From the blood-soaked sands of the Colosseum to the hushed halls of the Senate, a shadow looms large over the Roman Empire. It's not the specter of barbarian hordes, but something far more insidious: a sequel. Ridley Scott returns to the world of gladiators and emperors, but is this triumphant return, or a tragic stumble?
On this episode of The Film Senate, Pete, Steve, Justin, and Tommy grapple with the cinematic beast that is Gladiator 2. The whispers started early – Denzel Washington, an acting titan, seemingly adrift in a sea of CGI sharks and misplaced baboons. Could this truly be the legacy of Maximus Decimus Meridius?
Join us as we whack away at the film's triumphs and failures, exploring the delicate balance between historical epic and over-the-top spectacle. We’ll certainly talk performances, from Paul Mescal's stoic Lucius to Denzel's enigmatic Senate leader, a man seemingly battling his own wardrobe as much as the forces of corruption. And along the way, we'll ponder the questionable editing choices, the abrupt cutaways, the lingering shots of… two emaciated dogs?
Is Gladiator 2 a worthy successor to the throne, or a pretender destined for the thumbs down? Enter the arena and decide for yourself. But be warned, you may never look at a baboon the same way again. TWO EMPERORS!
From the blood-soaked sands of the Colosseum to the hushed halls of the Senate, a shadow looms large over the Roman Empire. It's not the specter of barbarian hordes, but something far more insidious: a sequel. Ridley Scott returns to the world of gladiators and emperors, but is this triumphant return, or a tragic stumble?
On this episode of The Film Senate, Pete, Steve, Justin, and Tommy grapple with the cinematic beast that is Gladiator 2. The whispers started early – Denzel Washington, an acting titan, seemingly adrift in a sea of CGI sharks and misplaced baboons. Could this truly be the legacy of Maximus Decimus Meridius?
Join us as we whack away at the film's triumphs and failures, exploring the delicate balance between historical epic and over-the-top spectacle. We’ll certainly talk performances, from Paul Mescal's stoic Lucius to Denzel's enigmatic Senate leader, a man seemingly battling his own wardrobe as much as the forces of corruption. And along the way, we'll ponder the questionable editing choices, the abrupt cutaways, the lingering shots of… two emaciated dogs?
Is Gladiator 2 a worthy successor to the throne, or a pretender destined for the thumbs down? Enter the arena and decide for yourself. But be warned, you may never look at a baboon the same way again. TWO EMPERORS!
The Film Board gathers for an in-depth panel discussion on a film just released in theaters and spoil it rotten.
Pete Wright:
From the sands of the Colosseum podcasting arena, where thumbs are always up for the cinematic, I am Petis Coractus, and I welcome you to another bloody episode of The Film Senate. Today, we face the might of Rome's newest epic, Gladiator 2. But fear not, for by my side stand 3 senators of wit, ready to dissect the spectacle and spill the critical wine. 1st, a veteran of a 1000 podcast battles, Stevus Sarmentus.
Steve Sarmento:
Wood, steel, appoint's a point.
Pete Wright:
Then the master of the rhetorical blade sharper than a Spaniard's Gladius, Justus Yegas.
Justin Jaeger:
I made it. It was hard. And I was a broken bat. But I'm here here to slay them all.
Pete Wright:
And finally, the legionary of laughter whose jokes are as swift and deadly as a scorpion sting, Thomas Meteos the triumphant.
Tommy Metz III:
Grain.
Tommy Metz III:
Just grain.
Pete Wright:
Together, we shall face the rhinos of filmmaking together and watch them hit the wall hard.
Tommy Metz III:
Let the games begin.
Tommy Metz III:
Alright.
Tommy Metz III:
Did you did you feel the worst for the rhino? Was that the low point that the movie does?
Tommy Metz III:
A 100%. 100%.
Tommy Metz III:
That was the worst part. Yeah. What
Pete Wright:
did they do
Tommy Metz III:
to that rhino? Let's see.
Pete Wright:
I mean, it's just the the
Tommy Metz III:
CG rhino, and I still felt more emotion toward it than anyone else in this movie. I'm sorry. Hi, guys. I'm Pete, and I'm here, and we're here to talk about Gladiator 2. And, we picked this movie because Tom told us we had to.
Tommy Metz III:
And, oh, it
Pete Wright:
was JJ's fault? JJ told us we had to.
Justin Jaeger:
I did not.
Tommy Metz III:
Tom I
Justin Jaeger:
just Tom advocated vehemently my position that was tenuous at best.
Tommy Metz III:
Right. All I remember is somebody felt strongly about it, and I feel vindicated. Where do we let's let's do some initial thoughts on Gladiator. We should set this down. I'm gonna let JJ go first because I think his story is the most interesting.
Justin Jaeger:
How much do how much clarity and transparency should I bring to these initial thoughts right now?
Tommy Metz III:
I think you should bring all all the transparency.
Justin Jaeger:
So I went to see the movie today, and, so many comedy of errors happened on my way to this film. I, when I say I made it I rushed here because I got the time that we're recording wrong. I saw all of the showings and I saw the runtime. I got the runtime wrong. I got everything wrong.
Justin Jaeger:
But the the real sort of blessing in all this is that the hour that I was able to consume of this movie before I realized I was late to make meet you jokers, was enough to let me know that this movie is just plain wrong. In all the ways, grain included. So, I'm really excited to talk about it in in terms of why. So let's hear it.
Tommy Metz III:
Alright, Steve.
Steve Sarmento:
So it's a epic tale, and I saw it in IMAX on a huge, huge screen. So huge rhino tears for me on on that. Everything was was big and bad in this movie in so many ways. And I, I have so many issues with this film and some of the assumptions that are made. Because I just watched Gladiator.
Steve Sarmento:
I rewatched it last week. It had been a long time, so I just really wanted to get into this, like, really familiar with the story. Where are we? What we're you know, we're following up on this. What's going on?
Steve Sarmento:
And realized I shouldn't have done that because it just made me more angry with this one because they really it's no. It's just let's staple this thing onto this other thing. It's, no. No. It was not pleasant.
Steve Sarmento:
And the more I think about it, the worse it gets, the more pain I experience.
Pete Wright:
Oh, I'm sorry for to put you through this next hour.
