Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
The Middle of Culture is what happens when two siblings with too many opinions and not enough chill dive headfirst into movies, music, video games, and whatever else is rotting our brains this week. It’s part pop culture podcast, part sibling rivalry, and fully unfiltered. Expect passionate arguments, niche references, unsolicited rankings, and the occasional moment of unexpected insight. If you’ve ever wanted to eavesdrop on the kind of argument you’d hear at the family dinner table—only with better audio—this is your show.
Eden
00:00
It's sexist, it's racist, and I had a pretty okay time.
Peter
00:14
Welcome back to the middle of culture. I am one of your co-hosts, Peter.
Eden
00:18
And I am your other host, Eden. Eden, how is it going? You know it's toasty today. Yeah. It's not as bad as it was yesterday. Yes yesterday was very warm. Today it was mostly warm. Um but you know it's been it's nice outside. We uh I don't know if I ever mentioned it on this podcast. We uh put in a covered patio uh last year. So it we have been spending a lot of time on our covered patio this spring, and that has remained true. I s Was out there this afternoon with a friend and we just like sat on the patio in the shade for like two, two and a half hours, drank some tea, chatted. It was great. Nice. How about you?
Peter
00:55
What you been up to? Uh not much. Interestingly it is the opposite here. It has gotten quite cool.
Eden
01:01
Oh, the cold is coming tomorrow for us. Highs of fifty something.
Peter
01:11
Yep. And and we're we're moving the other direction, looking towards seventies by this weekend. It was a little silly. I went uh did my usual early morning go out and kind of just on Sundays I like to just go for a walk, you know, no weights, no just just give myself a little bit of a a a movement break and I'm out there and I I knew it was cool so I'd thrown on gloves and a stocking cap but still just a short sleeve shirt and tee and shorts and I'm walking along and all of a sudden I'm like, what was that? And I look around and I'm like, uh-oh, there's another one. And then I was like, oh, and there's a lot of them. It is snowing.
Eden
01:49
Oh, well.
Peter
01:50
But you know, it's all melted and it's about 50 now. So It's it's it's all good. But I had a little trip down to it was it was an interesting bit of climate shock. So I went down to Austin, Texas last week for for Intuitive Connect, their annual big conference for DaVinci robotic surgery, and they're always, you know, talking about their new things or either showing off new stuff or hyping up older stuff trying to convince you that you're feeling miss you're missing out that you don't have it. Um but hey, it was a trip to Austin to which I've never been and it was interesting. It was good and it was all on intuitives dime they sent me down and everything, so I can't complain That's always nice. But I flew back Friday, and as I am getting on the plane at about two o'clock Friday afternoon, it's 91 degrees. And I land and I'm walking out to get to my car in Salt Lake City, and it is 38 degrees. Wow. So it was it was a bit of a bit of a shock going from Austin to to Salt Lake and having you know, almost what 50-55 degree difference in temperature in the course of two and a half hours. But, you know. It it was it was it was uh was a good trip and it was interesting and I did pick up a few things and like I say, you know, it's good to go to those things sometime. I've been invited in the past and I never really uh decided to go so uh this was this was a good opportunity for me i'll put it that way nice but well what you been checking out
Eden
03:33
You know, um, it's been pretty low energy around here. Okay.
Peter
03:37
I I I echo that. I I feel that and I echo it.
Eden
03:42
So not a not a ton of new and exciting things to talk about. Um the new expansion for Final Fantasy XIV got announced this week. Okay. It is called Evercold. And as far as I can tell, the idea behind it is absolutely idiotic. So I've got to go back. I gotta go back to Aeorzia, guys. Ethereus is calling my name. So I've been playing Final Fantasy XIV again. Um I made a new character on a totally new data center that I've never been on before Um and founded pretty cool free company. They're very cool people, very friendly. So I'm having a pretty fun time just getting back into a game that I love a lot. Just in time for it apparently to get real stupid here. We'll see. Uh yeah, I've made a new character. I have a stupid gimmick. that my new character only uses only will pick classes if you explicitly are using magic to do that class.
Eden
04:41
Okay. So obviously I picked up your panoply of mages, white, black, red, blue. And then I was like, I want to do a a tank of some ilk. Well dark knight literally stabs their nut their sword into the ground and then magical spikes appear from the ground. So that's magic. Let's go. True. Uh I think I'm gonna pick Reaper as my uh melee DPS because You literally make a pact with a demon. That's some magic shit. So, you know, it's been fun to have an excuse to go back and play a game uh in a in a new light. Because I haven't played uh in a long time and uh I've been having a lot of fun with it.
Peter
05:20
Nice.
Eden
05:21
Um let's see what else. Oh, in terms of game playing, last Sunday a the low the local uh board game cafe, board game lounge, whatever you call those, uh had a let's learn how to play Mahjong day. So a bunch of friends and I all went over to learn how to play Rishi Mahjong, Japanese Mahjong. Okay. Uh because it's a thing I've been interested about. I think I've brought it up. You mentioned it before. talked about ma uh mahjong soul with the big titty anime ladies. Um but I was like I'd like to figure it out and I'd like to have someone who I could bounce like questions off of because that's the hardest part with any of the The online games is it's you don't have a person that you can just be like, okay, explain to me why this didn't work. Explain to me what I did wrong here, or explain to me what I should do in this or in this circumstance. So having some experienced players there who were explicitly there to teach you how to do it, walk you through different, oh, you know, maybe you if I were in this position, I would probably make this choice and not that choice. Or here's why this works, here's why this doesn't work, was really, really fun. Um, so I have been, you know, plunking away at Mahjong again. This is also one of the things I went back to Final Fantasy XIV for. Because you you can just play Mahjong in the uh casino in Final Fantasy XIV. There you go. So I have been playing, I have been playing Mahjong at the gold saucer. Because why not? Um, but yeah, it's been a lot of fun. It really made me want to get a mahjong set finally, because them little clacky tiles. There's just something satisfying about that.
