Team America: World Police

The year is 2004. Alright team, that's it. We've got a job to do. Let's go police the world! The movie Team America World Police. Hello everyone and welcome to Unspooled. Yes, welcome to Unspooled. This is a podcast about good movies, critical hits, fan favorites, must-sees, and in case you missed them. We have covered the AFI Top 100 and now we are checking out movies from three major lists. The Letterbox Top 250 films with the most fans, the IMDb Top 250, and the New York Times 1000 Essential Films. And Amy, we will also, as always, be chasing our own curiosity. That's right, wherever we want to go, we will go because we're rebels, we're renegades. I'm Paul Scheer. I'm an actor, a writer, a director, and I once worked with a puppet cat and it was a nightmare. Did you really? What kind of a cat? It was for a TV show called Meow TV and I mean it was just a generic tabby. Oh, just some cat? Is that a kind? It is, it is, it is. When my boyfriend and I are jerks, we call them some cats. But we also are aware that we're being total jerks. This is just because we're assholes with Maine Coons. We have Maine Coons, we lured our Maine Coons over, but that's totally unfair. The first cat I ever fell in love with was a little calico. Oh, look at that. Well, I'm going to tell you this puppet cat was a real pan in the ass. I believe it. I mean, four legs. That's even harder than two legs. I want to apologize again to all cats out there. I am the baddie. I am the team Maine Coon world jerk about cats. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I love all cats. I love every single cat. I go on walks and say hi to all the cats. Wow, are cats out on walks? Yeah, there's a couple cats on my Sunday walk that always specifically come out to say hi to me, including this little one with a Hitler mustache. Wow, this is opening up so many questions now. I do want to just drill down. Are the cats also on walks or are you walking in cats approaching via windows? Or I don't even know. Are there outdoor cats like in yards? Yeah, yeah, yeah. A lot of outdoor cats in Atwater just chillin'. And there is one cat who does seem to be on a walk. That's the one with the mustache. He's doing his own thing. The others come out and say hi. He crosses the street every time and is like, what's up? And then he keeps walking. It's really impressive. Anyways, hello. Hi, I'm Amy Nicholson. I'm the film critic for the Los Angeles Times. I was thinking the first time that I saw Team America, I was at a hostel in Romania, watching it with a bunch of people from around the world who are all laughing hysterically. I'll now hand you over to my best man, Eddie. Wow, wow, wow. Second time's a charm, eh, Billy Boy? Oh, God. Substitution cuts the appality power. Embarrassing Eddie makes way for sensible Samuel. Cool, that was close. You might not always pick the right starter, but your sub can still deliver. Because with Paddy's Super Sub, your bet rolls over to the player coming on. Paddy Power. You know, this is one of those movies that I think is referenced so much, but I don't think I saw it more than once. And that may be just a me thing, but I feel like the South Park guys have this ability to create these cultural moments. Like, people will be talking about Book of Mormon forever. As a matter of fact, I think just last week, there was like a Book of Mormon night on Broadway, like a, just a celebration of the music, even though it's still, I believe, on Broadway, but they brought back a lot of the original cast. This movie, I think, is held in such high regard for the technical achievement of it. Like, they have created so many cultural moments besides South Park, and yet that still is going on. I'm kind of blown away by them when I think of what they have accomplished and how quietly they've done it. Yeah, I mean, quietly for a show that just seemed like it immediately got headlines when it showed up, and yet has just persisted, and their career has taken them to so many different corners, so many different types of mediums, so many types of acting. And I was watching this movie for the first time since 2004 and thinking, you know what? I always imagine Trey Parker and Matt Sonas, these like topical guys, you know, that like, oh, South Park, they're making an episode that has to do this week with what happened last week. We're on top of every single thing. One month before the presidential election of 2004, they make puppets of the presidential candidates, George Bush and John Kerry, and then decide to take them out. And I think that was such a smart move because honestly, this movie felt timeless. I know, and rewatching it, I think that's one of the best parts about it because it's really more of like an ethos. I think it captures something that is so American without labeling it in any way without picking sides. I mean, in many respects, I could see a lot of people who are incredibly right-wing loving this and the same four people that are more liberal. Like it kind of hits both sides perfectly and there's a lot of debate about, well, did it cross the line? We'll get into all that, but let's just kind of give you the context. The year is 2004. It's been three years since the 9-11 attacks in the beginning of America's global war on terror. And over a year since President George W. Bush declared, mission accomplished on a banner with stars and stripes. Wow, such great times. Sure did it. They sure accomplished it. Meanwhile, Trey Parker met Soda South Park. They have been thinking of making an action movie and before September 11th happened, they were planning to call it George W. Bush and the Secret of the Glass Tiger. And it was going to be this Indiana Jones style adventure where George Bush was just going to cruise around and be in a tough guy. You know, and they've got the clout in town to do whatever they want. Trey was just nominated for an Oscar for the song Blame Canada in the movie South Park, Bigger, Longer and Uncut. Great song. By the way, they've written amazing songs and I forgot a lot of the songs in this one, which we will play some clips of very soon. But after the attacks and after the war, that tone of just like, oh, George Bush, bumbling around, having some fun, being a renegade, it doesn't fit anymore. And besides, they are also already doing another sitcom about George Bush that's called That's My Bush. We're going to touch on how that came to be in just a second, but they decide this is just way too much Bush. He's the president in residence. He's kind of in charge. He's got the whole country saying, That's My Bush. Life is hard. That's the price of fame. When you're president, everyone knows your name. Hey, what's that there? It's My Bush. I can't believe he's actually in the White House. That's our man. That's My Bush. Amy, I have forgotten about that show and in my mind, I don't remember if it was good or not. In that clip, it's hard to tell. I just remember it happened and I'm still amazed that got on the air. Well, yeah, this takes me so much to the headspace of being sentient in 2000, because part of the build-up of the suspense of the election of 2000, which now appears incredibly pivotal and changed history dramatically, was that people felt like it didn't really matter who was going to win. Everybody was the same. Didn't matter. I have to write George Bush, Al Gore. The big drama was the South Park guys had committed that they were going to do a sitcom about whoever won the presidency. And so the real fallout of the election was just going to be who was the sitcom going to be about. And for the record, they were planning on it probably being about Gore up until 3 p.m. on Election Day. Wow. I would like to have seen that show. Now, besides the Bush show and the presidential sitcoms, they also are just, I guess, fans of dumb stuff. And that led them to getting an early script for Roland Emmerich's disaster film The Day After Tomorrow. That's the one about global warning. I believe a plane escapes like an iceberg or falls off a cliff. There is some insane imagery in that movie. Anyway, they read this script and they're like, oh my God, wouldn't it be hilarious to shoot this movie with puppets word for word and release it on the same day? Kind of like the Forbidden Dance and Lombada, that kind of classic, same, that kind of classic rivalry. But their lawyers convinced them not to do that. It was a dumb idea. They would get heavily sued. They cannot just steal a script. But the puppet idea comes about for a couple of reasons. One, they think it's going to be easier than working with actors, which they think is too time consuming and annoying. Which, you know, I'm a little offended about that. Oh, if you're offended by that, just wait till you hear what else they do and say about actors in the rest of this episode. And of course, that's also coming from Doing South Park. We're working