Friday Conversation | Ep 98: Cheers to Fantasy Taverns, Literature and Comic Books w/ Chris Mohan, Carl D. Albert, Varsha & Jarrod

This episode takes a frothy journey from the hoppy peaks of "Into the Stratosphere" IPA to the mellow valleys of a holiday white ale, with a detour through the taverns of our favorite fantasy realms. Whether you're a beer buff or a cider squire, our discussion plucks inspiration from the pages of iconic tales, pondering the spirited role of drinks in literature and the cherished camaraderie found in the fictional pubs of Westeros, The Shire, and beyond.

Ever wonder how your favorite comics keep you clawing for the next issue, or why trade collections can offer a more gratifying binge?  From the page-turning techniques that leave you hanging to the creative synergy between artists and writers, our personal anecdotes about our comic book journeys – including working in comic stores – will remind you why this medium is as compelling as it is unique. Plus, we're not afraid to dive into the murky waters where art and artist controversy swirl, challenging our ability to separate the two and inviting you to weigh in.

 So come for the beer banter, stay for the comic wisdom, and let's keep the conversation bubbling over like a freshly tapped keg of ideas. Cheers to another insightful episode, and here's to many more!

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:08

Hello friends and welcome to the Friday conversation. Hope everyone had a great week. We had a topic, but things happen, so we're just going to see what happens today. We're going to have a few fun things to discuss, but to start off before we start, well, first I'll start with what I'm drinking, because Jared mentioned getting beer. I'm drinking into the stratosphere. It's a hazy double IPA by Eddie Line Brewery. I believe that's out of Denver.

Speaker 3 0:38

A little spaceman.

Speaker 1 0:39

He looks like a happy spaceman because he's drinking lots of beer. I think it's the amount of hops or the kind of hops, but it's basically I think this is what, like 9%. It's pretty beefy, but it's not very, it's not very heavy, it's not. You know, some beers you can really taste the alcohol and some beers it's just tasty. So, the wizards, can we have a?

Speaker 3 1:10

backup plan though, Just in case you know. You say 9%, it's not too heavy, it's fine, but if you pass it out on the stage here, I don't have a car to take over.

Speaker 5 1:19

I was getting heavy.

Speaker 1 1:22

I wasn't going to have. There was another, there was a in the fridge, there was a, there was a what is a barley wine? It was into the woods. It had like a wizard on it. That's fitting, but I ended up grabbing this one, so I think that's like 13%.

Speaker 5 1:38

So yeah, it's. Friday Come on, let's go Hell yeah, I'm going out and celebrating my dad's birthday in a bit and definitely going to have a Mai Tai or two. So that was good yeah.

Speaker 1 1:49

So I got distracted. Jared, can you give us an introduction and tell us what you're drinking?

Speaker 4 1:54

From the Fennesey. Thank you YouTube channel and PageJewingcom enthusiast. I am drinking. That's the first time I've ever heard that I am drinking Samuel Adams, which, being from Massachusetts, that only makes sense. And the Holiday White Ale is a new special edition, citrus and Hazy. Citrus and Hazy, so I had to pick it up. Sounded great. It is great because this is my second one, it's good.

Speaker 5 2:34

Two thumbs up or two bottles up, as it were, and Chris.

Speaker 3 2:41

Yes, my name's Chris, Sometimes YouTuber, sometimes appearing on other people's channels. And because I'm already saying I'm drinking a Spanish beer, samuel Gale, just normal standard Samuel Gale. I tend to yeah, I tend to look at what is a reasonable price and go, I'll get 12 of those. Thanks, that's, that's my thing. If I'm feeling a bit more like I only want a couple, I'll go my craft beers at that stage and usually buy from a local brewery called Hilton Brewery. We do a really nice IPA called Twisted Hop, which is excellent.

Speaker 5 3:12

But not tonight. And I am Carl D Albert, indie fantasy author and very another page chewing enthusiast a fellow page chewing enthusiast, if you will. I'm only drinking coffee and water at the moment, but I am a big cider guy, like I mean all types of cider, like alcoholic, non-alcoholic, in general. You know, around the holidays like this when you know everyone's drinking like warm apple cider, that's, that's my shit. I love it. But you know, big angry orchard fan, also fan of the drier ciders, just like a little little fruity kick, I guess. But yeah, not an IPA guy. I tried it's, I bounce off. That's one that I just have never gotten into.

Speaker 3 4:04

Yeah, it's a funny one, because when I was even mid 30s, 10 years ago, I was very anti IPA, I have to say. And then I think you just I just got the stage one day that it was just exact a bit like you're saying, because some of the IPAs can be sort of fruity, you know, kind of like in that kind of really warm summer day, and I didn't want like a logger, I wanted something of it else. And it just hit right that day and from that moment it was like okay, we're good.

Speaker 5 4:30

You know what? What we're talking about booze. Has there ever been a book you know fantasy, sci-fi or otherwise that has inspired you to try a drink? Or has there ever been a drink you've read about that? You've been like you know it made up or not, like, oh, I want to try that, like that sounds really good. Or favorite drinking scenes, I don't know. I'm just. I'm just spitballing, throwing stuff out here now.

Speaker 1 4:55

That's a good question.

Speaker 4 4:57

Well, they did make a line of craft beers based upon gathrons, so I have a collection of six bottles that I got them all. I don't remember what we called it. Was that? No, no, no, I drank them all.

Speaker 3 5:24

I thought those was going to be one of these collection things that sits in the shelf somewhere and you know I spent 1500.

Speaker 4 5:32

They're in the cellar somewhere. Were they good? Yeah, some of them were good. Some of them are better than others, but you know, I like craft beers. So it's right up my alley.

Speaker 3 5:43

Did you say are there like six houses or they?

Speaker 4 5:45

had. No, there was six different stuff, Six different bottles, six different. You know types and, like you know, one was, one was like a white ale, that that it was like white Walker ale or something. You know something like that.

Speaker 4 6:05

And one of them was was a like a you know a poppy leger was related to house Lannister or somehow you know it was. So they had all different kinds trying to make them. You know the different houses and stuff like that and so they were. They were good. It was, you know, a little collectors run they had. I don't know how they got the nice, I remember seeing them.

Speaker 5 6:28

I never I don't think I ever got- any of them.

Speaker 4 6:30

Yeah, they were bigger bottles, but that was yeah.

Speaker 5 6:33

Yeah, yeah, I do know. I mean just to answer my own question, particularly like growing up reading like Norse mythology and stuff, and you continue to see. You know, mead was like always on my bucket list and I always imagined it was going to be like more like an ale, just because I associate like like I don't know, but it's not at all. It's very sweet, right, it's honey wine and after years and years of like hunting it down, I finally tried it and I was like that's all right, like I wasn't blown away.

Speaker 4 7:05

I have a mead too. Yep, if you ever want to, if you guys want to hear this, I set out to make our own mead. This is way back in the 90s and we, of course, we never did it before. So we didn't know what we were doing and we ended up buying champagne yeast to use to make the mead. And the mead, you know, we read about it. It was like, oh, you got to wait at least a year, you know, to do all the full fermentation to get the real good flavor and all that stuff. So you know, we did, we bait our time and we popped open that first bottle was like, wow, this is fantastic. It was a little bit bubbly and I was like this is great. And it was like and then I said, wait three years to get the real full good effect of a good mead. All right, it's fine, right.

Speaker 4 8:03

So we waited, and but so we, we, we, uh, while we're waiting for our mead to get better, we of course went to a store and bought some mead at a store. You know like, oh, we got to try some other ones. You know, we didn't even try any before we tried to make our own. This is how dumb we were right. And uh, so then we, we bought some stuff finally to try it and we're like, wow, this is really bland and fruity, like it didn't have any fizz. It didn't, it was, it was kind of. It was kind of like it was. It was alcoholic but it wasn't, uh, didn't have that nice fizz I was looking for. And we're kind of like, oh, geez, I hope if we wait three years, it's not going to, it's not going to taste like this, you know.

Speaker 4 8:50

Uh, so after three years we tried some more and it was even better. It was like it was like a champagne, honey wine and it was. It was outstanding. And so I went and I went down to my cousins in Connecticut and every year he's part of an association that had a beer tasting contest. And I said, and I brought a case of that mead with me and entered a beer beer tasting contest with it and I won. And all the people there who put their beer in there like slaved over making beer every year in this contest. They were pissed Like, this is not a mead, this is not a beer, you know this, this he shouldn't have won, you know all that stuff. But I took my blue ribbon and I left Connecticut forever.

Speaker 5 9:55

So you came, you saw, you conquered.

Speaker 4 9:59

And now we've never been able to replicate that. It's like one of the best drinks I ever had and I couldn't replicate it.

Speaker 3 10:06

Couldn't get that high again, but also wanted, also wanted in Connecticut for crimes against beer.

Speaker 1 10:12

Yeah, Three years, that's a long time to wait and like crusher fingers.

Speaker 4 10:18

I hope it'll get better. And then I don't know like kind of, and my friend actually kept some bottles and he opened some like seven years later and and he was like it's still outstanding. Can't make it again, though, but he was dead. He does later.

Speaker 3 10:36

What a new thing, for the bucket list.

Speaker 5 10:37

Yeah, All right, steve, chris, any what. What about you? Any book drinks?

Speaker 3 10:48

I don't think, I'm not even trying to think of food, food scenes. I don't think I can think of any. In fact, I might actually just skip over those whole parts to get to the bar fight, which is the interesting part. You know, love a good bar fight. Yeah, Bar fights might. Bar fights are awesome.

Speaker 5 11:06

I will say also summer wine. I don't know if this is a real thing, but it sounds good. Lovely name from the song about in fire, summer wine. I want to drink a summer wine. I don't know, Again if that's real or not, but it sounds good.

Speaker 4 11:18

Sounds refreshing considering their summers are like a decade long.

Speaker 1 11:23

That yeah.

Speaker 4 11:25

That's true.

Speaker 3 11:27

But maybe it's also one of those things that it's just wine to drink in summer and just call it summer wine, right?

Speaker 5 11:32

It's got some ice in it or something, yeah.

Speaker 3 11:35

It's the Billy Connelly joke when he went to your restaurant and on the menu specials had pitainous of the night and he thought, oh my God, these are going to be incredible, but it was literally just a tear. Who's the hat on that night?

Speaker 1 11:49

The only one. Really, I can't think of a specific drink, but whenever I think of bars, I always think of Michael or Fletcher, like beyond redemption. Okay, even though those are like the worst bars, that's like the last bar you'd ever want to be in. I'm trying to think of other bars. I just read something recently.

Speaker 5 12:08

Those are some of the most fun ones. You know, like the really shady ones like in fantasy I'm a big fan of really I know he has like it's not. He has like some like multiversal bar or something, right yeah, his books and it's like in other people's books now too, it's like appearing.

Speaker 4 12:26

The dripping bucket.

Speaker 3 12:29

He has the bars and drinks and his definition of grimdark, though, doesn't he? He says, actually the beer and the drinks served in bars actually is how you grimdark a novel is, isn't it, you know?

Speaker 5 12:41

I do love that definition. I think that's fun, that's really great.

Speaker 1 12:45

I mean it's pretty accurate. I think it's so.

Speaker 3 12:48

Very much so.

Speaker 5 12:50

You mentioned, steve, not to veered into my own stuff, but you have been reading my stuff and there is a bar in the beginning of that book, so I don't know if that's what you were thinking of.

Speaker 1 13:01

Yeah, something yeah.

Speaker 5 13:02

I love a tavern scene, I'm a sucker for a tavern scene, and so I was like I have to find a way to write, and luckily it wasn't hard, like when you got buddies. You know you just you just write the buddies going out drinking, like it's, it's good.

Speaker 1 13:16

It's a place for camaraderie and team building, and, like fights.

Speaker 3 13:22

Yeah, I love it, I do all three yeah, it's a very social space as well, because you think of any times you've been in bars. If you've been there in a bar for a while, you might go in to have the first pint and have the first drink, but after that you start people watching and you start watching everything that's going on around you and that's pretty much what it even with the bars in real life. It lends itself then to exposition and then and events and books. Very, very well, because of that very nature, oh yeah.

Speaker 1 13:50

I felt a little silly asking Robin. I think it was last year sometime. I asked her about pubs, because everyone always talks about pubs in the UK and it's this big thing. It's like is it really? Is it a real thing? Like, is it or is it just like some? You know, some made up, you know, like very tale.

Speaker 2 14:06

But no, it's a thing Like apparently so it's.

Speaker 1 14:08

I want to go check it out Like it sounds like a lot of fun.

Speaker 3 14:12

Wait, I straight. It's a little bit different than America.

Speaker 4 14:15

Well, we do pub crawling up here in Boston.

Speaker 5 14:21

I do think there's a regional sort of like. I we definitely have pubs in LA, but it definitely. The vibe is very different. When I studied abroad in London, and and that was one of the best parts was going to the pubs. You could drink for cheap and get good drinks. Oh man, I was. I was living. My liver was not, though.

Speaker 3 14:42

Yeah you can. Yeah, there's a couple of things struck me when I went to America and things like happy are, like from six to seven, it seemed like other people went to happy are and it kind of say it's a reasonable order to go with your friends and socialize. A happy are in Britain and Ireland is a race. It is literally how much you can drink in that are for cheap. So as you get towards the happy part of the bottom you're going on the next one. Thank you very much. I probably told this story before, but I remember going into a student bar that I hadn't you know drink prices and drink deals etc. And I went in and they had on the board behind them you know JD and Coke, one area. And I just went up the bar hadn't been a student bar in years and said you know, is it really one area for a JD and Coke? And he says yes, yes, it is. So would you like one? He says no, take it, give me the tray. Thanks very much.

Speaker 1 15:40

Yeah, I think. I think mead is one of those drinks that you always read about in fantasy. That just sounds good.

Speaker 4 15:45

Any drinking is okay, it's fine, you apparently got to get that three year champagne yeast mead Like that's.

Speaker 5 15:55

that's the secret sauce.

Speaker 3 15:59

The Vikings wouldn't have been as angry, if only they had champagne yeast.

Speaker 4 16:03

You know they would have stayed home.

Speaker 5 16:05

No wonder they're going around pillaging. They look like some bad drinks.

