NerdBrand Podcast
Nerd culture isn't just for a select few anymore; it's everywhere! It's in the movies we watch, the games we play, and the tech we use every day. Join us as we share our thoughts on how visual design, branding, and advertising shape our favorite movies, comics, books, video games, and other nerdy interests.
NerdBrand Podcast
Superman's Marketing Budget Could Buy Every Energy Drink Brand
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uh hi, mikayla, hi, how's it going?
Speaker 1:uh hi, mikayla hi, how's it going? Okay, it's going good. Um, you know it's thursday. I am happy for thursday, but at the same time, I'm also like it's not friday.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, it's like thursdays, like ever since I was a kid, because I don't know. I feel like my mom always gave me some leeway, staying up a little bit later on Thursday nights in comparison throughout the week, like, ah, it's Thursday, it's Friday, why not go crazy?
Speaker 1:So I've always liked Thursdays for that reason into the interwebs and I'm going to see, um, you know what, what are? What are people talking about in the marketing world? Cause we've noticed everything kind of travels in our industry, like one time it's a website, the next it's social media, then it's social media, then it's social media, and my God, um, and then, you know, no one thinks about really other channels in marketing. At least that's been my opinion and frustration. It's like that one channel, you know it's never going to go away. We've lamented about it for I don't know what, 10 years, but everybody still wants their Facebook post done, which is, you know, I get it, it's awareness, their Facebook posts done, which is you know, I get it, it's awareness.
Speaker 1:But, being a Gen Z-er, what is your thoughts on social media and its current state? I'm just kind of curious what your thoughts are.
Speaker 2:I don't know.
Speaker 2:I like the way that you put it.
Speaker 2:It is definitely awareness and just putting things out there Like I feel like if your content is not engaging or if it's just like something kind of static, it's not gonna be anything really impactful.
Speaker 2:People want to see you know the behind the scenes stuff. They want to see if it's a product or, I'm sorry, if it's a service, like what service does it look like? Like do a walkthrough of whatever facility you're in or whatever service you're conducting, um or seeing implementing how a certain product is used and like influencer marketing and content creators has like boomed. So that's really what I mean by that, because you have those collaborations with like a big, not a it doesn't have to be a big brand, but a well known brand and you're showcasing it for more people to buy and to consume it. So I just feel like that's my take on it. As far as, like a non marketing perspective, it's just people sharing their life with people that either are really close to them or they don't see very often. Like that's just my overarching take from a both professional marketing step stature to a personal note yeah, I mean, it's it.
Speaker 1:It's always never a thing, you know and I have to be careful here to not name names but sometimes, advice, like people are looking for, um, advice on how to do this better, like we all should, and I have come across some really bad advice and I can't say what it is Cause I'm worried that, you know, people be like well, that was me, I said that, and, um, it's really not, it's actually pretty like the same. I hear a lot. So, um, you know, know, when you are thinking about, like, how to reach an audience a lot, the shiny object is like always the first thing that everybody grabs onto, and it's like social media has its time, and then seo, and then podcasting, and then websites. Like I said, it's all cyclical and, uh, you know, the one thing that I don't think anyone thinks about is the attribution angle, and so right now, I'm going through a lot of things that we've done, because we come from how did we, you know, track like the leads and how they came in?
Speaker 1:Because when you're doing multi-channel marketing, like you should be, like, instead of just social media, like social media is a channel, you know, it's not a strategy, right? So it's like, okay, was it social media? What channel on social media? Was it email marketing? What was the segment?
Speaker 1:There's all these things to kind of go through, that that uh going through, and so one of the things the articles that I found online recently is talking about marketing attribution. Um, to see how well that message you're talking about, if it actually resonates with anybody. You know we have somebody recently that put out a message that was completely just seems like nobody's talking about it and we pointed that out to our client. We are not going to say who it is, but it's like doubled the views and impressions and mostly interactions, which is good with their account because of that message they were using, because they switched the message, meaning the words they were posting and what the content was and what it was talking about, flip script and you could see it in the analytics always good to see those charts right where it spikes up real big, and you'd be like, hey, look at that.