with cartoons and that people let's them work really fast. And they like this idea of just like banging it out, not worrying about trailers, not worrying about egos. And as Matt makes jokes, our cast will be deliberately made of wood that will only be taking to extreme what is evident in many Hollywood movies right now. Sort of mean, but also the early 2000s was kind of a bad point of them trying to make all of these movie stars happen who had no personality. I also think, and I just want to add my own perspective here, that the beauty of South Park and the beauty of puppets is that you can constantly change and evolve the script. And because they are voicing a lot of the characters, they don't need to call anyone in and deal with any sort of schedules. They actually set the tone for Human Giant when we were doing that on MTV, because they would deliver episodes right as it was airing. Like you could get it in the machine to then broadcast live on the network. It was, they set the precedent and then we started to follow that, which was like we would deliver episodes at like 4 p.m. and they would air at 10 that night. Like it's like that small little window that you can hit. And that kind of ability to think on your feet and get it in in the last minute really is the reason why South Park, I think, always feels of the moment, especially for an animated show, which a lot of the times you don't realize this, but animated shows are like years ahead. Like I remember I was pitching to Netflix, you know, a handful of years ago, and we have an open spot in 2028. I was like, wow, okay, got it. I mean, in speaking of time consuming animation, they're also really, really inspired by this 1965 TV series called Thunderbirds. That was almost all done in basically the same style that you're going to see when you see the movie, just this semi-realistic, very elaborate puppeteering where the puppets don't look like Sesame Street characters, they just look like people. Fairly real proportions, fairly real noses, slightly big eyes, but just because they have to look around and blink. And they actually reach out to Paramount to say, hey, what if we just do our version of Thunderbolts? But then they hear that Thunderbolts is already being made with people, human people, not puppets at all, and it's going to start Bill Paxton and Ben Kingsley. Oh my God, that never got made, did it? Oh, it did, we're going to talk about that too. Oh man, do you remember Thunderbirds? Because that was the cartoon that I had to sit through when I was a kid. Like, it was a boring cartoon, that, and there was like another one with like Johnny Quest. I hated those. They were just like, they were action cartoons. They weren't funny, and I couldn't get my head around it. Like, why do I want to watch puppets do action? Yeah, Thunderbirds is just these kind of puppets flying planes. So basically with the Thunderbirds property out of their hands, they decide to write their own story. It's inspired by all the dumb action movies that they love, hate, including Top Gun, Pearl Harbor, and this 1982 movie, which I also love, called Megaforce, which they both think is horrible and great. Megaforce, an elite compact fighting unit, armed with the most sophisticated weapons ever seen on a movie screen. The mission to preserve freedom and justice, and battle the forces of evil. The good guys always win, even in the 80s. Megaforce. As a Team America world police, it's about an actor named Gary, who was recruited to join a military counterterrorism squad by the squad's leader, Spotswood. The other members are a psychologist named Lisa, an empath named Sarah, a jock named Joe, and a martial arts expert named Chris, who, like Matt and Trey, really hates actors and absolutely hopes that Paul Shear is taking this personally. Trey does most of the voices, by the way. He's also technically the director, and Matt Stone is technically the assistant director, but they're just doing lots of everything. First, they fight a group of terrorists called the Dirkadirkers, then they fight North Korea's Kim Jong-il, and a couple, well, actually a bunch of liberal Hollywood actors, including Sean Penn, Alec Baldwin, Susan Sarandon, and, of course, very famously, Matt Damon, all who have sided with Kim Jong-il that Team America are the actual terrorists. In lots of places around the world get blown up. Paris, Cairo, the Panama Canal, there is a lot of puppet-bombering, there's some hardcore puppet sex, so much puppet sex that they have to submit the film to the MPA, so much sex that they have to submit the film to the MPA nine times to get an R rating instead of an NC 17. And let me just tell you, if you think that was time intensive, that's nothing compared to the movie, because this movie took a very long time to officially get underway. I mean, years. Matt and Trey claim that it got shut down and started back up again at least three times. And they even agreed to waive their millions of dollars in fees to make sure that they had the budget to get it made properly, the way they really felt it had to be done. Now, shockingly, they wound up starting to shoot the film April of 2004, and they released it in theaters just six months later on October 15th. Now, there's something really interesting about that, because in the history of cinema, that is such a small window. I think that Star Trek generations might have this shortest period of time from start of production to theater release. So that's the one feather in its cap there. But this probably is coming in right underneath it. Yeah, six months. I mean, that's usually when a film would have wrapped by then. Maybe they'd still be doing a little sound mixing. It's insane. I mean, it cost $32 million. Not that much. It made 50. But we're really indented in culture, whether the headlines, because it made people very angry, including Sean Penn. And now, Paul, yes, the live action Thunderbirds movie also came out that same year. It came out in July while they were finishing the film. And financially, it did the reverse. It cost $57 million. It made $28 million. I have never seen it. It looks awful. Here's a clip. In the year 2010, billionaire and former astronaut Jeff Tracy took his five sons to an uncharted tropical island, where they built the secret headquarters of International Rescue, an organization dedicated to helping those in need whenever disaster strikes. They have come to be known by the name they gave their incredible machines. Thunderbirds. Alan, my office now. They're so busted. Now, T.O. Miracle Bowl Police is not on any of our lists, but the National Review Online, the very conservative outlet, did name it number 24 in its list of the best conservative movies, which I think is a really interesting place to start talking about this film, because I was astonished. I would have put this very high on the list of the highest screw you to conservative movies. See, that's exactly what I was talking about. I think whatever your political ideology is, you can see the right being dumb or the left being dumb. It just comes to your perspective. I think that's kind of the genius of the film. And I know that that also is a big problem with the film, because a lot of people felt like the point of view was a little bit all over the place. I mean, the fact that Michael Moore is a villain in this movie. Michael Moore is a suicide bomber in this movie who was also covered in mustard. And I don't think the movie really... I don't know if the movie cares to be fair and balanced in its targets. I think it's just them attacking what they want to attack. I don't think it has a lot of political intent behind it as much as it is just like a ball to the wall. We are going to say and do it every one. It feels like how much can we get away with? And yes, it's offensive. And yes, it has things that you could probably label as racist and homophobic. There are a lot of things here. And I think that when we talk about this movie, I want to kind of put the debate on that a little bit on the back burner because I do feel like they're pushing boundaries. It's a different time. And I think it can get really lost in the sauce here a little bit. I think that the way people talk about Blazing Saddle, they're like, oh, you could never make that again. I would argue that this would be maybe the movie that you could never make again more than that. Right? Because I think that this is... Oh, what is naming names? 