128. Dingaling-Rich Environment

AlexDo you want a five hour energy drink? Got those. No. At this point I need to drink two five hour energies so that I get ten contiguous hours of energy.

energy oh that's fine i've done that and you can get a five hour extra so it like sustains you until you get to the next gas station i'm told hey merlin are you here hello yes have you ever

Merlinhad a five hour energy drink yeah i used to indulge in those things and they weren't super

Alexgood for me. Well, I can't imagine why I Joseph caffeine in liquid form. Caffeine is a fleeting

Maxfriend. Well, for me, it's a good way to say that. For me, it's that I'm either have a headache because I didn't have enough caffeine and I start to develop like a migraine or I've had too much caffeine and I'm dehydrated and I start to develop a headache. So I'm always trying to thread the needle between the caffeine withdrawal and the dehydration headache. And really, if I don't have the exact right amount of coffee to the gram, I just have a headache all day.

MerlinHmm.

MaxOh, no.

MerlinIt's a pretty cool drink. I started doing something different that's worked out. It's not funny. But I make a slightly less strong coffee, and I make a smaller amount of it. I microdose. So I'll have a little bit less coffee. Because my problem used to be, now there was a time, let me just tell you, let me just take you back to school. There was a time when I was drinking two pots of coffee a day by myself.

AlexHold on. How old were you when you were doing this?

MerlinThat's me trying to do maths.

Speaker AI was 20-something.

MerlinIt was when I got my job with Dave the Marketing Guy.

AlexOkay, so you were like Alex age and not Max age.

MerlinOh, yes. I was sub-Alex age. And I was taking ephedrine back then, which was great. Highly recommend the ephedrine. But not come in in the morning, come in early because it made me look good for $22,000 a year. And oh boy, I'd make me a pot of coffee. Then I got a raise at $24,000 a year.

MaxRoland, do you know that Samovar tea shop in Yerba Buena Gardens, the costly tea shop on top of the hill in Yerba Buena? Yeah, I know of it. I've never been there, yeah. I just got an email from them with the subject line, connect with your mom through tea. Oh my God.

Speaker AI don't want to do any of that stuff.

MerlinI learned you never say anything about Rodney's mother.

MaxDoing dishes on my birthday. It's my birthday. Take some advice from me. Don't mention people's parents in an email headline. Okay, is this one of your hot tips?

Speaker AMy dad is dead.

MerlinThis tea will raise your mother from the dead.

AlexThat was a rare miss. I wouldn't call it a miss.

MaxSpeaking of everyone losing their fucking minds, is everyone like- My birthday. Give me the reward.

MerlinIt's my birthday. I'm washing dishes on my birthday. God, I hate him so much.

Speaker AHe's so cool. I like that.

MaxIs it Dan? Who's the guy with the little hat?

Speaker AA woman should hold themselves to a higher standard. It's my birthday.

MaxIs it Dan with a little cap? Oh, fucking Dan. He's so cool. He should have won. I would have voted for him.

MerlinYou just got to look intensely in a woman's eyes and lie while your beard moves in the wind. Lose it. And then at tribal, he's an eye-rolling guy. I have a lot to say about Survivor.

MaxListen.

MerlinYes. So everybody's, oh God, here we go. Please don't, Max. Please don't. Speaking of my dad, this is the same thing as my dad is dead.

MaxEveryone needs to, everyone's dialed up.

AlexAre you, okay.

MerlinIs this going to be problematic because you've been on a bit of a tear lately? I know you're in a weird place right now. I can tell because you're getting weird.

Maxbut listen everyone is dialed up to 11 about no burning down yes and i need everyone to come down to like a six okay everyone could everyone no no no i know that everyone took a vacation to paris one time but could everyone it's not about that no it's your posts aren't gonna help Everyone just tone it down

AlexI agree Here's the thing

MaxDo you guys need me for this one? People are raising money They're doing GoFundMes to rebuild Notre Dame It's the fucking Catholic Church Can't they sell One chalice And it'll fund The construction of ten cathedrals A number of people

AlexOnly three but still Reached out to me I did not post this on Twitter because god damn it why would i but i i do truly care it is a it is a really big bummer there's a lot of people who are there what is it it's an old building it is an old not do this can we not not not do this merlin i am sad and i would like to express my emotions please don't interrupt me you know he's just gonna turn this around and make it weird i know yelled at and he's gonna get sadder don't do it but that's okay that's okay i'm gonna look i'm gonna look better uh

when when they go low we go but uh three people reached out saying how can i make this better and i'm like um how about donating to like mosques that have burned down or like people like oh thank you that's really brave and bold yeah i know i'm very brave but like places that need the money and it is a big bummer because that's it it's like somebody's church burning down like yeah it's also a tourist trap but a lot of... Did you guys ever take a humanities class at all? I mean

yes. I've never been to Notre Dame. It just bums me out because... If I did I'd have

Merlina photo of it. Here's me with a dead celebrity. What did they have a lot of... That's true.

MaxIs the thing deal though that they had a lot of rare purple artifacts in there? Like an elite? Yeah I guess so but I

Alexdon't really care about that. They had some

Maxsort of like enchanted unique greaves and they were lost in the fire.

AlexWell actually do you know what every single Catholic church has, Max? I don't know.

MaxSomething with... It was like, you have a helm with rare runes socketed into it. What's it called? It's called a diddle bath? Is that where they go?

AlexOh, are you talking... Merlin, are you talking about the bones? Do you know about the bones?

MerlinWell, I mean, you know, they're not supposed to, but...

AlexOh, no! Every Catholic church... No, are you talking about Peter? Are you talking about Peter's bones? Every church has a part of a saint's bone buried beneath it. Oh, that's nice. Every single Catholic Church has this and it freaks me the fuck out and it's really fucking weird and one time I got a gift that was supposedly a bone of St. James that was just like a tiny little white flake. You got a

MerlinSt. James bone?

AlexFor my confirmation.

MerlinFor your bat mitzvah. Wow.

AlexThat's wild.

MaxOkay, so Can I show you guys, can I introduce you guys to a new meme? It's a new mind palace that's developed for me over the last week. Please do. I'm going to put it in the super secret channel. Are you guys familiar with, so I've been hanging out with magicians all week. And are you guys familiar with David Blaine? Yes. He does the street, he goes, his bit is he goes on the street and he does like, he walks up to a stranger and does an amazing trick and then walks away. And this is from his first breakout special in the 90s. I've just sent it to you.

AlexAlec, can you do it with sound? I can indeed do it with sound.

MaxOkay, and I'll sort of narrate what's going on.

Speaker ADo you have a quarter? You'll get it right back. I've got a quarter.

MaxSo he comes up to a kid, kind of a derpy looking, kid in like a down coat. It looks like Francis from Pee Wee. And he goes, and he says to the kid, do you have a coin? And he goes, hold the

Speaker Acoin on your hand. Now the kid's got

Maxthe coin on his hand.

Speaker AAnd they're moving the camera around.

MaxAnd now watch this. Now Blaine is going to wave his hand over the coin.

Speaker ADid he feel anything? Now watch. Ready?

MaxAnd it's gone. and now watch the kid's reaction watch the kid's reaction this feeling i feel him so hard cool

Alexdid you see the kid at the end he just goes cool here's the problem with this it was adorable until you see a picture of a or not sorry it pans out and there's a large what appears to be kidnapping van behind David Blaine.

MaxThat kid's reaction of like, David Blaine walks out of the desert, comes up to this kid, vanishes a coin miraculously, and then the kid just goes, cool.

AlexPlease don't kidnap me.

MaxThese kids did,

Merlinhe made a boy disappear.

MaxThat's my reaction when you tell me there's a saint's bone buried in beneath every church. That's my reaction.

MerlinCool. Cool. Do you guys remember David Blaine Street Magic, remember the parody?

MaxYeah, that's very funny.

AlexOh, I see. Never mind. It's very funny. We probably shouldn't watch it on the show. No, no.

MerlinAlso, stop when a celebrity dies. You don't need to post a photo of you with them. Anyway.

AlexWait, hold on.

MerlinDid a celebrity die? No, you're going to cut all this out if you have any sense. Since you're going to cut it out, I'm just going to vent. And say, yeah, we know you met a celebrity who died. You don't need to post a photo.

MaxYeah, we get it. You went there.

MerlinYeah. I had the honor of working with Mr. Bob Hope in 19... That's awesome. Awesome. It's cool how you made it about you. Cool. Cool.