Speaker 1:You maybe should talk about that more did a thing, did a good thing yeah, yeah, this is where you go like, oh, found a nugget, we should go after that. What was they? How did they come in? And so, yeah, it was a little tedious because I had to go through and just on facebook alone I had to literally find out like, okay, what posts did this?
Speaker 2:and see like go through your metrics or audit uh through your uh profile your business profile and see which ones perform the best, because those are your golden ticket items right there. Yeah, it hurts, but if you use, if you repeat too much, then you're going to cause ad fatigue. So you don't want it to be like every week, but maybe the little content, content that's either awareness or educational you keep repeating it in a, in a sense, each month, but you just, you know, change the semantics of it yeah, I mean what, um, you know, I mean you're, you're obviously you buy online products and stuff like what.
Speaker 1:What makes you want to decide to buy something? I mean, is it?
Speaker 2:honestly, nowadays, it's the affordability, like I don't know. I like I do say I love Alani all the time, but I never buy anything off of, uh, their webs, their website. I only ever go to Kroger and like get their deals because I'm a budget girly and I like their two for, or three for six, or their two for five, whatever they normally have there. But, um, what entices me is that, like you know, if I I always like the reviews, if the reviews are there and if it's not going to cost me an arm and a leg, that's usually what entices me. I'm trying to think of a specific brand. I usually just go to Amazon nowadays, like I needed a new pair of sunglasses and I was just like, oh, these are the style that I have.
Speaker 2:I looked at the reviews like up there. You know they don't break easily, they're pretty durable and, honestly, if I pay more than $20 on a pair of sunglasses, you need to just smack my hand because it's one of those things that you just you lose a pair, why do I spend? I'm not going to spend $200 on Ray-Bans when I'm probably going to lose them. So I don't know. That's just my position on life right now is like I factor in the affordability, the convenience and, of course, the reviews, like is this going to be worthwhile to get or is it just going to disintegrate the moment it gets to my house? Whatever product? Maybe you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, yeah, um yeah, everybody's budgeting, everybody's decisions right now is is based on budget. But even though you do that, I mean you're still buying a quality product. I mean, otherwise, celsius wouldn't have bottomed out for like what? 4 billion. Them out for like what? Four billion. So you know, I mean you still got something that's pretty well known, it's established and they put a ton of money into it. To, you know, make that happen. Um, the acquisition. I mean they were bottled in prp with pleasure ridge park in louisville, kentucky, and, um, I don't know if they'll continue to be bottled. There are canned, whatever you call that. I don't know if that'll continue. But you know, yeah, I mean I have tried alani and it wasn't for me. I'm a red bull guy. I always have been because I'm old, um, you know. But at the end of the day it's like, uh, the surge and ready to drink and energy drinks and all of that has just gone.
Speaker 2:It's exploded over the last two years oh yeah, because I've just more influencers or celebrities who that are kind of turning into an influencer with promoting all kinds of different energy drinks. I can't think of them off the top of my head. But uh, there's several that I've come across and I'm like I've never heard of you before and it's some person you know I've seen in a movie or seen in, uh, some kind of reality tv show and I'm like, oh, you're doing this now.
Speaker 1:Okay yeah, I don't.
Speaker 2:I feel like there's also just it's kind of like energy drinks are kind of like how podcasts are. There's just a little bit of an oversaturation and you just you don't know which one to go with sometimes you know what I mean like that kind of analogy I had that conversation recently with somebody.
Speaker 1:They were asking about podcasting in relation to um. You know, elderly uh people, I guess is the way to say. I don't know. My mom is 76 and it was like she just doesn't want to part from her phone and as long as she knows how the app is, she'll listen right. It's like once you introduce that new medium to that new um demographic, now you got them and that's really what has to happen. A little harder to do that because I literally had to introduce her to it, but at the end of the day it's like it's for all ages and it has grown and still grows, like right now.
Speaker 1:And it's gone mainstream, of course, um, in the recent like because of the recent election and everything that happened. But it's like you said, every podcast has got its thing and it's like everybody wants to kind of jump in without planning about what. What is? What is it you want to talk about that people would want to listen to. If that's something you would want to do, I want to kind of go back to what? The Superman thing, because it is nerd brand and you're going to go see the movie and I don't want to wrap the show up before we talk about it because I may apply. I I'm not telling you it working. I may plan to see it Saturday.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay.