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I mean, somehow this movie manages to be, I think, both divisive and uniting in that everybody can kind of like how it's divisive towards somebody else. I mean, in a way, they basically made an Eddington. This is an Eddington, right? Or it's like, hey, I see what's happening in this country and why everybody's at each other's throats and why we're acting psychotic. I don't know how to fix it, but can I just say where all of the problems are and they are everywhere? Yeah, and I think it is capturing this moment where Americans are forcing their ideology and their weaponry on anyone who was against them. And this idea of like, who is a terrorist and why they are a terrorist? And this is the beginning of, not the beginning, but it's a moment where actors are speaking out, right? So it is attacking, I think, three different things at once, which is like American interventionism, political activism and action movies, right? It's everything. And I feel like where people are upset about this film is, well, but they're on our side, right? Or at least I would say people who consider themselves maybe liberal or progressive, like, well, why are they attacking that person? And I don't think that they get too caught up with that. The way that you were talking about, they would have made a sitcom about Gore or Bush. It didn't make a difference. They were just going to do this idea. The idea is king. Yeah, it almost feels kind of luxurious to be in that position of saying everyone sucks, kind of luxurious and also lazy and smart. I feel like a zillion different ways about it because, yeah, I want somebody to take a side. I want somebody to, you know, fight for what I personally think is right. But then I'm also aware that I'm saying, cross that line. Sure. Oh, but don't cross that line. That's my special protective line. You do have to be in kind of like a comfortable situation to say, eh, they all suck in whatever happens, happens. But they are fairly accurate in a lot of it. Although, I don't know, I go back and forth on attacking actors for speaking out because they're attacking the actors themselves for speaking out that they think it's like really narcissistic of the actors themselves to say, like, we alone, you know, can help save this. We're really important. What the world needs is an international advisory committee who truly understands global politics, namely us. The time has come for us to start using our acting talents in a different way. Yes, we can use our powers to change the world. We will persuade everyone to drive hybrid cars and stop smoking. If we focus our acting on global politics, we can change everything instead. But on the flip side, what I feel now, you know, two decades later is that it's not as though I feel as though we should be looking for actors to save us, but that the media system is so broken that actors are one of the only people who can say something that will wind up in headlines and we have become too dependent on actors because nobody else is being listened to. I would love it if we were listening to experts and an expert could say something that would make headlines, but it doesn't work out that way. You know, like Billy Eilish makes headlines and it's frustrating. Well, I think, you know, I worked with Jane Fonda when we were doing this. This, I think it was called fire drill Fridays where every Friday for over a month, people were getting arrested on the Capitol steps. And she knew that the best way to get attention to her climate change policies was making sure that every week famous people got arrested. It would be on TMZ, me and young Sheldon. That was the week that I was there. And then the week before, thank you very much, you know, Ted Danson and Martin Sheen. Like, you know, you have to get people where they're at and in many respects. Exactly. And I don't blame the actors for that at all. I blame the media, but yes, I think the actors feel the responsibility to step up and do something if they're the only people who can get attention. I think that they are mocking this idea of actors who maybe don't speak out or are just repeating what they're hearing. I mean, there's there's a nuance to it as well. Right. Like, I guess the point of view is, and this is no offense to this person I'm going to mention, but like, do we care what Liv Tyler says? Do we care what Alec Baldwin says? Like, is Sean Penn more worthy than Alec Baldwin? Like, who knows? I mean, obviously Sean Penn mixed the Academy Awards. He was in the Ukraine. Like, does he need to be in the Ukraine? I don't know. I don't know. And and I agree with what you're saying, too. But I also think, isn't that what South Park does? I mean, South Park is constantly criticizing people in a funny way. They are calling out, you know, hypocrisy in media. They they're the ones who finally pointed the finger at Scientology in a very public way. Like, that was huge. No one was able to do that before they did that. You know, and, you know, they talk about religion. They talk about gun violence. They talk about COVID-19. Actually, in many respects, as they've gotten older, they are part of the F.A.G. I mean, right, because they are the people who are coming hard at Trump. And whether it's just, you know, having Trump in this current season of South Park, showing his like little tiny penis and all that sort of stuff, like they are doing it. They're doing it in a different way. They're not sitting there preaching like how you should think or how you should act. But they are definitely constantly engaging with these topics. And that's always been what South Park has done. Yeah. I mean, that's true. And what do you say I ever do, whether you mean like the fictional thing that they call it here, like the film actors' guild, which they definitely use to be the rudest acronym on the planet. I mean, you could say they do an exaggerated version of what frustrates me sometimes in the media, which is the both sidesism. But they're both sides is so big and funny that at least it doesn't feel kind of profiteous the way that I sometimes think it does when they're like, oh, we're just disappointed and blah, blah, blah. And it feels like they're making up reasons to be mad at one side versus the other in the news. Or to kind of say like, oh, well, my quibble though, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I find that to be really frustrating, at least if it's like large and big and out there, it's something. And also, you're right, we should give them the grace of also many things happening that I think are kind of contributing to this worldview. I mean, for one, the Team America guys, you know, Trey and Matt, they wind up in this media crossfire where everybody's mad at them because in the lead up to this film as they're promoting it, because this election is happening, everybody is asking them how they're feeling about the election or how they think this film is going to affect the election or is this film time to come out in October but before the election for any sort of a purpose? They're getting asked about it on 60 Minutes, like here. The release of a political parody a few weeks before Election Day has some people wondering if the filmmakers are trying to influence the election. We don't think anyone's going to come out of this movie going, oh, well, now I'm going to vote for Bush, or, you know, now I'm going to vote for Karrick. And if we think that if anyone, you know, would come out of this movie changing the way they were going to vote, they shouldn't be voting. And they're taking a lot of heat because they do this interview with Rolling Stone where they're talking about how they really don't like these ads that, uh, he was then called Puff Daddy, that Puff Daddy was doing in the media where he was telling people you had to vote or die. And they were saying, listening to a celebrity saying vote or die is like a danger to democracy because that just means you're telling people who aren't that informed to go out and vote. And if you're uninformed and going voting, if you're just voting based on emotion, maybe you shouldn't vote. Maybe only the people who know stuff should vote. And that was their argument, but it got spun into them saying that nobody should vote or voting is for losers. And I think this is the issue where we have all the time, which is, satire is hard for people to digest. The reason why Eddington doesn't kind of connect with so many people because I also think, you know, Ari Aster steps back and goes, you guys figure it out. I'm not going to tell you what I think or what I feel and it allowed for... In a way, expecting me to figure out is what I'm saying you shouldn't be doing. Exactly. I'm a filmmaker. Exactly. And I feel like people are looking to them because they have this track record of being funny and being able to lampoon anything and they expect them to have a very clean idea. But I think what they're attacking is fine and right. Like I'm not offended that this group, this F.A.G. group, the film actors group, is, you know, in bed with North Korea because I think it is showing the dangers of not really understanding geopolitics. We have moved away from experts across the board to commentators and that's just in general. Yeah, and then the commentators have moved around from like actually being