Speaker 4 16:10

Yeah, Bruce is actually champagne yeast.

Speaker 3 16:14

Yeah, Bruce is actually champagne yeast. Yeah, that's what they look like.

Speaker 1 16:18

They would have gone around just like spreading a big party. He wouldn't have been pillaging to be like a big traveling party. Because they haven't a good time. Our history could have been different.

Speaker 5 16:29

I want to watch that movie now, the like like faux historical, like bar crawl movie about Vikings like going out, and I'm like a traveling like bar crawl, I don't know they get up the high Jinx, like you know, like a what's, what's the movie they? I'm thinking of the like World's End, the right sci fi movie, something like that, but with Vikings jotting that down.

Speaker 4 16:54

It's a great idea, Good idea for a short story. Every I mean nearly every D&D campaign begins in a tavern, right that's how the characters meet up. Then the quest comes.

Speaker 1 17:15

Yeah, so I should mention before I forget, that this is episode 98. We do have plans for 99. So in two weeks we'll have episode 100. And I think we're going to do like a six hour thing and just have people pop in and out as they want. So but if anyone is listening and interested, check out the forum. We'll have a thread going there on Wow, I don't know. Well, think of something I don't know how we're going to talk about for six hours, but let's see how it goes.

Speaker 3 17:45

We should have games. We should have, like a podcast, bingo and the things that people should be, saying like sick of bingo cards and stuff like play along at home drinking games.

Speaker 1 17:57

That's a great idea.

Speaker 5 17:58

Yeah, I think it's a really good idea to like I love the games idea and just in general, like definitely I feel like it requires a little preparation, because six hours, that's a hell of a marathon.

Speaker 1 18:12

It's a good one. Yeah, I think I'll do like three parts.

Speaker 5 18:15

That makes sense.

Speaker 1 18:17

Yeah, yeah, 100. Yeah. So before we went on we were talking about comic books and I'm reading single issues again because we're doing the weekly polls podcast Over under the podcast and Mike I managed to convince him to join me Poor Mike Weekly just talked about books and I think it's tricky and we discussed this on the podcast, but it's tough. And, carl, you mentioned you worked in a comic shop. I think it's tricky now because I think most people read trades like the collected trades. So single issues. I think you have to hook your reader early and if you don't hook them, then you won't end up with the trade. But then most people read for trades. So this is weird thing going on there. Hey, varsha.

Speaker 5 19:11

There you are. Just missed us talking about drinks and fantasy mead mostly.

Speaker 2 19:21

Nice.

Speaker 1 19:21

Varsha, you have to tackle Carl's question, which was go ahead.

Speaker 5 19:27

Carl, was there any fantasy drinks? I mean, I don't know if you drink any fantasy drinks, that inspired you. You were like I want to try that, whether it's real or fake or otherwise. Favorite fantasy bar scenes.

Speaker 2 19:44

So I don't drink alcohol, so none of that ever got me interested, but butter beer. I don't know what the consensus opinion is on the Universal Studios, but I rather liked it.

Speaker 5 20:04

I thought it was delicious for the first two sips and then it was too rich. It was great just for a little sip. And then I was like, okay, I'm good In my family generally we pass it around and, like everyone, it's like just enough. But I have a friend who, like I mean he goes to Universal all the time. He's a big thing part guy and he gets it every time he goes. He loves it.

Speaker 2 20:30

I really, really liked it the first time, I think the second time I liked it a little less. I don't like sweet things quite as much as I did 10 years ago, so I suspect I'll not like it quite as much now, but I'm going to keep the memory of how I liked it.

Speaker 5 20:49

All right, favorite fantasy bar scenes, though, or favorite fantasy bars, if you have one of those.

Speaker 2 20:55

I remember one Interesting, Sorry go ahead.

Speaker 4 21:01

You'll probably remember this fashion. It's a Kruels bar in Derudestown.

Speaker 2 21:08

Oh yes.

Speaker 5 21:09

Yeah.

Speaker 2 21:11

But there's also one scene, I think the second half of Reaper's Gate. I don't remember the name of the bar, but it's a CD feeling establishment where they find someone they're looking for. I think I really like that aesthetic as well.

Speaker 5 21:28

Well, as in definitely has a number of good ones. Yeah, derudestown, that's a great example. I'm pretty sure that's how you, jared you mentioned you know, it's like all great D&D quests start in a bar, and I'm pretty sure that's how Melasin got started too.

Speaker 4 21:42

Yeah, that's Kruppen, merilio and Crocus and those characters. That's where they congregate.

Speaker 5 21:48

Oh, I mean even before. I mean the actual campaigns and stuff that Cam and Steve ran. I swear those characters like Shadow Throne and Cotillion and stuff like ran a bar and that there was something. I this may be apocryphal, I may just be making this up, but I swear there's something or like Lysine was like a bar owner and that's how they met, or there's something there and maybe it's a tendency.

Speaker 4 22:15

The prequels that Esimon wrote yeah, it is. There's a bar in Melasin. I haven't read that yet, but I that's what they met.

Fantasy Series and Cozy Tavern Scenes

Speaker 5 22:24

There you go, okay, boom. So that's a lot of fun. I love all the little D&D nods you could say, and Melasin particularly because the series is so in so many ways. So, unlike what I think of when I think of Dungeons and Dragons, just in terms of like how, when I think of D&D I think of like kind of casual, lighthearted fun and certainly there is that in Melasin but it's also very dense and very dark and very serious it's. But like you also have like all the different elves. They have different names but they're the elves, you know, they're the elf races and you have your take on orcs and things and love it, something for everybody. Yes, I'm trying to think who. What other fantasy series I've read with like really good bars, I feel like Robin Hobb, just in general rides, good, like cozy places, and so I think there's some good cozy like tavern scenes, but I don't remember one distinctly.

Speaker 1 23:26

I didn't want to take the easy way out, but I think one of the first scenes that comes to my mind is Lord of the Rings. Oh, of course.

Speaker 5 23:32

Oh yeah.

Speaker 1 23:33

The tavern scene. I mean that's, but that's like too easy, right. I mean, but that's one of the ones, that kind of that's yeah pop in your mind just because it's so iconic.

Speaker 3 23:41

But it's people watching again taking a step back and sitting in the corner. You know what's good.

Speaker 5 23:48

You mentioned it, steve, though, because if you didn't, I'm sure someone some listener out there is going to be like why didn't you talk about the Lord of the Rings?

Speaker 5 23:54

tavern. You idiot. Yeah, what is wrong with you? Any others, I don't know. Song of Ice and Fire has some, but like I wouldn't say they're particularly memorable, like they're not like the parts of like I don't know, I just don't think of them a lot, like there's a place where hot pie works, but like I don't know, like I like hot pie but I'm not crazy about his tavern scenes.

Speaker 3 24:26

Dress in has Murphy's. If you read Dress, although it's not, there's only a couple of major scenes in there in the entire series, but it's. It's not just a bar but it's a save haven. It's got kind of protected zoom within that world. So there's that. One Should be loads. That should be springing off.

Speaker 5 24:53

I know exactly. I'm like I feel crazy, Like I can't think of more. You would think Joe Abercrombie would have some just like with the type of stuff he writes, but I feel like he doesn't really Like. When I think of the first law trilogy, I don't know that they ever like stop in a bar and even in like with Orso and the second trilogy, I don't know that there's ever any like bar scenes. They kind of he just like parties on his own.

Speaker 4 25:21

Yeah, I mean, every, every D&D book novel has one, you know, the most famous being the wandering. What is it called the wanderers? I forget the one in Dragonlands, where all the all the companions first meet up, you know and so, but they all have. It's just whether or not they're gonna stick in your mind, I guess, because it kind of when they get used.

Speaker 1 25:49

There's a bar scene in Curse of the Mistraith right, oh yeah.

Speaker 5 25:53

Yeah, I just started that. I'm like 50 pages in, very much enjoying it you can catch us.

Speaker 3 26:00

Yeah, definitely yeah, you probably could, yeah, maybe it'll be, we'll see.

Speaker 5 26:05

We'll see how it goes. There's how quickly I go through them.

Speaker 3 26:09

Yeah, there's quite a lot of scenes. Yeah, you'll get to the end of the first book and kind of go, I want to read more. But it is kind of I sort of like the pace we're going on up because it does force you to live in it. You know, live with what's happening in the events kind of slowly, although there are times where you get the end of your, your little section to go oh man, let's get going.

Speaker 1 26:33

Yeah, yeah it should be posed like let's go. I know. He's so it's cool that he's so passionate about it, yeah.

Speaker 2 26:45

I like the feeling of coming back to the series, for which it's necessary to take a break, if you like. I feel like I have to really push myself if I, if we went back to back without breaks. But yeah, I like the pace that we're doing it at do. But what I think fantasy needs more of is coffee shops. I can't think of any. I haven't read. Yeah, I haven't read it yet, but are there any other books that do coffee shops instead of tablets?

Speaker 4 27:19

Yeah, most of the fantasy books are medieval based, so I don't know if coffee came into the picture yet In that medieval type of terminology. Maybe tea, I think.

Speaker 5 27:34

I think they had coffee, but I don't know, like you would think, yeah, I don't know that coffee shops were like a thing or like kind of traditional cafes. It certainly seems like something that I would associate as like an anachronism, but that may not be the case. I mean, there are a lot of things you know. It's like the. Have you guys heard of the Tiffany effect, where Tiffany is like a classic name, like it goes back like thousands of years, but like if you had a character in a medieval novel or in a fantasy called Tiffany, you know a lot of readers would be like that's not right, like no, I don't think so, princess Tiffany. No, thank you. And yeah, it's just, it's about playing with the. You know, knowing what the audience is going to expect.

Speaker 3 28:23

There's a challenge, writer's challenge. That's the first writer's challenge of January. We're at a believable fantasy world with Tiffany the great wizard, tiffany the great wizard, tiffany, and you have to squeeze in the line. I think we're alone now At some stage in the story.

Speaker 1 28:43

Nice, hello, pat. You have to read it in a shopping mall, this thing's right itself, I know what you're saying yeah, fantasy shopping mall.

Speaker 5 28:57

I'm like in where this is going.

Speaker 1 29:07

So anyway, yeah, so you know the I think it's a tough. It's a tough thing to balance because as a creative team, if you don't have a have a successful book, then you run the risk of it not continuing. So you have to hook the reader and you have to leave the kind of a cliffhangers at the end of every single issue. But also you have to consider how it flow, how it will flow in a trade, because you don't want it to be the pacing to be off, and when it's collected together, it's just like it's an odd balance to to manage. I would guess.

Speaker 4 29:42

Yeah, that was a new. That was a new terminology that came out right after. Waiting for the trade was writing for the trade, where writers started to realize people were waiting for trades and started writing to better fit that format.

The Importance of Format in Comics

Speaker 5 30:04

It's interesting too that you're seeing that I don't want to say it's definitely not gone out of style, but that it I do feel like it's become emphasized less in the last like few years. Like I feel like you're seeing more like single issue stories again and things like that, even as, like issues are getting shorter. You know, I think even since, like I was working in a comic book store, I definitely feel like some of the ways people have been writing comics have changed. I mean, you're also seeing trades get shorter, right, they used to be like six issues or even eight, and now a lot of them are like five or four, which is, I mean, that's one of the economics, right, it's like trying to improve their margins as everything is getting more expensive, but it's certainly a can be frustrating as a consumer. Certainly, the comics is a weird medium. I love it. I love it a lot. It's one of my first loves.

Speaker 3 31:06

But it also creates a really nice screen experience for me. Who does the person that reads trades the kind of think like there's a couple of things we've done went? Oh my God see, if I was reading this in a single issue that was coming out every so often, I would have been livid. At this moment, like at this very moment, I would have thought like this is honestly Wrath inducing to have waited for some resolution to story and just gotten this what? Yeah, I feel like I'm reading some bad experiences there, but reading it in a trade, it's kind of either one of these are in so far as you're either going to run before it or run after it. You know, in some way, you know to kind of say that.

Speaker 5 31:48

It's almost, like you know, writing like a book series to where, like, you want each installment to kind of work on its own, but you also want to like entice the reader back for more, and certainly you need to have that hook, like you said, steve. I mean, it's even harder, in a sense, in comics because you, you potentially only have that first issue, and so definitely it's really important that you, you know, get your claws, and as quickly as possible. Yeah, it's something also I've been thinking about. I've been trying to get more into writing comics. Actually, I'm working on the short right now for this anthology, this little indie anthology. I'm trying to we're working on it Just turning the last draft of the script and the artist is getting to work on it and that, you know, that's its own beast too is like trying to, you know, tell a compelling story in eight pages, 12 pages, you know, similar to like stories and prose.

Speaker 5 32:49

It's its own art really, and it's certainly not something that I personally feel like like. I feel like longer form stories come much more naturally to me, just lots of ideas, and I want to throw them all out there. But you know, short stories you really have to be like, dig in and I mean that's the tricky thing too with like that first issue. You know, even in like longer series is you, you want to seed room for more but you don't want to throw too much to the audience where, like they don't know what to latch on to. You know they need to get emotionally invested is a tricky thing.

Speaker 1 33:26

And there's so many number ones every week. There's number ones everywhere and it's tempting to not ooh this new shiny thing and just not you know. But, chris, to your point. I'm reading Tenement now. It's the same creative team that wrote Gideon Falls and it's like this is really frustrating, like it's really, it's a it's. It's a big difference reading it in trade versus reading a single issue once every two weeks, because it's really it sucks.

Speaker 4 33:52

You're reading Tenement one at a time.

Speaker 2 33:54

One issue at a time yeah, I could see that I should know.

Speaker 4 33:59

Because I remember, chris you bringing this up during Gideon Falls, like you couldn't imagine reading this one, one issue at a time and and I agreed with that assessment when we were reading those because it really was not yeah, not like, like Steve, we're reading sacrifices right now and I'm having a great time with this because I feel like this is more, a bit more geared towards the monthly, the monthly grind you know is there's almost a complete story in each issue, whilst still being thoroughly connected with all the other ones, you know, but I'm enjoying that one a lot.

Speaker 4 34:40

I couldn't say the same if we were reading Gideon Falls that way.

