HomePodcastsGenXGrownUp PodcastThe Perfect Neighbor, 3-D Mirascope, & Keys of Fury

The Perfect Neighbor, 3-D Mirascope, & Keys of Fury

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About This Episode

We watch a new comedy thriller series about an unlikely workplace conspiracy, evaluate a mobile phone accessory to make your next flight a bit more tolerable, and play a vintage Atari game inspired by Mary Shelley’s horror icon.

(May contain some explicit language.)

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Show Notes

TRANSCRIPT

Speaker Transcript
Jon Welcome back Gen X Grown Up podcast listeners to this episode. Wait for it. Wait for it. 200 of the Gen X Grown Up podcast.
Mo Jeez.
Jon I am John. Joining me as always, of course, is Moe who can’t believe it. Hey, Moe.
Mo has’s it going
Jon Would not be a show without George. Hey, George, you doing?
George Hey, how’s it going guys?
Jon In this episode, we watch a new comedy thriller series about an unlikely workplace conspiracy, evaluate a mobile phone accessory to make your next flight a bit more tolerable, and play a vintage Atari game inspired by Mary Shelley’s horror icon.
Jon We’re going to have those topics and many more coming your way in this 200th episode of the Gen X Grown Up Podcast. We’re talking before the show. You’ve remember, that’s we only number the non-backtracks, so it’s more like 400 and
Mo yeah
Jon And then with extra, as you were saying, George, like 450, that’s a lot of episodes of this show, man.
George Yeah.
Mo That is a lot.
Jon oo In case Mo didn’t feel old enough, tacked it on there for him.
Mo I know. ah George, you believe John talked us into it this long?
George Yeah, I just, ah I was just on a panel recently where we discussed that very fact.
Mo Oh, really? Adding more, yeah.
Jon You guys love telling the story of how I tricked you into doing it and then tricked you into doing two and then tricked you to do it for eight years, apparently.
Mo adding more yeah
George Mm-hmm.
George It’s one of the rare things that Mo and I agree upon.
Mo Yes.
George So you’re not going to get to change the history no matter how much you try.
Mo so
Jon yeah You know, if you haven’t caught on by now, you’re probably not gonna.
Mo Yeah, that’s true. who was We’re pot committed at this point.
Jon Yeah, that’s right. Before we get into this episode of the show, time for some fourth listener email. You know, the three of us are liable to listen at some point across 400 episodes. 400 episodes.
Jon um as for episodes but i was little But I forgot where I was going.
Mo are you going with that?
Jon I don’t know. But whether we do or not, if anyone writes in to tell us about their thoughts on the show, that is our fourth listener. And the fourth listener this time around is longtime listener and Patreon supporter Rip Van X. He dropped us an email.
Jon Subject line, no jacket required. Okay.
George yeah
Mo Good one.
Jon Yeah, it’ just a few weeks ago, right? We did the Phil Collins. That may be month or so ago. Yeah.
Mo This is my month this year.
Jon Yeah. Yeah. Here’s what Rip has to say. Dear John, George and Moe. You’re not last, George. see that You’re happy about that?
George All right, I see.
Mo jesus
Jon When I sat down to listen to your flashback episode for the No Jacket Required album, I was thrilled to gain some new insights into the making of this album. Unfortunately, i found it quite distracting because I wanted to listen to the songs of their entirety as you were discussing them.
Mo I can see that.
Jon Yeah, yeah, yeah. We can relate. To compromise, I decided to listen to each track fully before you covered each song. So we’ve got to do it a ping pong, little back and forth.
George Oh,
Jon All right. This satisfied my desire and I was able to enjoy your content to its fullest. Yeah, as well you should. I love it. Yeah. ah He says, incidentally, here we go.
George Jesus.
Jon Incidentally, in 2001, I had a live cable community access show where people would call into the show and sing Phil Collins with me live.
George Oh, Jesus.
Mo oh it’s got to be recording that somewhere.
Jon He says, it was called, believe it or not, the Phil Collins Singalong Hour, though it was only half an hour long.
Jon He said, we sang mostly the songs from No Jacket Required and Moe. He provided a link, which I’ve given it to you.
Mo Oh,
Jon you would throw in the show notes so everyone can enjoy Rip Van X’s 2001 Phil Collins Singalong Show, I took a look.
Mo absolutely.
Jon It was ah video that I watched. ah
Mo It was definitely community access TV.
Jon It is community access TV. Yeah. Yeah, it is. it it’s every And it’s everything you love about that era of of broadcasting. So yeah, it’s exactly that. So thank you, Rip, for ah bearing your soul to us. we’re glad you enjoyed ah the backtrack. He wraps it up by saying thanks for all your content.
Jon Your fourth listener, Rip Van X. All right. Nice.
George feels like if we ever like get big enough to hire people, we need we’re going to have to hire somebody to create soundtracks for Spotify for our backtrack episodes when we talk about TV shows, movies, or music, I guess.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo Mm-hmm.
Jon Just put it together. Well, like Mo does every once while for the billboards, right? He does that for that, but for everything, for everything.
George Exactly. Exactly.
Jon Yeah. Or we just give Mo work. Give him more work right now. Who knows? Who needs a staff? We got it. Again, Rip, thank you for your email. Fourth listeners, if you would like your email featured here on the show, you know it’s dropped dead easy. All you have is fire off a note to podcast at genxgrownup.com.
Jon We’ll read every single one. Most of them eventually, like Rip’s, we’ll make the show. All right, with a good business in the rear view mirror, it’s time to jump into the body of this episode 200 right after this very quick break.
Jon All right, media.
Mo Hmm?
Jon Let’s get the ball rolling right here at the top. We’ve done it 200 times, 199 times before. This is the 200th. Talking about media we have been enjoying. Of course, this could be ah television or movies or comics or film or music or whatever. Whatever. I guess I said the film twice.
Jon Mo, I want to hear what it is you have been watching since we last spoke. Because the last thing you suggested, I loved and I got into. that the The movie about the guy with the… I forget. they hit The…
George the movie about the guy in the place with the thing.
Jon The time travel screens.
Mo Oh, the two minutes.
Jon Yeah, the guy, the place with the thing, the time travel screen, whatever.
Mo The two minutes.
Jon Yeah, the two minute, the infinite two minute. That was, and I recommended like five other people.
Mo Infinity two minutes.
Jon So I’m ready for a new hot recommendation from you. What do you been watching?
Mo Okay. So it’s a TV show that just started in October 12th of this year, actually. was called The Chair Company. i don’t know if you guys heard of this or not.
Jon Hmm. Hmm.
Mo um It stars Tim Robinson, not Tim Robbins. It’s Tim Robinson, somebody else. He was actually on Saturday Night Live for a year as a cast member and then went from that to writer for the show.
Jon Hmm.
Mo Like he stepped back from the show and and he was like a writer for like another four or five years.
Jon OK.
Mo Yeah. It’s a it’s this is such a bizarre TV show. It’s like a guy he’s in charge this big building project and he’s like his big opportunity and he goes to work um and he’s one of these like high stress people. You know, he’s like he’s very calm. As soon as something doesn’t go right, he gets like really, really stressed.
Mo um
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo A chair breaks under him.
Jon OK.
Mo And it’s in front of everybody. he’s kind of embarrassed. So he just obsesses over why this chair broke. He tries calling the company the fit that supplied the chair.
Mo He can’t get through. There’s no address. He starts doing some detective work. He finds their address in this abandoned warehouse. It’s just bizarre. And he just keeps going down this thing trying to find where this chair came from.
Mo um Eventually, some guy tells him to stop investigating the chair out of nowhere. it’s just It’s just a weird, weird show. um It’s funny. It’s entertaining. But this character stresses the shit out of me watching him.
Mo um Which I guess is a good actor because…
Jon was that Maybe they’re intended to, right?
Mo yeah Yeah, because because he he’s like one of people that’s like, you just feel like any moment he’s just going to pop, you know, that like in his voice and the way he moves it. He’s like, oh, any second, this guy’s just going to just freaking lose it, you know?