Speaker 1:Um, but how much do you think they've spent on marketing on this thing? Because I don't know if you've paid any attention to the trailers or anything going on with this brand, because it is one that they've literally rebranded and relaunched under the DCU movie universe, whatever. So it's kind of like what do you think that they spent on marketing on this?
Speaker 2:Let's see, I'm just like eyeballing off of what you all talked about with Thor Ragnarok. It was only a couple hundred thousand what they contributed for marketing. And then, whenever the Batman versus Superman came out, that was like oh, correct me if I'm wrong. It was like in the billions, it was like 2.5 billion or million.
Speaker 1:Well, I think that was like the yeah, that was like the ticket sales.
Speaker 2:Oh, the ticket sales. I thought that was really good.
Speaker 1:No, no, the marketing alone, marketing alone. Budgets are kind of hard to find, but you can find them on a Reddit channel. Can't remember the name of the thread, but it is. Imdb too right, IMDB has it yeah yeah, you can try to explore imdb and kind of see what they've done. It's just, it's very interesting because so they're always. So if the movie is like 200 million, you're probably going to have half to that much of the marketing budget with it. So you got a 400400 million film.
Speaker 1:You know, because marketing is $200 million, right. So the Superman film they really pushed this hard. I think we can say that for a fact and mostly on online and social media but it was $150 million and exceeding that.
Speaker 2:Typically, probably, they think it got close to about $200 million because technically they're still running campaigns's around what I was gonna say because I was like I was just eyeballing how it was for batman versus superman and I'm like I'd probably be about the same ballpark there, but yeah, and the opening weekend though.
Speaker 1:They said it's about 140 to 185 million. So you know, megan movies is not as sexy as people think. I mean, we have a friend that does it and has a studio in Kentucky and it's like, yeah, I mean, you've got to. Really the movie finance part of the business is wild. It's wilder than trying to find an audience and make the film. Everybody wants to watch the film and it's like, ooh, celebrities. And it's like that's celebrities. And it's like, nah, that's nothing.
Speaker 2:I was going to say it's wilder than Gene Wilder.
Speaker 1:And there you go, there's that old soul coming out. But anyways, opening weekend, it sounds like they've just about made the money back on the marketing so far, but it's not done. I mean, you still have a global campaign to do. It's like these are big campaigns. That's why the numbers are so large, but it seems like most of it is on digital and you know, you still have your print advertising for it, you still have your. They still got to do the trailers. Somebody's got a marketing company cuts those and marketing company cuts those, and so, yeah, all of that, uh, everybody's kind of hoping that it'll um you know, be fine, uh, I'm not gonna get into the reviews.
Speaker 2:Have you noticed any cross promotions like I don't know? An example that just popped in my head was when the new willy wonka came out and they did like a cross collaboration with ihHOP on certain like chocolate, purple looking pancakes to promote the movie. Has there been? I haven't seen any noteworthy, or really not even noteworthy like really any uh cross promotions with this movie other than like the widespread audience wise, it's not so much um on the marketing side, so they've been very specific about.
Speaker 1:You know how they're marketing this, so no um, there has been a cilinary revenue. That is the next step, which you know. That's the merch. You know you've got a property that's going to have a lot of toys and merch and so, because you know DVDs are dead, I mean tangible medium is kind of coming back. People kind of want to own movies again. But recently, what is it, which is one of the big companies quit making Blu-ray players, which is funny to say in 2025, you would think that that happened 10 years ago, but they actually stopped this year, I think, and then another one last year, and so if you've got a Blu-ray player, it's sort of like um.
Speaker 2:An obsolete item. That's just so.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I gotta, I gotta go into my closet and dig mine out, because it's like when you get these films, like I have actual films. Now, here's the thing those mediums are higher quality than the streaming. So you know, because it's like, with this, what we're doing right here, you know we're recording over the internet and quality is going to just be based upon internet service providers, whatever's going on and your router, my router, million different things, and so you know, you think about that. When you're streaming on netflix or you're streaming on disney plus, like the quality that you're seeing it may not be, may not be that they'll buffer it. Still, they don't tell you that they do, and um, but if you have a blu-ray player and you have a 4k disc and you're got a television that supports that format, that's what you're watching and you have.