Speaker 3 34:47

Gideon Falls is a tease. Every issue of teasing, a little bit more mystery, right, you know that's very much what it is and you want sort of resolution of the mystery. But you need a chunk of issues in a time to get enough mystery to kind of give you some ideas. Even, you know, I think a single issue would kind of leave you frustrated and like I really don't know enough. Still, even that hasn't progressed any. It's been like lost was a bit like that. You know I know we're talking about this an awful lot. But lost was very much. You know it built the bit over time but they tried to, best of themselves, contain stories every weekend, so far as being about a character development as well as eating out this tiny itty bitty story. But they had 24 episodes to do that in per season as well, so they had a lot of space to fill.

Speaker 4 35:29

So actually you're reading Sandman right now, right yeah?

Speaker 2 35:34

yeah, we read the first eight issues. I think we're going to read the next eight soonish.

Speaker 4 35:41

But that's eight issues of that is pretty dense, that's that's a, j and a. Hacked volume one there with eight issues and because I remember, because when you could read just one of those issues and get a good full story, a lot out of it. You know for the most part, especially early on in that in that series Later on to they like I'm on volume eight of a reread, like I.

Speaker 5 36:11

That was something I decided to pick up recently and I kind of have been reading it in like chunks and yeah, there are a lot of just really great short stories, basically like seeing came in stories and it's so for the monthly, the monthly audience with those with that, oh yes.

Speaker 5 36:31

And it was so striking to me that it didn't necessarily hit me on my first read this is my second was just how non traditional the storytelling is in that regard, where, like, there are things you won't hear about for like years, you know, and then they suddenly come back up and like, obviously I'm going to avoid spoilers for you, barcia, and anyone listening who hasn't read it, which everyone should read it, at least try it. It's really remarkable what he does and the way that he I think he was like making up a lot of it as he went along to is my understanding and I just think it's. It's such a masterwork in like non traditional, like structures and storytelling. Well, at the same time, you know, it's very much a product of, yeah, comics, particularly comics back in like the 90s where, you know, issues were a little longer, you had a lot more single issue stories and he really made the most of it and we've wove this like really rich tapestry that I you don't need.

Speaker 5 37:36

You don't have a full appreciation for it until you've read the whole thing and you see, like just what he was doing and how all these little things you know you think are just like oh, this is just one arc, or this is just one short story, comes back into play, you know, like 20, 30 issues later, or like all the way at the end of the series, and you're like, oh my God, you know, and it was all there. Like you can see it all. It really is just remarkable and very inspiring.

Speaker 1 38:04

I made the mistake of buying the big fat yeah, the big collectors edition of the hard cover yeah, it's bad.

Speaker 2 38:13

It was difficult to read. I stopped reading Berserk on the deluxe editions too, because they're so big and difficult to carry. Oh unwieldy yeah.

Speaker 1 38:24

Deliculna Shoth, though Very true.

Speaker 3 38:29

This is what's important. This is what's important, but it is that feeling of like there is a trade off between, like, having that tangible feeling of reading a comic in your hand. Well, I've read plenty, actually, even in Kindle. Like that can be that guy, that reading experience can be amazing. But also I don't think that I get the same out of. I'll get the story better, I'll get the flow of the story better, I'll get the storytelling and the panel and stuff to a certain extent, but I don't actually look at the artwork to the same extent. I don't think in that. I didn't know there's something about seeing the color, printed colors rather than kind of colors off a screen. That doesn't quite connect in the same way.

Speaker 5 39:06

You don't get the page turned the same way too. Yeah, that's right, that's right.

Speaker 3 39:10

The anticipation of it just won't flow.

Speaker 5 39:14

That's an underrated like. I mean it just fundamentally changes the way you write for the medium, like I've been talking to a lot of as I've been trying to like push into the industry like creators, and I was talking to Colin Kelly recently who he just he lives in LA and went to the same school I did and so connected and he was super nice and helpful. But you know he's talking about like it's different. You know like you have your own challenges when you're writing comics as compared to writing like prose or movies or whatever, and, like you know, the page turn is one of them. Like that's one of the like parts of the craft of the writing. That's like really important. It changes too Now that you don't have the page turned you do. It just functions differently when you're, you know, reading something on a Kindle or anything like that.

Speaker 4 40:06

Yeah, even the artist has to consider that page turning aspect. Because they have to, because they have to lead your eye from panel to panel, but when it's going to the next page they have a different, you know, like artistic mandate on the end of that page to the next page. You know, it's, it's, it's. It can get quite technical actually. What's?

Speaker 5 40:32

it. Yeah, that's, it's definitely something that's where they have the Joe Kubrick school for hot.

Speaker 4 40:37

I mean, it's a reason for that and it's like you know, there's a lot to learn about it.

Speaker 5 40:43

That aspect of pacing I find is is a lot more technical and a lot less almost instinctual at least in my experience than things like writing for screenplays or, you know, books where, like you don't know how it's going to be formatted right, like I mean, even if you do your formatting yourself, like every page is a page, like people don't think about page turns. You know, in books and in movies when you think about that sort of pacing, a lot of it comes in an edit right, where you're like thinking about individual cuts and things like that. But the actual like screenplay I mean you do think about. That's not entirely true. You do think about page turns and screenplays, particularly early on, when you're like trying to hook people, and that's a whole separate thing. But comics is much more like technical, like you said, jared, and absolutely the writer and artists have to be on the same page. You know, no pun intended.

Speaker 3 41:41

But I think that's also why, certainly my experience with comics is that certain creative teams are like blockbuster in some way. As soon as the creative team has got a new series coming out that people trust and kind of like their feeding style, they just kind of go well, this is an Autobahn. You know very much, so, in probably more ways even than books or anything else. You know people kind of dip it in and out, but it feels like in the comic or graphic novel space, that's very much. Some teams are like yeah, you know like a rock band.

Speaker 1 42:11

Yeah, a lot of it has to do with the amount of time investment too, because a novel takes you 10, 12, 15 hours to read and a comic book takes you a four or five issue trade takes you like an hour, hour and a half, so it's a lot more time investment. So I think people are more careful with longer form content like that. With the novel, I mean, stephen King can write whatever he wants, like he could scribble on a page and people will buy it.

Speaker 3 42:40

but you know it's not too often.

Speaker 3 42:45

My youngest finished 1922. The other day I'd read the body stand by me for those don't know and kind of like yeah, I was, okay, I was, you know, it was an interesting story, whatever. So they give 1922 to read which is like his property, gore in places, like seriously like messed up. But was reading it in school and like the reading page was in the last 20 pages going this is seriously aft up and I'm sitting in the school Up the hill everybody else is reading like Harry Potter and there's somebody just body just getting chopped up and put down a whale. The worst part is this is sort of cool.

Speaker 5 43:31

Get them while they're young. Yeah, barsha, what's your experience with comics Like? What comics have you read?

Speaker 2 43:40

So I think the, in terms of comics, what I read when I was growing up. We had these monthly issue things that we'd get. What was it? Jumper? No, that was a short story collection. It was called Twinkle and or Tinker. I don't know One of those Twinkle, I think.

Speaker 5 44:03

Probably Twinkle over Tinker.

Transitioning Careers and Recognizing Actor Talent

Speaker 2 44:15

I just was before I knew the other meetings and it had a bunch of collected story like it had some recurring characters and stories about these characters. So there was this Supandhi the fool, who do things like hey, what's the time? He has a glass of milk in his hand and he's turned it over because he has a watch also in the same hands. Anyway, dumb jokes like that. Akbar and Beedbull, I don't know, I can't think of a western story that sort of fits that format. But there are many stories of like the king and his clever minister who keeps pulling the king out of scraps. There's Akbar and Beedbull. There's Tenali Raman, and I forget who his king is, maybe Krishna Devraya, but anyway, this one was Akbar and Beedbull being the clever minister. And Akbar, the emperor of India, who keeps getting himself into scraps and Beedbull keeps getting him out of it. And then there was Shikari Shambu, who was Shikari the hunter and he'd get himself into trouble while hunting animals. So anyway, there were all these stories of people that get collected into tinker slash, twinker comics that I read once a month.

Speaker 2 45:33

I think my first acquaintance with the style of comics that you folks are familiar with was Sandman. I didn't even like, or think I liked, superhero stories until very recently. Sandman I only decided to read because I read American Gods by Neil Gaiman and I loved it and I wanted to read more by the author. So I tried Sandman. I loved it, so I'm actually reading it now for discussions, but I loved Sandman.

Speaker 2 46:00

I do out the whole thing in a week, which I kind of sort of regret because I feel like I forgot a lot because of it. But also I can always read. Now I do want to try more comics. I still don't think I mean I like superhero movies now I don't think I have the patience for long drawn superhero stories. So what I'm thinking is I'll follow the comics that you guys are reading for your discussions, because those seem to be like a nice non-superhero set that I can read. I'm planning to read Gideon Falls and I'm here to read Night Fever and you're reading Fade Out, so I want to pick that up. So all of those look interesting. I love comics growing up, except not the superhero ones. I do have this collection of Black Panther done by I don't know how to say his name. It's read Goats, that's the last name.

Speaker 5 46:58

Tanya used the Goats yeah?

Speaker 2 47:00

I want to try that. That seems interesting. I love the movies. If it's anything like that, I'll probably love the comics too.

Speaker 5 47:09

It inspired. There are parts of it that inspired, particularly the second movie. So yeah, he's a good writer.

Speaker 2 47:18

I was a miserable wreck during the second movie. I cried during the whole thing, yeah.

Speaker 5 47:26

Talking about that. That was a celebrity death. That hit me hard, I think, just because it felt so sudden, like we didn't know how sick he was. Yeah, and he was so young and so talented and just yeah, it's really sad.

Speaker 3 47:39

Well, like a lot of people that make it at a certain point in Hollywood or otherwise, you sort of think everybody's eternally young. But obviously Chadwick had been working for many, many years in kind of obscurity in a lot of ways, finally gets his break and obviously was a lot older than we give him credit for, even though he's still very young. But it's that idea that to make it often it's a life's work. Yeah, even get to that stage, absolutely.

Speaker 5 48:07

Yeah, people, it's the overnight success that took like 10 years, right, Like that's the classic Hollywood story. Oh my God. Yeah, you hear about that all the time. It is usually when someone breaks in when they're really young. There's some relationship going on there, you know, nepotism, that sort of thing, or they, you know they really got pushed when they were like ridiculously young. You know they're like a child actor and that's its own can of worms.

Speaker 3 48:34

Yeah, there's very, very few of those actors that transition as, as you know, it's just a very, very difficult transition for people to make and lots of people have tried lots of different ways to do it and often what happens is that they usually carry some stigma throughout the rest of their life, regardless of what they did to mitigate the kind of feeding of who they were as younger persons. Zac Efra would be a good example of that. Daniel Radcliffe would be another very good example of it. People that just can't shake off that, that thing they were first known for.

Speaker 5 49:07

You know, one of my favorite things, though, is like young actors like that like Daniel Radcliffe or Robert Pattinson is another good example Elijah, like a lot of these like huge franchise. It often seems to be the men, the women I mean, I don't know, Emma Watson's made a whole career for herself, but like the thing that I love is when they go and they've like made a bunch of money on a franchise and then they go do a bunch of weird stuff and they just like work on a bunch of like weird indie stuff and they do whatever the hell they want, and I love that for them. Like I've loved following Daniel Radcliffe's career since Harry Potter. Like he's been in such a lot of like delightfully quirky roles and he, in my opinion, is the best actor to come out of that like young class. He's just got such phenomenal range and is so good he's yeah, he's really great.

Speaker 3 49:58

What's it? Ironically, I think for Radcliffe, though it's his was it was a Jimmy Fallon, he was only did the rap. The rap exercise going through the alphabet is the kind of thing that sort of made people take him seriously. And it's sort of weird, ridiculous, like way the popular culture works and so far as you're known for one thing and then people go, oh my God, it's actually talented.

Speaker 5 50:18

Right. People definitely like to cast judgment on, like people who were like child actors or like part of those. Like Robert Pattinson was the exact same thing. People are like, oh, he's the Twilight guy, you know whatever. He looks pretty and he like looks constipated and that's it, you know. And then you like you see his career and like you watch him in movies like the lighthouse and you're like this guy can really act, like he's phenomenal. So it's, you know. A lot of times you know these actors are not one trick ponies, even if the public perception is of them is just that.

Speaker 3 50:50

So some people can do it. Rand Gosling did a great job of transitioning from pretty boy, young boy, actor, a notebook et cetera, to being like one of the real illustrious that the rest of the moment, yeah an amazing transition.

Speaker 4 51:05

Yeah, what's that show Reckliffe is in recently the miracle workers?

Speaker 5 51:13

I haven't seen it. They're good things. I heard the first couple of seasons.

Speaker 4 51:16

correct me up like crazy. It was, it was so fun. The last one was kind of a dud, but but the first couple were really good. That'll happen.

Speaker 3 51:28

But Reckliffe did something quite early on.

Speaker 3 51:30

After he finished, finished High Party, he went and did equus on stage.

Speaker 3 51:34

Yeah, and equus is a role which, quite notoriously, the person in the lead role is completely naked for it, one stage on screen and I think like that that kind of role, even though it wasn't like mainstream or otherwise, people are like, all right, this guy's not messing about.

Speaker 3 51:51

This wasn't like a like somebody cast him because he was Daniel Reckliffe. They cast him because he was obviously quite good and could bring something to the role and it was taken up very seriously in a way and it's craft very seriously in a way that other people he could have tech definitely a bit like you were saying. You could have taken the easy way out and done the, the, the movie, the romantic comedy or whatever for God knows how many years to kind of make his money and then step aside. But he wanted to make a career of his own, his own doing at that stage outside of the thing that he was famed for and became the same for. So he gets an awful lot of good deals for me for a lot of the decisions that he's made in his career.

Speaker 5 52:29

Mark Hamill is another one who I really loved what he's done with his career and now you see him getting back into more live action after doing decades of voice acting work and he's really good. You know like just watching all of the House of Usher recently and he's been in a number of different things you know, separate from Star Wars where, like I've been like this guy can act like he's, he's really got it.

Speaker 3 52:56

His Joker, oh yes, probably the best Joker, absolutely, absolutely Brilliant, oh, unbelievably brilliant, Like he watched three series that. And then somebody says do you know, by the way, that that's Mark Hamill? And you're like what?