Peter
07:00
Yep.
Eden
07:01
And here's the thing, like I we talked about Roma Cube and why Roma Cube is cool. Yeah. I think we've talked about that here. Because it's got because it's got the little tiles. And the little tiles is better than cards. I mean Romacube's just gin rummy. Yeah. But it's got tiles. But what if those tiles were fat and thick and extra clacky?
Peter
07:21
And and kind of looked like you wanted to like you can't decide. Do you want to take a bite out of it or do you want to play with it?
Eden
07:27
Yeah, we were talking about how especially because often they have like the door layer. Yeah. Like they have the colored back. We were like they evoke and they're often a green back, so they evoke to me haribo Frogs. Oh yeah. Where it's like the the pillowy top that has the mahjong symbol on it, and then the thicker gummy underneath. And I was like I would fuck up a bag of Mahjong gummies so fast. I want to eat these boys. Anyway, uh, so I have been doing a lot of uh of soul searching to be like, what should I buy uh for my Mahjong set? So that we can we can play Mahjong.
Peter
08:05
Nice.
Eden
08:06
Um, let's see, what else have I been up to? I've been reading a new book series. Uh It is a book series. It's often called the Clem and Wist series. Okay. Um, and is kind of a contemporary fantasy series. Um And it it's set in this world uh where every single person has the potentiality to either be a mage or a healer. Most people can't engage with those things at all. They're basically like you know, they they have a magic core or a healer core, but they can't do anything with it. It's whatever. But those who are mages have a certain amount of of like basically m arms that like everyone has this metaphysical core that you can kind of perceive magically and you'll have like uh you know phalanges that come off of it And each one of those you can basically train to be a t a spell type. So the more of those things coming off your magical core, the more powerful a mag a magician you are, right? Uh and so the and then a healer, healers cannot do magic themselves, but what they can do is they can manipulate uh a mage's core in such a way to make it easier for them to do magic because as uh he as a mage does magic They're, you know, the the like kind of arm things, the magical offshoots, kind of get tangled up. And so it causes a lot of chronic pain um for mages. And if it's not like addressed uh over a long period of time then they can go berserk and kind of lose their minds. Um and so healers can basically massage those tangles out. of a mage's core so that they're able to to alleviate pain, um, able to keep their sanity. So that's why they're called healers. Um, but the the premise of this book takes place in one of the, you know, nations in this world where basically it is a majocracy. Mages are the only ones who have power, and healers are de facto second-class citizens. Because uh another thing that happens in this society or in this world. Is that a mage and a healer can bond to each other, um, like metaphysically, and that makes it so that that mage can only be healed by their particular healer But they are much more powerful, much e it's much easier for them to manipulate their magic. They're able to regrow uh any damages to their magic cores much more quickly, all those sorts of things. But that again means that healers basically are second-class citizens, two mages. And once you are bonded, you have a legal obligation to assist your mage with anything that they ask you to do, essentially. Um, so it it's really thorny in that way. But what's interesting is the two main characters, Clematis and Wisteria, are two people who met uh at school and Clematis is a genius when it comes to healing. She is able to heal better than anyone else and can just perceive things better than just about anyone else. and eventually figures out how to hobble mages to essentially twist up their cores so they can't do magic for a set s a set period of time. And then it kind of can can unravel and then they they can do magic again. And she happens to meet Wisteria, who is only the second Kraken class mage to ever have existed in the history of the world. And what's a Kraken class mage, you might ask? Someone who has an innumerable amount of magical phalanges from their magic component. So she can literally do anything. No way. She is like her her power is incalculable. And so the two of them, you know, become friends and eventually, you know, lovers as young as as young people. And make all these big plans about how they're going to try to fight for healer rights in this society. They get whisted onto like the mages council because when you're literally the most powerful mage in uh thousands of years, you you ask to be on the council and they put you on the council.
Peter
12:31
Sure, sure, totally.
Eden
12:33
Uh and so they're doing all this to try to get a vote passed for healers' civil rights, like a healer's rights bill essentially. And so they get to there's 26 people on the Mage Council that rules this this nation They've got 13 people on their side. So Clem is like, well, you just need one person to not show up for a vote. And then it's a binding vote. And it's 12 to 13. And so she tries to make a uh a an accord with maybe some dissidents or some people maybe from some other countries to delay one of the opponents of the bill. They do not they delay him in a a permanent way. Oh. Uh rather than a temporary way. Which gets Clem caught and sentenced to life in prison. And so the book opens as she is seven years into her prison sentence. She has not seen Wist since. Wist is the person who turned her in. Uh, and so she has not seen her since. And she is basically works for the government from prison hobbling mages that have like a prison sentence or whatever. And then this uh maid shows up and says, hey, uh Wist's power is all gone and no one can figure out what happened. You have 30 days to see if you can help her. No. If you can fix her within 30 days, pardon If you can't, jail for the rest of your life. Of course. And so that is where the book that's where the book opens. And I don't really want to tell you more than that because it keeps going from there. There's six books in the series so far. Um I've read the first two and a half. Uh it's real good. Like really, really solid writing. Uh one thing that I think is very interesting in reading like reactions online to this series. versus how I have felt about it. I really like these two characters a lot. Like Clem and Wist are both really interesting snarky, mean, unlikable characters, and I really enjoy that about the book series. Like neither of them are particularly Nice people you'd want to hang around with. Sure. Like, whist is so emotionally dead and quiet and like the just like does not show emotion whatsoever. And Clem is Full of herself, thinks she's God's gift to the world and is just mean and persnickety and kind of rude about it. And online, that means people don't like this book series very much because they want sweet puppies as their main characters, I guess, for books. I like it, because they're rude and persnickety and you can't tell whether they want to kiss or if they wanna, you know, punch each other in the teeth. And I really, really enjoyed it. I'm I'm having a great time with it. I'm going to keep reading them. Uh the author also has like five or six other books that all take place in the same universe, the same world, um, but aren't necessarily about climat clematis and wisteria. Um I'm having a very good time. with it. Cool.