Speaker AWhat did you guys do this week? Hey, it's Dubai Friday.

MaxI have another funny bit I can tell you about. Okay, okay. So we went on to Fat Rice. Well, it's going to be the first bit of the show. So hey, Max. Hey, what's up, everybody?

AlexWelcome. Let's start the show.

MaxPop up on one of your patented bits. Hey, episode. I just want to start out with, you know, I know a lot of members of the Dubai Friday Nation are out there grieving the loss of the Notre Dame Cathedral. And it's very personal. and intimate loss for all of us.

MerlinI personally deeply hate you right now.

MaxA number of you probably saw the building firsthand at one point, and so I can understand that you're deeply moved by its minor damage from a fire.

AlexOh my god.

MaxGo on. Anyway, so I've been hanging out with magicians all week and we went to the restaurant Fat Rice last night for dinner.

MerlinThey made the spire disappear? That's not funny, man. Here's a picture of me with the spire with just the word 2012.

MaxThere's a picture of me There's a picture of me holding up the newspaper While an airplane flies into this fire behind me Oh god

MerlinNow I have the tallest building in Paris

MaxAlex did you get a call not to go into church The day that Notre Dame burned out No did they do a lockout So we go to Okay so we went to Fat Rice This is gonna age well Chef Abe came out and had drinks with us and he was asking all the magicians questions about magic and he's like hey what about that show Penn and Teller Fool Us well you guys watch that right? I've seen YouTube videos you know the conceit of it? yeah yeah yeah

MerlinI've seen like this 12 year old boy astonished Penn and Teller that kind of thing

Maxyeah yeah so he's like so Abe's like what's up with that show Penn and Teller Fool Us is that a good show like to magicians like that my friend Adam takes a long beat and he's like hmm He's like, okay, imagine there was a show called Make Tom Colicchio Say Yum. And you're a professional chef and you're sitting at home and you're watching this show. And a guy comes out. We make the perfect amuse-bouche. Yeah. And a guy comes out and he makes like a taco. And he serves it to Tom Colicchio. And Tom Colicchio goes, yum.

And then a trophy comes down from the ceiling. And you're like, congratulations. You made Tom Colicchio say yum. and then the next guy comes out and it's Grant Ackett's from Alinea and he and his meal involves like a mist that you pass through that reminds you of your dead mother and and he starts crying and he's like it was beautiful I've never seen anything like it but it didn't make me say yeah thanks for coming on but you did not make Tom Colicchio say yum trap door opens

Merlinbecause because they They're looking for a more subtle kind of effect that they haven't seen. Is that the idea?

MaxWell, the show, in order for it to work on TV, there has to be conceit. Did you ever see the guy with the masks? Oh, yeah. I saw the guy with the masks. It's pretty wild. Pretty crazy. Do you get it? Have we talked about that on here? The guy with the masks? Are you talking about the masked magician?

MerlinNo, no. I'm talking about over and over. like on like you just what costume and like mask changes and it just keeps happening and you're like what is happening like a sort of a um japanese magic like in the japanese stuff yeah so it's it's

Maxlike super traditional japanese magic and i think it's related don't email me i think it's related to buto no kabuki i'm sorry excuse me not buto it's related to kabuki so it's a lot of kabuki masks and sort of big poses and you're sort of yeah but i mean like do you know how they did it mugging. You're sort of mugging for the camera.

Well, you're mugging with a mask. Can you do that? It's your body language. Here's an interesting trivia. Nick Offerman did Kabuki. He did Kabuki theater before he did Parks and Rec.

MerlinOh, he's got a whole story, man. I'll find his fresh air interview because it's a

Maxride, man. In Kabuki, you do these huge moves where you're gesturing with your whole body and you're, if you're like, maybe you're trying to show that you're a cocky guy. And so you swagger out on the stage and you sort of thrust your hips into the audience. And then people would throw gold coins at you if they liked the performance. So you stand there and you mug and you sort of telegraph, now's the time to throw the coins at me. And when he, as he was figuring out the character of Ron Swanson, he's like, oh, Ron Swanson is a guy from a kabuki. And look at how Ron like walks into the room. He like comes in with his like hips thrust way forward

and he sort of takes these aggressive poses and then just like stops and like mugs. And that's a big part of like the physicality. Well, that's so interesting.

MerlinYeah. You'll never unsee it if you watch it. I'm going to put the mask guy in the show notes.

MaxSo you like that.

MerlinThat was a good one for you on Fool Us. What do I say? How do I please you?

MaxI'm pleased. Entertain us. I'm interested. I don't watch TV. I'm interested. Is Simon still here? Huh? My friend Simon is here. He was on Fool Us. And he made Tom Colicchio say yum. Yum. um okay um simon is the merlin thumbs up or thumbs down the japanese magician who with the kimono do you know that guy simon's trucking it was good check it out on youtube

Merlinmerlin how's it god you know every every the first thing the first thing any good magician learns is to one thing to make disappear is joy yes alex you were saying no it's just it's not

Maxyou don't want to disappear joy but you're enjoying it in the wrong way don't you want to

MerlinYou know, don't you want to know that you're. Well, the Internet tells me when I'm enjoying it wrong. Yes, Alice, you had a question?

AlexI don't remember anymore. You like magic?

MerlinIt's a podcast. It's a podcast called Fun Fact that I really like that I discovered in Overcast via Marco. And it's just two very nice men. But one of them had a great tip about how to emcee an event. And it really goes for lots of things, including any kind of onstage thing. And they said something that when you hear it, you're like, oh, Jesus, that makes so much sense. They said if you're going to emcee an event or any presenting thing, the thing you most need to do is control silence. You need to – so think about that for a second. To be able to – because like you think about like silence in the wrong places is what kills you.

If you're giving a toast at a wedding, if you're emceeing an event, whatever it is. And I've just been really thinking about that. I mean obviously I'm rarely silent professionally. professionally. But I thought it was such an interesting idea that if you're on stage, for example, if you have to introduce somebody who is doing a presentation, it benefits you to make sure they're totally ready to start the presentation the second. So otherwise, because there's silence where it's not supposed to be, that creates doubt, eventually creates derision. And the ability to control silence on stage, you made me think of this with

Ron Swanson's Kabuki school. But I thought that was such an interesting idea. If you think about that in retrospect, doesn't that kind of comport with experience you've had? Me? Anybody. Yeah.

MaxWhat is this podcast? It's called Fun Fact. Funfact.fm. Funfact.fm.

MerlinAnd, you know, they bring in facts. But I'm just really thinking about that. It's like, you know, the rest are as important as the notes. If you get a silence at a place where you're expecting, where something was expected, it breaks the audience's expectations. And, like, such an interesting aspect of timing is being able to control. I never thought of it that way, and I just thought it was thought-provoking.

MaxLet me give you one. Hey, fun fact. One of our patented bits on Dubai Friday. Fun fact.

MerlinWe're just stolen from a podcast, yes?

MaxFun fact. Here's one of Max's pro-life tips. So sometimes you're in a situation where you're speaking and you're trying to get attention. So maybe you're at a public meeting and you're trying to get a comment in. Oh, listen. Even if you're at a meeting at work and it's a really intense meeting and you're trying to get everyone to listen to your opinion. Or I learned this from doing debate in school. The most important thing for how you're going to deliver your remarks has nothing to do with you You have to watch the person who came before you and if they're loud and they're banging their fists on the table When you come on you need to take a big long pause and let the room get real quiet

And then you speak in like a whisper you just love you just go low

MerlinSmall small small that's also a really good tea. That's a really good teacher trick That's a very good teacher trick is like through a company Sometimes they have hand signals for like it's time to be quiet, but you never try to get a classroom quiet by screaming quiet Yeah.

AlexThis has never worked for a woman except possibly, what's her name? Vampire lady.

MaxVampire lady.

AlexTheranos person. Merlin. Elizabeth Holmes. Elvira? Yeah. Elvira Theranos.

MerlinThat's because your voice is too fucking high. If you brought your voice down and got a wolf.

Speaker BOh, God. Perf. I'm just here to get my smoothie. I brought my wolf.

MaxThe opposite is also true of if someone is real quiet and low energy, you need to come in and like bang your fists on the table and be loud. It's all about context. You just want to be as different from the person before you as possible. Oh, contrast. That's really good. Contrast.