Speaker 5 53:10

Yeah, it's not. That blew my mind when I learned that it I'll never be the same. Yeah, he and Kevin Conroy are for me that's Batman and the Joker, like until the day I die, you know what comes?

Speaker 3 53:25

a great example, just a really great example. Yeah.

Speaker 4 53:33

That's what else can we do? There's got to be loads. What else can we get for comics? Yeah, recommendations, I do want to recommendation.

Speaker 5 53:48

I try Alan Moore too, if you like. Neil Gaiman, alan Moore right Sort of similar stuff in that like dark fantasy, horror, very literary stuff. You know he's got good superhero stuff too, but like, particularly, you know, a lot of his independent stuff is very good. And I swamp thing too, if you want to go to like kind of a superhero kind of not thing.

Speaker 2 54:15

Yeah, I've had that on mission for a while.

Speaker 1 54:17

Yes, yeah, when I get to that.

Speaker 2 54:19

Yeah.

Speaker 3 54:20

Person on you. Watchman will blow your mind, like it.

Speaker 2 54:23

Oh yeah.

Speaker 3 54:23

Genuinely will blow your mind. Knowing you as a reader, I think it will Genuinely. You'd just be like what the actual hell yeah.

Speaker 4 54:32

I'll get it Watchman nobody use the nine panel format better ever than Watchman that was. Nobody can even come close.

Speaker 5 54:45

So, Alan Moore is a master. No doubt he wrote a book on the craft of writing comics. That is awesome. It's a great book. Yeah, have you guys read Nice House on the Lake? That was something that 12 issue series I guess it's going to go on. It's James Tinney in the fourth who I have really loved in his indie work particularly.

Speaker 3 55:11

I was like OK, on his superhero stuff. See the guy that he did World Tree I think that you talked about. I think that's right.

Comic Books and Working in Store

Speaker 5 55:20

That's his latest stuff, yeah. Yeah, nice House on the Lake is probably my favorite thing he's written. That are Department of Truth, both of which are fantastic, and Nice House on the Lake is one of the reasons I was thinking of it, is it? I read it in trade but I could not imagine like you were saying, chris, like reading it issue by issue, because it's such a slow burn and the mystery element is so powerful. But it reads like one of those great like mystery box stories, like lost, you know, except the answers are more satisfying and just very. It's very dramatic and the character work is really good, very atmospheric. Yeah, quite good, steve will be delighted.

Speaker 3 56:03

I know there's a deluxe edition of a tune like that. I mean, that's that's the special sauce for Steve, so he can hold something and rub it.

Speaker 1 56:11

And rub it. It keeps you warm at night.

Speaker 3 56:14

Yeah, you tuck it in. You don't put a special point in the hot water bottle, yeah, so in a great comics though, yeah, it's something.

Speaker 1 56:25

But also I didn't realize that Nicholas Eames is writing comics now too.

Speaker 5 56:30

Yeah, you just started it, right yeah?

Speaker 1 56:32

Mike read that book Barbaric. I think that sounds right.

Speaker 5 56:39

No. Do we know yet when the third band book is coming out, or is there any word on that?

Speaker 3 56:47

Don't see anything. I'm just literally googled this kind of get barbaric up. Okay.

Speaker 5 56:53

I don't see anything in my book three. I know you was struggling with it and maybe had personal stuff going on too. I don't know exactly the details. I imagine you probably didn't talk about them one way or another, but that was a series. I never read Bloody Rose, but I really like Kings the Wild. I've been meaning to get to Bloody Rose but it just hasn't. Hasn't yet. Have you guys read King of the Wild? No, it's super fun. It's like I mean, the whole premise is like what if mercenary bands were like rock bands, you know historically? And there's a lot of like music inspiration, a lot of D&D nods. It's just a fun read Like. It's just like a really good time. The characters are likable, it's breezy, it's quite funny. Yeah, that's. It's something to put on the endless TBR.

Speaker 3 57:46

Yeah, it sounds perfect because we are tending to read a lot of very thoughtful yeah, so mixing that up with something can be can be perfect actually.

Speaker 5 57:59

You definitely got it, or at least I definitely have to sometimes. Or like, if I get to like blog, like when I was reading Melazin I had to like read other stuff in between books, like, otherwise my brain was going to melt.

Speaker 1 58:13

I don't know, when I first started a book to, a lot of people were talking about that book and I thought it looks, looks. And then I heard the premise and it's like I don't know if that's for me. It's. It sounds fun, but I'm not. I'm more of, like you know, prince of Nothing sounds fun, right. Not like a rock band in a fantasy setting. I was like not sure it's my cup of tea. I'm sure it's great, I just not sure it's for me. You know like for sure.

Speaker 5 58:39

No, it's. It's definitely something where, like you have to be into a specific style of a fantasy, definitely kind of like a pulpier kind of Adventure. Like it feels like an action adventure movie. Really, like I'm shocked it hasn't been. You know, very seriously options to be made, because it seems, like Taylor, like you, the soundtrack is obvious, like you pull from the decade of rock music, you know, like it it could be like Guardians of the Galaxy and like a fantasy setting, which I guess is kind of what they try to do with the Dungeons and Dragons movie, which I thought was solid.

Speaker 3 59:14

Yeah.

Speaker 5 59:15

Yeah, I like.

Speaker 3 59:16

I like the movie. It was much. Not as a TV series. Yeah, it's fun, a lot of fun. Needle Drops, needle Drops. Westworld got four series that are needle drops, like you know, it's a well known trope, you know haven't if you read Monsters or Saga, because those are all my things. I've read a good bit of saga, really good.

Speaker 4 59:37

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 59:41

I tried Saga. I fell off it's too much. It was too Star Warsy for me.

Speaker 3 59:48

Or did you think so?

Speaker 1 59:49

I could see that. Yeah, you know, it's great it's a good set yeah. Yeah, I just think the maybe it's just because I so many people compared to the Star Wars that when I went in I was expecting Star Wars and I said, yeah, this is Star Wars. It wasn't bad.

Speaker 5 1:00:05

I just again it's not not a space fantasy guy.

Speaker 1 1:00:10

I'm not opposed to it, it just felt very familiar. Ok, yeah.

Speaker 5 1:00:19

The TV heads didn't make it feel weird enough like you need. You know Mr Robots and the line oh I love. I don't read Saga in years I'm way behind on it but I think I read, like the first, like 30 issues or something, and loved it.

Speaker 1 1:00:38

I think they took a break for a while, for a couple of years, I think so yeah.

Speaker 4 1:00:41

Well, it's a monster. I have read up to 65 issues Saga, wow yeah.

Speaker 5 1:00:47

It just came back after a big hiatus.

Speaker 4 1:00:49

Well, there are another hiatus now this year, but they came back with like 12 more and then another back over.

Speaker 5 1:00:58

OK, monstrous is pretty good. It didn't blow me away, I mean when we were the first, like trade, whatever it is, I have the second one. I've been meaning to get to it, the art is gorgeous, the arts amazing, like absolutely stunning. But I don't know. I don't know what it was, it just didn't quite grab me, it's all.

Speaker 3 1:01:18

Like even how it tells the story. I find it very different to read than most other things. Most graphic novels sort of flow whereas monstrous kind of. I think the artwork's really dense or something you know. It stops you from from a post I'm just going through.

Speaker 4 1:01:33

Yeah, I was reading the read notes when they first came out, the monstrous, and then then I stopped working at a comic book store and I kind of fell off. So couldn't, didn't keep up with, but the artwork's great, it's just yeah, it's great.

Speaker 1 1:01:52

But speaking of working in a comic book store, Carl, you had some stories for us.

Speaker 5 1:01:57

Oh yeah, I have so many. And Jared, yeah, I mean, if you worked to, I'm sure you you have your own stories. It's one of the most memorable ones is about the superhero metalhead. Now, if you have not heard of metalhead, that is for a very good reason, because metalhead is a real life superhero who exists in Oklahoma City, oklahoma, where the comic store I worked at was, and he I have a picture of him.

Speaker 5 1:02:28

He used to come into the shop in full costume and talk about the patrols he was doing and if you imagine he has like a domino mask, like a top hat, like a metal leather vest, a lot of like chains and stuff on him, like tight black pants, boots, the combat boots. He had a whole vibe and the best story you know. So like he kind of got known around the shop, like people knew of metalhead. But one day he comes in. But you could say he comes in as part Ken, right, he comes in, he is not in his superhero outfit.

Speaker 5 1:03:11

And my boss I wasn't here for this, my boss told me this later. My boss recognized him and he like kind of calls him over. He's like hey, your, your metalhead, right, and metalhead is dead. And my boss goes oh no, well, like I hope you know everything's OK, and like metalhead like comes back you know there's still a lot of crime to fight and he said you know, don't worry, like metalhead will be back, like when justice is needed, metalhead will return, and so that's you know. I have other stories I probably can't really say on air because you your podcast would be panned or something, something that should add a little NSFW. But you definitely have some experiences working at a comic shop. Most people, the vast majority, like, in my experience, totally normal, nice, cool, wonderful people there are. You get characters, though, for sure.

Speaker 3 1:04:18

Just the other guys Metalhead huh, metalhead.

Speaker 1 1:04:25

Did metalhead make a return eventually? I don't know.

Speaker 5 1:04:29

I actually I've never heard an update, and I by the time that happened while I was working there. The undercover metalhead retirement, I don't know. I don't know if he ever came back, Wow.

Speaker 3 1:04:42

That's hilarious. My question to the two of you is who did work in comic book stores? Because I can think of like various types of different stores that I worked in and grown up like. You must get totally immersed in, totally immersed in that world, like literally, like week on week, things coming in through the door and your life's consumed by the next issue of whatever it is. What were some of the series that, when you were working there, that that were like that, you know, like everybody in the shop was, was kind of right, oh my God, they were all in this together, yeah.

Speaker 4 1:05:19

Usually it was the. For me it was the just the big events that were going on with the mobile DC events. You know, that's what that's what all the most of the fans were talking about. You know, at the time I was working, it was, like you know, the secret invasion was going on and the big events like that is because we had like a little.

Speaker 4 1:05:40

we had a little podcast we did every month on the comic coach and every week and and so we we'd all would choose you know four or five issues that came out that we could talk about, and of course, I was always choosing the independent stuff because I like that better. So I would choose you know something from dark horse or what have you and anything fancy that came out. I would have be like, nope, we're talking about this, but everybody else be talking about the latest issue of Avengers or X-Men or you know, or Justice, batman, whatever, depending on what big events were going on in the in the comic world at the time. So a lot of superhero talk.

Speaker 5 1:06:26

Definitely I mean majority. There were some indie series that had, or smaller published publisher series that had their like audiences. Definitely yeah, although I think in a big way more independent series and small publisher series have like big small publisher series have like blown up more and like gotten more of the market in recent years. I feel particularly in the horror space, like horror comics have had a huge tremendous on the last five years.

Speaker 4 1:06:54

The Walking Dead did a lot to move that forward.

Speaker 5 1:06:58

That was a big one. While I was working there, issue 100 came out. I remember a lot of talk about that, yeah.

Speaker 4 1:07:06

I was working when issue one came out. Wow, way back.

Speaker 5 1:07:14

I'm trying to remember what were. I mean all all the different stuff that, yeah, Marvel and DC were doing at the time, Definitely all the big events. Rebirth was a big thing. Towards the end I want to say DC rebirth.

Speaker 2 1:07:34

Towards the end of my time in the comic shop, whatever.

Speaker 5 1:07:39

Yeah after all that, when Wally West came to that, yeah, yeah, I'm trying to remember the individual series. It's kind of like you were saying, chris, where like I was so immersed in it all, like I was reading almost everything that because, like I didn't even have to, like, pay for it.

Speaker 3 1:08:01

I could just like read it and bring it back and things like that.

Speaker 5 1:08:03

The core yeah, yeah, yeah that. I don't even remember what it all sort of like. It was just a huge blur.

Speaker 4 1:08:12

Yeah World, you know, I mean universe, it's again, the blend of stories, it really is blends, it's like purges into each other Absolutely and I remember the stuff that I was like introduced in like trade and that kind of like I had.

Speaker 5 1:08:29

Like planetary was something that I read it wasn't coming out. Then it was like had been out for a long time but that was something I really loved that I got into while I was working in the store. Invincible I read like all of invincible that had come out.

Speaker 5 1:08:42

That was another comic that I think was doing it's like a hundredth issue when I was working in the store or something there about. Yeah, I don't remember what I want to talk about, other than like, yeah, the events, whatever events were going on at the time, but and you know all the relaunches I mean they still do a bunch of relaunches but, like you know, superhero comics make it like 12 issues and then they get, you know, captain America number one again, and new creative team, that sort of thing, or even old creative team, but new number one, you know how, about all their little secrets to try to sell more.

Speaker 4 1:09:17

We talked about a lot what's the new big run on Captain America? That? Was great, right, I was talked about a lot. Yeah, you know, since we're all Brubica fans here, yeah, I'm, I'm, I want to look this up now.

Speaker 5 1:09:34

I'm like what was everyone talking about? What was coming out? Yeah me curious.

Comic Book Community and Changing Demographics

Speaker 1 1:09:39

Probably the new 52 was probably. Well, I think you left right before that after rebirth.

Speaker 5 1:09:45

No, no, it was after. Rebirth came after the new 52. So it was like new 52 was like 2012 ish, and then like that's when it started, and it went on for like a couple of years or so and then rebirth was like 2016. I want to say, because that's when I was leaving, yeah, 2012 is like last year in my head.

Speaker 4 1:10:10

Yeah, I know, yeah, yeah, Unfortunately, I mean, I wasn't full time. Yeah, I would just did it on on Wednesday afternoons. Of course, wednesday is comic day, right, new comic days, and Wednesday afternoons I would be there for the podcast and just do stuff, and then I was running the Friday night magic. So I was, I was doing.

Speaker 1 1:10:36

Oh nice.

Speaker 4 1:10:36

The store and that was a trip because, you know, while I'm running the tournament I'm also watching the register and people come up to buy comics and stuff like that. But back then they would have the, the pre releases, you know the big, the big release of a new set or whatever, and I would literally run a tournament past midnight into like four in the morning the next day. Wow, I was literally there from four in the afternoon to four in the next morning, running a, running a huge tournament and giving out prizes, and a couple of times I caught people stealing stuff and they had to confiscate it and kick them out and it was. That was a crazy time. I don't know how I. I don't know how I did it because I worked my full time job during the day.

