Show Vs. Business
Show Vs. Business
SvB E210 Oscars Go Woke? Snow White, Mandates & Backlash | Show vs Business
Theo and Mr. Benja break down the Oscars' new diversity mandates, explore the backlash around Snow White, and debate whether “woke” rules help or hurt creativity in Hollywood.
From Rachel Zegler’s controversy to the rise of inclusive casting—this is Show vs Business at its most real.
00:00 Introduction and Weekly Catch-Up
01:29 New York Adventures and Insights
06:35 Broadway Experiences and Musicals
15:31 March Madness and College Basketball
24:26 Comment Corner and Viewer Reactions
31:43 Foundation Series Plot Twists
34:12 Oscar Eligibility Controversy
50:52 Snow White and Wokeness Debate
57:26 Trailer Reactions: Happy Gilmore 2 and Minecraft
01:08:11 Closing Remarks and Future Plans
YouTube link to this Podcast Episode:
https://youtu.be/dlHLp-qL00A
#ReactionVideo #Podcast #ShowVsBusiness #Oscars2025 #WokeHollywood #SnowWhiteControversy #PopCultureDebate #DiversityInFilm #HollywoodBacklash #PopCulture #Streaming #Trailers
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Introduction and Weekly Catch-Up
Mr.Benja: Oh, not yet.
Theo Harvey: This is show versus business where pop culture means pop money with your host, the real Theo Harvey and Mr. Benja. So Mr. Benja, how was your week?
Mr.Benja: Oh, man. Week was actually good, man.
Embracing Introversion and Creativity
Mr.Benja: And I think the more I become detached from society and humanity, the better I feel. So this is really weird and I'm just going in on my Alex Hormoze plus one piece inspiration motivation trip.
And, I Hormoze was just like, Hey man, you get in there and do the work, and people say, come out to play with us. And he's no. And I'm like, wow, I am feeling that. Yes I am even further embracing this crazy introversion to do writer stuff and all that. It's great. I love it.
Theo Harvey: I love it.
Man, you in your mode, man. What they call muck mode, is that what they say? Muck mode. Yeah. Yeah. You just in there and trying to make it happen, brother. Yeah. I love it. I love it, man. For you.
Mr.Benja: And this and this diverse little cast around me, [00:01:00] this is actually more people than I've been around in a month now.
And it's very diverse. You got your, the Asian guy, there's a dark skinned guy, eyes closed, the sky looks, might be European of some sort. And just a little background of what's been going on behind me, in case you were wondering.
Theo Harvey: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. We'll get into that.
Representation doesn't really even matter. Care
Mr.Benja: inside an empty theater. Yes.
Theo Harvey: I love it. I love it. Oh man.
New York Adventures and Observations
Theo Harvey: So I got back from NYC Nice York.
Mr.Benja: Sun.
Theo Harvey: Sun. You do it. Yeah. No, is up to you. New York. New York. Anyway oh yeah, it was a bunch of stuff. We did, man. We did the Empire State Building. We saw late, went to Ellis Island, saw the Liberty Island, saw the Statue of Liberty went to nine 11 Memorial.
That was deep. Saw the Brooklyn Bridge. What else did we do? Saw some plays. New York [00:02:00] man, I had a hot take, man. I had a hot take while I was just walking to mean streets in New York, from Wall Street to Brooklyn, to Queens. Just getting the vibe. You walked to look.
I said, you know what? No. With the family, of course, okay. Just trying to get around and stuff. But it's everything is just so close by and never shuts down. You meet everybody from all across the world. So many different, nationalities. I'm sitting at the Starbucks, right?
From our hotel, and I don't know who's gonna walk in the door. It could be, different nationality comes in, different person, different language. You know what, I think the New York was the internet before the internet. That was my hot take man. Huh. And just a you the internet before
Mr.Benja: the internet.
So instead of sending the email, you just stick your head out the window. Hey, yo, I heard Bobby went to the hospital. Was that like
Theo Harvey: Exactly. I was talking to my family, when I had this epi epiphany walking the streets, I was like I. It is if you live there, you like, you got a guy, right?
You like, oh, I gotta get some cleaners done at 12 o'clock. [00:03:00] Who do I know? And then you got this other guy that knows a guy and it's all in the city, man. Yeah, because the city never sleeps. There's someone that does what you're looking for, just like the internet. You're looking for someone who can, you go to the chat room or try to find someone who can give, give you something what you need.
We talk, we're big. Was it Dr. Benjamin Hardy, he talks about like having partnerships. You can find literally partnerships in the streets anywhere in New York if you find the right person. Yeah. And then, so I was like, wow, man. And. But the challenge with New York is, and this another epiphany I just had just now, is it makes you seem so insignificant too, because the internet, you feel like you're oh I control everything.
You just don't know how big it is. 'cause you're in your own little world and you control that. Yeah. But once you're in New York, you like, there's so many people here, so many places, so busy. I, I'm very insignificant right now. I'm just one person in the city of 7 million,
Mr.Benja: one of, one of the times I was in New York, I ended up at an intersection.
I ended up taking a lap, like in a [00:04:00] clockwise direction. Instead of just going to the left like I wanted to, there was like a crowd of people moving and I was like, oh shoot, I should take a, I'm supposed to take a left here. But the crowd kept moving. And I started to cut through the crowd and I'm not a, a punk or anything, but the crowd was moving dog, and everybody was like, come on now, I gotta get, cars are honking.
And I'm like, alright, cool. I'm just gonna walk across the street anyway and walk right back. So I get to the other side of the street and the walk sign for the right side of the street goes, and I'm at the very corner, like about to fall into the street. So I'm like, I got Doggett let me see what's over here.
And I was just so much literally in the flow of things that I just decided to walk around all four corners of the block before going left, like I meant to in the first place. Wow. But you went
Theo Harvey: all the way out your way.
Mr.Benja: I had a fun trip dog. It was great. Glorious walking with the New Yorkers. I got yelled at once and yelled back at somebody once.
It was great. Just fun times.
Theo Harvey: Did you did you stay in New York any [00:05:00] length of time or was it just visiting always for you as well?
Mr.Benja: I've only been. In New York for, I'll say two weeks at a time.
Theo Harvey: Oh, okay. So what family or just hanging out and doing something? No.
Mr.Benja: When I was doing work for Rockstar Table Tennis, we were out there for a while.
Theo Harvey: Oh, okay.
Mr.Benja: That's where we did our motion capture. That's where I met Marlo from the Wire couple others. Yeah. So I was out there. We hung out for a little bit and yeah, it took some time.
Theo Harvey: Yeah, I've been there a couple times for work and, and even as entrepreneur, we had some customers up there in near Queens.
And so I would go visit folks. But yeah. This is the first time I did the, I think it's been 20 years. You remember our old roommate, Zach? I. Shout out Zach Jamat. Zack what? Zach? Hot Wings, ot, butter wings. Get at me. He's the only one. Just start getting that big pot. Throw some frozen wings in there and he hit wings up.
Make butter wings. All right, doc. [00:06:00] Do you bruh? Anyway, I went to go visit him. I think everybody had graduated. You all graduated four in four years. I was a slacker. I stayed around for extra years. So I think where everybody was gone working, I went and started visiting folks and I went to go see him, stayed with him, and then walked the streets of New York.
And it was just fascinating, man. Just, being so big and all different places I went to. And then I think at that time I was able to get into the crown of of the statue of Liberty. You can't do that as much anymore. I think there's some restrictions there now, but so I did have a good time, man with the kids and just, that whole experience and I'm glad they got to experience that.
Broadway Experiences and Reflections
Theo Harvey: One of the things I do wanna bring up is just Broadway plays. Are you a big play person, Mr. Benja, watching plays, going to them.
Mr.Benja: So I grew up, my mother sang opera and she was a professor of voice, so I grew up with a lot of that. Went to a lot of it when I was younger, then it fell off for me.
But the last thing I saw was Wicked. And I saw that at the Panta Theater.
Theo Harvey: Okay. So you, do you remember, was it the original cast? You know who [00:07:00] played the original characters? Yeah. It wasn't this newer one. It was the one
Mr.Benja: from last time they did the Wicked Run. Okay. Okay. Without the movie influence.