Jon Maybe.
Mo um He definitely is like an obsessive, compulsive person. ah and And he has some really good traits. Like he’s a really good speaker and he can talk to people. But then like he just gets in these weird and weirder and weirder situations that just, it’s very difficult to describe.
Mo um It’s only a couple episodes in right now. Go check out the first episode.
Jon I’m interested.
Mo I watched the first episode. I was like, wow, this is an interesting show. Couldn’t jump to the second one right away because he just stressed me out too much. know, I need to watch something else and come back to it because this character just, just my blood pressure was going up watching him because you’re like, why are you doing this?
Jon Right.
Mo You know, it was just crazy, but it’s definitely a decent show. It’s called The Chair Company.
Jon Yep. I’m interested. I think I’ll it out.
Mo Okay, cool. We’ll see if hopefully I’ll get two for two with John here.
Jon I would like that. Sure. That was great.
Mo So George, what do you got for us?
George Um, ah so I’m having a difficult time with only using a one slot in the media segment right now, because I’m watching so many things that are interesting.
Jon Yeah.
George So I’m behind a little bit with what I want to talk about this week, because then in a couple of weeks, I’m going to have to talk about another thing and it’s probably going to be old, but, um, this was something that I, um, mentioned at least in the last regular episode, it’s called humane.
Jon Yeah.
Mo Yeah.
Jon Mm-hmm.
George And so this is a very on-the-news, political, satire type of movie about the possible end of the world in a post-apocalyptic setting where there has been some natural catastrophe ah that seems to do with our atmosphere and the sun and something like that.
Mo Okay.
Mo okay
George What you learn very early in the movie is that all of the major nations of the Earth have come together and agreed to voluntarily cull their own populations
Jon Mm.
Mo oh
George in order to make life possible for the rest of humanity.
Mo Ah, few versus many kind of thing, right?
George Yeah, exactly. Needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few are the one. ah so um In America, they have been tasked with culling 10% of the population.
Mo Decimate.
George Yeah. ah Now, ah what they have decided was that for one year, they would accept volunteers for this culling program, and any volunteer would then earn a reward for their family who is still alive after they sacrifice themselves.
Mo Oh, oh.
Jon Ooh.
George um They get ah whole bunch of money. They get college scholarships. They get all these perks and benefits for their family. And every week on the national news, there are volunteers of the week who sacrifice themselves and they give a little brief history, very much like what you might’ve seen during a wartime thing where they talk about a fallen soldier or something like that.
Mo e
Jon Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
George The movie stars Jay Baruchel and a whole, like group of other people. It’s, it’s very much an ensemble cast piece. There’s not one particular star, one that the three of us probably recognize. Do you guys remember the leader of the alien race from galaxies quest?
Mo Yeah, yeah.
Jon Oh, yeah.
George Okay. So he plays the man who is in charge of coming to your house, this contracted company to help you perform your suicide.
Mo Oh, holy crap.
George Yeah. Yeah.
Mo That took a turn.
Jon Let me in.
George it does Well, that’s like that’s the calling, right?
Jon so
George So Jay Baruchel is the son of um this very affluential news broadcaster who he’s coming to his house along with his other siblings and a granddaughter for this special dinner.
George They don’t know what’s going to happen. And it turns out this broadcaster and his new wife have decided they will volunteer for this program. And they’re going to tell their children that over dinner.
Jon There
Mo Nice.
George The children all show up and they’re like, what the fuck? That’s bad shit. Crazy. Blah, blah, blah.
Mo Yeah.
George And all like this. And then knock at the door.
Jon there it is.
Mo He’s already there.
George He’s already there. Turns out they weren’t supposed to come until the next night, but the dates got moved up or something. When,
Jon Man, this giving me chills just like oh thinking about it.
George They’re doing all this dinner stuff and everything.
Mo This is not a comedy, right? This is like…
George It’s crazy. The wife goes away to go get dessert for everybody while they’re talking to the guy at the door. They go. ah The husband goes back to get the wife.
George The wife has disappeared. She’s flaked out. She’s like, fuck it. I’m not doing it.
Jon Oh, she’s absconded.
George She left a note. I can’t do this.
Mo Oh.
Jon oh, oh.
George The husband decides that he doesn’t want to do it, but then Galaxy Quest guy kind of blackmails him with some envelope a little bit, and you don’t really know what’s in the envelope, but he’s like, okay, fine, I’ll do it.
George I don’t want whatever this is to come out.
Jon Mmm. Oh,
George And he, with his family around his side, has a peaceful transition through suicide.
Jon goodness.
George The family’s like, God, that was heartbreaking. We don’t know what to do. There’s all this stuff we have to think about now because this was caught them totally unaware, of course.
Mo Thank you.
George And they all have different personalities. Like Jay Baruchel is a self-aggrandizing jerk. There’s a sister who’s like a businesswoman that’s about to go to jail for insider trading kind of shit. they’re One of the children, he’s an adopted guy who’s also a former drug user.
George um And then the the fourth sibling is a sister who is like a failed actress. Anyway, I’ve gone on way too long about this movie, but as they’re sitting in the, the foyer of the house, the guy goes, okay, who’s next?
Jon Because the mom left?
George And they’re like, what do you mean? He’s like, look, I came here to collect two bodies and the rest of the movie.
Jon There you go. Oh, no.
George I’ll let you experience for yourself.
Jon Mm.
Mo So is this like ah like a slight, there’s like a little bit of comedy to this? Is it all like very dead serious? Is it?
George they play it serious, but I would call it a very, very dark comedy horror kind of thing, like psychological social horror, maybe, you know, because of course the sibs are all going to start turning on each other and whatnot.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo Yeah. The situation seems kind of dark comedy-ish, you know? Okay, okay.
Jon Yeah.
Mo I want to see this. Okay.
George One of the sibs has a daughter. who is there and she’s like a 10 year old girl. They take her out of the house because they’re like, oh, she’s not of age. So we’ll just keep her in the van while you four decide who’s going to be the next.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Jon Ah. Nope.
Mo Holy jeez.
George Yeah. It is.
Mo Woo. It’s
George It’s a movie that you’ll probably only watch once, but it should leave an impression.
Mo like the long walk.
George Yeah.
Jon Yeah. ah
Mo Okie dokie.
Jon Humane.
Mo Humane.
Jon All right.
George Yeah. Yeah.
Jon yeah Is it recent? Is it come out a while ago?
George ah So that’s weird.
Jon or
George It, it has a release date of 2024, but I think that might’ve just been in selected theaters or maybe like the, uh, the art house kind of stuff or festivals.
Jon Okay.
Jon e
Mo Cannes Film Festival or something.
Jon Got it.
George Yeah. I think it probably just released through streaming just like a few months ago.
Mo and Okay.
Jon Okay. All right.
George Um, that was the first I had started hearing about it.
Mo That means it’s probably pretty good if it takes that long.
George Yeah.
Jon e Yeah.
George It’s, it’s really solid.
Jon Right. Okay.
George It’s a good film. Well put together, well acted. Um, I think there were probably some points where it could have been slightly better, but it’s still a really good horror social commentary piece in my opinion.
Jon Okay.
George So, all right.
Jon Yeah. All right.
Mo Hmm.
Jon Like it.
George Talked way too long about that. John, you got 30 seconds.
Jon ah
George What have you been watching?
Jon And go it’s on Netflix. We’ll be back in a minute, everybody. It’s I was looking forward to this documentary called the perfect stranger.
George There we go. Yeah.
Jon Uh, and it came out and I watched it.
Mo The perfect neighbor.
Jon Uh, uh, thank you.
Mo Perfect neighbor.
Jon Oh shit. Yes. And looking forward to this, uh, Netflix called the perfect. I will say stranger again. It was called The Perfect, right I guess.
George you got Belky on the brain. are you doing?
