The ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ Watch-Along!

Summary

The Big Picture: "The ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’ Watch-Along!"

Podcast Date: December 3, 2025
Host: Sean Fennessey
Co-hosts: Amanda Dobbins, Chris Ryan ("CR")

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Overview

In this special "watch-along" episode, Sean, Amanda, and Chris gather to experience James Cameron's Avatar: The Way of Water in preparation for the release of its sequel, Avatar: Fire and Ash. Chris notably has never seen the first Avatar in full, which shapes the trio’s blend of recap, critique, and playful ribbing. The hosts discuss the spectacle, cultural impact, technology, storytelling, and underlying themes of the Avatar universe, interweaving personal anecdotes and cultural asides for a uniquely immersive—and often digressive—movie-watching experience.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Cultural and Franchise Context

• Why this episode now?
  • The upcoming release of Avatar: Fire and Ash motivates a rewatch and encapsulated review of the previous film.
  • Chris has not seen either Avatar movie, offering a new-to-the-lore perspective throughout the commentary ([01:26]).
• Disney's Acquisition of Fox
  • Early banter covers Disney’s purchase of 20th Century Fox (now 20th Century Studios).
    • Chris Ryan: "20th Century Fox, one of Disney's great acquisitions."
    • Amanda Dobbins: "By the time The Way of Water was released in 2022... I think it’s been a net positive for Disney." ([03:29])
• Status of the Franchise
  • The hosts question if the continuation will (or should) reach the planned fourth and fifth installments, expressing skepticism about sustained audience interest ([190:10]).

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2. Avatar Lore & Story Recap

• Pandora: Planet or Moon?

  • Amanda Dobbins clarifies: "Pandora... it identified as a moon in Zack Baron's GQ profile of James Cameron. That shit goes through the Condé Nast fact checkers..." ([04:21])

• Summarizing the First Movie

  • Sean and Amanda walk Chris through the core backstory of Jake Sully, the avatar project, unobtainium, the concept of the Na'Vi, and human exploitation of Pandora's resources ([06:54], [09:01]).

• Simple yet Complicated

  • Sean Fennessey: "This is simultaneously the simplest movie of all time and the most complicated movie of all time... There's a tremendous amount of lore." ([07:47])
  • Amanda Dobbins: "The genius of James Cameron." ([07:54])

• Way of Water’s Core Arc

  • Emphasized as a family story, shifting away from the overt allegory of the first film to focus on Jake’s growth as a father in a hybrid family and the societal tension between the Na'Vi tribes and incoming human threats ([08:02]).

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3. Technology, Production, and Visual Effects

• 3D and Visual Realism

  • Sean Fennessey passionately defends the necessity of 3D for Cameron’s vision: "I was like, this is flat. This does not feel immersive... When I’m watching it [at home], it does... It’s hard to argue with what you're saying... but in this environment, it feels like I'm being transported into the world." ([19:12])

  • Amanda Dobbins is more skeptical about watching at home: "Just looks like a video game to me." ([18:42])

• Motion Capture vs. Generative AI

  • They discuss Cameron’s public stance and behind-the-scenes featurettes that emphasize human-led performance capture over generative AI, conveying both technical awe and a touch of skepticism ([14:00], [15:45]).
  • Sean Fennessey: “It was kind of an anti-generative AI explanation, but also showing the ways in which motion capture performance is so critical to these movies. So when you're watching Quaritch... that’s Lang giving the performance.” ([14:14])

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4. Thematic and Narrative Analysis

• Militarism and Environmentalism

  • The movie’s ambivalence toward military technology is dissected:
    • Sean Fennessey: "Heavy artillery is sick. And this is one of James Cameron's fascinations and also one of yours, CR." ([09:35])

• Assimilation and Difference

  • The hosts discuss Avatar’s preoccupation with blending cultures, the pain of assimilation, and cross-cultural connection, especially as the Sully family seeks out the “water Na’Vi.”
    • Sean Fennessey: "A lot of these movies are about assimilation... it's a real feel it kind of movie." ([54:49])

• Family and Loss

  • Centrality of parenthood, particularly Jake’s difficulty reconciling human and Na'Vi responsibilities and grief over the loss of a child in the latter acts.
    • Amanda Dobbins: "This is a movie about fathers in a lot of ways." ([52:42])
    • Sean Fennessey: "You relate." ([143:57])
    • Chris Ryan: “This is a lot like lioness... when she has to order in a drone strike on her own operative.” ([159:17])

• Spectacle vs. Emotional Resonance

  • The episode interrogates whether the films have lasting impact beyond technical achievement:
    • Chris Ryan: "Do you think that the narrative that these movies don't have a cultural impact... has just happened to stick, or do you think there's any truth to that?"
    • Sean Fennessey replies with depth: “…they are best experienced in theaters. People see them in theaters. They’re a ride... They're not super rewatchable. They're very adult films. They're more or less R-rated action movies..." ([22:49], [145:44])

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5. Memorable Quotes and Moments (with Timestamps)

• On Cameron’s Confidence
  • Amanda Dobbins reading a Cameron quote:
    "I think this movie is going to make all the fucking money. And when it does, it's going to be too late for you to love the film. The time for you to love the movie is today..." ([42:11])
• Comic Relief & Meta Energy
  • Sean Fennessey: “I am your Michael Clayton, no question about it. But I do not want to spend any social time with you.” ([33:42])
• Amanda's Yogurt Digression
  • Arguably the podcast’s MVP tangent: "This is the best fucking yogurt I've ever had in my Life..." ([28:17], [29:40])
• On Avatar Technology
  • Sean Fennessey: "This is a digital environment, and he's shooting it through with this prismatic light... this stuff is so much... so far beyond basically any Marvel movie that you watch..." ([45:02])
• On Sincerity in Blockbusters
  • Sean Fennessey: "It’s not all lioness 'I want to masturbate to Zoe Saldana' stuff. It can’t be all that. It can’t be this post-ironic way... What about being like, fuck parents and their kids? This is deep shit." ([183:48])

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6. Notable Segments & Timestamps

• 00:43–04:10
  • Setup, humor about Disney/Fox acquisition, and Chris’s status as an Avatar newbie.
• 4:21–8:01
  • Pandora lore, framing of Avatar films’ tone.
• 14:00–15:45
  • Discussion of motion capture tech and the anti-generative AI stance.
• 18:42–20:01
  • Debate on the value of seeing Avatar in 3D vs. at home.
• 42:11
  • Amanda reads Cameron’s “all the money” quote.
• 52:10–54:49
  • Transition to “water Na’Vi,” first major cultural/visual shift.
• 85:11–86:15
  • Introduction/bonding with Pyakan the Whale; highlight of emotional and technical achievement.
• 109:02–110:12
  • Detailed breakdown of the whale hunting sequence and its emotional fallout.
• 143:13–144:52
  • Sean and Amanda reflect on the film’s thematic ambition versus its storytelling simplicity.
• 159:13–161:44
  • Parental grief, emotional impact of the loss of a child.
• 194:22–194:55
  • Reflection on the structure of Way of Water and its sequel’s repetition.

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7. In-Jokes & Podcast “Looseness”

The group is not above frequent tangents—on yogurt, sleep positions, sports, fantasy football, holiday traditions, existentialism, and more—which give the episode its signature tone and rapport. Listeners are invited to both laugh with and be exasperated by the hosts’ affectionate chaos.

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Bottom Line: Would They Recommend?

• Sean: Enthusiastically defends both the spectacle and emotion of Cameron’s Avatar movies, especially as big-screen, all-in experiences.
• Amanda: Offers a balance of appreciation for the craft and skepticism about narrative power and cultural stickiness, but finds things to like (especially Pyakan the whale).
• Chris: Remains the witty cynic, acknowledging some wow moments but unconvinced overall by Avatar as his flavor of blockbuster spectacle.

Closing Thoughts

Avatar: The Way of Water is praised for:

• Immersive, unprecedented visuals and technical achievement—especially in 3D.
• Rich (if sometimes overwhelming) world-building.
• Attempt at sincere, big-hearted blockbuster storytelling in a risk-averse era.

Yet, the hosts note:

• The film—and franchise—may lack the generational, pop-cultural resonance of other sagas.
• Sequel fatigue and diminishing returns seem likely.

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For Newcomers

This episode’s blend of plot recap, context, camaderie, and irreverence is ideal if:

• You’ve forgotten the details of Avatar but want to catch up for the sequel.
• You enjoy honest, heartfelt yet unscripted movie talk.
• You’re curious where Avatar sits in the pantheon of sci-fi/fantasy blockbusters.

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Notable Quotes

• Sean (on Cameron’s work ethic):
  "When you look at the amount of work that goes into these movies, you can’t say that these are being done for money. These movies are insane." ([111:24])
• Amanda (on the emotional center):
  "This is a movie about fathers in a lot of ways..." ([52:42])
• Chris (on spectacle):
  "This last hour has been a little more engaging... this is more up my alley." ([165:24])
• Sean (summative reflection):
  "I brought my whole heart to this podcast... my whole life is getting invested in stories." ([197:26])

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Stay tuned for their Top 5 Films of 2025 episode, and, per Sean: "Letting someone take us away on a journey—that’s what it’s all about."

Transcript

[Amanda Davis]

This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Like an action blockbuster, the holidays move quick. But with prime fast. Free delivery means those last minute gifts arrive right when you need them. Last year, while watching Singin in the Rain with my son, I realized a pair of tap shoes would be a perfect Christmas gift. And I had them under the tree for him on Christmas day. Prime's fast shipping is always there for you during the holidays, especially when it's last minute and just can't wait. Last minute holiday magic. It's on Prime. Head to Amazon.comprime to shop now.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm Sean Fedisy.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm Amanda Davis and this is the.

[Sean Fennessey]

Big picture at Conversation show at the Way of water. Yes, CR is here. It has been 616 days since our last watch along podcast when we bravely embarked on all 189 minutes of Babylon last March. Do you remember that, Chris?

[Chris Ryan]

Of course I do.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

That episode was not filmed for video. And this episode is being filmed for video. We're gonna top 189 minutes today with an even longer film. A bigger film in more ways than one. We're coming to you live by tape. Yeah, I was gonna say to watch James Cameron's epic follow up to Avatar, which Chris Ryan has not seen. No, Chris has never seen Avatar.

[Amanda Davis]

So no Avatar in full.

[Chris Ryan]

I saw Avatar bits and pieces. I've never seen Way of Water.

[Sean Fennessey]

So you're gonna watch the sequel to that film with us. Hopefully ask some questions. Hopefully.

[Chris Ryan]

I was planning on just watching.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

You might be asking yourself, why are we doing this right now? Well, the follow up to this film, Fire and Ash is opening later this month and last night Amanda and I got a chance to see it.

[Amanda Davis]

We did.

[Sean Fennessey]

So the timing here is good for anybody who wants to freshen up on the Way of Water before learning about fire ants.

[Amanda Davis]

The timing would have been better if you and I did this before seeing Avatar Fire. That would have been better, but that's okay.

[Chris Ryan]

I thought I was gonna have jury duty so I couldn't do it.

[Amanda Davis]

Are you on the hook all week?

[Chris Ryan]

Kind of, but we're also thinking about breaking the law a little bit.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, I have to read the instructions. Cause Sean can't see. If you want to literally watch along, you can stream it right now and listen along with us. The movie is available to stream for subscribers on Disney as well as Paramount and of course available to rent on Apple, Amazon, Fandango at home or wherever you rent movies. In addition, Sean is willing to bet that many of you listening right now own this movie at home. That's between you and Sean. 4K and your budgets. We will get to the live watch right after this. This episode of the Big Picture is presented by Amazon Prime. You know how in every great holiday movie there's that last minute scramble to make it all come together. From gifts to hosting essentials. Prime's fast shipping is always there for you during the holidays. Especially when it's last minute and just can't wait. So if you need fast free delivery that saves the day, it's on Prime. Head to Amazon.comprime to shop now.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, we are ready to begin. So if you wanna watch along with us, that's great. We will count you down into it if you don't wanna rewatch this movie but do wanna listen to this 3 hour and 12 minute pod. You're a psycho. But we really appreciate your patronage. Here we go. We're gonna start now. Ready? Five, four, three, two, one. Press play.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, nothing's happening. Oh, now something's happening.

[Chris Ryan]

20Th Century Fox, one of Disney's great acquisitions.

[Amanda Davis]

I think you think that's been going well. 20th Century Studios, by the time the Way of Water was released in 2022.

[Chris Ryan]

I think it's been a net positive for Disney.

[Sean Fennessey]

What's been the best thing to come out of the acquisition?

[Chris Ryan]

Romulus?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, pretty much. It's been good. Did you see the amateur? The film with Rami Mahler?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I thought that was cool.

[Sean Fennessey]

You did?

[Chris Ryan]

It was all right.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think it's pretty mid.

[Chris Ryan]

You do that all the time where you ask me if I've seen something and you lead me in the direction of. We're going to high five about it. And then you're like, it was mid.

[Sean Fennessey]

Chris, I need you to pay attention to the film here. Right now I think we're in the depths of Pandora.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes. Which is an alien world.

[Sean Fennessey]

It is.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, okay, let's talk about it. Ooh, um. So that. That is Pandora. Is it a. It's an alien world or is it a moon?

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, I think it's a planet.

[Amanda Davis]

No, I. Because I was rereading Zack Baron's interview with profile of James Cameron. Yeah. Maybe you've heard of him. That was released in GQ for this film and it identified Pandora as a moon.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, okay.

[Amanda Davis]

And that shit goes through the kaninast fact checkers and they mean business.

[Chris Ryan]

Do I even dare ask a moon orbiting what planet?

[Amanda Davis]

It did not specify that. Also, Jack just texted me to say that the TV's on mute so we can unmute it if we want. The forests of Pandora hold many dangers, Chris. I'll read it for you. Until we unmute it. And they're breathing. So it's a moon with forests, which was not my understanding. There we go. Yeah, I have been learning a lot about space because my 3 year old is very into it, and he figured out where the space section in the local library is, so. But we haven't gotten to like moon designations. And what makes you a moon rather than a planet? I guess it's gravity.

[Sean Fennessey]

We gotta really situate the listener here. Pandora isn't a moon. Tiri is on the screen. Chris doesn't know who that is. That's always character. She's pregnant.

[Chris Ryan]

Head of the CIA's Lioness program.

[Amanda Davis]

I think she's no longer. I think the baby has been born.

[Sean Fennessey]

The baby's been born.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Cute baby. Yay. That's nice.

[Sean Fennessey]

Right now we're hearing from Jake Sully.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, who is paralyzed American soldier who was booted into, like a Na', Vi, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

Correct. He was booted into a navi, replacing his brother in the Na' VI program.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

His brother, who was a scientist, who was not disabled. And because they shared the same genome, he. His brother replaced him after his brother died.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

And that's what led him to becoming a part of this world. He goes into this world, enters the Avatar, falls in love with Neytiri and falls in love with the Na' Vi culture.

[Chris Ryan]

Right, but is he able to participate in all this, like, fully, or is he still like in a bed somewhere with a thing stuck into him?

[Sean Fennessey]

He is now like the Matrix? I think that's a great question. I can't remember.

[Amanda Davis]

I think he is not what I was asking you last night.

[Sean Fennessey]

We do not see him in his human form, but he's not in a.

[Chris Ryan]

Room somewhere with a tube into his bed?

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't think so. I think he officially cuts the cord at the end of the conclusion of Avatar.

[Amanda Davis]

But so. And also, this is an.

[Chris Ryan]

He kind of looks like Sy.

[Amanda Davis]

He does. Yeah. It's the cheeks, for sure. It does look like Sy. But so this was a point of clarification that I needed at the beginning of last night's screening, but. So Pandora is like a real place in the world of Avatar? Pandora is a real place where people can go, as opposed to a simulation that is existing in the mind of the people in the pods.

[Sean Fennessey]

The whole thrust of this is that this is a real place that humans travel to because there's a natural resource there called unobtainium. That will help them transform technology and power the economy forevermore. Incredibly valuable.

[Amanda Davis]

There's that spider.

[Sean Fennessey]

That spider that is the offspring of Corporal. No, Colonel Corps.

[Amanda Davis]

It's orbit by the war and raised by lab guys. It's telling us right now.

[Sean Fennessey]

He'S wearing a mask because he can't breathe in the Pandoran.

[Chris Ryan]

Cause he's a human, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

He is human, yes.

[Amanda Davis]

But he's playing.

[Chris Ryan]

Is his dad Rubizi?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, his father, you'll learn later in the film, is the Stephen Lang character who was the heavy of the first film.

[Chris Ryan]

And Zoe's like they should be.

[Amanda Davis]

Zoe Saldana is. Yeah, no, keep him separate down for him. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is simultaneously the simplest movie of all time and the most complicated movie of all time.

[Amanda Davis]

Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

There's a tremendous amount of lore, the.

[Amanda Davis]

Genius of James Cameron.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're all James Cameron movies. Right. They have a lot of detail and a lot of specificity in the world, but also the stories are extremely simple.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

The first film, you know, often compared to Dances with Wolves and FernGully, the animated movie. This movie is different. This movie is much more of a family story, as we see. Yeah. Much more about the crisis of being a dad. Right.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. So, okay, Avatar 1, the humans, aka the skywalkers, in the parlance of the Na', Vi.

[Sean Fennessey]

Go sky people.

[Amanda Davis]

Sky people, Right.

[Chris Ryan]

I was wondering about that. That would be some copyright violation.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, they're all under the same umbrella now.

[Amanda Davis]

We know that. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Thanks to the acquisition.

[Amanda Davis]

So. So they show up on Pandora because they want Unobtainium. And so it's sort of like military industrial complex type, you know, menace. And then Jake Sully takes over his brother's body and then falls in love with Zatiri, and then he leaves the human world and joins Pandora world as.

[Chris Ryan]

A Na' Vi full time.

[Amanda Davis]

And that's kind of where we leave it, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. The final shot of Avatar, which is sick, is when he wakes up.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I remember into the. I'm explaining to our friend Chris. Have you seen him? He's never seen the film.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, which Parts of Avatar 1 have you seen?

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, it's mostly.

[Amanda Davis]

In what context?

[Chris Ryan]

Like the context of, oh, it's on a TV or there's an ad for it, or maybe like I get some sort of short form video served to me about it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Here's why. Avatar 1 is one of the most CR movies ever made. I have a short list of things.

[Amanda Davis]

It can vanish in a heartbeat. Happiness can vanish in a heartbeat. So their family idol is about to Be interrupted by this large star.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. One, this is a film about the complex feelings that many American men have about the military industrial complex, in that it is a destructive force that ruins people's lives and destroys culture. But also, heavy artillery is sick. And this is one of James Cameron's fascinations and also one of yours. That's one of its primary interests. Secondarily. Giovanni Ribisi is in it, playing a sniveling guy who stands in front of transparent screens all day.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes.

[Sean Fennessey]

And he plays golf.

[Amanda Davis]

He's. But he's like the David Ellison of the Avatar world.

[Chris Ryan]

So he's super cool. He is the.

[Amanda Davis]

He's responsible for everything that's good.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. The offspring of an incredibly wealthy man who is attempting to colonize these nations.

[Chris Ryan]

Gotcha.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so a new ship is landing here. Oh, many. Because we see more in the distance.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't even remember this part.

[Chris Ryan]

I imagine that watching this on a flat screen television with lights shining in my eyes is not the ideal way to receive it, but I have to say, it looks pretty cool. You know what I mean?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, I get it.

[Amanda Davis]

We're like five minutes in. The animals are shrieking.

[Chris Ryan]

Why are they burning this place?

[Amanda Davis]

Well, they're landing, and they don't have respect for the natural world of Pandora.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, you know, Fuck.

[Sean Fennessey]

Also, due to the incredibly traumatic events of the first film, they're attempting to kind of seek revenge on the Na'. Vi.

[Amanda Davis]

So far, the traumatic events of the first film for the military.

[Sean Fennessey]

The humans are turned away by the Na' Vi in an epic battle in, like, a classic Cameron third act finale battle.

[Amanda Davis]

And so do they get any Unobtainium or.

[Sean Fennessey]

Not nearly as much as they would like. Which is where we learned that there's another natural resource in this film.

[Chris Ryan]

Guys, mech suits, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. So these are. You know, Chris, you're a fan of the Power Loader. This is another thing, another reason why these movies are CR coded. Now these power loaders are digitally rendered.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

I love that you think that a power loader is the number one thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's number three.

[Chris Ryan]

There are power loaders in train dreams.

[Sean Fennessey]

Number four is. I know that you think it would be awesome to be 8ft tall and married to Zoe Saldana. Like, that is.

[Chris Ryan]

I don't even need to be 8ft tall.

[Sean Fennessey]

But it would help. Yeah, like, it wouldn't hurt.

[Chris Ryan]

I think 6, 2 would be cool.

[Amanda Davis]

Next to the. So the Na' VI are taller.

[Chris Ryan]

So you want to have married to, like, lioness Zoe.

[Amanda Davis]

They're also, like, not.

[Sean Fennessey]

But what if your skin was blue? Would you be more attracted to it?

[Chris Ryan]

No, it has nothing to do with the skin tone. It's just like. I just find her character in that show to be enigmatic.

[Amanda Davis]

What's. Where did she leave things?

[Chris Ryan]

That character, she continually tries to promise her husband, Dave. Annabelle, who's a surgeon, one year later.

[Amanda Davis]

I just want to let you know, trauma surgeon.

[Chris Ryan]

So, like, the humans have landed, the family is traumatized.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're under attack.

[Chris Ryan]

Gotcha. Yeah. She keeps promising them that she's going to prioritize her family, but she can't leave behind the women she's trained in the Wyatt's program.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure, yeah, yeah. I'm much like myself. That's why I'm still here watching Avatar, the Way of Water with you assholes. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

You can't leave behind the Na'. Vi.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, that's right. Who's that?

[Sean Fennessey]

This is.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. Oh, this man just punched somebody.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. So this is Quaritch, Stephen Lang's character.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, that is.

[Sean Fennessey]

And he has been transformed. He has been. His consciousness has been moved into this Na' Vi body. He died at the end of the last film, as far as I know. And this is one of his colleagues who was a soldier in the previous film.

[Chris Ryan]

So they now have some bad Na'.

[Amanda Davis]

Vi.

[Chris Ryan]

Exactly, exactly.

[Sean Fennessey]

The new heavy is sort of the revived versions of these characters. Their consciousness has been inflamed and.

[Chris Ryan]

Wayne. Wayne Fruit.

[Sean Fennessey]

Wingro.

[Chris Ryan]

Wingro, yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. His consciousness and also their tattoos.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, I think. And I think their natural instincts towards violence and domination.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, cool.

[Sean Fennessey]

Which is, you know, once again, a classic Cameron Cameronian comment on.

[Chris Ryan]

To make the distinction here, where you're, like. When you're watching this, is it translating to your brain as, like, animated, or is it translating to your brain as something else?

[Sean Fennessey]

Funny you should ask. Before the screening last Night of Fire and Dash, there was a 90 second introduction.

[Amanda Davis]

No, no, no, no, no. Three minutes, at least. Five minutes.

[Sean Fennessey]

Five minute. Five minute introduction from James Cameron. Filmed or in person filmed that specifically detailed.

[Amanda Davis]

If Big Jim were there explaining this technology to me, you would have heard about that.

[Sean Fennessey]

You would have heard about that. He recorded a video and they showed a lot of BTs of the making of the third film and the ways in which humans make everything in the movie. And it was kind of an anti generative AI explanation, but also showing the ways in which motion capture performance is so critical to these movies. So, like when you're watching Quaritch there and he's a Na', Vi, that is Lang giving the performance. You Know, and what they show you. Actually, I thought it was pretty cool the way they showed the motion capture.

[Amanda Davis]

It was a little taken out of the.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, Giovanni.

[Amanda Davis]

The magic of. It's now harder to watch these and not think about the people in the empty room with the motion captor dots on their face when I'm watching this. And I did also feel like I don't feel that. That it made me more aware of all of the creation of the world around it, because you see these performances and they're just in a warehouse with a lot of cameras, you know, and, um. So it's amazing of what they build, but I found myself spending more time being like, oh, okay, that looks pretty real. And that looks, you know, not real, and that looks animated and that looks whatever. So, yeah, he said no generative AI was used, like, 50 times in that 2022 piece by Zach Baron. There's, like Cameron says, there's a lot of AI in this. Multiple times, which I thought was very interesting. So the generative doing a ton of work. Yes, but.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, yeah, gotcha.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

So he doesn't just stand.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's human. LED is what's most critical there. But that was just the explanation of sort of like a recorded video that.

[Chris Ryan]

Quaritch made, explaining to his clone that he has his clones, that Rabbizi downloaded his personality and his memories into a Roku stick.

[Amanda Davis]

They're flying.

[Sean Fennessey]

Would you go into a Na' Vi body after you die?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, for sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

Would you, Amanda?

[Amanda Davis]

No, but I would not. I mean, I just.

[Sean Fennessey]

Listen, were you buried or burned?

[Amanda Davis]

Definitely burned.

[Sean Fennessey]

Burned. Me, too.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Cremated. Burned.

[Sean Fennessey]

Fire and ash.

[Amanda Davis]

But then ash is spread at sea.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, you'll be buried at sea, but full body, as we know as we speak.

[Chris Ryan]

Viking funeral on an ice floe. Dude, shooting arrow.

[Sean Fennessey]

We'll make you the arrow, the flaming arrow, and shoot you into the sea.

[Amanda Davis]

Speaking of being, like, full body, buried at sea, so I pulled together a lot of ocean packs for later in the episode when we run out of.

[Sean Fennessey]

Things to talk about.

[Amanda Davis]

But one of them was that there are just, like, hundreds of thousands of coffins and bodies decomposing at the bottom of our oceans, among many other things. But because all of these people are like, no, I need my whole body to be sent down to the sea.

[Sean Fennessey]

So there's bones at this point.

[Amanda Davis]

Think about that the next time you go swimming.

[Chris Ryan]

So that's where bin Laden is?

[Amanda Davis]

Yes.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, that's where Megatron is. I was explaining this to you.

[Chris Ryan]

He had a. I don't Think so.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, what is Megatron made up of, like, the material?

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think Megatron and Bin Laden are like right next to each other?

[Sean Fennessey]

He's a cybernetic robot alien.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, but so, like, is the material decomposing?

[Sean Fennessey]

I doubt it.

[Amanda Davis]

Is Megatron responsible for microplastics?

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't believe so. I believe he's more.

[Chris Ryan]

I think I am.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think he's more of a fascist dictator robot.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, I forgot to turn my watch back from Philadelphia.

[Sean Fennessey]

These aerial creatures, the only way that you can fly them is to build a bond with them via the tendrils in your hair.

[Chris Ryan]

So dragon style.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, it's very similar. Yes. To Game of Thrones. Another thing I think you would like is some great flying shit. This in these movies.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, it's pretty good. They're good at flying.

[Chris Ryan]

They've, I assume, started an insurgency against the military occupation here?

[Sean Fennessey]

I think so.

[Amanda Davis]

But they are using guns because Jake Sully used to be a Marine.

[Chris Ryan]

Why were they not supposed to use guns?

[Sean Fennessey]

Were they. Well, because they just didn't have that technology on this planet. This was Pandora, a very spiritual place, a place about peace. Gotcha. And relationship between.

[Amanda Davis]

Run by the living creatures on.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, a very. A very.