Alexthere is a this american life story that is about a debate and oh man this this he he was like a national something whatever the debate scholars are called oh i remember this one yeah where the guy starts like he rips off his shirt and is like yelling and he kind of did exactly what max is talking about like there was a very good even keeled argument right before and he just kind of freaked out in the best way possible.

And I have never seen anything like it. And I, well, heard anything like it. And that's something I'm never, ever going to forget. So I'm going to say good advice, Max. Thank you.

MerlinI'm interested in what you said, though, about the women thing. Yeah, I think you're right. You know, I got other stuff to do. But that's such an interesting point. God, I can't stop seeing all these things now, Alex. I can't stop seeing all these things. I see it on Survivor. We talked about this.

Speaker AOh, welcome.

MerlinHey, also, can I get points for the name of our Jen channel? Is that not the greatest name for a channel ever? What is it? It's the Jen by Friday? It was Jen by Friday, and now it's called the Come On In Guys.

MaxYeah, that's good.

MerlinCome on in, guys. Boy, I'm really seeing this in season, whatever the one I just watched with Dan. And Mike, the guy who sounds like Screaming Bobcat Goldthwait. And stupid fucking Dan. Oh, and Rodney. It's his birthday.

Speaker AGive him a, give him, you got to give him a reward. It's his birthday.

MaxMerlin, remind me what season you're watching because I just watched that one.

MerlinWe just finished that one. It is, let's see, Survivor Rodney.

MaxIs there like a gimmick with it? What season is it?

MerlinI'm trying to provide it. Yeah, there was. There was a gimmick with that one.

MaxIs it like returning versus new people or something like that? No, I'm trying to remember. So I can go. It's so hard to look. Oh, was that a blue collar, white collar, no collar?

MerlinOh, yeah. It was white collar, blue collar, no collar. That's right. And it was the introduction of Joe.

MaxRight. Oh. Yes. And with a great ding-a-ling on the no collar tribe. Oh. The guy with the feathers. Oh, my fucking God.

MerlinA ding-a-ling for the ages. This was. No. No, no. I've been trying to. You guys. I know I like. Well, just our listeners won't know this, but one of my favorite things is upsetting Jen by just dropping in pictures of Phillip into our channel. in his underpants with feathers. And this guy had so many feathers and he is so... I'm glad you said that because have you seen the season, Alex?

AlexI don't think I have. Worlds Apart?

MerlinYeah, Worlds Apart. It was a good season. I really enjoyed it. Well, it's super entertaining and there's a real come to Jesus... Well, by survivor terms, there's some serious come to Jesus in the reunion where they're like, you guys said some shit and I don't want to spoil it, but let's just say Jeff holds one guy's feet to the fire

Speaker Awith footage, and it was good. It's real good.

MerlinBut no, these guys, this place, it was a ding-ling-rich environment and real bad ding-lings.

MaxNow, did you guys watch Game of Thrones? Yes.

MerlinI haven't seen it yet. Oh, I got a video for you. I got a 52-minute wrap-up video of the last seven seasons. Oh, thank God.

AlexIsn't that good?

MerlinHave you seen it? Is it like...

AlexYeah.

MerlinThank fucking God that exists. What's it called? Yes, yes, yes. I watched it. Yeah, I showed it to my kid. It's so good.

AlexWait. Wait.

MerlinNo, because it's mostly redacted. Okay, you're right. She's utterly obsessed with, it's like kids with Star Wars who've never seen Star Wars. She's utterly obsessed. She knows so much about Game of Thrones now, even though she's not allowed to watch it.

AlexYeah. Have you ever, like, it's out there, right? Some version of Game of Thrones that has been, you know, they take out all of the rape and gratuitous annuity.

MaxBut then there would be no... No, that's not entirely accurate. There would be no exposition in that show.

AlexYeah. That's the thing, though. Early seasons, you're right. But then it goes on.

MerlinShe knows Theon Greyjoy had a thing happen with his bathing suit area.

AlexYeah.

MerlinSo anyway, Max. Yes. I'm actually back to being obsessed with that show. So, yes.

MaxThis is what I wanted to ask you about. I really feel like I need to. So I read the books and I feel like I have a very good grasp of the first four seasons. Four, maybe five seasons. But do I need to go back and watch it all to understand the premiere?

MerlinYou shouldn't watch the show. You won't like it.

MaxI love Game of Thrones. Oh. I think especially in the later seasons, it far exceeds the quality of the books.

AlexWell, because the books don't exist, so it's pretty easy to do that.

MaxNo, the books take it up to season, what is it now, season eight?

AlexYes, yes.

MaxThe books take it up to season five or six.

MerlinI would give you my opinion of this off air. I'm not about to say this on air, because I happen to know that there's someone who listens to this show where I will be hearing about my fucking terrible advice to Max for probably months.

MaxBut I think there may be a season where you could jump in because you know the story. I do know the story. I've read the novels. So here's my take on this is the books one through three of the book series are just phenomenal. They're really super fun to read. I have like flashbulbs.

MerlinIt just started last night. I finally started reading the actual book.

MaxI have like flashbulb memories of where I was when I was reading parts, things that happened in books one, two, and three. I mean, they just killed me. And then I think part of what happened was those books become such a monster hit that he's suffering from George Lucas syndrome a little bit where there's no one who's going to tell him, cut this out. It's boring and long. And like nobody cares. He has that whole chapter about the whaling industry. Basically, yeah. like even in book like five he's adding huge parts of the world and as a reader you're just like dude

reign it in like we know what we care you know we know what we're here for at this point like you don't need to like expand the world and make the stakes make it much bigger that's one downside

Merlinof that level that level of success you know i mean restating what you're saying at that point is like you're right those those the audience the loudest part of that audience absolutely knows what they want and don't want and I would never want to face that kind of pressure yeah um Pat

Maxgets that pretty bad as well but uh anyway the shows are just because of the constraints of a tv show of like you can only have so many actors only have so many episodes only have so much screen time and there's a team of people who are who are really good at sort of telling stories for screen like at a certain point I really think from a storytelling point of view that the books greatly, or excuse me, the TV series greatly surpassed the books in terms of like telling a cohesive story. And it's sad because I love those books so much. But boy, do I, I've been loving the recent seasons.

AlexI like one through three a whole lot and the intro of four. Or wait, is it the very end of three where the character appears who's not in the show?

MaxThat's the end of three.

AlexOkay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember, what's the weirdest place? Quinn Quinn Quinn Bleep that out Quinn Bleep out the ladies That's not a Spoiler Bleep it out It's not a spoiler It's a spoiler It's a spoiler Because I still think She's gonna I still think that character Might appear Probably not But we can hold out hope I remember I was in a Chili's 2 And in the airport I think

MerlinA Chili's

AlexA Chili's 2 Okay Heading

MerlinSophomore slump

AlexUh huh Yep Yep

Merlinit was their second attempt at a Chili's not as good I well I was I was in an airport

Alexis that one of those like Chili's to go kind of places oh do you not know what a Chili's too is no oh yeah it's a small it's like a miniature Chili's that is only in airports oh it's basically like a convention booth yeah it's really sad um but yeah that's that's when I read the um Red Wedding part, and I will never forget it.

MerlinWell, it's funny you should say that because my advice, which is not advice because I would never want to suggest anything like this, but my gut tells me, oh, wow, you're going to get so much email about this. I think Max could – I haven't thought this through yet, but I think Max could jump in somewhere, not at the end, but near the end of season three because I think the show takes a little turn there personally. It takes a couple turns. But I think I would jump in somewhere around there.

MaxThat's certainly the part of the show that I forgot in the off season. So maybe that's probably what I'll do. I don't know. It's got Filch. He's a squib.

AlexOh, that's right.

MaxOh, I remember a good thing with Filch that happened last season. That was a good scene.

MerlinOh, shit dog. There's some good ass Filch. Yes. But it doesn't have – what's his name? Mrs. Rosewater? What's his cat? What's his cat? What's his cat's name? Mrs. Norris.

Speaker AOh.

MerlinOh, thank you. Thank you.

MaxYes. Wow. Nice pull. Woo. That was impressive. Let's see. What else? What have we not covered yet? I forgot. I forgot my parents' names. I don't know when Veronica's birthday is.

AlexYou don't need to know. A computer will tell you. That's what I tell her.

MaxShe gets upset every time I bring that up.