Theo Harvey: Okay, so you knew about the story and all that? Yeah. Which I never knew until I saw the movie. I was like, oh, wow, this is interesting. Yeah. So just so anyway so we had the chance to go see my kids, me and my wife shoot, almost 10 years ago. My son was first born, he's nine now.
We went on a whim. I said, let's just take a weekend. He's just born a month after he was born. Let's just go to New York. And I heard this play was amazing. People were talking about it. I said, let's go see this little play called Hamilton. So I bought, I, on a whim just went up there and I was amazed.
I had to buy actually four tickets.
Laugh: Yeah.
Theo Harvey: Because I they were all together. So I was like, crap, I spent all this money for these tickets. I'll just scalpel when I get there. So I'm over here. Never seen the play before. Yeah. So I'm over here, just young girl.
Mr.Benja: Wait, you mean, you said a play like on this level?
Theo Harvey: Yeah. Yeah. I never seen, I never went to a Broadway play. That was my first Broadway play. But I heard Hamilton was the play to go see. [00:08:00] So me and the Mrs flew up there for the weekend just to hang out in Times Square. And I, we were, I was trying, I had to sell my two other tickets.
'cause it was just me and my wife. So have four tickets. Yeah. So I'm over here trying to figure out how I'm gonna scalp these two tickets. This is, Ticketmaster was around and what's the other one? They, they have all kinds of scalpers now, but it wasn't as big as it was back then.
Like what, 10 years ago. So anyway I'm on the streets and this young girl, she's I need tickets. I'm trying to see Hamilton. Ooh, she's doing the SOB story. And she's I said how much you got? Because the ticket price, I think it was like 150 bucks. She said all I have is my birthday money and it is on this card.
You can have the card. I swear it's only 50 bucks on the card, but you can have what I got. I said, okay, come on. And so I gave her a ticket, her of my tickets for like a hundred bucks, even though it cost me probably 300. So I went and sent the play. I started watching it. At the intermission, I turned to her.
I said, I should charge you way more for those tickets. That plane was that phenomenal. I was like, this is, [00:09:00] I shoulda said, no way. I shoulda sold these for way more because that was like my first experience. I was like. This thing is amazing.
Mr.Benja: Dang, now I wanna go see it.
Theo Harvey: Yeah. So the kids went to go see the play, not with the original cast that me and my wife did, what, 10 years ago.
But they saw the play and they had a good time with their mother, with my grand their grandmother, my mother-in-law. And they actually, waited around, did that whole thing where you do, yeah. Broadway plays and, had the actors come out, make them sign their playbook and got some pictures of some of the actors.
So that was cool. Only in New York, man, it's just so
Mr.Benja: It kept them entertained. They were like engaged. Oh, they knew,
Theo Harvey: All, every young genzer, kid, they know Hamilton, you know that. So all of 'em, they knew every song. They couldn't sing it because this, just a theater you can't sing in a theater.
They were but they were. Super happy to see it. And then me and my, and me and my wife, we saw so now this whole thing, they call it jukebox musicals. Do, have you heard that term before? No. No, I haven't. It You remember that movie Mama Mia, back in the [00:10:00] day? Yes. And they, it, it started in play.
It was based on the music of abba. You can dance, you can, it is all that crap right Time, the time of your life. So they created a Broadway musical, based on their. Their song book, right? And that was phenomenal. Made a lot of money. The movie made a lot of money. They're doing the same thing with mj, the Michael Jackson play, and it's like basically a jukebox where they're playing his hits in the Broadway forum.
So Alicia Keys does the same thing with this movie, this play called Hell's Kitchen, which is basically about young girl growing up in Hell's Kitchen and who loves playing piano, right? Yeah. And so obviously Thinly Veiled spoiler alert is her right. Oh, no, why'd you say that? But yeah, definitely. Sorry.
But it is funny because you, if Alicia Keys songs, which, she's been around for 20 years now. It is interesting 'cause they changed the songs just enough and then they try to sneak 'em in there so you don't know when they're gonna show up. So you're sitting there listening to play.
Next thing you know, I keep on falling. You like, oh, there it is. [00:11:00] And so they try to switch it up a little bit. True story the lady who played her mother in it named the character named Jersey, she was actually Alphabet on Broadway in wicked, the witch in the green.
The has that big solo at the end, ah, yeah. So she could sing. She came out there and started singing her song that Alicia Key gave for the mother. It was amazing. She did this one riff where, it, so it was seemed like to me, because I'm sitting here in the on the st the stage, with the folks talking to people that left and, you get very close to people.
Yeah. You still talking to people. One person's from Dallas, other people from Boston, they're just like, Hey, we're just tourists. We're here. Just watch this play. So you get the sense that I guess the cast knows this. And so sometimes they play to the audience a little bit 'cause they're like, oh, these out of towners.
Let me go ahead and sing a little bit extra. Put a little. Stink on it, 'cause these travelers not, they're not New Yorkers, they're from Dallas, let's wow them with what we can do. And so they'll put a little stink on it.
When she was singing, I was like, oh, she's just trying to show out.
Mr.Benja: Nice. [00:12:00] Nice.
Theo Harvey: Anyway, make a long story short, phenomenal time, man. Just being in that city, like I was telling you before, the pod, Mr. Benja, I think, that energy, that creative energy and being around so many people.
Mr.Benja: Yeah. Yeah. Man.
Theo Harvey: I wish I did that in my twenties.
Now you're in your, late forties, you're kinda like, eh, I don't know if I want all that. But in your twenties, man, that's a perfect place to be, man. 'cause you just, ugh, I could do it.
Mr.Benja: Yeah. Nah, I, I'm thinking, I could go there in five years or whatever and just hang out.
I,
Theo Harvey: yeah. You could tell the city has changed after the pandemic and covid because, you hear a lot of stories. It was a ghost town, five years ago. And that's that's crazy. If you go to New York and you see all the people walking, all the action. Can you imagine that city just shutting down like that?
That's just, yeah. I can't even imagine what that was like for folks. And I was talking to one of our guides. He was saying how during the pandemic people walk to the Brooklyn Bridge and go out there to get haircuts. So you see people out there during the pandemic getting [00:13:00] haircuts on the bridge.
'cause you could walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, yeah. And so I thought that was interesting. So stories like that, man, just come out, man, when you realize, man, this is it. And I've been to all these different cities, traveled a lot. I know you've traveled a lot.
It's just every city's got its own little flavor. And New York is such a unique flavor man and such unique people. It's amazing to me.
Mr.Benja: Yeah, man. So I was okay, so when I was there I was hanging around soho and the Lower East side. That's, those are the areas I was hanging out at. And the amazing thing to me that I get nowhere else, is being able to just walk around and ask people, or look at, posts on in windows or on bulletin boards, actual bulletin boards.
Not like the computerized bulletin boards. Just walk around and find stuff going on. That kind of blew my mind. Like I, I walked into the Prada store, wasn't planning on buying, not Prada. I walked into the Louis Vuitton store, I. I wasn't gonna buy anything, and I just started talking. They're like, yeah, this art show is going, boom.
I'm [00:14:00] on it. An art show recommended by somebody shopping in a Louis Vuitton store. It's gotta be something, right? Yeah. So I walked there, started talking to those people, Hey, what's happening with, there's a blah, blah, blah, this, whole taste testing. The chef is trying out some new flavors and he just wants random people to show up.
Yeah, you can totally go up to the door. It looks like they're gonna charge you, but you can just walk in. They're like, cool. It just, I did that the entire one entire night, just walked around and kept asking people, where's the next thing? And I think I had to take a cab ride twice, just 'cause I didn't feel like walking.
But for the most part, everything was pretty much just like one block or two blocks away. Yeah. It was that packed with stuff. So I just love that. Can't get it anywhere else.
Theo Harvey: Yeah, you're right man. Just, I. Because you'll look at the map or trying to get to a place, oh, we're in Brooklyn. Why'd we get to Times Square?
It's only two miles, at two miles it's many blocks. Many people. And so yeah, take you about 30 minutes in a ride, right? A car. You're right. It's like every block is even walking downtown Brooklyn, [00:15:00] man, you could just, one minute I'm on juniors and this big old street next me, I'm down a corner and there's all these restaurants next minute.