Tommy Metz III:
I purposefully, for that reason, didn't rewatch Gladiator. I wanted to let this end because from the one trailer I saw, I knew that he was gonna go nuts, Ridley Scott, because there was already too many things in the trailer that were too big and too weird. And was that a shark? And so I wanted it to stand on its own. I don't think this movie is good, but I'm glad I went to see it.
Tommy Metz III:
I liked it. I don't think if you divorce it from being a gladiator movie and take it away from, like, the importance and how well the importance and how well the first one ended up doing and just have it be this other movie, it's a bunch of junky fun, and it's always interesting. And I love that Denzel Washington is in a completely different movie. And the biggest fight throughout the movie is Denzel Washington fighting his own scarves. Like, that's so, no, I kinda dug this movie, but it's not good.
Tommy Metz III:
Like, I I spent parts really laughing. I spent parts really rolling my eyes, but I wasn't ever bored.
Pete Wright:
I actually, I mean, to that point, I I don't think I ever measured my experience of boredom in the movie. I don't think I was bored either. There's a lot going on, and and I think the movie suffers a few sins. One is there's for me, there's no heart in our principal character. The story I cared about most was not the story they needed me to care about most.
Tommy Metz III:
Right.
Pete Wright:
And and that's a shame because I do like Paul Mescal. And I think that's a this is an interesting angle, but mostly, I just could not wait for the emperors to meet their end. Like, I needed them to die the moment I met them. And that I was really interested in the mechanics of Denzel and the Senate and all of that, and I wanted that to be more robust. And at the cost of this other story that I that I don't think they, you know, the story of, you know, legacy and identity that they just did not make strong enough, the movie deflates.
Pete Wright:
Right? It just deflates under its own CG weight. And and and I'll say I say that
Pete Wright:
let me say let me just say this about that.
Tommy Metz III:
Okay. Forgorge, of course.
Pete Wright:
The the CG doesn't look good. But what I what I like about it is that they attempted to show us parts of Roman history and and, like, Colosseum errata that I've heard tell they did. Right? I have heard they fill up that place with water and put ships in it, and that's crazy to me. And I've never seen a movie try it.
Pete Wright:
I've never seen a movie try and make it believable. This movie didn't make it believable, but did try it, and that's cool. Mhmm. Like, that was cool. There were there were cartoon sharks in the water.
Tommy Metz III:
Yes.
Tommy Metz III:
I wish I wish they had been, like, straight up animated and, like, talked. Yeah. They're like, oh, boy. Oh, boy. They're rubbing their stomach.
Pete Wright:
There is a scene where a shark sees a a soldier fall in the water, and I swear his eyeballs came out of his skull at, like, oh god, right before he ate them. So let let's start.
Tommy Metz III:
They all have napkins tied around
Tommy Metz III:
their necks. Little forks just strapped to their to their fins. The sharks may be the the most developed characters in the film. Let's I I wanna start with the I I don't think I think, Tommy, I I love your your initiative to separate these gladiator from gladiator. I don't think we can.
Pete Wright:
We have to take it as the sequel that it's intended to be, that Ridley Scott put a lot of weight behind making this movie and to tell this story of legacy and identity, as I said, and of power and corruption and revenge, and and, you know, there's a there's a dash of freedom and slavery in there. And and, of course, the the highlights of spectacle, like, of Roman spectacle and and the the attitudes that led to the fall of of Rome. And I if we separate all the story stuff, how well do you think the movie landed its thematic heart, if at all?
Justin Jaeger:
But which thematic heart are you referring to? Because I I guess that's the thing. Like, if it really is a history tale about the fall of the Roman Empire, my question is, is this just the meme that everybody's been talking about? About how we all think about the Roman Empire all the time? Because so much of this is unreality.
Justin Jaeger:
I love the things you're saying here, Pete, about the attempts they made at showing us things that we've heard in terms of history. But for the sake, it it appears that for the sake of the story, they decided to change that as well. And so where do we you your question was, does it find its thematic heart? I don't think so. I think it could it could be looked at, some people could say, as a bastardization of the very thing they're trying to explain to us, and that I have a real problem with.
Steve Sarmento:
So I because I'm gonna connect it to the first one. To me, it's the I think the thread that they're trying to follow through in is the in the beginning where Marcus Aurelius says, what is my legacy going to be? Is it, you know, being the philosopher, a warrior, a tyrant? And, you know, can it be that I give Rome back to the people? And I feel like that's the piece that we're still you know, there's all the political, you know, scheming going, and I thought this is this is the thread we're picking up on.
Steve Sarmento:
And I thought by the end, then we should have resolution to that of of which way things go, whether or not it's historically accurate. It's a movie. So what is it that's gonna give us that? Yes. We've got that, or, oh, no.
Steve Sarmento:
This is a tragedy. And I felt indifferent at the at the end. I just it just didn't I I the question I asked was, do the Roman people even care? Because all this is going I don't know that they're invested one way or another because if I am a viewer of all the things as a citizen of Rome, of all these things going on and all these leaders and scheming, and at the end, the this happens, how would I feel? And I don't feel anything.
Steve Sarmento:
Like, whatever. Didn't doesn't really matter. Nobody's nobody cares about me. I got a bunch of selfish people, you know, stabbing each other in the back, and my daily life isn't gonna change, so it doesn't matter.
Tommy Metz III:
I like the idea of the idea. I like movies about scheming, and I like there's a certain type of morbid curiosity of seeing overly developed nations fall under the crippling of their own decadence. When you don't have anything left to do, you just start turning on yourselves. I mean, that's what happened to Egypt also, where they just started burying worlds of treasures with people just because they didn't know what else to do. So when you become so stagnant, I think that's really interesting.
Tommy Metz III:
I thought it was weird that it was so played for laps a lot of times in this, but I also kind of liked that. Again, I was the one that kind of enjoyed this movie. So but as of but, I mean, I'm divorced. I'm saying, like, it was a good time at the flicks. In no way was this a history lesson.
Tommy Metz III:
In no way did it have the gravitas it thought it did. Mister Mezcal is no crow, all of those things. It doesn't work, but it's a interesting ride if I'm gonna go on it. And I loved parts of I wanted to see I wanted to see a serious movie, I guess. Less gladiator, more just look at the different Marie Antoinette had really get into the growthness of the rich people and the horribleness of the not rich people and arise up about that.