Merlinso uh you know any other hot any other hot takes maybe kristin gillibrand anything we want to cover

Maxyou guys watch that star wars trailer are you on full media blackout what's the deal i tried to be

Alexand then in the middle of the night i woke up and i had a dream that i had died not seeing the final Star Wars and I'm like well I guess

MaxYou had a stress dream about the Star Wars trailer Or the Mueller report

AlexWell just stay alive

Speaker AFor the Mueller report in Star Wars

AlexThat's part two Part one is that I had failed My math test so my Teacher murdered me Yes I am indeed 16 years old in this dream so I never got To see episode nine And so in the middle of the night I watched the trailer and I liked it quite a bit I saw it

MaxAnthony told me so Anthony hooked me up with some passes to the Star Wars celebration the big convention did you go?

AlexI did not no

Maxshe works for a living it was a very

Alexinteresting experience that's true it was on weekdays

Maxit was a super interesting experience but Anthony was like go on I can't remember I think it was Saturday morning or Friday morning and he's like that's the episode 9 panel and as it turns out it was hosted by Stephen Colbert and then it had

Speaker Aand then it had

Maxthe director all the cast all the actors they brought bb8 out like and it was in a huge massive auditorium the whatever the biggest theater in um in that in uh uh the convention center is the cormac place thank you and um the other cool thing is when that panel started they put it on these huge jumbotrons on the show floor and everything on the show floor just stopped and it was just this ocean

Alexlet me send you guys some pictures oh i saw this on instagram everyone just stopped and they came

Maxinto the show floor and this remember this is not the this isn't the theater where they're um let me put this in my super secret channel so this is not the theater where they're doing the panel this is

Alexthe show floor where it's being simulcast oh this is crazy isn't that giant giant knife and fork

Maxspoiler

Merlinand they showed the trailer that's the sigil of house utensil that's funny

Speaker Ait's a sigil no it's not that's funny Merlin always remember

Merlinour words pizza by the slice

Max$4.99

Merlinthe bread knives always pay their debts you know nothing john spoon

Maxour banner is a white fork and a blade rampant on a field of blue one napkin for customer and they showed the trailer and everyone watched on the jumbotron at the end of the panel and um everyone every time something happened i mean whatever spoilers i guess when it when

when Rey came on the trailer everyone was like and when Rey takes on her lights everyone's like and they and John Boyega comes on the trailer and you couldn't even make out what the fuck was happening in the trailer and like at one point like there's like Kylo Ren comes on I know that character I've seen him they're just apoplectic watching Star Wars and then at one point they have like also I suppose spoiler they have like there's like a shot of Leia and the

trailer people go I have a photo of her and me together and then and then and then at the end they're like let's roll JJ Abrams I guess who's has very good instincts was like let's roll it again so you can actually like hear it this time and then they roll it again and then and then it sinks in and everyone watches it more quietly and I look around and everyone around me is in tears. They are crying. They're hugging. There's tears rolling

down their face just smearing their blue twi-leck makeup down their chin.

Speaker AIt was crazy.

MaxIt was nuts. People lost their fucking minds and that was better than the trailer. Just being in the room when that thing dropped was very cool. As like a journalist or as like, did you have feelings too?

I don't have, I don't feel in myself. Careful.

MerlinI don't feel in myself. This is such a good episode. Oh my God.

MaxAny nostalgia yet for the new Star Wars movies. But of course I'll go see it. I love the movie.

MerlinI enjoy watching them.

MaxTry taking your kid for the first time and the music comes up in the crawl. yeah there are moments when you see the Millennium Falcon in the first one like I gotta chill there's moments but like you know what listen I really did not care for the Harry Potter movies when they came out I really really didn't like them and I felt like boy this is not in my head how Harry Potter looked and felt and I just didn't like them all at all I saw them all and I you know it's a real mixed bag there's some good ones and some bad ones and I was shocked when I went to the Harry

Potter land and I couldn't believe it and I found like in myself some sort of nostalgia for that world and I was like boy I didn't know that was there where did that come from and it was like the music and standing in the place and I just felt it and I was like damn like well it's what Freud

Merlincalls a latent period like I think you go through a time where like it takes time away in order to feel nostalgia or to quote Justin McElroy stop posting on social media or was it Griffin how can I love you if you don't go away you know it takes time away from the thing and nostalgia comes from that it's a Greek word excuse me I'm sorry

Maxnostalgia it's delicate but potent Teddy told me that in Greek, nostalgia literally means the pain from an old wound. It's a twinge in your heart, far more powerful than memory alone. This device isn't a spaceship. It's a time machine. It goes backwards and forwards. It takes us to a place where we ache to go again. It's not called the wheel. It's called the carousel. I'm going to break the carousel.

That's it.

MerlinThat was a reference.

Speaker AOkay. That was Star Trek?

MaxWas that Star Trek? That was Star Trek. Yeah, yeah. That's Star Trek. Okay, got it, got it, got it. That's Star Trek Episode 2, Attack of the Clones. I hate sand.

MerlinI hate this.

AlexHave either of you seen The Lion King?

MaxLet me ask you this. The Hawaiian? Did you say The Hawaiian King? Don't you feel like when the trailer comes out?

AlexYes, the trailer. All right. The old pineapple.

MaxDon't you feel like when the trailer comes out and they show Ray and you're just like, ah! Like, isn't that, there has to be some nostalgia there.

AlexYeah, yeah. Absolutely. No, no, no, okay, wait. I said, yeah, and I completely disagree. There's nostalgia.

MerlinYou meant, yeah, no. You meant, yeah, no.

AlexYeah, yeah, no. There was a really good tweet the other day that said, how do Midwesterners say yes? It's like, no, no, yeah. And saying, no, we say, yeah, yeah, no. So yeah, no I don't think it's nostalgia It is just pure excitement For something That they could have Had nostalgia for But they don't Because they see people around them Who are like them, they kind of want to be like them Like you want to be part of the Star Wars club

And it just never appealed to you But this new stuff appeals to you It is fun, and Max is laughing at me

MaxBecause I'm just thinking I'm just thinking about like can't these people get excited when like a new Paul Thomas Anderson movie comes out like does it have to be Star Wars yeah or Notre Dame it's like wow these people I guess all these people just like watching sports but I wish they could be this excited about the library why can't you donate to Bernie Sanders

Merlinyou know I'm going to tell you something real and this is not meant to be primarily a parent thing but I will tell you because I think it's basically about time travel It's about a kind of personal, mental, and emotional time travel that didn't hit me. I was unprepared for until I had a kid. And I realized something where I knew the factual of this, but I hadn't internalized it until I lived it. Okay? And that was this. That was when, not too long after my daughter was born, it really, really dawned on me that all the roles that I had had

and all the roles, consequently, all the roles other people in my life have had. So I know, for example, that my father had a father. I know that my mother had a mother. I know all of those things, but it wasn't until my kid was born that I realized this kind of Bran Stark thing you can go through where you're like, holy shit. I not only experience, I'm feeling all of these things about myself, but I'm also appreciating all of these things in other people. So when you're watching, why am I saying that here? because when I hear, and then you see the scroll start,

on a big screen, it's like, on the one hand, yeah, all of a sudden, yeah, first of all, I'm 52 and I'm enjoying it, or whatever I was then, all right? But on another level, I'm 10 again, and I'm 10. But also, there's a little kid next to me, and I'm experiencing all that overwhelming emotional time travel all at the same time in a way that's utterly overwhelming. And you can see this in a Cubist way in something like Synecdoche, New York. It's kind of about the horrors of time and the way we look at things. But no, all I was going to say is, yeah, we can have fun at these people's expense, but it's new footage of a thing that means a lot to them,

and you experience it in different ways and on different levels in ways that are difficult to talk about rationally.

AlexOh, I cried when I saw the trailer in the middle of the night. I did not cry. There were tears, I guess that's crying. There were tears going on my face.

MerlinWhat are these? What are these salty? What are these salty art effect on face?

AlexIt wasn't the full on choking sobs that happened during the Lion King. Don't know.

MerlinOh, you saw Lion King. No, it's not Doctor Who. I mean.

AlexBut I'll play the card. It's Rey. It is. It's about Rey. Like that is. That's it. It is Rey and Leia hugging. Like, yeah. Yeah. It's brutal. I think it's the.