Jon was called The Perfect Neighbor. And it had a lot of buzz because it went to the festivals and it was aired ahead of time. And people said, oh, it’s going to be the greatest thing when it hits Netflix. And so I actually watched it together. My daughter and I did remote streaming so I could watch it together because we love these kind of…
Jon Creepy, weird, true crime documentaries. And you might think it’s just another of the same, but it’s where it differentiates that I want to explain. The premise of the documentary, this happened in Florida, in Ocala, Florida, back in, I’m going to say it was 2022, 2023.
Mo oh okay
Jon And what’s going on is there’s this neighborhood of rental homes. And a lot of these families have kids that are all playing in the empty lot next to these houses. And there’s this one woman who I won’t judge her, but I will say everybody in the neighborhood calls her the Karen.
Jon OK, so this is I wouldn’t even call her elderly.
Mo Okay.
Jon They call her an old lady. i think she’s like 58. fifty eight She’s not that old. right
Mo Jeez.
George He he he he.
Mo Screw them.
Jon She’s you’re right. Exactly. But to these kids, she’s the old lady. And she’s. She’s very curmudgeonly. She works from home. She hates the kids making noise. And the vacant lot is adjacent to her little strip of land.
Jon And so she gets mad at the kids out there playing. She’s always calling the police on them to come and tell them to quiet down and get off my property.
Mo Okie
Jon Little altercations like, oh, she took out my no trespassing sign and threw it at me. Oh, and it touched her leg. And so it’s elevating, escalating on each side. And you even learn in the opening few seconds of this documentary, it starts fast forward a little bit where the police are called and they’re like, what’s that?
Jon Shots fired. We’re on our way.
Mo ok kidoki
Jon and like, whoa. And then we rewind to see this thing kind of build. And you see the police.
George Oh.
Jon Now it’s all put together by body cam. Aside from maybe a couple of drone shots to show the neighborhood, there is no sitting in a room reflecting with people go, so tell me, how did you feel? None of that.
Jon It’s all in the moment.
Mo Hmm. Mm-hmm.
Jon and very visceral and you can, you can see it coming. And it’s one of those things like, well, you know, the neighbors and the kids are probably, or they are kind of harassing her because they don’t like her. And you know, the woman is probably kind of saying ruder things than she’s admitting.
Mo z
Jon The truth is somewhere in between what they’re saying. But as said, it escalates to shots being fired and a woman is lying on the ground and police are on their way.
Mo geez
Jon And that might make it a good documentary. But that’s the midpoint of the documentary. Because what happens next is because you have all these body cams, normally you would follow the ambulance and then you would go to the courtroom.
Mo Mm
Jon The body cams and the cops are still there. And you see everyone dealing with what has just happened. The family is my mother going to live. The neighbor saying the police are coming and they’re banging on my door.
Mo Well.
Jon And you’ve got her in the car. She’s in the car detained. And people are banging on. There’s a camera in the car. People are banging on the window. Why did you shoot my mom? Why did you like, holy shit, like it’s happening in real time.
Mo Oh, geez.
George wow
Jon It’s crazy. And then you do follow on and you see kind of the the in interrogation scenes and, I don’t look if you it was a pretty popular ah popular is the wrong is a pretty well-known thing that happened in the news back in 2023. So you might already know the case or the story. So i won’t tell you more about what shakes out and what happens. But if you heard about it and thought, oh, it’s another true crime.
Jon If you heard about it and you thought, it’s just some other true crime documentary. doesn’t I don’t care. It really does some different interesting things. And know that it’s no matter which side you agree on or where you lie, it’s going to make you angry for on behalf of someone, maybe behalf on everyone, maybe on the the state of interpersonal relations in the United States, you might feel bad.
Jon So to make you feel things.
Mo Does this like some documentaries like I kind of upset me because they start and then you realize that it’s not over yet. You know like that wherever is happening is still in process. So they kind of like ends right without any resolution.
Mo Does this one actually get to a resolution?
Jon Oh, no. We follow this one all the way to the end of what happens.
Mo Always again. OK.
Jon Yeah, it’s not like, you know, to be decided that are currently in negotiations.
Mo Oh, OK. OK. Right.
Jon No, this happened a few years ago and something has happened. There is something resolved. Yeah.
George The way you described this documentary all on the police body cam footage, it’s very interesting to me because for whatever reason, maybe six months ago, i got sucked into YouTube hell with police body cam videos and YouTube said, Oh, he watched one of those.
Jon Mm hmm.
Mo she should
Jon e
Mo oh i do I’ve been there.
George And so now let’s give him 7,000 of those videos.
Mo Yeah.
Jon he
George So, and I do watch them regularly every day.
Jon Yeah.
George I probably watch five or 10 of these damn police body cam videos and
Mo This is addictive.
Jon Yeah. They’re interesting.
George they They are. I mean, they get samey after a while. Like, this time, police reported to the airport. Oh, shit. Drunk passenger, right?
Mo Yeah.
George it’s You know what they’re going to be. But this, I’m wondering… Is it because of the editing between the body cam footages that pulls you in?
George Because those the ones that I see on YouTube, it’s usually just one police body cam at the most, maybe two.
Jon Yeah.
George ah But this sounds like it’s a whole big production of a whole bunch of different body cams and some drone footage, like you said.
Jon Oh.
George Is it the editing that pulls you along? Because I can’t imagine watching the police body cam stuff on the same subject for an hour and a half.
Jon Yeah.
Mo David Price-
Jon So the editing is part of it.
Mo Price- Ah.
Jon The bigger part of it is it’s not an incident. you follow this incident building and starting to simmer and boil over, over a year, over multiple different incidents.
George So there’s a whole bunch of call outs for the police to come to this place.
Jon Like, That’s right. Lots of call-outs.
Mo ah
Jon What happened this time? Why is she mad this time? Where were you playing now?
George Hmm.
Jon Right? It’s these multiple 911 calls. And each time people are a little more agitated. So it’s telling a story, not just an incident.
George Okay. All right.
Mo Got it.
Jon Yeah. the The incident is the is the turning point, but it’s not, and it’s either the beginning or the end of the story.
Mo Okay.
Jon Yeah.
George Gotcha.
Mo Okay.
George Gotcha.
Mo Gotcha.
Jon That’s what kind of makes it different. So it’s called The Perfect Neighbor. It’s on Netflix right now. You probably already heard about it. But if you enjoy crime, ah like true crime stuff at all, and and body camp stuff that George got addicted to, it is kind of different and novel and does something you might have seen before in a more professional way. So definitely check it out.
Mo Cool.
Jon Nice. Okay. Nice.
Mo all right George why don’t you just jump right into Tekken toys this week and tell us what you got for us this I’m sure it’s amazing moving on John what do you got for those okay
George Okay.
George Yeah, i got a phone holder.
Jon All right. Hey, we’re out of time.
George Yeah. ah So I was, uh, obviously John and I were going on a trip to Portland for PRG E 2025. And I realized that my travel gear was woefully lacking.
George I needed a better suitcase.
Jon Yeah.
George I needed a good tech bag. I wanted some different cables, but a better fast charger, all this kind of stuff. Because while I’ve upgraded things like my phone, as we’ve talked about on the podcast and a few other stuff, I haven’t upgraded the stuff that I travel with.
George So I still have the same pack that I’ve used from back when, you know, we first started going to conventions in 27, 18, whatever.
Mo she
George um So I went on a little bit of an Amazon spending spree and hopefully the Gen X grown up links worked and we’re getting at least a couple of those pennies back to the company.
Jon Okay.
George ah The phone holder that I decided to go with, it’s from you green and I’m big on the you green brand. I know a lot of other people are big on anchor and some of that stuff, but you green to me ah produces the same quality as anchor at about two thirds the price usually.
Mo Yeah, they’re big ones too, yeah. Oh.
George ah charging packs, cables, and this phone holder, which is not just a phone holder, but it’s a MagSafe clippable phone holder specifically designed for situations when you’re on an airplane.
George So it has this really strong hinge system that allows the mag ring part of it to be folded and unfolded and twisted in a lot of different orientations.