Tommy Metz III:
You know, I don't need sharks, and I don't need baboons for that. So
Steve Sarmento:
No. There's a a very interesting chessboard that we're set up with when you look at Paul Muskell's character and Pedro Pascal and then Denzel Washington. You've got that dynamic, that triangulation of who's allying with who and what they're trying to do and how they're playing each other. That was very interesting, and I wanted a lot more of that. And it's it does play out, but there were so many other things, you know, distracting from that.
Steve Sarmento:
A boat. Yes. There there's potential. I think that's probably why I'm frustrated because I I saw the hints of what I really felt like could have been that traditional epic political Yeah. Tent.
Steve Sarmento:
Very interesting.
Tommy Metz III:
Unconclaim, like a serious take
Tommy Metz III:
come out. This kind of
Tommy Metz III:
thing would be fascinating.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. It it it's all of that that you're describing, I totally agree. And every time they went into the underground to have their, you know, secret meetings with the senate and and and do all of the stuff that I really wanted them to to, evolve into a real kind of thriller, they they they gave us, like, one senator avatar to to care about. And and I guess the doofus that lost his house in betting with Denzel Washington. One should never bet with Denzel Washington.
Tommy Metz III:
We've learned that countless times.
Tommy Metz III:
Do they really have she pushed a stone, and the door slid open like a blue bookcase.
Tommy Metz III:
Do you really have that back then? JJ, did you see that?
Tommy Metz III:
No. That's how they get to the downstairs secret room. She pushes the stone, and it goes Yes. And I was like, I don't think so.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. And then the stone moved silently like it was a pneumatic, like No. Yeah. I didn't care for that.
Tommy Metz III:
Can I say by just to get it out of my head, my biggest quibble, but also the thing that I enjoyed the most is there's one word that is missing throughout this movie, and it would have been said by thousands of people? And the word is what? Because there's so much just like talking in these huge coliseums. Paul Meskell is addressing billions of soldiers, and we needed a, yeah, like you said, kind of a thing.
Tommy Metz III:
Well,
Tommy Metz III:
let's 3 people could hear it, and everyone else is just, like, wait. What?
Justin Jaeger:
No. No. No.
Tommy Metz III:
It's not We have the water that Matt Lucas is carrying. Right? Like, he's the, like, MC. He's not amplified. He's just drinking his wine.
Justin Jaeger:
I I because I just watched the first movie this morning, I'd like to sort of remind us that they didn't do that in the first movie either. They had the MC addressing the entire coliseum with no particular amplification, but for some reason, you didn't say what. You you let it happen. There was something that made it more grand in the first movie where this one just felt like a whole needn't have bothered the entire way through. There are so many needless cutaways and so many needless things that are not story points.
Justin Jaeger:
They are maybe just sharks. They are I mean, it's it's really difficult to see the why at any turn in this movie, including the beginning.
Tommy Metz III:
I'm glad that you brought up the cutaways. This movie is also edited really weird. It's like he didn't know how to end scenes, and so it would go to just, like, some person staring off into the middle distance or cut to 2 dogs. Yes. I guess that's the end of, like, too much coverage or not enough coverage.
Tommy Metz III:
He didn't it's like it wasn't crafted, which makes me think that some of this movie was remade in editing because it made so many weird choices of, like, oh, you went to that because what you had originally just didn't work.
Justin Jaeger:
Right. The 2 dogs the 2 dogs is exactly one of the ones that I'm thinking. What why what I need I there's no reason for this.
Tommy Metz III:
Which which I think is is sad because the the setup of Pedro Pascal's regretful general character, I quite like. I really like the idea of that mistaken identity. Right? That that Pascal's character, as Acacias Acacias, Acacias, Acacias.
Justin Jaeger:
I love it. All of those.
Tommy Metz III:
He he doesn't like, when he learns the identity of, you know, Meskell's character, like, that that, enlightenment should come with some significant weight to it, and I think that, you know, the way they wove the story together was kind of nonsense and didn't give Pedro Pascal a chance to really shine, and and be a hero character. His ultimate ending was rushed and sad, but not in an emotionally resonant way. It was sad that made me feel bad for Pedro Pascal for having to sit there and do it.
Tommy Metz III:
Right. And one of the 2 real movie stars that are capturing attention is now gone.
Pete Wright:
Yes.
Tommy Metz III:
And the other one is doing a bad job, but it's incredibly watchable. Mister Washington, in my opinion.
Steve Sarmento:
Okay.
Tommy Metz III:
I thought he was terrible at this movie, but he's so fun to watch because he's a movie star. He's so interesting. I'm glad you brought up the beginning in the setup because
Tommy Metz III:
Well, it's also JJ knows that we gotta keep it.
Tommy Metz III:
As I'm remembering now, I was like, oh, man. Like, Ridley Scott, he's back. He's done it. There was a lot of real beauty and patience. That opening battle was epic and looked great and everything.
Tommy Metz III:
And then and I'm it sounds like I'm joking, but I'm not and then the baboons came out, and I was like, oh, no. He's not. He's he's still with Scott. He's on this trajectory still because that looked terrible, and it was too weird, and it didn't look right, and none of it made sense.
Justin Jaeger:
So you did like the first battle. The the difficulty that I had too is that okay. So I love I I wanna say that I'm with Pete on the idea of this regretful general piece, but it was disorienting right away in that who's our protagonist. I have no I mean, we we are set up with Hanan, as the the protagonist, but then Pedro Pascal comes in. I mean, what where what yes.
Justin Jaeger:
Epic. But what do we do as an audience member? What what what are you rooting for in that epic battle? I mean, I guess just more cool visuals because you can't pick a side. You have this this this was one of the things that was a difficulty of the first movie that was navigated perfectly.
Justin Jaeger:
Right? You have the Romans, traditionally, the conquering emperor, but it was navigated perfect perfectly with Russell Crowe. This movie didn't even take steps to help us figure out where to go, I felt.
Tommy Metz III:
That's a good point. Until I was felt recentered when he was so sad about, I take this for Rome and woe be to the conquered. Then I was like, oh, okay. I get it. Like, we're supposed to like him too.
Tommy Metz III:
But you're right. That didn't occur to me at first of, like, wait. But I really like him, and I like him better than our hero. But he's doing all these terrible things.
Tommy Metz III:
I mean, on that point, we probably should turn our attention to mister Washington.