Speaker 1:Also, the other important thing is the sound quality is better, and so it's like I think, uh, actual tangible owning the mediums will come back. So I'll be very curious to see if they you know, with superman, I don't think they will. I think the studio, I think they they're one of the ones that said like we're're not producing DVDs or discs anymore, because that's the other thing. Not only has there been a stop in manufacturing and making players, there's a stop in manufacturing discs. So I don't know.
Speaker 2:No, more $5 movie bin at Walmart.
Speaker 1:No, no, no, really. That's absolutely what I'm saying. It's like it's whatever's there. Might want to go buy it. It's whatever's there.
Speaker 1:Might want to go buy it. If you want to collect all of the Marvel MCU films on disc, well, you probably won't get. I think it wasn't Endgame, that was the last one. It was maybe Marvel's, I don't know. There was a couple of them, maybe that's it. You're probably not going to find Thunderbolts, thunderbolts, thunderbird. I don't know the new Avengers that gonna find. You're probably not gonna find thunderbolts, thunderbolts, thunderbird. I don't know the new avengers, that is not, in my opinion, the avengers. I'm sorry if that's controversial but that's just my opinion.
Speaker 2:Um, so, yeah, yeah, no more five dollar ben. I love crawling not literally crawling, but like just digging through those and having a nice like movie night at home.
Speaker 1:Those were the good ones oh, I know, yeah, I want to show. I'm going to present this one here. See, here, share screen. I don't know if this is the way that I want to do this. I didn't do this last time. So, yeah, there we go.
Speaker 1:So, um, how Superman marketing balances mass appeal with fan centricity I like how some of these words come out. Uh, so it's the highlights and iconic visuals, and, you know, they kind of got their like synopsis here. But, um, two audiences, sets of expectations, casual fans, hardcore fans. I'm not going to spend too much time on this. There doesn't and no spoilers here, because neither one of us have seen the film either, but, from just judging the trailers and stuff, there does seem to be a little bit of fan service.
Speaker 1:I honestly don't know, though, what's happening with some of the characters. I hope they have the Justice Gang, and that is Nathan Fillion as Guy Gardner, as Green Lantern, and you got Hawkgirl, which I was very pleased to see because, introducing the Thanagarians, they're a separate race of beings from another planet. And then you got Mr Terrific, who's just very smart, and so I'm like, okay, so you got the guy that's smart and techie, you got the guy that's the muscle and you got the girl. That's the badass with the whatever. I hope to see something of that. Um, but then I got to thinking I was like wait a minute, it's a Superman film. It already seems overloaded with um heroes. That's the only apprehension that I have. And so when you're doing a film, it's like there's just nothing we can say about. Um, not our gig, right, we don't make movies. But I don't think. Do you think James Gunn has maybe made a misstep? Are you expecting a good film or not?
Speaker 2:I'm kind of expecting it, because I think he did really well with peacemaker, the peacemaker series, and made it, you know, kind of like a serious undertone but with a little bit of lighthearted goofiness, you know what I mean. But it has John Cena in it and he just carries the show and you get more laughs probably than anything. But what I'm worried about, especially now that you mentioned the hero cameos that are going to be sprinkled into the plot think that they should maybe focus more on, like, the backstory. Maybe, you know, throw in lois lane and, like, make it kind of like that nostalgic, not oversaturated with all the other characters, and then that's an opportunity for the sequel.
Speaker 2:I don't you know what I mean oh yeah and I had another idea too, but I don't know how it could cross over into this. But I was like, and that's an opportunity for the sequel. You know what I mean? Oh yeah, and I had another idea too, but I don't know how it could cross over to this. But I was like, oh my gosh, if they have something like with Teen Titans, they do like that kind of a crossover, because I grew up watching and loving the animation with Robin and Starfire and Cyborg and Raven, so I'm wondering if they could maybe take a take on that.
Speaker 1:I know they're going to introduce Batman, obviously, cause he makes money and um, whether or not we get a Robin ever again is really difficult to to put down, but I, I know James Gunn, I think, has mentioned the idea of there being one coming and it's like, uh, he always does like the obscure characters, like you know. For example, we've got this poster that if I see it, I'll buy it. Um, but it's with crypto, um, and it kind of looks familiar. If you look at behind me, I've got the super. It kind of looks familiar. If you look at behind me, I've got the super, the wonder woman poster, and so it's kind of doing that.