Peter
15:43
Anyway, what have you been up to? Very good. Well, you know, I figure it's time to come back to uh TikTok's favorite podcast within a podcast, and that is Let's Talk Dungeon Crawler Carl. Because it continues to uh drive an interestingly surprising amount of engagement on the socials, particularly TikTok. But no, I finished Dungeon Crawler Carl Book 7. I did see over the course of sometime in the last few weeks the word that that I had a little back and forth with the person who left the response and they were in they were very pleasant, very, very pleasant person Uh but we had a difference of opinion where I said, uh excuse me, you keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. And that word, my friend, was art. I referred to Dungeon Crawler Carl as entertainment, and I said, but I'm not gonna give it the credit of calling it art, and then was countered with a art is in the eye of the beholder and it is subjective, and then I said I think I will choose to not further engage because look, I had a ton of fun. Dungeon Crawler Carl book seven was fun. It was, you know, it wrapped up a few things. It introduced a few more things. It did exactly what a book in roughly the middle of the series needs to do. And I Oh, you know Book Seven's like mid-series? Well, I'm assuming, because you see, in the dungeon, if you're to complete the dungeon, which no one in the history of Dungeon Crawler World ever has The dungeon is 18 floors. And Book 7, they completed the ninth floor and are moving on to the 10th.
Peter
17:28
Okay. So that's why I'm assuming that we are roughly halfway through the series.
Eden
17:32
Only 18 levels? Come on, guys. Eincred had a hundred.
Peter
17:37
Yeah, well.
Eden
17:37
And Kirito did that. You know how he did that? Two swords. Oh. Two swords.
Peter
17:42
Well see.
Eden
17:42
You don't get this joke. You don't get this joke because you don't know anything about Sword Art Online.
Peter
17:46
No, I don't.
Eden
17:46
But Sword Art Online is um is an anime, it's a anime light novel series. The main character Kirito is like the most Mary Sue of Mary Sue's that's ever existed. And the way that he wins at the end of every single series is he goes. You've heard of one sword. But what if two sword? What if two sword? Because the whole premise of the first world that he's in is he's the only person that wields two swords, everyone else is like, ah, does she wield one sword? And he's like, Oh yeah, well I do one in each hand. And that wins the first game. And then they keep s the he basically becomes like a government agent going into other MMOs to fight and beat them. And I think he even goes to a gun one, and I think he also beats that with two sword. I mean as you do.
Peter
18:34
Gungeon crawler Carl just need a second sword, I'm thinking. You know, that's the problem, is he can't use weapons. He got enough buffs out from the get-go that he's He's gotta use his he's gotta use his fist and his feet, so it's gonna have to use two feet. Uh but yeah, so again Uh look, it's okay. And and again, when I say when I say that Dungeon Crawler Carl's not art, I'm not being critical. I am listening I am just like At least in my mind, art has gotta be something more. It's gotta be that there's got like again, I and I've used this comparison in the past. I'm gonna use it again. There I I'm seven books into Dungeon Crawler Carl. There's nothing about Dungeon Crawler Carl that makes me come back and think about it other than, okay, the next one will be fun. Sure. The Gone Away World by It doesn't provoke. No, it doesn't provoke. And that's the thing is The Gone Away World by Nick Harkaway is also a fiction novel. in in that case, sort of a dystopian post-apocalyptic future. And I think about that book all the time. And passages from that book bubble up in my readwise highlights all the time because in this ridiculous world. There are so many little moments of just profound observation about the world and humanity and things like that that it keeps coming back. I'll say, and again, the word art is weird, but I'll call the gone away world is literature. Dungeon Crawler Carl Is McDonald's.
Eden
20:15
It's a light novel. It's a light novel. Again. That's fine. I love light novels. I read a lot of light novels, but it's Mickey D's. It's not a really, it's not going to the French restaurant for a prefix six-course meal. Correct. And And you know what's fucking great sometimes? McDonald's.
Peter
20:34
Um McDonald's burger and fries. Yes. Again, Dungeon Crawler Carl was exactly what I needed it to be, which was I needed a palate cleanser from the heaviness, the existential heaviness of the gone away world. As well as the fact that it's a little different because it's translated from Chinese to English and all this, but I needed a break from that. And it's been exactly that, and it's been great. And I'm looking forward to in about a month book eight'll come out and I'll for sure check it out and listen to it and read it. But But I'm gonna just say it again. It's not art and that's okay. And that's okay.
Eden
21:12
That's okay. We don't listen No one's out here telling Matt saying Madam Webb's art, but I love that movie.