commentators who might know a little bit to just being who can scream the loudest and seem the most upset. And I think that because this movie isn't nuanced, it's just big, bold. You know, you run into these things where it's like, okay, let's talk about, you know, Kim Jong-il, like his voice is, I mean, that's a, is that racist? Sure, I think you can make that argument. But then I also feel like it's the viewed through the eyes of maybe an action movie director, like the way that the terrorists speak, you know, they, it's, I feel like there's a lot of things at play that you have to unpack and you can't do everything at face value. Because they are really trying to make a point that when they go around the world, this is how Americans at large see the world. You know, every time they show up in a city, they're like, this city, by the way, is 3,635 miles east of the USA. You know, that USA is always the center point. USA is the full Chrome where everything gets measured from. And so when you're in Paris and you're looking around, it is all like the Arc de Triomphe and the Eiffel Tower and croissants in the windows and croissants on the freaking cobblestones. The cobblestones are made of croissants. The cobblestones are made of croissants. Because it's just like our lens in how the world looks if we haven't been, because a lot of Americans don't have passports. And it would really be great if it was easier and we all did and got to travel more. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's important to see the world. And I think that when Americans are coming into these world, they are destroying it, right? And everyone is destroying it. And I feel like there's also an argument to be made that like, you know, Kim Jong-il's whole idea is to basically send the world into a spiral. So everyone is completely alone and abandoned and is revolting against whoever is left. It's just destroying society, right? There's a lot of big ideas here. And I think that if you want to find a way to critique it, you can. I know that like the big thing that I remember people being upset about is like the Dick's pussies and asshole speech, which I think is one of the funniest monologues ever. I didn't even pull it because I was like, this is too foul. But it's so good. But I mean, right? It's there. There is this idea of, you know, there's three types of people in this world. And that's a point of view of a character that we don't even know. I don't think that the movie is saying that that's the right point of view, but there's so many points of view. And I think that this movie does walk all those different lines. Like, what are we trying to do? What are we trying to say? Everybody thinks they're right. And that's the other part of it. And when everyone is just operating on a point of view of I am right, everybody else is wrong. You're never going to make any forward momentum. You're never going to learn about a culture. You're never going to change anything within a culture because you're not listening in very little, simple terms. You're just blowing shit up. And that's really what I think. If you want to really look at it from a big point of view, that's how I would say this movie shows. People aren't listening to each other. Well, yeah. And they are blowing stuff up. I mean, I love how they make that point just like straight away in the get go when we're in Paris for the first time. And that is such a good fake out, by the way, when the movie starts and you see a really janky puppet in front of a really janky backdrop. And then it pulls out and you're suddenly like, oh my God, they really did this. They really made all of these flowers and mimes and butterflies. There are so many cars. Like their vision of puppeteering is just astonishing. The ambition of this movie. I heard apparently when they showed the first clips of this movie to the Paramount executives, that's exactly how they did it. And when an executive saw that janky Marinette at the very beginning, he yelled, oh my God, they fucked us. And then, boom, there is never feel. But it's spectacular looking. Spectacular looking. And very hard, right? That's one of the things that when you look at the stories behind this movie, and it's a short production cycle, but man, oh man, they will tell you, Matt and Trey, that this is the hardest thing that they have ever done. And when you're talking about the croissants in the street, this is a movie that they're spending a thousand dollars to construct a tiny Uzi. You know, Kim Jong-il's eyeglasses were made with hand-ground prescription lenses. Like why though? Why? That's so absurd. But it looks so great. I mean, the mechanical skulls and these rubber faces, there's so much. The explosions, the disasters, thousands of puppets getting washed away in water. I mean, they're talking about scenes where a character is drinking and they're like, that could take half a day to complete. Right? It is like, it seems like worse than stop motion because they have like 30 puppeteers sometimes operating, you know, the puppets in the shot. I was thinking about that. Like, how are they on this set? You know, it seems so hard to control all these things. I mean, they had three dozen marionette operators and they were using five cameras simultaneously to capture the scenes. And they had three stages working simultaneously. There's so many different sets here. And you know, I think Matt Stone was saying that he was working 20-hour days and using sleeping pills to go to bed at night. Like it was just this battle to get it done. Yeah, I mean, they sound like they went through a war themselves. Whenever they talked about it after the fact, they're like, oh God. Puppets are absolutely horrible. They are the worst things in the world. They can't do anything. They don't, you know, there's nothing that they can do. They can't sort of block the scene out ahead of time. Nothing. They're still better than actors. I mean, but these puppets are incredible. Like incredible. The way that they can blink and look around, the tiny little motions that they make are phenomenal. I mean, here's a little bit about how they worked. We are controlling his facial animation and we're bringing the emotion into the puppet heads. All the motors are servo motors that are very small. There's about six or seven of them in each head. Like one controls a jaw, one controls a left and a right. We have the brows going up and down and some lip articulation as well. I have heard it. I don't know if this is true, that they could actually make the puppets look even better than this, but then it was getting too close to Uncanny Valley and people were freaking out that they needed the puppets to just stay slightly janky. But there are things happening right from the beginning in this movie. Like when you first see, you know, the blonde, the love interest, Lisa, entering to Paris and she does this tiny little hair toss over her shoulder that could not be more exactly right. It is just exactly how an actress would do it. And that's what I really love about how this film was made is they do not act like puppets in the slightest. They act exactly just like B-movie actors. Yeah. And what you're seeing in this movie is something that is not like an art form that we see films of. Yes, there were Thunderbirds, but they play within the specificity of what you just described, like tossing the hair back and it looks so elegant to, you know, another puppet missing their mouth when they're trying to drink. Or other moments where the puppets look dead, right? You know, there's that moment of Gary in the limo in his head is just hanging to the side of the window while it's raining outside and he looks completely lifeless. Like they they're within the puppet, you know, usage. We're seeing different ways that they're getting jokes because I think that these puppets aren't funny. Like they're not trying to be funny. I think you're right. They're being B-movie actors, you know, they're doing melodrama. And then you add on top of the melodrama like stuff that you would never see from a puppet, spitting up blood, vomiting, you know, talking about, you know, going down on each other. I mean, the sex scene, like we mentioned so many times to get that through the MPAA. And it's funny because it's just dolls. They don't even really have genitalia. Yeah, I mean, they kept making the point, Matt and Trey, that every single person has done exactly this with their dolls when they were little. And in their little element of trolling, they always referred to it not as a sex scene, but as a lovemaking scene. And that the puppets were falling in love and that the more the MPAA made them cut it down, the more it felt like a cheap one night stand. I mean, that is not entirely fair. Of course, like things that the MPAA made them cut out was like a golden shower, but they at least enjoyed that they got to make them