that singular time. I would say make it a drinking game, but you may die of alcohol poisoning. So please don't do that.  Mike: Yeah. And I mean, like, you need a couple of cocktails just to get through this movie anyway. Jessika: Yeah.  Mike: Like you said, it's an undertaking.  Jessika: And the other thing is I kind of actually really enjoyed that Steppenwolf had someone to be subservient to when he was actually driven by something other than this ridiculous unknowing desire to get these boxes put together. For some reason that never were explained, you know? So at least it kind of made him feel like he was a kid who was trying to get the approval of his parents.  Mike: Oh yeah. Like during his 3D Zoom calls with, with, with the various members of Apokolips and his court. Yeah.  Jessika: Yeah. Definite Dotty issues. That is for sure.  God. I, I will  Mike: say that I actually appreciated that they gave a little bit more backstory on that because in the movie he shows up in the theatrical version he shows up, there's no explanation about anything. It doesn't make any sense of why is this dude here instead of Darkseid. And then they do the bit where they explained that he's an exile. I thought that was better handled. I do have to say though that no matter how ominous and deep and full of rage, your voice is, the phrase "anti-life" sounds goofy as fuck. And they say that a lot in a lot of deep threatening voices.  Jessika: Especially when it's set out of that funky ass CGI mouth, which they did not do a good job in that second version that was messed up. It was like watching the scorpion King. It was like, I felt like it was maybe not exactly on that level, but it definitely had flat face vibes. Mike: Yeah. Which, I mean, I love the scorpion- or the Mummy Returns, right? That's what you're talking about with, oh, it's a terrible movie, but like, oh, that whole sequence, but the Rock is another of my future ex-husbands and they did him dirty.  Jessika: It was disappointing for something and otherwise lovely movie. Mike:  It's a fun movie. It's dumb as shit. But I remember watching that when it came out in theaters, I saw that movie like three times in the theaters with my friends and the other CGI and the movie is actually really good. And then they have that sequence and I was 20 at the time. And you know, this was what, 2000, 2001, when it came out and all of us were sitting there and we're dumb kids, like just out of high school. And we're like, "that looks like ass." Like we're, we're not connoisseurs of CGI. At that point, we were just like, that looks terrible. That is so bad. It might violate the Geneva Convention. I don't know. I'm not, I'm not a lawyer, but that might be a hate crime.  Jessika: The top half of him swaying, like it, like it's drunk on his scorpion body. Oh, so bad. But the armor, I like the armor better in Snyder's version for Steppenwolf. I thought it was cooler. I liked the way that it kind of moved-  Mike: -it rippled and it had almost like a fur. It would like bristle, like fur, I thought that was cool. Yeah.  Now it's time for us to discuss our Brain Wrinkles, which are those things that are comics or comics adjacent that we just haven't been able to stop thinking about lately. So, Jess, how about you? What's wrinklin' your brain these days?  Jessika: Well, since I've been so DC forward in my life, these tasting notes of mine, I recently saw the Wonder Woman 84 -it was recently released- the Wonder Woman 84 gag reel. And I sent it in your and Sarah's direction. Cause I saw it and I was like, they have to see this. It was hysterical. Not only was it funny, but it showed a side of the characters that I think really is missing from that film. And don't get me wrong. There were absolutely moments of humor overall. It's more serious in nature, especially than the first one when you're looking at them in comparison. And I think that's why I'm such a Marvel fan girl, the Marvel characters to me, just, they seem to present a wider range of human emotions that make them feel more relatable than a lot of the characters in DCEU who just seemed like these kind of stoic, vanilla flavored, putting characters, you know, that you could kind of put them in a mold to be the other character and they might just fit. Mike: I mean, I love the fact that the Marvel movies are a lot of times really funny like Ant-Man and the Wasp is one of my favorite movies. It's arguably my favorite MCU movie. And it's just because it's so fun and funny. Like Scott Lang is a walking dad joke. That's his entire thing. That's a huge part of his character is that he is just, he is trying to be a good dad and he is not afraid to be goofy and weird.  Jessika: Oh, that's so wholesome. I'm getting to those films. I had to stop my, my Marvel universe jaunt in order to jump, you know, face first into the DC world. But I'm coming up for air friends. We are, we're going to get there. So what about you? What's what's been on the brain?  