It's like highfalutin area. So it's just everything's just like on top of each other, it's kinda weird. The blocks are like, diff whole worlds and communities and each block. So I do, you're right. There's another, we're back here in Florida. I'm like, shit, we go two, two miles, we may hit a Publix, yes. That's the only thing in New York, man. Yeah, man. Super, super hype. Yeah, we'll talk more about some interesting things.
March Madness and College Basketball
Theo Harvey: And one thing is, a couple other things I did, just to give you a highlight March Madness basketball is back. I'm a big basketball person.
Sports my brackets always busted. Mr. Bigge, have you ever done a bracket for March Madness? You know what that is, right?
Mr.Benja: I know. March Madness. I know, you start doing the whole bracket, you get down to the Final four and everybody loses their ish, even Barack Obama was doing the brackets.
That's
Theo Harvey: right.
Mr.Benja: Yeah, I know about the brackets, but it's, that's actually very entertaining to me, [00:16:00] watching other people get into their brackets and argue who's doing what and why it's happening this way, and, yeah. Never got college
Theo Harvey: basketball. Yeah, college basketball is so much different now.
Mr. Benji, if you, now they have what they call NIL money, name, image, and likeness money. So kids are coming in, right? They're getting like millions of dollars if they're like top prospect. And so basically, you remember back in the day, oh, amateurs, yeah. Good for you. You playing for the love of the game?
Nah, man, these cats are millionaires, man, even in college at this point. So that's changed the game. And then also you have this transfer protocol thing where basically any college player, no matter what program he could leave at any time. So basically if you have a terrible program, this what happened to Kentucky, one of the, you probably heard of Kentucky is like top one of the top, so the coach there, Cal Perry, he left like last year outta blue. And all these players said, I'm gone too. And they all left. So Kentucky was this blue bread college team. They had no [00:17:00] players and a new coach. So the coach had to recruit. College players from all over. He played the college player from New Hampshire, college player from California and created his own super team college players.
Yeah. And now they're, in the NCAA tournament, which is unheard of. So these kids have never played together before, but they're now super team. So it's like the, it's very interesting how this is all changing in real time. Gambling's a big part of this. We talked about gambling and how that's affected.
It's a big weekend, big week for Vegas. They always love March Madness. 'cause all the gambling when I was there two weeks ago, March Madness signs were everywhere, gambling, so yeah, man. I get into it. I enjoy the Thursday and Friday. I fall off a little bit the next weekend and I jump back in for Final Four.
So maybe I'll give you a highlight of on what's to come on there. But yeah, man. So it was a good weekend, man. I can't say. And then we'll talk a little bit later about the Snow White movie. I saw that had a little bit of controversy. Oh. So we'll talk about that later.
Mr.Benja: I. The I think the closest Michigan State when I was [00:18:00] there, yeah.
Laugh: When I was there at
Mr.Benja: Michigan State that was the first taste of that high level college basketball. And I remember, oh, what's the guy's name? I don't know. There was a black film that had just come out recently. Terrence Howard and some other people went to the went to the basketball game and of course, Mo the stands were mobbed and everything.
And I'm like, okay, this is what caused the whole basketball can get and I just remember, I knew one of the I knew a tutor, right? She was a grad student and. She broke down crying one day and she's I don't know what to do. I dunno what to do. I was like, what's going on, what's wrong?
I said, I dunno what to do. I'm tutoring the student and he's really bad at his, he's just bad and he can't do his work. It's so you're a tutor and you work with him and you work with him and she's, she was like. I have everybody. She was basically saying she had everybody in the school calling her, telling her to make sure this dude passes and [00:19:00] or else, yeah.
Or else, and she started considering all these options Hey, maybe I can whip up some kind of cheating rig for him. Maybe I could, geez, maybe I could talk to the teacher. She was just going through options and spilling things out very quickly. She wasn't seriously considering any of that.
Or was she, but it was wild man. And just that level of intensity. I love it, man, but I don't wanna watch it.
Theo Harvey: Oh, these prog, these programs are big time money. Just to coach alone, Mr. Benja Cali Perry, to go to Arkansas, to leave Kentucky to go to Arkansas, he got $8 million. A year, just a coach, a college team.
On top of that, he got a budget of $5 million just to go recruit players. So basically with the MNIL, he said, Hey, come here. I got 500,000. You want 500,000? I got a million for you. Come on. I got the money for you. So they basically paid him $13 million. Mr. Benja to coach a basketball team.
So if they're [00:20:00] playing a coach and give him a budget. Total of $13 million, they gotta be making five to 10 x that from advertising money. Yeah. Recruiting all that. So it goes to show you the pressure your tutor was under was valid.
Mr.Benja: Yeah. Real, real quick, what is name, image, and likeness and why has it spa spawned so much of this money that we're seeing all these college athletes with?
Theo Harvey: Yeah, so basically, I think this came outta UCLA Ed Bannon. He was a player that played for UCLA several, like almost 15, 20 years ago. But basically there was a game called, it was, it came out of a video game. It was college. NCAA basketball and he used his image and of course millions of dollars are made from this game, being out there into the community.
And he actually took it to court and said, that's not fair. You use my image, my likeness to gimme all this money. And then, to be honest with you, he wasn't a great pro either. So that probably [00:21:00] was another impetus. It was like, look, I'm trying to get this money. Lemme get this Goop son. So they sued and say, Hey, that's not fair. And then obviously the countersuit was you're an amateur, you know what you're getting for compensation is a scholarship, to go to college. So they went back and forth and finally, I think I can't remember the ruling we'll put in the show notes, but it happened not too long ago.
Supreme Court actually ruled on this and said it was okay to pay college athletes a fair exchange. And they likened it to any kind of work study program. You remember how we had work study back in the day, Mr. Benger at FAM and other, schools where you know you do some bs I had one, I, it was so funny.
I had a work study. I was supposed to be tutoring students. I didn't even know. I just, I thought I just got a, I check. I showed, I said, got the check. And they told me one time, oh, you're supposed to be tutoring these last two months. I was like, oh, for real. Oops. Dang. Yo, my bad. Dang. I got this polo fit though.
This Tommy Hilfiger though Tallahassee at [00:22:00] Governor Square Mall. What? Anyway, so yeah, so it was a big thing. And then obviously football and college basketball are two, biggest revenue producing, for any state, any college program. So obviously they got the lion share of money and budgets to go after these players, because let's be honest before that, if you ever see a movie called Blue Chips with Shaq, Shaquille O'Neal and Penny Hardaway, did you ever see that movie?
No. Basically it was about this. No, I didn't, tons of movies like this where college coaches were literally using boosters. Boosters are people high net worth individuals who were under the table giving kids money, giving kids Escalades. I mean there was a rumor that LeBron James, he was driving around for Escalade when he was a junior in high school.
Everybody was like, excuse me, how? Excuse LeBron James afford that. Yes. Yeah, exactly. Giving him a boost. Yeah, a boost for a booster. Yeah. Yeah. Because think about it, they want the best players. The team gets validation. The booster feels good 'cause that's where he went to school. So anyway yeah man, it's this [00:23:00] whole thing.
'cause I think, dan Gilbert out Detroit. He he's big time. He did rocket Mortgage back in the day. He went to, I wanna say Michigan State. And so he put a lot of money to that program. And obviously, he's, he owns the ca cla cavaliers, the Okay. Cleveland Cavaliers. And so he's worth $13 billion.
So yeah, he's one of the big boosters there. Probably Why they get some hot recruits and Tom Izzo, he's been there shit since you've been in school even before that, so he's not going anywhere. So anyway, man. Yeah. Do your tutor just to circle back around, I can understand why she felt the need to think about some other kind of scenarios here, because if that dude failed, she would've got it.
Mr.Benja: Yeah. It is, no that stuff like that is just wild. And you start to see how the machine. Changes internally to accommodate whatever it's trying to do. Hey, maybe they can, allow people to take their [00:24:00] test on certain days. Maybe they can allow the test to be broken up into segments.
And you start all these weird little things that just become policy and you're like, how did that get here? It's maybe it has something to do with the NCAA or boosters.