watch a golden shower. They also shit on each other, I believe. Yeah, but that's the thing. Like to your point, the calibration of jokes here, they're not having this hero who looks exactly like Chris Pine. Like exactly like Chris Pine. I know Chris Pine wasn't famous yet. Come on. He looks exactly like Chris Pine. Proto Chris Pine. It's like you could have just touched this puppet with a magic wand and Chris Pine appeared. But like his name is not Hero McSquare Jaw. You know, his name is Gary, Gary Johnston. And that normality of it keeps things in such perfect balance. Like they don't lean into stuff. It's like, hi, I'm Chris. I'm from Detroit. I like martial arts and disco dancing. Notice like I do martial arts. Like they really pull back. Well, I also just want to point out just to go back to that sex scene for one second that Trey Parker. You don't want to go back there? You love that sex scene? Trey Parker said, you know, we blew Janine Graffo's head clean off, but the MPAA had no issue with that. They were more concerned about the positions of the dolls having sex, which I also think is just another level. Perfectly America. Yes. Right? Yeah. And like we took this movie abroad and they did not care about the puppet sex, but this country. They also, I think, scored it in early test runs to Aerosmith Don't Want to Miss a Thing. Because Armageddon, by the way, shout out, we did a do an episode on Armageddon. Yes, which we found to be oddly better than we remembered. But the one movie that we will never remember with fondness is Pearl Harbor, which does take such a hit. And when you're talking about wooden performances, I think that Gary Johnston, to a certain extent, is analogous more in this moment to Ben Affleck, right? Because Ben Affleck in this is a real punching bag. Yes, Matt Damon is, you know, shown in a way that he seems mentally not all there. What do you mean like this? Matt Damon. His only line. His only line. Matt Damon said he actually felt kind of hurt by that. He was like, I write scripts. I'm smart. Is that how people see me? I mean, it's a funny person to attack. I mean, and at that point in his career, too, he was doing interesting stuff. You know, there are these odd shots like Sam Jackson being a part of the film actors group. I was like, oh, I don't ever think of him as somebody who speaks out. You know, obviously, Sean Penn, obviously Alec Baldwin, Janine Garoflo at this point as well. Susan Sarand and sure. But when I saw a couple of these other ones, I guess they're just filling out the thing like Liv Tyler, too. I'm like, why are we taking shots at Liv Tyler? That's where I feel like they're just hitting people that are in theirs like ice. They are thinking about Pearl Harbor and that song about Pearl Harbor, I got to say, yeah, they are right. And they nailed it. And I forgot about that. I was like, I'm glad that someone took it to that movie. He's way better than Ben Affleck and now all I can think about is your smile and that shitty movie, too. Pearl Harbor sucks and I miss you. I mean, Jerry Brockenheimer, he I think was their toxic narstar. Basically, they said they wanted to model the script after the classic Jerry Brockenheimer structure, where instead of starting with this hero who is reluctant, they have to figure out how to grow up and become the hero that they were born to be. That it starts with a guy as, and this is Trey speaking, who is fucking rad and thinks he's rad. And then in the middle starts thinking, maybe I'm not so rad. And then the end decides that he really is rad again. But they're not only really modeling their script after that. I mean, this movie is made by people who have worked on Jerry Brockenheimer films and also just gigantic action films in general. The score, which is incredible, is by a man who did at least three Jerry Brockenheimer films. And I love it. It sounds so perfect. Like when they get into the car, they become a plane. It's like, yeah, this is the right cool guy in music. And beyond that, they're also the pyrotechnic supervisor. You worked on Independence Day, Tornado 2 Judgment Day. The cinematographer is none other than Bill Pope, who did The Matrix. Oh, yeah. And Spider-Man 2. They're shooting this with real people who know how these movies really look. And I was thinking, that's, hey, it seems strange. Why would they want to make a puppet movie? Why on earth? And the argument that Bill Pope made was, right now, most big action movies are animated anyways. Everything is CG. And at least here with these puppets, I'm not shooting green screen. Like I'm shooting practical, which is what I want to be doing anyways. By the way, they would never get the performances that they got from the actors that they would have needed to make this film. Right? And if... Yeah, it would be like Starship Troopers. You'd have to really trick them into it, maybe. I mean, and beyond that, no one's going to shit on anyone else. And if you did make this movie, that would just balloon the budget. I do want to say that Bill Pope has a great quote, which is, you know, shooting this movie was harder than making The Matrix. Wow. And that also just kind of, six months of that. You know, six months of not even knowing, is this all working? Like you mentioned, they show it to the executives. It's not even sound mixed. They are racing to this deadline. Like they literally, the print is hot off the presses the day it is released. You know, and it really gets to live in this unique position, which is no one knows what they're going to get. And when you get that, I think you get this unfiltered thing. There was no test audiences that could take stuff out. There was no debating. Like they had to just commit, you couldn't reshoot. You couldn't really lose that much in the film. And I think what we get is this moment where as a country, we're in a weird spot where we feel like we can be attacked. We feel like we are going to continue to be in war for the rest of our lives. And what they do is they kind of channel that anger and all the things that are going on. And I think they lay out a blueprint for the next 20 years. I mean, this is a movie is a little older than 20 years now. And I have to say it feels just as relevant today as it did when it first came out. I think they saw ahead. They saw the future. I think that that's what great satire does. It doesn't just see the now and the ridiculousness of the now, but it also kind of foreshadows what's to come. And everything in this movie, we didn't know it yet, but they were kind of right on. They were. I mean, one of the clips I pulled, I pulled it because it not only nails how the attacks of 9-11 will be pointed to as a reason why we should just give unlimited power and access. And money to the military or else that kind of constant or else that I feel like, gosh, at this point in our lives, we've been living under longer than we ever had before. But it also presages artificial intelligence in a way that's really freaky. Intelligence. The most sophisticated computer in the world. I have intercepted communications that several terrorist groups are being organized for one massive worldwide attack. From what intelligence has gathered, it would be 9-11 times a hundred. 9-11 times a hundred. Jesus. That's. Yes. Ninety-one thousand one hundred. Basically all the worst parts of the Bible. But then they're able to even make a joke about this dangling of 9-11 as this constant threat. This like this terrorist hate you. They hate the way you are. They hate the way you live. They hate that you live in a free place. And just build it and build it and build it until it becomes absurd. Like when Kim Jong-il is threatening it towards the end. It will be 9-11 times two thousand three hundred and fifty-six. My God. That's. I don't even know what that is. Nobody dies. You know it's weird. I'm with you. I hate the way that Kim Jong-il talks. I mean not the cart menace of it. Just like the Rs and the Ls thing. Yeah. You know his big standout song, I'm So Lonely. If it was just lonely, I think it'd be just as funny, honestly. But it's like it crosses just enough of a line with me that I'm like, oh man, and I get huffy. Yeah. It's just, you know, because I feel like the movie is smarter than just doing the, like I think the terrorists just saying like, jihad, jihad, you know, like those words, like that to me is really funny because I think it shows the POV of Americans in the way that we view people from other countries, right? Like I think that there's. Oh man. Right. And it's like about us trying to speak their quote unquote language, like when you have the scene right here. You have the power. Bak Dirk Dirk Allah. Dirkadurka Muhammad Jihad. Hakkashirpa Sherpa. Bak Allah. Oh Dirkadurka Dirkadurka. All right Gary. Told you he was top gun. I've never seen acting that good. He's amazing. Then then the joke is a thousand percent on