Peter
21:19
I mean, there's so many things we cover on this podcast that we love. That's our art. And that's okay. Speaking of McDonald's, so I will just say I'm I won't uh I won't go into too much detail, but I am now a little over halfway done with uh 12 months, the book 18 in the Dresden Files. I've actually It's interesting. There's been parts of it, and understandably, and it fits the story, but for about the first half, Harry Dresden is just depressed. and super mopey and after everything that happened in book seventeen it makes sense so it's okay. Welcome to the club Harry. Right But I've actually enjoyed that it has thus far, we haven't really had much in terms of big wizard battles and this and the other. It's been a lot more kind of contemplative and I'm actually really enjoying. In fact, there was this one scene that was building up and I was a little worried that it was gonna turn into some big failure and fight and all this kind of stuff. And and no, Harry Dresden has to stress himself and is able to remove a curse from a person. And then they move on. And I'm actually really enjoying that. And I don't know, I haven't looked. I have no idea what the reception of this book was. But it's definitely one of those where I could see people maybe being a little bent out of shape that again I'm about 60% into the book, and there hasn't I mean there's literally been one battle with some ghouls where Dresden kinda got his you know, his butt kicked a little bit. Very briefly. But other than that, it's been much more him trying to kind of get past the trauma of what happened in book 17 and establish a new life for himself in this really, really just kind of fucked up situation that he's been thrown into, where he's the winter knight, he's been kicked off the White Council of the Wizards, and he's been betrothed to basically the Queen of the White Court of the Vampires. Oh, okay. Who doesn't want to marry a vampire? And now he has his daughter there with him and So it's again, I'm really enjoying the fact that it's it's kind of slowed down. And I'm sure, I'm sure crazy shit's gonna happen because you know that's what's gonna have to happen at the end of the book, but whatever. Um interesting. Few music releases worth bringing up. There's been a lot lately. It was interesting. It was last week there was nothing, and it was kind of a nice break because there's been a lot. A couple that I was unfamiliar with and have been really pleasantly surprised. And then a couple that I knew were coming and didn't disappoint. So let's start with the surprise. A new album from the album Grief Collector, The Death of All Dreams. Grief Collector is just sort of a classic Doom metal band. Rob Lowe is the vocalist. He was the second longest vocalist for Candlemass, which is like the epic doom metal band, um, you know, that really kicked it all off with their classic, I think, 1986 album, Epicus Doomicus Metallicus. Um so Roblo sang for them for a number of years in the 2000s and 20 teens. Uh and Grief Collector is kind of his his In that same vein, classic Doom Metal uh style. Uh I stumbled across thanks to a review on the Angry Metal Guy blog. a new album called Catabasis, a Marriage Amongst Among Ashes by the band A Dream of Poe. Apparently this is mostly a one-man act from, I believe, Portugal. Uh it is kind of doomy gothic, symphonic. Uh you know, kind of again, there there's a theme you'll see going on here, which is things are a little dark, but hey, it kind of just fits where things are these days. So maybe that's why I'm loving the gothic and doomy and that kind of stuff. But uh it's a really cool album that I haven't dived into a ton, but I went and it was one of those I go to the bandcamp page. There's all of the uh the the the band's releases for like 40 bucks and I was like yes I will get these all and within like two hours I had a lovely little email personally from the dude who was like hey peter I saw you bought my whole you know discography thank you so much for the support really means a lot that stuff's cool I mean that's just cool like I love that we can have those sorts of interactions with certain things. You know, big big bands, big label kind of stuff. That's not gonna happen, but it's kind of cool to you know, be able to buy music on Bandcamp basically directly from an artist and have them reach out and say things. Another one, uh same sort of more of a death doom than gothic doom, Avertat, Dead End Life Avertat is the brainchild of the one of the guitarists, founding guitarist and principal songwriter of the German Death Doom band December Noir. Uh they I I really like some of their albums. I mean it's some real real depressing sounding stuff. Avertat is uh similar in some ways but kind of pulls what I am now forever going to refer to as the um uh the guilt machine move where he he the the guitarist he does all the instruments and then he does the harsh vocals and then he got this complete non-metal vocalist young guy to come in and do the clean vocals. Sort of like, you know, the the I'm blanking on his name, but the guy who did the vocals on the Guilt Machine album was a pop singer from the Netherlands that Arjen Lucasen pulled in to do that. So it's it's a cool dynamic and I've really, really enjoyed that. And then a couple interesting albums in that one we know is a swang song, one maybe a swang song. Uh the EP, The Cloud of Unknowing by Sepultura dropped. They have announced that you know they're going on tour and then they're calling it quits. I have a hot take about Sepultura. And that is that since Max Cavallera left and Derek Green joined, Sepultura has been pretty much at least as good or if not in some ways better than when the Cavallera brothers were still with Sepultura. And I know that there's a bunch of people who are like
27:54
Oh, ever since Max and especially once Max and Igor left, it's not Sepulchre anymore. And why are they using the same name?
Peter
27:56
And I'm like, Well because Paulo Jr. has been in the band since eighty four and Andreas Kisser has been in the band since eighty six and has been the principal songwriter since that time And they're still in the band, so fuck you, they can use the name Sepultura. And if the Max and Igor wanted to leave because they were butthurt for some reason, they don't get to decide what the rest of the band does. And it kind of sounds like Max and Igor have been a bunch of little bitches about it all ever since, because Andreas Kisser even like tried to reach out and was like, hey, we're calling it quits as a band. We'd love to do some shows with you guys.