Mo oh
Mo Okay. Mm-hmm.
George But then the back part of it has this really heavy spring-loaded clamp that is at its natural state completely closed. So you have to really force your thumb to push open this clamp in order to attach it to something like your tray table on an airplane.
Jon Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
George What I do like about it is your tray table can be folded down in front of you like you’re receiving a snack and you can clip it on the tray table in that manner. or because of the design, if the tray table is up and attached to the seat in front of you, like, you know, when they tell you well we’re going to be taken off or landing, you can still clip this phone holder to it in that position.
Mo Mm hmm. Yeah.
Mo Oh, OK. You.
George ah It was very affordable. I think when I got it, it was $14, then immediately went on sale for like $10, and it goes up and down.
Jon Mm-hmm.
George So if you get it anywhere between $10 and $15, I think that’s a fair price. The magnet ring on this thing is super strong. I never had a problem with my phone jiggling at all, let alone falling.
George So um it’s it’s a good system. There’s only one thing that it lacks that John and I ran into we wished it would have had at the convention.
Jon yeah You mentioned that we kind of used it a little bit as kind of like a tripod enhancement for your phone for MagSafe. And it made me think, I actually have two questions.
George Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Jon One about this and one about something related. One was, you bought this for on the airplane. And since we kind of ad-libs at the show, do you think you’ll use it for anything else since it has a MagSafe and it has that kind of thing on it?
Jon And the second question i’ll go to ask you is… around this trip a few weeks ago, you bought some air earbuds that you were specifically thinking would work well on the plane.
Mo she
Jon I wonder if you could comment on that and have follow up and how they did for you.
George Sure. Okay. ah First of all, yes, I’ll likely use this holder in other situations around the house because that clip allows it to be expanded. I think it’s like three and a half, four inches of ah clippable space between the clamp.
Jon Okay.
George So I can clip it to a table or, you know, anything I’m holding. Like if I have a little
Jon ah like that The jaws of it can hold on to something fatter.
George Yeah, the jaws are really strong.
Jon Got it.
Mo okay
Jon Got it. Yeah.
George They’ve got a nice rubber coating on the inside, so they’re very sticky as well.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo You won’t mark anything. Okay. Yeah.
George So once you get it ah expanded and clamped onto something, it does not come loose very easily.
Jon Mm-hmm.
George um Like I said, the magnet ring is super, super strong, which, by the way, MagSafe is… pissing me off because we’ve had this ability forever remember those metal discs that we could have gotten back in the day to attach our phone to some kind of magnet thing chi charging all we had to do is cut a fucking hole in those things and it would have done the same thing but then they put ah new term on it and charged us extra money anyway uh
Mo yeah
Jon Right. Yeah.
Jon Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Mo instances
Jon Right.
George I thought John was going to talk a little bit about what it was missing on this clamp. It doesn’t have any of them, any mount inserts for a screw hole for a tripod. So we had to clamp it onto the tripod extension arm itself, which still worked.
Jon right yeah
Mo Okay.
Mo but
Jon oh yeah
Mo Let’s not say it wasn’t his purpose, though. I mean, you know.
George Right.
Jon right
George It would have been a nice bonus feature and maybe they’ll do that in model two or something.
Mo hmm.
Jon Right. Right.
George Anyway, John, I,
Jon Like, by the way, dot, dot, dot can be used as this if you want to.
George Yeah, exactly.
Jon Right. Yeah.
George Uh, John also asked about those JBL, uh, tune buds. I think they’re called or something like that.
Jon Yeah. Yeah.
George I forgot what they’re, uh, they worked tremendously well when I put them in my ear and was on the plane, I heard none of the air noise that you hear inside the cabin.
Jon Oh, good.
Mo Oh, that’s great.
George Normally, um, they connected perfectly with my phone.
Jon Doing their job.
Mo Nice.
George No limps, lip syncing problems with the video. Like I talked about, um, in the last episode, um,
Mo nice
Jon Good. Mm-hmm.
George and matter of fact, I downloaded a whole bunch of ah movies and TV shows to my Plex app on my device. So I didn’t have to worry about, you know, being connected. And I watched several movies and several TV shows ah during my trip, both to Portland and back.
George um And as a matter fact, because of that clamp, when the… um when the flight attendant was walking by in one case and, you know, we were going to be going in for a landing soon, she stopped for a second and was about to chastise me for having my tray table down, but my tray table was up.
Jon I don’t a rule.
George And she was like, I don’t have a rule about that.
Jon Okay. Cool. We it?
George So I guess I can’t yell at you, but if you get impaled, it’s not my fault.
Mo Yeah,
Jon i don’t have a rule
Mo yeah that’s fair.
Jon okay
George So a good solid device under $15. It’s well worth the pickup. If you have this need.
Mo Okay.
Jon yeah
George So Mo, what about you?
Mo So I’m going describe what this is first and then tell you what it is. So imagine a small six inch black plastic and it kind of looks like a flying saucer, you know, shape.
Jon Okay.
Mo OK, and sitting on there’s little hole cut on top, but sitting on top of it is a little plastic frog.
Jon All
Mo OK, frog, like a little colorful frog, like, you know, the amphibian.
George A plastic what? Frog.
Jon right. Ribbit, ribbit, frog. Okay.
George Ribbit, ribbit. Okay.
Mo OK, so it’s kind of cool. You look at it and if you reach to try to grab the frog, it turns out that it’s an optical illusion. The frog’s actually inside the thing and the way the mirrors are placed, it makes it look like it’s hovering above it. And it looks just like it’s hanging out there.
Mo ah I saw it on a some YouTube show. We saw something about it and I said, oh, I said, that’d be a fun thing to get for the kids. You know, just something they say to come over have and play with it.
Jon Oh.
Mo And really, you put any small object in it and it will look like that object is floating above it. Like it’s sitting on top of it.
George Huh.
Mo um It surprised me how actually how good it looks like that thing is actually there. Now it’s certain angles. You see, it just totally destroys the illusion. It goes away, but from the most you know common viewing point, you look at it, it just looks like it’s sitting there and you actually can try it.
Mo Every time I’ve shown to somebody, the first thing everyone does is try to grab it. And they like the fingers go right through it.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo Cause not really there.
Jon Naturally. Yeah.
Mo um You can only, this is a very small one. um It’s super It’s like 10 bucks or 14 bucks, something like that. Um,
Jon This was purely a toy, a novelty.
Mo It’s totally a toy. It’s totally a novelty.
Jon Okay.
Mo It has zero purpose in the world.
Jon Nothing wrong with that. no not I’m not judging. no
Mo Yeah, it zero purpose in anything except to like distract people for a few minutes.
Jon I’m a toy dork. That’s fine. Yeah.
Mo um One, though, just the way it works, I guess, iss because there’s a concave mirror inside and somehow the angled way it’s angled or arched, it just reflects it perfectly so it looks like it’s above…
Mo the actual piece of plastic that it’s sitting on. It’s actually where it’s actually inside of it. You can do with any small item. It comes with the little plastic colorful frog there with it. So you can put, you have something you could put in it right away, but I put like a coin in it and it looks like the coin is sitting on top of it.
Mo I mean, it’s really, long as something small, I saw that you actually have like bigger ones, but I’m like, you know, I’m not going to spend like 40 bucks on a toy on a distraction, but you know, 10.
Jon I put my car in there.
Mo Yeah, exactly. So, you know, for 14 bucks, i was like, okay, that’s pretty cool.
Jon good
Jon So with all the mirrors, does like, you have to mount it upside down? So otherwise it flips it upside down on in reality or. Huh?
Mo No, it just it’s just the the two kind of flying saucer shells, they come apart. You just put the object in it, put the top back on it, you’re done. That’s it.
Jon Huh? I was wondering if maybe like you had to like stick it to the top because you know, mirrors would reverse things and make them look upside down if you, but I guess it’s, it’s double flipping somehow.
Mo Yeah. Nope. It looks, yeah, how the physics behind it.