Speaker 4 1:11:30

And then I would be up all night running a tournament at this place. It was nuts, wow, youth, youth.

Speaker 1 1:11:39

You meet some interesting people at Magic tournaments though.

Speaker 4 1:11:42

Yes, you do, and you know that would keep keep little things the deodorant behind the counter. In the past I would every once in a while, oh my goodness, I thought that was.

Speaker 1 1:11:53

I thought that was like a, you know, like a stereotype, but it's not Well it's a stereotype for a reason. Yeah, yeah, it's pretty bad. It can be pretty bad, but it's interesting, like my comic shop.

Speaker 3 1:12:09

Now it's a very different demographic than when I in the nineties. Like it is, it is a place that all ages, all because of the other superhero films. I think it has become a very acceptable place to go as a cool place, cool shop to go, you know, in towns and city centers and that kind of stuff and I to go see, whereas it was often in the dark, dark, alley and I kind of down a little side street.

Speaker 3 1:12:35

you know, in there you get secret handshake to get in and you'll be part of the club kind of thing, whereas you know my kids are like let's call him to be for the plant here or otherwise.

Speaker 5 1:12:48

Definitely saw a similar sort of growth and change from like when I was a kid because the comic shop I worked in I've been going to since I was like eight years old or even younger it definitely changed in a good way over time, where it definitely felt it became, you know, you just saw a wider group of people. You know it wasn't all stereotypical comic book guys, you know, going in and we would also. We did this thing we called they still do it called superhero school, where, like people dress up as superheroes and it was just as a volunteer community and like teach kids, you know, about comics and superheroes and things. It was a lot of fun. There are a lot of pictures of me out there and different little homemade, you know, costumes and spandex and things. It was a. I think some of them are on my Instagram.

Speaker 2 1:13:47

I don't think I expelled them.

Speaker 5 1:13:52

It's, they're out there, they, oh man, it was a lot of fun, though I actually I miss it because it was just such a great community. You also had your drama. You know, they were person out, like it's like any group of people where, like, you inevitably get people who cause shit and talk shit and you know, which is almost part of the fun, as someone who, like, wasn't involved in all the drama, was like sitting outside of it and like you know, and I was like the high school kid who, like, was just like cheery and people liked and was, like you know, I was the punk ass kid was my title my boss gave me. He always, he always had at least one punk ass kid working for him and yeah good times.

Speaker 4 1:14:35

That was the older guy. So I was the voice of reason in the store.

Speaker 5 1:14:40

There you go, staying out of the drama in that manner. That's what she need. Yeah, my, you know my boss always got caught in the middle of it, like he was never like involved in it, but he also would be like a voice of reason and would be like like a mediator, and inevitably I mean again, the great thing for me was then I got to hear about it all and just sit on the sidelines and enjoy all the guys.

Speaker 4 1:15:08

It was fun, though you know it all. It led me to you know a great event to go into New York Comic Con, being invited there. So that was. That was just.

Speaker 5 1:15:17

Hell yeah.

Speaker 4 1:15:17

So cool and you know. So all that being involved in the community and stuff is what is what shows. You know, hands in the hands of Ryatt, of the athleticists and of the classics Eventually let me go into there. So it was so cool.

Speaker 1 1:15:33

Yeah, I think every group has a person who, like, talks shit and starts trouble. That's far sure for us.

Speaker 5 1:15:38

Yeah, exactly, exactly. I don't act like you don't know. No.

Speaker 2 1:15:52

I'm just sitting here quietly listening.

Speaker 1 1:16:00

Just in your opinion.

Speaker 4 1:16:07

Oh, my God.

Speaker 2 1:16:09

Now that we've established I was paying attention.

Speaker 3 1:16:19

To bring it back in no far. Certain I'm sort of like impressed but also not really surprised that like I can't imagine your first comic book series being Samman. That seems like it would almost put you off for life and sometimes, if that's your gateway, like this series, that is like it is. But knowing you and the type of reader that you are as well, it sort of does make sense as well.

Speaker 4 1:16:43

Yeah, kind of makes sense. I mean, it's a very literary series. For what? For our comments, yeah, and so I can see how she would enjoy it. She's a very literary person.

Speaker 2 1:16:55

I think in many ways I made well okay in for comics and for fantasy series in general. I started with kind of the big ones I know people talk about like beginner series and things like that. I started with a lot of things is everybody's beginner, that doesn't really count, but I did Wheel of Time. Then I went to Malazan and I guess in a lot of ways I may have been able to appreciate them more because I didn't know of other ways to do the same thing, you know. So, yeah, it's what I read first. I liked it. Maybe other things will seem less good or different compared to this one, but yeah, that's my baseline now. So yeah, it's interesting. I did love Samman. I loved everything about it. I'm really glad to be reading it now, but yeah, it's a great series.

Speaker 5 1:17:49

It's one, too, that I know. When I was working in a shop, it was one of the ones that, like, would get people into comics.

Speaker 5 1:17:54

Actually it is a weird like you wouldn't think, because it is very literary. But I think, particularly with women, I found was like that was one of the big entry points, because I think it was, you know, a little safer and less, I don't know traditionally masculine. You know, that's something like a lot of the superhero comics in particular, although that certainly changed too right. You were asking, you know, chris, like what were some of the things people talk about? Miss Marvel first came out, kamala Khan, miss Marvel while I was working in a shop. I had to look it up and that was one of the ones. Saga was another big one. That's another one again that you could like hand out to a variety of people who maybe weren't traditional comic readers, who would get sucked in then and then branch out and try different things. Yeah, it's really well done. It's really well done.

Speaker 4 1:18:44

It's strange as in paradise. But Terry Moore, I don't know if you have had an independent comic book and a lot of female readers with that one as well. Very well done book. It's like a romance spy kind of series, so it's not superhero at all. So the artwork is just outstanding and it's really well done.

Speaker 1 1:19:15

But it's strange as in paradise.

Speaker 3 1:19:22

I was going to say it's just you see those videos and I thought about doing them myself. You know series to get you into whatever you know. You know fantasy, whatever. Often the answer is just pick something really bloody good, regardless of whether it's heavy or otherwise. Just pick something that's really great. You know, don't over complicate it, regardless of give me malice, and if you've read malice and you thought this is really great, that might be a good series for somebody you don't even know.

Speaker 4 1:19:48

If it's just really good, that's a great point. That's a great point because you know it's like you look at the series that basically that won the critical awards. You know the Watchmen won the Hugo and Nebula Award for a reason, and so did some of Gaiman's works as well, you know, and so you know if that's the type of reader you are, where you're craving that kind of literary experience, read the ones that are winning the literary awards, because they're the ones that you're probably going to like and probably going to delve into more stuff later on after this.

Speaker 5 1:20:26

Absolutely, and I think that's something that really has, I mean, all credit to writers like Alan Moore and Neil Gaiman, and you know, I mean I loved and still love a lot of the American Superior Comics written back then. But like opening up the industry and really you know what. You know what we in America call like the British invasion of in comics, right, that it really did change the industry and it changed how people look at comics. I mean I don't know that you're like average Joe per se necessarily realizes how literary comics can be, but you know that's truth, anything, right, you know they probably just think of Marvel, probably in DC, but it definitely made it so that it was taken a lot more seriously as a medium and has a much wider variety of stories told, and I think that's only been good for everything and for the health of the industry as a whole.

Speaker 4 1:21:29

Yeah, I mean how much, because I think the movies are going to bring in readers for a different reason than like the recommendations and you know, from people like us or whatever, sure, yeah. So I'm wondering how much? Maybe? Maybe you have an answer, kyle. How much do the movies impact the sales of actual comics, or is it?

Speaker 5 1:21:58

when I was working and, and from talking to my former boss since then, it impacts sales in very specific ways. I mean, one way that you can see it is in what the publishers are actually publishing right and like what characters they're spotlighting and things like that. So that you know that obviously has an impact. I think the weekly comics it doesn't affect things very much. You know, comics have their audience and any given comic book as its audience and that doesn't really change unless something very dramatic happens within the industry. You know, or it's like a particularly great run Stuff, like free comic book day, you know, which was like when like half the sales the shop would make in the whole year happened on a single day. Things like that definitely are much more influenced. And so you do see, you know, like no one was buying Guardians of the Galaxy comics before the movie came out, right like that. That just wasn't happening actually I did but, I, did too.

Speaker 5 1:23:01

I was a fan. I loved Rocket Raccoon before. He was cool and it's you know but yeah. But then suddenly people were coming in and like wanted to read Guardians of the Galaxy comics and so it definitely has some impact, but I don't think as much in the like weekly sort of polls people had beyond the like you know again, like more Guardians comics being published. You know they hadn't been published for like five, eight years, something like that, by the time the movie came out.

Speaker 4 1:23:33

That free comic book day thing. The owner of my store, he, he caught some guy trying to get a whole huge duffel bag stuffed with all the free comics out the front door, like are you kidding me? Because only because of the, the few cases, the one of two cases where one of those free comics actually was worth money a year later because nobody could find them. You know, oh man, it's just some people trying to cut the market.

Speaker 5 1:24:06

Yes, yeah, oh yeah. Working retail in general, you, oh yeah, you have experiences. Oh my god, I worked at Barnes Noble for six months and it was also just like you. It's again, most people lovely, but you, every once in a while you get someone, or is like that. I will remember you for the rest of my life.

Speaker 3 1:24:30

The one thing that I think movies made a difference is gave a lot of comic book stores an alternative way to make sales. You look at the amount of like figures, the you know fungal pops as, even as an idea. You know they're absolutely everywhere because of that very nature of thing and whereas, like I can consider, back in the 90s if you had like a figure or a statue or something on my shelf, people went of that, the kind of label you because of it. Now people look at that and go that is mega cool, in the same way that I did when I stayed at the shop, one of those in the 90s going like that is incredible. I actually have a lost figure. Ridiculously, I lost the base because it gets pissed off, but I actually have a lost figure as I throw in tv. Don't forget about that yeah, no, no no no, no.

Speaker 3 1:25:27

Well, all the people have Matthew Fox. I don't know I should have got somebody else, but it does give you way to embrace your love of a certain series, or you know what is the word? That these franchise that you have in other ways, all of them, just the comics or the books or other ways to kind of absolutely no.

Speaker 5 1:25:51

All the comic shops I've seen that have survived have pivoted to not just selling comics, you know, sell board games, sell toys, sell, you know, even movies. You know manga has become such a huge thing. I mean over the pandemic it blew up and it's now sells way better than American comics. Big part of that is like like teenagers and stuff, like for whatever reason, like that's what they're gravitating towards and the the American comic publishers need to.

Speaker 4 1:26:21

I know they are kind of but trying to like take a slice out of that pie, but I they have not figured it out yet I remember trying to give, give one of my kids get you know, yeah, oh yeah, some comics, and they would just go oh, look, naruto, you know that's it's like oh they're in manga okay.

Speaker 3 1:26:42

But you go into any bookstore at the moment, like I don't know if the bookstores are in America, the manga section is there's. It's three people deep waiting to get that themselves and the rest of the bookstores empty, which is great, I think. Like a lot of people go snooty, get whatever. They're here wasting their time looking over those kids are walking to the bookstore in like the free time to go. I can't wait to get to the bookstore, like that is. That is the thing that is only good for the rest of the literary work. You know, as they progress through and kind of realize well, give me more of that type of story, but in like a larger sense you know, some will branch out and move on other stuff Exactly, and for some it'll be just be a fad, you know you know, but for some they'll branch out to other literary avenues, you know.

Speaker 5 1:27:28

It's important. Everyone needs their, their entryway, like Sandman you know they're talking about like everyone, regardless of what it is like. American Gods is what got me back into reading, like adult fantasy books and it I'm so grateful you know it. I mean it changed my life in that way and it just decided to pick it up and my sister's old beat to shit copy that I actually got, signed by Neil Gaiman, oh wow, and it will forever hold a special place in my heart for that. So it's important.

Speaker 3 1:27:59

If it wasn't for American Gods, you would not be sitting here writing on it.

Speaker 1 1:28:04

Carden.

Speaker 5 1:28:05

Yeah, yeah, credit that and the other two that followed that were the first Mistborn book and Name of the Wind, and so all of those books have a special place in my heart for getting me really back into the genre after not having read it much for several years. I actually on that note, I need to go, but I will talk to you. You scared me off. Now You're welcome. Thank you, chris, it was you specifically.

Speaker 3 1:28:39

I got sleep so much better. I always wanted to be a horror character, and I've just made it.

Speaker 5 1:28:46

Yeah, well, it was a lovely chatting with you all and I will see you all again soon.

Speaker 1 1:28:52

Take care, see you soon. What's your story? Go ahead, oh, go ahead. Nothing important.

Speaker 2 1:29:04

I was going to ask about web comics because I read a bunch of those. I binge read a bunch of those back in college. But didn't read any web comics, so I mean Calvin and Hobbes. I don't know if it counts, but like PhD comics, oatmeal, saturday morning breakfast series, I think you guys might like Saturday morning breakfast series. But anyway, I was curious if anybody was interested in any web comics.

Speaker 4 1:29:37

Yeah, I've never been interested in reading anything on a computer until very recently.

Speaker 1 1:29:46

I used to read Calvin and Hobbes a lot the comic strip. I still have those collections for somewhere. I think the only web comic I've read was Syce Barrier's Crossed Wish Over here. It's an extreme horror comic but it's in trade now so I have to trade. I think it came out weekly at just like a few pages a week. That's a great story.

Speaker 2 1:30:16

Not for the sensitive soul. Yeah, it's really extreme.

Speaker 1 1:30:23

Not for the sensitive soul. Yeah, it's pretty. It can be pretty graphic.

Speaker 4 1:30:29

It's like when was the most recent boom in web comics? I know it kind of took off. I can't remember how long ago, though when did you start reading web comics?