MaxI actually think Merlin is exactly right. And I think when these new trilogy is sort of at its best from like a storytelling point of view, it's literally about passing the torch from the previous generation of heroes to the new generation of heroes, right? And it's Luke going like no one's ever forgotten. And you're like, oh, I get it. It's like literally generationally like the previous generation of filmmakers giving the franchise to the new generation of filmmakers, the previous generation of fans giving Star Wars to the new generation of fans. and also there's another piece of it that's weird

which is like I know that Disney's going to keep making these movies until long after I'm dead so like there will come a time when I give Star Wars to the next generation of fans and I'm like this is what it was for me when I was you know a kid or whatever it's just a weird it's weird right it's like

Merlinit's certainly to be in an environment back to Alex's question to be in a room that like cheek to jowl with people that are all feeling something that intensely in a positive way right all at one time is in a neutral way overwhelming, but in another way terrifying in some ways. Anywhere, I mean, you can think of lots of instances of people in a room that all feel the same thing and it's not always good. It can be very like, whoa, what's going on in this particular space? It can be a very strange emotional vibe.

MaxI was probably the person in that convention center who cared the least about the new trailer other than maybe there was a hot dog vendor or something.

Speaker AIt was a very weird experience.

Maxeverybody's got a role to play in the game of forks have any of you guys like alexander you know we do all these like gaming shows and pop culture shows and c2e2 and all this have you ever

Alexbeen to a single ip convention i oh i um a convention for one piece of intellectual property

Merlinoh oh like uh like a gallifrey or something like that it was so it was so weird yeah because it

MaxIt made me really sad. I mean, I really felt some serious cruise ship level existential dread at this convention because it felt very monoculture. It felt very cultural hegemony. It felt very hyper normalization. It felt very like, oh, this is the thing that you can consume and this is the way you can consume it. And which one of these characters will you cosplay as? Which one of these six costumes will you be? All the booths had like more or less the same merchandise. I was like, which one of the six booths and the nine pieces of apparel will you buy to express yourself?

It took the specialness of Star Wars and it made it feel so small and so mundane and so unspecial.

AlexNo, okay.

MerlinI think you're not being entirely open-hearted about what could be happening with folks there.

AlexOkay, so.

MerlinSo there's stuff going on that you, for a variety of reasons, could not appreciate in the same way. That's all I must say about that. I would just say that there are people who have those very strong feelings in ways that they might be reading slightly against the grain in some ways. Not entirely against the grain. But, I mean, I don't know. See, I don't want to get into this. But, like, you know, representation. Certainly one thing. Unity. imagine going to a Star Trek convention in the mid-70s

like what that would be like how cool it would be to meet somebody else that dresses up like a Star Trek that's such a huge deal like you're around your people and the example that I will just beat into the fucking ground is imagine arriving in the Castro in 1978 and going holy shit there's so many shirtless men who want to fuck me nobody here wants to beat the shit out of me because I like you know Finian's rainbow like everybody here wants to blow me

Alexno no no this is different

MaxCan't these people just go on their forums and complain about Anita Sarkeesian? Do they really need to assemble in one building?

AlexBut I would normally understand what you're saying, Merlin, but I think this is the difference between a trade show from Star Wars and Edge of the Galaxy. Like, is that what? No. Galaxy's Edge. Thank you. They did.

MaxLet me say this. They had a booth for Galaxy's Edge. I want to hear the rest of that, though. This is a very quick aside, but they had a booth at the convention for Galaxy's Edge where they were showing a ride vehicle and some of the architecture and stuff. And it was a multi, multi, multi-hour wait to get in. So I didn't go in, but I saw it from above, from that vantage point you see where I'm looking down. And it looked so fucking magical and cool. I mean, I'm going to lose my shit when I go there.

MerlinThat is the benefit of a lot of wood behind the arrow for one of these enterprises. It's like, you could actually, you could do some shit. So what is it that makes a big company great? is they can do shit nobody else can do. Because they've got the IP and they've got the skills and they've got the budget. And that's kind of the dream in some ways is to be able to actually make something that's genuinely fun and entertaining and absorbing out of a pile of contracts.

AlexThat's the difference between going to see a Harry Potter booth somewhere and then going into the Hogwarts castle. Like if you're going to do capitalism and sell me things, at least make me a little bit happy.

MaxI heard something amazing, which is in California Universal where they have the Harry Potter in California, outside of Los Angeles, I guess, there is a culture of kids in college who are annual pass holders at Universal. And what they do is they get dressed in their house wizarding robes and they go to Harry Potter World to do their homework and hang out.

AlexOh, that's so cute.

MaxIsn't that amazing? Have you ever heard Jesse Char talk about Disneyland?

AlexI mean, actually, no.

MerlinDid you hear on Matt Howey's podcast, on Hobby Horse, she talks about her relationship with Disneyland. And it's absolutely fascinating. People who live, people like David Sparks, you would go there like people in Florida go to a 7-Eleven. It's just there. And you go there for dinner because it's equal to a 25-minute drive. But you would go there for dinner. And then you come home. And it's just a thing that you do. I hadn't heard that specific detail, though, Max. That's really interesting. So they'll just go to their favorite place. They know every corner of it.

It's their Groundhog Day. They know every aspect of that community, basically.

MaxNo, listen. I actually, when I heard that, it just immediately clicked in my head that like, I mean, Wizarding World is cool. It should stay there. But there should be like a new category of thing, which is like a magical place to hang out. Oh, that's a fourth place. That's a really good idea. No rides. No rides. Just restaurants, streets, stores. It's a little world you can be in for your thing. and it's not a theme park per se because all it is is you get dressed up in costume and you go and you're part of this world and it's generous

and it offers to bring people in in a cool way. Why isn't that a thing? That should be a thing. Someone should do that.

MerlinThat's a good idea.

MaxIf there's someone listening to this podcast and you're like a billionaire and you want to give me a lot of money to make a world where people can hang out, we'll kill it.

MerlinWhat about like you could have a chain of Notre Dames. You come in. So adding that to show.

MaxYeah. And you're like, here's my, here's my.

MerlinYou draw me in. You draw me in with your pain fuel. Your pain fuel feeds me.

MaxHere's my, yeah, you come into Notre Dame. They all have unique artifacts and collectibles.

AlexPurple artifacts. Yeah. Okay. Here's a bad thought I had was one, when can we start making really terrible Notre Dame jokes? and two are there going to be museum exhibits like they had uh for the titanic you know you'd

Maxpick a ticket someone posted there was a good tweet of like has it like uh it's a shame about notre dame but the opportunity to like rebuild it as like a co-working space is going to be really exciting

Speaker Achallenge

Alexthis week's challenge was max's

Merlinhey where's our friend are we bringing in our friend

Alexno Matt Howie was not able to attend because he's doing He's doing something way too special and cool to hang out with us. Oh, man.

MerlinOh, his. Oh, OK.

AlexI thought he was coming. No, no.

MerlinBut he gave us a fantastic document. Oh, sorry. But a challenge.

MaxTalk about the challenge. Sorry. Challenge. The challenge was we have all semi-recently watched the documentary Free Solo, which tells the story of what's the guy's name? Alex Honnold. Alex Honnold. Honnold. Something like that. And he did an accomplishment called Free Soloing El Capitan, which is the mountain inspired by the Mac operating system. And they built it to specification to match the wallpaper on the Mac.

And we can't wait to see what you climb with this. And I watched the film. We all had strong reactions. I mean, let's let's just stipulate like it's a good movie, like it's a well-made movie. Right. No, it was. well you didn't think it was like well shot and fun to watch

AlexI thought it was well shot that's

Maxokay I thought it was an extraordinary documentary and I'm sorry that you can't enjoy it if you're closed off to happiness and joy I suppose and he's a he's quite a character he's a pistol as Merlin would say and we all had very strong reactions to it and I thought it would be interesting to have an airing of the grievances around the Festivus pole and talk about Free Solo.

MerlinCan I bring in some of what Max gave us? Excuse me.

MaxYes. I think we should... Actually, so one of my...

MerlinWe should just read Matt's document because it's so fucking good.

MaxI completely agree. And I actually felt that... So one of the things I mentioned was when I watched this, I was just a little bit confused from the documentary about what exactly did Alex do? Was he the first person to climb it or was he the fastest or was it without the ropes? I was like, I didn't quite understand. Has it ever been climbed before? It was all very confusing to me. And Matt very much helped just explain what we're talking about here. Are we allowed to cite from this? Do we have his permission to use this?

AlexWell, he cites certain things like no one had ever climbed El Cap before 1958.

MaxYeah, so why does – let's start here. So a friend of the show, Matt Howey, had heard us talk about this. He sent me some answers to some of my questions.