Mike: Um, so last week I wound up watching a TV show called The Watch and it's based on a series called the Discworld, which have you, have you read any of this? The Discworld books?  Jessika: I haven't, no.  Mike: The Discworld books are by a British author named Terry Pratchett. He co-wrote good omens if you saw that on Amazon.  Jessika: I've read that actually. Yeah.  Mike: Yeah. So he co-wrote that with Neil Gaiman, immensely talented, immensely funny writer. His book, he wrote, I think 40 or 41 of these books over about 30 plus years. And they are set in a fantasy world. That's like what Lord of the Rings would have been like if the industrial revolution had happened, where they all start, all the different races start congregating together and together in cities and there's vice and corruption. It's generally pretty funny. A lot of the books are set in the city called Ankh-Morpork where

What happened this week?Another Fitbit step challenge - Allison hates them but continues to join in...why?Cameron's first baseball game of the season. Our Samsung fridge stopped making ice from both ice machines. Allison got to see Mean Girls on stage. Took a trip to Target like a real suburban couple. Perno Pizza Friday is back!Tip of the week - quality mixers3 for 3 topics:Allison - What makes a good marriage? Never ending pasta bowls - do we need that as a society? People that wear Air Pods while not using them - why?Mike - Why don't people want to talk about politics or religion? What age were you when you discovered your favorite band? Can you tell the difference between top shelf and regular liquor?Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/basicsuburbia)

Mike gets to walk the kids to school again, we took a day trip to Orlando to visit cousins, Mike attended a Little League scorekeeper clinic that lasted 90 minutes! Tip of the week - dry shampoo 3 for 3:Allison - Mike's lack of multitasking ability, If you could fly anywhere - where would you go? Do you have an internal dialogue in your head?Mike - Why are Allison's favorite movies about cheating? Why do you bring so many things with you on day trips? Neighborhood jokes about mulch, washing cars, etcSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/basicsuburbia)

When you ask how are you, do you really care? We don't. :) Mike talks about the 10 or 12 Spanish words he learned while working in a cafeteria in college. Rate our show on your podcast app, give us a hand? Mike's first week commuting about 2.5 hours per day, good times. Beach day in Florida. Mike still has sand in his back hair, that's salt life for you.The stupid dishwasher overflowed. Mike had some back pain because he's old. Tip of the week: Amazon/Alexa Groups - play music all over your house.3 for 3: Allison says we don't structure in this area, Mike says she's wrong. Dry January / Veganuary. Kids on leashes. People sharing every thought they have with no regard for manners.Mike: Why doesn't Allison allow relaxation during the day? Fun at the beach - it's OK for people to dress nearly nude but only at the beach. Does Allison like to read about politics?Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/basicsuburbia)

RHOA PREMIERE WATCH NOTES Act One Kenya has a baby. Kenya: “It can only be one turn up queen in this house.” Now they’re showing Kenya be nasty to everyone…?  Kenya splitting from her husband.. I mean we saw this coming. Any time someone gets married all hush hush you know it’s not going to go well. People you need to date for YEARS before you get married. Kenya calls Marc: All circuits are busy. Please call again later. What?? That can still happen?  Cut over to Porsha whose baby is crying and it’s raining outside. Then there’s this dramatic package of Porsha’s relationship with Dennis. They’re really pushing hard how opposite she and Kenya are. They argued about ‘something that was on his phone.’ If we’re in a position where we’re goign through each other’s phones…… Tasha K says that it’s a woman named Sincerely that hooked up with Dennis. I love these ‘other woman’ names. Faith over on Vanderpump, Sincerely in Atlanta…  Act two Kandi calls her surrogate mom. Ok guys what planet do i live on? I had no idea this was happening! First three scenes are about babies…. This doesn’t feel like it’s for me….  Now Eva is pregnant again. Guys I can’t. There are as many pregnant women on this show as there are franchises airing right now. Some part of me is like… is this the same pregnancy from last year?  Eva orders 4 deviled eggs, octopus, and cheeseburgers. Such a gross combination!  Eva: Last year I was the victim of disgusting rumors. Victim…? Really?  Here comes Cynthia… Guys, Cynthia is nice but she’s so boring. Mike Hill is even more boring. I don’t need to see these two on this show. I need them to get married and retire to a farm.  There is nothing I like less than a housewife DESPERATE to get married. It’s unbecoming. They’re too good for that! In her case it’s not like she wants to have a baby so I don’t get what the rush is. I feel like it’s a bit of that Luann thing where they just want to say i’m engaged and have a wedding.  