[Amanda Davis]

So I don't know whether we learn that in. Well, yes, sort of.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, AWA is a. Is a female goddess.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, that's true.

[Sean Fennessey]

But, you know, we have a lioness and a goddess.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

These creatures, I don't remember what they're called, these kind of horse dinosaurs.

[Amanda Davis]

Horse dragons. Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

How much of what I'm watching right now, which is a fairly well rendered action scene, I guess, like, did you guys see this in 3D when you first saw it?

[Sean Fennessey]

So this is the point I was going to make. You have to see these movies in 3D.

[Chris Ryan]

I can't watch 3D movies.

[Sean Fennessey]

I know. And so this is a huge challenge.

[Amanda Davis]

I'll be honest. I guess you have to, in the sense that you must see the artist's vision the way that it's meant to be rendered. Just looks like watching a video game to me.

[Sean Fennessey]

I completely disagree. I could not disagree more because I just watched Avatar at home two nights ago and I was like, this is flat. This does not feel immersive. Like it has the dimension that it is hoping for. It is attempting to have. For example, this sequence in space would just look tremendously better if it felt like that satellite was 3D.

[Chris Ryan]

And even like, I assume a shot like this with that much sense.

[Sean Fennessey]

The light. Yes. So candidly, last night, watching the movie I was like, this is dramatically better, especially in the action sequences, than watching the action sequences at home.

[Amanda Davis]

I agree with you in the sense that it is. I mean, it's just showing off what they are doing, technologically speaking. And the way that the shots and the action are designed and meant to be seen. I get all of it. But like, I was like, I'm watching a different product that is.

[Sean Fennessey]

And in a. I hear what you're saying. To me, that is actually the one thing that makes it feel not like a video game cutscene. Like when I'm watching it in this environment, it does. It's hard to argue with what you're saying, Chris, that it doesn't feel like a more rendered world when you're watching it on a tv on a big screen with the glasses. I feel like I'm being transported into the world.

[Chris Ryan]

Gotcha.

[Sean Fennessey]

That was my big testimony about the first film, which I loved when it came out.

[Amanda Davis]

I think that that's true. And I think there are also parts of the third that feel. And you turn to me in one part in particular where I was like, that was amazing. There are a lot of battle sequences in the third that just start to feel like I'm.

[Sean Fennessey]

I've seen it.

[Amanda Davis]

They look like a first person shooter commercial that I have watched on TV many times. If that's weird, you know, the third movie. We'll talk about it when it comes out.

[Chris Ryan]

So this is their base, their camp?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes.

[Amanda Davis]

High camp.

[Chris Ryan]

Gotcha.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't think you have to understand as much. I think it's a. It's a real feel it kind of movie.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure. Okay. So Spider is a grown up now, I guess, or a teen.

[Chris Ryan]

He's a teen. It's a year later, so he's probably like 12, 13, I imagine.

[Sean Fennessey]

One of the real mind fucks of the movie is the character of Kiri, who is a teenage girl who's portrayed in the film by Sigourney Weaver.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

She's a critical to this story. Sigourney Weaver is in the first film as a very powerful scientist who is running the Pandora program on behalf of this evil corporation. But she is more of an ecological, scientific figure of good. And she suffers a fateful end, but is sort of like transformed into the body. This like her soul is transformed, but.

[Chris Ryan]

Not her consciousness and not her scientific knowledge.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, no. So she sounds and sort of looks like Sigourney Weaver, but she isn't her.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

But she's also a part of this family, though, I guess perhaps not A blood relative that is explained to her in depth in the future.

[Amanda Davis]

But so the transformation is in one?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, I don't think so.

[Amanda Davis]

Is it in two?

[Sean Fennessey]

I think we learn about it here in this film.

[Chris Ryan]

Am I watching Kiri here?

[Amanda Davis]

No.

[Sean Fennessey]

No.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, so I don't watch it already.

[Sean Fennessey]

Because everybody who's listening to this either is. Has seen the film already.

[Amanda Davis]

You don't know that. Except maybe they're watching it for the first time.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think people are watching this for the first time while we yammer over it? That's an insane way to watch this.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, besides, Chris do all sorts of crazy things. You know, maybe they also don't remember and they want to experience the magic again for the first time.

[Sean Fennessey]

Then just go watch it and don't listen.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you find that avatar stuck with you?

[Amanda Davis]

No, I. Literally, last night, as. As it showed up, I was like asking Sean very basic questions about how the Pandora world works and who these people are and whatever. I remember nothing.

[Sean Fennessey]

I am not an expert, but part of my point about the 3D experience was one of the reasons why I think these movies get a lot of flack for not having, like, cultural impact, which we can talk about some more later, is because they are best experienced in theaters. People see them in theaters. They're a ride.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, they're like a ride.

[Sean Fennessey]

And then they're not really revisited at home.

[Amanda Davis]

Which. Which is. Which is true. I'm realizing that I made a. It's. It's his job to do what? Oh, are they fighting about guns and stuff and, and battle.

[Chris Ryan]

Is that Jake?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, that's Jake.

[Sean Fennessey]

Jake and Neytiri are married.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm Team Neytiri on this.

[Sean Fennessey]

You know, Jake has a lot of Western ideas about civil responsibility, violence versus pacifism, spirituality versus secularism. Sure.

[Chris Ryan]

How far into the future?

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so where are these people right now?

[Sean Fennessey]

They're in their base camp.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, but I'm.

[Sean Fennessey]

And these are all the scientists who are working with them in the first film. And they've all kind of moved over to the side of the Na'. Vi.

[Chris Ryan]

So they have to wear faces?

[Amanda Davis]

That's what I was asking.

[Chris Ryan]

They have to wear faces.

[Amanda Davis]

But so where are they right now?

[Sean Fennessey]

Just in a building that they've built like an outpost.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so are these the same people that we saw as, like, what's happening?

[Sean Fennessey]

Some of these people are born Na'. Vi. Some of them are using their Na' VI pods to. They're using their avatars.

[Amanda Davis]

But then the Na' Vi can come back into where the pods are.

[Sean Fennessey]

I guess so, but that's a good question about the breathing situation.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, well.

[Sean Fennessey]

But also, are they breathing oxygen in here or what?

[Amanda Davis]

But it's like, why would you use a Na' Vi pod to go be a Na' Vi? If the Na' Vi can just come in and talk to you. You know what I mean? Or why would.

[Sean Fennessey]

So that you don't have to wear masks and so that you can live inside the Sigourney Weaver. That's Sigourney Weaver? Yes. That's like. That's essentially her. And see, this is Kiri.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, but so how are they related?

[Sean Fennessey]

She's effectively like a spiritual clone.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, all right, hold on. This is important.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, you guys can watch, but we are recording a podcast.

[Amanda Davis]

No, I. Well, this is a. So she is explaining, but. And she's relating to her because she knows that that's the living version of the person in the gel.

[Sean Fennessey]

Kiri doesn't know that right now, but they have a psychic. They share a psychic consciousness.

[Amanda Davis]

No, no. Does she know that this video, Sigourney Weaver, is related to the person in the gel?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes.

[Amanda Davis]

Right. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's just the same woman.

[Amanda Davis]

Is it gel? That's what it's.

[Sean Fennessey]

That is the doctor's corpse. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. And Spider is best buds with all these guys.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. He is, like, the foster son in this family.

[Amanda Davis]

It doesn't seem like the lab has a lot of, like, protocols, you know what I mean? In terms of scientific.

[Chris Ryan]

So presumably, though, we're, like, hundreds of years into the future, though maybe they've just figured that stuff out.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. So they don't have to worry about, like, microbiomes and stuff. I mean, I don't know if I think that's true.

[Sean Fennessey]

You don't. You don't hear a lot about Navi catching the whooping cough or anything like that, you know, although.

[Amanda Davis]

But it's also just like, what if someone gets their, you know, grungy stuff into her gel? You know?

[Chris Ryan]

But it's pretty sealed.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, until it's not. They're just walking with you.

[Chris Ryan]

We're talking about microplastics, we're talking about biomes, we're talking about getting grungy stuff together.

[Amanda Davis]

I told you, I did some scientific.

[Sean Fennessey]

About to be the boomerang theory, politically, for Amanda. We're like. We're an inch away from getting all the way to the other side.

[Amanda Davis]

While we're speaking of microbiomes and stuff, I realized I made a colossal error, which is I left my yogurt in my bag. Is There someone you can go get it? Can I go get it? I know, but then I gotta go around, and I don't have a spoon, so can someone. Is there someone listening who can bring me a spoon?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, just get up and get it. What are you doing? You want your butler, Jeeves?

[Chris Ryan]

That make me really talk?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, here's the thing. I know that there's a huge visual psychic barrier for you in accepting animation.

[Amanda Davis]

I am not.

[Chris Ryan]

I'll be serious. Like, what I said in the clip, your viral podcast moment that we had, I think a lot of it has to do with, like, have you been feeling robbed of other James Cameron work by this?

[Sean Fennessey]

And many people share that opinion, I think.

[Chris Ryan]

Or did they. Did they pick up that opinion after I said it? After I showed them it was okay?

[Sean Fennessey]

With respect, Chris, this movie came out three years ago, and in between this movie and the previous movie was 13 years. So I think a lot of people thought about maybe the time that had gone by without a James Cameron movie. I.

[Amanda Davis]

That.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's the other reason is freaking. Edie Falco plays a general in this film who is a woman that you would throw your life away for.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, it's true.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're keep the. The ledger.

[Chris Ryan]

So this is Edie Falco looking at your stilts here.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. She's in a fucking power lo. She's Courage's boss. She also forgot that she appeared in this film and was interviewed recently, and she didn't remember that she'd done it.

[Chris Ryan]

No, come on. That's bullshit.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was like, did that come out? This was something that happened in 2022.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, you. You probably do, but I'm finding people are starting to be a little.

[Sean Fennessey]

Performatively forgetful.

[Chris Ryan]

Performatively offline. Oh, actors who were like, I had no idea. Am I in that film?

[Sean Fennessey]

You're going the other way. You're saying, like, I remember every part I've ever done.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm not saying that, but I'm saying, like, yeah, there are some times where I'm like, oh, I completely forgot we did this on Big Picture. Rewatchables of the Watch or something like that. But I do remember. I think I would remember being in New Zealand making Avatar.

[Sean Fennessey]

What's the worst episode of the Watch you've ever made?

[Chris Ryan]

There's definitely a couple.

[Amanda Davis]

Do you know about Panel and sisters yogurt?

[Chris Ryan]

Is this a sponsored content moment?

[Amanda Davis]

No, it's not. I'd love to be sponsored by them. This is the best fucking yogurt I've ever had in my Life. It's from Pennsylvania, though. I don't know where in Pennsylvania. Well, listen, it's what.

[Chris Ryan]

And what kind of flavors you got going here? Banana, peach.

[Amanda Davis]

Talking about, like, hardware. What do you want from me? Like, they're gonna have a problem with the Na'. Vi. The Na' Vi are gonna, you know, fight back. Like, will they get the Unobtainium? It's fine. Like, we know what's going on.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think that's less germane than this Pennsylvania yogurt?

[Amanda Davis]

I know that you have.

[Sean Fennessey]

You have yogurt mouth while talking on a podcast.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm hungry. I need protein. It's a three hour podcast. You said I could do whatever I want. And, like, I truly can't tell you how good this yogurt is. Like, I know you don't do dairy anymore.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't.

[Amanda Davis]

But do you still have Greek yogurt every morning? This is technically skier Christopher. Like, go buy some. They sell the large plane. I honestly can't believe how good it is.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's Pete Hegseth's favorite yogurt, too.

[Amanda Davis]

Yep. I'm mostly out on, like, really bulking with protein, but this shit's good.

[Chris Ryan]

What are you talking about?

[Sean Fennessey]

There's, like, speaking of psychic breaks, there is, like, an ongoing Amanda psychic break where she's like, everything's fine. You guys are the weird ones. Which is just clearly not the case.

[Chris Ryan]

Talking about yogurt 11 minutes into Avatar.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm hungry.

[Chris Ryan]

This is also. What's going to happen is she's going to completely burn herself out. Hour two, she goes down. That's when we start talking about falling. Lane Kiffin. Are we getting back into rap?

[Amanda Davis]

I'm excited about Lane Kiffin.

[Chris Ryan]

I start reading Guardian US Politics Live blog aloud. That's what it lifts off here.

[Sean Fennessey]

CR and I did a solid 10 minutes on New music, like, an hour ago, and I felt like we were at the Magician in 2006. It was just like, have you heard this yet? Have you heard this yet? I haven't been in that place with you in a long time.

[Chris Ryan]

About our taste or about albums that have come out?

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, no. About me. Sorry, I thought you guys were talking.

[Chris Ryan]

Over me like you normally.

[Amanda Davis]

I have some questions about my yogurt. It's just like, I really can't tell you how lifechanging this yogurt is.

[Sean Fennessey]

And I think more people to know.

[Amanda Davis]

About know about new music that I've been.

[Chris Ryan]

What they do say this. This lady, she's.

[Amanda Davis]

She's Maga or Maha.

[Chris Ryan]

No, I. If the painter and sisters. You.

[Amanda Davis]

So they're the. Yeah, they're the painter sisters.

[Chris Ryan]

And they're like, you know what?

[Amanda Davis]

They're fourth generation dairy farmers in Pennsylvania. I mean, outlook, like, not the best for the politics based on what I know, but it is, you know, delicious. And women.

[Chris Ryan]

What happens if they send you 6,000 cartons of that? And like, now you've got a house full of yogurt?

[Amanda Davis]

Well, I don't know. I'll give it out. Maybe I'll just like set up like Nino Brown.

[Sean Fennessey]

Absolutely.

[Amanda Davis]

Just. There's so much yogurt consumed in my. That there's like. We have a yogurt shelf in the fridge.

[Sean Fennessey]

Have you guys gone to see yogurt Santa? She's been giving away yogurt all throughout the land for months.

[Amanda Davis]

No one in the family is allowed to eat this yogurt but me because it's too expensive for the little kids palates.

[Chris Ryan]

That's generous.

[Amanda Davis]

Knox tried it once and really liked it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Anyway, it gets better and better. Story.

[Amanda Davis]

What happened to Kiri?

[Sean Fennessey]

She was napping in the grass. This was actually a slow. It was actually a good moment.

[Chris Ryan]

Kira and this kid Spider, they beef a little bit, but there's probably something, a little spark, young love going on.

[Sean Fennessey]

There's definitely something between them.

[Amanda Davis]

What's up with the floating jellyfish or the flying jellyfish even?

[Chris Ryan]

I know that's a staple of Pandora.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, you do. But like visual cue. What are their functions?

[Chris Ryan]

Not everything in nature.

[Sean Fennessey]

In the. What is her legendary.

[Amanda Davis]

You'll find that it does. You know that life is a delicate ecosystem.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's honestly everybody's.

[Chris Ryan]

Because you're introducing as much mature skirt yogurt into yours as humanly possible.

[Amanda Davis]

So many probiotics. Did you start a probiotic?

[Chris Ryan]

No.

[Amanda Davis]

I thought you said you were going to.

[Chris Ryan]

No.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

I don't think so.

[Sean Fennessey]

Use cocaine before the beginning of this pod. You're on a rail right now, flying.

[Chris Ryan]

One thing that I'm experimenting with right now is doing nothing different in my.

[Sean Fennessey]

Life.

[Chris Ryan]

Except lifting with no preparation. Three times a week. Like, no stretching, no eating before you're doing now. Like. Okay, so for. For the first few weeks, I was like, I should stretch. I should get ready or whatever. And now I did it a couple of times and I was like, I feel pretty good afterwards.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. So what happened to Chris? Oh, he tore both rotator cuffs simultaneously.

[Amanda Davis]

I like. What kind of lifting? Like bench presses. Like, what are we doing here? Free weight. Okay. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Sumo squats.

[Sean Fennessey]

Can you not do that?

[Chris Ryan]

Squats are dope.

[Sean Fennessey]

Who's your first call. You're prone on your back.

[Chris Ryan]

Always you. Yeah, always you. Dead body in a desert. I need you to dig a hole. It's. I'm calling you.

[Sean Fennessey]

Are you being serious?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's honestly the nicest thing you've ever said to me. And I will dig with you.

[Chris Ryan]

No, I know, but I think if I'm like, hey, there's like a post hardcore band that also interpolates some techno elements. Would you like to go see them? You'd be like, no, I'm sorry, I would never. But if I was like, I killed a guy and I need you to help me cover it.

[Sean Fennessey]

I am your Michael Clayton, no question about it. But I do not want to spend any social time with you.

[Amanda Davis]

I. I mean, I. I'm like, a little hurt, but that's fine.

[Chris Ryan]

No, I think you would actually be a pretty. Ride or die as well. In that case.

[Amanda Davis]

Absolutely.

[Sean Fennessey]

Ride or die. What? You dropped a word there, right?

[Chris Ryan]

Ride or die, homie.

[Sean Fennessey]

Woman. Yeah, lady. Yeah, gal.

[Amanda Davis]

Who do you think would be better at digging a hole right now? Just fitness wise?

[Sean Fennessey]

You.

[Amanda Davis]

Thank you.

[Chris Ryan]

90% yogurt pulsating through your body. The power of skirt.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm not doing well. I'm doing heavyweight Pilates, but then it's more free weights for me. But I'll do like a pickup. Free weight situation.

[Sean Fennessey]

Seriously, how many holes have you dug in your life? Have you dug one hole? You never dug a hole in your life?

[Amanda Davis]

Yes, to plant our lemon tree that won't grow any lemons.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you have like a.

[Amanda Davis]

What. What is that? Why do you think I can't dig a hole?

[Sean Fennessey]

That's not your thing. You're not. You're not a manual labor person. You never have been.

[Amanda Davis]

You're just not. That's just. Why did you have.

[Chris Ryan]

Honestly, that's gender norms too, though nobody.

[Sean Fennessey]

Maybe never was like, I know Amanda very well.

[Amanda Davis]

Excuse me. What about the manual labor of growing two children?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, there was manual birth and then.

[Amanda Davis]

Carrying them up and down. Well, yeah, that's. It's very rude.

[Sean Fennessey]

Let's dig a hole right now.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Let's go, Jack.

[Sean Fennessey]

Get some dirt in here.

[Chris Ryan]

So this is going to probably be the first attack of Stephen Lang's homies, right? Is that what we're building up to?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. They're like, they're monitoring them and they're trying to figure out how they're living. So the. The former Quaritch is basically like, Jake Sully is your all time enemy. No matter what happens, you have to kill Jake Sully. Okay, so the. The Quaritch. Na', Vi, uh.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh.

[Sean Fennessey]

Is singularly obsessed. This is now what?

[Amanda Davis]

You first.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, yo, what's up there? Are not bad. Na' Vi now.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. All right. I just want to note that we're like 30 minutes in and have not seen any water, so just.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's a really good note.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

We have not yet learned the way. Well, this is. You know, they can't stay here. That's kind of what they're showing us here.

[Amanda Davis]

You keep spoiling the movie before they get there.

[Chris Ryan]

This is funny.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is not. If this is your first time watching it, I just think that's such a weird way to watch it.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, I. People do all Sully here.

[Chris Ryan]

Is this, like, spiders dumb?

[Sean Fennessey]

This is the kids.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, man. You hate that.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

You don't want to see that.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

But this is what it's like, you know, you come over to my house. You know, Knox and Sire there. They're doing whatever the F. They want to do.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. That's jumping off the couch 302 times.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. It's just something that happens, you know, it's like. It's like I'm running through the.

[Amanda Davis]

Happens.

[Sean Fennessey]

The Forest of Pandora.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Also, some of these kids are basically teenagers, too, so they're sort of like babysitting the younger ones.

[Amanda Davis]

Right, Okay. I mean, this is good acting in, you know, digital makeup as they describe it.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think kids are good.

[Amanda Davis]

I don't know how I feel about the kids, but the grownups are good.

[Chris Ryan]

Have the kids been making these movies for 15 years, or did they run different kids in there?

[Sean Fennessey]

They shot two and three consecutively.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. So who's writing your weightlifting program? Like, where are you getting the.

[Chris Ryan]

I have. I have people overseeing it.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, yeah, all right.

[Sean Fennessey]

People overseeing it.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like the Department of Defense or.

[Amanda Davis]

These guys.

[Chris Ryan]

Kristi Noem is spotting me. That would be good. Generative AI. Kristi Gnome is my bodybuilding instruction.

[Sean Fennessey]

She's in full suit.

[Chris Ryan]

Don't worry.

[Amanda Davis]

Chris.

[Sean Fennessey]

She's in a red pantsuit with, like, door knockers on, but she's holding the bar for you.

[Chris Ryan]

Or I just have Edie Falco in.

[Sean Fennessey]

A mech suit holding the mouth with a button or mouth.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Spider. Oh, that's his son.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, Right. That's right.

[Sean Fennessey]

So he sees something in this boy.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh. And he's like, oh, it's Luke. You. I am your father. They can't put babies in cryo. Is that how. So that's how you get back to.

[Chris Ryan]

I gotta be completely honest. With you, that yogurt is quite fragrant.

[Sean Fennessey]

He just politely said, you stink.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

No, no, not you.

[Sean Fennessey]

I just like.

[Amanda Davis]

It's the peach. I mean, I would throw it away, but I don't know where to. I got locked out, by the way, when I went out. So when you guys go to the bathroom, take your key card or have.

[Chris Ryan]

Someone let me play.

[Sean Fennessey]

You guys know how Louis CK is back? You know how he's like. He's back and accepted into society, like being reviewed in the New Yorker and the New York Times and whatnot. My favorite Louis CK bit was always the one where he was like, I have a peach. You guys remember that one?

[Amanda Davis]

That was really funny.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't really. I haven't really been watching the new stuff, but I do remember that old.

[Amanda Davis]

You're right. That this is peach yogurt. Okay. But I had a Avatar question. What is going. It's like 2150 in, like, right. You know, BC.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't know the year. Is that what it is? Is it 2150?

[Amanda Davis]

It's like 2150.

[Chris Ryan]

Something inhabitable or they're just.

[Amanda Davis]

That's what I'm asking. What's going on?

[Sean Fennessey]

But I do think that they're in desperate need of new resources.

[Chris Ryan]

We are now, you know.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Yeah. So I'll tell you one of the ocean facts I learned. I'm not endorsing ocean drilling, but there are a lot of minerals and resources available to us in the ocean and it's been quite unexplored. But, you know, not.

[Sean Fennessey]

Not by Jim Cameron going to the depths.

[Chris Ryan]

But isn't he trying to protect that area? He's not. He doesn't want us to be for him to go.

[Amanda Davis]

Trench.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, okay. He's in the trench. He's in.

[Amanda Davis]

He went to the. He went to the bottom of the Mariana Trench, the deepest that anyone's ever been.

[Sean Fennessey]

He claims.

[Amanda Davis]

He claims. And then there's another explorer who's like, no, I went deeper.

[Chris Ryan]

And did Jim Cameron say, like, I see your deepness and go and take you one step? He's like.

[Amanda Davis]

I went. He's like. He literally says he's full of shit because you can't go any deeper than I went. I went to the bottom. So that's the other thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is another reason why the Avatar films are so great, because they create a new James Cameron news cycle. They're wonderful where he comes around and he just starts picking fights with people.

[Chris Ryan]

Who have been training to be the first time. I feel like he's. He's Been. The champ is cut, you know.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think the champ is cut A little bit.

[Chris Ryan]

I think he's like, well, you know, maybe I won't make any more of these if nobody goes and sees three.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's done that every time. He does that after every movie so that he gets more money for the next movie.

[Chris Ryan]

You think Disney is happy with their.

[Sean Fennessey]

Investment in the Avatar films?

[Chris Ryan]

How come they haven't made Pandora as like a theme?

[Sean Fennessey]

Avatar is the most successful movie of all time. Yeah, I haven't seen it.

[Chris Ryan]

I understand. I'm asking if Disney is happy with their investment. I support Disney in many other areas.

[Sean Fennessey]

I do think that.

[Amanda Davis]

Name some of the areas.

[Chris Ryan]

The foremost proponent of the upcoming Paul Bettany series. Vision. White Vision.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. And you, Are you the co star of that film?

[Chris Ryan]

No. And then.

[Amanda Davis]

But Vision is not who she was grieving when she had the profound thing. But I thought it was also her brother.

[Chris Ryan]

No, that was before.

[Sean Fennessey]

What was that line of dialogue from that show?

[Chris Ryan]

Love means. Love is grief telling you that it's okay to be sad.

[Sean Fennessey]

So that's not what it was.

[Amanda Davis]

That's what it was.

[Chris Ryan]

Love is. Love is grief. Reaching out across time.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure. I want to read you guys a quote that James Cameron gave Zack Baron in 2022.

[Sean Fennessey]

Why do you keep saying is it full name?

[Chris Ryan]

Because to me and Chris. Yes. You got Zach as a husband. You don't have to like. It's not like the yogurt company.

[Amanda Davis]

Anybody.

[Sean Fennessey]

I hope Zack Barrett is listening to this. I've been citing his work.

[Amanda Davis]

So a note that I get from him pretty often is that I need to say the full name of writers because they deserve credit.

[Sean Fennessey]

So that's a frequent note that you get.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, I do actually. He's like, if you have to talk about me, but like him or other. But like once.

[Sean Fennessey]

Also Charles Dickens.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm starting book promo right now. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

So on his behalf.

[Amanda Davis]

Yes. Novel. Listen, you think I'm going to go door to door with yogurt? You just fucking watch me sell this novel.

[Sean Fennessey]

That always works. People love to be hectored about a novel they love.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm not going to hector them. I'm just going to like hand them a novel.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think people love doing reading and eating yogurt?

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, but anyway, that's your fantasy?

[Sean Fennessey]

Sitting around reading a novel written by someone you love while eating yogurt?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, it's true. I mean, honestly, the fantasy is like having a cocktail and maybe bumming a cigarette off of someone and then Nelly starts playing. But anyway, no. So this is the quote that he gave about the response to this movie and executives.

[Chris Ryan]

The first or the second one?

[Amanda Davis]

The first movie and how people feel about this movie and how he's feeling about it. I said something I've never said to anybody else in the business, Cameron recalled. He said, he told him, I think this movie is going to make all the fucking money. And when it does, it's going to be too late for you to love the film. The time for you to love the movie is today. So I'm not asking you to say something that you don't feel, but just know that I will always know that no matter how many. How complimentary you are about the movie in the future when it makes all the money. And that's exactly what I said in capsule. All the money. Not some of the money. All of the fucking money. I said, you can't come back to me and compliment the film or chum along and say, look what we did together. You won't be able to do that. At that point, that particular studio executive flipped out and went bug shit on me. And I told him to get the fuck out of my office. And that's where it was left.

[Chris Ryan]

That's really what art's all about.

[Amanda Davis]

No one is doing it better.

[Sean Fennessey]

Now, you could argue that that is the strong perspective of a fascist dictator.

[Chris Ryan]

That is not how I yelled at a man. And when he defended him, I kicked him out.

[Sean Fennessey]

That being said, never doubt Big Jim has become an axiom because of him communicating in that way about his work. And he's proven time and time again.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so Jake Sully has come to do an exfil.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Because he knows his teens are taken under attack.

[Amanda Davis]

Do they? Papa Bear is always, you know, waiting.

[Sean Fennessey]

He is a trained Marine.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

Who has a Na' Vi body.

[Chris Ryan]

That's good. That would have been a cool 3D.