MerlinHe's a climbing boy.

MaxHe's a climbing boy. He knows a bunch of climbing boys too. And so where do you want to start, Merlin, with the vocabulary stuff?

MerlinWell, yeah, I mean, yeah, absolutely. So he goes through explaining what the difference is between free climbing and free soloing. I mean, the quick version of this is that what this guy's doing is pretty wild because he's doing it with very minimal equipment. Some other fast things to get through. I did not know this. Or maybe I just skipped this part. This is what John Syracuse might call an iPad-worthy movie. I know it. You should watch it on the big screen. But I was kind of like half-watching it for some of it. But I didn't realize how bananas what he was trying is for a variety of reasons.

A friend of the show, Matt Howie, tells us that no one had even climbed El Capitan until 1958, which is pretty wild. As he says, it seems very late compared to most climbs in California. and then when people did climb it sitting here in the 90s it took four to five days with a group of people and with belaying correct the having the ropes to save you

Maxif you fall right one thing that this movie I don't think it did not make clear to me is there's a difference between free climbing and free soloing so free so climbing you might I don't know listen what do I know about climbing I've never climbed anything in my life I know fuck all about any of this yeah so I always assume I see a lot of ropes and I always assume you're somehow like there's a guy helping you like pulling you up on the ropes right no no what a lot of people do is what's called free climbing which means as Matt puts it you are climbing without any help from above you're roped in but you only go up with your own strength no aid this is just like every climbing gym and climbing

wall and the ropes are there to save you from a fall thanks to someone on belay which I think means they're like a ballast they like counterbalance you with the rope and the harness and you use your arms to go up. But free soloing is when you do it completely by yourself with no ropes, attachments, or anchors at all. And Matt says, it's clearly the highest difficulty setting, but also the stupidest. Many soloists die from their falls. People rarely solo for very long due to the danger of it.

MerlinExactly. So there's two aspects to, well, there's several aspects to what Matt said, but two things that really strike me are, first of all, like I said, how long it was before anybody did this with all available help. And then the fact of like how difficult any kind of you get a sense from the movie about how difficult and dangerous free soloing is. But then I guess I wasn't grokking how quickly he had done this. So when you hear numbers like nobody did this in any form or fashion until 1958, when you hear the groups of people did this in four to five days, he did that climb, his successful climb in four hours, which is that is really mind blowing for a number of reasons.

Alexhe's a very impressive athlete that's all i got i mean yeah so anyway but like to your point max

Merlinlike i don't know i guess i i must have just missed this because i i had trouble fully engaging with this movie for a variety of reasons but um um not least of which is it the actual task that he's doing i'm just you know i'm not interested in it um i'm not personally but like yeah it was good shooting great shots yada yada uh but like uh so what else did we have here that how difficult this was switching leads and that basically this guy is the goat you know in some ways that he like his what's he saying here that uh according to his friend tommy that he's his fitness is

world class he's an endurance climber who's at his peak and currently holds the speed record with tommy caldwell for climbing the nose they'll cap in less than two hours uh quoting alex is hella fast. So, you know, I mean, and I guess I feel like I do think they did, we covered this in Erective, so forgive me, I do think they did a good job of explaining in some detail, like, here's these pain points that he's going to have to deal with, right? He's going to have to deal with this thing. He's got to get through the clown car, and the devil's crack, and like all the different parts of what he's got to get around,

you know, the oblique Pope hat, like whatever the different parts are called, because of course everything has to have a funny name. But I guess I didn't fully grok. I knew that this was fucking insane what he was doing, but I didn't fully appreciate how athletic and a world apart as an athlete he was. So in deference to Alex, this Alex, Alex Climbing Boy. Yeah. So I just want to toss that out.

AlexI guess that I knew more about climbing than I thought because I thought the exposition was fine and understood everything that was happening. but I think it's just because I know people who climb. So that's interesting. Because I was fully engaged with this film and just full of outrage, except when they showed the Mac OS screen backdrops. That was lovely. But this... Not only is this man just a gross human being,

the way they tell this story, they're so up their own asses. There are multiple scenes where they're like, should we even do this?

MerlinThey knew going in that they were going to be the co-stars of this.

AlexYeah, they do this kind of thing that is sort of a documentary trope where at some point the filmmakers are like, is this worth the harm that's being caused? And usually it's like a delicate, sensitive situation where the subject of the film doesn't have much agency. this guy has 100% agency he can quit at any time and he does like quit one climb at some point but they like if you're asking that question the answer is no you shouldn't make the movie it's

it's dangerous it's dumb and you want to be I think you know what I think they wanted I think they wanted him to almost fall and have one of the filmmakers catch him like there was a little bit I was getting a little bit of that vibe.

MaxI, you know, I went and saw a while back this IMAX documentary about Everest. Did anyone see that?

Speaker AYes.

MaxIt was really cool. And I watched it in the Museum of Science and Industry, like IMAX theater in the big dome theater, and it was fucking awesome. And on the way out, I was like, man, that was a really well-made movie. And the whole movie, they're following this expedition that's hiking up Everest. And I was like, that's incredible that those people managed to get all the way to the top of Everest. And then I was thinking, wait a minute. They were just filmed by an IMAX camera, which means that there was another group of people behind them filming them climbing Everest with them holding an IMAX camera.

Like that's – have you seen one of those? They're huge. Oh, yeah.

MerlinLike I was – It's like we talk about – this is a silly example, but something I talk about with my kid is like every time we're watching some kind of like a Gordon Ramsay reality show. And I'm like – they're like, oh, and Gordon walks into the restaurant like it's the first time he's been there. And I'm like, well, how did they capture the shot of him walking in the door?

MaxRight.

MerlinWell, it's because somebody in there like went in there with a camera and lit it and blocked it so that they would capture Gordon, quote unquote, walking into the. Yeah. And once you start noticing that, it's kind of hard to.

MaxI'm just saying in Everest that was presented as like almost like a verite documentary where it's just like you're following this expedition of Everest. And after I left and I thought about it for 20 seconds, I was like, damn, there was a camera crew with like microphones. And like they probably like they had all this gear and stuff. And then I was like, that's weird. Like, I mean, that's arguably a bigger accomplishment. Getting an IMAX camera to the top of Everest is certainly harder than merely climbing a second documentary.

AlexNo, there totally is on the DVD. Like there was a series of IMAX films like shown at the Museum of Science and Industry. My favorite of which is the Dolphins program. But each one has like a DVD commentary and they talk about like how they do that.

MaxIt's one of my favorite parts of the Planet Earth series is the making of short at the end. But anyhow, you know, these filmmakers chose it made a different artistic choice, which was that they're like, there's probably no sort of getting around the fact that by us making the movie, we're changing the context of everything of the climb and us being there and us being on the mountain with him. And so they're like, what are we going to do? Pretend like we're not there. Like they did. In my opinion, they took the best way out. And Matt, in his document, he pointed out that climbing, what makes someone good or bad at climbing, is often sort of a question of style, like stylistic choices.

And the style of his climb was compromised by having the camera crew there. Because if he ever really got into a jam and he's like, I'm done, but I can't get down, the camera crew would rescue him. They would save him. Whereas if he was truly just like a man out there on the brink, like in the middle of the wilderness, climbing El Cap on his own, and he got into a jam, there'd be no one to help him. He'd just die.

MerlinYeah, like an example of like if he was like doing one of those, like I'm going to sail across the Pacific by myself kind of things. We're like, well, if your radio died and your boat won't go, like now what's going to happen? Like in that case, yeah, I guess I don't super mind that because my problem, my whatever with this is not the amazing thing that he accomplished.

MaxWhat I don't want is.

MerlinWhat I don't want is a documentary. Sorry. No more attempts on my father's biography. No, but I mean, like, and I'm not trying to cut to the woke chase, because I do want to hear more about what Max liked about this. And I'm really actually fine to not rant too much. I want to give Alex the floor for this. But, you know, I mean, honestly, like, I was excited when he made it to the top. And sorry, spoilers.

Speaker AWhen he made it to the top and had his phone call.

MerlinYeah, I mean, has his, like, you know, Paul on the road to Damascus moment. And he's like, oh, maybe Alex Bott won't be so terrible to girlfriend. Ha ha. And so I was excited for him. It was very thrilling. And to see him, after seeing him, what did Kavanaugh say? Seeing him boof the karate kick so many times with the ropes, it was amazing to see him get it that time. So, yeah, I don't know. That part was great. I was highly distracted by almost everything else about him.