Theo Harvey: Boosters, man. It's the game, man. What's it? The system defined it. The it's designed to defend itself. And so the system is designed to defend the system.
Yeah. Yeah. So it's not going anywhere anytime soon. Mr. Benja.
Comment Corner and Viewer Reactions
Theo Harvey: So Mr. Benja, do we wanna get into, comment corner real quick.
Mr.Benja: Yeah, let's run through some comments right quick. I love comments from the peoples man. If y'all got anything to say, any flames to spit, any dirt to throw any corrections?
We love the flames. That's give us all the flames. 'cause half the time, I don't know what I'm talking about. I got it from somewhere, but if you feel like flaming me, go ahead. Anyway black Mirror reaction, missing pieces says we were, before I mentioned her or his comment here, we were meh [00:25:00] or, enthused.
We liked it, but it wasn't like anything mind blowing like we expected from Black Mirror. So with that in mind missing pieces made this comment. The Americanized style in more recent seasons takes away from how bleak these dystopians dystopia seem, in my opinion. That's a good point. I don't know how.
Bleak American productions are with like, compared to a British or a German version of bleak. You know what I mean? You're saying, oh
Theo Harvey: damn. Let's be honest. Germany and think about their histories, Germany, the rise of Nazis and all that. And obviously with Britain, the history is, being bombed, yeah. During World War ii. And so I'm sure they can be extremely bleak in the United States. We really haven't, maybe 'cause we're just such a spread out country and it's just hard to just traumatize a whole nation like that. But I would say, man, some of this stuff is it's getting there.
God, we can be bleak too. Yeah, man. I don't know what your politics are, but it's looking pretty bleak right now [00:26:00] where we're headed. And black Mirror can kind capture that. Great. But I take their point, I take their point.
Mr.Benja: Cool. And we were talking about the last of US trailer and A-B-C-O-Q seven.
DT said the last of us took a part of the game that implied there was a relationship between Bill and the other guy. Oh, there was that one episode where the two guys were hanging out. It's not a spoiler, but it was something in the game. And they expanded on that story into the last of us TV show.
So he's responding here. The last of us took, apart from the game that implied there were a relationship between Bill and this other guy, but it played that you don't realize that he loved the guy without the clues which were there. The series decided that this episode is just about a couple of gay guys being gay in the apocalypse and dying together.
Bill isn't dead in the game. A couple of gay being gay in the apocalypse then tied together. [00:27:00] What a synopsis.
Theo Harvey: Hey man, hey, that's life, man. I love it. Be gay together, man. In a Apocalypse man. That's be who you are. But respect. I didn't play the game, Mr. Benja, but is that the case? Bill is still alive.
And did they infer there was a love story between these two characters,
Mr.Benja: In the game? I
Theo Harvey: don't know.
Mr.Benja: I don't know. I'm not a player of the game, but I have heard a lot of praise for how they presented this, where it's not like a thing, it's just,
Laugh: yeah.
Mr.Benja: It's just the story of the show goes through the story of the show.
In fact, this is a good comment because it wasn't like woke in your face or whatever, that we've been talking about recently. It was just kinda yeah, man, two gay guys being gay in the apocalypse.
Theo Harvey: What's wrong with that? Oh man, I love it. Yeah. So anyway, I thought that was kinda interesting comment.
We could talk about, wow, Mr. Benja. I wanted to bring this up. Arcane [00:28:00] season two. We got some comments on that one. So if you don't know, Mr. Benja has strong emotions of our king, season two. And some people who commented also had some comments. Mr. Benja, I'm gonna ask some questions that come outta these comments.
First at the Exodus, REX 33 85 says, what about this season does disappointing you also, I just wanna combine them both at gaming. Channel four says, season two was not as good as season one, but was still great. I don't know what you didn't like about it, Mr. Benja, what didn't you like about it?
Mr.Benja: Imagine you watch all through Star Wars. Just imagine you watch all through Star Wars, right? You get the forest, you get the Skywalker Saga, you get the Empire versus the rebels. You get this little side story about big guy versus the little guy and then the smuggler story Han Solo. And then at the end, just imagine, right?
That you got to return to the Jedi and a [00:29:00] after return to the Jedi. The next six movies that came afterwards were all about the Ewoks.
Theo Harvey: Why six? That's very specific.
Mr.Benja: Yeah. It's anything after that is all about the Ewoks. So okay, you should say in the first three and then the prequels we'll keep it at, we'll keep it even.
Season one is season two, arcane, mirror that to four, five, and six. And then the Ewok Trilogy, you're like. Why is this about the Ewoks? No. If you really think about it, the Ewoks are nature. They're nature's forced. They really, it really was about Ewoks the entire time. And you go back and you're trying to piece together this Ewok story, and you're like, yeah I guess maybe okay.
I I wanna believe that in arcane, as I said, a lot of stuff happens. A lot of story threads go in and out, but when it hits season two and starts doing stuff, it's really hard for you to stop and piece [00:30:00] back why that might have happened. It all makes sense. It's all there on paper. But if you were not following that particular story thread in the way that, granted, a lot of people did follow it this way, but most people really only like it because of the music, the animation, the fields it gave you.
If anybody comes in here saying they were really following that story the way it was intended, all the way through. And that the Black rose makes complete sense and all that. I, we might have to discuss something because I don't know, man you walked, Christmas was all I saw when I was watching Arcane season two.
Y
Theo Harvey: While you were talking, since I didn't see arcane, so I was trying to think, but I get that premise where you're wa reading something, watching something, playing the game and you're thinking it's going this way. And then it completely pulled a rug out of, you said it was there, but it was like this one little thread.
They're like, oh, this is what's really about, and now the whole next part is like about this. What the hell? I didn't read this for that part. The only thing I [00:31:00] remember, this is gonna be very obscure reference, but it was I don't think you ever read Foundation Aza Eims books, did you?
Mr.Benja: No, we, I started on the Apple TV show, but
Theo Harvey: yeah.
Yeah. The, it wasn't great. It was okay, they trying to expand upon it. But if you read it, back in the day I loved it. Okay. Very, not a lot of, as a lot of talking, Asim Off is not the greatest writer, just give you a lot like, oh, he's not ge George, RR Martin giving you descriptions of food and religion, stuff like that.
Straight facts. But anyway so I read the Foundation series. Great show. High level premise, 10,000 years in the future, gly, the Empire Human Race is dying. 'cause one guy uses math to prevent the de-evolution of humankind so they don't, fall into anarchy.
Foundation Series Plot Twists
Theo Harvey: And shenanigans and ensue. So that's pretty much the premise of it. But anyway so I read the book is about this. Oh man. So you got this first foundation and then now who's the second foundation? Oh, where they at? And oh man, who's this mutant called the Mule. So there's all these little storylines that you're just like, man, this is awesome.[00:32:00]
So then they get to the last book and it's, oh, you know what? This is really depress. The sequel to my books about robots detectives sent in early two thousands. He like, what the hell? This is one character from his original series trilogy like he did on Robot Detectives.
Mr.Benja: Yeah.
Theo Harvey: Shows up in the 10 thou year.
10,022. 'cause he is a robot. He lives forever. He comes to find out, he is the mastermind. This whole damn thing. Sorry, spoiler alert. I'm like, what the hell?
Mr.Benja: I'm all about spoiling spoilers like that. Just give it to him. Let people know what's gonna happen.
Theo Harvey: So I know exactly what you mean. I'm like, I did not read this story to find out this is about a robot detective trying to save humanity. It was like, no, I read it because I want to hear a galactic empire and all this other stuff.
So anyway, needless to say, man, Mr. Ben, that ru, that rug pool. Stories do not, I'm trying to think if a story ever done that and I can, I can't think of one right now where they just completely take the rug [00:33:00] out from you and it's there, but it's just like stupid. Maybe the plot twist, the usual suspect, it was there all along who Kaiser Soche was, and then at the end when they reveal who it is, that's always a classic. But I can't think of any, or the sixth sense, where you find out what Bruce Wills was up to spoil. He's one of the dead people. So anyway, so I think some twists work, but not when you create a whole new premise and now it's a whole new universe that you're gonna explore for another 20 books.