Speaker 2 1:30:45

The ones that all the ones that I mentioned. I binge read PhD comics when I was in college, which was what 10-13 years ago? I think it's still going actually. But everyone XKCD that's another one. These were all pretty popular when I was in college and I think they had just started to take off, but XKCD is still pretty popular. Saturday morning breakfast is here. I think it's doing well. The people who write those comics now are writing some sort of books, like the person who wrote XKCD, for instance, wrote something called Thing Explainer and George Cham I think. I forget if he's the PhD comics dude or the SMBC person, but yeah, the PhD comics dude collaborated with some physicists to write a book and say so. I think they've all got into the place now where they're doing other things, but the comics are still going as well and they're not several pages, it's usually just a strip and I think SMBC is daily, but I forget. But I love all of them. They're sciencey subjects which I enjoy a lot.

Speaker 4 1:32:03

I know Scott McLeod in his reinventing comics was kind of trying to predict the future of comics and stuff like that and he put a lot of emphasis on web comics in that book. But he was a little ahead of his, you know, ahead of the curve as far as that goes. It hadn't really taken off yet when he presented this kind of thing. And I know Brian K Vaughn has some web comics that he does with somebody Then they later collect it into a trade or something like that.

Speaker 4 1:32:38

But I know that's something that you can and I know there's a lot of those web comics that you can like a voluntary donation to or something like that to help keep them going. But I'm not sure how the ones that don't have that kind of funding, you know whether they're profitable or whether they're. You know how they keep a business or what have you, or they just do it on the side. I mean, I'm not sure how it all works, but I think, a lot of them.

Speaker 3 1:33:14

yeah, sorry, go ahead, I was gonna say, I have a friend who does web comic. Marius, If you look actually at my Twitter profile picture, he did it for me.

Speaker 1 1:33:23

Oh, okay, I think that's what I was doing.

Speaker 3 1:33:25

So he did it. He did me in the style of Booker to Witt from Doushark and Philip actually is what he did, but the Irish flag at the centre of mind. But he's done one that was actually just on his website here. It's called October 20 comic. He's been doing it from 2011 and he just does it the side. He does a page a week and he has done a page and he's about 450 pages or something now of this comic with audio dramas and stuff and there seems to be like a real community.

Speaker 3 1:33:50

When I speak to Marius about it, it's like they kind of all push each other's kind of content, even though you know that's kind of it. So there's like a network kind of goes up on about it and I just think it's a really fascinating space because it's very not what traditional comics is, if that makes sense. You know he's literally doing a page a week kind of moving this forward and then doing like teasers and stuff and character art of his other characters. You know the drawings that he's doing of his characters that he now loves and he's shown to the world and stuff like it. I just think it's such an interesting space creatively for people to dive into because his artworks are terrific, Like beautiful, yeah, yeah, really really, but a really talented guy like that. So, yeah, really interesting.

Speaker 1 1:34:37

Yeah, looking at the website now, october 20 comiccom and you have some beautiful artwork, really great colors too, really vibrant. Yeah, yeah, it's well JC and Burns kind of doing something similar, right, right, I'll forget the name of it.

Speaker 2 1:34:56

I think he's doing Grim Dwarf magazine.

Speaker 3 1:34:59

Grim Dwarf yeah.

Speaker 2 1:35:00

Yeah, I mean I didn't get all the details from you have to sign up on his Patreon and it's free to sign up and to get the magazine. He said something about submission, so I don't know if it's something that he's writing on his own or if he's also accepting submissions, but I think it's a really cool idea overall. So I'm gonna yeah, I'm yet to go sign up on his Patreon to get the free shoes. I've got to go do it. I have to do it. But next week after Berserk, I'll do that.

Speaker 4 1:35:33

Yeah, I think he's looking for submissions.

Speaker 2 1:35:37

Okay.

Speaker 3 1:35:42

That's an interesting idea because he's obviously doing his magazine and stuff as well. You know all the different avenues, creative avenues, and Jews, obviously, a bit like the rest of us, likes a lot of different things and, in a sense, a lot of different things. So that's great.

Speaker 1 1:35:58

Can't relate.

Speaker 2 1:36:00

I guess the internet also gives you audience, like for instance the PhD comics thing. I don't know that if they had published it as a magazine. I still think that maybe mostly sciencey folk are probably its biggest audience. Maybe XKCD is popular among software engineers I don't know what other kinds of audience it has but those don't feel like they'd blow up if they were in print. Same with I don't know what's that, what's that series called the wandering in? That's grown up really big.

Speaker 3 1:36:39

Right, right yeah.

Speaker 2 1:36:40

Yeah, yeah, I kind of want to read it, but it's.

Speaker 3 1:36:45

I mean it's books like 1200 pages. Yeah, it sounds like a not me kind of series.

Speaker 2 1:36:54

I read too slowly for that to be something that I read on this side.

Speaker 4 1:36:58

I know that Matt from Matt's Finis, he books raves about that series, but even he hasn't caught up to it. He said it's going to be like the guy writes so much. I think he said like 1000 words a week or something like that. I don't know Something crazy and I don't know how you could catch up to that.

Speaker 3 1:37:25

No.

Speaker 1 1:37:27

So, speaking of authors and kind of a turn, but I'm really curious to hear everyone's thoughts. This author Kate Coran, I think her name was, I saw articles, it was all over. I didn't say it until it was like a news week or something. But so, basically, for anyone who's not familiar, from what I understand it's an author who had a book coming slated for release in May or something a few months out and I believe. Correct me if I'm wrong. I believe she created a fake Goodreads account multiple to once.

Speaker 1 1:38:04

Oh, there's more than one.

Speaker 3 1:38:06

Yeah.

Speaker 1 1:38:07

And she was one starring reviews of books in her genre. Is that, and also five starring her book or?

Speaker 3 1:38:15

I think it's even worse than I may have picked this up wrong, but I think she was specifically targeting people of color and LGBTQ. Plus is like almost like punching bags, If you know what I mean. You know, targeting their books specifically and then owning up to it all as well as say, actually what you suspect is true and these are the reasons which were weak in some ways Certainly just excuse that kind of behavior.

Speaker 1 1:38:44

Part of me kind of wonders if she, if she meant to get caught because it's so obvious, like either she's the worst troll ever because she didn't like. It's so obvious because it's public what you once are unless you private your account, everyone can see this person one star in everyone's books and then praising other books. It seems like it's pretty obvious who's doing it, or at least it's a coordinated thing. I just wonder. It's such like I don't. What I don't understand is how would that help her? That's what I'm confused about, like why? How would that benefit her? I don't know, unless there's something that I'm missing.

Speaker 3 1:39:21

Hi, I mean, I only looked at that from the outside, looking in. I obviously hadn't heard of her before the post went up and purposely didn't get involved, because I hate saying things like that in a vacuum. You know where you just get the post at the end of and you just sort of like social media sort of forces you to make a judgment call based on that one thing alone, not really knowing this geographical context. But the thing that I took away from it was like, aside from the fact that the apology is kind of a non apology, etc. You got to think about the circumstances that led up to somebody doing that kind of action repeatedly. It wasn't just a one off, it was like it.

Speaker 3 1:40:02

You know that's not a healthy space that's been created there, whether it's Goodreads, quits, etc. Or anything, okay, regardless of what this one person did it, a lot of people must feel motivated to do it and not do it in a certain way, if that makes sense. You know, I think it speaks more to the nature of the competitive nature of the industry and all that kind of stuff in terms of like how being a creative and that fear of I'm not good enough leads people to insane judgments you know, you know and really poor decisions, and it's obviously a mental health thing. I also think it speaks to the environment that's created around that and the pressure that's created around that.

Speaker 1 1:40:49

I kind of feel sorry for her because it seems like she's I mean to do something like that. Yeah, I think she just, you know, I don't know anything about anything, you know, so I'm just a observer. But I kind of feel like I hope she gets help, the help she needs, basically. So but I also feel bad that her mistake means that her career is essentially done Unless you self publish. I mean, the mob will come for her if she uses the same name or similar story. So I hope that doesn't happen.

Speaker 3 1:41:23

But in life. Maybe this is just me being a much older person, but I hate, hate that people are never given a chance for redemption. Just in life in general, like I don't just mean in this one space people. People have to be flawless and make stakes, like you can, I'm sure. If somebody went through my Twitter profile and went through the amount of tweets I've made over the years, they'll find something controversial. I said 10, 12 years ago when I was just an idiot.

Speaker 3 1:41:48

Like, let's be honest, I think most of us can relate to that in some way and that you can be hung over the calls, dragged over the calls for that. You see it happen with famous football players or whatever, something that they tweeted about many years. You've got to give people a path to redemption and actually use it as an opportunity for people to grow and learn and actually have them something and give them a clean slate if they learn from the position. I just I just think that speaks more about us as a society rather than kind of condemning people to be you are a racist, therefore that's you get you done for eternity. I just think that sucks. I don't like that.

Speaker 1 1:42:23

Yeah, I do think that I think we're more. I think people in general are more likely to give someone a second chance for the benefit of the doubt if they know them personally. Yeah, because you have that human element, you see them and you see them there Element and you see them every day and you have that connection with them. But when it's someone on a screen, it's a screen name somewhere. They're not a person to a lot of people, they're just. It's like there's a person on the other side of that screen. It's not just a random name. So I hope that it works out for her eventually.

Speaker 3 1:42:51

But you know, it's just.

Speaker 1 1:42:53

It's just such a strange thing.

Speaker 3 1:42:56

It's a horrible situation, like I don't want to be a light of the things that she did because they're despicable. I mean like both in terms of what comes from what she actually did. But people have to find a path to redemption in some ways and actually, if she can write a book and has written a good book, judge it. It's merits. You know, in the same way as you know the difference separate in the art from the individual is an ongoing problem I think that we have as a society. But you know, if somebody's art is good, judge the art. You know.

Speaker 1 1:43:30

So hard though, isn't it Sometimes like I can't listen to Michael Jackson anymore, like I just don't. And we grew up, I mean, in the 80s, you know, you know this good, jared and Chris and Russia may have seen the till end of it, but I don't think we'll ever see someone in that. He was just larger than life at the time, late you know, 90s, late 90s even. He was just another. It was like it was wild, his, his, his status in the, in the culture and you know. But yeah, so when you learn other things, or at least what's was alleged to have happened, it's just, even though it's just like I just can't like it.

Artists and the Impact of Controversy

Speaker 3 1:44:12

Yeah, he was clear, it's. It's fine if you can't forgive that person yet as well, just say, look, that was a line that was too far for me and just kind of draw line and say that they are dead to me at some stage. But I think as a as a, as a saddle thing, just kind of write somebody off inside, done. But yeah, chris Roth joke about Michael Jackson. I think I think it's very apt, if anybody knows it, the one where he basically says you know, we love Michael Jackson so much as a Sally we're forgiven the first kid, you know it's, it's funny, but not funny in a lot of ways. But that's how popular he was in some ways as a people would give him the benefit of the doubt initially.

Speaker 4 1:44:46

You know, at a certain point until the wealth of evidence became too much.

Speaker 3 1:44:49

But you know, you put in a humorous context.

Speaker 4 1:44:51

He was the king of pop, you know. So he had that, yeah, that that kind of that kind of following. You know who's, that's, how big he was. And it's funny because I was never a fan of his music because I was a metalhead. I don't believe it. I was a young metalhead and I remember me and some other stupid young metalheads getting very angry at Eddie Van Halen for doing that, for doing that solo on his song, yeah, but yeah, those were the days.

Speaker 3 1:45:31

You ever had an artist like that for sure, that the kind of couldn't connect with them after hearing the bit how they did what they did.

Speaker 2 1:45:45

I think I'm having a bit of trouble picking up Harry Potter. I used to love the CD so much and it's hard to reconcile that with sort of some of the hatred that she she's been spewing. I did read her explanation and everything and it just felt like, you know, baseless rationalizations and I'm like I learned a lot about friendship and trust and really wonderful relationships from this person and to see like it's difficult to reconcile. At the very least, I think I will eventually, because those stories have a very special place in my heart and I think I might read them differently If I read them again. I do want to go back for the longest time.

Speaker 2 1:46:33

When I have kids, these are the books I'm going to read to them first, and now I'm not sure of that anymore. I'm not saying I won't, but I'm not not sure of that anymore. So I do look at everything differently. I'm not I'm not going to outright reject it because I, like you said, chris, I still don't have all of the context. I've read her apology letters. I've read the crap that she did on Twitter, which you know, everybody does crap on Twitter. But so I'm not saying I'm going to outright reject her, but it's been harder for me to. I used to read them once every couple of years, but I haven't. I haven't picked them up in several years since.

Speaker 3 1:47:19

It's interesting to say that, unfortunately, because like the likes of, say, kevin Spacey, for instance, I can sort of watch Kevin Spacey film is no problem.

Speaker 3 1:47:27

I don't have an emotional connection to Kevin Spacey in any way other than like in a few of his movies, but I can watch them in isolation from something else. But it's something some other art that I had based on off a lot of my, you know, adoration over other somebody like actually put a habit set beside me. The artist, ryan Adams, which I'm listening to I've been the same three, four times live. I completely live for his music. I connect him such emotional level.

Speaker 3 1:47:57

I can't listen to the music. I can't listen to a second of his music anywhere. I just cannot. That I just felt the you know and it's such a double standard for me and I know what it is. But the emotional connection and how that was almost the soundtrack to 15 years of my life has been tainted by the fact that he was basically using as a platform to groom young women is just despicable. Like it's the very antithesis of what I thought his music was in a lot of ways and because of that, going from like the most deep emotional connection to just being like I can't disassociate those two feelings anymore.

Speaker 4 1:48:31

No, I think about it. That's because American beauty was one of my favorite films that I watch, and I do love American beauty. I loved his performance in that and I just you know, and it's tough to look at the same way that I used to you know, but it's like you were saying. On the other hand, there needs to be a path of redemption there too as well. And is he? Is he going now? I don't, I haven't, I haven't kept up with the story you know about Kevin Spacey, but so it was.

Speaker 3 1:49:06

it was not prosecuted for it. I think the brother and son is not guilty. I don't think that's necessarily the takeaway you take from it, but he was you know, I don't know.

Speaker 4 1:49:14

I have no idea whether he's guilty or not guilty.