Speaker 1:Now, I, I'm not a judgy person when it comes to um, you know these kinds of things because I don't really know. Like, I know there's people out there They'd be like, oh, the posters are, you know, and here's one of Mr, and so, eh, let's see, here we go, there. It is Um, so, and there's one with Mr Terrific, um, you know, so you've got that. Um, there's just, you know the posters. That's kind of what I like.
Speaker 1:Um, I'm going to share this. Yeah, I'm going to share this uh tab. Um, I'm going to share this. Yeah, I'm going to share this uh tab that I got open, so where these are coming from, um, but you know it's, it's, it's this one shot that I saw, uh, of Nathan filling in and there's hot girl and then Mr Terrific, and when I saw that I was like, oh, that's going to be interesting to see. But Maxwell Lord is like the. You know, there's that guy and then there's also Lex Luthor, so you also have a very heavy villain roster, which is weird, makes me nervous. But yeah, here's one of the posters I thought art posters One of the billboards they put up in Los Angeles, art posters, ha ha, one of the billboards, um, they put up in Los Angeles, um, which I think is pretty creative on how they have him holding up the date.
Speaker 1:Right, it's always nice to see that play with. You know, out of home what we call out of home, um advertising, um so, and then you've got I guess that's a statue of him. They made that. I mean, yeah, I think this is also part of the marketing campaign, right, like somebody's got to make the billboard, somebody's got to make this thing. I don't even know what to call this thing, but that's obviously. That is James Gunn in the photo.
Speaker 1:That is not the star in there, that's like a full-size statue that's got to go in an auditorium.
Speaker 2:I guess that's probably going to be a hot ticket item auctioning off.
Speaker 1:Oh my god, yeah, somebody will be like I want that. And then, of course, you got your digital trailers. We've seen all those Talk about those. This is another poster. That is the Superman poster of him, and you know it's a yeah, our girl. Now I actually like that one. I hope we get this kind of get a little bit of a story with her. I don't know.
Speaker 2:That's why I mean like backstories, I feel like are a little like. It's kind of like how marvel did that, because before the avengers got together it was very much backstory backstory. You're learning thor's backstory, you're learning iron man's backstory. I feel like that's something that dc could take a lesson of, is to really dive back into like the beginning of it all, tell that backstory and then save the character, cross collaboration until, like a couple movies later yeah, yeah, I mean you got like three heroes.
Speaker 1:I mean this first time we've ever seen guy gardner, mr terrific and honker.
Speaker 2:Well, we've seen hawk right, you're gonna confuse like the passive movie yeah watchers. You know what I mean. Like you, probably you know them like off the top of your head because you've read the comics. You're a big fan, whereas me, I mean I I do enjoy, uh, like marvel universe, the dc universe, but as far as like backstory and being like a super fan, I wouldn't call myself that, so it may confuse audience members like me, like who this guy?
Speaker 1:yeah, oh yeah yeah, and you don't have time to do that in a two-hour feature. Like you can't flash out. Like why is guy gardner the green lantern? I thought that that was hal jordan and I was like, well, yeah, there's more than one you can't explain the backstory and you're going to confuse people by just sprinkling to your point. Here's the Keebler stuff. You were talking about earlier collaborations. So Keebler did something. That's all I know of that I've been able to find they look like red velvet cookies they do well.
Speaker 2:I'm taking that off the stage there so we can stop. Why do I want to say?
Speaker 1:they look like red velvet cookies, they do. Well, I'm taking that off the stage there so we can stop that distracting Michaela. Yeah, I did see. So, to your point of fleshing out other characters, there is going to be, so, one of the brands that rebranded from Max back to HBO, because HBO's got a lot more brand equity than max, so that streaming service hbo max is back. And, uh, because, you know, discovery bought out warner brothers and then they just I don't know, it's like they're rolling back the rebrand on that because I think they found out nobody wants it. So, anyway, they are doing a green lantern series. This is what really is interesting. Um, it will be hal jordan, and it will be, um, uh, john stewart, who's the marine, and so, uh, they've cast both actors for it and it will be on. Um, I don't know when it's going to be on HBO Max, though.