MaxBut let me let let me agree. Like the guy points. It paints a very unflattering, but fair picture of him emotionally abusing his girlfriend. I would say it's very sympathetic.

AlexIt is. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. That whole bit about his parents. You don't think they could have edited.

MaxThey left. Why'd they leave all that stuff in? Like they're showing you they're showing you this guy is like terrible to his girlfriend.

AlexBecause every time they're filming him, he's just a total asshole. And they need some explanation.

MaxI don't think they had other footage to use.

AlexYes, exactly.

MaxWhy was his girlfriend in the movie?

AlexWhy was that even a thing?

MaxThey're showing you a portrait of the guy, and he's terrible to his girlfriend, and that's part of him. Listen, this is to me, it's like all those documentaries, or sorry, all the books about Steve Jobs that tell the stories about when he threw an iPad against the wall and screamed at people, and he was a child and an asshole.

I think maybe this is a Marco quote or something, but he's like, listen, there's lots of assholes. Like lots of people are petulant and they're awful to their coworkers and they're mean. But they don't all invent the personal computer and popularize the personal computer. So what was it about this asshole that made him do that incredible thing? Like that's the specific thing I'm interested in. And I don't sort of I don't care about everyone's anecdote of the time that Steve was rude to them. I get it. The guy was an asshole. I get it. But also, in addition to being an asshole, there's this other thing that's relevant about his story, which he did all these cool things.

So I don't know. Like, I just the thing I'm compelled by is, like, in the in the human in the history, in like human history and human accomplishment, like there are always these people who are out on the fringes and they always are insane. and they do things that are like ill-advised and, you know, do dumb, risky things that are way outside of accepted cultural norms and offend and frighten people and bother them. And then they do something remarkable and they're the first guy to do it. And those people are often,

they're like always outcasts and they're always sociopaths and they're always weirdos and they never fit into society.

MerlinI think there may be, your analogy is fine on one level and it's actually something Syracuse and I talked about. I also think there's another part to this is I benefit a lot from the iPhone, iPod, services. I benefit from Apple products in a way that I don't benefit from this douchebag climbing a rock. That was his decision for his own adulation.

MaxBut why do people care? But listen, I feel the same way about sports.

MerlinYou don't take my point, though, that there is a difference of quality and quantity?

MaxIn that respect, I could write off every physical achievement that every human being has ever done. I think it's all boring to me, honestly. But like when people are like, oh, my God, the California, they had all the three pointers and it's a new basketball and it's all different. And isn't this exciting? I'm like, I don't fucking care. It doesn't matter to my life. Like, I don't. Who cares? What is that? That's like Marvel for it's just a different fandom that you can be into. And like the same is true of Rockland.

MerlinWell, what's the pivot there? What's the pivot?

AlexBut that's the difference between a good documentary and a bad documentary. Like who drinks?

MaxThere's ESPN 30. I think arguably rock climbing is like a cooler thing to do the most outrageous, dangerous, like exciting, novel thing in than like a sport. Because a sport, this isn't in this. So take it from your point of view.

Speaker AWhat is happening? Let me make my case. Okay.

MaxGo ahead. Go ahead. People get excited about new things that happen in sports all the time, right? Like didn't your basketball team, they have this thing where they shoot the three-pointers and everyone's like, it doesn't matter. Yes.

MerlinNo, I'm asking. That's a big... No, but because you're going to finish your point without me saying that it's more like watching dance than watching a man climb a rock.

MaxBut I'm just talking about basketball for a second because I want to make sure I get... Okay, well, I don't accept the analogy, but continue. Fine, but I'm just trying to make sure I'm correct. There isn't there... I don't know enough about basketball. I need your help. I don't know enough about basketball, but there's... You don't need to know. You won't enjoy it. But they shoot the three-pointers and everyone's very excited because they're playing the game in a different way, right? Sure. Is that accurate?

AlexI truly don't know because I don't know anything about basketball.

MerlinI don't know what I'm getting drawn into. Fine. All right. Listen. No, here's the two points I'm getting from you. So I do take your point. I think your strongest point that you should pursue is like, hey, it's like I used to think about Berkeley. Like Berkeley is really fucking annoying, but America needs Berkeley. Like we need somebody who's doing too much of the thing. California writ large. We need a whole state that's doing too much of the thing.

MaxBecause that's the only way anything changes. But I also, I just, I have a point here that I want to try and make. I think it's a good, I think it's interesting, which is like people in our society get very excited when a new thing happens in sports. Like, did you guys hear the radio, how everyone plays baseball differently now? They do the new defense that broke baseball and now everyone has to do it.

MerlinYeah, I agree with you that that's very, yeah, absolutely. So like the whole like money ball kind of stuff, like that's very interesting for sure. Sure.

MaxIt's not money ball though. there's like a new thing. Fuck, I don't know enough to make this point. It's like in baseball, there's a new maneuver that people do when they play defense and it's so good that every team had to do it and now a lot of people think baseball is broken, right? Or it's the way that the basketball team shoots the three-pointers and now some people are like, they innovated and it like broke basketball. Now, I get why that's, not to me because I'm a genius, but to the sort of plebeian swine, I understand why that's very exciting.

Because like a new... To the quotidian hogs in East Bay.

Speaker AYeah.

MaxLike, I understand why that's exciting.

Speaker AI understand your interest better than you think. And it's not interesting to me.

MaxBecause like a new thing is happening. I get it. Someday I'll be bothered to understand your interest. Yeah, I get it. It's like... Yeah, it's hard. It's basketball. Yeah, yeah. But I understand. My point is like, it's a whole new thing that's happening in the sport. And it's hard. it's really hard for me to get excited about it, even though I understand it's impressive and people had to see the game in a new way and physically do it. I get it. I get it. I get it. But it's, but basketball sports, organized sports, they have all these arbitrary constraints. Like, what are you doing there?

These rules were just made up by men and it's just the way we agree to play the game. And I'm like, not that impressed when someone figures out a new little arbitrage on those rules. Okay. Now Alex climbing the rock. What rules are there? It's the man and the rock. That's, that's all there is. It's the man and the rock. And if he figures out a new way to do it, that is very cool. I understand that in a more primal and simple way than, oh, they changed how they play defense in this sport and it's novel. It's like, cool, congratulations. Like, you made up the rules and then you broke them.

But, like, what is there new to do with climbing a rock?

MerlinRight. And you can see when you can see his nerding out and his like where he goes into his beautiful mind thing of like reading all his stuff from the book. Yeah. That was a very upsetting scene to me. There's a word we're not going to use this episode, but like it really made me think, wow, he's very deep on the lingo. But no, he's a strategist also. Like he's thought about every aspect of this. He's run all these scenarios in his head. So no, I absolutely think that's very admirable.

MaxThat's what's the remarkable achievement is like what could you take away? It's this man versus nature story in the most elemental. Like even your thing of sailing across the ocean, it's like what a bullshit achievement. and you have all this technology and GPS and radios, and it's dangerous, but, like, I don't know, you have all these tools. Like, what tools does he have? Is he chalk? It's just him and the rock. That's objectively very cool.

AlexNo, it is not objectively very... Wait, that's objectively very cool. Like, I don't... To me, it's like... What's another dangerous sport?

MaxTo me, it's like the guy who can run the fastest or jump the highest. No, no. There's nothing... It's like, what is there? It's just a guy. It's a human and human ability versus the constraints of nature.

MerlinRight. So to your point, it's not like you're getting more points in figure skating. Correct. Getting more points in figure skating isn't as interesting as somebody who, oh gosh, one of those recent skaters that has finally nailed that one move consistently that everybody thought was not going to be doable. Or let's be honest, something like the four-minute mile. We're like, that's really something as simple as like a human being just running really fast over a period of time. So it sounds like what you're trying to say is, you know, without any kind of particularly special equipment or rules other than those of physics, like you found a way to do something extraordinary that nobody thought was possible.

That's kind of part of it.

AlexBut what Max is talking about isn't the film we saw. Like all of the things you are saying, they are all true. But that is not what the movie is about. They kind of sort of get into that a little tiny bit. Like, yeah, people who do this are crazy. Oh, man, it's real, real dangerous.

MerlinBut even the crazy people think he's crazy.