[Sean Fennessey]

Shot if I had to wear 3D glasses. Yeah. There's a lot of coming right at you stuff in these movies.

[Chris Ryan]

I just can't see well enough without my glasses. So that when I have 3D glasses, it just feels very disorienting. And then I assume now because I'm wearing using Progressives for reading and stuff, that it would just feel really weird.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, okay. And so you can't.

[Sean Fennessey]

Would you consider getting a pair of contact lenses that would work just for abt. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Do you have astigmatism? Is that why you can't do contacts?

[Chris Ryan]

I think so. No. I don't like touching my eyes.

[Amanda Davis]

I know that everybody says, yeah, you're an eye baby.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, an eye baby.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, that's. Zack is also an eye baby. Zack Baron is an eye baby. And when you give him. When Sean scratched his eye and then he had to get eyedrops, he would like dart. I do that five feet away from the eye drop. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

That was tough. That wasn't. That was. That wasn't my.

[Amanda Davis]

It was just like a normal 4am Zach Baron emergency room visit, but because he was an I baby. Couldn't wait till morning.

[Sean Fennessey]

Eye stuff is tough. You get used to it with contacts. It's fine.

[Amanda Davis]

You do. Okay. They're okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay. So they break free. Is anybody still under Stephen Lang's.

[Sean Fennessey]

Look at this use of light. Come on, Chris. This fucking Jim Cameron.

[Chris Ryan]

It's just light. It doesn't need use of. So he's got spiders.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is a digital environment, and he's shooting it through with this prismatic light. It's gorgeous. Like, most digitally rendered movies don't do this.

[Amanda Davis]

That it looks so much better than everything other, like, straight up. I mean, I completely agree. It's like.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's in the. Creating it. The atmosphere and the environment, the sound design. Like, to me, this stuff is so much. It's so far beyond basically any Marvel movie that you watch or any superhero film.

[Amanda Davis]

Completely different, like, product of. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

The only person that I compare it to, and you guys always will grow to me a little bit, is the Michael Bay Transformers movies, where it's like they spent, like two years trying to.

[Chris Ryan]

Make those movies that good. First few Transformers films have more life in them than this does.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, they have more humans.

[Chris Ryan]

They have Shia.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, yes, that's true. And then later they have Mark Wahlberg.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, okay. So he's going on with Spider right now. He's locked up.

[Sean Fennessey]

Anthony Hopkins.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Spider has been captured.

[Chris Ryan]

Has the guy who played Spider play Spider done other work that I would have seen him in?

[Sean Fennessey]

You know, I don't know the answer to that.

[Amanda Davis]

What's his name? I kept meaning to look that up.

[Sean Fennessey]

Let's look it up.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

It's Austin Butler.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think he's good in this film. I think he's quite good in three. Three is the story. Is. It's important.

[Chris Ryan]

Spider coded.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you think at the end of this, you'll be like, I'm in fire and ash. I'm going.

[Chris Ryan]

Me?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

What do you think?

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm talking to Amanda and I saw it last night.

[Chris Ryan]

I gotta be honest. So far, no, the Spider.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, but listen, we haven't gotten to the way of water yet. Right. This is a lot of water.

[Sean Fennessey]

Think of yourself as a water guy.

[Chris Ryan]

As elements go, I would much rather explore space than underwater.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, good to know. And Sean, it's Chris. I'm in space. I killed a guy. I need you to dig a space hole.

[Amanda Davis]

You know, I'll come give you. Okay, so Jackson Champion, sick name was in Scream 6.

[Chris Ryan]

As who?

[Amanda Davis]

Remember that? Hold on. Wow.

[Sean Fennessey]

Jackson Champion.

[Amanda Davis]

Ethan Landry. Of course, Landry. He was also kid on bike and.

[Chris Ryan]

Avengers 6 is New York, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

And.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, I think so. And. And Trap House, if any of you saw that. But he's not on the poster here.

[Chris Ryan]

So he's one of the kids who's.

[Sean Fennessey]

Killed early on in. In their apartment.

[Chris Ryan]

Scream six. Okay, okay.

[Amanda Davis]

But yeah, his. His, like, chew. Come on. You know, his TK on Wikipedia is just Avatar 4.

[Chris Ryan]

And Avatar 5, she is.

[Sean Fennessey]

Is Natiri.

[Chris Ryan]

Natiri. She's usually stressing like, you know, we gotta keep. We got to just stay out of trouble. We can't get into violent interactions.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, she's a warrior, but I think she's focused on surviving and protecting her family, kind of.

[Amanda Davis]

She's also, like, connected to her world.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes.

[Amanda Davis]

And the end the Na' vi people.

[Chris Ryan]

In a way that they're in her world. Right?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. But Jake is bringing in like the marine technology and worldview.

[Chris Ryan]

What the fuck is this?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. What's going on?

[Sean Fennessey]

This.

[Chris Ryan]

Advanced interrogation techniques.

[Sean Fennessey]

Trying to find the location of where they're living, where the base is.

[Chris Ryan]

I see where this is going.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so they. Oh, so they captured him and everyone else got away with Jake Sully, and now he's being tortured and he's wearing the face mask.

[Sean Fennessey]

I gotta give this kid credit. He just turned 21. So he's like 50 when he's making this movie.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, he's pretty good.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's also acting in a world in which everyone else is wearing a ping pong ball on their face.

[Amanda Davis]

Right.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, Stephen Lang.

[Sean Fennessey]

He doesn't like it.

[Chris Ryan]

Spilling paternal.

[Sean Fennessey]

A single nosebleed. Kind of looks like last time you had a nosebleed.

[Amanda Davis]

Me? Yeah. I've never had a nosebleed.

[Sean Fennessey]

What?

[Amanda Davis]

I don't know. I've just never had one.

[Sean Fennessey]

You've never had a nosebleed?

[Amanda Davis]

No, I've never had a nosebleed.

[Sean Fennessey]

And you're living a blessed life.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. That's right. It's all coming up. That's what the protein will do for you. You know the scurry yogurt, Is that.

[Sean Fennessey]

One of the yogurt does prevents. Nosebleeds. It's so ironic, given all the cocaine you've been using, that you've never had a nosebleed.

[Chris Ryan]

Her being like Alex Jones, just being yogurt stops nosebleeds.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's a great theme of this conversation. Nosebleeds. Cr. When's the last time?

[Chris Ryan]

2008.

[Sean Fennessey]

2008, okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Financial crisis, you know what I mean? Went upside down on a couple of houses pouring out.

[Sean Fennessey]

Right.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you gu. Guys know that some people borrow money against their stock holdings? Do you do that all the time? I thought that might be a new business.

[Sean Fennessey]

You're asking because you've done that?

[Chris Ryan]

I was thinking about it. I was like, what would happen if I did that?

[Sean Fennessey]

What are you trying to acquire?

[Chris Ryan]

I don't know. I need a.

[Sean Fennessey]

You just need a lot of cash.

[Chris Ryan]

I want a bunch of cash. And then maybe buy Warner Brothers. Like a championship level football squad.

[Amanda Davis]

Thanks. Thanks for my. Yeah, you describe. Chris.

[Sean Fennessey]

Warner Brothers is something I want to see.

[Amanda Davis]

I need to.

[Sean Fennessey]

What?

[Amanda Davis]

What do I get to do?

[Chris Ryan]

Wait, wait. If I buy Warner Brothers, what am.

[Amanda Davis]

I in charge of?

[Sean Fennessey]

Carefully.

[Chris Ryan]

Yogurt, product placement. Making sure that in Task, Mark Ruffalo is like, have you tried this Pennsylvania yogurt? It's really good, right before shooting a.

[Sean Fennessey]

Guy in the head.

[Amanda Davis]

How did Task work out for you?

[Chris Ryan]

Like in, like at the end or.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Like. Yeah. Was it good ending?

[Chris Ryan]

Immensely satisfying. You didn't watch it?

[Sean Fennessey]

No. Were there any Na'? Vi?

[Chris Ryan]

Did you watch the Beast in Me?

[Amanda Davis]

No. Zach started it without me. Zach Baron started it without me. Okay, so I'm still on my flight back from Philadelphia for Thanksgiving. The worst flight of my life. I watched three fourths of an episode of the Diplomat.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Which I really enjoyed, but that's what I managed to.

[Chris Ryan]

That's what you were allowed to watch in a six hour episode?

[Amanda Davis]

That was what I got together. Yeah. Listen, it was real bad. It was a bad scene. God love my children. And in this case, not really Knox's fault. But the baby did not want to be contained, so I can't confront that. A man in front of me did watch the Big Short, so I was, you know, thinking about, you know, back in the news.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The financial crisis. CR's nosebleeds.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Michael Burry.

[Chris Ryan]

The Fed's pumping cash into the economy.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, Michael Burry stepped away. He closed.

[Chris Ryan]

No, it's not true. He's shorting bitcoin.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, he closed his brokerage.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so who is being.

[Sean Fennessey]

His hedge fund is closed.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, no. He's shorting.

[Amanda Davis]

He was shorting water data centers.

[Chris Ryan]

I can't remember.

[Amanda Davis]

So we're having some sort of ceremony right now, I guess.

[Chris Ryan]

Anything on, like, those prediction markets?

[Sean Fennessey]

He's shorting avatars. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

So there's an. So this is an important. So Jake Sully is getting some sort of. Some sort of ceremony here. Oh, they're leaving Toruk. Mocking. Yes. So and that was. Who is Torque Mocto. That's.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, they're leaving their.

[Amanda Davis]

Their spot name.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's sort of. I think it's his union with a larger creature that makes him like an epic warrior.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so they had a like, leaving ceremony because they have to leave because they're bringing danger to the forest community.

[Chris Ryan]

But they don't know. Okay. If that kid gives up the spot.

[Amanda Davis]

Right.

[Chris Ryan]

They're gonna get smoked anyway.

[Sean Fennessey]

Right?

[Amanda Davis]

Yes, right, exactly. Well, he's not giving up the spot. I mean, I guess he could, but that is disrespectful to Spider.

[Chris Ryan]

This is a movie about fathers in a lot of ways.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. And families.

[Sean Fennessey]

Jack has just asked us what percentage of this discussion do you think has been about Avatar? 35 to 40%. I think we've been doing actually pretty good relative to where we've been.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm surprised by how engaged in it I am.

[Sean Fennessey]

I fully agree.

[Amanda Davis]

Listen, some water. Jack.

[Sean Fennessey]

Finally drinking water.

[Amanda Davis]

Jack, how many minutes?

[Chris Ryan]

No, no, no, no. This has to be like a flight. You can't look at that.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

You can't look the clock. Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, you can't.

[Amanda Davis]

Is that part of what you're doing? That was the mistake I made on my thing.

[Chris Ryan]

You cannot ever look like you have to read a book and then randomly be like, I wonder how. Like, if you get. Get like a nice chunk in. You're like, oh, I only got two hours left. Great.

[Amanda Davis]

Wow, it must be nice to be you and living that way.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, so they're getting to the water.

[Sean Fennessey]

The. The way of water. You're a woman of the water.

[Amanda Davis]

I do love the water, though. It's not. I was going to ask you. You are a Scorpio. What element is that? Is that earth? I think that might be earth.

[Chris Ryan]

Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

Scorpions. I think it's he of the nosebleeds.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. Scorpio. 8th astrological sign.

[Sean Fennessey]

You're in the nosebleed. Moon as well.

[Amanda Davis]

It is water. What a surprise. Okay, so that makes sense for you. So you and I, of course, are fire. Yeah. Leo's.

[Chris Ryan]

So this is more my kind of Avatar movie then.

[Amanda Davis]

I guess. So astrologically speaking, this is minus all like the beasts and machine guns. My ideal vacation.

[Chris Ryan]

Did he shoot this in sandals?

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, yeah, yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Honestly, if you want. If someone walked in here and was like, don't even bring a bag. We're taking you in the car and sending you to Sandals for a week.

[Sean Fennessey]

I.

[Amanda Davis]

You can come if you want. I mean, I guess if that was the price.

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure.

[Chris Ryan]

Because I would love to definitively not.

[Sean Fennessey]

Interested in that vacation.

[Amanda Davis]

You would be terrible at Sandals. You would be fine.

[Chris Ryan]

I'd be fine.

[Amanda Davis]

Maybe they have a casino.

[Sean Fennessey]

I haven't all inclusives before.

[Amanda Davis]

So have I. We all have. You know, it was more the sun and the sand.

[Sean Fennessey]

I would have done it.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, but you don't.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was just in Hawaii. It was great. I had a great time.

[Amanda Davis]

The best.

[Chris Ryan]

Different Na'. Vi's.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure.

[Chris Ryan]

Different spot. Right?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is just a.

[Chris Ryan]

Why'd you guys come here?

[Sean Fennessey]

This is the Aqua people, right? They're all Na', Vi, but their cultures are different. A lot of these movies are all about assimilation. Differences between people kind of bridging the gap. I found the third film to be the second movie in a row this year. The second great movie of this year about being a mixed race kid. Like, there's like. That's a real.

[Amanda Davis]

The second great movie.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, one battle after another.

[Amanda Davis]

Yes, No, I know that, but I more meant that. Avatar, Fire and Ash.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think it has greatness in it.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, how full of shit was your tweet?

[Sean Fennessey]

It's 100% true.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, my God. Hold on. I didn't even see this. Let's pull up the tweet.

[Sean Fennessey]

Everything in the truth in the tweet is true. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

How you're feeling about your Twitter feel fine.

[Amanda Davis]

What are we doing?

[Sean Fennessey]

There's so many people who are like, you can't be on there. Like, other social media platforms are not all completely. I didn't say that. Run by demons and fulfilled with demons. People are just full of shit.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, when are. When did you send this? Did you send this while we were walking? Oh, no, this morning. Okay. Six hours. Yeah, that's fine.

[Chris Ryan]

No embargo on that.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was trying to think of what movie it was reminding me of when I was watching the third film. Okay, dead serious. Because I was like, the setup here.

[Chris Ryan]

Is Drums along the Mohawk.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's Drums along the Mohawk, which is a John ford movie. The third John Ford movie of 1939. Cool. Can you name the other two?

[Amanda Davis]

No. The only 1939 movie I can think of is Gone with the Wind. Which is not a John Ford movie.

[Chris Ryan]

Grapes. Not grapes. The Irish one. What's the Irish one?

[Amanda Davis]

What's.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's not Irish. Isn't it Welsh? How Green Was my Valley?

[Chris Ryan]

How Green was my valley? Is that 1939?

[Sean Fennessey]

That's not correct.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

It's not.

[Sean Fennessey]

How Green is my Valley? Famously, I think the following year defeated Citizen Kane for best picture.

[Chris Ryan]

It's not any of the cavalry. The cavalry movies are later, Right?

[Sean Fennessey]

Cavalry movies are later. 1939, John Ford made a stagecoach.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, I thought that was earlier than 39.

[Sean Fennessey]

Young Mr. Lincoln and drums along the Mohawk.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, young Mr. Lincoln. Wow. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Famously.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. So your girl right here, Kate Wins. Elko. Yeah. In the. In the. I know that she's not actually from Delco.

[Sean Fennessey]

Elko. Oh, Kate Winslet.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure. Yeah, yeah, that's her.

[Sean Fennessey]

How do you. This is a thorny one, but how do you feel about the water people having these kind of Maori intonations in their dialogue?

[Amanda Davis]

None of it feels great.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't like that.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think with Cliff Curtis, the actor who portrays one of the leaders here, you can kind of, you know, he's had some experience working in that world. But like Kate Winslet doing the Maori inflected accent is very odd.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. I think that this movie, this world is obviously about, you know, different cultures, assimilation, like cultural, like exchange, accepting people, all these sorts of things. But it can be Kate Winslet and.

[Chris Ryan]

Zoe Saldana head to head.

[Amanda Davis]

They just literally. They do literal hissing, like a cat fight. The lioness and male representation of women in Avatar. Avatar. All threes.

[Chris Ryan]

So have you ever had to apologize for your mate? Just been like, I apologize for my mate. The way he just.

[Sean Fennessey]

Eileen's had to apologize for me.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't. I've never had to apologize for Aileen.

[Amanda Davis]

It can be a little loose with some of the big gym is always a little loose.

[Sean Fennessey]

You know, we've all seen true lies. There's always a couple things where you're like, it's a little broad.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

A little stereotypical.

[Amanda Davis]

Maybe we could have gone a different direction, thought this through a little more.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, doesn't he? Doesn't he? His brushstroke is deep and wide. You know, it's not thin.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

So the thing that I turned to Amanda Yesterday was like 40 minutes into the movie and the kids were swimming in the water.

[Chris Ryan]

Not the fire.

[Sean Fennessey]

Not the fire.

[Amanda Davis]

No.

[Sean Fennessey]

And I was like, it looks like these navi are fucking swimming in water.

[Amanda Davis]

It really did.

[Sean Fennessey]

In water.

[Amanda Davis]

Even I watching that was like, this looks amazing. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Now this, you don't quite get that as strongly when you're watching it in this way on a 48 inch screen. I don't want to overemphasize that point too much, but since so much of this film now takes place in this kind of environment. Right. The fact that they were able to.

[Amanda Davis]

Make this, it's like a technical achievement unlike any other. I really give them that.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh. Just wanted to let you know.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Red Dead Redemption is on Netflix games now.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

So.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. For the boys.

[Chris Ryan]

For the boys.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, okay.

[Chris Ryan]

When he gets into Cowboys, he and I are gonna play an immersive weeks long video game.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

So if I have a subscription to Netflix, do I have a subscription to Netflix?

[Chris Ryan]

I think you can play it on your mobile.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, well, you can, but my children don't have access to a mobile, so.

[Sean Fennessey]

Not yet.

[Chris Ryan]

Not till Uncle Chris comes Christmas Day. IPhone 17. IPhone 17. Group chat started. You.

[Amanda Davis]

You bought my children. I mean, madly.

[Chris Ryan]

And giving memes starting at 6 in the morning.

[Sean Fennessey]

How soon before Knox says the word 6? 7.

[Amanda Davis]

How soon before I tried teaching it to him and Zach was like, don't do that. That's not funny. So but the other issue is like, how long until Knox can identify the numbers 6 and 7 when pointed out.

[Chris Ryan]

To him, which could be. Do you think that I say this with love?

[Amanda Davis]

He just has a very creative relationship to like the numerical representation.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think Knox will know his numbers before or after he knows who Elaine Kiffin is?

[Amanda Davis]

It is really, really up for debate. But. But you'd also known that like he. I don't know if he has like the celebrity bug, but he does notice people and he remembers people pretty quickly, like saquon, like Rory McElroy, like Tom Cruise, like Yuri Gagarin. Who is the newest person who wants to come. Yes. And he wants Yuri Gagarin to come to his birthday party. And like on a number of levels. I'm just like, that's not gonna.

[Chris Ryan]

Is he also on Telegram? Yeah. Is that happening?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yuri Gagarin?

[Amanda Davis]

Well, we have a book and he was the first person in space.

[Chris Ryan]

Where's the book from?

[Amanda Davis]

The library. I told you.

[Chris Ryan]

He knows like the book, who wrote it.

[Amanda Davis]

I think this is the Robert Usborne, like space and such.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is the boomerang theory again, where it's like, we got to start getting him introduced to, you know, Soviet communism.

[Amanda Davis]

Really early as the first person in space. So anyway, if he hears about Lane Kiffin, he could be like, I would like him to come to my party. You know, people who don't think that.

[Chris Ryan]

The moon landing is real. Also don't think any space exploration is real or just the moon landing.

[Amanda Davis]

Jack, can you weigh in for us?

[Sean Fennessey]

Does Jack have a microphone? Jack, do you believe in space travel? No. Okay, just. Just checking. Jack can't speak right now.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

So now they're like after some beef on the beach. The two tribes are like, you know what? Let's break bread.

[Amanda Davis]

And now they're in the bed.

[Sean Fennessey]

Can you protect us too? Snorkeling, we need refuge from this. This incoming war.

[Amanda Davis]

They experience the. Experiencing the wonder of the sea.

[Chris Ryan]

And this is like every time somebody gets fishing gear on Survivor.

[Amanda Davis]

So you go snorkeling a lot?

[Chris Ryan]

I have been snorkeling.

[Sean Fennessey]

Right. So every week for roughly nine hours.

[Chris Ryan]

That you go swim from Echo park.

[Amanda Davis]

On a beach vacation, you guys, like, do go snorkeling.

[Chris Ryan]

We have gone snorkeling in Hawaii and Puerto Rico.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so what are you up to when you're snorkeling?

[Chris Ryan]

What do I think about? Yeah, the vast void just out of touching distance and how terrifying it is.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's what you think about often in front of you.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, what.

[Sean Fennessey]

What about what's right in front of you?

[Chris Ryan]

It's like I'm following a turtle. And then it goes out into that drop off. Like nothing. I'm like, this is it, the shelf. This is. This is what Sartre wrote about.

[Amanda Davis]

You don't want to. With the shelf.

[Sean Fennessey]

The void. Yeah, yeah. Absolute blackness.

[Amanda Davis]

The thing is, with snorkeling, I guess it's like the reverse of 3D glasses, is that I can't really snorkel with contacts. I know it's supposed to be an airtight seal, but they don't have the technology down, you know, so then I can't keep my eyes open.

[Sean Fennessey]

You haven't had that issue?

[Chris Ryan]

An early kind of scuba gear, like where they put the whole suit on you with the Giant.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Do you get, like, Richard Dreyfuss and Jaws? You should do that whole. That whole getup.

[Amanda Davis]

Do you have interest in scuba diving? No. Me either.

[Chris Ryan]

No.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'd be too worried, but no. Me neither.

[Amanda Davis]

Too much gear.

[Sean Fennessey]

Big no. Love to snorkel. Big no on snorkel.

[Amanda Davis]

I don't really like snorkeling. I just want to be swimming myself.

[Chris Ryan]

When they're like, you can't. It was in the firm. He can't fly for 24 hours. Right?

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, that's right. After diving, that's a problem for me.

[Chris Ryan]

You never know. When my loans against my stock portfolio are Going to get called in and.

[Sean Fennessey]

What'S in his mailbox, you know? Have you considered that?

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, so, yeah, they're bad divers. They're learning. Okay, so these guys can't swim. So they can't. Well, they don't have breath control. They're not like Kate Winslet. Okay, so this is one thing we're gonna do. I'm gonna set a timer, and you see how long you can hold your breath. Just like Kate Winslet.

[Chris Ryan]

That's not really good podcasting, I guess it's good for video.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, we can talk about it.

[Chris Ryan]

I didn't say I hold my breath. I said I could do it under water.

[Amanda Davis]

Kate did seven and a half minutes.

[Chris Ryan]

I think I could do two.

[Amanda Davis]

Four, five.

[Sean Fennessey]

Wait.

[Chris Ryan]

Sorry. No, I have to take a deep breath. Hold on. Wait. Go. Ready? See, this is gonna mess. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

No.

[Chris Ryan]

One, two, three.

[Amanda Davis]

Wait. No, no, I stopped. Okay. Okay, reset. Tell me. Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Are you supposed to blow out?

[Amanda Davis]

Well, that's what they do before. I'm trying to remember what movie where right before they go underwater. They do.

[Chris Ryan]

That's. Tom Cruise does that in Mission Impossible.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, that would be right. Cause we've seen a lot of it.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm just gonna take one deep breath.

[Amanda Davis]

Ready? One. Okay, I'm going. One second.

[Chris Ryan]

I have two seconds.

[Sean Fennessey]

Got to fix his microphone.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, my God. Oh.

[Chris Ryan]

Ready?

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, okay, okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Three, two, one.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, here we go. Three seconds. I'm going to.

[Sean Fennessey]

All right, this is great. When Chris dies.

[Amanda Davis]

Where's Spider going? I'll call out every 10 seconds. That's what my favorite workout. 10 seconds.

[Sean Fennessey]

Chris, I forgot what you said. Is it. Is it burn or bury? We didn't figure out.

[Amanda Davis]

He wants to be buried.

[Sean Fennessey]

Buried?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, like Osama. Where are they going? 20 seconds.

[Chris Ryan]

I almost blew my eardrums out.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so that was 20 seconds.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, my God.

[Sean Fennessey]

Underwater is.

[Chris Ryan]

She made a Bin Laden joke. You know, that's my guy. I love hearing about him.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's nice to be reminded, though.

[Amanda Davis]

Yes, I know. Yeah. Okay. Well, that was great. Content. Seven and a half minutes. Kate Winslet did. That's pretty good.

[Sean Fennessey]

I gotta say, I remember this movie being quite complicated.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Did you drink my water?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, this is my water.

[Amanda Davis]

Where's. I had two bottles of water. Thank you.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, take a deep breath. Can we get her more yogurt? Get the yogurt palette in here.

[Amanda Davis]

Just wondering why my favorite Snap. I'd like to be.

[Sean Fennessey]

We try to not have a lot of shit on the tables in the shop.

[Amanda Davis]

You have a iPad here or. No, it's A laptop.

[Sean Fennessey]

And it's closed just in case I need it.

[Amanda Davis]

Put it over there.

[Sean Fennessey]

Why is your yogurt container here?

[Amanda Davis]

Because I ate it and we don't have a trash can.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you not eat your sandwich?

[Amanda Davis]

No, it's right there. See? Okay. You know what? Keep it to yourself.

[Chris Ryan]

They're getting in touch with the dolphins here.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, they're not dolphins. I'm not sure what these are called.

[Chris Ryan]

It's the fish thoroughbreds.

[Amanda Davis]

Like fishbowls.

[Sean Fennessey]

They appear to be mammals.

[Amanda Davis]

Bull sharks, sort of. I have some facts about bull sharks for later.

[Sean Fennessey]

Bull sharks?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, man.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. Oh, yeah, he got thrown. So, like. Yeah, bulls.

[Sean Fennessey]

Bull.

[Amanda Davis]

Water bulls.

[Chris Ryan]

So this is not water. Like this digitally rendered.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're in a tank.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, they're in a tank. But this world is obviously not real. No, that's not sand.

[Chris Ryan]

Who shot this?

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't know the cinematographer's name. I'll look it up. It's Vittorio Storaro.

[Amanda Davis]

Why don't you get out that laptop, buddy?

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think that Gordon Willis would think this is cool looking?

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't see why not. I think you would be blown away by the technology. There's a reason why these movies are both immensely successful and critically acclaimed, and awards bodies are interested in them because there's just the level of craftsmanship that is way above anything else that is trying to do this kind of work.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

The cinematographer of this film.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm in it for. The story, though, is.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, look, he's flying.

[Chris Ryan]

That's cool.

[Sean Fennessey]

Your boy Russell Carpenter, who also did. He also did True Lies. He also did Titanic.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

He shot the Charlie's angels films for McGlorin.

[Chris Ryan]

Nice.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Shot Ant man for Peyton Reed.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Number of other films. Some good, some bad.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. There he goes. Oh, now they're diving. Oh, and he can't hold on. Yeah. You know, kind of like water skiing. Where are you on water skiing?

[Chris Ryan]

Would prefer tubing. Like tubing behind a boat.

[Amanda Davis]

It's the same thing. You're. What about you?

[Sean Fennessey]

Never done it?

[Amanda Davis]

No. Water skiing nor tubing.

[Sean Fennessey]

I've never done either one.

[Chris Ryan]

Wow, you've tubed before.

[Amanda Davis]

You've never been.

[Chris Ryan]

You've gone tubing on a river, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, but. Yeah. No, I've been in a tube going down a river.