Justin Jaeger:
Sure.
Tommy Metz III:
I saw the trailer, and I think all of us said at one point or another, some that Denzel Washington doesn't know what movie he's in, what he said yes to, or Ridley Scott doesn't know who he just cast to do this. And I went into the movie hoping beyond hope that I would be proven wrong. And I was not. He was you're right, Tom, you're absolutely right. He is bigger than life.
Tommy Metz III:
He is bigger than life in this movie. And he is just vibrant. And and I not not once did I believe who he was in this movie. And you
Tommy Metz III:
just he's just he's one of those actors now, unfortunately, with all due credit and bowing down and all of that, but, I mean, you could just see through him. He's now Robert Damir. He's now Al Pacino. It's just ticks. It's ticks.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah.
Tommy Metz III:
And you
Tommy Metz III:
can tell exactly when he starts improvising with movements and lines, and they cut to a wide because the director knows Denzel is just gonna walk around and touch things, and that's what he does. And he's just been doing it for, like, a while now. So and they're just there's nowhere to hide in this movie Because there's no one else that's soaking up the attention.
Tommy Metz III:
And it just makes you wanna say that's politics over and over again.
Tommy Metz III:
I own your house. How long? I don't remember what the other
Tommy Metz III:
part was. Yes.
Tommy Metz III:
You're So you
Steve Sarmento:
don't have
Tommy Metz III:
that line, JJ. Yeah. Right.
Steve Sarmento:
He does he does
Tommy Metz III:
a version of I'll drink your milkshake.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah.
Justin Jaeger:
Well, you know, because I didn't see the rest of the movie, my assumption is just that Michael Che finished the movie for him with his caricature because he was playing a caricature of himself throughout this film.
Tommy Metz III:
So his the the trouble I have with his arc, and I think you you bring up a really interesting point, JJ, in the conversation about casting and and what faces they put, the what bankable faces they put where. I I I'm curious your take on the, just the sort of cast politics and cast economy that they're asking us to to play with with this movie. Because in the case of Denzel Washington, he is in the beginning, he's set up as, as a good guy, as an ally to Lucius. And over the course of the movie, I'm not sure I understand when he became a bad guy. But in the end, the final fight is with Denzel Washington and Lucius?
Tommy Metz III:
I didn't see that coming at all.
Justin Jaeger:
Well and I I will say, again, with my sort of recency of the original Gladiator, Denzel here, we we've put our biggest star in the Proximo character from the first movie, and Proximo's arc in the first movie was the opposite of this. So it's like, I feel I I don't know. But my assumption here is that this is how Ridley Scott justified coming to this. He's saying, okay, we have our cast of characters from the first film. And now let's take 2 other characters.
Justin Jaeger:
Technically, Proximo, the slave master from the 1st Gladiator, and Quintus, the reluctant general from the 1st Gladiator. Let's put our biggest stars in these two characters and let's humanize them and maybe put them on different arcs. At least that's where I was. In terms of casting though, I mean your question was about casting. I got really tripped up through this movie a lot because I could not figure out if we were watching, like, the Hamiltonized version of Roman history here because it really felt like that a lot.
Justin Jaeger:
In that, like, do I pay attention to who these characters are in actuality or is this just a fictionalized thing here with a purpose of witnessing the epic battles? I I was taken out of it at every turn because of that. The first battle included.
Tommy Metz III:
I feel like that is it it that's just part and partial for this film is the fact that I knew right from the beginning, from when they introduced Pedro Pascal and his wife. My first thought was, well, she's gonna die, and that will give him motivation.
Justin Jaeger:
Oh, you mean Paul Pascal? Oh, Paul Pascal.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. Yeah. Paul Pascal. Sorry. Yeah.
Tommy Metz III:
Paul Pascal. Their first hugs and kisses, and they're strapping on each other's satchels. It was like Nope. They're done. She's done, and he's motivated.
Tommy Metz III:
And I'm so sad to say that that's exactly what what the movie is about is him being motivated because of death, which seems like such a, like, a Ridley Scott Trump card at this point. And, I Why did
Justin Jaeger:
why did Pedro Pascal in the battle single out her? Because she killed one person next to him? Mhmm.
Tommy Metz III:
Like Yeah.
Justin Jaeger:
Wait. No. That one
Tommy Metz III:
is true. Yeah. Just get that one. I right.
Justin Jaeger:
Utter redo.
Steve Sarmento:
Well, because in the first battle year, that worked so well for Maximus of taking his wife and child from him. So it's like, okay. Let's do something similar. We have to motivate this character. We'll take his wife away from him.
Steve Sarmento:
That gives him this inner drive. We need to quickly, you know, hot bake this, get it get him going, get him motivated within the first 10 minutes of the movie because we've got a lot of story to tell. So they did that. But it it it just does not have that emotional resonance because it was it was done as a plot point versus that was an integral piece of the whole dynamic to things in terms of even Maximus' relationship with Lucilla. And she has a son the same age as his son, which gets into I won't even get into the after watching the first one, and this one, I'm like, you can retcon this all you want.
Steve Sarmento:
I I will not buy into the fact that he is is Lucius. Or that Lucius is Maximus' son. It doesn't resonate I it it breaks too many things with the first one. Right. But, again, they they needed that quick motivation, and they it felt like I thought, please don't do this thing where you're gonna redo the movie.
Steve Sarmento:
You're gonna alter a couple of things, but most of the story points are gonna be the same. And I the trailer was like, oh, we're gonna have sea battles in the coliseum. I thought, okay. That's leveling up that like we do as bigger death star. Right?
Steve Sarmento:
But there's gonna be something more to this. And when we had an interesting, more complex story with 3 people versus just, like, Russell Crowe and, you know, Joaquin Phoenix, you know, duking it out, I was like, oh, we've got different sides. And who's backstabbing who? I had high hopes. But the the beginning, as soon as she died so quickly, I thought I didn't get a chance to know her or their relationship or anything.
Steve Sarmento:
And then his first gladiator fight, when he starts commanding them, like, okay. No. Hold hold fast. Hold fast. All of that.
Steve Sarmento:
Well, in the first one, Russell Crowe could do that because some of those guys, he's like, you know, oh, sir. I served with you so and so.
Tommy Metz III:
He was a commander.