Speaker 2:Jon Stewart from the Daily Show.
Speaker 1:No, that's just weird. He just so happens to share the same name. What?
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:See, that goes to the point of what you said about this whole thing. It's like your generation isn't quite as familiar with some of these characters. But they exist.
Speaker 1:So that's john stewart right there. So the difference between and that's kill a, kill a hog, I think it's a yeah. So anyways, um, how, jordan is obviously the first green lantern. We got him with ryan, with Ryan Reynolds that he hates and has definitely made fun of himself as that character over the years. But Hal Jordan was a Marine and is a Marine and his, I guess, things that he makes with the ring have never been very imaginative, not as much as Hal Jordan's.
Speaker 1:Like Hal Jordan will come up with a locomotive, but during the cartoon animation series of the Justice League, I mean, honestly, jon Stewart was just like a bunch of green glowing fists and stuff. It wasn't really. That's the only thing that I don't like about the character. At least it's portrayed in animation. We'll see how this series does and what they do with him. So these are the actors that are going to be playing them Kyle Chandler and Aaron Pierre as Hal Jordan and Jon Stewart respectively. And so yeah it's. You know, hal Jordan is, like I said, the original Green Lantern and Jon Stewart came in after him. Um, because Hal Jordan became, I guess, got upgraded or whatever he became a white lantern, which there there's different colors, like there's a whole universe to explore with this.
Speaker 2:That's what I mean. You need to dissect that a little bit better. I feel like, or compartmentalized, rather than just throwing a bunch of characters into a movie plot that we don't really quite know the backstory on. And we would like to know the backstory bond, because that that creates the fandom once you peel back those layers more and you get more of an attachment.
Speaker 1:You know what I mean yep, and I hope that that's what this is, because you can see this shot he's got the ring on his hand. So this is actually a production shot that they've shared. So this is happening. They asked the question will it be connected to Superman? I mean it will be smart if they did. I would think that that would be very, very smart. But, as we've learned that, I would think that that would be very, very smart.
Speaker 1:But, as we've learned that, you know, the Batman Part 2 is not connected.
Speaker 1:So when you have a brand or a series of brands like DC, it would be beneficial to them to connect them all and not try to rush building this universe like they did with Zack Snyder's stuff, where it's like hurry, hurry, hurry, let's catch up to Marvel, because when you have competition out there that's putting out product like this I mean that's kind of what happened it's like, oh no, here's this one, here's like batman versus superman had four acts and you had wonder woman appear, which was great, but the way they kind of did all of that, you never got anything like. She was really a different character by the time you got to her independent film and um. So I hope that that's not what we see, where we see like this kind of tonal, uh, disconnect. But we could cause, you know, even though James Gunn and the director of the Batman are are they know each other uh, the very different tones like this one here is talking about it's in the vein of true detective. Now, I don't know if you've seen true detective on hbo, have you? Or?
Speaker 2:I don't think so. No, but it sounds vaguely familiar yeah, there's a couple.
Speaker 1:There's, there's a few very famous scenes for very um rated r reasons. Um, I'll say that, and and particularly in the first, second season, I believe. And yeah, it wasn't exactly like it's not a lethal weapon type thing. There's not a lot of ha-ha's going on in there, it's more like hoo-ha's. I'll leave it at that. And so if you've got this going to be in the vein of that I mean, they say this stuff all the time to get you pumped for something. This is a thing that's done in brand messaging, where it's like okay, we're going to associate it with a thing so that you go out and get it, so that you kind of have an idea of what to expect when you consume it. It's fair, but is it? If it's actually not? You know, and I think that's where if and I think that's where if you don't do that right and it's not like that, then you've lost your base immediately, before you even got them right right so, but anyways, the Green Lantern Corps is basically a cosmic police state organization.