[Chris Ryan]

I've never been on negative tubing experience in. In the Badlands.

[Sean Fennessey]

I did. Thanks for asking. So I went to Jackson Hole with my wife.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

It was during my sojourn in 2015 through the.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, right.

[Sean Fennessey]

The American West.

[Amanda Davis]

Your breakdown, your.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's not a breakdown. It was a moment of realization that also turned out to be tremendously impactful in your life. And if I had not gone on that journey, we would not be sitting here right now.

[Amanda Davis]

I was concerned because it's like, you know, it's an every 10 years sort of thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, it's happening. It's unfortunately not happening in the American South.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure. So. But this. Ilene was present for some of it.

[Sean Fennessey]

So I went out on the road for.

[Amanda Davis]

I remember that well.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm sharing this with the listeners. They don't know the whole story. I went out on the road by myself for a week, drove through Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, et cetera, et cetera. Eileen met me in Colorado.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

We went up to Wyoming and Montana, and when we were in Wyoming, we stayed in Jackson Hole, and we went tubing down the river in Jackson Hole, and we went too far and we didn't have any shoes on, and we. There's no way to get back into our hotel without walking on the gravel roads.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Bare feet in bathing suits with no towels in the middle of the summer in a city we'd never been to.

[Chris Ryan]

With phones.

[Sean Fennessey]

No phones.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Because, you know, though, they do have those little packs now where you can put the phone in the water pack.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. This was 10 years ago, so it might as well have been 300 years ago.

[Amanda Davis]

I probably did have it then.

[Chris Ryan]

That'll be dope. Because next time I go tubing, I could still text nox and si. Sick memes.

[Sean Fennessey]

It was just really a failure of planning, you know, where we were just, like, had not considered that we would get two miles down the river.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, you just missed your exit.

[Amanda Davis]

That's all right. Yeah. But then you do have to walk a while, so. But you've never been on a tube.

[Sean Fennessey]

But then just picture me shirtless in a bathing suit, walking down a street with no shoes on, holding a giant tube.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's not cool.

[Chris Ryan]

And they're like, that's Grantland's Sean Fennesee.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so you've never been, like, on.

[Chris Ryan]

A tube behind a speedboat?

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, yeah, I've obviously done that a lot. I grew up in the South.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, on lakes.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. So, you know, lakes aren't my preferred body of life.

[Chris Ryan]

Has your dad weighed in on the coaching carousel of college football?

[Amanda Davis]

I haven't heard from him about Lane this time. But listen, can you text him? Yeah, I actually can.

[Sean Fennessey]

His name is kind of mud for volunteers fans. Right.

[Amanda Davis]

My father and uncle have been trying to get the Knoxville sewage waste you know, waste management facility named after Lane Kiffin.

[Chris Ryan]

The Lane Kiffin Sewage.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They've been. They have. You know, I don't know whether they, like, signed a petition or started the petition. I've been cc'd on some emails because my dad has a similar email strategy to your wife, Chris. All right, let's text my dad.

[Chris Ryan]

Very direct.

[Amanda Davis]

Dad. Yeah, direct. And okay. I am podcasting, and Chris wants to know your thoughts about Lane Kiffin. Thoughts about Lane.

[Chris Ryan]

What's going on here?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, Quaritch is continuing to track Jake Sully and his family.

[Chris Ryan]

And Spider is helping him.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, he's being forced to help him.

[Amanda Davis]

But also, there's sort of like a dad son thing going on.

[Sean Fennessey]

You know, there's a critical sequence in the first film where Jake learns to ride that giant creature.

[Chris Ryan]

I think I've seen that in short form video.

[Amanda Davis]

Just as you might have seen a.

[Sean Fennessey]

Moment of that in the film Babylon, which is the last film that we covered. On the. Watch along, you can see a brief clip of it. And so that was kind of Quaritch, like, doing an echo of that scene, but he's not making a connection with the creature. He's just trying to dominate it, which is what, obviously, the American.

[Amanda Davis]

I thought you were going a different way. And I was like, don't do it.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't. I can't even fathom what you think I was going to say. So. Yeah, you know, on the one hand, Chris, like, you're not really a creatures guy.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm trying to think of some of my favorite creatures, and I'll just run off the top of my head, I'll name some. I really like Falkor from Neverending Story.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Yep.

[Amanda Davis]

So do we all.

[Chris Ryan]

Formative buck, dragon. What is he?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, I think that's right. That's the creature that he rides.

[Chris Ryan]

Number one. Yeah, that's him.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

He rules.

[Chris Ryan]

Good film.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Dc count as a creature?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. I mean, he's an alien. I don't count.

[Amanda Davis]

Separate that. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

These are technically aliens.

[Amanda Davis]

To whom?

[Sean Fennessey]

To.

[Amanda Davis]

To you. So maybe you should think about that worldview. Just like James Cameron's asking you to.

[Sean Fennessey]

You feel that you have a great deal in common with the Na', Vi.

[Amanda Davis]

You know, matriarchal society, for sure.

[Chris Ryan]

Warrior.

[Amanda Davis]

Warrior moms not impressed by machine guns.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Hang in there, Mama Natiri.

[Amanda Davis]

You got this.

[Chris Ryan]

You got this. You got this, Kiri, you got this. Padma, you got this.

[Sean Fennessey]

AWA.

[Amanda Davis]

And I. Well, I like these. I do like the water. I like being near the ocean. So in that sense, I.

[Sean Fennessey]

You're a waterly to these people.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, but I don't really aspire to scuba diving.

[Chris Ryan]

Would you say this is the first act of this film or.

[Sean Fennessey]

We're deeply in the first act, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay. We're not in the second act, though.

[Amanda Davis]

We might be in the second act because we've at least made it to the water. But I guess we're sort of in the second half of the first act because we're learning about the water. And then there's going to be some more water conflict, I guess. And then, you know, 90 minutes of machine guns. Ooh.

[Chris Ryan]

Or you can get jellyfish attached to you and you can swim around. That's sick.

[Amanda Davis]

All right. They're doing. I mean, that. That looks cool. So, Chris, this a reference here for this world. Could be Ariel's cavern in Little Mermaid. Part of their world. You know.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm trying to think of.

[Amanda Davis]

Something, except she has, like, a lot more forks and stuff.

[Chris Ryan]

Dope creatures.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so aliens don't count.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's not really your thing.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, would you call sloth from Goonies a creature or just.

[Sean Fennessey]

Absolutely not. Right.

[Chris Ryan]

It's just a guy.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's a human who loves Milky Ways. Baby Ruth.

[Chris Ryan]

Baby.

[Amanda Davis]

What about slimer?

[Chris Ryan]

More of an apparition.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, well, you know, there are no bad ideas.

[Sean Fennessey]

In a brainstorm, you came right out with Rancor.

[Chris Ryan]

Falkor.

[Sean Fennessey]

Falkor. Rancor.

[Chris Ryan]

Rancor is the. What's the thing from Star Wars? Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

It's also how you feel whenever you're around Rancor. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's what you feel when I'm around. Hurts my feelings. You came right out with Falkor. Hot.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And then no creatures after that.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, because I think that we're getting into semantics here. Like, I was thinking.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Because you're not a big fan.

[Amanda Davis]

I was gonna say Furbies, but that's not what I meant. What are the little baby waddling? Yeah, but. No, the other little guys in Last Jedi.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, the ones that are like the Porgs?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, they were cute.

[Chris Ryan]

They're. Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

What about Gizmo from Gremlins?

[Chris Ryan]

Is he a creature?

[Sean Fennessey]

I think so.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Then I like Gizmo.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you like Gremlins?

[Chris Ryan]

What's the Skeksis and the Dark Crystal?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, yes. Now we're talking.

[Chris Ryan]

Those are cool. They're the bad guys or the good guys?

[Sean Fennessey]

Those are the bad guys.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, they're pretty. Pretty cool. Those were gnarly, intimidating.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, the.

[Chris Ryan]

What's the one that throws Gandalf off the bridge?

[Sean Fennessey]

Balroth That's Balrog.

[Chris Ryan]

Balrog, yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

And that's a creature you shall not pass.

[Sean Fennessey]

Remember that Lord of the Rings?

[Amanda Davis]

No, I really don't.

[Sean Fennessey]

Ian McKellen.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, I.

[Sean Fennessey]

Wonderful performance. I'm sort of like Christian Gandalf the Gray.

[Amanda Davis]

I have seen all of those films, but my memory of them is limited.

[Chris Ryan]

Are you sure you've seen all of them?

[Amanda Davis]

Too short. I've definitely seen the last two.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's incoherent.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you see the Fellowship of the Writer?

[Amanda Davis]

I don't know. I remember though, in college they did a back to back of two and three.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, did you get Blackout?

[Amanda Davis]

And I went, no, I did not get Blackout for that one. That was just. That was just for Rocky Horror. But I did. So I have seen two and three. I went and I don't think I've.

[Chris Ryan]

Ever seen you blackout drunk.

[Amanda Davis]

That's. That's good. You're maybe the only person on Earth, but. Not in a while. You know, I've grown up. I'm mature. Okay, so why are they fighting?

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm. I'm still fascinated by you seeing Two Towers and.

[Chris Ryan]

And Return of the King.

[Amanda Davis]

And Return of the King, but my memory of it.

[Sean Fennessey]

But Fellowship of the Ring is fucking fantastic.

[Chris Ryan]

It's awesome. Those three movies rule.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're great.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, what is.

[Chris Ryan]

When are they hunting for Gollum? Like, when does that happen? The hunt for Gollum, Hobbit and Fellowship of the Ring?

[Sean Fennessey]

I thought it's be.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes, yes, but why would they be hunting for him?

[Sean Fennessey]

Because he has the ring.

[Chris Ryan]

Right, but who's on. Like, I thought they had let the ring kind of pass into like SEAL team.

[Sean Fennessey]

This.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, my God, bro.

[Sean Fennessey]

Now that's.

[Chris Ryan]

That is.

[Sean Fennessey]

That is David Ellison's Paramount.

[Chris Ryan]

We need to get generative AI on that. SEAL Team 6 hunting Gollum.

[Sean Fennessey]

Free money. This money is free. And if we could just get the navi involved somehow. Now we're talking to her. Yeah, get she Hulk in there. What other characters can we get involved?

[Chris Ryan]

This is, you know, a popular but difficult to master cooking style. With the banana leaves.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. What do you like to put in there? Piece of fish? Little bit of.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, like a nice. Like white fish.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Black tar heroin. Maybe Chuck that up.

[Amanda Davis]

No, I was thinking about you remember the Tall Day fish? Yeah, the Tall day fish that's recommended to cook in the banana leaf. But I often have trouble sourcing it in short notice.

[Sean Fennessey]

This scene is like. There's like a replica of this scene in the third film.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, there are many replicas of this of many scenes. I. I don't know.

[Sean Fennessey]

I did read that they were written simultaneously, split in half.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, well, that's always the way.

[Chris Ryan]

Solo, credited writer on these.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, I believe it's Sorkin. Is it Amanda Jaffe and Scott Silver. I want to say.

[Chris Ryan]

Scott Silver, Huh?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, Amanda Silver and Rick Jaffa. Excuse me.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

They are writing duo, and their other films include the Hand that Rocks the Cradle.

[Chris Ryan]

The new one.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, the 1992 version. The Planet of the Apes films from the 2000 and tens. The Matt Reeves movies.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

They wrote Jurassic World.

[Amanda Davis]

Which one's that?

[Sean Fennessey]

The Mulan live action remake. Yeah. That's blue.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Okay, so this looks fun. This is like jet Skis, but, you know, with nature.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're dolphin jet Skis. That's cool.

[Amanda Davis]

What's the, like, big scissors thing? What's that for?

[Sean Fennessey]

Scissors.

[Chris Ryan]

They're all holding big scissors.

[Amanda Davis]

Those are arrows.

[Sean Fennessey]

Those are. That's a bow.

[Amanda Davis]

That's a bow.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm fairly certain. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so this is kind of like.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's like a. A tensile bow that, like, straps back.

[Amanda Davis]

Got it.

[Sean Fennessey]

And you can release it.

[Chris Ryan]

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. Everybody's kind of arrived at this place, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

It is a lot like that.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, are we about to meet someone important? Okay, this seems.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't. Is it right now?

[Amanda Davis]

I don't know. It's just like they're out in the world, precious friend, and they're, like, about to. It just.

[Chris Ryan]

There's a sense of wonder building, actor, cameo. Or is it just a matter of speaking DiCaprio?

[Amanda Davis]

Serene music is playing so that is. There we go. Call the fish.

[Sean Fennessey]

Call the fish.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. So they're speaking a special language. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I love that.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, that looks remarkably like a pair of nail scissors. I just want to point that out.

[Sean Fennessey]

There, you see, it's got an arrow.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, I do.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think they're on the hunt here.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're hunting for fish and they're trying to. They're mocking him.

[Chris Ryan]

Are they gonna find out that he actually is able to do this, or is he gonna drown and they're gonna get in trouble?

[Sean Fennessey]

They're gonna bail on him.

[Amanda Davis]

That's fucked up. But then. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, this is sad, you know? Oh, he got the fish.

[Chris Ryan]

Was he not supposed to have done that?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, now he's all alone. And watch out, here comes a big fish, more than likely right, to chase after him.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, he's alone. For not being very nice.

[Sean Fennessey]

I told you guys the story of the kid who got invited to the party at my house?

[Chris Ryan]

No.

[Amanda Davis]

No. Is this sad?

[Sean Fennessey]

It's the saddest story in the world. You want to hear it?

[Amanda Davis]

No.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think their parents are listening?

[Sean Fennessey]

No. Okay. I was 14.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, this is awful.

[Sean Fennessey]

Just went to high school.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, this guy.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. But that's not.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's not what we're waiting for.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, that's not what we're waiting for.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's just a giant fish.

[Amanda Davis]

Shark fish. That's an evil shark fish.

[Sean Fennessey]

And of course he's chasing that guy, which is not ideal for our guy. Is this Lo' ak, who is the young. What's the young boy's name? I forget his name. Lo' ak might be the other son.

[Amanda Davis]

It's probably. No, I think it's Lo' ak because he makes the bond with Lo'. Ak. Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think that's the older son. I could be wrong. So I'm 14 years old. I have a doubleheader baseball game to umpire or play. I was playing, it was in Nesconset on Long island. And I never. I never umpired a doubleheader. That's a lot of work.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Caught both games. Long day.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Saturday evening, I get home, this is awful.

[Amanda Davis]

This is. I'm just like really, really sad.

[Sean Fennessey]

Arrive in my house. There's a boy there, a kid sitting on the stoop on the front porch. He just moved to the neighborhood like three months earlier. And he's holding a bottle, a two liter bottle of Pepsi. And me and my mom pull up and this poor kid says. He bounds up, runs up to me and says, hey man, I'm here for the party. Said somebody pranked him and I guess friends of mine told him that there was a party at my house that started at 5 o'. Clock. I got home at 6 o'. Clock. He sat on my porch for at least a half an hour. That's what I said.

[Amanda Davis]

That's awful.

[Sean Fennessey]

It was the most pained I think I've ever been for another person in my life. I could not have felt worse for this kid. And it was like a nice kid who was like, we weren't good friends or anything, but he was not somebody that I was picking on. And I think that's why they picked me to be the house to do that to this poor kid. And I felt such a deep hurt for this kid.

[Amanda Davis]

What did you do?

[Sean Fennessey]

I just told him the truth. I said, there's no party here. I'm really sorry. I just got home from a baseball game and then. I'm really sorry.

[Amanda Davis]

Like ordered pizza.

[Chris Ryan]

Did his dad start oracle.

[Sean Fennessey]

Uh huh. And now he's. And now he's a real boy.

[Chris Ryan]

Now he's gonna take away all the IP that we love to punish him.

[Sean Fennessey]

Not only that, but he's gonna delete every episode of the Big Picture because of what happened to him on that day.

[Chris Ryan]

No, you fucking elevate you.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so he's grunting. He's having a hard time in the corner.

[Sean Fennessey]

This pod is trapped.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, but he can breathe underwater. So he's got 10.

[Sean Fennessey]

But he's still learning how to do it.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, and here comes the fish again. So that this is the bad fish. That's a bad guy.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'd say that's what. Yes. This is who we're waiting for.

[Amanda Davis]

Here he is.

[Chris Ryan]

Is this before? This is a classic Spielberg big creature hits the little creature.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so he's taking care of business. Oh, but this guy is about to faint.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, he's dead.

[Amanda Davis]

No, that guy.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, this guy.

[Amanda Davis]

Yes. Yeah. We don't know his name is Gagging. He can't.

[Chris Ryan]

But does he bond with the biggest fish?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, of course. You bet he does.

[Chris Ryan]

And they're like, yo, yeah, he's a whale. There's something special about this kid.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes.

[Chris Ryan]

The ball pops out of the hand.

[Amanda Davis]

And there we go.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. He's like. This kid reminds me of Wemby.

[Amanda Davis]

Very beautiful.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's been brought to shore by this magical creature. This creature.

[Amanda Davis]

Has he been brought to shore? Is he resting on the creature?

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, yes, he's resting on the creature.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

So they've bonded.

[Amanda Davis]

That's beautiful. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

So this is Payakan, Chris.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is a whale voiced by Jim Carrey.

[Chris Ryan]

Seems like somebody.

[Sean Fennessey]

Smoking pikon doesn't use words to communicate.

[Chris Ryan]

Of course not.

[Sean Fennessey]

He does communicate in his own whale language.

[Amanda Davis]

Right.

[Chris Ryan]

And this kid understands it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, they come to understand each other over time. But he is a majestic creature.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, shit.

[Amanda Davis]

He caught one Pycon. No.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, God.

[Sean Fennessey]

Brother.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Payakan to me is worth the price of admission for this film.

[Amanda Davis]

I totally agree. So Toucan is the type of whale that he is or the type of mammal.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you study that or does this.

[Amanda Davis]

No, that is like all I remember.

[Sean Fennessey]

Comes up frequently.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. And so actually, when Payakan shows up in Avatar 3, I turn to.

[Chris Ryan]

Is that a spoiler?

[Amanda Davis]

I guess. So I turned to Sean and I said, is that Toucun? Because I didn't remember Payakan, but I did remember Toucun. So they talk. They're important.

[Chris Ryan]

The touchwoon Were many people turning to their seatmates and asking questions and chatting? Or were you guys ruining it for other people?

[Sean Fennessey]

It was just me, Amanda and Jim Cameron in the screen.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. He's getting. Oh, he's trying to get this thing out. My dad has responded to the Lane Kiffin tweet. Who wouldn't want to leave Ole Miss.

[Chris Ryan]

Shots? It just means more down there.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, that's cool. He's helping him out.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. That is nice.

[Chris Ryan]

It's like the Pit.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is like the Pit. They should do the Pit. But.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, if we get enough corporate mergers, maybe.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, there you go.

[Sean Fennessey]

If we get Paramount and. And Warner's together, for sure, that's in play. Right?

[Chris Ryan]

But I guess 20th Century Studios.

[Amanda Davis]

Yes.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Should they all just come together?

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think that there's somebody at Disney in Burbank right now is just like, why. Why can't Captain America be in Pandora?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Yes, of course there is somebody who is doing that, and that person should be sent to hell. Well, because they're probably putting it in Free Guy, too. I mean, that was what Free Guy was.

[Chris Ryan]

That is what Free Guy was.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Wouldn't it be sick if Captain America had a lightsaber?

[Amanda Davis]

And they'll do that. But Bob Iger won't let Kylo Ren live. You know, we can.

[Chris Ryan]

We can hunt for Gollum, but we can't hunt for Ben Solo.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's a cowardly act, Bob. Empower creatives. That's what. That's Disney's legacy.

[Amanda Davis]

So this is nice. So now they're swimming together. They're buds. He's sort of like. He has, like, lobster like claws and.

[Sean Fennessey]

He has a sea turtle kind of.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Quality, but like a double blue whale meets a turtle. But also like a dune sandworm. But also like the projection of the sand like that.

[Amanda Davis]

Look at that.

[Sean Fennessey]

From beneath your whale.

[Amanda Davis]

The crab or lobster claw situation. I mean, just think about how delicious that would be. I haven't had lobsters.

[Sean Fennessey]

Whale undercarriage, pro or negative.

[Chris Ryan]

Whale undercarriage.

[Amanda Davis]

Lobster, of course. Well, I never know with you.

[Sean Fennessey]

What do you mean?

[Amanda Davis]

But scallops are. No, you said don't like scallops. Scallops or no lobster.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes.

[Sean Fennessey]

I tell you. What's a. What's a small. A bay scallop. Small scallop. Yeah. Have a bay scallops. Bay scallop with some pasta is nice. A large scallop that has been, like, pan seared.

[Chris Ryan]

You know what I've never seen you do is tuck into a bowl of.

[Sean Fennessey]

Mussels and frites well, funny you should ask.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. You had a bad.

[Chris Ryan]

Once. There was a 14 year old boy at my house.

[Sean Fennessey]

That same boy brought over a bucket of mussels the next morning and we ate them together and nearly died. No, I had a bad muscle in 2014. And I'll never go back.

[Amanda Davis]

I'll never go back.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'll never go back. And by bad I mean like the worst night of my life. Like the most ill I've ever been. And I just can't go back. And I'm. Prior to that moment I would have eaten mussels every day. I love that.

[Chris Ryan]

I used to think I was impervious to food poisoning until I was in Norway. And I was on an island in Norway at a lovely dinner. And a man who I think owned this restaurant was serving oysters, fresh oysters, but was like really getting his thumb in the air.

[Amanda Davis]

She thinks she's connected to Eywa.

[Chris Ryan]

And that's important.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, it is.

[Chris Ryan]

My lasting memory of this experience is eating oysters. Eating. I feel. I don't feel good about this. But a whale burger.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

And seeing this man.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, I have a driving about respecting local cultures.

[Chris Ryan]

Driving away from the, from the restaurant in a boat and be like who was that guy? Did he work here or what? Was he just bringing oysters by?

[Sean Fennessey]

Chris, I have some news for you. That man was your real father.

[Chris Ryan]

And then getting violently ill.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, that is really tough.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you think it was his thumb or the whale?

[Chris Ryan]

I ate so much weird stuff that night. That was like the outer limits of like how adventurous I am as an eater, which I am quite adventurous until.

[Amanda Davis]

Someone tries to serve you a lovely mushroom skewer.

[Chris Ryan]

I didn't. That's not about adventure. That was about the flavor profile of that mushroom.

[Sean Fennessey]

What was the profile?

[Chris Ryan]

I just thought it was pretty earthy and fine. But Amanda looked at me but he made eye contact. The future of the West.

[Amanda Davis]

Because what he did was he lied to me. He looked at me straight in the eyes and he was like that's dynamite. And he was just lying. And it was a terrible to do.

[Sean Fennessey]

That from time to time.

[Amanda Davis]

I know a little bit of.

[Chris Ryan]

A little bit of a.

[Sean Fennessey]

You know. He's very kind.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh look. That is a planet. But that planet looks a lot like Jupiter.

[Chris Ryan]

Is it?

[Amanda Davis]

That was a really big planet that looks a lot like Jupiter and. Or the planet that is crashing into Earth at the end of Melancholia.

[Sean Fennessey]

So I believe this is a different solar system from Earth.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, I'm just saying it is planet Coded it very well.

[Sean Fennessey]

Could be a planet.

[Amanda Davis]

But you know what?

[Sean Fennessey]

If this is in fact a moon, perhaps that is the planet for whom.

[Amanda Davis]

This is the moon. Exactly. Right. And you see the.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you like other Lars movies or just Melancholia?

[Amanda Davis]

Really just melancholia. It's.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, because I think Lars mommy would also be a really good move for you.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

You're just like, it's time to watch Antichrist again.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure. I mean, I don't like. I. I respect it. Yeah. Yeah, I guess. But not really. No, I do, but it weirds me up.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm an og. Saw Europa in the. In theaters.

[Amanda Davis]

There you go.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like 1987.

[Chris Ryan]

No, it's like the 90s.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Was Europa in the 90s?

[Chris Ryan]

I think so.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

I was like, this guy's one to watch these.

[Sean Fennessey]

Say that to when you were 10.

[Chris Ryan]

This 14 year old boy sitting next to.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so. But why.

[Chris Ryan]

So you never got to the bottom of this?

[Sean Fennessey]

What bottom? What.

[Chris Ryan]

What happened to the boy? Which one of your friends set him up?

[Sean Fennessey]

I know who did it.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, see if they're listening.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's in play.

[Chris Ryan]

Was it Pants?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, that was a college friend. Was it Chris? Could have been. Probably was.

[Chris Ryan]

I think he's listening.

[Sean Fennessey]

He does from time to time.

[Amanda Davis]

They're having some strategic with this guy.

[Chris Ryan]

It's not his fault.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yes. No, it is his fault. It's not his fault. But I think they left the compound without.

[Chris Ryan]

Shame.

[Amanda Davis]

Why. That? I mean, I just. That. That is not Dr. Becky. Parenting is what I would say.

[Sean Fennessey]

Jake Sully has some struggles. He does as a. As a boy. Dad. Yeah, he really, you know, he's raised.

[Chris Ryan]

He's all right. The kids.

[Sean Fennessey]

Probably by a military man. You think it's a kid's fault?

[Chris Ryan]

Well, what's the. What is his issue? What did he do wrong? Wrote the whale.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, among other things.

[Chris Ryan]

And that's for a while.

[Amanda Davis]

You're not allowed to ride the whale.

[Chris Ryan]

These other kids abandoned him.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, and this dude's like, why didn't you rat me out?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, that's sick.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. And so then she's like. So does she look like Sigourney Weaver?

[Sean Fennessey]

Ask that.

[Amanda Davis]

That's S. Weaver. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Then Kiri, the 14 year old girl. Cool.

[Amanda Davis]

But now that you know, like, watch the mannerisms a little. I see it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Of course.

[Amanda Davis]

And that's.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's Kate Win.

[Amanda Davis]

And that's Kate Winslet.

[Chris Ryan]

Young Kate Winslet or. No, no, young Kate Win. I thought Kate Winslet was like the mom who greeted them All.

[Amanda Davis]

And gave her.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, that's her.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, no, that's the.

[Sean Fennessey]

Is that her daughter?

[Amanda Davis]

That's her daughter, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

Sorry.

[Sean Fennessey]

They look a lot alike.

[Amanda Davis]

They do. Okay. Okay. So then they're talking about whether Payakan is good or bad. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

It was Lo'. Ak.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Who did form the bond with Payakan.

[Amanda Davis]

I know because he's translating for him throughout the thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

I know.

[Amanda Davis]

It's beautiful. You gotta respect the ocean.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, so you said something very rude when we were watching the movie last night where you were like, I don't care about any of these characters, but I disagree. I like these kids.

[Amanda Davis]

We were just watching four people. I didn't really care about. I care about Pikon a lot.

[Sean Fennessey]

Pycon's very important.

[Amanda Davis]

But I also just didn't. What I meant in that now he's.

[Chris Ryan]

Out there, he's trying to find Pycon again.

[Amanda Davis]

Was that the.

[Chris Ryan]

Damn.

[Amanda Davis]

The movie was not effectively communicating stakes and motivation of these people. They were just running back and forth for a while, and I was like, I don't care.

[Sean Fennessey]

Fair enough.

[Amanda Davis]

That was my note. Okay. Sulaine Kiffin. He's leaving and people are mad.