Act three Wait… Baily Wine Cellar actually happened?  Kenya: Have you had a lot of customers yet? Cynthia: uhhh welllll….  So Cynthia opened this random ass wine shop and then basically skips town to hang out with Mike? Why not just focus on building this up first…? What is the big deal about mike hill?! Kenya wants to do a barbie themed party.  OH yes, I forgot Kenya showed up at the launch party in the finale and said “I’m supposed to not know Kenya was coming.”  That was so great.  Cynthia is disappointed by her friendship with Nene. Why does ANYONE expect anything from nene?? She is the actual worst.  Kenya and Cynthia discuss Dennis and Porsha… SO we go from Porsha telling us she wants her mom and her sister to know the bare minimum about dennis, to Cynthia shoving cookies in her mouth saying she read about dennis and drugs and beastiality. Wellll guess her family knows now!  I love that Kenya goes after Cynthia for being thirsty to get engaged because honestly who cares. Why are we chasing things we’ve already experienced?  Lauren and Miss Diane come over to Porsha’s. I feel for Lauren. Her life is all about Porsha.  I really do feel for Porsha… but did anything think that guy was any good??  ACT FOUR Eva Kandi and Cynthia get lunch.  I love how annoyed Kandi gets with Cynthia adding chill to everything. These women have to find Cynthia super boring and annoying, right?  OMG SINCERELY SENT KANDI A DRINK!!! Sincerely is here!! These producers are shadyyyyy. She comes over and is like “Hey what’s up! Can I sit down??”  HOLD ON. Sincerely sits down and says that she is the alleged mistress and these women are SHOCKED. There is no way they didnt know!! Having said that, they’re really selling that they didn’t know… i mean this is a bit too produced for my liking. She just happens to be at this random ass lunch spot?  They re-show us Tasha’ blog and they show these ‘headlines’ over her face. They were trying to go for this citizen kane moment of headlines rolling by and its literally like 3 headlines in courier font from the comments section of one article.  Sincerely: “I have a feeling it has to do with a vindictive hateful ex of his.” Ok who wrote this scene? And by the way they cut to Eva and of the three she is the LEAST convincing as far as this being a ‘surprise.’  Cynthia: I appreciate you coming over and sharing this with us. WHAT IS HAPPENING?!!? No!! This is weird!! Sincerely should deal with it herself! In this day and age, there are a million ways to reach out to someone. It’s not like you have to go knock on her door!  I died. Sincerely: “Thank you guys enjoy your meal!” Eva: “ugh, PLEASURE!!!” so fake!! This scene has taught us two things: 1) Kandi and Cynthia are amazing actresses. Eva is not. 2) Kandi and Cynthia are fake. Eva is not.  Kandi: I forgot where I know her from…. NO WHERE KANDI!!!  Kandi doesn’t want to say anythign to porsha because of last year. There’s a difference between tellign someone ‘your boyfriend is a cheater’ vs ‘the woman who you thought was the mistress isnt.’  It’s true though, Porsha CHOSE to ignore everything last season.  Kandi notes that Porsha doesn’t follow him on social media anymore. Now how does she know that??? Kandi is getting messy now.  ACT FIVE Act 5 and no Nene. She is not missed.  Cynthia arrives as Thirsty Bride barbie. I mean she isn’t wrong… Cynthia CLINGS to her one story line and just makes everything about that. Like when she turned 50 and did that 50cynth nonsense.  So on the step and repeat thing the have the barbie box but the plastic is so shiny and reflective that they have to stand behind. I bet those pictures are terrible.  Porsha arrives as Holiday Barbie. It’s nice to see that even when things aren’t going well she still goes over the top.  It’s fascinating that it took the two women becoming mothers to put their guard down.  Kenya: marc would have a fit if another man held his baby. WELLLL its gonna happen if you’ren ot around MARC!!  Eva not bringing her kids because of Kenya… relax. The only person that physically attacks people are Nene and Porsha. Porsha has moved on from that and Nene is MIA… Eva is so extra.  This party is cute but there are too many children.  Kenya and Porsha talk about their budding friendship. A great chance to revisit bye Ashey.  Porsha: “It takes a lot of energy to be mad at a bitch for years.”  ACT SIX Ooooh boyy, Porsha telling Kenya that Eva was afraid to bring her kids around her. I like that they’re both still messy even though they’re being positive with each other.  Kenya brings the story to Porsha about Sincerely.  Porsha says of course she was at Kandi’s restaurant. It’s trueeee. Kenya introduces the story but then brings the girls into the room.  Porsha tells us it was someone else that Dennis hooked up with but she’s too embarrassed to talk about it.  SEASON TRAILER Ummm mike is going to propose in front of a bunch of other people…? 