Yeah. That's dumb.
Mr.Benja: Man, it was a slow twist, which is the funny thing. Okay. 'cause you're like, okay. Why are we spending this much time in this character? Oh I'll stick with it. And you keep on going. And the deeper you get into season two, it's wait a minute, what's going on? And you're just sitting somewhere.
You're, you weren't before. If you ever, if you've ever been driving with friends on the highway and the lane [00:34:00] splits and one person goes in the off ramp and you're still on the main highway, that's what it's like. It's like, why are they over there? Yeah. Oh, lost. All right. I don't wanna talk about that anymore.
Theo Harvey: No. That's why, guys, so we're moving on. Mr. Benja. What is our, what are we talking about today? Man? You want to bring this up in the show notes?
Oscar's New Diversity Standards
Mr.Benja: Yeah, I was I was just perusing the internet and we've talked about movies before and things and, snow White came up and. Here we are talking about stuff being woke and by the way, props to arcane for the way they treated all the character representation, it just flowed properly.
So even props on that. Love it. But it's been a topic of discussion lately and I found a post that said the Academy is crazy. The Oscars people, the Academy of Motion, picture Arts and Sciences, we're doing all this stuff and we don't like them. And I was like, okay, another hater post. But they had this [00:35:00] description of saying that basically saying that the new requirements for getting an Oscar's eligibility for the best picture.
This post was saying that, it's a bunch of garbage and I was about to scroll past it, but it had, let me see, I'm not gonna give it dignity here 'cause it was a troll, hater post, but, a couple thousand retweets and everything. And I was like, okay, let me see what's going on. In short, the Oscars are saying you have to be woke to get best picture category.
And as a woke, bro, this concerned me. We can go through the bits here in a second, but Thea, had you heard about any of this?
Theo Harvey: I did not. I remember. Do you want me to get into the reason why this maybe been created with the Oscar? So white controversial?
Mr.Benja: Yeah. Yeah. People heard about Oscar so white, but let's give him a little refresher.
Theo Harvey: Yeah. I think in 2015 there was made notice that of all the 20 acting nominations, best actors, supporting actor, best actress, [00:36:00] supporting actress and others, all the nominations, the Academy Awards that year went to all white actors. So basically no person of color at all. And that just prompted activist and writer April Rain to create the hashtag.
Hashtag Oscar. So white. So when in 2015, can you believe that was 10 years ago? Literally, the hashtag went super viral, sparked widespread criticism and a public identity crisis for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which, who runs the Oscars. So they responded by setting ambitious goals to diversify its membership.
A lot of these people, yes, we know the big stars in Hollywood, but there's a lot of people, what's the key grip? You ever watched the credits in a movie? Yeah. All these folks have Academy awards. Have an option to vote for Academy Awards. And so we would never know these people but their own little community.
And so what Hollywood they were doing was to diversify the membership and adding more people, women of color and underrepresented members in 20 by 2020, which was a good goal. I think your more representation [00:37:00] makes more diverse storylines. Yeah. Yeah. And that's probably why we're seeing in, we were seeing interesting cast choices recently in the last several years where we had the little Mermaid cast, where people got upset about that, but she was cast as a black woman as opposed to a cartoon, which was not, and then we also had folks showing up in roles that you're like, oh wow.
They're letting you know, black leads show up more that you wouldn't see that they weren't just a sidekick or the jokey sidekick or something like that. Which is a. So I think, I think we're in I think that the challenge is when you start to mandate wokeness, right? Where you try to say, in some cases you have to, to kinda get things started, but when it becomes too stip, I guess the concern you have is that these new regulations are too too stringent on creativity.
Is that what you're saying? When it comes to mandating, that certain people separate under representative groups have to be a part of the cast, for instance, or certain groups have to, be they have to have paid in [00:38:00] internships from people from these groups. Yeah. What are some of the things that, that you have concerns about with this writer?
Mr.Benja: Okay, you can't just start talking to people and saying, Hey, this is a major push and here's why you always have to swing. We're in extremist time right now. So you're gonna ex, you're gonna swing from Yes. I was part of the, I was part of some crazy regime in the past known for terrible acts.
And on the other side you're like, yes, we believe everybody should wake up in the morning and, eat soybean cheese and sing kumbaya. There's just these weird two extremes of types of people and it seems like a personality jumping back and forth when you're talking about companies or corporations or organizations trying to appease everybody, but they keep jumping back and forth wildly differently.
To wildly different extremes and to give you that point. In the Oscar's own words, [00:39:00] the Academy of Motion, picture Arts and Sciences, representation and Inclusion for the Oscar's eligibility in the best picture category are designed to encourage equitable representation off and off screen to better reflect the diverse global population.
Cool. Submitting a confidential academic academy inclusion standards form blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and meeting two out of the four standards will be required in order for the film to be deemed eligible for the best picture consideration. So you need two of the, these following four standards to be considered for best picture.
Standard, a onscreen representation. A film can achieve this by meeting the criteria of at least one of the following. And it says you need to include somebody from somebody's East Asian, African American, Hispanic middle Eastern. And there's a list. The general ensemble cast, at least 30% of actors need to be from two underrepresented groups.
Main storyline and subject matter [00:40:00] is, has to be centered on an on way, so it's like to get the first standard of onscreen representation, you have to go through and literally check these boxes. Okay, do I have enough of this? If I don't have enough of this, maybe I should have more of this.
And okay, it's too this way. I can offset that by adding in some more people with cognitive or physical disabilities according to this. So that's one standard. Next standard, the creative leadership and the project team. A film can achieve this standard by meeting one of these, you have underrepresented groups and at least six other crew team members in technical positions are from an underrepresented, racial or ethnic group.
You're talking about your key grip and your best boy. It's Hey, we got a technical position over here, the boom camera operator, let's get in somebody from the Middle East and we can, they're underrepresented in the key grip, arena, standard C industry access and opportunities.
Hey, [00:41:00] maybe, if your pictures coming out and it's not very diverse, then maybe you had a paid apprenticeship or internship opportunities where the cast was all of one group and then it got diverse because of all your internship opportunities and training and.
Skills development and finally audience development. And you get that by distributing to certain ethnic groups. And you have, you may have one or more in-house senior executive or hired consultants and so forth. So basically, you're either talking to the audience you're making industry access and opportunities.
Your creative leadership is diverse or your onscreen representation, themes and narratives is supportive of these efforts. And I don't wanna use the word diverse 'cause that makes you think of DEI, which I support in a lot of ways, but I don't want that to get confused with what we're talking about here.
[00:42:00] This just seems very odd to me that it's codified so specifically and literally check boxy. It's a checklist.
Theo Harvey: So you don't like it, what's the sum summation of it? Do you feel like it's restrictive? What is your stance here? 'cause I have some comments.
Mr.Benja: It seems bad now how this plays out in reality could be a good thing. But I'm really leaning on the side of what the hell is this?
Theo Harvey: So yeah, my, my 2 cents on this. So basically it, you're just saying it's bad my sense of it is I agree, I think it's a good thing to codify stuff, but we already have this example that stuff like this never really works out.
It's in football. Have you heard of a thing called the Rooney Rule?
Mr.Benja: Oh no.
Theo Harvey: Have you heard of that?
Mr.Benja: No.
Theo Harvey: So it was in, the Rooney Rule was instituted by the NFL in 2003, and it mandates that teams interview at least two minority candidates for ed, coach, [00:43:00] general manager and coordinator positions. So this is something, say
Mr.Benja: what she about to say for the kicker.
Theo Harvey: No. This is sports is, let's be honest, sports is a true meritocracy. If you're a good kicker, it don't matter what your race or nationality is. You gonna, you're gonna make the team, right?
Mr.Benja: You will.
Theo Harvey: But as we all know, it can mess up when there's other, when there's other factors involved in decision making, right?
You play well no matter what. Coaching is so contingent on a lot of different things, not just, can you coach and you know the mind, how well do you interact with the higher ups who won't be hiring you? Can they have a beer with you?
Do they feel that you're a guy that can connect with? And so I say that to say is we've seen this experience in a Rooney world, where, let's be honest, it started in 2003. A number of black coaches has gone up, but I gotta look at the numbers, but statistically I don't think there's been significant changes in that last, what, 22 years or so since this rule was enacted.