Jon Huh?
Mo I actually looked online to see the physics behind it and it made my head hurt. I just stopped.
Jon Yeah.
Mo I was like, this is just too complicated because it’s like refraction, blah, blah, blah. And the way it’s art, you know, push positions the thing exactly right here on top of it because of the size and all that stuff. um If again, it’s, it’s a cute little toy, zero purpose in the world, but yeah,
Jon Mm-hmm. That’s all right.
Mo It’s neat, you know, and like I said, it’s, you know, hopefully I’ll show it to the grandkids and they’ll they’ll be curious enough to start looking it up and trying to figure out how it works. But yeah, any small thing, just stick it inside and it just looks like it’s just like sitting on top of it somehow.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo It’s, and we, and you work around it.
Jon See? It’s
Mo It looks like it’s sitting there. i mean it looks like a three fully 3d picture of it. So it’s pretty cool.
George Wow. Yeah.
Jon What did you say? So this is like a yeah trying to make a gateway drug into science and physics for your grandkids here.
Mo That’s what hoping.
Jon Kind of sneak them.
Mo It probably won’t work, but it’s worth shot.
George yeah
Jon but but It’s worth a valiant effort, at least.
Mo Exactly. For $14, maybe they’ll get the stem.
Jon Sure.
Mo We’ll see.
George All right, guys, time to talk about games. Now, I know John hasn’t had anything in a little bit, but I moved his game to the very end of the segment because I think it’s probably going to be the one that’s most noteworthy.
George Mine is a very short thing.
Jon okay.
George It’s just a demo right now. It hasn’t been released, but John and I, well, I found this at PRGE this year. And that’s the wonderful thing about going to some of these conventions, especially retro gaming conventions, because you get exposed to things that you normally wouldn’t find out about because steam, if it doesn’t have a million wishlist, you’re never going to fucking see it.
Jon Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Mo Yeah.
George Um, it’s not like a big triple a title. Although the programmer of this game works at a triple a gaming company, this is his side thing that he’s doing and it’s called keys of fury.
Jon Okay.
Mo Oh, OK. I
George uh, The guy’s company is called Elcorn, E-L-E-C-O-R-N. It is available in a demo right now on Steam, and I want everybody to please go wishlist this game because it’s really fun and addictive.
George Do you guys remember Typing of the Dead?
Mo don’t
Jon Oh, hell yeah.
George Back in the ninety s early Yes, exactly.
Jon I played the heck out of that.
Mo remember that one.
Jon Mm-hmm. its Yeah, it’s it’s the house of the dead, but with your keyboard. And the zombies have words on them, right? Over their heads or something.
George yes
Mo Oh, you had to type out the words or letters that’s on them.
Jon Yeah.
George exactly
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo back I can’t think.
Jon Right.
George Exactly.
Mo Got it. OK.
George Well, imagine if you had that style of game, but for Streets of Rage.
Jon Yep.
Mo Oh.
Jon Oh, like a retro beat-em-up.
George Exactly.
Mo Huh.
Jon Okay.
George That’s what Keys of Fury is.
Jon Mm-hmm.
George ah The graphics are totally bit mapped, 90s, 80s vibe feeling. ah
Mo OK.
George The words are all randomly generated, but… They’re also kind of in context of the beat-em-up genre, which is fun. um When you’re typing, you don’t need to worry about speed in this game.
George Accuracy is far more important when you’re playing.
Mo Okay. Okay. okay
George And you get to play through like three stages, and then you get to do a boss fight. That’s the whole demo. Um, it’s just fun.
George I sat and played this game at this gentleman’s booth, um, probably two or three times to the point where people had to ask me to stand up so they could try it.
Jon Sir? Sir? ah sir
George It’s yeah, it’s very interesting.
Jon sir
Mo Give the kids a chance.
George There are no mouse controls. There are no joystick controls at all. It’s purely 100% keyboard. Even to the point of when you’re starting the game, you have to type in the word menu to go to the menu or the word exit to leave something.
Jon Fully committed.
George Um,
Jon i like that.
George Yeah, it’s fully committed. It’s a brilliantly designed game that kind of brings back that typing of the dead feel. oh And it’s just fun.
Mo ah he Describe the gameplay exactly. How’s that work? Like.
George Sure. So characters like you’re in the middle of the screen and bad guys come up on your left or your right.
Mo Mm hmm.
George There are words on the left or the right of the screen. And as you type the letters of the words, the then you start punching the bad guy.
Mo OK.
George Now, if you don’t type the word correctly or in theory fast enough, I know I said speed is secondary and it is, then they get punches on you and you lose lives and whatnot.
Mo Oh, okay, okay.
George But if you type the word accurately and fast enough, you’re just blitzing them, right? Like I think my accuracy on one run was like 98% because I mistyped a couple of keys.
Mo Wow.
George um It’s not a very difficult game. It’s a very easy game to pick up. But just like Typing the Dead, its goal is also a little bit to teach you how to touch type, which is a skill that’s kind of lost a lot, you know, since the days of typewriters.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo Right.
Jon Yeah.
Mo Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
George The way that this one makes you want to learn to touch type is the same way Typing of the Dead did. You want to see what’s happening on screen rather than looking at your keyboard.
Mo Look at your finger. ah Right.
Jon Mm-hmm.
George um There are a couple of instances also where some bad guys throw objects at you and you have to type just single letters to dissuade those objects. And in the boss battle, not only do you have to type words or phrases to hit him, but then when he’s going to hit you, these words spin around him in a circle, and you have to type those words to make him miss hitting you.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Jon Interesting.
Mo Okay.
George So…
Mo Okay.
George very fun game. It’s well worth it. Like I said, it’s on steam. Please go wishlist this game because it deserves attention. It’s a great fun game. Elkorn is the name of the publishing company.
George He’s got a website. If you want to go to look at it, he’s got a couple of other games listed there as well that I haven’t tried out, but keys of fury is well worth your time.
Mo All right.
Jon Mm-hmm.
George I can’t wait till he releases it. We’re going to try and do a live stream with him and have him on the live stream.
Mo Sweet. Nice.
George So yeah, it looks really fun. Now,
Mo nice
George Mo, what about yours? Yours looks like it’s less of an indie game and a little bit maybe more AAA side.
Mo Yeah. So um you remember, you know, last time I was, what am i looking forward to was Bloodlines 2, the vampire game. So I got it, played it, and I’m not going to talk about it because it’s meh.
George Right.
Mo So I want to talk about instead is a different game.
Jon oh
George Oh!
Jon Take that, Bloodlines 2. Hmm.
Mo Yeah, it was a different game that was way cheaper that just came out called Dispatch. And George, you definitely 100% want to look at this game. 100%.
George Okay, going to type it in now.
Mo um it’s a it’s it’s one of these like it’s many different games in one game you know so the cut scenes are fully drawn out animation looks like you know because okay so the premise is that you’re super an ex superhero like you’re one of these guys that had a super suit and the suit gets destroyed you can’t build it yeah and so
George I know this game. I saw this game and was ah thinking about including it in bit by bit.
Jon Oh.
Mo Oh, okay. And so what happens is that you now work as a private company that basically offers private security, and all the security people are superheroes or have powers.
George Mm-hmm.
Mo And you’re the dispatcher.
Jon Hmm.
Mo So you see what the emergency is. You try to match the right hero with that particular kind of Incident, you know bank robbery, cat stuck up a tree, you know, someone playing music too loud.
Mo Yeah, but you that’s but that’s the company’s job. They so you send out the right people. um Everybody has like characteristics, each of your heroes, and it tries to match up your characteristics versus what it is you’re trying to solve. So if it requires more brains or strength or whatever, you know, but that’s only part that’s like I’ll call it like that’s the main game.
Mo But around it, though, is just like the cut scenes are amazing because all the cut scenes are interactive. So they’ll do a whole thing with a total and then you’ll get a choice of what response you want to give.