Peter
28:31
and Max and Eero were like, no, we're not going to. 'Cause they're just a bunch of little bitches. Uh but I've listened to this. It is classic modern Sepultura. It is it is heavy, it is a little thrashy, it is a little deathy, it's a little progressive. Uh it's what has made Sepultor, I think, a great band for the last 20 plus years. And uh it will be sad to have them hang it up, but at the same time You know, it's okay. You kind of would rather a band go, you know what, we've run our course, we've done what we want to do, than continue to bury drive things into the ground. Um And then the final album that I will mention is the latest from At the Gates, The Ghost of a Future Dead. Eden, are you familiar with At the Gates? No. So At the Gates in 1996 released Slaughter of the Soul, widely regarded as one of the greatest death metal albums of all time. and really put the Gothenburg death metal sound on the map. It was kind of between in flames and at the gates at the time. And uh so they dropped Slaughter of the Soul in ninety six and then they broke up And didn't get back together and I think it was like 2011, 2012, released a new album in 2014, put out a few others since then. I actually saw At the Gates Live. It was at the gates. Um It was At the Gates and oh, who was the other band? And then Amana Marth. Uh Arch Enemy. There we go. It was At the Gates, Arch Enemy, and Amana Marth. They were excellent live. Well, they were working on this album. And Thomas Lindbergh, the lead vocalist, was diagnosed with adenoid cystic carcinoma. He in one day went in and recorded like demo tracks of all the vocals because then he immediately had to go and have pretty aggressive surgery, have his whole like soft palate removed and then had to have radiation for this. Uh and ultimately actually died from admin cystic carcinoma. And so the band completed the album and used those one day of sort of demo recordings as all the vocals. for the album that Thomas Lindbergh during his treatment may have had some sort of premonition and asked that they change the name of the album. from Dissonance Something. It was named after the second track. I'm gonna tell you right now real fast what it was supposed to be. The Dissonant Void Uh in his treatment, Thomas Lindbergh was like, I think we should change the name of the album. And the name that's come to me and is sticking out for me is The Ghost of a Future Dead. Anyway, it is uh there's a lot, you know, there's a lot of baggage, obviously, with an album like that. And the good news is, is it is really, really good I mean, it is just top-tier melodic Gothenburg death metal that just has that classic sound and feel to it that that uh at the gates really are the pioneers of. Nobody really knows what the future of the band is, uh, but at the very least it went out with uh Thomas's last uh last album being A Real Banger. So, all right Shall we talk about our main topic? And this is going to be really interesting to see where this goes because this Again, with the travel, with everything else that's going on, with us having done a couple movies. Again, you know, I think we like to get a break from just doing movies every now and then. I reached out to Eden and I was like, hey, this will be pretty easy. What if we just read some of the G. I. Joe compendium comics? And so I I sent those to you, shared those with you. And I don't know what you we didn't even say, hey, let's read this much. It was just, hey, here's some comics. What did you end up reading, Eden?
Eden
32:15
I read the first three or four issues, I want to say, the first four or so.
Peter
32:20
Perfect. I did the same thing, so nice. So l this these are from again. uh the the compendium that was done similar to the Transformers one uh they're actually doing a second compendium for the later era G. I. Joe comics now.
Eden
32:35
Yeah, because the ones that first came out were just the first hundred and fifty-five of the Marvel run, right? Correct. Yep. And so now they're doing one for the Devil's Do run. And is is it both are they are they getting both Devil's Do and IDW out in this next chunk?
Peter
32:51
You know, I I looked at it briefly and it was very confusing to me what was what and it was Honestly, I was in a hurry one morning when I pledged on Kickstarter, so I don't know for sure what it was. I was like, sure, I'll get the other half of of what they're doing.
Eden
33:07
Well, that's essentially what it is, because the the book went famously for almost 300 issues before it got re-re-started. with Skybound, which is going right now. It's at like 320 something. Um, but between the Marvel, the Devil's Do, and the IEDW era, they got Within like spitting distance of 300. 300 might have been the last issue that IDW published. And so I know that if that first half, the first two compendia were the Marvel era Up through like 150 or so. Yeah. I gotta imagine they would do another one for the other hundred and fifty.
Peter
33:44
I have to think because it is similarly four books, just like the the first compendium was. Uh and so that would make sense that it is is similar in size and scope. So Yeah. Well, so what did you think of of reading some old classic G. I. Joe comics?
Eden
34:02
Um I when I first sat down to read 'em, I was like, I don't know about this one, guys. I really don't know about this one Okay. And so I took a couple days away from it. And then it was an hour and a half before we were going to record. And I was like, well, I've read 10 pages. of comics. I should probably read more than 10 pages. Okay. So I sat down and I just kind of, you know, blitzed through those first four issues. And honestly, I had a much better time. Revisiting it today, I think I recalibrated my expectations.
Peter
34:33
Yes.
Eden
34:33
Because here's the thing: this is a famous series. Again, 300 plus issues. All of them essentially written by Larry Hama. There's a couple fill-in issues that he didn't write, but he has had story direction over this thing since before I was born. The first issue came out, I think, in 82. Yeah. Um, and so he has been running this for a hot minute. And, you know, I guess my question is What what's the what is the allure? Because again, we have people were so excited when Skybound relaunched it with Hama, because they essentially have two G. I. Joe comics going right now. There's the one that ties into those Transformer comics that we've read that uh that Joshua Williamson has been writing. And then they were just like, Larry. Go to continue your 300 plus uh issue epic. And people were so excited. People were bouncing off the walls with excitement. And I have always wondered, what's the deal there? Like what are they so excited about And so I was hoping to have an answer to that. And I'm still not sure I have an answer. Okay. No, I'm not sure I have an answer. I I didn't have a bad time with it, but also, at least in these first four, it's just It I I don't understand how it developed the um the cult following that it Sure, sure I don't know. What do you thought?