Speaker 4 1:49:16

I haven't kept up with the story at all, but because that was a long time, a long time ago that movie came out. But but I have the DVD of it, you know, and, and I see it on the every once in a while. It's on, you know, suggestions or what have you. Yeah, and it's one of those movies that if it happened to be on TV I would just leave it on because it's mesmerizing, you know. Yeah, you know, and it's fortunately there's a lot more that goes into that film than just him, you know, there's there's the directing and the writing is just amazing, and so you can kind of just kind of look past him a little bit and just take in the rest of it. And fortunately it's not a solo thing, like like a performance, like like that guy there, like him. That's more all him, you know, or a writer, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3 1:50:10

Whereas.

Speaker 4 1:50:10

Michael Jackson, it was all him, you know. So it's, yeah, so it's. You get a little bit of distance, cognitive distance, in that manner, from him. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 1:50:26

And I have to admit, kind of much less serious note. I think there's because we kind of talked about I believe we talked about this on one of the episodes recently about, or maybe it was in the form, about, you know, authors that we interact with and kind of like the connections that we think we make and you kind of learn more about them. And so there's times when I don't go back to certain books because of the experiences I've had with you know. It's, I think it's a little bit more personal, so it's not as of course it's nowhere near as serious. But when it's a personal connection it's even. Then it kind of sour, as you want it Like. It just kind of like you know it takes away from the experience. So you have to. I wonder sometimes is it better to not meet some of these people as a better to not interact with them?

Speaker 4 1:51:11

That old saying never meet your heroes. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 1:51:18

Sorry, go ahead, Chris.

Speaker 3 1:51:21

No, I was gonna say go ahead, parv.

Speaker 2 1:51:25

I was gonna say I feel like social media has made it so you're forced to meet your heroes, right the like. There's a singer that I loved and maybe still do. I don't know an Indian singer. He said something Islamophobic in a tweet. I don't know if he was, you know, trying to, which a lot of artists are sort of being forced to because of political situation in India. I don't know if he genuinely believes what he said or if he is just stabilizing his position, whatever, but like now, I can't listen to his music without thinking of what he said. So it's just I.

Speaker 2 1:52:01

If I'd never interacted or got to know their personalities through social media, I'd be, I'd be fine. You know, I don't. I don't want to meet, I don't want to know what kind of a jerk you are, and it can be really small things too, right. It's like what he said, for instance, wasn't particularly incendiary or anything. It's just stuff and an opinion that maybe a lot of people share doesn't necessarily make him a bad person. But now I'm like you know, we disagree on a very fundamental level, so I can't listen to you anymore.

Personal Beliefs and Appreciation of Art

Speaker 3 1:52:36

Yeah, it's a strange facet of modern society in terms that we know people's political beliefs that you know we wouldn't have known it would have been the biggest secret. Did you know that such and such is a thunder of a right winker? Those things are all very open now and we sort of make value judgments, especially in art, on other things other than the art. Sometimes I don't say this wrong because we're human, but that's what you do. But it also makes me uncomfortable in terms of my even my own evaluation of the art. Thankfully, there's so much of it that it doesn't sort of matter. You can move on to the next thing very, very quickly and go. I found this other favorite thing that I've got, which is ultimately what a lot of us come to creative process for is to find things that we revel and enjoy and you know, and then really that is the space that we should probably live in more so, and don't feel like social media is good for any of that.

Speaker 1 1:53:35

I think it's to your point, chris. I think it's almost expected when, like in certain industries or certain communities, it's almost expected for you to announce your political beliefs. You know it has no bearing on the work you're doing or the art you're creating, or you may be a good person, but if someone disagrees with you politically, it might just be a simple, a harmless, you know nothing serious or harmless disagreement, and then it can derail your whole career. So it's, it's this balancing act of how much you know. But yeah, it's, it's strange and I think it. It brings us together, but it also maybe makes us further apart and it's, you know, I can't tell you how many books I've thrown away from people I've had bad experiences with, or just authors that I've always wanted to read and I communicated with them. They were a total dick bag to me and I could. I will never read their books because that's always them back in my head, like I just I just don't want to. I lost all the desire to even spend my time or money on their stuff.

Speaker 3 1:54:33

So conversely, I can talk with. A number of times I've met somebody that had no intention to read the book, met them or spoke to them and had a positive experience. Now I want to read the book, you know, which is also ridiculous in its own way, but it speaks maybe more to. But you know, the things that Varsar was talking about in terms of I identify with their value and belief system in a way that makes me think that actually I would like, I'd like to like what you like, because then you'll have me at a connection with people. And so I think sort of apologizing for the fact that we're human and we like human interaction and we like positive humor and interaction as a way to where we spend our time next to you is a thing to kind of say look, this is okay to feel like this, this is fine as a way to judge where I'm going to spend my time.

Speaker 1 1:55:21

Yeah, and I don't want to sound, I know it sounds really negative, but I've met so many wonderful people, like Stephen Erickson, jenny Wurz We've met, like Richard Nell, all these, michael R Fletcher, clayton Snyder, I can go on and on and on to all the wonderful people we've met. Anna Smith Spark is fantastic as a male actor, holly Tinsley is an admin on our forums. I mean, I can go on and there's, there's so many great people we've met, but, just like with anything, you the the negative ones, kind of stick around stick out, you know.

Speaker 3 1:55:57

And to your point, steve like just starting to rhyme off names are the vast majority of all of those interactions are overwhelmingly positive, like the bit of like you're saying that the exceptions stick out because they are the exception rather than more than just the fact that most people are just generally the same. Generally give people different political beliefs or not. Like actually, that in some way is fine with me, like ideologies are fine for the most part and if you believe something different, then that's sort of it's okay.

Speaker 3 1:56:35

In a lot of ways, but actually the using things for your advantage, accept taking advantage of people is kind of where the line is drawn, maybe at some stage you know.

Speaker 1 1:56:48

Yeah, that's a tough one.

Speaker 2 1:56:49

Does it? Does it feel like I think for me maybe this is true for all artists, but people who create stories and tell stories or act in and like if I really connected with their character or the story feels like I've learned something about you know important human characteristics let's say what I think is important to clarify. I feel like that hits me harder if I find out that they did something bad or if they are not a good person in whatever definition we use for that. Is it because, I don't know, stories are a more fundamental medium from which, like, we learn things. That's kind of why it bothers me so much. Some actors like it's like you know, you know the theory of what you think is good, but you're not living up to what you're putting out, so that that bothers me more. I don't know if it's true, for maybe music too, because you have to feel something real to put out good music. Yeah, what do you guys think that the stories feel different if you find out more bad things?

Speaker 1 1:58:05

Yeah for me yeah, I try not to. It's just hard. You know it's when especially when it's on a personal level, when it's direct, that's it makes it and amplifies it, or when it's really something to agree, just like you know some other things we've mentioned it just makes it for me. I try really hard not to, but it's hard sometimes to do that.

Speaker 3 1:58:29

It's so stupid and so difficult because what you've just described there, varsha, is the fact that you've experienced personal growth through the work of somebody else. Right, they've made you question something you've you didn't consider and you kind of go all. I've come to realization about something, about myself or otherwise, and yet you then have to reconcile that with the fact that that maybe they aren't a very good person. Yeah, you know, that's tough, like, I'm sure, like the zoo, without going completely off paced. Like the reason Hitler came to power is because he had a message that people connected to it at a certain point People. You know the reason he came to powers because he could communicate that message and that I dated in a good way.

Speaker 3 1:59:10

His actions at the end of it make people retrospectively question what the hell was wrong with me or otherwise. But it's in my day. You know they experienced personal growth, what they thought the experience personal growth through his message and what they're trying to say. So that's very hard for people to turn around and say, actually, what is that set about me then? And people don't like facing truths about themselves or otherwise. They'd much rather and I'm not saying you should like, it's very much easier just to kind of say come on, just move on. Can I just move on with that thought and just kind of park it and put a little box behind me? But it does create a difficult situation and it's often the case of the more you know the way, the more you wish you didn't know.

Speaker 2 1:59:55

Yeah.

Should Artists' Personal Lives Affect Appreciation?

Speaker 1 1:59:58

Yeah, sometimes it is that. Is that distance necessary for art? Is it? Do we need that buffer between the art and the artist to really appreciate the art, especially now in the climate we're in? Is it? Do we? Is that something that we should, that we that we should strive for? Is that that separation is interesting because everyone's you know everyone's everyone has faults right, so it's you'll find something wrong with them, no matter who it is I mean. So I sometimes wonder if, if we should have not, not that it's up to me just mean, like, should we strive for that buffer to, to not worry about what the artist says or thinks or does and just appreciate the art for what it is and what they're, what we get out of it, like Shakespeare, who knows who kind of person he was, but we, we don't think about that, we just think about what he created. Or you know, there's other artists.

Speaker 4 2:00:50

Great question. I think that requires a long essay to answer.

Speaker 3 2:00:57

Creative Corner is three four weeks of further content now. But I think it goes back to my earlier point about the, the author who did the review, ballman, etc. Like we have sort of created this vacuum in which she must exist and kind of promote herself. And if you're an author, say on social media, try and promote your book, try and promote yourself as thing, living in fear that if I say the wrong thing one time, that's that's that career gone. That's that's not exactly a healthy space to live in. Like I don't know, I could come off tonight. I've had a fair bit of drink tonight and I could just tweet one little thing and then wake up in the morning and realize that it's been, you know, a little bit controversial or otherwise.

Speaker 2 2:01:47

And really I mean, I don't want not to sound like I'm defending her, but it doesn't feel like she did a lot of damage to like she did a stupid thing. Yes, that's the worst you can say about it.

Speaker 3 2:02:00

And reflected body and herself as well, like it did butter.

Speaker 2 2:02:05

But then, like, I think her publishing career is in ruins now. The nice thing about publishing is you can publish on a pseudonym, but you know that stuff comes out. But yeah, it's not a mistake over which I would refuse to read her book. You know, I might put off picking it up, I might choose a lot of other things, but it's not something that would make me stop. I think it would take, or maybe, maybe not. Maybe the racist aspect of it will make me stop. But again, like you said, chris, there's this scope for redemption. She wrote that apology letter. She must have. Maybe she meant. You have to give her the benefit of doubt and say maybe she meant it. I don't know.

Speaker 3 2:02:44

I'd rather concentrate on the fact that, whether the book's any good or not, you know that she had published. You know if it's a good book, I should be able to read it.

Speaker 4 2:02:53

Well, I think I mean it's. It's like you said earlier. We have so much stuff to choose from, so personally, I wouldn't have any interest in reading this book. It's, I mean, it's a style was yeah, probably. So I wouldn't even gone there anyways. But but you wonder what you would do if you were currently in the middle of the book, like reading it now, you know, would you then continue on? You know, and that's when you, that's when you say, well, if it's really good, you probably would want to continue on, you know exactly.

Speaker 2 2:03:42

Just just some mental and philosophical gymnastics to reconcile the person with the book. If, if you do find out about the person like it's not, like everybody looks up everything about the author before you go buy a book.

Speaker 4 2:04:03

Like like all these sci-fi authors were reading now from back in the 50s. What have you? Who knows what they were back then? I am not looking up any of them, you know, because I don't. I'd rather just read it and find out for myself whether the books are good and what have you and you know, if I find out later, then it's like okay.

Speaker 2 2:04:26

And is it sorry go ahead.

Speaker 3 2:04:28

No, go ahead. I was going to make a nothing point.

Speaker 2 2:04:32

I was going to say is it. Is it much different from not knowing what kind of person makes this water bottle I drink from every day? Is, you know, like it? I don't know. Maybe I'd stop buying from them if I find out that they're a bad person or like whatever. Whatever gets people to cancel. But if you're not putting in a lot of due diligence there, why would you? In these things like, what makes these situations much different? But I mean, I think I'm disagreeing with the point I made earlier, which is that you know, some something touches you deeply or emotionally. I think it just hurts a lot more to find out that they came from maybe not a very good place, but but just on a very high level. I don't think it's fundamentally different.

Speaker 3 2:05:30

I'm kind of struck by the idea. When you boycott something like I have a couple of teenage kids and they've been your teenager you're dealing in absolutes a lot more. You know this is fundamentally wrong. Therefore, I'm not going to do this one thing so well like getting to play the girl. Otherwise, kind of certain companies stands against certain wars in the world. And my kids were like right, I'm never eating McDonald's every game, I'm never watching a Disney film every game, and that's, you know, a really nice idea if you're going to support the cause or otherwise. But at a certain point you want to. Mcdonald's or McDonald's is the option on the table and they kind of like like these are massive companies that sort of pervade a lot of society. It is not as easy just to say I will never and have very hard lines in your life as you make your way through life. So I think it quits an interest in earning space for people in terms of you know, is it actually important or you know yeah?

Speaker 4 2:06:28

that's like. I mean, mcdonald's is one thing, but you could probably never go to McDonald's again if you really wanted to, but saying I'll never use like a craft product from craft company. They're involved in so many products in life You'd have no clue whether or not you're participating in. You know, giving money to craft company, you know it's so that's. That would be the more difficult route to go down for sure.

Speaker 3 2:06:57

And what happens if you find it after the fact that you have been consuming their products, and inadvertently, for a lot of years? Is the self looting coming to that, which is a ridiculous concept? In another way, you know.

Speaker 2 2:07:11

Yeah, I mean like I've been a vegetarian my entire life but I've accidentally eaten a few times.

Speaker 3 2:07:18

It's a quick, quick a sharp hole.

Speaker 2 2:07:22

A very common mistake that I'm given to understand Indians make when Indian vegetarians make when we move to the US is pepperoni looks a lot like tomato, so few of us have accidentally eaten pepperoni pizza, but anyway, it's not something that I beat myself up Like. I'm doing my best. If I accidentally make a mistake, it's fine, you know.

Speaker 3 2:07:55

For giving yourself is often the very hardest thing people can ever do in general. Well, that's a bit of small thing that keep the pepperoni whenever you know what your trigger is, for. That's interesting whether something bigger, like creating a path for self redemption, is often as difficult as anything else.

Speaker 2 2:08:15

Yeah.

Speaker 1 2:08:19

Such a strange time to live in. I do see more people craving the distance from social media. It's not this huge wave, but I do see that things are starting to turn a little. Even Gen Zers are craving some of them not all of them, some of them are on TikTok all day, but I do get the sense that things come in waves. I do think that we'll see in the next five to 10 years we'll see people move away from social media, be more private, crave more of the personal interactions and physical media Again, I think that'll be at least I'm hoping that's coming.