MaxFrom what I understand about climbing, from what I've observed about climbing from popular culture and seeing movies with climbing in it, I assumed that those little metal clips that you have on your water bottle were a really big part of it. Carabiner. Carabiners, right. Having the right clips and clipping them in the right place. I always assumed it was about gear and ropes and tying knots. And I always thought it was like, I don't know. If you look at climbing, I guess that's all about having the stuff that you buy at REI and then you use all that technology to climb up the thing.

I didn't know any of this before I watched Free Soul. You can just do it. I mean, not you.

MerlinAlex, Alex, Alex, Alex, talk more about what you started to say about this is a different movie. Say that. I want to hear the rest of that. You feel like something else was on screen.

AlexNo, no. They wanted to paint. They wanted to make a gorgeous character piece. So there's all these amazing wide shots and this incredibly expensive camera. And of course, they need to show the very expensive camera that they're shooting with. And they're trying to paint. What do they have?

MaxA little C100?

AlexYes, a C100. No, I don't know. What do they have? Oh, my God. No, it was like the craziest. Oh, the Zoomy boy on the ground? Yeah, yeah.

MaxIt's like a telescope.

AlexIt is crazy.

MaxYeah, it was like a telescope, right?

AlexBut they have to show all that. They need to show the discussions of, oh, is this right? Is this not? And the reason they show all the stuff with him and his girlfriend is because otherwise the whole thing would be him scribbling in a notebook, which you're right, Merlin, is very interesting. And they did that scene very well. But that can't be the whole movie. And they also try to paint him as somebody who's as what we used to call has Asperger's. Like they're trying to make it look like he is a broken man and a broken person because of all of these things.

And that's why he's this way. And you know what? Maybe that's true. Like maybe he is the Steve jobs character of like, yeah, there's something he, his brain is clearly wired differently because he's ready to take all of these risks, but that doesn't make him a good person. That doesn't make him an interesting person. He just happens to be the first one who has done this. And there was no need for them there, there to be a film about it even he says like there's something less pure about it because i'm doing this in front of all of these people and to show the way he oh god he's just such a

Maxfuck and i don't but but i know lots of people with asperger's and not at my own diagnosis like this is a thing that they have and they talk about it and none of them are have a world record for climbing a mountain they all memorize like item builds and league of legends oh let's set that

Alexa side perhaps no no no no hold on hold on no we're so i we both have a lot of friends who are on the autism spectrum right and but when they are assholes to us we're not like oh it's okay like you like mental illness is not and i know people with autism are don't have it's not a mental illness i apologize i don't know what i'm talking about but like no one would excuse my behavior somebody who's not neurotypical in that particular way yeah like no one like if you murder someone it doesn't matter that you're bipolar like you shouldn't be like emotionally

abusing your girlfriend no matter what's going on in your brain it was just well so i have an easy

Maxsolution if i could if i could just like make some changes to his life don't have a girlfriend he obviously doesn't want one and just has it like yeah i'm like honest to god like why like just don't be in a relationship like or wait until you're done climbing and then get into it like you

MerlinOr wait till you die. I mean, and as I said with rectives, I mean, like I will – because I did lots of bagging on this guy already in another episode. So I'll try to bring something slightly fresh here. I mentioned this too. But it's – you know what it is? The most difficult things are when we see ourselves in other people. When we see something we'd like to think that we're over, that somebody else is not only suffering from but is happily considering a core part of what's made them awesome. I mean when people quit smoking they get all mad about other people smoking right I mean and in my case like I'm

I don't know if I'm done smoking exactly but like I have in my own way over I don't know how many years just tried to be less of such a happy asshole with people and when I see the way that he's acting it's painful to me on a couple levels it's painful because like I said to Syracuse if this movie came out in 1985 and I was Back in 1985, I would have seen it very differently. It's probably that my hackles are up a little bit about a certain kind of person. And in his case, it pains me to see there's one move that he has in particular, setting

aside looking at your phone while you're looking at a house with your girlfriend. The thing that he does that I have historically hated in myself and will hate in myself forever is if I can get you to stop being mad at me right now, I have fixed your problem.

AlexOh, that was so gross. where he's like, you're not mad anymore.

MerlinMy problem, my problem, see, your problem is, yeah, here's you. You're always going on. And, like, there was something that really tugged at my heart, but when he does that whole thing of like, hey, see, I'm going to do a little dance now and make you happy. I'm like, oh, man, that's his whole MO. And he thinks he's nailing it. When he's coming out of whatever his little shell is and he pops up long enough to deal with her, he's he's now nowing her in a way that just i'm not even talking like being woke here just like

i used to fucking do that all the time and it was so shitty and maybe maybe bad on her for believing it but like he placates her it seems in that movie the movie that was on screen or on ipad was that he is placating her to keep her around without having really any particular interest in her long-term happiness, viability, and needs. And it bugged me.

AlexAnd he says so straight up many times.

MerlinAnd I can almost hear the words in my head from 1984, you knew what you were getting into when you met me. I can really hear that, like with Thompson twins playing in the background. I can hear me going, well, you knew what I was like when you started going out with me. I can't believe you're surprised that I'm such an abject asshole. And basically, we'll just wait out this relationship until you break up with me because I'm such a piece of shit.

MaxIs that that bad of a point? Like, she did know. Does she have no agency? She could break up with him. Like, she knows what she's in for.

MerlinI think she deeply, honestly, deeply very much cares. She's not there because he's star rock boy. I think that, wow, that was an interesting turn of phrase. No, I think she's there because she genuinely cares for him and his welfare. And I don't think she's being like the astronaut's wife who's back in the room watching the color TV and going, oh my, my, I hope everything turns out. I think she really legit cares about the guy. And you can see her trying to kind of break through with him to be like, how do I phrase this so that we can have a conversation about this in a way

that will keep you. I'm sorry. I'm going on. Yeah. I thought that part would hurt me. Yeah.

AlexI mean, the one thing to be, to be honest, that was the one thing that I'm like, okay, at least you're owning up to this. And maybe it is because I still see the person in college that gave matchy a list of things to expect if we were to date and the bad things i'm going to do what was

Merlinon that list whoa whoa whoa hang on somebody was dating matchy you're talking about no me i gave a

Maxlist of things oh that oh no was it in notes what did you tell him like what's the warning what's

Alexthe warning label i'm just like was it a screenshot that that you know like that work comes first and Filming comes first, and I'm going to have to travel a lot. And I just, you know, maybe we'll have time to hang out like twice a week. But there might be months on end where I'm just gone. It was real bad. It was real, real bad. I should find it. It's probably in Facebook messages.

MerlinChallenge.

AlexYeah. Oh, boy.

MerlinAlso, I'll also own one more little piece of this, just to be dead fucking honest. I thought she was charming. I mean, she was cute. but I thought she was genuinely charming and charismatic. And that bugged me even more. I was like, oh my gosh, you deserve a nicer person in the van than him.

MaxIf you date Alex Honnold, right? What's on your note card about him when you start dating him? But that's the thing. That's part of why. I mean, listen, I don't know. We all saw the same 12 minutes of their relationship and we're trying to psychoanalyze both of them. Oh, come on. But all I'm saying is, Like, do you think she, like, she, like, months into the relationship, she's like, oh, my God, he's dangerous. He climbs dangerous rocks. Like, no, like, it's fucking the first. It's on your note card. Like, he's going to die falling off of a cliff. It's just, like, that's the deal.

AlexI agree.

MaxThat's part of what's romantic.

AlexThat's, like, part of his whole thing. So then why would the film paint her like that? Because it is dramatic and interesting. And to have the, oh, look, this poor sympathetic woman. Like, I do think actually she knows what she's signed up for. And we never see her express anything like super crazy. Like, she's like, you know, I hope he's done after this. But, you know, he really loves it. She is also kind of like bonkers in the good way. Like, she also really cares about climbing. I agree.

MerlinBut she's not trying. I think it's going to be super clear to use a very old term we don't use anymore. She's not trying to fix him. Right. I don't think she's trying to rehabilitate him into a businessman. I think she, I don't know. I can't speak for her. And I do think it was more than 12 minutes.

AlexBut they almost make it try to look. I don't like how they filmed her. I don't. The way he's like, oh, yeah, no, my girlfriend's not really a climber. And then we see her.

MaxI thought that the food he was cooking was more upsetting than his relationship.

Speaker AIt looks good. I was actually thinking. You want to know what you planned for? Food in the form of beans.

128. Dingaling-Rich Environment

Show notes

Transcript

128. Dingaling-Rich Environment

Show notes

Transcript

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