AcaGeekz 02 – “One Man Vocal Band” AcaGeekz is available on Apple Podcast and Stitcher!  If you like what you hear, please leave a 5-star rating and review and help support the show! Welcome!  This week, we’re celebrating the first month of the year with an episode all about the One Man Vocal Band!  I know there are plenty of ladies who do solo a cappella, and I intend to give them their own episode in the future.  I Hope you enjoy the special little bonus at the end! It’s my hope that AcaGeekz will introduce the casual listener and the hardcore a cappella fan alike to some groups and styles they’ve never heard before.  Whether it be Barbershop, collegiate, doo wop, high school, choral, jazz, funk, pop, rock, or classical, there’s something for everyone! It’s time to give the tracks for this episode their due credit.  So here they are, the tracks for AcaGeekz “One Man Vocal Band”! Apple Podcast and Stitcher Promo: Song Title: “Can’t Sleep Love” Artist: Pentatonix Album: Pentatonix (Deluxe) (2015) Website: www.ptxofficial.com You can purchase Pentatonix (Deluxe) by Pentatonix at: http://www.ptxofficial.com INTRO: Song Title: “Paul” Artist: Paul Cingolani from +4db Album: +4db (2000) Website: N/A You can purchase +4db by +4db at: http://www.amazon.com/4db-Plus-Four-db/dp/B0001WW2KI SONG #1: Song Title: “Moneyman” Artist: Scott Leonard Album: 1man1mike (2008) Website: www.rockapella.com You can purchase 1man1mike by Scott Leonard at: https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/1man1mike/511893372 SONG #2: Song Title: “Papercut” Artist: Corey Slutsky Album: Lucky Oysters EP (2013) Website: www.voicesonlyacappella.com You can purchase Lucky Oysters EP by Corey Slutsky at: https://www.amazon.com/Lucky-Oysters-Corey-Slutsky/dp/B009XY5Y3C SONG #3: Song Title: “Animal” Artist: Mike Why Album: Run My Mouth (2014) Website: N/A You can purchase Run My Mouth by Mike Why at: https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/run-my-mouth-ep/1110190649 SONG #4: Song Title: “Person” Artist: Sean Altman Album: SeanDEMOnium (1997) Website: www.seanaltman.com You can purchase SeanDEMOnium by Sean Altman at: http://www.seanaltman.com SONG #5: Song Title: “Hodja” Artist: Todd Rundgren Album: A Cappella (1985) Website: www.todd-rundgren.com You can purchase A Cappella by Todd Rundgren at: https://www.amazon.com/Cappella-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B00000348M SONG #6: Song Title: “Mere Words” Artist: Bobby McFerrin Album: Bang Zoom (1995) Website: www.bobbymcferrin.com You can purchase Bang Zoom by Bobby McFerrin at: https://www.amazon.com/Bang-Zoom-Bobby-McFerrin/dp/B000005GZ6 SONG #7: Song Title: “When You Go” Artist: Jonathan Coulton Album: Thing A Week Three (2006) Website: www.jonathancoulton.com You can purchase Thing A Week Three by Jonathan Coulton at: http://www.jonathancoulton.com SONG #8: Song Title: “Never Enough” Artist: Peter Hollens Album: The Greatest Showman A Cappella (2018) Website: http://peterhollens.com You can purchase The Greatest Showman A Cappella by Peter Hollens at: http://peterhollens.com SONG #9: Song Title: “Mothership” Artist: Kid Beyond Album: Amplivate (2006) Website: www.kidbeyond.com You can purchase Amplivate by Kid Beyond at: https://www.amazon.com/Amplivate-Kid-Beyond/dp/B000G8PK60 OUTRO: Song Title: “Spat” Artist: Dave Baumgartner (from Almost Recess) Album: Number 2 (2007) Website: www.almostrecess.com You can purchase Number 2 by Almost Recess at: http://www.amazon.com/Number-2-Almost-Recess/dp/B00104B3T2 SONG #10: Song Title: “A Quote In Song” Artist: Sean P. Gorecki Album: N/A Website: N/A   Thank you for listening to this brand new episode, and please come back next week for another brand new episode!  So be sure to subscribe for more great content!  And if you like what you hear, please leave a 5-star rating and review to help support the show! Follow on Twitter @AcaGeekz . If you’d like your group to be featured on a future episode, contact me by e-mail at: acageekz@gmail.com I’ll See you next week! ~Sean~

In Episode 18 of Breaking Walls, we sit down with comic book artist and freelance illustrator Mike Freiheit for a conversation about using crowd-funding to finance creative endeavors. Mike has successfully funded two separate kickstarter campaigns, which has helped him publish Vol 1 & 2 of "Monkey Chef," a comic book centered around Mike's experience as a monkey chef in South Africa. Highlights • How going to college in NYC shaped Mike • Why it's difficult to find work as an illustrator in today's job market • How Mike came to experience life as a monkey chef in South Africa • Details on his experience • Why he decided to publish a comic book series on his adventures • The importance of being vulnerable and why Mike views vulnerability as a strength • Thoughts on how to approach people to ask them for money • Important tips to use when creating a crowd-funding campaign • What's next for Mike Mike's website: http://www.mikefreiheit.com Mike's site store: http://www.mikefreiheit.com/store/ Follow The WallBreakers on soundcloud: @TheWallBreakers Subscribe to Breaking Walls on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-wallbreakers/id924086880?mt=2