us, right? Exactly. And that's, you know, so that's my probably biggest, not pet peeve, but it's one number. It's a little lazier than the other ones, but I don't know, you know, and, and yeah, it's offensive, but I think that you also just have to go. I know this movie is trying to offend me. Just sit back and watch it. Because I think that if you start to pick a part every joke, then it just all falls apart very quickly. It's a house of cards. It's sort of the thing. Like if you want it to offend other people, you have to accept. Yes. It offended yourself. And I think that that's okay. I think that all, like I think that a movie that satirizes something should also offend you. Well, yeah. Everybody, I think has maybe an individual line, right? So it's impossible if you try to make a different deal. From the parents behind law and order comes a mystery the whole family can enjoy. Patrick Picklebottom, everyday mysteries. Step into the whimsical world of Patrick Picklebottom, a precocious 11 year old with a love for reading and an uncanny ability to solve mysteries. Inspired by the beloved children's book of the same name, this podcast vividly brings Patrick's tales of deduction and everyday adventures to life as he unravels baffling indigmas and solves clever cases. Patrick Picklebottom, everyday mysteries is perfect for kids and is just as entertaining for grownups who love a good mystery. The whole family can listen now wherever you get your podcasts. The war is over and both sides lost. Kingdoms were reduced to cinders and armies scattered like bones in the dust. Now the survivors claw to what's left of a broken world. Praying the darkness chooses someone else tonight, but in the shadow dark, the darkness always wins. This is old school adventuring and it's most cruel. Your torch ticks down in real time and when that flame dies, something else rises to finish the job. This is a brutal rules light nightmare with a story that emerges organically based on the decisions that the characters make. This is what it felt like to play RPGs in the 80s and man, it is so good to be back. Join the Glass Cannon podcast as we plunge into the shadow dark every Thursday night at 8pm Eastern on youtube.com slash the glass cannon with the podcast version dropping the next day. See what everybody's talking about and join us in the dark. I really also just want to call out the mix of things that they do here. The fact that they bring in pop songs and are parodying Broadway and take these beats for musical numbers is another like subversion of just doing an action movie, right? There's no songs in Pearl Harbor. We already have a great score for Team America World Police. To do these musical breaks is, I think, really just like a big, bold swing. And obviously, America, fuck yeah, that's like that is one of my favorite songs. And then when they do the slower version of it, right, it's such a such a funny way of kind of making fun of these like, jingoistic like pop songs of the time, right? And how they slip in stuff right at the end, like this one. It's the dream that we all share. It's the hope for tomorrow. Fuck yeah. McDonald's. Fuck yeah. Walmart. Fuck yeah. Yeah. Fuck yeah. Beesball. Fuck yeah. NFL. Fuck yeah. Rock and roll. Fuck yeah. Internet. Fuck yeah. Slavery. Fuck yeah. Fuck yeah. Oh, it's like they get you, man. It's like they're like, you think you're going to do this at karaoke? You just wait. And I also think like juxtaposing, you know, Gary is in a Broadway play that's parodying rent. I forget the name of the. Yeah, it's called Lease. Yes, Lease. And, you know, everyone has AIDS. I think what I thought was so funny about that was, you know, how this this show rent has become so popular. Like it's like it is popularizing. It's making it poppy. It's making it catch you. This like epidemic that is so dark and and. I, you know, at that point, it was a really astute point of view, but no one wanted to touch that. I think they did it again with Book of Mormon, which is like, oh, we're going to do a Broadway musical. It's going to hit all the tropes, but we're going to say shit that is going to blow your fucking hair back. I remember watching that show for the first time on Broadway and being like, holy shit, like what? Like, yeah, really? Like, and that's, I feel like we are missing in society. Like, yes, South Park still exists, but wow, for this to be a major motion picture, for that to be a Broadway show, like we are, we should be pushing more of these boundaries. We should. And I want to play a little bit of everyone has AIDS, because what I like picturing about that scene is not just even the number itself, but I think what's more important is all the reaction shots of the audience, because you're watching this audience that's starting off sniffling a little bit like, oh, and then they're just rocking out. And it feels like you're watching them comment on how we use art to say, OK, we cared, we did it. We checked off our little caring box, but we're rocking out. And that's not really our problem in many ways. And we did it. We did our good deed, like leaning on art to say that you have solved a problem when all you've really done is just like dance a little bit in your seat. Right. Well, I'm going to march on Washington. Leave the fight and charge the brigades. There's a hero inside of all of us. I'll make them see. Everyone has AIDS. My father. AIDS. My sister. AIDS. My uncle. And my cousin. And her. AIDS. The gays. And the straights. And the whites. And the. Space. Everyone. Has. AIDS. My grandma. And my. Dog. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. Oh. I mean, and I think that's the kind of like turnaround about the commentary on what is art doing in our society. What should art be doing? Because this basic structure of a movie that we're watching, it is pretty sincere. Like the way that they wrote the script originally, they wrote a script for Team America that was really funny. They said it was very Adam Sandler-y, like super jokey. And Paramount was like, great comedy, we like it. And then as soon as they started shooting with the marionettes, they realized, oh no, we have to get rid of all of these jokes. Because the jokes don't make sense coming from these puppets, that then the joke actually is just these marionettes trying to do the straight drama. So they took out all of the jokes. And they were like, if you read that second version of the script, you would say, this isn't funny at all. There are no jokes. It's completely dry, like completely sincere, completely earnest. They're like, it's just screwed up. It felt like a really weird, serious satire. So then they had to figure out like what jokes to put in, which is when they wound up with like the pussy and the dick monologue and all of that. Really, the calibration is so tricky here. Well, I think, you know, whenever you're doing a big comedy thing, you have to ground it in a world. And what they really do well here, and I was thinking about this last night, if it was done with actors, I don't think it would be as funny, right? Because it creates a very specific world. The violence while over the top isn't as like, it's not a grass. It doesn't feel like you're not looking away. It's puppets, right? So there's a safety within this. There's there's something really quaint and unique about putting it here. I also think it helps with the idea of, you know, when I said before I go, I think that that, you know, the R's and the L's with Kim Jong-il are like lazy. You can't say this movie is lazy, right? Like you really like, I mean, there's so much attention to detail here that I actually think it gives it more of a free pass. Whereas if it was just actors, you feel like they couldn't calibrate all of those things the right way, but they get to keep it kind of in like a snow globe. Like everything is able to be tweaked. And because they are the creators very much like Rick and Morty, you know, they don't need to bring in a million people to do things. It's really just them being able to, you know, just add the right bit of something, pull back a bit of something when it's not working or they need more of it. So I think that that really is why this movie is so unique in that way. Yeah. I mean, they even had an opportunity to use actors. I think Alec Baldwin heard that he was going to be a character and I was like, I'll do it. I'll do my own voice. And they said, no, like we just don't want that. That would actually disrupt what we're trying to do. And this puppet layer on top of it, I think it really highlights that this is just a commentary on the kind of brain rot movies that have existed throughout American history, you know, about just like, yeah, we show up and we're cool and we're heroes and we get the job done and there's a little bit of sacrifice, but we make it work. And you know what? Our own of this team, America, World Police