And so it goes to show you that you can mandate wokeness, but doesn't mean people are gonna follow it. They'll find [00:44:00] loopholes. Yeah. They may bring in a black guy to interview. But because, are they gonna hire him? No. Yeah. How many coordinators? And if you don't know, coordinators are like just below the head coach that they bring in to interview for the head coach position, just to meet that mandate.
Yeah. So I would agree, it, when you mandate, wokeness it does get some pushback and people look for loopholes and use all the creativity to, to create stories, that, get around that mandate. Now, I would say, and I'll, my other point to this so I think we're agreement on that, but I would disagree in that we talked about this creativity loss structure.
And so the more structure you put around it, it can't enhance creativity to help creatives create more inclusive storytelling. Like for instance, okay, there's a show called The White Lotus, and they film it in Thailand. It's a murder mystery. It's all this other stuff, right? So yes, they have a lot of white characters, but they, since they film in Thailand, they actually have a couple of characters that meet this mandate, right?
They're, from Thailand, right? They're, and so I say is, [00:45:00] if you are think of a storytelling, then why don't you create environments that. Naturally precludes you to have more inclusivity. If you're gonna if you film in Brooklyn for instance, you have to make it more inclusive because you're not just gonna have all white males.
So that's all I'm saying. You can enhance creativity when you put more structure and mandates around things.
Mr.Benja: Yeah. Okay. Like I haven't seen Yellowstone, or I haven't seen a lot of these I mean there's like Yellowstone, I'll just take that as an example. When I first think about that, I don't even know if it's supposed to be diverse or around
Theo Harvey: it's not.
I've seen it.
Mr.Benja: Yeah. And I start to wonder even
Theo Harvey: that, be honest with you, there's indigenous people, right? There's that's what I was, I'm wondering about,
Mr.Benja: The indigenous crowds and yeah. They run up against that. But it seems like it's definitely marketed to not that group. Feels weird to me. I don't want to, harp on the Oscars in particular, but that, this mandate they've put, and we'll have a link to it in in the notes. I don't know if that works. And it also, one thing you didn't mention that I wanted to throw in there was that it, it could build [00:46:00] animosity because, if there's like a certain way that, that the idea was conceived or a certain way, things were brought about what happens when all of a sudden it's yeah guys, we were gonna go with that, but we're gonna bring in these other people instead.
And we're, I don't wanna sound like it's a, diversity is a bad thing, but I know this swings the other way as well, where it's like, Hey, I'm going to do an all black presentation, and suddenly it's Hey, you can't do that. And people get mad and all of a sudden it's like, why not? And it's this.
It's coming from the other side where it's definitely not the same. But, I've had problems with with my certain online accounts, I've had issues with people coming after me saying, Hey, this isn't very diverse or whatever. I'm like, it's not supposed to, it's a story about X, Y, and Z and, that by nature should be diverse and yeah, but you're not diverse with what you're doing.
I'm like I see how this is. And just [00:47:00] recently a lot of there was like the grants for black women and something, and Trump went in and shut all that down. And it's are you kidding me? Why would you do that? So
Theo Harvey: why would you shut it down? Or why would you create that? The grants for black women.
Mr.Benja: No. He came in and sh started shutting down. Oh. The grants for black women, like, why would you shut that down? And it's because you're supposed to be diverse, aren't you? And it's kinda like this finger wag back. It's here comes a stupid rule that bothers a bunch of people, so they're going to turn the rule around and use it against us.
And I'm like, I don't need that. Gotcha.
Theo Harvey: So basically you're against these mandates because they create backlashes that, that really prevent what's supposed to happen for creativity, to create more inclusivity in the first place. So is that what, why you're against these mandates?
Because now, with the internet, the rise of internet and the internet, bros, they get wind of this stuff and then they said, okay, we're going against it and show how discriminatory you are so we can get the power back because you're restricting us and our rights.
Mr.Benja: [00:48:00] What is tokenism for appearing in, the dominant societies?
Productions, what's tokenism for them and wanting to get crumbs off of that table is erasure, forced engineering influence on our side. It's I don't need, people coming in trying to overly influence, our Spike Lees, our LERs, our, our Tyler Perrys.
Even though I'm not necessarily down with a lot of what he does, we don't need that kind of pushback where it's Hey guys, we're from Gotcha. We're from the Oscars. We're gonna,
Theo Harvey: okay. So you're saying basically creating these mandates creates a sense of tokenism, Hey, we're going to shoehorn someone in here as opposed, and then that creates backlash against all of it, even though there's some true, genuine, great talent out there.
Like the Spike Lees, like the Googlers who are great. Creating great art. And, but they're getting the backlash from, creating this more inclusive environment [00:49:00] or the facade of one, with these mandates if you will. Is that kind of your argument?
Mr.Benja: Yeah. It becomes a yeah.
That that's what I'm getting at, obviously with that.
Theo Harvey: No, and I get that point. Backlash might not be
Mr.Benja: the right, backlash might not be the right word, but it's just, where I not listen, I went to a very racially tense school in north Florida, south Georgia had plenty of issues.
Dude pulled a knife on me in the middle of school in front of the entire student, high school student body, and nobody said anything. It's just Hey, man, stuff like that happens. I'm like, what? In high school, I know the issues, but what I'm saying is this doesn't get pushed through unless there's a bit of a control scheme inflicted back upon us, baked into it.
And that I don't like, I want my apologetically black, whatever [00:50:00] creators to do what they do.
Theo Harvey: No, I get it. But, I don't think that should prevent us to try to make change and sometimes the only way to make changes to force people to change, and we've seen that in history.
Mr.Benja: You sound like kin.
Theo Harvey: I'm just saying. March on Watches Washington, go back to civil rights movement, right? They had to get the attention. They wouldn't, they LBJ would not assign the Civil Rights Act, the 1968 if it wasn't for, or 64 if it wasn't for the March on Washington.
And just having this big show of all that, and so in protests I don't think protests work as well as they did in 64, because I think people don't realize the tension game has moved from the tv. Yeah. And that's what got us to get to where we point now we have to think of a different way and it can't just be Twitter or, and all that anymore.
It's gotta be a new way to protest and I think we're still trying to figure that out.
Snow White Controversy
Theo Harvey: But Mr. Ben, this kind of opens up another can of worms with this whole Snow White, fiasco. Me and my daughter went to go see Snow White this [00:51:00] weekend.
Mr. Benja, it wasn't as bad as the naysayers say it was, you probably heard all this rich all about it, that this is the most woke Snow White, number one, the casting, Rachel Ziegler. So number one, she's not, what's her nationality? She's, I think she, she is like Italian. Let me not say exactly what her nationality is, but she just a controversial figure if you don't know.
This young lady is out here, very outspoken. And she's been like that for a while. And she talks about certain things and certain, issues and she's just very outspoken. And, which I'm fine with, I think it's good to have character. She's from New Jersey.
Yeah, so she's from New Jersey. I'm trying to think where is she based out of? So very outspoken. She faced racial discrimination on social media due to her mixed ethnicity. I don't know what her ethnicity is. I got
Mr.Benja: you right there. She's a Colombian American actress, born and raised in New Jersey.
Her father is of Polish descent while her mother is of Colombian
Theo Harvey: descent. Okay, so she's Colombian. She identify,
Mr.Benja: she identifies as a white [00:52:00] Latina.
Theo Harvey: Okay there you go. So she, she's got controversial views. She supported Palestine, which, a lot of folks on the right don't like.
She's talked against, Trump. She did all kinds of crazy stuff out there. She critic, she criticized Donald Trump and supporters claiming there's a deep sickness in the United States and accusing Trump of threatening our democracy. Ooh. But so anyway, so there is a white wing white leaders are going after her movies and Snow White was just probably ground zero because number one is two things wrapped.
One, number one is her. And there's Disney. There, there is a concerted effort to go after Disney, right? Especially after some of the things that happened under Iger and Chap, right? Yeah. With the don't say gay movement. Anyway, make a long story short. This movie's Getting, li Got, ROL says terrible, so I'm gonna go watch it with my daughter and man, this.