Peter
36:02
Yeah, I had a similar I had a similar experience though in a more condensed timeframe because I read all of them this morning. And so for me it was, I start out and like I I swear somewhere between that I read the first And then there's like this not really a second issue, but like another little short story kind of thing in there. And I was like, oh dear Lord, am I gonna have to read one of these after every one? Because I I was I was not loving it Yeah. And then as I continued to read them, I don't know if again, was it that I recalibrated? Was that I just got used to it? Did they get a little better? I don't know. But I found myself slightly charmed by the end.
Eden
36:52
Yeah That is also how I felt by the time I got through here's the thing. When you get to issue three and it's got a big ass mech that puts itself back together That's where I was like, okay, Larry. Okay, you got me. You got me, bud. Yeah, like that's what you meant. That was absolutely that was absolutely what caught my attention was okay, let's Let's let's play.
Peter
37:18
Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know that I'm even gonna bother uh giving any reasoning.
Eden
37:23
There's nothing to sum. There's nothing to summarize. You know. Hey Yo Joe, there's some there's some white people and one black man doing some racism to some people in the Middle East. And Cobra is Sometimes there and sometimes not. Right. Sometimes it's also sometimes it's also racism against Eskimos.
Peter
37:43
Race. That's true, it's true, because we got Well and and we have we have some sexism. I mean we we got all the we're just bringing it all together. We've got sexism.
Eden
37:52
I mean the first It's a nineteen eighties it's a nineteen eighties uh military hoorah Uh comic book, guys. Yeah. It's sexist, it's racist, and I had a pretty okay time.
Peter
38:04
We have we we got the first episode, you know, they've got to rescue this lady who created un unknowingly or unwittingly somehow created some doomsday device. And and I love that multiple times members of the team are just like
Eden
38:18
Well, if she's that dangerous, like let's just- Why don't we just let her die?
Peter
38:22
Like let's just drop a b- Yeah.
Eden
38:24
Drop a bomb on the whole fucking island. Like we take out Cobra. We take out this lady who's a traitor to the government, essentially.
Peter
38:31
Yeah, so it's like We got that one and then I think what the second one was the one in the Middle East, right?
Eden
38:36
Yeah. Yeah, where it's like Scarlet's Where Scarlet's like you guys get you guys get the tape with the evidence against the bad Muslims to our friends who are in brown face at the ho in the town ten miles from here. Yep. And then And then they're like, I thought I was in love with Scarlet and I also thought you were in love with Scarlet, Snake Eyes who never speaks in any of these issues. Maybe you're Are you deaf? Are you are you mute or you don't have a tongue? I don't know. I don't know, Snake Eyes Deal, he never speaks. I mean that's the funny thing is
Peter
39:06
And I I don't know if this is a sign, is is this a factor of the time it was written? Is this a factor of the nature of these G. I. Joe comics in particular? But you know, we get zero motivation. Or Cobra at all. Zero backstory, nothing. Like we just jump in and here's Cobra, and he's got he he's got the little shroud over his face with the eye holes, and then he puts on his battle helmet.
Eden
39:35
Yeah, you got both of them there. You're like two action figures. Yeah. Two action figures, one guy. Yeah.
Peter
39:39
We've got Baroness there, and then that's it. All we have so far. But it's like we don't know anything other than Here's I mean there's stupid things where it's just like guys why are you advertising? You know when Baroness grabs the lady she gets pulled up to this like with a balloon and a rope. They get pulled up. They get pulled up to this big.
Eden
40:02
She puts on a gas-powered uh blow-up balloon and is like, strap those things down so you don't dislocate your shoulders. Boom, and then they go up to a helicopter. How does it not get caught in the helicopter blades?
Peter
40:13
But but here's the thing: the helicopter in the middle of day emblazoned with a great big red cobra symbol on the side. And then and then we've got at some other point we've got helicopters coming in. They're waiting. It's in that third issue. So we've got the mech. the mech that has been taken into the depths of I mean so many dumb things. The depths of G. I. Joe's base, which is like six floors below the ground. And, you know, it's talking about it's impregnable all the impregnable impregnable. But Up at the top of it, up at the top of it, we literally have vents that are carrying the smell of people cooking bacon and eggs, or the smell of the robot being set on fire. And like it's it's so dumb. But but in the middle of that one, you know, we've got Cobra waiting for the robot to be able to reactivate itself, to get to the outside, send a signal where the base is, so they can come and destroy it. And they've got now helicopters that are not emblazoned with a cobra symbol on the side. No, no. These are helicopters that are shaped. Like the head of a cobra. I mean.
Eden
41:26
It's almost like, it's almost like this was designed to sell action figures to young boys. Almost like. Even more than those Transformer comics, the UK Transformers comics felt like I am designed to tell you to go buy some action figures.
Peter
41:47
Yep.
Eden
41:47
Yep. And yet I was kind of charmed.
Peter
41:51
I do want to read more of it. That's the thing, is you know, we get to that fourth one, and that's the one with the big Eskimo dude who, you know, he he follows his contract. He follows his contract. And so You know, he delivers the thing to to the Russians and no to Cobra. I don't even remember.
Eden
42:10
It's the Russians. Cobra was not even in that one. That too was one of those ones where Cobra missed not appearing in this film. Cobra.
Peter
42:17
He's just taking stuff to the Russians because, oh, that's right. The Russians were were gonna develop a fear thing. So we almost had he gives this one little speech to the G. I. Joe's that I'm almost like Oh, oh, oh, are we getting a are we gonna get a fear is the mind killer moment here?