Clicks, our own like love triangles, they're just as important as everything else happening on. And when we got to take out our emotions on killing people, I mean, it gets to this level of, I think, I don't know, the brain rot absurdity of the kind of media that you absorb a lot in this country about what a hero looks like. Like to me, one of the coldest seeds of the film is when the quote unquote like empathic character, you know, the one at the ponytail. Yeah. Yeah. When she's looking for Gary, when he goes inside that bar in Cairo and she's trying to find him, and she's just grabbing her machine gun and yelling, Gary, Gary, while machine gunning hundreds of people without even caring, like that kind of ghoulishness happens in our movies. You know, it's an exaggeration, but having it in puppet form, it makes you start thinking like, God, we absorb such crazy media in this country. Well, I mean, the biggest blockbuster action films are often America's saving the day, but it's not viewed as America's saving the day, but America doesn't work with many other countries in every, you know, the end of the world is coming. America is like, we're sending up only oil drillers from like Texas. That's it. It's going to destroy the world. And we're like, no, no, no, we got the guys. No one else in the world is capable of this. And you're right. Like we're not thinking about it. It's not conscious, but that's the story that we're telling time and time again. Yeah. And then it's even here kind of double when you have somebody like Gary, who's an actor, he shows into this group that's already existing and they're like, you're the only one who can do this. You're actually the only one who can do this. Nobody else can save it, not even us. You know, all the world is just on your shoulders. Well, and that's the funny thing. This is a movie that you, like you said in the beginning, like, oh, you're going to be upset about the actor stuff. But the truth is, it's like, it's a movie about how actors are bad because they kind of mess things up. But at the same time, our hero is an actor. And the reason why they need him is because he can do something that no one else can. Right. So there's an interesting mixed message there. I'm not saying like, it's a defense or anything. I think it's a funny joke. Well, before you feel too confident in yourself, I'm going to let them make fun of actors again here. Well, right. Cause it's like this idea, like you're a tough guy on screen, then you're not there. And it can all go back to, you know, Jane Fonda on that tank, something that she has apologized for a million times, but she was caught in this moment and it was used in a way that she didn't understand fully. And that created this energy around her so much that, you know, whenever you can hear older people still not forgive her for that, right? Like that's idea. But when you look at Jane Fonda's career as an activist, I would say that she's on the right side 95% of the time, you know, it's like, and it's bold. And that was my Damon's argument too. He was like, you know, I was in this, I was parodied here because I was against the Iraq war. I went on record against the war and history's on my side. And I also say it's a lot of the times the media's fault because they will ask them what they think. It's not like that Damon held the press conference to say, I need to get out in front of it. There are other people who do, but you're not holding a press conference, but like really, but like sometimes it's, you're grabbing somebody and you're pulling them into a moment and whatever you say, you're kind of damned if you do and you're damned if you don't. Well, yeah. And I mean, that comes up all the time. It's a dumb, I think about a lot. Like it came up when I was in Sundance and there was all the violence happening on the streets in Minnesota this year and the death. And, you know, we're running like our studio where we're like talking to people about their movies. And you're thinking, some people actually really do feel an obligation to want to be able to say something about this moment. And we don't want to put people on the spot, but we want to figure out a way to make it comfortable if they want to say something. And we also feel like as frustrating as it is, that's a way of not feeling like we're ignoring it at this point in time, you know, like to just let history pass. It's, there is no clear answer to this. I feel like I wish, well, the clear answer would be like we make experts celebrities, but we don't. Well, I also feel like as somebody who's been on the receiving end of those questions, it's very hard to give a succinct answer to anything that is a complex issue, right? Like in, and I think when you look for those moments where, oh, you do have an easy answer, well here that, you know, the, the killing of that man in Minnesota, like he was innocent. He did not pull a gun on them. He was carrying a gun. He had a license to carry a gun, right? Like that's a very cut and dry thing that I think you can speak to easily. But when you are asked to give an opinion about, you know, a war, a point of view, like it's, it, if you can't give the jingoistic quick one liner, you know, then you're forced to get into a larger conversation, which is never going to make the cut of anything. So it's like, you get caught in this like crosshair. And I know that I'm, I'm the least effective because I'm oftentimes still digesting it. And I heard the best thing from a friend one time, which was like, we, you don't need, it wasn't to me, it was just in a general sense. It was like, you don't need to have an opinion on everything. Like you don't need to publicly share what your opinion is on everything. It's constantly evolving. You should be stepping back. You should be listening. And I think that we make mistakes when we jump in right away. And I think that this movie does highlight that, you know, when you just decide on something, you know, it's so quick. I remember it was, I listened to this podcast, I was like, I really don't understand this conflict between Israel and Palestine from a historical perspective. I was like, I understood opinions about it. I had thoughts and I listened to this podcast. And there was a seven hour long podcast that started off by saying, we will not cover everything. We can't cover everything. And it's seven hours long. And it was like, and we also understand by even using the, the term Israel, we are going to offend on a majority of people. And I was like, whoa, I didn't even understand that. Like, you know, so it's sort of like there are, there's so much there. And I don't know if people are going deeper. I don't know what people are doing. I just hope to, and I think we all do, want to get a smart person, somebody who has a, you know, we want to learn from people who are writing the books and are on the ground to know what is actually going on. But I think it's hard because you're forced into having an immediate response. And that response can be cheered or can be booed. And I think that that sucks. So that's like, it's just, you're making it like go team. And that kind of, I think belittles even the complexity of anything where people are dying. Yeah. I mean, it, it, everything feels awful. So maybe that's why something like this, that just kind of detonates is the only way to kind of clear the air and then start new fights, of course, because then like Sean Penn is, you know, writing a letter where it's so good, can actually just read Sean Penn's letter. Okay. To try Parker Metstone, I remember a cordial hello when you guys were beginning to be famous guys around Hollywood at some party. I remember some several times getting a few giggles out of your humor. I remember not being bothered as you traded on my name, among others, to pure witty, above it all, and likable to your crowd. I never mind being of service in satire and silliness. I do mind when anybody who doesn't have a child, doesn't have a child at war, or isn't, or won't be in harm's way themselves, is encouraging that there's quote, no shame in not voting. If you don't know what you're talking about without mentioning the shame of knowing, not knowing what you're talking about and encouraging people to know. You guys are talented young guys, but alas, primarily young guys. It's all well to joke about me or whomever you want, not so well to encourage irresponsibility that will ultimately lead to the disembowelment, mutilation, exploitation, and death of innocent people throughout the world. The vote matters to them. No one's ignorance, including a couple of hip crossdressers, is an excuse. All best in a sincere fuck you, Sean Penn. P.S., take this as a personal invitation from me to you to escort you on a trip which I took last Christmas. We'll fly to Amman, Jordan, and I'll ride with you on a 12-hour trip through the SUNY Triangle into Fallujah and Baghdad, and