Steve Sarmento:
He was a commander. Paul Meskell okay. I got a sense he was some type of commander, but that was sort of observed, and then he's just commanding guys to do something. For what reason, I don't know. I don't get the sense that he commands their respect or loyalty or his I haven't seen him demonstrate strategic, you know, creativity or intelligence.
Steve Sarmento:
I say, yeah. Listen to this guy. He's gonna do something dynamic here that's not gonna be expected. So I just felt like he is this poor shadow of Maxis. And I felt like Paul Meskell was good casting for the character that that should have been, which would have been in that more political thriller of he's a pawn.
Steve Sarmento:
He isn't the hero that's gonna you know, he's not Braveheart calling the troops. He he's a pawn that's being manipulated. And how he cleverly works that would be the genius of that type of character. I think Paul Muscala could do that. But unfortunately, that's not the film we get.
Steve Sarmento:
So I have to take what I can, which is lots of shirtless, you know, sword, you know, play, which is fine, but I've I've seen that done, and I've seen it done better before. And, you know, not making me feel sad for for rhinos.
Justin Jaeger:
I wanna see your your movie, Steve. I like your movie too.
Steve Sarmento:
Y'all do.
Tommy Metz III:
Connie Nielsen, is back as mom, Lucilla. Do did anyone get stuck on the the very the, like, the reality of recognition after all these years when she's in the cell with him? Like, there is a play around which they they sort of, deal with when he does he recognize her? Does she recognize him? It or who are they who they say they are.
Tommy Metz III:
Right? It's there is that that bit. I found myself really digging in my intellectual teeth on, would Paul Mezcal, would his character have recognized his mother after all those years without an iPhone?
Tommy Metz III:
I would think so because she looks exactly the same.
Steve Sarmento:
She looks pretty close.
Tommy Metz III:
She looks
Tommy Metz III:
pretty close.
Tommy Metz III:
Not aged, so I would think I would think yeah. I think he's he's her in the stadium.
Steve Sarmento:
And he wasn't He's so angry and
Tommy Metz III:
hurt. He's not.
Steve Sarmento:
And the yeah. But he wasn't I had to think through that. Like, how old was he? No. He was, like,
Tommy Metz III:
say what?
Steve Sarmento:
8, 8, 9, 10, you know, whatever. So it's not like, oh, he was 4 or 5. Right? So, you know, memory. And it's it's 16 years, but at at 10 years old, 12 years old, 16 years, you and you've spent those formative years with your mother, your father's dad.
Steve Sarmento:
There's all these things. You know who your mother is. And so I I really found that hard to believe. Even if he tried to disassociate himself from that, it was a big struggle for me. And then so in my head canon, I I played this as he's that changeling character.
Steve Sarmento:
She wants him to be Lucius. She needs him to be Lucius for this scheme. But again, that's a different movie. You know, but I felt like that made would make more sense than him trying to play, like, I'm denying that, and so I'm gonna pretend that I don't know who you are and that I'm not owning this this title, because I don't get the sense that he, you know, as what what did they call him? The prince of Rome, which makes no sense to me.
Steve Sarmento:
I just I didn't get any sense of how why he would have such a strong disassociation from that. You know? They sent him out for his own safety, so he has to make it on his own. But I don't have any sense of the the trauma that that might have been where he would want to have such a strong disassociation of, like, no. I'm not gonna recognize you as your mother because these other people raised me, and I am the man who I am because of them and has nothing to do with you or Rome.
Steve Sarmento:
And so I really struggled with that lack of recognition, that laugh, you know, whatever gamesmanship he's trying to play and and denying that identity did not I did not see a reason for that that I could believe it.
Tommy Metz III:
I'm glad I'm not alone. I didn't get a reason either. That didn't make sense to me. Like, even if they expect us to to believe that both of the characters in that cell knew who each other was, the, like, the emotional reason behind why he wanted to dissociate is lost on me. The dual emperors.
Justin Jaeger:
Twin Joffrey's.
Tommy Metz III:
Twin Joffrey's. Right. This is the it's also the there what what was the in the mate the second Matrix movie where they're the 2 Oh,
Steve Sarmento:
the the twins with the good luck. The albino twins. Yeah. Yes.
Tommy Metz III:
Okay. I mean, I I kinda feel like it's it's reloaded. Right? It's table stakes to have, immature emperors demanding insanity in a Roman story, and I struggled to to feel a whole lot. Did you, did you guys appreciate Epper Gaeta and Epper Caracalla?
Tommy Metz III:
They were pretty blandly psychotic.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. Like, they were just kind
Tommy Metz III:
of petulant. There was there's just more nuanced or interesting ways to go with it. Instead, he just kind of like what Steve was talking about. Everything in this movie is just hit the gas, get us there as quickly as possible. They might as well just cut to him and then just like they just punch a cat in the face.
Tommy Metz III:
Right. I'm sorry. God, I'm not supposed to like him. No. They're just so weird.
Tommy Metz III:
And the guy who I guess is crazy because he has syphilis is what we find out. The the the twin who lives longer, he was extremely uninteresting, and that's kind of an interesting actor. They just didn't have enough to do. There wasn't a lot of fun there. And that could that should be really fun, gross, Joaquin Phoenix like.
Justin Jaeger:
Which again, you did so well in the first movie. I I I mean, I I totally understand, Tommy, your original point of wanting to separate these 2, but it seems like they tried to approach a lot of the same problems in this movie and just did it much poorly than they did the first time.
Tommy Metz III:
I think they made the right choice. Yeah. And not free of punches. That's, like, that was the winning move.
Steve Sarmento:
Well, I I struggle to understand, you know, if I'm looking at the story of, like, what is it that everybody wants? You know? So if we've got Pedro Pascal, who is like, I'm I'm done with warfare. I'm I'm done with this. I've got my army.
Steve Sarmento:
I'm gonna bring them in. We're doing this. I don't know what these these 2 lunatics want because they just played it as, like, we're just crazy. We just like violence. We're just gonna do things in reaction to Verzuz.
Steve Sarmento:
They've gotta have some motivation because it's only been 16 years. How did they come to power if Lucilla is the daughter of Marcus Aurelius? Why is she not in power? What's going on with the senate? Who did where did they come from?