Speaker 1:Lanterns will be a detective story in which Jordan and Stuart investigate a murder in American flyover country, specifically Nebraska. Now, I don't know why it's like maybe we can't do kansas because that's superman, but anyways, we're in nebraska this time. Um, though nothing else is concrete dc co-chief peter saffron and said in early 2023 that it's very much in the vein of true detective and variety, pointed out that he seemed the most excited about lanterns of all the upcoming DC shows. So to your point, michaela, you're right, you're on track. There's going to be separate shows where they will have to. Probably they're going to have to break these characters out and flesh them out for people to become familiar.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and my question is since we had the rendition with the Justice League in like 2017 to 2018, like around that time, I wonder, are they gonna reframe those characters and have fresh faces, or are they gonna use those same characters? That's my question too, because they did do the justice league with the ben affleck, uh uh, batman and I can't remember who played superman, but that's what I mean. Like there's been too many faces for the part. You know what I mean, and it might muddy the water. So I wonder how they're going to.
Speaker 2:I think that help this new era.
Speaker 1:Being true rebranding? The answer is no, they're not connected in any way, because I think that would definitely like defeat the purpose of the rebrand, which is really what. This is right, because the the story that they're using as inspiration is one thing, but it's I don't see it. I only see it in the logo on his chest as the reference to it, but in the comics, but at the end of the day, this is like a brand new story and character. So I'm actually more interested to see who they're going to replace for wonder woman than I am batman, to be honest with you like you, you're thinking what I'm thinking like who all are going to be the new faces of these, these characters?
Speaker 1:yeah, because I mean, you, you've always had like the lanterns are great. You've always had like the Lanterns are great, but you know they're not. They've never been like the forerunners of the Justice League. It's always been what we call the Trinity, and that's Batman, superman and Wonder Woman and, which is funny, it's like you know, wonder Woman's had two films. That's it. How?
Speaker 2:many we had of Batman and Superman right, I can't keep track who played the parts, or and honestly, they all kind of look the same to me. They have blue eyes and black hair right.
Speaker 1:So the guy that plays Jack Reacher has been rumored to be Batman, which would be a great casting. He was actually in a movie with Henry Cavill recently the former Superman, in a movie with henry cavill recently. Uh, the former superman, uh, within a guy richie film and so, um, gentlemanly warfare or something like that and uh. So it's like, yeah, he could be. He's about he's a little taller than henry cavill, so he's he's really close to like six, eight, eight or something, I think. So he would be a definitely a big menacing form in that suit, um.
Speaker 1:But here's the problem when you have a character that like that, that's got such a presence on screen, how does that stack up against this Superman? Um, when you see them together, who are people going to pay attention to more? Who are they going to want to see more? And then, if you've got him as Batman, this guy is playing Superman, who looks like a younger Cavill. Whoever you pick as Wonder Woman is just going to fade into the background, in my opinion. So the casting on this has got to be right. I don't know. I think on the Lantern series, from what we just saw. I think on the Lantern series, from what we just saw. I think they got it, I think they nailed that. But I don't know. About the Superman casting, I'll just be honest and I'm probably going to be controversial for that one. Yeah, so it's kind of like picking a mascot for your brand, right, kind of like what we talked about in the last episode. It was like do you need one? With what you do?
Speaker 1:I kind of feel like there's already been a just a slight misstep, a bit yeah, I can see that yeah, not to poop on these expectations if they haven't seen them I can't wait to come back and talk about fantastic four oh my god, that one is hot during that one I'm gonna skip that one. I watched um uh, it's already leaked online the end scene of fantastic four.
Speaker 2:Don't tell me I'm going. We already got our tickets for that one. We're going to go to the world because you know, I love Pedro Pascal.
Speaker 1:Okay. You're going to want to it's a it's. It's weird and it's very lengthy, so I don't know when it plays. As far as before credits, after credits, mid-credits, I don't have any idea. Stick around, watch it, come back, be like what the? Or maybe you'll be like oh, I don't know. Kind of like.
Speaker 2:Have you seen Thunderbolts right?
Speaker 1:Actually no, but I'm not. You know, I'm not one of those that the last film and I know there's a particular person out there that I know is gonna he hates me for this because I went and seen doctor strange 2 in the theater. That was the last one I saw in the theater and I was bored. About 20 minutes in I was thinking about where to get a burger. I swear to god, I've never had that happen but you know, I'm, I'm grandma now.