Have we mentioned Dan's going to be a grandpa?Soup Smorgasbord?Mail Bag:One from Mike: Why we like children.One from Becky: Blonde jokes.Two from Earl:1) Suggests a new segment on the show "To F-ing bad"?2) Commentary on a Leonard Pitts article.One from Peter: Trading bibles for porn in San Antonio.The Rest of the Show:1) Iran's Ahmadinejad calls Sept 11 big fabrication.2) Toyota moves past apologies, aims for sales. To early?3) ACORN workers cleared in New York City prostitute video.4) Pennsylvania man dies during storm when 911 calls unheeded.

The FCC 700 MHz Spectrum AuctionIntro: In this podcast we discuss the in-progress FCC 700 MHz spectrum auction.Gordon: Mike, you are the reigning Global Wireless Education Consortium Educator of the year so you know about this stuff - what exactly is this spectrum the FCC is auctioning and where did it come from?Back in 2005 Congress passed a law that requires all U.S. TV stations to convert to all digital broadcasts and give up analog spectrum in the 700 MHz frequency band. This law will free up 62 MHz of spectrum in the 700 MHz band and effectively eliminate channels between 52 and 69. This conversion, which has a deadline of February 18, 2009, has freed up spectrum that is being split up by the FCC into five blocks.Gordon: What so interesting about this block of spectrum?Cell coverage, required cell-site density and cost (total network cost and cost per customer).I understand each spectrum block in the 700 MHz auction, except for the national public safely D-Block, has been assigned an area designation by the FCC. Could you describe those areas included in the 700 MHz auction using FCC definitions.Economic AreasBoth the A-Block (12 MHz) and the E-Block (6 MHz) are being auctioned using the Economic Area (BEA) service areas established by the Regional Economic Analysis Division, Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. Department of Commerce. Included are Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa and the Gulf of Mexico. There are a total of 176 Economic Area service areas designated by the FCC.BEA services include General Wireless Communications Service (GWCS), Specialized Mobile Radio (SMR) and Location and Monitoring Service (LMS). Cellular Market AreasThe B-Block (12 MHz) is being auctioned using the Cellular Market Area (CMA) service areas. The 734 CMAs are broken down as follows: Areas 1-305: Created from the Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) defined by the Office of Management and Budget (1-305) Area 306: The Gulf of MexicoAreas 307-734: Rural Service Areas (RSAs) established by the FCC which do not cross state borders including parts of Puerto Rico not already in an MSA (723-729), U.S. Virgin Islands (730-731), Guam (732), American Samoa (733), and Northern Mariana Islands (734).CMA Services include Cellular Radiotelephone Service and Interactive Video and Data Service (IVDS) Regional Economic Areas The C-Block (22 MHz) is being auctioned using the 12 Regional Economic Areas (REAs) created by the FCC. The REAs are an aggregation of the 52 Major Economic Areas (MEAs) defined by the FCC. REA Services include Wireless Communications Service (WCS)All FCC areas, along with names, county lists, maps and map info data can be found on the Commission's website linked here. Mike: How is the auction being conducted? On their website, the Federal Communications Commission has  a public notice titled Auction of 700 MHZ Band Licenses. This document describes the bidding procedure for the 214 companies that have qualified for the auction, which will be handled by the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau (WTB). The WTB is one of seven FCC Bureaus and is responsible for all FCC domestic wireless telecommunications programs and policies.Here's a summary outline of the procedure pulled from the 12 page FCC document: Bidding in Auction 73 started on Thursday, January 24, 2008.Each qualified bidder received prior to January 24: At least two RSA SecurID tokens An Integrated Spectrum Auction System (ISAS) Bidder’s Guide A FCC Auction Bidder Line