Steve Sarmento:
How did they even get into power? Did they just step in and take it in that void? What I needed something to know how they got there so I understood at least where they came from to know where they were going because they were just caricatures that were they were just punching bags and and and punch lines, you know, for for things because I am going to decree so and so that, you know, this person and it's the monkey. Like, oh, great. The monkey's in charge.
Steve Sarmento:
They're so Oh, what a fuck. So wacky.
Tommy Metz III:
He ends up yeah. He makes his first counsel the monkey.
Tommy Metz III:
The
Steve Sarmento:
monkey. And I thought because
Tommy Metz III:
he's so crazier.
Steve Sarmento:
Right. And it just I I they they can't be the villains then, which then sets it up for Denzel to be the the big bad at the end, but they weren't even, like, interesting agents of chaos because they didn't do anything.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. They were like road warrior, Mad Max villains. They're just villains because they're gross and loud and just dumb. There's no fun to that.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah.
Tommy Metz III:
Agreed.
Tommy Metz III:
Right. And and it it also makes them predictable. Like you say, they weren't good agents of chaos.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. That's a good idea.
Tommy Metz III:
Of course, they're gonna make the first council the monkey. Like Right. They should have asked, who do you think I'm going to make the first council? And every senator would have said, you're gonna make
Tommy Metz III:
it the monkey.
Tommy Metz III:
The monkey.
Tommy Metz III:
Of course.
Tommy Metz III:
We all know it's gonna be the monkey. Let's just get on
Pete Wright:
with it.
Tommy Metz III:
So I I you know, it's big. The movie is is big. The look of it is big. John Mathison is back on, Gladiator and or on Gladiator 2. What did you guys think about the camera and the look of the film?
Tommy Metz III:
Separate all the other things we didn't like about the movie. How'd it look? They built a lot of Rome in Malta to to make it look good. Did it look good?
Justin Jaeger:
I I mean, with the limited that I saw of the film, I really feel like the purpose was to be something big and bright and beautiful. So I I get what they're doing there. I don't have any real sense of in terms of the landscape or the environment what was CTI versus what was practical, which I guess is a compliment that we'd like to say there. It has a lot of the feel of the largest of, like, Titanic when we talk about stuff like that, where they just made a whole lot of big sets that they could fill out with computer graphics and make look work. And I to that end, I believe they accomplished that.
Tommy Metz III:
I thought a lot of the outside stuff looked good. I thought for some reason, a lot of the indoor stuff, something wasn't handled correctly. It looked like a set. Like I got the feeling that they're walking into a sound stage now, even though there's nothing. I don't, I don't know what was missing.
Tommy Metz III:
I'm not smart enough of a visualist to know this is why I feel this way, but I was, like, that's not a real wall. That's not a thing.
Tommy Metz III:
I can Is it because of those Styrofoam rocks that she pushed? Right.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. Some of the in some of the indoor stuff just seemed very maybe it was the fact that there was never any windows, that you can't see the outside, and so there's no atmosphere, and you need more of that in order to make it seem because all of these places had windows all over the place because what did what else were they doing?
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. Yeah.
Steve Sarmento:
There was there was no sense of location of where things were relative to other things. So when we have that first, Paul Mascall has that first fight, and he's like, they're like, the Emperor's like, no, it's to the death and all of that. It's like, okay, and he kills the guy all that, then it's like, oh, we're going to Rome. I'm like, I thought they were in Rome because the emperors were there. But then they so whose house were they at?
Steve Sarmento:
And why Why was this there? Or, you know, when Denzel shows up to what's his name, Thrax or whatever? It's like, I own your house. I'm like, okay, that's his house. But where is that?
Steve Sarmento:
We're basically in the foyer, but I have no sense of that. And then the secret passage, how to get to that. I think we've got one shot of like, Lucilla sneaking down some, you know, evening alleyway, but I how far is she going? And how big is her palace? Or even within that, we see a couple things, you know, cut to the dogs.
Steve Sarmento:
They're walking through a doorway. But everything was so isolated from itself. I didn't know where things went to or from. We just had yeah. As you said, like, sets.
Steve Sarmento:
We just we're here, and it's a room that's isolated from the rest of the world around it because we're gonna do this little scene right here, and then we'll move to another scene someplace else.
Tommy Metz III:
It doesn't matter where. She goes down that there's the gate at the top of that thing, and there are, like, little stairs in the middle of of the ramp, and and that gate opens. She goes down there to get to the underground and the secret chamber. Paul Muscau goes down to get his dad's army stuff, his gladiatorial gear. I think they and and he runs up it to get out into the Colosseum.
Tommy Metz III:
I think, I mean, they I think they really wanted us to believe that there those ramps are everywhere all over Rome, and maybe they were, but I couldn't stop the thinking that this is just they had the 1, and they're just using it. It's like dis
Tommy Metz III:
it's like Disneyland. There's just tunnels of your everything.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. Yeah. Right.
Tommy Metz III:
There was a lot of basements.
Tommy Metz III:
One entrance. It's so many basements. I I would love to know, and I'm sure that somebody listening is an expert archaeologist in, Rome. Awesome. And I'm sure that you could tell me that the what they did to make this movie, it hews closely to history.
Tommy Metz III:
Like, there are those ramps and gates and secret passages with buttons and all of those things. No. We have those. Those were real. Okay.
Tommy Metz III:
It what doesn't matter is any of the history if
Pete Wright:
I don't believe this movie. And I didn't believe this movie
Justin Jaeger:
No. At all.
Tommy Metz III:
I didn't believe this movie. I at one point at the end, you know, when he says, speak to me, father, he picks up a handful of the there's so much picking up of dirt. And I was looking for, like, a bottle cap in there. It just didn't even look like real dirt. It just looked like thimbles and thread and maybe a Hot Wheels car and some beads.
Tommy Metz III:
That's what it, felt like to me. I just didn't I didn't believe any of it. That that's the real challenge. And to all the credit of the people who built over an 8 kilometer, area in Malta, they built Rome to you know, parts of Rome to make it look legit. It it like, all of that is is on film.
Tommy Metz III:
It's in there. Mhmm. And Yes. To ILM who put water in the coliseum, that's amazing. And the movie, I don't think the movie exceeded that.
Tommy Metz III:
They got a lot of money from Malta and Morocco to film where they did, but, yeah, just just not sure it it holds up as a story.