[Chris Ryan]

Hold on. I want to see what Pycon says.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

It's too painful even to talk about.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's. He doesn't. He can't trust anybody.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. How did he learn Payakan's language? Wow.

[Chris Ryan]

Man. This is deeply moving.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. This. Look at that. It's beautiful.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is the best part of the movie.

[Amanda Davis]

It's incredible. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's a good movie about friendship.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Did this. Anything bad happen to Payakan?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, you'll have to watch. Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Lane Kiffin.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

He was at Ole Miss. He rebuilt Ole Miss, right?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Did he?

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure. They're having a good season.

[Chris Ryan]

They're having a great season. They largely built their team on the transfer portal, where you bring kids in.

[Amanda Davis]

Familiar.

[Chris Ryan]

But as Van explained and Todd McShay explained on Sunday night on Bill. And then there are other pods, higher learning and not higher learning. Tailgate and the Todd McShay Show, L.A. just has a fertile recruiting ground. One of the great talent centers of football in this country.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yep.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

And if he can build a team of homegrown players, they're going faster. And use his own. You know, he's a great developer of talent.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

If he can find himself a Piecon, but.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

He has never left a place without utterly fucking destroying it on the way out or completely embarrassing himself on the way out.

[Amanda Davis]

Right. Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

And so he did it again.

[Amanda Davis]

All right, so what did he do this time?

[Chris Ryan]

He took this job at lsu, reportedly several weeks ago, if not a week ago. Bought a house in Baton Rouge. Pretended like he was still preying on it for, like, another week.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure.

[Chris Ryan]

But basically wanted Ole Miss to let him stay and coach Ole Miss in the playoffs. Even though he was already going to be working for lsu.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Well, that's unrealistic.

[Chris Ryan]

Go. Go yourself.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Who were his advisors on that?

[Chris Ryan]

Jimmy Sexton, the most powerful agent in college football.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

And my agent in my. My renegotiation.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, did you buy your home in Baton Rouge as well?

[Amanda Davis]

Jimmy was out over his skis a little.

[Chris Ryan]

Honestly, I think I could do a lot worse in life than to have a third act as, like, there's an nice Southern city and becoming, like you've.

[Sean Fennessey]

Said for years, your dream is to be the offensive coordinator of an SEC team.

[Chris Ryan]

No, it's more of, like, a North Texas kind of thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, I see. Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, I think that's better. I think SEC is a little more stressed than you want at this point.

[Chris Ryan]

I want to.

[Sean Fennessey]

I want to. You want to be able to test.

[Chris Ryan]

Some of my concepts.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, you want to be experimental.

[Amanda Davis]

This is the spirit tree.

[Chris Ryan]

Nobody blocks underwater. Spirit tree.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. But there's a spirit tree in the first one.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. Which is dramatically destroyed. Well, the giant tree is destroyed by the American military.

[Amanda Davis]

Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

And then there is another gathering tree space where they connect with Eywa. And this is also.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so there are different spirit trees throughout the ecosystem, different ways to pray.

[Chris Ryan]

What's Jake's plan here? We're just gonna hide out for the rest of our lives?

[Sean Fennessey]

It's an excellent question. Unclear.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so they're connecting with the spirit tree. So what are the rules around connecting with the spirit tree?

[Sean Fennessey]

You've got these.

[Chris Ryan]

You have to have t mobile.

[Amanda Davis]

It's just Billy Bob Thornton has to connect me.

[Chris Ryan]

I made the request for BBT to come on the watch.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, my God, I'd love it. For who?

[Chris Ryan]

Billy Bob Thornton to come on the watch. I think he and I will get along very well, or I.

[Amanda Davis]

He will think, yo, look who it is.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, it's okay.

[Amanda Davis]

So now also watch Sigourney act against Sigourney and tell me what you think, my beautiful. My beautiful daughter. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

I legitimately find all this stuff very moving.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, well, it's Sigourney Weaver.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think you would without a child?

[Sean Fennessey]

Probably not. Yeah, But you know what? That's just life. Yeah. That's just the Truth. That's the truth of my life.

[Chris Ryan]

That's why I find.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, but. So now, why is she blue?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, she's. She's having a spiritual experience where she's.

[Amanda Davis]

She's.

[Chris Ryan]

She's.

[Sean Fennessey]

See, she's seeing visions of Eywa.

[Amanda Davis]

She's not really actually seeing things, but Eywa. Does she know that?

[Chris Ryan]

Is Stephen Lang, her dad, too.

[Amanda Davis]

The blue person is Sigourney Weaver. Like, irl.

[Chris Ryan]

Did she go to Stanford?

[Amanda Davis]

Or, like. No, irl, but, like, in the.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, shit.

[Sean Fennessey]

She's just having visions. That's what we're doing.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, but that we're cutting from. Like, it's Sigourney without the blue.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think what she's trying to make sense of is, like, the. What. What is the logic of her parenthood. Of the parenthood. And, you know, we come to find out over time that it's not as natural as some of the other Na'.

[Amanda Davis]

Vi.

[Chris Ryan]

So Sigourney Weaver is her own mom?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, Sort of.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

But we don't know who the father is.

[Amanda Davis]

No.

[Chris Ryan]

And it's like, can you now create Navi?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, it's kind.

[Amanda Davis]

It's.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's kind of an immaculate conception. Kind of a cloning thing. Oh. Like, it's both.

[Chris Ryan]

Gotcha.

[Sean Fennessey]

And that's very important because Kiri becomes a very important figure in this world because she has extraordinary power and access to awa. That.

[Chris Ryan]

Have these guys ever seen a helicopter like this before?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, this guy's a Marine.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, but the other guys.

[Sean Fennessey]

These other guys are humans in Na' Vi bodies. That's Joel David Moore, the actor in a Na' Vi body, and he's a scientist who is one of the key partners in the first film. That's Kate Winslet. She's very pregnant.

[Chris Ryan]

Mad.

[Amanda Davis]

But she can still hold her breath.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, she's giving. I can dig a hole energy right now.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so she does like. She's sort of. You know, she's like Maha medicine, you.

[Chris Ryan]

Know, but then homeopathic.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But, you know, they're like super aggro military people, so. Okay, everybody's checking their phones.

[Chris Ryan]

Just a quick text. Oh, I got a text from Ayanna Pressley. She wants. She wants to let me know that I'm needed in the fight for democracy.

[Sean Fennessey]

Ayanna Presley. Yeah. Nice. And are you gonna leave right now and join her? You gonna finish the film or is it urgent?

[Chris Ryan]

I have to leave this screening to join the squad.

[Sean Fennessey]

Who are you replacing in the squad?

[Chris Ryan]

No, I'm additive.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you think Needs a stronger male vision. Yeah. A white ally.

[Chris Ryan]

No, one ally.

[Sean Fennessey]

What about a white vision?

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, they're. They're explaining the seizure. This is important. So she's not allowed to plug into the spirit tree anymore?

[Sean Fennessey]

That's right.

[Amanda Davis]

But this person can do cocaine on a dead body?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, yeah. I mean, these are ancient, ancient traditions.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, it's true.

[Sean Fennessey]

Revivification.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, there she goes. But she's.

[Chris Ryan]

So Caitlyn's lit fixed her.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Where modern science couldn't.

[Amanda Davis]

Exactly.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't think I realized how much of a backseat Neytiri takes in this film.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, in the. I mean, they've left the forest, so now I know.

[Sean Fennessey]

But she's. She. She is the first movie.

[Chris Ryan]

But this is an away game for her.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, it is.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

This is about.

[Sean Fennessey]

She has a strong. She has a very strong role in the third film.

[Chris Ryan]

It's like goth outdoors, you know?

[Sean Fennessey]

Can't trust it. Yeah, yeah. 17 for 32, 190 yards, zero TDs, two picks. That's golf outside, golf indoors.

[Amanda Davis]

So just to be clear, you're doing G O F F and not G O L F. Which I was like.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, no, we're talking about the Detroit Lions.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Alice's favorite football team, the Lions.

[Amanda Davis]

Why?

[Sean Fennessey]

Because they're Lions and they.

[Chris Ryan]

Cool colors.

[Amanda Davis]

Got it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Cool colors. Do they?

[Chris Ryan]

The silver helmet, I think, is iconic blue.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, I guess so.

[Sean Fennessey]

Speaking of Saquon, what's up with this, man? What's going on?

[Amanda Davis]

The Eagles.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't want to talk about the Eagles. I want to talk about why Saquon sucks.

[Chris Ryan]

I don't want to get into whether or not running backs fall off a cliff after a certain amount of carries.

[Amanda Davis]

I don't want to get into that.

[Sean Fennessey]

I know. That's what's been suggested.

[Chris Ryan]

We also have not had Lane Johnson for significant part of the season. And I also think that they are not as creative in the run game as they used to be.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm only asking because I drafted him in the Ringer Fantasy Football League and it has been a great season.

[Amanda Davis]

The offense all season long has been.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, we got some humans.

[Amanda Davis]

Truly embarrassing.

[Sean Fennessey]

Right? So this is where the story really kicks in.

[Chris Ryan]

Can I pee?

[Sean Fennessey]

I would. Wait a minute.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. And then we can.

[Sean Fennessey]

And then we'll take our break.

[Amanda Davis]

All right. That's very exciting.

[Sean Fennessey]

How long have we been going?

[Chris Ryan]

It's 308. So we've been going for like two hours.

[Amanda Davis]

More like an hour and a half. Yeah. So we're like halfway okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. Let's just set the stage here and see what these guys are after and then we'll take a quick break for the listeners and for ourselves.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, I see. Okay. Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, Ayanna Pressley was more saying that she heard everybody calling for her to run for the Senate.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

But she feels like her. She's more needed in the house.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, got it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, that's. I sent a similar message this morning.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so these people are tracking the water.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, it's.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah. And he's a marine biologist.

[Sean Fennessey]

And this fellow here is a hunter.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. He hunts Tukun.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's a whale hunter.

[Amanda Davis]

No.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. So they're looking for Jake Sully.

[Chris Ryan]

Is this guy South African also?

[Amanda Davis]

Probably. Yeah. And no offense, but did you see. Now you see me, now you don't.

[Chris Ryan]

No, I haven't.

[Amanda Davis]

You gotta just.

[Chris Ryan]

Is there a South African?

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you not know about this?

[Amanda Davis]

Oh my God.

[Sean Fennessey]

You don't know about this.

[Amanda Davis]

Rosamund pike plays a South African like Dani at like diamond.

[Sean Fennessey]

A diamond princess.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, A diamond. Eris Bond villain. It's incredible. And she's doing full blown South African accent. Wow.

[Amanda Davis]

It's so.

[Sean Fennessey]

Honestly, you will jerk off to it like. I swear to God.

[Chris Ryan]

Can I go to the bathroom?

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, let's pause.

[Amanda Davis]

So the whales are coming back, but also whale hunters are there. This is problematic.

[Sean Fennessey]

We're gonna take a pause of the movie now for a bathroom break and a message from our sponsor.

[Amanda Davis]

This episode is brought to you by Amazon Prime. Like an action blockbuster, the holidays move quick. But with prime fast, free delivery means those last minute gifts arrive right when you need them. Last year, while watching Singin in the Rain with my son, I realized a pair of tap shoes would be a perfect Christmas gift. And I had them under the tree for him on Christmas day. Prime's fast shipping is always there for you during the holidays. Especially when it's last minute and just can't wait. Last minute holiday magic. It's on Prime. Head to Amazon.comprime to shop now.

[Sean Fennessey]

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[Amanda Davis]

Free styling help.

[Sean Fennessey]

Free shipping and quick order pickup make it easy in stores or online.

[Amanda Davis]

It's time to go shopping at Nordstrom.

[Sean Fennessey]

And we are back.

[Amanda Davis]

So the two couldn't have come home? I didn't remember that. Where were they?

[Chris Ryan]

I want to do just a quick level setting.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

And say that I'm loving my time with you guys, but I, I, I still think that this is pretty nonsensical.

[Sean Fennessey]

Or at least like, like, this is uncalled for.

[Chris Ryan]

No, I'm not trying to ding it. I'm just saying, if you thought I was converting. I thought the pieacon thing was cool.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, there's more.

[Sean Fennessey]

What?

[Amanda Davis]

What flavor is this? Pretzel.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's a seasoned.

[Amanda Davis]

With what? Crack.

[Sean Fennessey]

Crack cocaine.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, great.

[Sean Fennessey]

It doesn't really suck. I mean, you've not had a seasoned snack before. Dots like a seasoned snack.

[Amanda Davis]

I wasn't expecting it.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is the original flavor of Dot's pretzels.

[Chris Ryan]

I guess. I hit up TJ's for the step up to the bar snack mix today.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, beautiful.

[Sean Fennessey]

What's in that?

[Chris Ryan]

It's your usual snack mix or sesame sticks. Maybe like a Brazil nut in there.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. Any, like, cheez it type thing? Kind of.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, they got some wild in there.

[Amanda Davis]

I ordered a bucket of potato chips chips for the holiday party this year. Like a, like a large bucket.

[Chris Ryan]

Will you keep it in there?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, of course.

[Chris Ryan]

That's gonna be a German factory.

[Sean Fennessey]

Hands in the.

[Amanda Davis]

You have to put a hand in the bowl, Sean. It's no different.

[Sean Fennessey]

You pull it. Pull a chip off.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, you could. It's a large bucket.

[Chris Ryan]

It's like, it's like this couldn't support a person. Like, if they don't bring your own.

[Amanda Davis]

Potato chips to the party. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. Will there also be like, a live pangolin that I can murder and eat?

[Chris Ryan]

We should start doing that. Bringing chips to your parties.

[Amanda Davis]

But, like, not. I wish.

[Chris Ryan]

These are my always drinking. Oh, Kate Winslet's Now Team P on.

[Amanda Davis]

Huh?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Your son is beautiful.

[Amanda Davis]

Thank you.

[Chris Ryan]

How is your baby? Come on.

[Amanda Davis]

Baby is strong. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

The Tulkun, you know, there's an ancient spiritual creature in their religion.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. Oh, this is cute. Look at that baby. Damn, dude, that baby swimming.

[Chris Ryan]

Is that Kate Winslet's baby or Zoe?

[Amanda Davis]

Well, I guess so because the baby's not in her belly anymore. Oh.

[Chris Ryan]

So we've. We've some time has elapsed.

[Amanda Davis]

Maybe that was a flashback. I'm not totally sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think that was a.

[Amanda Davis]

Or she just gave. It was a water birth.

[Chris Ryan]

This is bad.

[Amanda Davis]

Seems intense.

[Chris Ryan]

But this looks like a Halo cutscene, right?

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, I've never seen Halo.

[Sean Fennessey]

This part is all real. This was all shot in the real world.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

And these are all real Nubby. Does that make it better for you, Do you think? If we could militarize Navi, we should.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so they're looking for Jake Sully.

[Chris Ryan]

And then other guys island group with different people hanging out.

[Sean Fennessey]

Correct. This is a different tribe.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, got it. And they're going to keep moving. But then. So the Tucun have come back from where her. The great C. And they raised Kate Winslet.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't know if they raised her.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, I mean, spiritual guidance, they're connected. Okay. All right.

[Sean Fennessey]

Her parents probably raised her. Okay, but maybe like a latchkey kids.

[Amanda Davis]

Maybe it takes a village, you know? Maybe.

[Sean Fennessey]

Could be. Who wrote that? Hillary Clinton?

[Chris Ryan]

One of your faves.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, they shot a whale. Yeah, they're bad.

[Sean Fennessey]

Damn. These are. These guys are evil. Like the fruits of the devil, as Mike Myers once said.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Damn Spider, you narc.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, he doesn't really know what he's doing. Torok Mocto. What is my Navi.

[Chris Ryan]

Put her down. No, man. We're not gonna have that happen here, right?

[Amanda Davis]

No. Okay, finally Spider's sticking up for. Yeah, but they don't have him. So this kid's 15 when he's filming this?

[Sean Fennessey]

Maybe 17. Okay, he was cast when he was 15.

[Amanda Davis]

Pretty good.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, his audition was in 2017, so he was 13 when he auditioned.

[Amanda Davis]

Wow. Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Project Phoenix. Is that what it says on his little vest? So the Vietnam era.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, these are the obsessions of James Cameron. Look at all the entry points.

[Chris Ryan]

Chris, do you think it would have been better though, if he had just made a movie about the Phoenix project in Vietnam as period piece?

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't. I made this movie. Respect the artist.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, no.

[Sean Fennessey]

Now that I tell artists what they should have done.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, but this is the big picture. Sometimes we. We weigh in on what artists should have done. Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't really. I don't.

[Amanda Davis]

We try not to do that.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't like to do that.

[Amanda Davis]

That's boring.

[Sean Fennessey]

I have done that and I'm not going to pretend like I haven't done that. But I would prefer not to do that. I don't really. Because I don't want somebody telling me what I should be doing. That's true, you know.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

That's really.

[Amanda Davis]

Sometimes we can't help ourselves.

[Sean Fennessey]

I get frustrated certainly when I feel that people are doing things just for money. But when you look at the amount of work that goes into these movies, you can't say that these are being done for money. These movies are insane.

[Amanda Davis]

They're getting some bad news.

[Chris Ryan]

Except when he tells Aaron a story about how it's gonna make all the fucking money and get the fuck out of my office.

[Sean Fennessey]

But I don't think he's like, I can't wait to spend all that money. I think he's like, I can't wait to be the most successful person. Now that is also a kind of sickness, but it's different. And to me, less egregious ambition can often create human boy speaks.

[Chris Ryan]

Naobi. They now know that Spider is on this other. Is on the other island working with these guys.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes.

[Chris Ryan]

Are you reading the latest Ryan Lizzo newsletter?

[Amanda Davis]

No. I'm not paying for that bullshit. I actually, I don't endorse. They can all go fuck off is what I have to say. All three of them.

[Chris Ryan]

Who's the third?

[Amanda Davis]

RFK Junior, Mr. Maha himself.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, you've made your feelings on this known. I think it's a bit of a strange stance. It is one of the more interesting things that's happened in recent American political media history.

[Amanda Davis]

I guess so. But like is it that interesting? It's like two star fuckers are each writing their own story of, you know, their interactions with another star fucker. Not only is now denying vaccines to children. Like I'm good. Like, you know, now they're trying to make money off of it. Cause they can't make it any other way. Like no thanks. I like. They like good riddance.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, I understand but like your moral superiority over that and not other things is just inconsistent. So I mean that seems like a weird stance.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm gonna be inconsistent on this one. Like I truly. They can all, you know, something to them. Yeah, they all are like taking up space that should be filled with other things. This is the other thing. Like I don't really believe in political journalism in this way. Like I just, like, don't care about that.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, the, like kind of insider.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, they're all. Because what they want is to be famous themselves as opposed to, like, actually reporting on things that matter to the. To the world. So I like. I think of. I thought less of them before all of this. But then, Ryan, your vision for political.

[Sean Fennessey]

Journalism in America, what do you think is the best way to do the work? I'd like to hear it because I would argue the people that they're covering are just as vainglorious and corrupt as the people who are doing the reporting.

[Chris Ryan]

Payakan.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, that's true. But it's like.

[Sean Fennessey]

I guess that's why it's worthwhile to me is like it reveals something true about the system, the story.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm just. I'm just now sure Liz has got me hooked. I just need to know, are you paying for it? No. There's ways around screenshots.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But did he reveal the conspiracy?

[Chris Ryan]

Number four went out yesterday. But I have not read the full thing earlier.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. I think if he were like, you know, there was a plot to assassinate Trump and, like, Olivia signed the legal.

[Sean Fennessey]

Documents, we might have heard by now.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. I'm like. I'm just guessing.

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure. Yeah. I think that's fair.

[Amanda Davis]

Also, bad writers.

[Sean Fennessey]

Just very purple.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Really bad.

[Sean Fennessey]

So that hasn't really stopped anybody else in the past.

[Amanda Davis]

That's true. But another reason I don't want to spend time reading it.

[Chris Ryan]

So there's bad news. Is traveling across the islands, but now these kids are exploring caves.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Oh, but it's not a cave.

[Chris Ryan]

Turns out to be.

[Sean Fennessey]

Be calm.

[Amanda Davis]

So that's the older brother.

[Chris Ryan]

This is a little bit of a Jonah and the Whale situation, huh?

[Sean Fennessey]

Manner of speaking. Reminds me a little bit of Jonah. The mirror sequence in us.

[Chris Ryan]

Sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

Remember that scene?

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Beginning of us.

[Amanda Davis]

That's good. I liked us.

[Sean Fennessey]

Me too. Also a little bit kind of lost in the. In the 2050s.

[Amanda Davis]

Was it 2019?

[Chris Ryan]

The fuck's going on?

[Sean Fennessey]

It was.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. So that was like one of our first deep dive episodes, but that was like a big movie year and then pandemic. So kind of lost a time. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, it's a little messy.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Narratively.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. No. So now he's still.

[Chris Ryan]

Memories. We've seen. We saw us together at south by Southwest.

[Amanda Davis]

Did we? Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's great. Oh, that's nice to have made that memory.

[Amanda Davis]

How's that going? They bring in the arclight back.

[Chris Ryan]

Hermits, are they keep saying they applied for.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. That's what I said. So this is a flashback. He is like sharing memories with Payakan.

[Sean Fennessey]

Payakan is sharing memories with him about.

[Chris Ryan]

The last time the humans came through.

[Sean Fennessey]

Or these flash forwards what the Tulkuns have witnessed. I believe it's him showing them their memories.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. And that's how his wound happened. Remember that then?

[Chris Ryan]

Gotcha.

[Sean Fennessey]

So they've been under siege for a long time. We haven't yet seen why the whales are so under siege.

[Chris Ryan]

They probably have like oil, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

We'll find out.

[Amanda Davis]

I guess so. All right, here's my first question for you. Not my first about the water. Oh, no, no. Do you want some water fast?

[Chris Ryan]

Give me what we're gonna say.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, I mean, just so just like what's up with Geese?

[Chris Ryan]

The band?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, like what's happening there?

[Chris Ryan]

Well, they're on a rocket ship to the moon.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, I know, but like they are and they aren't. Well, but like I. I didn't click through. So, you know, I know they did like some cover came along a couple.

[Chris Ryan]

Years ago and to, you know, I wouldn't say an enormous amount of fanfare. And they put out a first record. These are like private school kids from New York. York, you know what?

[Amanda Davis]

Private school?

[Chris Ryan]

I can't remember. I think, I think Brooklyn Friends.

[Amanda Davis]

Here we go. Oh, Quaker kids, I think. Well, Quaker educated.

[Chris Ryan]

And they put out one record that I happen to like, but is very much like post punk interpoli kind of private disco.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Then they put out a record called I believe, 3D, second album. It's much more classic rock vibey.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

And then late last year, the lead singer and songwriter for Geese put out a record. Cameron Winter put a record called Heavy Metal.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. I've heard of Cameron Winter separately, but.

[Chris Ryan]

I also didn't became a cult hit. He became quite an object of interest.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, wow. Okay. So that's. They went to Park Slope Rock.

[Chris Ryan]

I just don't know if she really cares about the answer to this question.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so they put out two albums, plus Cameron Winter has a solo album.

[Chris Ryan]

And then Cameron Winter's solo album, I think starts to garner more attention around the band. And they put out a third album called Getting Killed and have now been adopted, I feel like, by a larger swath of the hipster influencer universe.

[Amanda Davis]

That seems right.

[Chris Ryan]

And are a very good band.

[Sean Fennessey]

I love them. I'm a fan.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. So I can confirm that they, or at least some of them were educated at the school of rock, like the film, which. Okay, well, here's a Telling line as the teen sat in the sunroom of the funky forking brownstone owned by Bassin's parents. Okay, so. I mean, that must be nice to own a Brooklyn, Fort Green brownstone.

[Chris Ryan]

3D country. My bad.

[Amanda Davis]

Not 3D, but I still can't find. What? Private school. Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

If I were you, I would just check out the most recent record and I would probably skip the first song because you're going to be like, this is too noodley. But then you'll be like, damn, but is there.

[Amanda Davis]

Are they controversial now?

[Chris Ryan]

No.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

People will not like this band.

[Amanda Davis]

How do you know she likes the Strokes?

[Sean Fennessey]

It's not that cool. It's not that clean and slick and pop oriented.

[Amanda Davis]

No, it's much more like.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's a little. It's a little experimental, a little vibesy.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

A little bit atonal.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, I don't. I don't always love atonal.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're the kind of band that you could see them making an album in the next 10 years that is like the album of a generation.

[Chris Ryan]

Sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

But I don't. I think they're still working some stuff out. I think they're really cool. I was surprised that they're not as popular, at least on the streaming services as I expected.

[Amanda Davis]

Right, right.

[Sean Fennessey]

Based on the way that people my age and younger talk about them, you would have thought that they were the Strokes. But maybe that's actually a notable thing about the Strokes is maybe they weren't as popular as we thought they were.

[Chris Ryan]

They're pretty popular. Big geese doesn't have. Like last night.

[Sean Fennessey]

They don't. Yeah, they don't have a hit like that.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm scrolling through my second taxes.

[Chris Ryan]

I think a big song, but you.

[Sean Fennessey]

Don'T really see too many sea birds in these.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, no, not a missile to the back.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, that's a tracking device.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Mother and calf.

[Chris Ryan]

So we have not disclosed why we're hunting these guys. Spider is just like frying pan to the fire.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. And that. That ship. Ship driver appears to be member of the San Francisco Giants. What was that outfit he was wearing? Navy hat.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. Thank you for that explanation.

[Sean Fennessey]

Logo.

[Amanda Davis]

I don't know if I'll check it out, but now I at least feel informed.

[Sean Fennessey]

I like these little. These crab guys.

[Chris Ryan]

You should go for a nice long jog with the geese. Discography and report back.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. Definitely leave a long voice memo to Chris that he can automatically delete.

[Amanda Davis]

Do you not listen to voice memos ever?

[Sean Fennessey]

I listen to them.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you listen to voice memos or.

[Amanda Davis]

Do you delete them?

[Chris Ryan]

I'll just read the transcription of them.

[Sean Fennessey]

Depends on who sends it.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Mal will send like 5 minute voice memos to me.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

She's never sent me one in her life.

[Amanda Davis]

That's really long.

[Chris Ryan]

You just gotta ask her questions.

[Amanda Davis]

I listen to them, but I seldom know how to send them. So like I figure it out, but then sometimes I send it to the wrong person, you know.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, it's a disaster when people ask me how I'm doing. I just send them an episode of the Big Picture. Say, check this out, you'll figure it all out.

[Chris Ryan]

Is that how you want to be known? Is that how you want your emotional life to be understood?

[Sean Fennessey]

It's all real. It's all authentic.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so these guys are on back.

[Sean Fennessey]

All of it.

[Amanda Davis]

And they have their.

[Chris Ryan]

They're on.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're on the hunt. This is a full blown hunt, okay. This stuff is all very real world. Chris.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, looks. It looks really.

[Sean Fennessey]

These are real whales?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Oh no, there's a sensor on that whale.

[Sean Fennessey]

You missed that. He got shot.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, it's a tough break.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's not what you want when you're being hunted.

[Chris Ryan]

And why is Stephen Lang on this trip if he's just looking for Sully?

[Amanda Davis]

He's looking for Sully, but he's commandeered the boat. It's like a. Oh, oh, it's awful. Stop doing that.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's a sonic paralyzer. Because there is such sensitivity to the sound underwater.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, gotcha.

[Sean Fennessey]

Forces them to the surface.