phone number The FCC will conduct the auction over the Internet and telephonic bidding will also be available. In either case, each authorized bidder must have his or her own SecurID token. There will be a minimum opening bid amount for each license and package and the minimum opening bid amount is subject to reduction at the discretion of the WTB. The WTB will not entertain requests to lower minimum opening bid amounts. The WTB has established the following block-specific aggregate reserve prices for Auction 73: Block A, $1.807380 billion;Block B, $1.374426 billion;Block C, $4.637854 billion;Block D, $1.330000 billion;Block E, $0.903690 billion. Mike: It's interesting the range of reserve prices - is it safe to say that these correlate to the "value" the FCC sees with each?If, at the close of bidding in Auction 73, the aggregate reserve price for the A, B, C and/or E Blocks has not been met, the WTB will issue an announcement that bidding in Auction 73 is closed and set a date for commencement of Auction 76. Round results will be available approximately 10 minutes after the close of each round. and two types of reports will be available to bidders: (a) publicly available information, and (b) bidder-specific information available only to that bidder when logged in to the FCC Auction System. Each qualified bidder will have a default watchlist that contains every license and packages of licenses selected on the bidder’s short-form application. Qualified bidders may also create custom watchlists. On Tuesday, January 22, the WTB conducted a mock auction, which will allow qualified bidders to familiarize themselves with the FCC Auction System. Only qualified bidders will be permitted to participate in the mock auction. Once winning bids are announced (either after Auction 73 or Auction 76) and winning bidders are announced, winning bidders will have 10 business days to file a long-form application (FCC Form 601) and make down payments for all of the licenses it won. Mike: Who are some of the major bidders? USA Today has published an interesting article titled Google could cause a stir in FCC's airwaves auction and, in the article, some of the leading bidders and their likely strategies are listed.Let's take a quick look at some of the major bidders (in alphabetical order) and their expected bidding strategies. For additional detail be sure to read the USA Today Article.AT&T AT&T already has more spectrum than any other carrier so bidding on the 700 MHz band will be used for further build-out. Many experts are speculating AT&T will focus primarily on the D-Block public-safety spectrum.Mike: Why is AT&T going after public-safety spectrum? Am I missing something?Cablevision, Cox, Advance/Newhouse, BresnanThese cable companies are interested in spectrum to provide wireless services and compete with the large providers. Most experts believe they will be bidding on A-Block regional licenses in their service areas.EchoStarEchoStar is a satellite TV provider that is interested in using spectrum to provide wireless broadband access to its customers. Most experts do not feel EchoStar has the money to compete with companies like Google, At&T and Verizon in the auction.GoogleGoogle is the heavyweight here. The company wants to further expand into the cellular smartphone market and has the money to compete with the big providers. The company is expected to bid the $4.6 Billion minimum for the C-Block spectrum.Mike: Is this National Spectrum? As opposed to regional?Leap, MetroPCS,, AlltelLike the cable companies (Cablevision, Cox, etc), these regional wireless companies will likely be bidding on A-Block regional licenses in their service areas. Experts also are speculating Alltel will bid on the public safety D-Block spectrum.Paul Allen and VulcanPaul Allen's (co-founder of Microsoft with Bill Gates) investment company, Vulcan, already owns spectrum in Washington and Oregon.Vulcan may be bidding on some of the C-Block regional licenses or smaller A or B-Block regional licenses.QualcommThe California based wireless manufacturer is looking for spectrum for its MediaFlo smartphone video service. Qualcomm will likely be bidding on E-Block regional licenses.VerizonVerizon will likely be bidding big on C-Block spectrum with plans to open their network to any (hardware and software) devices.Mike: Can you give us some background on the auction to date?The 26th round finished yesterday (Friday - Feb. 1, 2008) afternoon - here's a quick update from the FCC auction site: Bidding Rounds to Date: 26Bid totals to Date: $18,554,080,600The A and B-Blocks have been getting most of the attention lately:The Los Angeles