Mo And it just naturally flows like the video doesn’t even stop. It just flows or what you what you picked, you know, so it’ll be snarky.
Jon Hmm.
Mo Also, it comes into snarky and attitudes of people around you change based on how you react to them.
Jon Hmm.
Mo um So it kind of reminds me little bit of the ah like the Walking Dead games, that kind of thing, except it’s a little more fluid and the the animation is freaking amazing on these things.
Mo um Like said, I’ve never paid as much attention to cut scenes as I have in this game. you And that there is a setting where you turn off all the interaction and just watch the cutscenes as they play out.
Mo you You could totally do that. But that’s not like, what’s the fun is that? I’d rather decide that he’s going to and just have him give smartass answers.
Jon Is it like telling a story as you go through?
Mo Yeah, and there’s a story.
Jon Is like an evolving story?
Mo And you’re you’re the main guy.
Jon Like, okay.
Mo You’re this guy who…
Jon Yeah.
Mo loses his suit. And basically the company says, okay, if you, because you have experience and knowledge, you become, and you’re basically the people who are on your team are all ex villains.
Mo We’re trying to become heroes.
Jon Huh. Well, that’s a neat swerve. Okay.
Mo So they’re all like just got a prison or just got out jail or this is in lieu of jail time and they’re trying to become heroes now.
Jon Okay.
Mo And so the and they call the company, the carrot is they say, if you work for us and help us and get this team going, we’ll repair your suit for you.
Jon Okay.
Mo And that’s like that’s the thing.
Jon So he could be a superhero again. Yeah.
George Yeah, i I saw this game probably in a press release a few months ago and was very interested in it.
Mo Mm-hmm.
George You’re right. This is a game that’s something that I would definitely be into. There’s only one downside that I’ll say that looking at their Steam page now that I hadn’t seen back then before release, ah they’ve got the game that you can buy for right now.
Mo Mm-hmm.
George It’s 10% off 27 bucks. That’s not an unreasonable price for a good solid game.
Mo no
Jon Mm-hmm.
George But then they already have a deluxe edition.
Jon Huh.
George yeah I traditionally think of new games as needing time to soak in their own juices a little bit before you’re going to come out with some deluxe edition later on that adds something to the game.
Mo he
George Now, this deluxe edition is $36, so it’s $9 more than the regular edition.
Mo The base game, yeah.
George I’m not saying it’s not worth it, but why would you do it? Why not just release the game in a solid form, then wait a while to see if people buy it, want to do enhancement? I’m not sure I’m fond of this strategy.
Mo I’m trying to figure if I actually bought the deluxe one because i played the demo and really enjoyed this game. So I’m not sure if I man just bought it. um It’s definitely set up like in episodes. that are going to come out over time.
Mo And I think if you get the deluxe one, you get them all now.
George Right.
Mo You don’t have to wait. I think that’s the difference. If you’re impatient, you just get them all now rather than wait for them come out week over week.
George Huh.
Jon You know, I… I’m kind of like, initially when you said deluxe edition, I’m thinking, oh, it’s probably includes the soundtrack or something, you know, in which case, like I’m okay if you’re getting more for your money, right?
George That’s another one. Yeah.
Jon You’re getting something or you’re getting an art pack or getting something, but, but oh really?
Mo Oh, she they had that. So you do get that, too.
Jon So, but right when it releases, that feels like you held something back from the released game for enhanced revenue.
Mo Yeah.
George Yeah.
Jon It’s one thing to added content later. so I mean, it doesn’t me furious, but it feels kind of like, eh, kind of sketchy.
Mo yeah
Jon Yeah.
Mo Yeah. I mean, I played it
George By the way, Mo, you do own the digital deluxe edition.
Mo OK, that’s what I bought.
George It tells me in Steam.
Mo I paid the 35 bucks.
Jon What you have?
Mo So but let me tell you, it’s I mean, it’s when it’s just a well done game.
Jon Yeah.
Mo um You just look at like and when I say cut scenes, they’re like a good, you know, few minutes long. And it’s like you’re watching an animated superhero thing.
Jon Yeah.
Mo I mean, they’re they’re done really, really well.
Jon Huh. Cool.
Mo So again, ah there’s a demo out. So I say go ahead and grab the demo, play that, see how you like it, because that’s basically pretty much the game. ah But yeah, it’s and I mean, and there’s even other like sub games in it where you kind of like the ones where you have to break into computers and you’re like having to do certain keystrokes like it was just separate from everything else, too.
Jon Yeah.
Mo So it’s like a whole bunch of little tiny games kind of build.
Jon Like little mini games. Yeah.
Mo Yeah, built into it.
Jon Yeah.
Mo So definitely, I think worth getting.
Jon Yeah.
Mo Like I said, I’m enjoying playing it and definitely to look at it.
Jon What’s it called again? God.
Mo It’s called Dispatch.
Jon Dispatch. Dispatch. Okay.
Mo Because you’re a dispatcher. So dispatch.
Jon Oh, dispatching the heroes. Got it.
Mo Yeah.
Jon Okay.
Mo And it’s even funny because you go when you go in the office, it’s like a cube farm.
Jon Got it.
Mo But you see like this giant, huge, like nine foot person trying to type the keyboard.
George Yeah.
Mo He’s like using his fingers and trying to type because he doesn’t even fit the chairs. And there’s a guy walking around. It looks like a bat. I mean, it’s just weird, but it’s it’s very fun and definitely has a lot of humor tied to it as well.
Jon Okay. All
Mo So dispatch. um That’s what I got. So, OK, so we saved you for last, John.
Jon right. Cool.
Mo George did a lot of build up here, so I’m assuming this is amazing.
Jon I hope it pans out. Yeah. So, you know, I do a series on our YouTube channel every week called Friday Plays, where I take one vintage game and kind of walk through how do you play it?
Mo Thank
Jon What you know what do you need to know about it What are the nuances and the game options that I do? I could try to play it and see how it goes. And around the Halloween time, I look for spooky games. Like last year, I did Haunted House. I did Ghost Manor and some other Dracula game. And so this year I’m getting…
Jon I had hesitated looking at this game called Frankenstein’s Monster for a couple of years on Friday Plays because i was always of the opinion that it was a poor game.
Mo Why? Oh.
Jon and I have no good reason for that other than it’s very expensive. So like a cart alone is like $50 if you can find it.
Mo oh
Jon A complete set is like $230. It was print printed by Data Age in 1983. I’d always thought of Data Age as kind of a subpar developer. They did fewer than a dozen games and often crazy games.
Jon crazy Games get really expensive for no good reason, not because they’re good game. So I figured, oh, it just got expensive because it was a limited run and it says Frankenstein on it and that’s it. But I decided to try out this game and, oh my gosh, this game should be played.
Jon right ah if If you’re going go back and play Pac-Man and Yard’s Revenge and stuff, Frankenstein’s Monster is not just a Halloween game. I was stunned by how good this game is on the Atari 2600.
Jon So, look, anybody can go play it right now in emulations. Let me tell you why it’s good and why you should go try it. And not just because this episode is coming out around Halloween. but but The premise is not you’re trying to build a monster.
Jon The premise is not you’re you are the monster. You are visiting Frankenstein’s castle and you need to stop the monster from coming to life and escaping the castle to go and wreak havoc.
Mo Oh. Mm-hmm.
Jon So in the midst of that, you play a little platformer game reminiscent of vaguely pitfall-ish, vaguely… any number of platform kind of games that you have a little guy that has to roam around dodging enemies, you know, bats and ah spiders and whatever that’s in your way to collect these stones and then bring them back to build a wall before Frankenstein.
Jon There’s lightning flashing throughout the game, slowly charging him up. You have like eight minutes to finish the game and you almost can’t earn points. Yeah. You get a point every time you bring a stone, but everything that touches you doesn’t kill you. It diminishes your points.
Jon So and it’s a game you can finish if you can complete it before Frankenstein comes to life and smashes through the wall.
George Oh.
Jon By the way, full screen animation on the 2600 of a giant Frankenstein smashing through your screen. Pretty cool.