[Chris Ryan]

They hit Millie Bobby with one of those in the season five of Stranger Things 11. Yeah, like a sonic paralyzer thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, Stranger Things.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. So what's up there?

[Chris Ryan]

It was fine. It was cool. I got to watch it with like my friend's daughters over Thanksgiving and they were like fired up about it. So it was a funny story.

[Amanda Davis]

Like what's. What's going on with everyone in. What's the town where they live?

[Chris Ryan]

Hawkins, Indiana.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, that's right.

[Chris Ryan]

And there's a parallel dimension called the Upside down right underneath of it.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

And they're.

[Chris Ryan]

That's stalked by a demon named Vecna.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. And they can't seal it up?

[Chris Ryan]

No, they've military tried.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did they have any tulkuns there? No.

[Chris Ryan]

They have demigorgons though.

[Sean Fennessey]

I've seen those. I gave up on that show after the second season.

[Chris Ryan]

Many did.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think it's pretty incoherent. I find it surprising, its level of success.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you watch into the third season?

[Sean Fennessey]

I did.

[Chris Ryan]

To the mall one.

[Sean Fennessey]

That was the introduction of Maya Hawk.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, I did love Maya Hawk.

[Chris Ryan]

She's got a big role in this one.

[Sean Fennessey]

I've heard you guys talking about it. I don't.

[Amanda Davis]

You know, Timothee Chalamet just. Just posted pictures of him with a new puppy. We think it's his puppy.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, he's running.

[Amanda Davis]

He's. No, he's really running. And then what else is in the kill? All right, we've got Josh. Josh has the black Marty.

[Chris Ryan]

It's not out yet, is it?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, but a lot of people have seen it. Nobody called you and tapped you on.

[Chris Ryan]

The shoulder and said, I had plenty of invitations, but I was traveling internationally and.

[Sean Fennessey]

Fancy.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Ooh la la. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

So spoiler alert. That won't be on your list this week.

[Chris Ryan]

I. I'm fully ready to be, like, completely transparent about the films that will be on my list.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

They largely are from the John Wick universe.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

I haven't seen Sentimental Value, and I haven't seen Marty. Otherwise, I'm. I'm pretty much caught up.

[Sean Fennessey]

Are you.

[Amanda Davis]

There's.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, I haven't seen Decision to leave.

[Sean Fennessey]

No.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

No. No other choice.

[Chris Ryan]

No other choice.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, right. Yeah. This puppy is very small, Tracy.

[Sean Fennessey]

Let's tell me no Other Choices is number one right now based on what he's seen so far.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Does Tracy see everything contemporary?

[Amanda Davis]

Has he seen one battle after another yet?

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't think so.

[Amanda Davis]

Tracy. Should I text him right now and ask?

[Sean Fennessey]

You can ask him.

[Amanda Davis]

Tracy, have you seen this yet?

[Sean Fennessey]

No Other Choice Rocks.

[Amanda Davis]

It is. It's really good. Tracy, have you seen.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think it's weird to put two Scott Derrickson films in my top five?

[Sean Fennessey]

Are you. Were you planning to put Dr. Strange from 2018?

[Chris Ryan]

No. Black phone two and. And gorge.

[Sean Fennessey]

I know.

[Amanda Davis]

God.

[Sean Fennessey]

Black phone two.

[Amanda Davis]

You.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you think?

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, Pro Care Drop Knox. Knox is free. Knox is hitting the streets. He's been signed out. Do you know about this?

[Chris Ryan]

It's like they let you know that.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, yeah. You have to sign your kid in and out of school every day with this app, and then you get a notification. It's basically like, is the kid under our care? Is the kid under your care? Kids back under my care. I got that. It's the only app that can give me notifications.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't need that, though, because I have a psychic link, like Payacon with Alice. Right. So anytime I know she needs something.

[Amanda Davis]

I got a text from Ben Stiller asking me for money, delete, and report.

[Sean Fennessey]

And still for what?

[Amanda Davis]

I don't know. I did not report them all as junk. I mean, it wasn't from him.

[Chris Ryan]

So now the whales are dragging the boats, but they're struggling. We got load management. Yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

You know, trying to catch them with the barrels.

[Chris Ryan]

You can always tell when you get a South African big game hunter who talks a lot of that, he's gonna suffer a really gruesome death. Death at the hands of his very. His prey.

[Amanda Davis]

What are these?

[Sean Fennessey]

You may have seen a movie or two in your time.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. What are these buoys attached to them?

[Chris Ryan]

I tried to slow him down.

[Amanda Davis]

That's awful.

[Chris Ryan]

Spider. You fucking piece of shit, man. Hope you're happy.

[Sean Fennessey]

He couldn't do anything. Look at the calf. That's brutal. Look at these things.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, awful. That's so. What are those are like again?

[Sean Fennessey]

This is Jim cooking. What is this thing that he designed?

[Chris Ryan]

Jim's community. His peers. Do they like these movies?

[Sean Fennessey]

Jim's.

[Amanda Davis]

Who are Jim's peers?

[Chris Ryan]

No, I get the dga, who's. Who's hosting Jim. And it's just like I'm with God right now. This is amazing.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, I think he has the admiration of everyone in the industry. I do think that he is famously like kind of a. Like a poke you with a stick.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

You know, he'll be like, spielberg can't do this.

[Chris Ryan]

So like GDT Del Toro is his homie. Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

He told Matt Bellani, Guillermo del Toro is his best friend who's a filmmaker as well as Catherine Bigelow.

[Chris Ryan]

You don't see like Catherine.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, that's nice.

[Chris Ryan]

Bigelow and him used to be together.

[Sean Fennessey]

They used to be together, but they're still, you know, they show each other their work. They're still very much. They have a creative connection. Yeah. Which is nice. That's nice to think of.

[Amanda Davis]

I watched a short form video of Seth Rogen and Aziz Ansari. This is gross. Talking about, like going to dinner or something. Being like shown to the patio. And the only two other people there were James Cameron and Kathryn Bigelow.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's wonderful.

[Amanda Davis]

Having dinner. And they were like, what do we do? Do we talk to them? Blah, blah, blah. And then Jim and Catherine came over and were very nice. Nice. Which is cool.

[Sean Fennessey]

Makes sense.

[Amanda Davis]

Tracy has responded. He has not yet seen one battle after another.

[Chris Ryan]

This is them extracting is the unobtainium inside of these things.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's whale brain juice, which is an even more rare commodity.

[Chris Ryan]

No way. Really?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. It's worth billions of dollars, which is why all of this tremendous technology and machinery is going into.

[Chris Ryan]

Look at the twinkle and spikers. Spider's colonist eyes. Man.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is also giving major Jurassic park vibes. There's a lot of Jurassic park in this film. That smaller creature getting eaten by the bigger creature, right?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, the jaw stuff.

[Sean Fennessey]

Spielberg is a big part of these movies, I think.

[Chris Ryan]

Is that good?

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, I think they. Wow.

[Sean Fennessey]

No dramatic scientific breakthrough.

[Amanda Davis]

There we go.

[Sean Fennessey]

Anti aging.

[Amanda Davis]

So this is even better than unobtainium.

[Sean Fennessey]

$80 million for that.

[Chris Ryan]

That's not that much money.

[Amanda Davis]

Especially in 20. Especially in 21. 50. Whatever.

[Chris Ryan]

That's like a decent second baseman for. For eight years, right?

[Amanda Davis]

There we go.

[Sean Fennessey]

Hey, guys.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm just saying inflation is real.

[Chris Ryan]

In this future America that they're basing this on, like, I don't know what's happened to the dollar, you know, It's a good question.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, who's been shorting bitcoin? You know, that's really the question.

[Chris Ryan]

What's Michael Barry doing in this reality?

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, Chris, you have to either join the military or go into corporate America. What do you do? What.

[Chris Ryan]

What time period?

[Sean Fennessey]

1870S.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, so this corporate America.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. You would go be a robber baron.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, with hindsight, I would not want to be part of what was happening in the 1870s with the American military.

[Sean Fennessey]

You're thinking more of a. I mean, you're from Pennsylvania. More of a Carnegie guy.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Railroads.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Steel.

[Chris Ryan]

Gilded Age is not problematic though.

[Amanda Davis]

You caught up on the Gilded Age?

[Sean Fennessey]

Caught up.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I've seen 10 minutes of the first episode.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. Wow. I've seen all three seasons now. Just absolute masterpiece.

[Sean Fennessey]

I have tremendous amount of respect for Carrie Coon.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. And haven't seen the show.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Christine Baranski. She's on it.

[Amanda Davis]

She is as well.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Of the. Of the namesake Farewell on your pod. Cynthia Nixon. Sure, she's fine.

[Amanda Davis]

Morgan Spector. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Morgan Spector. McDonald. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Have you watched Pluribus?

[Amanda Davis]

No, I'm still on episode four of the Diplomat. I know. I didn't know.

[Chris Ryan]

If you're like moving around, finish it.

[Amanda Davis]

I didn't finish episode four because of incidents, you know, so.

[Sean Fennessey]

I can't believe they fucking killed these. Winslow. Yeah, it is.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. And she has a bond with them, so she's really upset.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is actually slower paced than the third film.

[Amanda Davis]

I guess that is true. Yes. But I don't know.

[Sean Fennessey]

There are much more. Many more set pieces in three.

[Amanda Davis]

That's true.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's interesting.

[Chris Ryan]

Can I ask, does Sully know who's after him?

[Sean Fennessey]

He does. He doesn't totally understand it, but he does.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, you guys ready for some ocean facts?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. All right, Great time.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so just to go back to microbes, just 1 liter of water from the ocean can hold up to 38,000 kinds of microbes. That's just about how varied life is in the ocean, you know?

[Chris Ryan]

Not necessarily, because, like, when you jump in, you don't want to be thinking about microbes.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, but not all microbes are like that. It's just. That's just the ocean. The ocean is a source of life for us in many ways. Right. Okay. You ready for another one? By the way, I, like, I verified all of these, or at least verified that they were from a real source and not from AI Like, I didn't just copy.

[Chris Ryan]

That's what you were doing outside.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, I was. Well, not like. I mean, I was. I can't fact check everything. I'm not a marine biologist. But I did not ask Chatgpt for.

[Chris Ryan]

Any of these because I have never asked Chatgpt anything.

[Amanda Davis]

No, I've never used it because, I mean, you have.

[Chris Ryan]

I haven't.

[Amanda Davis]

Have you?

[Sean Fennessey]

I asked it for your favorite water facts, and I got some interesting responses.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, here's another one. Parrotfish poop makes up to an estimated 70% of the sand on Hawaiian and Caribbean beaches created by the fish eating coral and excreting it. Parrot.

[Chris Ryan]

Wait, say that again.

[Amanda Davis]

Parrot fish poop makes up 70% of the sand on Hawaiian and Caribbean beaches.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, great.

[Amanda Davis]

Good news. Some shark species can lose and regrow up to 30,000 teeth in their lifetime.

[Chris Ryan]

Knew that.

[Amanda Davis]

You did?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

What from. From whom?

[Chris Ryan]

I think in my shark phase. I retained that from when I was a child. That was a shark boy?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. You were a shark boy?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Giant sperm whales float vertically in the ocean while sleeping.

[Chris Ryan]

Like Sean.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I sleep on my stomach every night. Can't sleep in any other position.

[Chris Ryan]

Arms splayed out.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. And. And suspended in.

[Chris Ryan]

Not like an upside down Dracula where you're sleeping on top of your arms.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, I sleep with my. I. I sleep with my arms at my sides on my stomach.

[Amanda Davis]

Are you serious?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Head to the side. That's actually psychotic.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's the only way I can get comfortable.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Are the arms. Are your palms down or palms up?

[Sean Fennessey]

They're full of Cheez Its.

[Chris Ryan]

Every night?

[Amanda Davis]

No, but now I'm trying to imagine positioning myself. Okay, so do you sleep on your stomach?

[Chris Ryan]

You don't sleep on your stomach. Your sides are flat down.

[Sean Fennessey]

So palms up, palms up. Or sometimes at my side, maybe. Sometimes I don't know if I'm quite so stiff when I'm sitting.

[Chris Ryan]

You're like a torpedo? A little bit.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. A little bit like a torpedo.

[Amanda Davis]

That's so weird. So it's just like this? Like you're like a little t. Well.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, I have a long, tall body, so no, it's not like my arms are not like this.

[Amanda Davis]

I would say that I used to be a stomach sleeper, but between pregnancy and neck problems, I've had to move to my side. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

What about you?

[Chris Ryan]

Side?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And you sleep standing up.

[Chris Ryan]

And now they're a little rebellion going.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, he's got to go save Payakan or something. Or they've been banned, but they got to join up.

[Chris Ryan]

Get off me.

[Amanda Davis]

So lo ax striking out alone.

[Sean Fennessey]

Intergenerational drama, intra tribe drama, interspecies drama. The natural world colliding with technology.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure.

[Chris Ryan]

Who did the music for this? John Tesh.

[Sean Fennessey]

Is it Thomas Newton Howard or Thomas Newton?

[Chris Ryan]

I should say no. Thomas Newman's doing the music for Star Wars Starfighter.

[Amanda Davis]

I have an ocean fact that's also a pitch for the next dream.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did you see sh.

[Chris Ryan]

Levy was like. They made me redo the ending of my movie.

[Amanda Davis]

Of which movie?

[Chris Ryan]

Of Starf Fighter. Of the Star wars movie.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, why? Because someone.

[Sean Fennessey]

He said that. He said the opposite. I thought they let him do whatever he wanted.

[Chris Ryan]

No, that was what he first said, and then he was just like. I think what he meant was like, I was encouraged to rethink the ending, and thank God I was, because it's so much better.

[Sean Fennessey]

Simon Franglin is the composer who did the music for this film. He did the music for Avatar. He did the music for. He arranged for Thomas Newman on Skyfall.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

He works with Thomas Newman.

[Amanda Davis]

And James Horner is getting rid of the censor so that they can't find. Oh, no, but it's too late in Navi.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, sure. Okay. I still can't believe a Shawn Levy Star wars movie is like, it's happening.

[Amanda Davis]

Like, in a good or a bad way.

[Sean Fennessey]

In a terrible way.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, have you watched Shawn Levy's movies?

[Amanda Davis]

Yes, and I don't enjoy them, but, like, I never, you know, I just wanted to. So it's a quality control issue for me.

[Chris Ryan]

For me. Honestly, as much as I like him, and I bet Project Hail Mary is going to be dope, I just don't. I can't believe what they did to my boy Gosling. Yeah, they did.

[Amanda Davis]

Or maybe what he did.

[Chris Ryan]

I know, but I just misplaced beyond the Pines.

[Amanda Davis]

Ryan yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

You know, drive Brian.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's hard to tell him to only make incredibly violent, alienating movies about men who cannot communicate. Like, he can't do that forever. I'm not asking for that.

[Chris Ryan]

Clint Eastwood did.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's not true. He made the Bridges of Madison county.

[Chris Ryan]

When he was like, 70.

[Sean Fennessey]

He made every which Way I would loose. You can do other kinds of things.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, but he's not. It's fall guy, Barbie, Project Hail Mary. This Star wars movie.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think Project Hail Mary is a win. Even if the movie doesn't work. Ultimately, I think doing stuff like that is great. It's a beloved book, science fiction, but grounded, made with a great. A good film, good filmmakers. I think it's cool.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm excited about it.

[Sean Fennessey]

The Star wars thing, I'm just like, I can't. We've been waiting nine years for Starfighter. Star Wars.

[Chris Ryan]

Star Wars, Colon.

[Sean Fennessey]

Starfighter. The dumbest name imaginable. Starfighter. It's already called Star Wars.

[Amanda Davis]

Let them know.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, what the fuck are they fighting?

[Chris Ryan]

Get it off your chest game.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, but why is no one saying the same thing I'm saying right now? Not just you guys. Is everyone. Everyone? Are we collectively agreed that this sucks?

[Chris Ryan]

I just think that, like, okay, so.

[Amanda Davis]

They'Re going out to fight for the to. That was Kate Oneslet doing her.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. They're going to see.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, they're doing.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're whale hunting.

[Chris Ryan]

They're taking a piece of this back with them. Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

And the production design was Steven Lang.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, this is what I wanted to have happen. We were going to hunt the whales, and then we're going to draw them out.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, because he understands that these people have a connection to this. No, I'm not ready to give up the Star wars thing. And I know I sound like a weird. Like an elder millennial baby, but it just sounds shitty.

[Chris Ryan]

Can you watch. Will you watch season two of Andor for me?

[Amanda Davis]

You didn't do it. You said you were gonna do it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Now we do it over Christmas. I had to watch too many things to get ready for later this week's episode. There are things that I was like. I don't know if I feel good about doing the best of the year if I haven't seen these five movies.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, I've seen Andor season two, and I have not seen sentimental value.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

That's where I am. I think that's okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, but Starfighter's not out yet. Like, when Starfighter comes out. If I haven't seen Andor 2, I failed right. Help me out.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, I agree with you.

[Chris Ryan]

It's an abomination. It's an abomination. It's terrible.

[Sean Fennessey]

Why are we all pretending like this is okay?

[Amanda Davis]

I think it's Star Wars, Mommy. I am not.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. They wouldn't let Ben solo. They took away the Benioff and Weiss trilogy. They took away Rian Johnson sequels. They took away.

[Amanda Davis]

They said no to Steven Soderbergh.

[Chris Ryan]

Where's James Mangold's fucking Samurai Monks movie?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh my God.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. A good question. Where's Taika Waititi's Star wars movie? You know, where's. Who else? What was Rogue Squadron? Patty Jenkins movie.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And so we moved through all of these filmmakers. You can have varying degrees of interest in any of their films, but we netted at the blandest mainstream movie maker in America to make a Star wars movie.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, that's the way the world is moving. It is disappointing. It's really bad. Okay, so now maybe it'll be great.

[Chris Ryan]

Don't put the sensors in a reef.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, that's not good for the reef. And one of my ocean facts that I learned that I knew already. But the reefs are very important for life on this planet and I assume on Pandora. Okay. They're also. They're hiding.

[Chris Ryan]

These are like hermit crabs.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I love these creatures, these little mecha crabs. This is Jim cooking all of this stuff.

[Amanda Davis]

You want to go on a submersible ever?

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm interested. It seems dangerous. I will say the sequences in the life aquatics seem very fun.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure. But if Wes Anderson is designing the.

[Sean Fennessey]

I want a submarine made of paper.

[Amanda Davis]

Mache, I'm definitely available. What about you?

[Chris Ryan]

I don't want to go in space.

[Amanda Davis]

You don't want to go in space? Yeah. No, I agree.

[Sean Fennessey]

I want to be trapped.

[Chris Ryan]

I wouldn't mind being trapped in space. Like in a space station.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Where I could jog.

[Sean Fennessey]

What if a xenomorph was on. On board?

[Amanda Davis]

So that's your concern. Physical movement. You need to be able to jog.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. But I also just think that like space stations just seem kind of sick, you know, like your little zero gravity moments.

[Amanda Davis]

You know, I have always wanted to do that. I recently found out that my good friend Molly got to go to space camp when she was younger and she did the zero gravity thing. I didn't know this about her and I just. The jealousy is still coursing through me. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

You know, maybe that's the yogurt.

[Sean Fennessey]

You gotta get that out. You gotta go to space camp.

[Chris Ryan]

You do have to go.

[Amanda Davis]

I think we've done that. We've talked about this once before and I googled it on a podcast. And they do have adult space camp.

[Sean Fennessey]

Of course they do.

[Chris Ryan]

Is it at SpaceX? Like, do you have to go in.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like, in Jupiter, Florida? Right.

[Amanda Davis]

No, it's not Jupiter. That's where all the rich people live. This is Cape Canaveral.

[Chris Ryan]

Jupiter is where all the golf bros live.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's right. That's where Tiger lives.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Yes.

[Chris Ryan]

Rich people camp.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's going to Tiger's house.

[Chris Ryan]

Tiger's chipping and putting again.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Well.

[Sean Fennessey]

And among other things.

[Amanda Davis]

Right? Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I didn't say golfing.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. All right. So they're under attack. And the crab.

[Sean Fennessey]

What's up with lt. Grace? He all right?

[Chris Ryan]

He just did a press conference today. He was like, back as. But I'm chipping and pudding.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Gotta love.

[Amanda Davis]

To what end?

[Chris Ryan]

I. I mean, there's. The level of interest there is in golf when he is playing is incalculable compared to, like, when it's not.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

You know.

[Amanda Davis]

Yep.

[Chris Ryan]

It's like the casual looky lose. Or, like, is Tiger playing on Sunday? Unbelievable. I like golf.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. How did you feel about Happy Gilmore too?

[Chris Ryan]

I didn't see it.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Should I see that before the Best of the Year pod? I appreciate you guys letting me participate even though I haven't seen some of.

[Amanda Davis]

These classic films this year.

[Chris Ryan]

Like Happy Gilmore.

[Sean Fennessey]

I wonder what you'll make of Sentimental Value too. Or Sentimental Value.

[Chris Ryan]

Is it okay if I haven't seen Sentimental Value one before? I see two.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, but Two is a prequel, so it's okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Selling Skarsgard is just playing his Andor character, right?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, he's playing the professor from Goodwill Hunting in Sentimental Value. He wears his Fields Medal the whole time.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. This is a very long trouble. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Great. Oh.

[Chris Ryan]

None of these people have any moral compunction about what they're doing.

[Amanda Davis]

Seems like.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think that, you know, it's just an allegory for how we treat those who are different from us and the natural world also. And they all work for a military. Military industrial corporation. They capture creatures. This is what we do to real sea life in our world.

[Chris Ryan]

Sure. You rat. You better redeem yourself, man.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. It's been like 2 hours and 15 minutes. At least. What's he supposed to do?

[Sean Fennessey]

He's powerless.

[Amanda Davis]

Grow a pair.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. Speak up.

[Sean Fennessey]

You guys are bullying Spider.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Practice political journalism the Amanda Dobbins way.

[Sean Fennessey]

He could grow up to be Ryan Lizard one day.

[Chris Ryan]

Start a substack.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, my God.

[Chris Ryan]

So what's the idea here? They're capturing them to get Sully, or they're capturing them to study their bodies or what?

[Amanda Davis]

Why do they want Sully back? Revenge.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. And also that he is kind of like a symbol for betraying the human race.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, that's right.

[Chris Ryan]

But how does. But Stephen Lang's like, na'. Vi, it's like you and me were not so different. Like, what's going on?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, he's a clone. He's not actually a human consciousness proper. So I guess they can argue it a way that in order to defeat the Na', Vi, you must become like the Na'.

[Amanda Davis]

Vi. This is sad. They're tying up. Children don't like that.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, come in the political environment. This is pretty serious stuff.

[Chris Ryan]

Practically one battle.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think you're making a joke, but I think it's. I think this is what genre is for. For.

[Amanda Davis]

You're totally right to confront people with.

[Sean Fennessey]

These ideas in ways that are entertaining and then they start to realize that this is evil to do this sort of thing.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes.

[Amanda Davis]

So are people making the connection to the real world?

[Sean Fennessey]

Some people are not. It's our job as cultural commentators to point out these ideas.

[Amanda Davis]

You are right. You are 100% right.

[Chris Ryan]

So he's got his seeds. Yeah, he's mad. As.

[Sean Fennessey]

One of the interesting tensions of the movie, for real for me, is this guy is an ex Marine who's really good at shooting people, but who has been thrust into a world where pacifism and connection to the world is definitional to their lives.

[Amanda Davis]

Much like James Cameron.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's totally a reflection of his point of view.

[Amanda Davis]

Moved from Los Angeles where he was, you know, the. The weapons king, and trained on all the guns. And now in New Zealand, he says in that piece, there are no. There are no guns. I don't need it anymore.

[Sean Fennessey]

There's a lot of things in these movies. I mean, also, this is a movie about a guy who's like, I wasn't a good father and I'm trying to get better.

[Amanda Davis]

You relate.

[Chris Ryan]

I did not get that, but I.

[Sean Fennessey]

You don't get that from Jake Sully dealing with his teenagers.

[Amanda Davis]

I think we were talking too much about, you know, yogurt, political journalism.

[Chris Ryan]

No, I've been watching. Now I'm getting dialed.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, well, we're kind of heading into the. Into the best part of the movie here.

[Chris Ryan]

He just.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, we already. Payakan was the best part of the movie.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, I did like Pikon.

[Chris Ryan]

So Winslet's mad Now this is.

[Sean Fennessey]

They. They're confronted with. What do they do? They have to, they have to fight back. There's no other choice in the face of these genocidal monsters.

[Amanda Davis]

Again, so it's about American isolationism and. Yeah. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't know. I think these movies are really dinged for having poor writing and I think it's because Cameron historically is not the best writer of dialogue.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes.

[Sean Fennessey]

But I think the frameworks of his stories, while simple, are often insightful and create enough room to have these ideas sit comfortably.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. They take.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm not trying to be pointy headed. Like I'm being sincere.

[Amanda Davis]

I don't disagree with you. I, you know, they take too much room. And I think as the films go on, he becomes more invested not just.

[Chris Ryan]

In like world building, lurking here.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes.

[Amanda Davis]

But also, you know, he is enamored with his own ideas and the symbolism of his own ideas in these films and can stretch it out a little more than is totally necessary.

[Sean Fennessey]

We will explore that when we talk about the new movie. For sure, it's not without fault. I just appreciate that there's someone who's trying to make big blockbusters that are about something.

[Chris Ryan]

So do you think that the reason why do you think that the narrative that these movies don't have a cultural impact is one that's just been thrown at it and has happened to stick, or do you think there's any truth to that?

[Sean Fennessey]

I think there's truth to it.

[Chris Ryan]

And why do you think that is?

[Sean Fennessey]

There's not great merchandising around these movies. They're not super re watchable. They don't have the same level of like happy mealification. They're very adult films. They're very violent. They're more or less R rated action movies. They don't appeal to kids the way that most things that have this cultural impact do. So that's a factor. Some of it is. There's quite strange and idiosyncratic.

[Chris Ryan]

So Piacon's on land here.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's on boat.

[Amanda Davis]

There's also, I mean, there was a 10 year, 12 year gap between the first and second installments. And this is because he was waiting.

[Chris Ryan]

For the technology to catch up or something or.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. And I think they were going through all of the work that they needed to go through to make it the way he wants to, which I admire.

[Sean Fennessey]

But one thing I would recommend for people who are watching this or listening to this episode is Disney just put out a two part making of documentary about the making of this film. And it's more of a bonus feature than it is a documentary, ultimately. But it explains in detail everything that they had to figure out about how to shoot on water, which is super complicated. And there's a lot of time spent with the stunt performers who pull off all of this stuff, and just the various difficulties of trying to create water action and the way that water moves against the currents of these, you know, these creatures and the ships and all of this technology that they're basically inventing. And what would be the logical science behind how those things operate? There's just, like, so much intention and time put into thinking about it that maybe you don't get it all when you watch the movie. But I think that in that big gap, there was a ton of. There was years where they had to kind of figure out how to execute on this. The same way that, like, Titanic took so long and they're inventing. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I just think Titanic just has, like. It's easier to, like, get lost in Titanic, not because it's a real thing that happened, but because the characters wind up. Up pulling you in. Yeah, you can watch it.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

For Jack.

[Sean Fennessey]

And I like Titanic too, you know, and I wouldn't argue that Avatar is better than Titanic, but I think Titanic has just as much terrible dialogue. Sure.