Eden
42:31
But we did not quite that would have been pretty cool.
Peter
42:34
I mean, I thought it would have been cool too, just to know that Dune exists in the world of G. I. Joe. But alas, we did not. But I'm the same. As I was going along again, the first one, I was just like, oh man, this is rough. And the second one, I was like, oh, you're not getting any better. And then the third, I'm like, okay, this is silly. We've just got, you know, Hawk and Scarlet who are up there trying to distract all of the chaplains. From the fact that they're smelling things coming up from below the chaplains. And then by the time we get to the fourth, you know We've got a fear weapon that the Russians were pointing at the at the Americans, but then g it caused them to die. I mean, it's just it was silly. And I was kind of ready to read a little bit more.
Eden
43:21
Yeah. And uh yeah, I I kind of started to get it. And I was like, okay, I'm I'm ready. I'm I'm ready to maybe I don't know that I'm 300 issues ready. Maybe very, very, very long term. It would have to take because part of the thing is, it is again just seeing the way that comics have changed over time. The amount of panels per page, the amount of words per panel, how wordy these things are. It's not as bad as like a 60s comic. Like you go back and you try to read some of those early Marvel things from the 60s. Stan Lee does not know when to shut the hell up when he's writing a comic. Everybody overexplains everything on the page. And this is not quite that level of bad. But it also doesn't just trust you as the reader to in to like infer what's happening. Like it it really feels like I'm gonna get on into like comics theory a little bit.
Peter
44:19
Please, because again, there's not much more to talk about in these issues themselves. That's true.
Eden
44:23
This this might be a little shorter one. So please. But uh it it really comes down to like The influence of manga on Western comics, knowing how to uh there there's a movement in late 90s and especially early 2000s Western comics, especially superhero comics, called wide the widescreen comics movement. Largely popularized by Brian Hitch, most explicitly in the book The Ultimates, written by Mark Millar, drawn by Brian Hitch. And Hitch, I don't care for Hitch's art. He's very popular. Um I know why people like him. He's not to my taste. Uh, but I'm not gonna say he's not talented. It's just not for my I just don't like it very much. But the thing about Hitch is he knew how to tell dynamic uh stories through the action. in bigger, more uh action-packed paneling. Okay. Um, and so a lot more two-page spreads, a lot more dynamic paneling choices when it turns in terms of like It'll be a big two-page spread with a la a very large panel that covers most of those pages, and then like a spattering of things along the top left and a spattering of things along the bottom right. Or those sorts of things which are very much influenced by what you're seeing in the manga that's coming over in the 90s. Dragon Ball, uh, you know, Blade of the Immortal. Um Stuff like that where where there's a big focus on action in the artwork. That's not what you get in these older things And so they don't trust you as the reader as much to look at a few panels and be like, I can read what's happening here. I can Infer the action that's occurring. You don't need to explain to me, I'm running back to base because I need to get back to the base, which is somehow sometimes how Overe-xplained, especially 60s and early 70s, silver age comics are. Now, by the time we get to 82, we are firmly in the Bronze Age. Honestly, late Bronze Age. And so we are doing less panels per page, we're doing bigger panels, we're doing sometimes larger page spreads, um, more of a focus on dynamism in the art, but it is still overexplained. Those scenes between the two generals back at the Pentagon, that grinds every issue to a halt The minute it's Flag and Allen or whatever their stupid names are, as soon as those two dudes are talking, you're like, okay, I'm bored for the next three pages. Like, let me Skim and move forward till we start shooting guns again. And then eventually it starts to pick up uh the pace again. But it is it's just really interesting to see this kind of in this interstitial period. in between over-explained silver age style and expansive, you know, uh modern period comics that we get in the 90s and 2000s. And and I would be very curious to go pick up issue 324 and see how Larry Hama, if he has changed the way that he structures a book. if he has moved in and and modernized the way that he's doing his storytelling over the last 40 years or not, you know? I'd be very curious. Next time I go into the comic shop, I'm gonna pop the last issue of a real American hero open and just see what see what it has in store for me.
Peter
47:50
Yeah, I would be curious to hear.
Eden
47:52
kind of how And I know that he does oh go ahead.
Peter
47:55
Just to hear how does it compare? You know, what is what is that uh difference there?
Eden
48:01
Well, and I know that we're looking, again, we looked at really early stuff. He gets a lot more uh inventive with some of his choices. There is famously an issue called the silent mission. Which is an entire 22-page comic that doesn't have a single word of dialogue in it. And it is Snake Eyes going on a mission, because as we talked about, Snake Eyes apparently mute. Character doesn't speak, does do, does sign language, which apparently only Scarlet understands, which that's a choice, whatever. Um Uh Scarlet being the one woman on the team. The one. She's the only one who can interface with the disabled man. We could talk about as we don't need to get into these things. But So the so this is a really famous issue that doesn't have a single word of dialogue is told entirely through the art Um, so you know that Hama gets inventive later on and fairly quick. I want to say that's in the forties or fifties, so within a few years. Anyway, uh so I i I I love that that he clearly does get like a little more excited about things and and grows as an artist and as a writer. He's fairly young when this starts, because he's still working today. I want to say he's in his 60s, which means he'd be in his early 20s when this book started, maybe mid-20s, and had to invent so much of this from scratch alongside Hasbro. He was making up stuff, and then Hasbro was like, okay, slap it in a toy. It's like the opposite of what Transformers was. Because with Transformers, they were presented with the toys and they said, name these fuckers. Like, here's a here's a truck. His name in Japanese is Convoy. What do you want to name him? And they were like, Convoy's a bad name. Let's call him Optimus Prime, which is a better name.