Justin Jaeger:
Well, I have a weird sort of film board ish question to pull out and consider this because the last film board that I was on, we had done The Crow, the new version of The Crow. And one of our big difficulties with that as a group now I loved that one. But one of our big difficulties of that was it was such a divorce from the original Crow. It was such so different. And that's something that I appreciated, but a lot of people who were loving The Crow did not.
Justin Jaeger:
So I I I I just kinda wanna pose the philosophical question here because, obviously, we we would like something new in what we see in Gladiator 2. But running on these tire treads, especially when Gladiator compared to The Crow is such a larger movie in cinematic history, it seems like Ridley Scott had to do some of this. Right? He had to make some connective tissue that worked here to I don't I wouldn't call it fan service, but really to make a movie that would be a true sequel, because The Crow wasn't. Right?
Justin Jaeger:
So is there a way that we can appreciate this as the next chapter without all of our quibbles? I'd for me, I my my answer is no. But I wanted to pose that to you guys because specifically I loved The New Crow. And when I'm thinking about doing my rating for this movie, I am comparing them exactly in my mind. Right?
Justin Jaeger:
It's like how much I appreciated this and how much I appreciated that. So I really wanna hear from you guys like in terms of where this shows up as a sequel, is there some sort of appreciation we can get for Ridley Scott and what he's trying to do here in that?
Tommy Metz III:
You mean as an excuse?
Justin Jaeger:
As maybe the reason why. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we could say it's an excuse, but maybe that's why it, you know, it's the kind of thing of, like, he's gotta play the hits. Right?
Tommy Metz III:
Yes. And I was and I liked the hits. Again, I was the one that kind of enjoyed this movie.
Justin Jaeger:
Right.
Tommy Metz III:
It's the quieter moments
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah.
Tommy Metz III:
That were so missed, and that's hard to find an excuse for that. It's hard to find to cast someone like Denzel Washington and not be able to rein him in. Mhmm. Yeah. To drink that entire thing, to make so many confusing to make the big to decide throughout different big bads, and almost none of them are interesting enough.
Tommy Metz III:
And then you're just changing. Unfortunately, that doesn't go alongside of not fan service, but, like, having to do that stuff because the stuff that he did, like, some of the battles were really thrilling. Yeah. For sure. Yeah.
Tommy Metz III:
It was really exciting. And so that stuff he did, and I was fine with. It's the other stuff. He it's like he did the he did the hard part. Wait.
Tommy Metz III:
How's the store how's the sentence at?
Steve Sarmento:
He went easy on the hard part and
Tommy Metz III:
Yes. Something like that. Yeah. He made the hard he made the hard part good, and he messed up the easy part. What?
Tommy Metz III:
Alright. Old Mac Old Navy.
Steve Sarmento:
You're you're no. You're absolutely right. Those those battles and everything, I mean, there with the water and all of that and, you know, the the the strategy of, like, pull the oars in so we can snap the ones off of them. And there were really you know, it was something where I was like, oh, I haven't seen that because we don't see ship to ship combat in close confines. So it's it's different.
Steve Sarmento:
It's, you know, it's Pirates of the Caribbean. They're shooting cannons across fast distances. So, yeah, there was something interesting. Even even that baboon fight of the you know, just something interesting with with Hannah or Lucius, whatever we'll call him of, like, I've gotta defend myself, and so this baboon is coming at me. And I'm gonna take a chunk of flesh out of him because that's what he's gonna do to me.
Steve Sarmento:
I'm gonna fight him as an animal to animal because that's what it's gonna take. And I'm like, oh, that's gonna tell that's gonna I started thinking, that tells me something about what type of fighter he is. Forget that. No. It's just not something that was unexpected.
Steve Sarmento:
And I thought that dynamic of that fight was very interesting of, like, here's 2 competitors, you know, sort of sizing each other up in a different way because one is human, one is an animal, and what what's he thinking? There were those those things that I I really enjoyed, and I I will say to Tommy, I had that fun. I you know, yes. It's a fun flick in those areas, but those are just, like, you know, little sprinkles on on such a larger thing. And I think they were handled well when it comes to, again, geography.
Steve Sarmento:
I knew where I was. I wasn't disoriented. I didn't have that, you know, quick editing that kept me, like, what's going on? Who's fighting what? I could track things fairly well in in the the large battles as well.
Steve Sarmento:
He does Ridley Scott does that well. I I know where we are and and what's going on when there's armies about. And, yeah, to see, you know, storming the walls and getting those, you know, bridges over and all of that and arrows flying. I was like, yes. This is he's in his element there, doing that well.
Tommy Metz III:
You know, I'll I'm I'm gonna agree with everything you you just said because this is a set piece movie, and the set pieces were, really fun. I I struggled with the the CG elements, but only because I'm looking closely at them. Like, if this movie just washes over me, all of that stuff is really fun. And I just went in with much higher expectations for the story. That's the the the big crime of the movie.
Justin Jaeger:
Yeah. My favorite, comment that I'm gonna take away from this, episode is even that baboon fight.
Tommy Metz III:
You know, I'm a fan of the baboon fight. Yeah. Yeah. I I like the baboon fight because I because, again, it goes back to what I know about the Romans where they were nuts for fights. Right?
Tommy Metz III:
Like, the the the thing with that this movie didn't pay off at all was Chekhov's Bengal tiger. Right. Oh, yeah. We got a quick cut, and I was like Yeah. That puppy's coming out to play.
Tommy Metz III:
And we never we never we never got it. And I think that was a that was a a big loss. It turns out, apparently, Scott wanted to do the rhino battle in the original film and didn't have the budget for it, so they cut it. So this was like that's why we get so many animals because it feels like it's a stack of baboons and then rhino. Right.
Tommy Metz III:
Maybe that's why the kitty didn't get to come out to play.
Justin Jaeger:
That's the reason this movie was made. One other real key thing that was a major difference for me is as I was walking to Gladiator 2, I found myself humming, you know, the theme from Backdraft and the thing from The Power of 1 only because I had just been watching Hot Simmer in Gladiator 1. And the reality is the the music in Gladiator 2 is not memorable, special in any way in comparison to what's there in Gladiator 1. So that you know, it's a different composer, but it it it just wasn't even a part of film here for me.