Speaker 2:Whenever it comes to, like you know, staying on the couch past 9 pm, I just get ep and yeah, but I just wasn't in, I wasn't engaged at all.
Speaker 1:So right, I mean, and that's the thing. It's like you build a brand up, you build up a product and everything, and then people kind of snooze at it and you're like what happened? And it's sort of what I've been preaching for years Content is king. And it's not coming from me, I didn't invent that. But it's like what you read, what you're looking at, what you're watching if it's a video, matters, what you're looking at, what you're watching, if it's a video, matters and the quality matters. And if you're just, a lot of people are really happy to kind of do what you said save the money. And we're going to wrap up with this, because this is an important thing, especially for business owners.
Speaker 1:If you're just starting out and you're less than three years old, it's totally understandable the corners you have to cut, the tools you need to use in order to do things. But Canva is not a professional designer tool. I've never met a professional designer who uses it, unless they just don't care what they're delivering, because they just got to get it done, because they do actually have a professional client that needs something professional made. But after looking at these posters, if they were done in Canva, it would really shock me. But I don't think so and um, so you know it's sort of, uh, it's like, okay, on the cheap we can get Canva pays 50 bucks a month for this or whatever, and you can do your do things. And now you're, it's just, it's everything looks the same. Nothing is differentiated from something else. It all just kind of looks the same. You got the same kind of treatment for typography in a graphic, the same kind of treatment of a background image in a graphic. It's just like the slashes here or there, where they're at, or how the masking is done.
Speaker 1:We know these are templated and people are putting them out there on social en masse and the message is getting lost and so that's content. And it's like watching a film that has bad content. You know you get disengaged from it very quickly because you're like this is boring, right, show me something new to look at that I like looking at. And you know, I think that that is where that you've got to really invest in your creative moving forward, especially in the age of AI, because AI will generate this or that, even copy, but if you want something unique that's going to stand out, you're still going to have to have a human do it and as an agency, we have several humans, but at the end of the day, it's like we get it.
Speaker 1:You want to save money. However, you're not going to have the impact as much as you think. It's just not going to happen. I think ai is slowing down and a lot of people like, oh no, it's not slowing down. I think it is because how far can we go after this? Like, we've already seen it produce videos, but I've never seen an ai film that I look at and go yeah, I want to watch that.
Speaker 2:I still it's. There's flaws, it's. I always say it's a tool, not a replacement.
Speaker 1:Right, you know, cause you still have a uncanny Valley, like right here, you know, under the nose, and the eyeballs don't really look great, and then sometimes it messes with fingers and digits so it's like, well, no, that's not going to happen. Um, I can imagine like somebody doing an AI only feature film and there's a love scene with two main characters and it's just like, like you know, like there's no way that's happening to each other.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there's, there was a scene and it was an Al Pacino film and, uh, with, there was a scene and it was an Al Pacino film, and with Keanu Reeves, oh, devil's advocate. And there was a scene and they all just kind of blended together and it was like a really cool effect. And I'm thinking like that's what you're going to see with AI love scenes, if they filmed them or they use them. So it's like all right, you know, because there's only like so many ways that the engine is going to be like okay, well, that's what a nipple looks like. And yes, I said that on a podcast. Um, and it's just sort of like, you know, boring. I mean, how far does that? How far do you go before you're like, yeah, this is like watching, you know, a cartoon. Um, at the end of the day, um, you can go to nerdbrandagencycom slash podcast If you want to like, subscribe to this thing and share the love.
Speaker 1:Um, you know we'll talk about, uh, maybe coming up on a future episode with our creative director, about, you know, have comics died? What's happened? And I say this because I went to a Barnes and Noble and I saw the graphic novel uh section, and it was a small section with a few shelves, but, oh my Lord, there was a huge part of the entire store. That was just the manga is what it is, and that was nuts. I mean, it was everywhere. So obviously there's been a cultural shift away from comics. So are comic books going to die? What's going to happen, you know? So, anyways, that's just something I'm putting out there to see if there's an interest there. Anything. Closing remarks that you got.
Speaker 2:No, just keep your nerd brand strong. That's all I got to say, and I hope I didn't take the words out of your mouth, nope.
Speaker 1:I think we're going to end on that. So do like she said. Everybody, Do what I say.