Peter
49:51
It is.
Eden
49:52
I ain't out here saying Convoy's a better name than Optimus Prime. It absolutely is not. Um and so, you know, they they were given toys and then built a world around those toys. But I know that G. I. Joe was more collaborative in that Hama was making dudes and then they went and made those toys after he made a dude Um, so that is just interesting to see how influenced it was. But I think another thing that's interesting, I was talking to a friend about this the other day. Who's Mr. not appearing in any of these issues? The main G. I. Joe guy, Duke.
Peter
50:27
Yeah.
Eden
50:28
Which, to be fair, who's the main G. I. Joe guy in these issues? Hawk. It that's just Duke, I know. He's a he's a blonde man with a flat top. That's what Duke is, but in the TV show he was named Duke, and here he's named Hawk But that's because he's not Duke. They introduce Duke later on, apparently, and he becomes the main character much, much, much later. Okay. And I know for a while there is a black guy that is essentially the lead. for a whole chunk of these issues before Duke gets introduced. So I really would be curious to see, like, where does he go with this? Like, cause there was some weird kind of like I said, kind of weird racist stuff. But again, from a guy who's like an Asian American, he's not like a white guy. Larry Hamas is not a white guy. He's an Asian American guy. So I'm just, I don't know. I'm just curious. to see how long does it take him to get out of this kind of tropey, uh, kind of messy, just like I'm watching a Commando with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Just as violent, just as over the top, just as racist. Yep. I don't know. I had it I'm glad we read it. I'm glad I have these now to pick away at when I feel like it. Uh it was it was more fun than I thought it was gonna be, especially after my first Stab at it. It took me a time or two.
Peter
51:51
Yeah, I'm with you in that again full disclosure. I'm reading the first issue or two and I'm thinking to myself I've made a horrible mistake. Why did I made a hundreds of dollars mistake? Did I kick start these and then I just did some more? What is wrong with me? The nostalgia hit too hard because I have very fond memories of watching the G. I. Joe cartoon as a kid. And and the thing is is, you know, it always seemed like A season would end with like a multi-part big one. I remember one that was like three lasers, like a blue one and a red one and some uh anyway, there's So in my head, I I was like, oh, I gotta I gotta jump on these. And I'm reading the first issue or two and I'm like, oh no. What did I do? But again, even over the course of just those first four, I was like, okay, okay, I'm kind of more into this now. So I think I'll do the same. I will occasionally just something to pick down pick away at when you're sitting at your PC. I mean, see the good news for me is I just threw them on my big iPad that's got this gorgeous OLED screen and I'm using the Panels app which is this really, really well-made uh app for reading comic books. And so I just threw them on there. And so I could just pull it out and go through and read an issue and put it back. And and uh yeah, it was it was interesting. I'm glad we did it. And I'm glad that I read more than the first two so that I don't feel all the regret that I was feeling while reading those. Me too.
Eden
53:29
I did go and check. Looked I looked at the Kickstarter that ended last week. Sure enough, it gets you all the way to 300. There you go. So it has all of the devil's do and all of the IDW stuff.
Peter
53:41
There we go. Well anything else you want to mention before we wrap it up today?
Eden
53:47
No, the only thing I will mention is uh I the only other G. I. Joe comic I've ever read is I read a single issue because I we talked about the silent issue that Snake Eyes did. One thing that they've been doing with the current run is there have been two mini series called Silent Missions, and then the one that is running right now is called Sss Silent Missions because it's Cobra Guys. Yep. So there's four S's at the start of Silent Missions. Which again did mean the other day when I was at the comic shop and Jackson was calling someone to tell them that we had their special order of that comic in. He did not say silent missions and I gave him a hard time about it. So then the next time he called that person, he said, I have issue number four of G. I. Joe silent missions here for you. Anyway. The only other G. I. Joe comic I've ever read is one of the issues of Silent Missions that was actually written by Phil Hester, who friend of the comic shop, Phil Hester, famous comics artist and writer. Um, who used to live in Iowa City, used to work at the shop that I work at, drew uh the logo 40 years ago that we're putting on a t-shirt for free comic book day. Nice. Uh But yeah, he's like a big name in comics and he wrote this one and then Danny, who is a kind of an up-and-coming artist, drew it, and it was a delightful issue. So if you want to see some cool comics that I was understood just fine without any context You could go pick up that G. I. Joe silent missions silent missions uh book with all four or four or five of those in there. I had a really good time with it.
Peter
55:18
Very cool. Very cool.
Eden
55:21
Oh, and the last thing I'll say, talking about free comic book day, next Saturday, Saturday the twelve the second, May 2nd, go to a local comic shop if you have one. Stop by Check out some stuff. The Dungeon Crawler Carl uh comic book is having its zero issue released on that day at free comic book day. So if you want to see Dungeon Crawler Carl in comic format. You can go pick that up. I flipped through it and I thought, oh, this seems like a dungeon crawler, Carl.
Peter
55:50
There you go.
Eden
55:51
It seemed cute. It seemed cute. I didn't have any context, but I did flip through it yesterday at the shop and I was like, oh, people are gonna be really excited about this one Very nice. But yeah, so there's, I'm sure that your local shop will have fun events. You know, stop by. Have fun.
Peter
56:04
Yeah.
Eden
56:05
Hang out.
Peter
56:05
Very cool. All right. Well, we'll be back in another couple of weeks. So go ahead and uh give us a give us a rating, leave a review, and uh share it with somebody else. And we'll talk to you then. See ya.