I'll show you around. When we return, make all the fun you want. The hip crossdressers, by the way, as a tiny callback if people don't remember, that's because when Trey was nominated for an Oscar for Blame Canada, they went to the Oscars dressed specifically as Jennifer Lopez and Gwyneth Paltrow, Gwyneth Paltrow in the pink dress when she won for Shakespeare in Love. J.Lo, when she was in that deep, plunging green V-Dress that was so striking, they made a pact actually, you know, I'm just gonna let them describe it. Friend of ours had sugar cubes with LSD. That's so crazy now to think. Like, just so nuts, the whole idea you would, I mean, even to just go, okay, you're gonna go to the Oscars and take acid and go to the Oscars, I'd be like, no, dude, I'm not doing that because I don't know what I'm gonna end up doing. That'd even be too scary. Talk about a fashion statement. Now, two of you are nominated for Best Song Blame Canada. That's not. I'm not. We said we can't say anything about the dresses. Nothing about the dresses. So, I want to go and say, guys, what about the dresses? Why the dresses? And we go, magical night tonight, just all the dresses are out. Is that why you're in the dress? It's just such a magical evening and everyone, it's just everyone looks so spectacular, you know, we just wanted to be a part of it all. It's a night of magic. Come on. There were people, they were like, dude, this is my big night. Fuck you. That was the funniest thing to us. We're like, really? Like, this is bullshit. It's Hollywood. Like, that's rock, you know. But we don't have any friends anymore. I wonder why. I wonder if that's why none of the songs from this movie were nominated for an Oscar because I think they're all really great. Yeah. And how times have changed. And I think that whenever you are going out and speaking about society, or you have an opinion, you are putting yourself up to ridicule any which way. And I think it takes a very thick skin to be able to do that. And there's something so thin skinned about what his reaction is, because the truth is, is like, you are one of the people that you probably think of that is, you know what he was, he went to not El Chapo, right? Like he has been, he puts himself there. He puts, he's in Katrina in a boat. He puts himself there. He misses the Oscars. And that's not bad. But you have to acknowledge that that's who you are. That's what you are doing. And if you I respect that, though, more than I respect Leonardo DiCaprio being like, I love the environment. I'm on a yacht. You know, I love the environment. I'm at Bezos's wedding. I think Sean Penn, everybody's problematic person on there in some way or another. But I do think he is sincere. Yeah, I think he's as sincere as this movie is. I think as the characters in the movie are, you know, playing this as sincerely as they are, it's just we live in a world that is controlled by the big marionette people holding the strings are here in this movie, at least they are 10,000% against being earnest in any kind of way. I also think what's kind of funny is in the grand scheme of things. Wow, you talk about like how this movie is still right. Well, when you look at these people who are speaking out, Alec Baldwin and Sean Penn still doing it, right? They're still, you know, and, and, and for better or for worse, it's like it like it's who knows. And I don't not say it's for worse. I'm just saying it's just like, that's what they have chosen to do. That's who they who they want to be. It's very easy for them not to be that because they don't have to do any of that. Like you just talked about Leo, like you don't have to. You can just walk away from it, but they keep on going. And, and I do think they bring attention to issues. And they can be easily ridiculed as well. I think it's the whole reason why people really wanted to side against Alec Baldwin in the shooting incident on Rust. A thing that he is one million percent innocent of. And so so many ways it doesn't even really go to there. But it's like, but because the people are like, well, he's, he talks about politics. Like, no, no, then people wanted to bring him down for that. And it sucks. But you know, the whole reason why he was tried repeatedly. Yeah. Yeah. It wasn't about like, yeah, yeah, it's, it's a very, very interesting thing to me. And I think that good for them for not giving a shit. I think it's youthful. The beauty of youth is like you fuck and take a gun into these places and they are as reckless with their comedy and what they're doing as anyone. And I think as they've gotten older, they've gotten more pointed. I think they've gotten better. I think that South Park is still executing on such a high level. They haven't fallen into the preachy. They've always been funny. They continue to do it. So great. Good on them. And I think in more ways than one, they have probably leaned more into the side of making a stand, not just on the media and the pop culture of the day, but on bigger issues. And I think that their voice matters so much so that Trump is the old, like Trump has threatened to sue everyone and keeps his mouth shut when it comes to South Park because he knows he can't win. I wonder how much they feel about being the leaders of the conversation. I mean, it's so, it's so needed. And also it's exactly what they're arguing against here. And by the way, their jokes on Trump for the most part are like, he's got a tiny dick and he fucks Satan. It's not like his politics are geopolitical. It's like, no, and there's, I like it. Like, why not? Why don't it just fucking hit low? And that's the other thing. It's like, that's what they're doing. And they're doing that same thing to anybody. They're just kind of making more base observations, which I think are funny and weird and great. Oh, Paul, I think we should just let Kim Jong-il have the last word on this episode with this younger he reveals that he's actually not even from North Korea. He is an alien and he's here just to start fights, which this movie did. So Kim Jong-il, take it away. Okay, so next week, I'm just going to make an executive decision. There's a movie that I really want to do. I've been thinking about it a lot because the new season of Jerry Doody's Out, I haven't seen it yet. But the last one, it just felt like we're all like, oh man, people are good. I really want to watch the show where people are good. And I thought, well, what's the really screwed up version of that Truman Show? I want to watch the Truman Show. I want to get in the headspace. Let's Truman Show it up. Let's Jim carry it up next week. And make sure you check out our sub-stack each and every week to go a little bit deeper on the movies that we talk about here. It's always free. So join in the conversation. Unspooled is produced by Amy Nicholson, Paul Scheer, Molly Reynolds, and Harry Nelson. Sound engineered by Corey Barton, music by Devon Bryant, episode art by Kim Troxell, show art by Lee Jamison, and social media production by Zoe Applebaum. This is a Rome production. See you next week. Bye for now. Oh, please, not that music. That music gives me nightmares from my childhood. Could we get something a little bit lighter, some lighter music here? Are you a fan of true crime TV shows? And what about Unsolved Mysteries, the show that jumpstarted all of our love of true crime? I'm Ellen Marsh. And I'm Joey Taranto. And we host, I Think Not, a true crime comedy podcast covering some of the wildest stories from your favorite true crime campy TV shows all the way to Unsolved Mysteries. Baby, you will laugh, you will cry, you'll think about true crime in a whole new way, and you'll also ask yourself, who gave these people mics? New episodes of I Think Not are released every Wednesday with bonus episodes out every Thursday on Patreon. And every Monday, you can listen to our true crime rundown, where we go over the top true crime headlines of the week. So come and join us wherever you listen to your podcast. Look, we all know there are a lot of celebrity interview podcasts out there, but there's only one happy, sad, confused. I'm Josh Harrow-Witzen. Yeah, I'm the host of the show, so I'm a little biased, but truly happy, sad, confused is the place for nerdy and intimate conversations with all your favorite actors and filmmakers. From Andrew Garfield and Scarlett Johansson to Christopher Nolan and Quentin Tarantino for over 10 years and over 700 episodes, happy, sad, confused has broken movie and TV news every single week. That's because I ask all the questions I want to know, and more importantly, you want to know. Casting what-ifs, backstage stories, acting pet peeves, and much more. So whether you're into superheroes, prestige TV, or just the coolest actors and directors alive, you're going to learn something in every episode. Listen to happy, sad, confused on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.