Speaker 3 2:09:04

I see quite a lot of that.

Social Media's Impact on Opinion and Privacy

Speaker 3 2:09:06

Actually I experience a lot of myself, like you were saying about that, when that situation developed over the week on that person. Social media sort of makes you think that you're forced to make an opinion on something, state your opinion on something publicly, otherwise your silence is sort of acceptance, tacit acceptance In the same way as like getting too dark. Like a member of the BookTube community where they have done some horrific things, I personally do not feel it is impingent on. Every single person that has interacted them to publicly denies that. I would much rather just not give it any ear at all and just ignore it and kind of do the things that say I'm not going to interact with that in some way and just be done with it.

Speaker 3 2:10:01

That does not need brought up and I think as a community, as one that's broadly, massively positive, I don't think it's needed that everybody has to weigh in on that and say on that. But if people feel like they would need to, that's absolutely fine for them as well. The person should be allowed. There should be a suit, whatever they want.

Speaker 1 2:10:22

Yeah, I don't know that much needs to be said about it. I mean, I think everyone's any decent person's in agreement with us. I think it's just kind of like universal and plus, I think people who have had really terrible experiences I think it drums up memories for them too. That's another thing is like just you know, it is what it is and if you want to look it up then you can. But I mean, it's not much needs to be said. It is a terrible situation.

Speaker 4 2:10:58

Yeah, and that's a hidden predator type of thing. So it's, you know, people blindsided by that kind of thing. It's a horror show, yeah, to be sure.

Speaker 1 2:11:12

Yeah, but again I think we remember the negative ones and we forget all the. It's easy to forget, like all the wonderful interactions we've had over the years.

Speaker 4 2:11:22

Yeah, not easy. Yeah, it's been outstanding. So, like we said earlier, I did my one year. I've done a one year tour now and it's just been absolutely wonderful, I think.

Speaker 3 2:11:36

Yeah, and it's the thing that I think again, it's gonna be another thing. Just as you get older, the thing you realize in life is that most people are good people and want to be good people, Like that is just the gross acceptance. So I think when I was younger man I didn't realize that. But actually at the core, the majority of society is moving in the same direction and that's what makes it hard to spot the others sometimes, you know, is that we kind of accept the people are like that, but they are Except the people driving in traffic on my way home from work, they're all terrible people.

Speaker 3 2:12:15

The fact that you let that bother you, Jared, says actually more about you than it's the argument I have with my wife, and she gets very annoyed when she gets in the road, reason I go. It's your point, little brother. You're just taking, as a group, as a gross acceptance that other people are gonna drive like assholes.

Speaker 2 2:12:31

And you'll be fine, there's a reason they call us massholes. My husband's one of the nicest people, the most understanding people, but he gets it over to rage. So it's very amusing for me what bad traffic can do to perfectly nice people. It really is.

Speaker 1 2:13:00

It brings up the worst in people.

Speaker 3 2:13:03

I look over, I'm in the car and my wife and you can see her starting to go in her teeth and I, what are you doing? What are you up by today? Well, it's happening here.

Speaker 1 2:13:14

It's funny you mentioned that, chris. Back I used to do a lot of business travel. I'd travel all over and every once in a great while we had a team that would travel everywhere. I was one of those people and we would meet up, we'd be in the same place at the same time once in a great while and one of the people I talked to, she would travel around and she told me I always remember she would train people different all over the country, even other countries, and she says something. Some of that. What I've learned is that most people are just good people trying to earn a living, trying to get by, like that's most people, just good people, like I just think it's easy to forget that. I think most people are just, you know, trying to live their lives. Yeah.

Speaker 3 2:14:00

However, however, however, however is possibly the wrong word, the other thing that people would need to accept. And I think and one thing I see that everybody on the planet has prejudice. Everybody on the planet, culturally or otherwise, has prejudice. Yet most people spend most of their lives going. But I'm not prejudiced and I think it's a starting point that the tacit acceptance that you're not a perfect human being should be a good starting point.

Speaker 3 2:14:30

But it would lead to a lot less arguments of people not trying to justify their positions or trying to say I feel this way because we all grew up in different culture backgrounds, we grew up in different people, all that kind of stuff. Our experiences shape who we are and, like I, have profound prejudice around certain things, as much as I try not to be like, it just is who you are as a person and I think we'd be an awful lot better off if we just accepted that everybody does have prejudices, as a starting point and kind of based on our interactions with people around them.

Speaker 1 2:15:03

Yeah, I think, being aware of those and just accepting them and saying I know that this is something, and to be aware of it and to try and correct it or at least have it to consider it, because I think we all no matter who you are, just something that you're aware of and you can chip away at it, or just you know. Yeah, so Be better about stuff. So this got serious.

Speaker 3 2:15:28

This was all your fault, steve, yeah, yeah. I think Steve spotted some of his drink and I went. You know what would make great. You know I could get stone clips, stone bites, everything would be great. We'd be doing it to do something a bit controversial. No, I think it's.

Speaker 1 2:15:50

I mean, I would hope it's like you know, I don't think it's anything too crazy. No, I think everyone, especially now the social media age. I think having that direct access with people that creates things that you enjoy is tough. Like if I was a famous, whatever. I would stay far away from social media completely. I'd be private, I'd be mysterious because I know that I'd say something really dumb one day and forget it.

Speaker 3 2:16:18

I'm a nobody, I'm a private, mysterious, all those things anyway. So yeah.

Speaker 2 2:16:24

Which you know, authors who have to market their work lately because that's what they have to do for publishing, and especially independently published authors. They have to put themselves up for that kind of exposure, even if they don't want to.

Speaker 4 2:16:39

That's a good point Because that speaks to what Steve was saying earlier about the separation from the artists and the people, because, like before the internet, you would writers would have an agent and they would have a publishing company who did all this promotion and did all this stuff and you'd have that separation that you're talking about and you wouldn't know much about the person you were consuming the art from and stuff like that, whereas now the publishing industries change so much in not always in favor of the writer where they're forced to get out there and pedal.

Speaker 2 2:17:26

Yeah, it was a book that used to get marketed, no, and now it's Yorta, which is a fundamentally different proposition.

Speaker 1 2:17:33

Okay, I talked to someone recently who was talking about how they don't do social media and they promote their books with mailing lists and like a blog and that's how they gather their own, they curate their own client lists and they'd stay off of social media. They want to be private, they don't want to have their face on anything because they want to be neutral. They don't want anyone to know if they're male or female or whatever it is. They just want the art to speak for itself. And I'm sure it's a tougher road to take because it takes longer to do that.

Speaker 1 2:18:10

But I wonder if being amongst another 5,000 people screaming, reading my book or listening to my music or watching my movie or whatever, is more productive than having that slow, that slow build of.

Speaker 1 2:18:24

I'm sure it's really frustrating to do that to have a website and to gather mailing lists and do all that work.

Diverse Topics and Personal Projects

Speaker 1 2:18:30

I wonder if it's the amount of time you spend on social media to please the algorithm, is that time that you're spent building your own platform on the side that's separate from, because X or Twitter, whatever, can disappear tomorrow and all the things. All the time you spent is gone, or you're gonna have 20,000 followers and nobody cares about your book or whatever it is. It just. It doesn't mean you're gonna sell 20,000 copies, that just means 20,000 people hit, follow. So it's this weird thing. But I do think that we'll never have someone again in the social media age like Michael Jackson or like a superstar like that, because we know too much. We know too much about these people for them to be this larger than life. You know they seem like they're not a person, they're just. I think now we know too much and it's hard to separate when we see all those little things now whether it's good or bad, but Taylor Swift is pretty huge right now.

Speaker 4 2:19:30

She seems to be doing okay. Yeah, she's doing good.

Speaker 1 2:19:36

She's not Michael Jackson or even like I think, going back to like even like U2, or even like I hate hair metal, but like Bon Jovi and stuff like they were. I mean, maybe she's in that level. I think she's pretty popular.

Speaker 3 2:19:54

She had the Haskells movie for a couple of weeks there and like she's doing okay.

Speaker 1 2:19:59

The movie's a flaming dumpster fire. Right now, though, that cinema is in trouble.

Speaker 4 2:20:06

Well, yeah, that's why they're doing it Stuff like Taylor Swift's concert, because there's so much trouble, yeah, but she's pretty huge. I mean she's on Time Magazine, that's pretty big.

Speaker 3 2:20:20

That's right. That's right. She's the person of the year and that was not the thing. I have a controversial opinion of movies. I don't think movies have been in a better state. Mainstream movies, sure, but mainstream everything is always was a dumpster fire in a lot of cases. You know 80s mainstream music, 90s mainstream music, 80s mainstream movies, 90s mainstream music we're all kind of. We all work to a formula, but I think we have a greater diversity and range of creators being able to showcase their stuff Now than has ever been possible. Same with books as well. The avenues that have been open in the set of publishing mean that we get way more voices and choices now than we ever did. And while the mainstream you may say is not, for me we have all the other stuff and that wouldn't have existed 20 years ago. 15 years ago, like it's just wasn't a thing.

Speaker 1 2:21:09

So yeah, no, I think you're. Especially music there's so much. I always hear people say like there's no good music. It's all the same it's there. It takes a while to go through it, but there's so much great music, it's just finding it as a hard part. There's so many great bands doing great work out there.

Speaker 3 2:21:28

Like you can make a song tomorrow, steve, and have it in Spotify, apple Music, by the end of the week. Like that is an amazing word to live in. In a lot of ways, it is not, you know, get kept the way that it was for most of my life, you know, in terms of you must have reached a certain attainment level, or must have reached a certain level of success before anybody could even hear you. Yep.

Speaker 1 2:21:52

Like. I guess the downside is on Spotify you can get what is like. Snoop Dogg has like two billion plays and how much has he earned? Like nothing. Well, it's money, but it's not two billion plays worth of money, so it's a tough thing.

Speaker 3 2:22:05

Again, you could say that Spotify's fault but it's also classically been the record label model as well is that you make a record, the record label makes the vast majority of the money. The artist gets only a small percentage of that all the time. I think I've seen those watching a TikTok video with Prince talking about Mariah Carey signing the biggest record deal in history and they were talking oh God, what is this good for the record industry? What is this? It's a terrible deal, and he did the numbers of it, but it's absolutely the worst. It's honestly the worst deal that he could possibly have. Like, I know the big number is thing, but if she makes a million, the record company's making 50. You know it's not. It's not a good thing in that way. So, yes, spotify have sort of strangled the music et cetera, but they also are a loss making company. Every year. Nobody's making money in Spotify either. Like so it's called Witches or Horses. It's a weird industry, very weird industry.

Speaker 1 2:23:00

They just laid off a bunch of people. Yeah, they just laid off a bunch of employees. Wild oh, this took a turn. We covered a lot of subjects, though covered a lot of topics.

Speaker 3 2:23:14

We never struggled for things to talk about, that's for sure.

Speaker 1 2:23:17

No, we don't. This was great about it.

Speaker 3 2:23:20

Yeah, we even added Varsha as the disruptor. You know, that's it. People didn't know that.

Speaker 2 2:23:28

I'm gonna force all of you to sit down and listen to some gossip after this, just because you said that. I'm gonna say it. I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say it, I'm gonna say it.

Speaker 1 2:23:44

I'm gonna strong our muscle into other buddy reads.

Speaker 2 2:23:47

Yeah, that funny. You should mention that I actually wanted to bring up that sci-fi podcast for discussion today.

Speaker 3 2:23:54

Let's go for it.

Speaker 2 2:23:56

Yes, let's go to the next two hours.

Speaker 3 2:23:58

I will schedule let's go. Kim Stanley Robinson. I believe Rev Mars was the book that was. I read it six months ago. I bought it.

Speaker 2 2:24:09

Okay, good, let's read it. We'll talk details after we finish recording, but I wanna start that up. I really do. Things were a bit busy there for a while, but they're freeing up and I wanna start that thing.

Speaker 1 2:24:23

Yeah, for sure, that's great. I've been looking forward to that. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 2:24:28

Cool, cool, cool yeah.

Speaker 3 2:24:30

We've come full circle. We have, yeah, we have.

Speaker 1 2:24:37

I think we started with alcohol.

Speaker 3 2:24:40

Yeah, we started with alcohol and the audience anybody that's left this in the stage is going. The alcohol took pre-assurance at least an hour ago.

Speaker 1 2:24:52

At least, at least, yeah, at least about 20 minutes in. It was over.

Speaker 3 2:24:57

Despite force's best attempts.

Speaker 2 2:25:00

So I'm the designated driver of this group.

Speaker 1 2:25:07

So in the meantime, jared, where can people find you? And congratulations on one year on Book 2.

Speaker 4 2:25:13

Yay, Thank you. Thank you, that Book 2 channel is the fantasy thinker. You can find me there and you can find me on pagejewingcom and pagejewingforums and hopefully I'll be writing some more stuff soon.

Speaker 1 2:25:33

Nice. Yes, the anthology stuff is coming up. Oh, yes, yes, very soon.

Speaker 2 2:25:39

I'm excited for that.

Speaker 1 2:25:41

And yeah, in virtual, where can people find you?

Speaker 2 2:25:45

You can find me on my YouTube channel called Reading by the Rainy Mountain and, if you can't remember that, you can find me on the pagejewing forum by my name.

Speaker 3 2:25:56

And me you can find me on my YouTube channel, possibly, maybe talking about books. My younger son either like do you do book reviews? And I'm like, oh, I mean, yeah, I used to, so I have to get back to that someday, but I'll have to read some books to do that, but otherwise you can find me on pagejewingforums or otherwise. Or it might find me here for the drinking games of the Hunter Thad. So that kind of thing excites me.

Speaker 1 2:26:26

Yes, yes, we have a plan that's going to be a cigarette idea. Yeah, a lot to talk about that. So, yeah, find us all. If you'd like to join us on an episode, check out our forums and join a little group of misfits, I guess, or I don't know what you call us.

Speaker 2 2:26:45

I like hooligans.

Speaker 1 2:26:46

Hooligans, yeah, hooligans. So find us there and thanks everyone for listening and, yeah, we'll talk to everyone soon. Our great weekend you.