I'm not saying it was the greatest movie, but it wasn't as bad as people say. And the whole premise of the movie is Snow White has to find her voice to speak [00:53:00] up against the tyranny in the movie. And so it's they changed it. They flipped the script. If you watch the original cartoon she just says she gets kissed and after eating the Apple and lives happily ever after this one, they create a storyline where she has to realize that she can, she doesn't have to wait for a man, quote unquote, to come and save her, but she can speak up and learn how to take control herself.
And so some of the, I was like, wow. So I see exactly why she was cast. 'cause that's the fire personality you need and it works for the film. So it was like, wow. But it is so this is happening in real life and what she's speaking about. So to me it was a interesting juxtaposition with what was happening in real world and what was happening with the movie.
And I was like, oh. This is, what's that? And so when I see all the vitriol, it does make, bring to mind that there, there is a concerted effort to try to tamper down voices. And I do feel like right now, the other side is pushing back 'cause they're getting some wins. [00:54:00] But Mr. Benji, this is America, man.
I, this is America is Donald Glover reminded us there will be a snapback. So I do see that coming. So do I agree with, your statement on mandating stuff? I would say, this, I would say I think it's okay to mandate put some parameters in place. I just don't want it to be a point where we don't try anything and give up because of, what could happen, or the opposite.
I do feel like we need to make an effort and have courage to do something. 'cause eventually, any of this stuff will go away anyway. We don't do anything if we don't speak up. So I, I think I commend, I maybe on the other side of the woke cop quotient a little bit, where I'll say, yeah, let's mandate some of this stuff.
'cause they'll find loopholes against it anyway and find ways around it. But I just say, let's put some stakes in the ground. 'cause when it does come back around to the other side, a lot of people who make the right decisions, think about it, during their lifetime, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King were [00:55:00] considered, the most dangerous men in America.
Say without a
Mr.Benja: mandate.
Theo Harvey: Yes. That's true. That's true though. Without a mandate, I would say this, there were things that were happening to make the mandate a reality. Oscar so White or George Floyd. People really die, to even get the mandate started. Yeah.
Mr.Benja: Okay.
Yeah. There, as I said, we could open up the whole can of worms on that, and that will take us into a completely different episode. Let us know your thoughts. 'cause I wonder about what this does for entertainment and art and entertainment and art has already changed in reference to it. It's bizarre out there right now.
There's a wave of literalism that's coming out in a lot of our art where it's, Hey, I'm just saying this because, I pulled a tra, Tracy Chapman, looked out the window, saw something happen, and now I'm talking about it with no filter. I have. My life and this is it. That's my art, my life.
Theo Harvey: And yeah.
And just go back to the business side of it. Yes. No [00:56:00] white. The market speaking is already sub 50 million. I think the last of as we're recording is that 43 million, which is much lower than live Action Little Mermaid, which made 93 million this first weekend, and this is lower than even Dumbo, which came out several years ago, was universally panned that movie that, that live action Dumbo movie,
Mr.Benja: the way you said Jumbo.
Theo Harvey: Yeah, Dumbo. It doesn't look good, but you never know. These movies, man, family movies, have a long legs. I talked to my daughter, and then I'll leave it at this. I said, what'd you think of this movie? And she liked it. And I liked it too. It was a very positive message for young girls. And so I think when you put in and if they're marketed right and if a good word of mouth, I could see this kind of doing that long leg thing where all of a sudden it may terrible, first weekend, but we could have those week, those weekends where it's doesn't drop much because the word of mouth is gathering with younger girls and, it'd be a moot point at this.
So Mr. Benja, was there anything else that we wanted to cover today? [00:57:00]
Mr.Benja: Nah, man, I'm just being woke, but not not trying to go broke. I.
Theo Harvey: Yeah, man. I think we did want to cover guys, look like Mr. Benja said, if you got comments, come at us, we take the smoke, please. Let us know your thoughts and yeah we'll shout you out in comments like we usually do because this is a conversation that needs to be had, especially in the quote unquote, nerd culture or pop culture because I think these are relevant conversations.
Trailer Reactions: Happy Gilmore 2 and Minecraft
Theo Harvey: Mr. Bid, do you wanna go over some trailers real quick?
Mr.Benja: Let's jump into some trailers. All right, this is trailer time. We have two trailers for you today. Maybe we'll get to both of 'em. Let's see. But first of all, we have Happy Gilmore two. I didn't even know this was on the radar and now I understand why Adam Sandler has been slowly popping up in the media here and there again.
But one of the funniest movies I had ever seen was Happy Gilmore One, and I'd never thought I'd be into a golf story, but here we are. With this golf story. And now after all these years, we get happy [00:58:00] Gilmore too. I guess Adam needs a check. Or, it's one of those things you keep in your back pocket.
Hey, whenever I need to make some money, I'll get on the phone and say, happy Gilmore too is coming. I don't know what you think, Theo. Yeah,
Theo Harvey: I'm excited about that. Rest in peace called Weathers played his golfing instructor and the first one hilarious. Hilarious. Him and the alligator. Go check it out.
But yeah, man yeah, we'll see Netflix, and I try to watch, I try to, yeah, Netflix don't have a good track record with these sequels because then Prime come out with Come to America too. One, one, good one good. So these older stars, going to streamers with a sequel to their most beloved movies doesn't seem really good.
And then also saw Adam Sandler stand up on Netflix. Wasn't good either. So cautiously optimistic. So you ready?
Mr.Benja: Random fact they forced Eddie Murphy to put Louis Anderson in the movie. So they'd have one white character coming to America. Just in case you missed that one.
Theo Harvey: Mandated [00:59:00]
Mr.Benja: got mandated.
They better mandate some call with us back up in here. CGI, I don't care. All right, here we go for the Happy Gilmore two trailer reaction in 3, 2, 1, play.
Theo Harvey: Okay. How are you feeling?
Mr.Benja: It seems like they got the Coming to America production crew and put it to Happy Gilmore too. Extremely safe. Just, Hey, let's run this Netflix thing. We'll get some people staying up late night to run some clicks. I don't expect anything major or boundary pushing in there.
It's just Hey man, let's give us that Happy Gilmore movie. Let's go.
Theo Harvey: Oh, the other, reference would be last year, remember 4th of July, they dropped Beverly Hills Cop four on Netflix. I dunno if you saw that, right? Yeah. So very safe. You're right. It was older star, safe movie.
One of his biggest hits. This is, but I ain't gonna lie, I laughed at one part the old guy, with the nipples. That was hilarious. But [01:00:00] I hope they have more of those than but the li the last joke was just lame to me. It was like, okay, fine. He blew a hole in it.
Was that supposed to be super funny? I dunno.
Mr.Benja: You know what, okay here's what didn't pull me in. And I think all trailers should pull you in with a hook of some sort that think of like a fish hook. You know where it gets in. You, I dunno if any of you have ever been poked with a fish hook where it just gets stuck in you.
But something that actually makes you like, hold on a second. This isn't just nostalgia. I need to see this because blank. If you're talking about coming to America, it's Hey, what happened to Simmy? Simmy disappeared. It's oh, okay. That's an interesting, I just wanna know what happened to Simmy Kathy Gilmore.
It's like I lost my golf swing. How do I get it back? Huh? He lost his golf swing. How does he get it back? There's just gotta be some question you put in the viewer's mind. This is so safe. They're like, Hey, we're not gonna put any question in your mind. We're just gonna give you [01:01:00] Adam Sandler and some Timbalands on the golf course.
Theo Harvey: But you know what? Maybe Netflix doesn't have to 'cause, think about it. And they know that, I think that's what it is. They don't have to give you a hook, 'cause you don't have to go anywhere to go see it. You not pay any extra money. It's just there. They just want you to stay on our platform till July.
Just say, Hey, it's coming out July. You already got it. Just wait. So don't cancel Mr. Benger, don't cancel your Netflix subscription yet. I got one piece. Just wait for Happy Gilmore. Just happy. Wait for Happy Gilmore. It's coming out soon, but you're right. That is a good point. That's probably why this is so safe.