[Amanda Davis]

But it also has I'm the king of the world.

[Sean Fennessey]

So is that part good?

[Amanda Davis]

Well, it's memorable.

[Sean Fennessey]

It is memorable.

[Amanda Davis]

And that's. I mean, I think. What?

[Sean Fennessey]

Is it more memorable than I see you?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, it is.

[Sean Fennessey]

I disagree.

[Chris Ryan]

What does he say? I see you.

[Amanda Davis]

That's.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's how they make their connection. Like, when they're like, we are connected, we are in love.

[Amanda Davis]

But what's memorable versus what's good is also an interesting rubric through which to discuss the films of James Cameron.

[Sean Fennessey]

It is. What's his best movie, Chris? Aliens.

[Chris Ryan]

That's my favorite of his.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

T2.

[Chris Ryan]

I like aliens more than T2.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you have a favorite?

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, Titanic, but T2 is really good, too.

[Sean Fennessey]

I like them both. Coming around on Terminator. Wasn't always the original Terminator guy. As I get older.

[Chris Ryan]

Huge achievement.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's pretty crazy.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Pretty crazy what they pulled off. Piranha two spawning.

[Amanda Davis]

It's okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

A lot of some Piranha two vibes.

[Chris Ryan]

Is this the big battle? Is this the final battle?

[Sean Fennessey]

I think we have more coming.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. I mean, at some point, it just becomes.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is the beginning of the end.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. One big battle.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you want to talk a little bit about iterations in remote control design?

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was out to dinner with some friends a couple weeks ago, and one of my friends who works in the movie industry was like, here's the biggest thing that happened in the movie business in the last 10 years is they started putting the Netflix symbol on remote controls. And as soon as they did that, it was over. Netflix won. That was the nail in the coffin for the entirety of the theatrical film business. And I thought that was fascinating. I hadn't thought about that. But putting that symbology on a physical item that you touch when it goes.

[Chris Ryan]

From day tissues to Kleenex.

[Sean Fennessey]

Exactly. And it was like, this is TV now. I just thought that that was very powerful and smart and simple.

[Amanda Davis]

It's true.

[Sean Fennessey]

And kind of definitional. That was it.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And so on this remote, which is for an LG Television, it has Netflix Prime Video and Disney, but in the top left position, of course, is Netflix.

[Amanda Davis]

Is Netflix. Yeah. They haven't made that functionality like any better though, from a user experience. I mean, the damn. That's workplace Thanksgiving. Like at the parents home. I know everyone's complaining about motion smoothing or whatever, but my issue is just trying to make the load a single app on the smart tv, you know, just one for five minutes.

[Sean Fennessey]

It doesn't work nearly as well as it should.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, it does not work. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Even though my crashed it.

[Sean Fennessey]

I have a wonderful 4k player at home and they put a fucking Netflix button on the 4K player. I'm like, why did I spend $800 on this fucking 4K player? You put the Netflix symbol right in the middle of this remote control. What did your parents call the remote control? Clicker. Remote.

[Amanda Davis]

Remote. The remote.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, it's New York. The clicker.

[Amanda Davis]

Clicker, Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I never said.

[Chris Ryan]

Is this Charles Milton?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, it's not Charles Milton. This is a prequel to May December, though.

[Amanda Davis]

Christopher, how do you say the word for the condiment that goes on a hot dog with mustard or at least on some ketchup? You say ketchup. Yeah. But you are from Philadelphia, probably. Ketchup. Yeah, that's that. It's the. I will. I will walk out of my home if my children start pronouncing ketchup. Ketchup. Yeah. In the Philly way.

[Chris Ryan]

They won't be speaking. They'll be texting me.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

You'll have a Payakan brain link with them. You guys will be communicating about how far along you are in Red Dead Redemption.

[Amanda Davis]

Right? Okay, so Red Dead Redemption is cowboys.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, it's awesome. You have to like take care of your horse Oh, I love.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Payakan. Fuck that guy.

[Amanda Davis]

Go. Oh, no.

[Chris Ryan]

Cut it.

[Sean Fennessey]

No. Cut it. No.

[Chris Ryan]

Come on, brother.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Flip the. Yes. Flip the boat.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

This guy is just one of the most unlikable dudes ever.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. It doesn't really seem like any of their life jackets are properly secured, you know, which is your Clement.

[Chris Ryan]

Like, I. I have second thoughts about this. I'm a marine biologist.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, he shouldn't be participating in the death of sea creatures.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, incredible up.

[Chris Ryan]

Body strength.

[Sean Fennessey]

My soul came out of my body when that happened, when we saw it in the theater. Do you remember where we saw this? I can't remember. The movie theater. It was. We went together in 2022.

[Amanda Davis]

We did.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. I got a gigantic soda.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

I had to go to the bathroom, like, four times.

[Amanda Davis]

I guess it would have been Burbank.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think it was Burbank.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Saw it in 3D shot. Ya. K. Cole. Gavin. Have you been to South Africa, Chris?

[Chris Ryan]

No, this guy's Australian.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's Australian. Okay. Is he. What is he, Kiwi?

[Chris Ryan]

No, I think he's an Aussie.

[Sean Fennessey]

Jermaine is from New Zealand.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, I believe so. Yeah. Okay, this. This vessel is in trouble.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is sick.

[Chris Ryan]

Cut him in half. Oh, come on, dog.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh. Oh, you're not gonna like this.

[Amanda Davis]

Rope against your go. Yeah, there the arm goes detached. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

This guy really, like, loves the fact that everybody else died, so he became captain.

[Amanda Davis]

Right. So he gets to yell. That was sick. That was a cool way to board a plane or board a. I'm serious.

[Sean Fennessey]

During this part of the movie, I was like, jim is cooking.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I often wonder about this. Like, I find it hard to get directors to explain this specifically to me about designing action set pieces. The only person who really does it is Stahelski.

[Chris Ryan]

He'll be like, this is how we did this.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was thinking this, and we wanted to have this element because of this. And some of it is because the stunt coordinators and the stunt designers do a lot of that work. But Cameron, he's in the weeds.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. He's very.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'd love to hear him do the telestrator breakdown of a scene.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Is that Curie?

[Amanda Davis]

That is Curie. Does she look like Sigourney Weaver to you yet?

[Chris Ryan]

No.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. I remember when I first saw it, I was like, oh, that does look like Sigourney Weaver. Like, I get it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. Top five Sigourney Weaver roles.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Ghostbusters.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Five.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, Ripley and Alien.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, that's one.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, that's one. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Working Girl.

[Amanda Davis]

Working girl is definitely in there. Only four. Wow. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Gorge three is the gorge. What's. What's. What's Sigourney's other besta?

[Amanda Davis]

Miles. Tell teller, Anya Taylor. Joy 1. I don't think you told me she was in that.

[Sean Fennessey]

She plays.

[Chris Ryan]

She plays the head of CIA.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah. What about the Paul Schrader movie?

[Chris Ryan]

She in Card Counter or is she in.

[Sean Fennessey]

She is in Constant.

[Chris Ryan]

Constant Garden Gardener.

[Sean Fennessey]

She is not the Constant Gardener. Master Gardener.

[Amanda Davis]

Master Gardener.

[Sean Fennessey]

She is electrifying.

[Amanda Davis]

He's incredible. And I was like, if we're gonna do Sigourney Weaver villain in a she is so good, questionable movie released in the last five years.

[Sean Fennessey]

Nothing questionable about it to me. Galaxy Quest. That's a good one. You know, I was thinking of Copycat. That's one of the first ones that comes up.

[Chris Ryan]

What's up with this sun here? Is he. This is a problem for him. Like the eclipse that's happening.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, something happens during the eclipse that they explained earlier, but I don't remember what it is. It's like they lose their powers or something.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, no.

[Amanda Davis]

That's bad.

[Sean Fennessey]

Pushed into the water. So Gorny. Not as strong a filmography as you might think. She is in the Mandalorian and Grogu.

[Chris Ryan]

Yes.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Is her face.

[Chris Ryan]

No, she's. She's. She's like their new, like, operator, I think. Like, she's sending them on missions or something.

[Sean Fennessey]

Mandalorian and Grogu. You're excited, Chris, or.

[Chris Ryan]

No, I'm not, man.

[Sean Fennessey]

What happened? What happened, guys?

[Amanda Davis]

So I guess you could put Avatar in it. Would you put Avatar one or two?

[Sean Fennessey]

I think one.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Even though I like her.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, is Spider about to catch a bullet?

[Amanda Davis]

She plays herself in Finding Dory. Didn't know that.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. She is on the screen at the aquarium, and she's like one of the guides explaining what's happening at the aquarium. I know because I just saw Finding Dory in theaters with Alice recently.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, that's nice. Nice. Her. Her episode of Call My Agent was very good.

[Sean Fennessey]

I haven't seen it.

[Chris Ryan]

The French one or.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, the French one.

[Chris Ryan]

I don't think I saw that. But Spider can't do super swimming, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

He's just a regular old human with Quaritch's DNA.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, why is all of the.

[Sean Fennessey]

All of the production design yellow on these? On these?

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, probably for safety precautions.

[Sean Fennessey]

The whole thing is for safety.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, so you can see it in.

[Sean Fennessey]

The event of what, like, darkness under the sea?

[Chris Ryan]

In the event of Payakan coming up from behind and sinking the attack.

[Sean Fennessey]

His body on top of the vessel.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah. Shot.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, no.

[Chris Ryan]

Who's this? Who got shot?

[Sean Fennessey]

This is his older brother. Right.

[Chris Ryan]

He's bleeding out, dude. Gotta get Winslet to put hands on him.

[Amanda Davis]

Did this. Oh, okay. So this animal is gonna take him back where he needs to go.

[Sean Fennessey]

What do you think about the Na' Vi siblings all calling each other bro?

[Chris Ryan]

You know, do you think in Jim's final draft script writing, he's like, comma, bro every time?

[Sean Fennessey]

That is what kids say to each other right now.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like, my niece. I saw my niece in New York in October, and my niece Madeline, and she was like. She called me bro the whole weekend. She's like, bro, bro, bro. Check this out.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Just 14.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, that's nice. You know, you're young, but it was.

[Sean Fennessey]

Jim, like, ahead of the curve on that or, like, are all the kids copying Avatar?

[Amanda Davis]

I. Yes. I think that they watch it every day.

[Chris Ryan]

Avatar is chopped, but maybe this is.

[Sean Fennessey]

Its cultural cash impact.

[Chris Ryan]

That's what started bro coming back. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And Loak is calling his brother bro.

[Amanda Davis]

Definitely. All right. They're trying to save him.

[Sean Fennessey]

I can't believe how little Neytiri is in this book. I'm kind of blown away.

[Amanda Davis]

I did not remember the.

[Chris Ryan]

This guy gonna bleed out. What happens here, man?

[Sean Fennessey]

Watch. Just keep watching.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. We're not gonna spoil things for you. Okay. Here comes this guy. Oh, there she is.

[Sean Fennessey]

There she is.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, no.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is really not what you want.

[Amanda Davis]

That's very sad. Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

To the forest.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

It'S got a little chill.

[Chris Ryan]

You got a little chill.

[Sean Fennessey]

I like these movies.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't know what to say.

[Chris Ryan]

You're looking at me. I'm not going to ruin them for you.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, I get it. I mean, that's very sad. Don't start crying, though.

[Chris Ryan]

Don't be weird.

[Amanda Davis]

It's sad.

[Sean Fennessey]

They lost their child.

[Amanda Davis]

I know. And they're human. Like, you can see Zoe Saldania. You know, they do a good job of communicating the humanness in these emotions. Yeah. So that's awful.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is just like hamnet.

[Chris Ryan]

This is a lot like. Like, a lot like lioness.

[Sean Fennessey]

Is it?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

When she has to order in a drone strike on her own operative.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, boy, does she do it.

[Chris Ryan]

First episode, dude. First few minutes, Sets up, sets up.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did you. Did you cry?

[Chris Ryan]

I got choked up at the part when the first lioness joins the Marines and they're like, why? Why do you want to be a Marine? And she's just like, narrates the pamphlet back at him. He's like, bullshit. Why do you want to be a Marine? And then she's like, I was being chased and a Marine helped me. And he's like, then you know exactly what it means to be a Marine.

[Amanda Davis]

Wow, that's beautiful.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you enlist that day as our sobbing? That's great.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. The machine's still there.

[Sean Fennessey]

Where do you think Teller Sheridan nets out on the intention of going to Vietnam?

[Chris Ryan]

I would love to find out with a Taylor Sheridan show about Vietnam.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think he's like, good idea. Wrongly executed?

[Chris Ryan]

I can't, honestly. He's one of the most mysterious minds in Hollywood.

[Sean Fennessey]

Absolutely. Many people are saying. Extremely hard to read what he thinks.

[Chris Ryan]

What he juxtaposes is just so wild, where he's just like anything. Did you watch the most recent episode of Land Man? Multiple scenes of Ali Larder attempting to give Billy Bob Roadhead.

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure.

[Chris Ryan]

Juxtaposed with a chemical leak and Andy Garcia playing a.

[Sean Fennessey]

Those are not juxtapositions. I'm not sure you know what that word means. There's nothing antithetical.

[Chris Ryan]

No, they're tonal.

[Sean Fennessey]

Tonal or strikingly different.

[Amanda Davis]

Yes, there is.

[Chris Ryan]

Watching four men being like, I'm dying of, like, a chemical leak, while Ali Larder is like, baby, keep the car straight. And he's like, that's too much teeth. That's what's that's said in this show.

[Sean Fennessey]

Too much. I mean, too much teeth.

[Amanda Davis]

This is like a moment of parental grief and bonding and digging, you know, deep.

[Sean Fennessey]

Teared up during the scene when the kid died.

[Amanda Davis]

Let's go get our daughter.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, here we go. Now it's fucking revenge time.

[Chris Ryan]

Lioness time. Yes.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is why I've been wondering. We're in a tier. She is.

[Chris Ryan]

And now she's.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, she's ready to fucking soar.

[Chris Ryan]

It's Kawhi. Take the minutes limit off.

[Sean Fennessey]

He just completely blows out both knees in the second quarter. Kawhi, NBA great all timer.

[Chris Ryan]

Great pitch man. You know, when you think about it, Hawaii.

[Sean Fennessey]

Leonard is a great pitch man. Yeah. Well, I mean, he's an earner. Yeah. Cash a lot of checks. Where are you at on. What's it called?

[Chris Ryan]

Aspiration.

[Sean Fennessey]

Asphyxiate. Aspiration.

[Chris Ryan]

The tree planting startup that he was reportedly.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Allegedly a spokesman for.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, I know what you told me the last time we talked about this on the podcast.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did you ever get to the bottom of how much you invested in the company?

[Amanda Davis]

No, because I was digging the trees and planting them myself. There we Go.

[Sean Fennessey]

We know that about you.

[Chris Ryan]

I borrowed a lot of money against my aspiration stock.

[Sean Fennessey]

So you buried it. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

So where does he play? Is he still.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's a Clipper.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, he's a Clipper. He's still playing?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. But his knees are giving him problems.

[Amanda Davis]

But the legal focus on the NBA has moved instead to. To gambling. And so they're not as.

[Chris Ryan]

They've got some fires they have to put out.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

In the national battle.

[Sean Fennessey]

How do you feel about the health of the league?

[Chris Ryan]

Well, I love the players, you know.

[Sean Fennessey]

You love the players? Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm a player guy. Player first. Sorry. Don't know if that's controversial.

[Sean Fennessey]

You just said it with such ease, like it's a thing you've said many times.

[Chris Ryan]

There's a lot of really like, great young people.

[Sean Fennessey]

David Falk rare. I love all my guys. All my little boys that I keep in my stable.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, my gosh. Thought I was going to choke out that water.

[Sean Fennessey]

What if the Knicks go to the finals?

[Chris Ryan]

They're not, but go ahead.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. Why would you say that to me?

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think the Knicks are going to the finals? Aren't they already beefing with each other? Don't they already hate Cat?

[Sean Fennessey]

What are you talking about?

[Chris Ryan]

Doesn't Mikhail. Mikhail hates Cat because he doesn't defend.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, they're fine. They're doing. They're doing very well.

[Amanda Davis]

How do you know?

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, I guess I don't know for sure. I don't have Mikhail on speed dial. Mikhail Bridges.

[Chris Ryan]

That's what Lizzie needs to do.

[Sean Fennessey]

Emergency. Yeah. That's a hard story to break. I think. I think they could go to the finals. I'm not saying they would win. They would probably get their doors blown off for nothing.

[Chris Ryan]

They will beat the Thunder for the several years.

[Sean Fennessey]

I agree with that. But if they go to the finals, like, am I. I'm allowed to be excited about that, right?

[Chris Ryan]

For sure. Of course. I would never. I don't begrudge you any sports joy way at all.

[Sean Fennessey]

Thanks.

[Chris Ryan]

And you've always been honestly more supportive than you need to be of me.

[Sean Fennessey]

I. I just. I just don't like the Phillies.

[Chris Ryan]

I know.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

The other teams are. We're good. I know. If you. I. Sixers. You know, you haven't had a title in a long time.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, she's up now.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

She's throwing arrows right in their eyes.

[Sean Fennessey]

She was doing this way before Taylor Sheridan knew about Saldanya. Way before Natiri was wrecking dudes.

[Chris Ryan]

Is Stephen Lang still. Yeah, he is.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's Alive.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, there is. So is this actually. Is that a Zoe Saldania stunt double doing all this jumps and stuff?

[Sean Fennessey]

I think she does a lot, but she. There are definitely a lot of doubles as well. They. There. There is a lot of attention in that.

[Chris Ryan]

I wonder if he could have gotten these movies together much if the navi were just normal height. You ever think about that? That's a note I would love to give him. If the navi were just five, nine, Right.

[Amanda Davis]

Then we've got a regular cadence.

[Sean Fennessey]

You have a surprising amount of notes for James Cameron, the most successful director in the show.

[Chris Ryan]

I've been brought in here for a purpose. I wasn't here to just kiss this movie's ass, you know, it's supposed to be.

[Amanda Davis]

That's true.

[Sean Fennessey]

The voice thus far, is it any more like or unlike, like, what you thought?

[Chris Ryan]

I think this one's much more combat than I imagined and much more like. Especially this last hour.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Has been a little bit more engaging. I probably talked less because I'm a little bit more. My eyes on the screen.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Because this is more up my alley.

[Amanda Davis]

As far as touching each other. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And I think if you listen.

[Chris Ryan]

People psychically communicating with, like, inanimate objects or animated. But whatever.

[Sean Fennessey]

You're not as into that.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. You don't have a spiritual inner life.

[Amanda Davis]

Life.

[Chris Ryan]

It's not true. I don't know if you didn't listen to my task pods, I guess I didn't.

[Sean Fennessey]

What did you talk about?

[Chris Ryan]

I was. I was. I was going down the road of.

[Sean Fennessey]

Of.

[Chris Ryan]

Of reading Franciscan philosophers. Richard Rohr, you know.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

But does that mean you have an inner spirit?

[Amanda Davis]

How does that relate to task?

[Chris Ryan]

Well, the. Richard Rohr's philosophy on life is that the task of life is to, like, discover what you're supposed to do with the second half of it after you've set up, like, your. Your baseline personality and your. Your beliefs.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

And then, like, what do you do with that?

[Sean Fennessey]

And does that correspond to how you're feeling right now?

[Chris Ryan]

I guess so.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

What is your task?

[Chris Ryan]

My task is to watch Avatar.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

And, you know, and I have experiences like this. I. I haven't decided yet, but my spiritual life is. Is like an ongoing process as it is for every human. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, no, it's her boat.

[Chris Ryan]

I'm not like, I'm.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's dead.

[Chris Ryan]

It's out, you know?

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. And you're open to new. Yeah. Are you open to new feelings?

[Amanda Davis]

No, I have plenty. Like, all right. I'm good. Like, you know, we're at capacity for new, new things.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think your spiritual life is topped up? The tank is full?

[Amanda Davis]

I don't think I have one, actually. I think I'm pretty dead inside in that way or this spiritual life is like, all around us, you know, in the everyday.

[Chris Ryan]

Sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

Quakers. Can I tell you something? I'm feeling an awakening coming for you.

[Amanda Davis]

In your spiritual life.

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think that that will subsequently change your attitude towards cinema? Like maybe interconnected. You'll get rid of all this, all this plastic in your life.

[Sean Fennessey]

No. Interconnected art is. Is my spirit.

[Chris Ryan]

You found the one. Okay, Spiritual ideology that promotes. We have a pope that supports cinema of DVDs.

[Amanda Davis]

No, I, I.

[Chris Ryan]

One Jesuit scholar was like, go forth and collect.

[Sean Fennessey]

You haven't seen Wake Up Dead Man?

[Amanda Davis]

No.

[Sean Fennessey]

You've seen it?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

So it's all about Brian Johnson's like, test of faith. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

And I had him on the show, which I guess will hear next week.

[Chris Ryan]

Spider on the block here.

[Sean Fennessey]

We don't want that. We really don't want this. This does clarify what has Spider done.

[Amanda Davis]

For us thus far in this film?

[Sean Fennessey]

He's just shown a discomfort with the aggression of his clone father's tendencies. And also we know that he grew up with these kids.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

So he's connected to them. He doesn't want to be killed by Neytiri, that's for sure. Very quickly on the Rian Johnson thing, my mom was extremely spiritual in the second half of her life. And one thing I shared with him is that she became very close friends with a priest. And then, like, I would come home from school and the priest would just be there hanging out with my mom. And I'd be like, this is so strange.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, that is weird.

[Sean Fennessey]

But I was thinking about her opening her mind.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, that's nice.

[Sean Fennessey]

In the second half of her life, being more open to changing feelings. So I like what you're saying. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

You never know. I don't really like the Catholic Church specifically.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. I mean, that's the other thing is I like spirituality. I'm fine with that. Can you point to an organized religion of any kind where it's like, at the end of the day, I'm like.

[Chris Ryan]

I think the Quaker's got a lot of fun.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think the Lutherans are nice.

[Amanda Davis]

I don't know. I grew up with some Lutherans, so.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. You know with Martin Luther.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, him.

[Sean Fennessey]

He was, he had, he had a lot of problems, a lot of ideas. Oh.

[Chris Ryan]

So they got their whole squad back. Where's Spider? You can't let this dude live. Oh, cool.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, here they go.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is a former corporal and a colonel in hand to hand combat into V bodies. Very normal movie.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. While other people are swimming around and fire a ring of fire on water.

[Chris Ryan]

Speaking of fire on the water, watch Dunkirk again.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Still goaded.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did you see qt?

[Chris Ryan]

I sure did.

[Sean Fennessey]

What'd you think?

[Chris Ryan]

I was, I was like, you and.

[Amanda Davis]

I are smoking one. Hold on.

[Chris Ryan]

The same brand of cigarettes. That's my brother Googling ring, Quentin.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean that.

[Chris Ryan]

I would not put Blackhawk number one.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, that drop was very ser.

[Chris Ryan]

But I was like, I see you and I understand you.

[Sean Fennessey]

But some real, some real. If you go through the Ringer archives, you know, we did Unstoppable and Dunkirk with him on the Rewatchable, so no surprise to see those.

[Chris Ryan]

I was surprised. I didn't know. I thought he was Social Network over Zodiac and I was interested to see.

[Sean Fennessey]

We specifically have talked to him about that over Witch's bet. I mean, that's a. That's a, a. That's a fierce debate. Toy Story 3, he's been talking about that for years. He loves that movie. Some interesting. Some major idiosyncratic picks, but I thought it, I thought it was cool.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Good job.

[Chris Ryan]

What do you about his take? That Martin Scorsese hasn't made a movie in the 21st century as good as west side Story?

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't, I don't. But I think, I think silence is wildly underrated.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

And I would love to know what Quinn thinks about silence.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Because it's not doing the thing that, you know, west side Story is doing.

[Chris Ryan]

A thing that dude just loves fucking.

[Amanda Davis]

Jack just sent me a Paul Dano quote. A quote from Quentin.

[Sean Fennessey]

I heard it.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm going to read it now.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's very severe.

[Amanda Davis]

There Will Be Blood Would stand a good chance of being number one or number two if it didn't have a big, giant flaw in it. And the flaw is Paul Dano. Obviously it's supposed to be a two hander, but it's also drastically obvious that it's not a two hander. Dano is weak sauce, man. He is the weak sister. Austin Butler would have been wonderful in that role. Wow. It keeps going. Says I think. Listen, I like Paul Dano very much. Wildlife, wonderful films.

[Sean Fennessey]

Paul Dano is a phenomenal actor. One of the best actors of his.

[Amanda Davis]

Generation, in my opinion.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't agree with Quentin about that.

[Amanda Davis]

In the wizard of the Kremlin, which is the Olivier sas movie starring Vladimir Putin, I Did I should have saw it in Venice. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

About to be CR's best of 2026. Jude Law as Putin.

[Amanda Davis]

You know, I didn't think Paul Dano was the perfect casting for that.

[Chris Ryan]

You didn't?

[Amanda Davis]

No, but. All right, everybody's entitled to their opinion.

[Sean Fennessey]

I love Paul Dano in that movie especially. So I don't agree.

[Chris Ryan]

What are we getting? What's big next year?

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, what's a big movie that's coming out? I mean, the Odyssey is coming out.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, that's.

[Amanda Davis]

Will you go see this for the 5 minute featurette? Will you go see the new avatar for the five minute?

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, I'm not going to watch the five minutes.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's not worth $20 to you?

[Chris Ryan]

No, it's not about money. It's about purity of experience.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

You want to be able to.

[Amanda Davis]

You won't watch the trailer? Get into it.

[Chris Ryan]

I watched the teaser. I guess I'll watch the trailer. I don't want certain things spoiled for me. I don't want to see the Sirens until I walk into an IMAX movie theater.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm with him.

[Sean Fennessey]

Who's playing the sirens?

[Chris Ryan]

Sydney Sweeney. Cloned.

[Sean Fennessey]

Uh huh.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you not. You didn't read about that?

[Sean Fennessey]

But it's Na' Vi sirens.

[Amanda Davis]

Right?

[Sean Fennessey]

This is a very protracted final battle between Quaritch.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, now they're underwater punching each other.

[Chris Ryan]

Can Quaritch breathe underwater? He hasn't had this kind of training.

[Sean Fennessey]

Very good point.

[Chris Ryan]

Fucking sleeper hold.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, it's like Roddy Piper down there trying to put him out. You know about Rowdy Roddy Piper? You familiar with his work?

[Amanda Davis]

No, but I have to sign up for a parent teacher conference right now because I missed them.

[Sean Fennessey]

And can that wait like nine minutes until the movie's over?

[Amanda Davis]

Well, do you want me to be able to podcast next week?

[Chris Ryan]

You know what I just saw this weekend I really loved?

[Amanda Davis]

Like, I can be here doing this work or I can get a good spot.

[Sean Fennessey]

I already did my video.

[Chris Ryan]

You know what I really love this week? That has a great fight scene and a great sleeper hold.

[Sean Fennessey]

What's that?

[Chris Ryan]

Splitsville?

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, yeah, it was funny.

[Chris Ryan]

Really good fight scene.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, Very, very elaborate stunt work. Right. A lot of smashing through glass tables. Yeah, I like those guys. They're really funny. Very amusing to be like. Yeah, we absolutely are married to Adria Arjona and Dakota Johnson. Just straight up hilarious.