Jon So the challenge becomes getting really good at the platforming and the bat dodging levels of the screen because you’re only going to get points for like six times in the game. Each time you bring a stone, the rest is diminishing returns.
Jon Lose 20 points, lose 10 points, lose 20 points, lose 10. And it’s a startlingly good game. I could not. And normally I don’t say, oh, here’s what I did on Friday plays here on this because it’s just some other Atari game we all know.
Jon But I would hazard to say that a lot of people like me, because it’s rare and expensive, they don’t have it most likely.
Mo Mm-hmm.
Jon And like me, if they were aware of the history of Data Age, you’re like, oh, those guys make subpar games. Don’t try it. No, not this one. Frankenstein’s monster. You got to give it a try.
Jon Maybe seek out a cartridge. I don’t think you got to do that, but it’s definitely worth playing. I’ll give you a link mode to my Friday plays that I did on it so you can learn how to play. don’t have to look up the manual. Just watch me teach you how to play it.
Jon And then I encourage people often to watch the Friday plays, see how well you can do a good or discord server where they’ve set up a ah whole thread on beating my high score on Friday plays. This one won’t be tough, but you’re going to have fun with it.
Jon So you have an emulator running, you got it. You probably already have this game. You just ignored it. Frankenstein’s monster, 1983 from day to age and very timely being spooky season.
Mo All right.
Jon So check it out.
Jon We are coming into the last segment of episode 200, believe it or not, of the Gen X Rona podcast.
Mo she
Jon As we always get to this part of the show, you know, we like to take a second to talk about the things we’re either looking at now or looking forward to between now and the next time we get together. And i’ll I’ll get it kicked off this time. There are some pretty cool things coming up that I did. They snuck up on me. I heard about them and they’re like boom, they’re here.
Jon um October 26th on HBO max is the new mini series. It welcome to dairy based on the Stephen King thing.
Mo Oh, yeah.
George Yep.
Jon ah And they brought back the same actor who’s playing Pennywise. So we have that. And it’s, I think it’s backstory. It’s a history. Welcome to dairy. goes back to the beginning of maybe it jumps around. i don’t know, but that, that whole mythos is very interesting. And so I’m definitely going to check it out. Coming to HBO max.
Jon There’s another stare. There’s another series ah coming November 7th to Apple TV called Pluribus. don’t know if you’ve heard of this or not, but it stars.
Mo Mm
Jon So it’s it’s by the guy who did Breaking Bad.
Mo hmm. OK, Gilligan.
Jon So so the creator of Breaking Bad. What’s that?
Mo Something Gilligan or whatever is.
Jon Vince Gilligan. Thank you.
Mo That’s it.
Jon i couldn’t think of his name. Vince Gilligan. It’s also stars Rhea Sehorne, who you might remember as the female lead and better call Saul. She was Kim, Kim Wexler.
Mo OK, OK, yeah.
Jon She was the, you know, anyway, the premise of this series though, that’s all that other stuff irrelevant. There’s some kind of a global virus that spreads, that makes everyone satisfied and happy and not in desire of anything, but she’s immune.
Jon And so She’s miserable because everyone else is happy and everyone else is not ambitious. Like they’re not taking care of things, right? So this, this virus around the world has led them to not take care of business as you need to.
Jon And she is the only one immune and somehow has to get them, so get the snap them out of it to deal with, the real world because you’re oh, everything’s fine. Everything’s cool. And it’s clearly not.
Jon So she’s kind of this one woman against the world to try to convince them that everything is not okay. So she has to be the buzzkill, but people who are artificially influenced to think everything is fine.
Jon Weird concept and premise, something I think Vince Gilligan could do interestingly.
Mo That’s interesting.
Jon So i want to see what he does with it.
Mo Mm hmm.
Jon So, The thing I’m most looking forward to, the release, the Digital Eclipse bundle, Mortal Kombat, the legacy collection. It’s collection with a K, as you might have imagined.
Mo Oh, God.
Jon Collection. October 30th, being published by Atari, put out by Digital Eclipse. It’s not only a collection of dozens of Mortal Kombat games over the years. It’s also that documentary thing that Digital Eclipse does so well.
Jon We talked to the Ed Boones of the world. We talked to the actors who portrayed these people in mocap. It’s a documentary series of gaming. And if you ever enjoyed Mortal Kombat but were crappy at it, George, the great thing about this collection…
Mo And me.
George wow
Jon is that
Mo I’m with you, George. Don’t feel bad. Hmm.
Jon is that they’ve baked in right on screen tutorials for every move, every fatality, every strategy, every combo. so if you want to learn how to do it, you don’t know how to look it up in a book or online. It’s right there on the screen to help you learn all the cool features of these different characters. I love this franchise, this collection, the history of it seems really cool. So October 30th, Legacy Collection.
Jon That’s what I got. ah George, what about you? I know you suck at Mortal Kombat. What do you got coming up on the horizon?
George Well, just for that, I’ll look forward to Mortal Kombat Legacy Collection as well, I guess.
Jon but okay You might as well.
George um
George I’m also ah looking forward to St. Dennis Medical Season 2 premieres November 3rd over on NBC.
Mo Oh, that was a good show.
Jon Oh, awesome.
Mo I enjoyed that show.
George So happy that that’s coming back.
Jon That’s a great show.
George i’m Very fun, office-style workplace comedy ah show that just has some great people in it.
Jon Mm hmm. Mm
Mo Mm-hmm.
Jon hmm. Mm
George Um, and it’s, it’s just been a tremendous show. My wife loves it. It’s very fun.
Jon hmm.
George It’s one of those shows that life or work or the world might’ve gotten you down, but you can watch an episode of this thing and just feel uplifted and happy and fun.
Jon Agreed.
George Uh, but the thing I think I’m looking forward to the most will have already released by the time you guys hear this episode, but it’s coming out today that we’re recording it.
Jon Yep. Yep.
George And that’s Chainsaw Man, the movie Reze Arc. And goddammit, they got a popcorn bucket, so I’m going back in the hole again, I guess, on this thing.
Mo Always.
Jon but
George They got two, one that’s only in Japan, which is the cooler one, in my opinion, and one that’s here in America at AMC and Cinemark Theaters.
Mo always
George um But yeah, October 24th is when this movie releases. Because it’s a Japanese anime, I do not expect it to last very long in the theater, so if you are a fan
Jon Mm. yeah.
George As soon as you hear this episode, you might need to go get tickets because if it lasts more a couple of weeks in theaters, I’d be a little bit surprised. um But it was a very fun animated series that my son found for he and I to watch.
George It’s very tongue in cheek. There’s a whole lot of sexual innuendo jokes in the anime. And what’s better than an anime where a guy changes into a character whose head becomes a chainsaw?
Mo Yeah, yeah howckey how can you beat that?
George That’s just freaking awesome. Yeah, I don’t think you can.
Jon That’s peak media.
George mo
Jon Oh, yeah.
George Yeah, exactly.
Jon Okay.
George Why don’t you try and top it though, Mo? What are you going to be looking forward to?
Mo know if I can. um So one thing is Disney’s come out with another season of Star Wars Visions, which is a bunch of like video animated shorts that they do based on the world of Star Wars, which are really because they’re like side stories, but they’re very cool.
George Oh, yeah.
Jon oh yeah okay
Mo I saw another show coming on AMC called Talamasca, The Secret Order, which I… believe I’m totally guessing here that it’s based on Anne Rice’s you know the vampire books that she wrote because there was a group in it called the Talmaska that was like that knew of the vampires and was like basically their job was like to control them or keep them from getting out of hand and other supernatural groups as well so that’s Talmaska so it could be terrible could be good don’t we’ll see um but really most looking forward to um
George Oh.
George Ah. ah
Jon but remember to Remember to plug in these dates and where you people can watch because you kind of, mentioned those.
Mo Oh, well, what I said was Disney, but yeah, Disney Visions is coming out um October 29th.
Jon You did say Disney.