A-Block leads the A's with a current bid of $580,268,000.The Chicago B-Block leads the B's with a current bid of $892,400,000. There has not been a C-Block bid since it passed the FCC reserve price on Thursday. The current C-Block bid is $4,713,823,000.The public safety D-Block has not had a bid in 25 consecutive rounds and is stuck at $472,042,000, well below the $1.3 Billion reserve price set by the FCC.E-Block bidding has been slow with the New York City E-Block leading at $178,897,000.23 licenses had not registered a bid at the end of round 26, 19 of these 23 are in the E-Block. Mike: Any personal observations and opinions on the auction?It looks (to me anyways) like the C-Block bidding may be done. Since the FCC reserve price of $4.6 Billion has been passed, the open-access that Google wanted is assured. We won't know who the winning bidders are until after the auctions have closed but I'd say Google is the current leading C-Block bidder.Right now it does not look like the D-Block will meet the $1.3 Billion reserve price and will end up being re-auctioned by the FCC.A number of E-Block licenses will not meet minimum bids and will also be re-auctioned.The FCC had set an original goal of $10 Billion for the auction. With current bids totaling over $18 Billion, it appears the auction (from the FCC's perspective) will be a success. Bidding is closed for the weekend with round 27 starting Monday (Feb. 4, 2008) morning.Mike: What's the best way to stay updated?If you want to stay updated - the FCC Auction 73: 700 MHz Auction Summary page lists, among other things, results of the auction after each round. You can also watch my blog!Mike: When will we know the winners?The auction will likely last a couple of months so we won't know the winners until then. We should start to see products from the winning bidders that use the spectrum sometime next year.

Short introduction:  Today we’re here with Kim Grady. Kim is the  Founding Director and PI for the NetWorks, an NSF online digital  resource center. MATEC NETWORKS is one of 3 ATE manufacturing and  engineering technology centers that offer a collection of resources  online. NETEC, MERC Online, are the other centers. MATEC NETWORKS is  part of MATEC and located in Tempe, Arizona.Gordon: Kim, what exactly is a digital library?Well, our digital library is a convenient and easy way to locate  valuable resources for teaching and learning. It's also a way to  share self-created and favorite classroom ready resources.Mike: Why another digital library, what is the need and mission and  vision?Believe me, being an advocate of not reinventing the wheel, I asked  myself that question many times. What I have come to realize is that  NetWorks and the other online resource centers that are part of the  NSF ATE program are working together to "Beat Google." We are  aggregators of resources in our technology areas. Not only that we  have criteria for the resources that make it into our collections.  How many times have you been disappointed in search results on the  WWW? Either there is just too many to sift through or they are not  the quality or type that you need. With NetWorks you get the  resources you need for instruction. That's why we think we can be a  time-saving tool.Gordon: What types of material do you collect?Well, we focus on material in the Semiconductors, Automated  Manufacturing, and Electronics technology area so you will see  resources that relate to the science of semiconductor processing,  instrumentation and controllers used in automation environments, and  tons of electronics and electricity resources. You heard me use the  term, classroom ready earlier. Classroom ready means it is easily  implementable into a class or training room. You won't find a lot of  research papers for example on our site. We search for and create  material that can be used in an engaging presentation, a lab write  up, or a student activity. We also believe that material that help  faculty learn fits our definition of classroom ready so you will also  see things like reports on emerging technology and tutorials on hot  topics such as rapid prototyping.Mike: How do you build your collection, what programs do you have in  place and what results have you seen so far?Our NetWork and relationships, NetWorks staff of industry and  marketing professionals seek out resources using tools of their trade.Our National Externship Program allows faculty to gain knowledge and  skills in emerging technology areas that can be brought back in to  the classroom and disseminated through NetWorks. To learn more about  the National Externship Program, log on to matecnetworks.org