[Amanda Davis]

I enjoyed that one.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, it's a fun movie.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Okay, so they're swimming under the fire and he's.

[Chris Ryan]

Jake's also gotta learn he Also can't breathe underwater. Did Stephen Lang get out?

[Sean Fennessey]

He did.

[Amanda Davis]

He didn't do the Kate Winslet training. This would be you, Chris. 20 seconds.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, so Stephen Lang lives to fight another day.

[Amanda Davis]

That sucks, dude. I'm just gonna keep watching the movies.

[Sean Fennessey]

You need him to die.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, I assume this is gonna happen in three, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

What's gonna happen?

[Chris Ryan]

That he gets Vadered or Palpatine?

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so now they're under.

[Sean Fennessey]

You'll have to see. When you go to see the Odyssey trailer, a wreckage.

[Amanda Davis]

And then, you know, this is a pretty long underwater stunt. At some point the novelty wears off. It would be really underwater stuff.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is a very long sequence.

[Chris Ryan]

A very funny sketch would be I get middle row, middle of the row for the middle row of an IMAX theater. And after the Odyssey trailer, protractedly climb over every single person to get out. So I don't watch Avatar fired as.

[Amanda Davis]

You should go at like, the 8am screening as well.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, I guess so.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Okay. They've got Jake.

[Sean Fennessey]

Just want you guys to know that this is what happens to me these days. What? I get a text from a friend.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Who works in the industry.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Someone I haven't talked to in a few weeks. This has happened a couple of times.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

And he just says, I'm hearing it's Netflix.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, that.

[Chris Ryan]

Warner Brothers and stuff.

[Amanda Davis]

All right.

[Sean Fennessey]

And like, I don't. You know, maybe it's true, maybe it's not. It's just a rumor. Well, this is just what it's like now, you know, that's cool. Every day.

[Chris Ryan]

I don't think. I think Trump's gonna let that happen. Right?

[Amanda Davis]

Is he?

[Sean Fennessey]

He might be out of office by the time this thing closes.

[Chris Ryan]

That's true. We gotta go to court in Delaware.

[Sean Fennessey]

And take two and a half years.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, I guess so. All right, So I don't even. Who is. Is who's helping who right now.

[Sean Fennessey]

He thought it was his dead son. Oh, he thought he was moak. Yeah. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. Oh.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's a tough dad. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

He's not even giving his kid a piece.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

He must have been raised in a challenging environment, Right?

[Chris Ryan]

Spider Man. What about you?

[Sean Fennessey]

That's amazing.

[Amanda Davis]

I mean, Spider is just kind of like, around like.

[Sean Fennessey]

You see what he just did, though?

[Amanda Davis]

I know, but he doesn't do very much ever. He's just, like, always there being like, porch. He's just like. I'm so sorry.

[Chris Ryan]

He did his own dad, who he.

[Sean Fennessey]

Just dragged up to the shore.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, well.

[Chris Ryan]

Are you serious?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

This Goes back in the spiders. Back out of my cool book now.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, these stories are complicated, man. It's not that simple. That's the navi clone of his own father.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

What would you do?

[Chris Ryan]

Your sincerity is throwing me off.

[Sean Fennessey]

There's gotta be something in this world that you believe in. And if it's not God, what do I believe in? Yogurt?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, not that much.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, Come on.

[Sean Fennessey]

This brings. These movies bring this out of us. You know, you're confronting your fears.

[Chris Ryan]

This is kind of silly though, right?

[Amanda Davis]

So what's she confronting?

[Sean Fennessey]

Her.

[Amanda Davis]

What's confronting.

[Sean Fennessey]

She's channeling Eywa.

[Amanda Davis]

But she can't, or else she's gonna have a seizure.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, no, but she is connected to the natural mystical world.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, Kiri, who is that?

[Sean Fennessey]

That's Jake and Lo' AK, his son. Oh.

[Chris Ryan]

Because Lo' AK's like, I've kind of mastered this whole water thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

He knows how to swim underwater with Payakan. He's a master of the sea. Kiri is like, we need the. We need the natural world and the spirits of Eywa to save my family.

[Chris Ryan]

And where Sigourney, while this is happening, like, the Sigourney, the human part of.

[Sean Fennessey]

Her, she's dead, floating in, like, a gel bubble.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay. And Rabizi is back on Earth.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, he's furiously masturbating right now. No, he's practicing his putting.

[Chris Ryan]

No, he's fixing cameras.

[Sean Fennessey]

You know, I really want to have him on the show. Let's talk about just that.

[Amanda Davis]

Just about fist division.

[Sean Fennessey]

Just about the camera stuff.

[Amanda Davis]

That seems cool.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think that would be interesting?

[Chris Ryan]

Do you think he has a line where it's like, you know, because Euphoria is shooting in VistaVision.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, I heard.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, my God, it is. I did not hear that.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay, everybody. Like, how shitty does the movie have to be where they're like, but we're going to shoot on VistaVision. Is he like, I'm not going to fix the cameras for you. I'm sorry.

[Sean Fennessey]

You know, it's funny.

[Chris Ryan]

Like Ballerina two. You know, I.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was just on the Pure Cinema podcast last week to talk about the New Beverly December calendar, and there was a movie on the calendar that was shot in VistaVision. And it kind of like, it speaks to. But also a little bit undermines what you're describing. A movie. It's a Humphrey Bogart movie called Shoot. What is the movie? Werno?

[Amanda Davis]

Angels, Magic Jellyfish. And now Neytiri's wearing it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Bogart, Aldo Ray and Peter Usinov. Play three escaped convicts from Devil's island who basically like kidnaps slash befriend a shopkeeper and his family over Christmas. Oh, and it's just like an all in one location Christmas movie. Fun movie. I liked it. Shot on VistaVision. It's not really terribly cinematic at all. It's just like once upon a Time, it was a format that just was like standard for its time. So it's not like so crazy to do that. But when you use it for one battle where you use it for the brutalist, you expect that it's gonna be. And now a bunch of other movies. What other? There's a couple of other filmmakers who are using it.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, Brady Corbet is gonna make a four hour movie with it, right?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, that's what he says. Rated X.

[Amanda Davis]

We are doing like a lot of James Cameron greatest hits in this one. Like, we had the Terminator 2, we had a lot of aliens, we had the Terminator 2 section. Now we're doing some Titanic.

[Sean Fennessey]

Let me ask you a question about that.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

So like late style, right? Where a filmmaker is like, fuck your criticisms of like, I'm repeating myself. This is my thing.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you like that?

[Chris Ryan]

Yes, of course. I like it when it's in a more contained package.

[Amanda Davis]

Well, it can be done poorly and it can be done well. But I think that you're not repeating yourself. You're investigating your interests, whether they are thematic or. I mean, like, he is doing the settings and conflicts of movies that he's done before. But all of this is like new tech. Right. So. And like set in a totally different world, so he's not repeating himself.

[Chris Ryan]

All applicable. Like, is anybody gonna use any of this technology to tell their story?

[Sean Fennessey]

It's hard for anybody to get $500 million from Disney to make these movies. So at this scale, I think it will be a challenge. But like, to me, the Nolans and the Villeneuves are in the tradition of Cameron. Sure. Which is like, we can go really big and we really are trying to.

[Chris Ryan]

Hear something, if you want me to be honest. Here's what I think is that so many of these stories that are essentially creating fantasy mythologies. It really is. It's the buffet. And you pick which one tastes good to you. This one doesn't for me, but I have ones that you're like, what the fuck are you talking about?

[Sean Fennessey]

What's an example of that?

[Chris Ryan]

I probably was more into Thrones than you.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, I liked it though.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like, I definitely wasn't like, I'm not.

[Amanda Davis]

Watching that I was in and.

[Chris Ryan]

Fair enough.

[Sean Fennessey]

I. I'm. I'm genuinely curious because it's not so far afield from stuff that you like, which is why I find it so interesting. And even Amanda, who's very skeptical of this stuff historically, it's like, I find things to like in the Avatar movies.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure. Well, I found things to like in the first two.

[Sean Fennessey]

In the first? Yeah, yeah. You'll be less high on the third.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

Spoiler alert.

[Chris Ryan]

Embargo broken.

[Amanda Davis]

The embargo is broken. So is this a social reaction? We're being social.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

If they find that three hours into this podcast you've expressed some doubts about the third Avatar movie, I think they're gonna be okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

I have some doubts too, but there's things I loved about it as well.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so now he saved his.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's not a review.

[Amanda Davis]

For the 45th time.

[Sean Fennessey]

All right.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, I want to see.

[Amanda Davis]

And he deployed his.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you think James Cameron's time would be better spent making Predator Badlands?

[Chris Ryan]

Fire in the background? That's foreshadowing.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Nicely done. Your real James Wood.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so his kid with you or what, bro?

[Sean Fennessey]

He's torn.

[Amanda Davis]

He's not that torn. There he goes. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Painful.

[Amanda Davis]

He's chosen the Navi.

[Chris Ryan]

More echoes of one battle, right? Betrayed them twice now.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think? A lot of people are like, I'm listening to all 3 hours and 12 minutes of this podcast.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, I, you know, we're sundowning a little bit here, but it's okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Are we? I feel ready to go. I'll do another one.

[Amanda Davis]

Don't you think?

[Sean Fennessey]

I'll do the first Avatar right now.

[Amanda Davis]

Listen to two hours in. They went the whole way through for sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

What do you think they're doing right now?

[Chris Ryan]

Two hours in.

[Amanda Davis]

I don't understand how people listen to this podcast. People go running. People watch it on their screens. People, you know, I don't. I don't know what the children are up to.

[Chris Ryan]

Long haul truckers. Yeah, Long haul truckers bringing American goods.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think a lot of long haul truckers are checking out, Big pig.

[Amanda Davis]

I'm sure James Cameron was a long haul trucker before. Yeah. And then. And checked out.

[Chris Ryan]

Did he tell him I saved my dad, by the way?

[Sean Fennessey]

He did not communicate.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. So conveniently left son for a son.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is heavy, man.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I feel like you're laying it on a little stick with me right now.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, now they're singing.

[Sean Fennessey]

What do you mean? I don't understand what you're saying. That's. You're missing the sincerity bone.

[Chris Ryan]

No, that's not true.

[Sean Fennessey]

You got to bring it in.

[Chris Ryan]

That's not true.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's not all lioness. I want to masturbate to Zoe Saldania stuff. It can't be all that. It can't be this post ironic way.

[Chris Ryan]

Dude flying at Andor. You just don't know. You don't know about the revolution.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's like, oh, it's actually Marxist, but Disney produced it, you know? No, man. What about being like, fuck parents and their kids. This is deep shit.

[Chris Ryan]

Is this a funeral for the older. The son that got killed? Right.

[Amanda Davis]

I guess so. Yeah. I mean, it's definitely a ceremony. Okay. We're getting back to the failures of the father. Yep.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think I changed my mind. I want to. When I die, I want to go out like the boyfriend in midsommar. In the bear suit.

[Chris Ryan]

In the bear suit?

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Inside the tent.

[Amanda Davis]

Not the old people. Off the tent.

[Chris Ryan]

When you go out, we're going to do a giant kind of pontoon barge of tubers in a lake in Tennessee.

[Sean Fennessey]

And what do you want to do?

[Chris Ryan]

Just celebrate. Amanda.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

With beers. What beer do you want us to drink? Drink at your Viking funeral. Natty Light.

[Amanda Davis]

I found some really good ones at the beer store on Thanksgiving.

[Chris Ryan]

Are they all IPAs, though? They're like.

[Amanda Davis]

No, they had good names and stuff. And I almost sent you a bunch, but then I was like, you don't really need an update from this freezing cold beer store on Thanksgiving morning.

[Sean Fennessey]

Always like squirrel masters. Machete.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The hopsecutioner is still the best one.

[Sean Fennessey]

The best one.

[Amanda Davis]

That is a. It's a very cute little baby.

[Chris Ryan]

We're lion kinging now.

[Sean Fennessey]

How do you think you do with a tail, Chris?

[Chris Ryan]

Okay. Yeah, I think so.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I had a cat with no tail.

[Sean Fennessey]

Whoa.

[Chris Ryan]

And I think it's better to have a tail if you're among tail tail people.

[Amanda Davis]

Right. But you do.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's better to have a tail?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. My cat kind of looks like a rabbit.

[Amanda Davis]

Did you feel.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did you ever feel like an outsider in your life?

[Amanda Davis]

Sure, man.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Did you?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. When was that?

[Chris Ryan]

Like, right now?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, I'm curious.

[Chris Ryan]

No, I mean right now. Like, this has been really weird, you crying about they're shaking hands is not.

[Sean Fennessey]

What I thought was going to happen.

[Amanda Davis]

I see people now.

[Sean Fennessey]

I didn't cry. Don't say that.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. What happened to Payakan?

[Sean Fennessey]

He's around.

[Chris Ryan]

Creation tree.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah. He helped smash the boat.

[Chris Ryan]

Creation tree.

[Amanda Davis]

Spirit tree.

[Chris Ryan]

Spirit tree.

[Sean Fennessey]

There's Pikon.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. I was just like, where is he? Yeah, I just, you know, he disappeared from the narrative for a good 45 minutes there. Okay. So they can connect to the spirit tree because it doesn't give them a seizure.

[Chris Ryan]

She's dialing in and what's she gonna get?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, yeah, It's Black Friday.

[Amanda Davis]

Signing some deals.

[Chris Ryan]

Cyber Monday.

[Sean Fennessey]

She's signing up.

[Chris Ryan]

Just signing up.

[Amanda Davis]

You get anything good?

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, my God. You can't even believe how much physical media I got on Black Friday.

[Amanda Davis]

Good, that's nice.

[Sean Fennessey]

Insane, insane holes.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you caught me anything?

[Sean Fennessey]

I have some stuff at home for you.

[Chris Ryan]

I have some stuff at home.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did I tell you what I did for the unboxing boy gimmick? No, I'll tell you when we're done. It's going up over the weekend.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay, so now they're in the past or in the future or in the spirit.

[Sean Fennessey]

They're in the present time. Right?

[Chris Ryan]

Is it a she connected to the spirit?

[Sean Fennessey]

They're reconnecting with their child.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, and now he can be nice instead of giving him a fucking hard time.

[Sean Fennessey]

You learned how to fish. Okay, Come on, cr. This is real shit. What if you could go to the spirit world and reconnect with your dead child? This is fucking crazy stuff, man. What does that matter? You get. You're a kid. You were a kid once.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, I know.

[Sean Fennessey]

I know you. You're a living, feeling person now. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. That's very beautiful. Are there, like, limitations to the number of time you can go to the spirit tree?

[Chris Ryan]

That's a great question to me.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, it's like a ticket situation when you go to a carn and you run out of tickets.

[Chris Ryan]

But even so, it's like with any drugs.

[Amanda Davis]

Did you see Eternity?

[Sean Fennessey]

I did.

[Amanda Davis]

You can actually. They have tickets at the. To go through the spirit tree.

[Sean Fennessey]

I have many notes about Eternity.

[Amanda Davis]

I have so many thoughts in this.

[Chris Ryan]

Is it doing well? It's very limited reviews.

[Amanda Davis]

Yes. I think everyone should see it.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think it's a catastrophic failure with some interesting things in it.

[Amanda Davis]

I think that it was a very fun premise. And for the first hour or 45 minutes, I was like, I'm having fun. And then they can't really.

[Chris Ryan]

I think Miles Teller might be more interested in golfing than being in movies.

[Sean Fennessey]

To his credit, in the movie Eternity, which is. This is the end of Avatar. The Way of Fire, by the way. So wait, wait, what?

[Chris Ryan]

To set up fire and Ash?

[Sean Fennessey]

Just that they're staying connected to the world.

[Chris Ryan]

But he doesn't know Stephen Lang still lurks.

[Sean Fennessey]

He doesn't know that. That will become very clear. Here we see. Oh, man. Jared Cameron, fucking whale.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, great. And the Weeknd song over the credits.

[Sean Fennessey]

That was. We laughed so hard when that was revealed.

[Amanda Davis]

That's really, really funny.

[Sean Fennessey]

That was great. That was, that's. That song has just disappeared to time.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. Okay, so you didn't like Eternity?

[Sean Fennessey]

I, I, I liked Miles Teller was like, I'm just playing a grouchy old Jewish guy from New York, which is not really in his historical skill set. And he was, like, doing the accent. Pretty good accent.

[Chris Ryan]

Is he a grouchy old Jewish guy who has now been re.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like, he's an older guy who. Then he, he, he goes back to his. Himself at his happiest.

[Chris Ryan]

James Cameron gives himself editing credit in this.

[Sean Fennessey]

He edits these films.

[Chris Ryan]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

He didn't give himself credit, but he's like, chop.

[Chris Ryan]

He's cutting the movie.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

You don't scoff when Steven Soderbergh does it.

[Chris Ryan]

That's true, Sean. Yeah, that's true.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm so disappointed.

[Chris Ryan]

Did you think I was going to have, like, a Road to Damascus moment with these movies?

[Sean Fennessey]

I thought, you know, your heart is different than mine.

[Chris Ryan]

This was better than I thought it was going to be.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

Action sequences can do that. You don't. It's done now.

[Sean Fennessey]

Is it, is it any different than you thought it would be?

[Chris Ryan]

Not really.

[Sean Fennessey]

Not really. And would you.

[Amanda Davis]

That's a cool fish. Brontosaurus.

[Chris Ryan]

Would I go see the third one?

[Sean Fennessey]

No. I know you're not, you're not going to do that.

[Chris Ryan]

I wasn't planning on it, but I feel like I should probably experience one of these movies on a big screen.

[Sean Fennessey]

My gut tells me there will not be a 4 in 5. My gut also tells me that the movie will make significantly less than the new one will make significantly less than this.

[Chris Ryan]

So this made two bill 2.3.

[Amanda Davis]

I think you're correct. I think it's less of a novelty now. I don't know that the word of mouth is that great.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't think it's going to be nearly as strong as it was for this one. It's 3 hours and 17 minutes, and.

[Amanda Davis]

Cameron is already shopping like the other projects he wants to do besides Hiroshima.

[Chris Ryan]

Four and five.

[Amanda Davis]

Exactly.

[Sean Fennessey]

Apparently that was all a stunt to get Disney to pay for the fourth movie. Okay, well, like, his tactic is, here's some other stuff he's threatening to do.

[Chris Ryan]

Other stuff.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay. All right. You may also like Avatar. I don't know. You may. You May not.

[Sean Fennessey]

We usually talk through the entire credits. Do we? Credits maybe quite long. Where are you? You have a dinner date?

[Chris Ryan]

No.

[Amanda Davis]

Original Avatar themes composed by James Horner.

[Chris Ryan]

I have some stuff to watch tonight.

[Sean Fennessey]

What do you have to watch?

[Chris Ryan]

Pluribus.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

New Pluribus is out.

[Chris Ryan]

We're recording tomorrow for later in the week. I was gonna watch the finale of the Chair Company.

[Sean Fennessey]

I haven't seen that yet.

[Chris Ryan]

And I was going to watch Blue Moon.

[Amanda Davis]

Oh, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's wonderful.

[Amanda Davis]

That's a lovely movie. A lovely film.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. I watched Nouvelle Vogue the other day.

[Sean Fennessey]

What'd you think of that?

[Chris Ryan]

I thought it was very charming.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's fine.

[Chris Ryan]

I mean, it's like. It's. It's just very. There's a cognitive dissonance between a movie that is very sweet and straightforward. That is about a movie that was so formally groundbreaking.

[Amanda Davis]

Yes. Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

So. But I think maybe that's the only way you could have done that. And I. I just love that Linklater's like, I'm obsessed with art and artists and I want to.

[Sean Fennessey]

I like that too. It's unique to find a film with zero dramatic tension.

[Amanda Davis]

Right. Mm.

[Sean Fennessey]

What is the dramatic tension of New Ilbog? That doesn't mean that every movie has to have dramatic tension, but it's unusual to find a movie, like, on a. From a big studio.

[Chris Ryan]

If anything, I. You know, I think it's like, also supposed to be a. Like a pamphlet about those filmmakers and introducing people to, like, 30 people from that era.

[Amanda Davis]

But.

[Chris Ryan]

Well, I think we learned a lot today. I mean, I think we did well, considering the length.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

I followed along with what was going on.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's a fairly straightforward film.

[Amanda Davis]

I think it would have been helpful to see this before Avatar Fire and Ash, you know.

[Sean Fennessey]

Fully agree. However, and I'm saving this for way at the end.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Avatar 3 repeats many of the beats.

[Chris Ryan]

Of Avatar, much of it structurally or actually, like, seen both in a way.

[Sean Fennessey]

That is somewhat confusing.

[Chris Ryan]

So there's just like another part of Pandora that's on fire but, like, on purpose?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, it's not that at all. I don't want to spoil anything, but just like, literally, like, the framework of, like, battles and how the sequences are being set up and things that transform.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you think that.

[Chris Ryan]

That that's because it's conceived as like a third and five, or do you think it's because there's like, this is the game engine and this is what we're inside of?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, it's. Come. I said this earlier. It's come out that he wrote two and three together and then split them up. And so it's kind of a similar to Wicked WI and Wicked for Good, where, you know, like, splitting up Wicked and Wicked for Good made Wicked for Good so much worse.

[Chris Ryan]

Which is apparently Craig Mason's idea.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes.

[Amanda Davis]

Yes. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Which was terrific for the movie studio and terrible for filmgoers. That movie's gonna end up making, like, $200 million less than the previous movie. That never happens.

[Chris Ryan]

Is it really?

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's gonna make, like, 620 million or something.

[Amanda Davis]

People are not psyched about it.

[Sean Fennessey]

They really don't like it.

[Chris Ryan]

It's too bad.

[Sean Fennessey]

But so I think because they were written together, it was kind of like the repetition of the beats was part of the original intention of the one story. And then you split it up and you're like, so I just watched Way of Water to get ready for Fire and Ash. And then I watched Fire and Ash, and I was like, wow, Same movie. This also features a scene with whales and ships. And you're like, we just saw that in the last movie. So it doesn't have that same novelty, like you're saying Amanda, but there's still some sequences that are incredible.

[Amanda Davis]

The song chord by Zoe Saldana. All right.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did you know she sings a song on the soundtrack?

[Chris Ryan]

I didn't, but she sings in.

[Amanda Davis]

In the film.

[Sean Fennessey]

Amelia, right? Amelia Perez. Yeah, I did.

[Chris Ryan]

See that.

[Sean Fennessey]

Was that number one on your list last year? Where was that? That number three.

[Chris Ryan]

Can't remember what my top five was last year.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah. What was it?

[Sean Fennessey]

Number one was Civil War. I'll never forget.

[Chris Ryan]

Oh, yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

That was.

[Sean Fennessey]

Best thing you've ever done.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

So proud of you.

[Chris Ryan]

Was. I. I. I'm. I'm worried that my top 5 is too chalky this year.

[Amanda Davis]

I think mine is, like, unsurprising, though. I've got, like. I have an Amanda twist, but also.

[Chris Ryan]

It'S like, I don't see you in person enough, and you really throw me off now. So, like, when I was like, what about this? Is this in your top five? And you're like, nope. I was like, what? Like, who's he become? What's going on?

[Sean Fennessey]

Who's he become?

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. And now you're.

[Sean Fennessey]

You're.

[Chris Ryan]

You're tearing up over the death of a Na' Vi boy, you know.

[Sean Fennessey]

But.

[Chris Ryan]

You might not put weapons in your top five.

[Sean Fennessey]

Have I ever made it seem like I don't love stories? I love a story.

[Amanda Davis]

Sure.

[Sean Fennessey]

My whole life is getting invested in stories.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's what it's all about. Yeah, man. It's letting someone take us away on a journey.

[Chris Ryan]

Are you crying or is it just the lights?

[Amanda Davis]

Are you just really tired?

[Sean Fennessey]

What do you. No, I'm wide awake. I'm deeply engaged. My eyes are open and I see you both.

[Chris Ryan]

What's happening? Are you method acting?

[Amanda Davis]

No.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. Because I don't have weapons in my top five.

[Amanda Davis]

I've changed, so it's not gonna be in your top five at the moment.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's not in my top five. You're surprised to hear that?

[Chris Ryan]

I just thought you were my disgusting brother and we were like, right now.

[Sean Fennessey]

Weapons is number seven on my list. Okay.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Is it.

[Amanda Davis]

Is it, like. Is it on letterboxd?

[Sean Fennessey]

Is it available?

[Amanda Davis]

Can I just go look?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, it's on letterboxd, but it is private.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

It will stay private until I've seen all the movies from this year.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

That's the discipline.

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, it's what I do every year. I don't know if it's the right way to do it, but it's what I do.

[Chris Ryan]

I have to watch, you know, eight hours of. Of television drama series.

[Sean Fennessey]

You got some good ones this year. I feel like my choices. No, like, TV shows. I feel like this was better than last year.

[Chris Ryan]

This was the top of the top for tv. This year is among the best of the decade, at least.

[Amanda Davis]

What were they?

[Sean Fennessey]

Thera Task. Adolescence.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah. I mean, Andor. The Pit.

[Sean Fennessey]

Andor. Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Was.

[Sean Fennessey]

Andor this year.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Pit. Yeah. Good year.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's cool.

[Chris Ryan]

Low down.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. I still haven't seen that. I'd like to watch that.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, you'd really like it.

[Sean Fennessey]

I know. All my guys are on it.

[Chris Ryan]

Stories.

[Sean Fennessey]

I love a story.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

You don't like stories.

[Amanda Davis]

I do. And I. What I really like.

[Chris Ryan]

She likes political journalism.

[Amanda Davis]

Right. What I like is when people identify themselves as storytellers, you know, and then misquote Joan Didion in order to justify their political careers.

[Chris Ryan]

No spoiling for Beast and me, but Claire Danes basically says we tell ourselves.

[Sean Fennessey]

Stories in order to live.

[Amanda Davis]

Yeah, listen, I don't.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's not what I want someone to tell me a story.

[Amanda Davis]

Okay.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah, you should say that to Alice. She's like, dad, read me a story. You're like, tell me a story.

[Sean Fennessey]

She. She will. That's something she can do.

[Amanda Davis]

That's amazing.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's. It is amazing. I brought my whole heart to this podcast. I was good to know. I want to say thank you to both of you for doing this entire 3 hours and 15 minutes recording.

[Amanda Davis]

I want to say you're so welcome, Sean.

[Sean Fennessey]

Thank you to our producer, Jack Sanders.

[Chris Ryan]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

For engineering and navigating this tricky situation. I want to say thank you to the listeners for spending all this time with us. This is definitely the most popular episode in the history of this show. As soon as it's.

[Chris Ryan]

It'll probably do numbers.

[Sean Fennessey]

You think so?

[Chris Ryan]

Not like wicked numbers, but it'll do numbers.

[Sean Fennessey]

I want to say that later this week we shall return with Adam Naiman and we'll talk about our top five favorite films of 2025.

[Amanda Davis]

We sure will.

[Chris Ryan]

On Gladys, voters, stay in line.

[Sean Fennessey]

You're revealing titles.

[Chris Ryan]

Just saying while you turn your back.

[Sean Fennessey]

So weapons. Black phone 2.

[Chris Ryan]

The Gorge.

[Sean Fennessey]

The Gorge.

[Chris Ryan]

Materialist.

[Sean Fennessey]

Materialist. You've already given away four or five.

[Chris Ryan]

Ballerina.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay, see you then.