Tommy Metz III:
Harry Gregson Williams is, a really great composer, and, we've actually had him on, movies we like. He's a he's absolute, and he's wonderful. And also, I agree with you. Like, there are this this was this was, this was, like, good music that didn't feel a piece with the film, and and I I struggle with that as a final piece. But he also did, you know, the Meg 2, the trench, which was Fun.
Tommy Metz III:
You know? Hey. You got sometimes you gotta take a paycheck. Yeah. So I, overall, I the movie is what it is.
Tommy Metz III:
Do we have closing comments? Anything we haven't talked about that you really wanna make sure is recorded by you for legacy?
Tommy Metz III:
To answer the film's question, and especially the question of the first film, it sounds like we are not entertained.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. I'm
Tommy Metz III:
I bet I'd be 9 thousandth person to make that.
Tommy Metz III:
You know, the the other joke that, we haven't said it all, but I'll just say it out loud is maybe we should have seen Wicked because they're very much trying to do Wikiator or Glicken. Glee yeah. What what was the other one? Glicken?
Tommy Metz III:
It's Glicken. It is the is the Oppenbarbenheimer. The barbenheimer
Tommy Metz III:
is Glicken. Glicken. And, so I'm excited that that exists. I don't know that they're gonna be able to get much traction on it. That doesn't
Justin Jaeger:
seem to be No. The theater talked about Friday night being packed for both movies, and I said, oh, what's more? And they said, definitely Wicked is
Steve Sarmento:
Oh, yeah.
Justin Jaeger:
Is drawing most of the folks. Yeah. That is significantly different. But they said it was it was a lot more traffic than they had expected on Friday night.
Tommy Metz III:
That's that's the movie. That's where we are. And now, you know, we need to turn our attention to how we're going to rank it. Letterbox. We're on Letterbox.
Tommy Metz III:
Letterbox.com/thenextreal. That's where you can find our HQ page and, links to all of our ratings and reviews. What are you gonna do? JJ, you do you even like, how do you even approach this? You only saw an hour of the movie.
Justin Jaeger:
Yeah. And I was you know, honestly, I I I will give you a number, but the I don't feel like it's fair considering Reyes. I I am on it. I I thought walking out after an hour that the 2 stars that I'm gonna give it were probably more than I would give it if I stayed longer. It felt that way as I was watching the movie because so many of those needless cutaways were angering me as an audience member.
Justin Jaeger:
So but then after talking to you guys, I feel better about the fact that, that's where I was. So I would probably even push lower. But for the purposes of what we're doing today, I'll give it to an a not like.
Tommy Metz III:
Okay. Alright. Steve?
Steve Sarmento:
I've been on the fence about this. And then, you know, JJ did talk about the end, and I realized that the end is such a strong call back to the first one. So the movie makes the fatal error of remind continually reminding me of a better movie. So I I'm gonna go with 2 and a half stars on this. I I thought those cool battles were gonna keep it over in the 3 range, but I have to go with 2a half.
Steve Sarmento:
And and there's there's no heart for me on this. It just makes me too angry.
Tommy Metz III:
Makes me angry. Okay, Tom. Are you angry at all?
Tommy Metz III:
I'm not angry. I'm, I guess, just for the purpose of my sanity, I am glad I didn't go back. One of the big reasons I didn't go watch the first gladiator is I knew that it would also I would be influenced by nostalgia because that movie meant a lot to me a long time ago, and so I would be looking past its flaws. I'd be, you know, looking at some of the struggles we had with CGI back then for some of the cityscapes. So with if you're allowed to do what I did and just divorce it from it while acknowledging mister Mezcal is no mister Crow, all of that stuff, I'll give it a 3, and it might be between 33.5.
Tommy Metz III:
A heart, I don't feel there's enough heart in it. So, no, I'm not gonna give it a heart, but I'll give it a 3 or a 3.5.
Tommy Metz III:
That's the exact problem that I have with it. It's actually not on the stars. It's on the heart. And, is it is it 3 stars, no heart, 2 stars and a heart? I don't know.
Tommy Metz III:
I I think I'm actually leaning on 2 stars, no heart because, you know, the spectacle is significant in the movie, and it's just such empty calories. And I don't, I want to expect more from movies of of mister Scott. And, this was this was, this was less than, and it makes me sad. And and, of course, the usual disclaimers apply. Making movies is really hard, and it is a collaborative effort of 1200 people that come together to make this movie and take years to do it, and we just talk about it in an hour and and, you know, make these judgments.
Tommy Metz III:
But, boy, that's what that's what movies are for. And I think the disappointment for me is I wanted to feel more walking into this movie because, like you said, Tom, of the first one. This this movie, I think, fails because it carries on its back such legacy. And that's the that's the problem.
Tommy Metz III:
Movies are so hard to make. I'm gonna go ahead and change everyone's scores to 5. Okay. Great job. Great job, Gladiator too.
Tommy Metz III:
You got a perfect score.
Tommy Metz III:
You really did just change those, and, we're never gonna remember what we said. So I haven't even said that. Yeah. I I've really did that.
Justin Jaeger:
Pete, you were supposed to be recording this.
Tommy Metz III:
I don't even know. Come on, man.
Pete Wright:
I just it's gonna
Tommy Metz III:
I've been transcribing it. AI is gonna rerecord your voices. Don't worry about it. It'll be all AI ADR. Thank you all for for downloading, listening to the show.
Tommy Metz III:
We sure appreciate your time and attention. Next month, we do have a movie picked and, because he's the oldest of us, it's gonna go to Steve to tell us what it is.
Steve Sarmento:
It is going to be a movie that I can't even say it's from our youth, but it is from way back in the day, y two k.
Tommy Metz III:
Don't know what we're getting into with that. I'm I have some hunches, but, we were we lived through it, and we're gonna talk all about it. And we're really excited to talk about y two k. I don't even I can't even tell you that I've seen the trailer. I haven't.
Tommy Metz III:
Because we we just picked it. Yep. Yeah. I have.
Tommy Metz III:
I've seen the trailer.
Steve Sarmento:
Oh, it's it's it's a ride.
Tommy Metz III:
I'm gonna go watch
Justin Jaeger:
it right now.
Tommy Metz III:
Yeah. Good. Awesome. So that's what we're gonna be talking about next month. Thank you all for downloading.
Tommy Metz III:
We appreciate you. You're the best. And, we'll see you next month when, meeting, is meeting adjourned. I'm just I'm sick. I'm done.