And they probably do it by algorithms, seeing some simple jokes, but there's no hook where it's just 'cause I agree, it could be something like, his son is trying to get into golf now. Or that he's got play against his son, oh wow. What's that's gonna be like?
And his son is you know he's sad Gilmore or something like that. He's just a total different
Mr.Benja: character,
Theo Harvey: but
Mr.Benja: yeah. I don't know. Sad Gilmore Theo. Rock with it, man. Okay. I'm looking through the comments and you're [01:02:00] right. 10,000 comments on this view on this movie from five days ago.
And it's everybody saying thank you for rescuing my favorite seventies movie. If he doesn't get angry and scream, this won't be a sequel. I guarantee he'll get angry at the ball and scream. This is my favorite type of movie. We don't get enough wholesome comedies anymore. Wholesome. Yeah. This one's not
Theo Harvey: a wholesome movie
Mr.Benja: when it came out, but, okay.
Wow. Wow. This one should be a winner. I'm genuinely excited to relive some nostalgia. Apparently they know what they're doing and, me and my creative hater self obviously is a little too maybe I just need to chill out because I'm looking at these comments and I. Yeah, they're just like, Hey man, happy Gilmore.
I'm happy nostalgia, man. That's all they've,
Theo Harvey: Which is fine. That's fine. Yeah, I'll watch it. But, but to that point, 30 years since this came out, tiger Woods wasn't even a thing when this movie came out. Remember? So it's been that long. So Tiger Woods was not a golfer 30 years [01:03:00] ago when this first movie first came out.
So
Mr.Benja: it's, this is strange. Yeah. This is strange. It hearkens back to our discussion about when you really niche down, you don't need to shake things up as much. If you're really trying to be safe, and this is where I give the last Jedi credit, where it's like, Hey, I'm not trying to be safe.
I'm just trying to thank you. Do something crazy and do it out the box. You can also have an arcane season two and and alienate everybody.
Theo Harvey: All right. We got talk about more or are we good?
Mr.Benja: Let's rock out the other one real quick and we'll cut it if we don't.
Theo Harvey: All right, let's go.
What's up Mr. Ben?
Mr.Benja: This is a trailer for the Minecraft movie. This is one of those movies where I have no idea what it's going to be about, what it could be styled for. I was walking through the grocery store and I saw an ad that had the live action Minecraft characters, and I was like, oh, okay. That's weird.
That's what it looks like in, real life. Three dimensional, [01:04:00] totally. CGI generated blocky characters. It's just a weird look. So I was intrigued and I'm glad you selected this one for our trailer today. 'cause I was curious about it throughout the week. Know nothing about it. I've only. I don't know.
Theo, have you ever played this game?
Theo Harvey: With my son, just watching him play in the background. Me, that Ben Z generation, they love it. Yeah. Bat and Roblox, so it's just the way to play in the world. But yeah, it's been around for a while though. Mr. Benger, I can remember being around where we were in, not grad school, but I think came out when we first started working, like in the early two thousands.
Mr.Benja: Yeah,
Theo Harvey: I just, I never really got into it, but yeah. We'll see.
Mr.Benja: I wonder if this is one of the things where it's been around for so long. They're like, if we do a movie, it'll make something, it'll do some numbers just because it's been around so long with so many fans.
Yeah. Yeah. So I have no idea what they could be thinking of with this movie.
Theo Harvey: The game Renaissance is here. We talked about this with the last of us. We talked about this with [01:05:00] Mario.
Mr.Benja: Yep.
Theo Harvey: Super Mario. Yeah, I think this is where we at, Mr. Benja, so we'll see.
Mr.Benja: Let's go ahead and get into it.
This is a Minecraft movie from Warner Brothers, the Final Trailer, and I haven't even seen the other ones. But either way, we're gonna start this in 3, 2, 1, play.
Theo, oh.
I've never wanted to get high like this in my entire life. Like I just want to destroy my body with chemicals and stimulants, uppers, downers at the same, I'm don't do drugs, kids, but this movie makes me want to.
Theo Harvey: Yes, good point. This is one of those movies 'cause it's going to throw so much at you.
'cause the premise is you can create anything, right? And so they're just gonna throw stuff at you. I don't know if it's gonna be it's gonna make sense, but. I'm, they'll put some story plot around it, but [01:06:00] least Mario Kart. We kinda already knew who the bit bad was gonna be Bowser.
Yeah. We know what lasts of us, the zombies. It's like they kind create a villain. I don't know if there's really villains in Minecraft. The villain is your laziness. I think that's what's,
Mr.Benja: yeah.
I don't want go the house. They did show that big pig dude. I guess maybe that'll be him.
Theo Harvey: I, that's what I'm saying. It's not inherent to the game though. Exactly. It seems like it's an expansion. We, I created another world. Oh, this is an expansion pack to the game, but, so it's but yeah, sure. I'll be there. 'cause my son plays, I'm sure he wants to watch it, so we'll check.
Yeah. Yeah. I, but you're right, Mr. Bishop, this is one of those where. Yeah, I got five on it.
Mr.Benja: Yeah. This was like a, when I took my, I tried to take my dad to see see the Wizard when I was young. The Nintendo movie, the Wizard, and my dad was like, son, you enjoy that. I'll be back in an hour and a half, just hang out in the lobby.
When the movie's over, I'll pick you up.
Theo Harvey: Yeah, I'll [01:07:00] watch stuff because, there's life lessons.
Mr.Benja: I was so happy that I did. I was like, yeah, man, whatever, dad, I don't need you getting my vibe down. I'm about to watch. It was me and my brother and. I think we had some other people with us, but my dad dipped out on that one.
He was like,
Theo Harvey: nah. Oh you were so hype, man. I know. I've been there, man. I could care less. I'm gonna watch this movie, man, when he pulled out the glove, man, I almost piss my pants. So yeah, I sure my myself will feel the same. I bet there's a lot of jokes in there that I don't get. 'cause I don't play, I don't know if you know some of those jokes my stomach
Mr.Benja: some of them just, like instantly turning into a little stake when he got stabbed.
That's comedy. Some of the fireball action and random stuff disappearing. Yeah. With Jack Black. I know there's gonna be some weird offbeat humor in there, but
Theo Harvey: Peaches, can we, it had to be him, right? Come up with that whole premise that became like a number one song.
Peaches. Yeah. From Mario. Super Mario brother. So I think he'll come up with something that's hilarious. Yeah. Yeah, he's just the movie guy, I guess he's just the, not the [01:08:00] video game movie guy now. So not a bad gig if you can get it.
Mr.Benja: No, he's a bonafide gamer and weird person and I'm off for that
Theo Harvey: Mr.
Benjamin.
Final Thoughts and Wrap-Up
Theo Harvey: This has been great, man. I think we knocked it out. Everyone. Mr. Benjamin, anything going on for this week for you?
Mr.Benja: I am it's coming up on the end of the first quarter, so I'm about to redo my steps a little bit and man, I'm just moving, man. 10 X is easier than two x, that's all I gotta say.
Theo Harvey: Oh, speaking of which, you saw, he's got a new thing called the scale coming out. I dunno if you checked that out yet. The
Mr.Benja: scale. Yeah. No, I, he disappeared and was talking about rapid development. Now he's talking about the scale. All right. Yeah.
Theo Harvey: Yeah. Go check it out. He got a new email that came out.
Mr.Benja: Alright.
Theo Harvey: But anyway, I digress. Yeah, Mr. Bid, I'm back. Vacation was vacation. Still do a little work, have to keep. Charge with things. But so now I'm fully back immersed. I'm gonna be traveling again, doing some stuff, like you man, this is we're about to get a Q2 brother overdrive now, so trying to [01:09:00] accelerate, but and try to get more healthier trying to, get some stuff going on, on, second half be a big number end of this year.
So I wanna go ahead and get that going again. So that's my goals for q2. But Mr. Bench, always a pleasure talking to you, man. So I know we'll catch up again soon, everyone. Hey, look, if you like what you hear, please subscribe and comment and show versus Business X threads, YouTube, Instagram, listen to us at Spotify, iTunes, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
If you wanna learn more about this and all the things that we're doing, go check out our website at show versus business. Mr. Benja. Have a great one.
Mr.Benja: Peace.