Mo So any day now.
Jon Okay.
Mo Tala Masca Secret Order is going be on AMC, and that’s coming out ah the 26th of October. So when you hear this, it’ll already be out.
Jon Already out.
Mo And then on November 7th, what I’m really looking forward to is Predator Badlands, the movie.
Jon Oh, mm-hmm.
George Oh, yeah.
Jon Interesting.
Mo um I really liked the Prey movie that they did.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo I thought that was a really that was a really good movie.
George Yeah, that wasn’t bad. Yeah.
Mo I enjoyed it. It looks like this is like, again, it’s like side stories because it kind of adds more to the world and you know rather than necessarily being like a um like a ah plot thread, so to speak. right
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo And from what I’ve seen, I don’t know 100%, but just what I’ve read about it, it seems like you know young predators get dropped on the most dangerous planet to prove themselves.
Jon Yep. That’s what it looks like.
Mo And that’s basically the premise.
Jon Yeah.
Mo And it looks really cool. I mean, just it just looks awesome. So kind of looking forward to kind of getting more into that world. And again, just seeing how, but um just really seeing how well they flush it out.
George I kind of feel like they’ve taken that from a couple of Star Trek episodes from back in the day.
Jon And isn’t there…
Jon Like arena?
George There was one Star Trek episode where they got dropped on a planet and they had to survive, and then another one, Tosk. Can you remember that, John, from DS9?
Jon Yep. Yep.
George Feels very similar.
Mo No, yeah.
Jon Yep. and Apparently the the Predator and alien worlds are well fused now because in in this movie, isn’t like ah there’s a Weyland-Yutani robot that’s part of the the show, right?
Mo Yeah.
Mo Yeah, there is.
Jon Like, well, I guess it’s no longer, are they connected? Like they’re permanently fused, it seems now.
Mo They are definitely connected now.
Jon Yeah.
Mo Yeah.
George Hmm.
Jon Yeah. I want see that too. That’s good.
Jon Now, before we wrap up the show, you know, I always like to take a second to thank one of our patrons or maybe a new patron or whatever we have new.
Mo she says
Jon Before I do that, one of the benefits of being a patron, I know, Mo, is you check through the comments and look for questions that people asked for us to answer here on the show.
Mo Yes.
Jon And I see you have one for us this time around.
Mo Oh, yeah. This time is from Joe H. And his question I purposely pulled out just because is our 200th episode. um And they asked, like, what are some of our favorite backtrack episodes that we’ve done?
Mo Simple question. I don’t want us to go too far down the rabbit hole here, but if you guys want just throw out like a couple, like, John, don’t you start off like, but what’s a couple was that we did that you really enjoyed? Mm
Jon you know, I always tell people about the Dewey Decimal System, of course, just because it’s so kind of ridiculous and fun.
Mo hmm.
Jon ah Any, you know any musical backtrack where, you know, we we hear the songs in the context of, I really, those are really hard to edit. They’re extra work, but I think they sound so good and people really enjoy those a lot. So those are the ones that jump out at me. And and there There were a couple that we recorded at a convention.
Jon The ones we do at conventions live, those are always entertaining for me because they’re they sound different. It’s a different soundscape and people hear what’s going on in the show and the kind of real time.
Mo is
Jon And somebody will walk up and talk to us. MC Mer will pop in. So I like those little deviations from the norm episodes too. I think those are really cool.
Mo awesome how about you George
George ah Well, I know some of the backtracks I like the least. Like, I really ah didn’t like the Monday Night Wars wrestling one because I talked way too goddamn long in that episode.
Mo I enjoy that I just had to sit back it was awesome yeah
George We had to split it into two. Oh, man. um
Jon It’s educational.
Mo yeah
George It was, yeah, for me as well. Shut the hell up, George.
Jon ah
George That’s what I learned. um I guess my favorites are the ones that we do voting on. I really enjoy those because I like the process, as everybody knows, of setting up the spreadsheet and the voting rules and all of that.
Jon Those are fun.
Mo Okay.
Jon Mm-hmm.
George But I think those are fun because we really tend to argue and fight for the things we believe in in those episodes, especially like think of the movie soundtrack episode.
Mo she says
Jon Mm-hmm.
George And then no matter what we came up with in our list, our listeners give us something completely different. Like, Oh, well you didn’t talk about this.
Jon Yeah,
George You didn’t talk about that.
Mo Yeah.
George And it opens you up to a whole bunch of different possibilities. So I really enjoyed the voting ones. And then of course, I think my favorites that we haven’t done in a long time are the debate episodes. um
Jon unless we did was bad guys.
Mo Yeah, sure.
George Those, those are a blast.
Mo We’re doing a good debate, aren’t we?
Jon We did a bad guy one not long ago.
George Yeah.
Jon Yeah.
George I just really ah ah really enjoy the the structure of debate and ah the fun that we have with them. We’ve had a couple of guest people on to help us judge those a few times.
Mo this
George That’s been a lot of fun for me.
Jon about you, Moe?
Mo Oh, cool. Yeah. So mine are really, I guess, more of the true nostalgia ones I really enjoy. Like we did one playing outside. I really enjoyed that one. i enjoyed um summer are car trips.
Jon Yeah.
Mo You know, um and maybe because it just takes those episodes in particular just really take me back to those times.
Jon Uh-huh.
Mo um
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo And it’s just funny how we kind of grew up very differently, but we had the same, a lot of the same experience, you know, and that we can still share.
Jon Sure. Yeah.
Mo You know, like I said, everyone talks about the long car ride or sideshows or, you know, roadside attractions or things like that.
Jon Mm-hmm.
Mo So it’s that and due decimal.
Jon Yeah.
Mo But besides that, yeah. um Those are ones I really enjoy. So yeah. So Joe, thanks so much for that question.
Jon Yeah.
Mo ah Great question, especially here in our 200th episode.
Jon yeah
Mo So again, if anyone out there wants to get their question asked on the show, it’s super easy.
Jon yeah
Mo Just go to genxgrownup.com slash Patreon.
Jon yeah know
Mo Little as a dollar a month and your question will be asked right here on the show.
Jon Yeah. Speaking of which, we have a brand new patron that did exactly what Mo just suggested. I want to welcome Ben Stein. Not that one. not
Mo I was like, whoa, we’re moving it up.
George yeah
Jon You know, I normally I just would say Ben S, but it just so ah struck me like, wow, Ben Stein signed up. I don’t think it’s that Ben Stein, so clearly. But Ben, thank you for becoming a supporter over on Patreon.
Jon We appreciate that you did. ah Again, just head over to patreon.com slash Gen X Grownup. Opened up his heart and his wallet and said, we like what you do. We want to support you doing it. um You joined a roster of amazing people. So Ben, thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much on behalf of all of us.
Jon All right. That then is going to wrap it up for episode 200, the Gen X Grown Up podcast. Don’t worry, though. be back in two weeks with another one. And next week, of course, is our backtrack. That’s where we pick a single nostalgic topic and dig in deep.
Jon ah Mo, why don’t do the honors and let the fourth listener know what’s coming their way next week.
Mo Oh, sure. ah I mean, before shows like Black Mirror, there was amazing stories. ah Back in 1985, Spielberg, of all people, ah it decided to bring an anthology, weird, funny.
Jon Hmm.
Mo It’s even hard to put into a category what type of show this was, but it was a great show, and we’re going to be talking about it in next episode.
Jon That’s right. Yeah. You don’t want to miss that one. We hope you will join us until then. I am John George. Thank you so much for being here.
George Yes, sir.
Jon Mo, you know, appreciate you.
Mo Always fun, man.
Jon Fourth listener. It’s you. We all three appreciate most of all, though. We cannot wait to talk to you again next time. Bye-bye.
George See you guys.
Mo Take care, everybody.
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About The Author

Mo As someone who barely manages to squeeze in as a GenXer my memories include more of the 70's than those younger GenXers. Reading and movies are my passions with some video gaming thrown in there for good measure!

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