Project Hail Mary: Hollywood We Have Lift Off 🚀

Welcome back to the show where we combine film, history and comedy. 

Story Preview:

Join Craig, Shawn, and Susie as they journey through the cinematic universe, from the vibrating D-Box seats of Project Hail Mary to the controversial moments of the recent Oscars. Discover why audiences are flocking to theaters for original stories and practical effects, and how a puppet alien is capturing hearts.

Chapter Summary:

00:00 D-Box and Project Hail Mary Intro
04:30 Oscars Review: Low Ratings and Politics
08:32 Oscars: In Memoriam and Best Picture
12:50 Project Hail Mary: Initial Reactions
17:30 Project Hail Mary: Cast and Directors
21:58 Project Hail Mary: Plot and Themes
29:40 Project Hail Mary: Space, Comedy, and Critique
33:09 Project Hail Mary: Alien Design and Target Audience
36:12 Cinema’s Comeback and Future Releases

Featured Quotes:

• “Boy, does the world need a movie like this right now?” – Shawn
• “This movie is going to be huge.” – Shawn

Behind the Story:

The hosts take us behind the scenes of their movie-going experience, sharing anecdotes about D-Box chairs, late-night showings, and even overly-fragranced fellow moviegoers. They contrast their personal cinema experiences with broader industry trends, such as the Oscars’ declining viewership and the resurgence of original, non-CGI films. A key discussion point revolves around Project Hail Mary’s release timing and its potential to stand out amidst summer blockbusters, especially given its focus on practical effects and a heartfelt narrative.

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Transcript

Craig
You're listening to Basket Traffic.

Shawn
 I mean, what are we talking about?

Craig
I lost my D-Box. It was interesting.

Shawn
The ladies love the D-Box, by the way.

Craig
I mean, yeah, you were joking, you know, the other night about how it massages your asshole.

Craig
I actually.

Shawn
Did I say that?

Craig
Yeah, you did.

Shawn
I raided the tequila cabinet here the other night.

Shawn
Oh my God. Sorry for the drop by the other day. I don't remember much of it, but I, I can tell you I had one hell of a headache the next morning.

Shawn
We should set this up for people.

Susie
Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Shawn
So we're, we're going to talk about a great film that just came out called The Hail Mary Project today. Very excited about it.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
What we thought we would do, of course, is we'd actually go and see the film together. No, of course not. Let's go and spread it out. I, I was going to say, Susie, you should have went to a separate one too.

Craig
Oh, I know.

Shawn
Because we all went to different movies yesterday. The same theater. I left something in that theater for you guys.

Craig
Oh, that was you, is it?

Shawn
Yeah, I left you a note. This is a spoiler note for the end. I'm like, but so I went to the cozy, God, the cozy three o'clock show. You did not go to the three o'clock show.

Craig
Nope. Late night, 10 o'clock.

Shawn
Was it 10:00 p.m.?

Shawn
Out of your mind.

Shawn
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Anyways, you guys went, you got D-Box. I've done it a few times, the D-Box, and I'm just like, eh, just didn't add a lot for me. I just, first of all, I don't want my drink shaken up the whole movie.

Craig
Well, my, my, that's funny because my stuff started sliding off. The vibrations might be a little off.

Shawn
You can turn it down. 

Craig
Yeah, and I did.

Shawn
You can adjust.

Craig
And I did. I turned it down, but I thought this one next to me, my wife here would actually be annoyed by it. But I've looked, I kept looking over to her settings. She had it at cranked.

Shawn
Were you falling asleep because of the movement?

Susie
So there was one point, probably an hour and a half in, that I was just, it was like.

Shawn
Starting to get the nods.

Susie
The lights and, and it was, and the chair's like, I can crawl, I'm curled up in this chair. I can stretch out. Like, it's tons of space. It's awesome and very comfortable. And then as soon as, like, it was, you know, one of these, like, calm scenes and I sort of felt myself.

Shawn
And you're like, no.

Susie
No, then the chair jolted me, scared me.

Shawn
Oh, so you got to do this all the time.

Craig
Exactly, Shawn.

Susie
Get out of me. And then I was awake, wide awake for the rest of it. So I didn't actually fall asleep at all. I sort of dozed, like.

Shawn
Susie, Susie falls asleep a lot, by the way. Let's just preface this for people at home.

Craig
It's almost guaranteed, but those D-Boxes did their work.

Shawn
This is the equivalent to electric shocks for you. So this is what we'll do.

Susie
Because it actually, it did, that was the time, because I was, like, starting to relax, it scared me. So then I was just like.

Shawn
Fear will keep you awake.

Susie
Yeah.

Craig
You know what the thing is? I didn't mind it.

Susie
I turned it down. I left it on.

Craig
Yeah, I'm surprised. Yeah.

Susie
I know. It was fine.

Craig
Yeah. And it was perfect for Project Hail Mary because there's a lot of kind of like scenes where the angle is shifting left or right and rotating. And so because you're in space and you got that sensation. I didn't realize those chairs did that. They kind of like.

Shawn
They do.

Craig
The thing that annoyed me more than anything was it felt like someone was kicking my chair and I kept wanting to look around going, you know, like.

Shawn
Like you're back on the airplane.

Susie
Most of the time it was right on timing point, but a couple times it was like a cut, like a second late and you're like, well, you missed the, like, it should have.

Shawn
It's all programmed, Sean.

Craig
Well, I know what it worked because there was that one jump scene in the movie Project Hail Mary. And, and by the way, are we going to do like spoiler alerts here? Are we going to get into that part?

Shawn
If you haven't seen it, and I'm sure a lot of people haven't first of all, go out and see it. But second of all, we are going to talk about the film and we probably are going to spoil it. So you should probably not listen to us. So thank you. Good night.

Craig
Good night.

Shawn
I just quickly too want to say the last time I did the D-Box was, was for F1.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
And that was very good. Those are the kind of movies you want to sit in the D-Box for.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
I, I want to go see Hamnet and sit in the D-Box.

Susie
No.

Shawn
Not the same.

Craig
Speaking of Hamnet, speaking of Oscars let's just talk about that for a few minutes.

Shawn
Right. Because we weren't here for that and.

Craig
We were supposed to do this last week and then we just had this kind of impromptu trip to Mexico and couldn't, you know.

Shawn
Couldn't do it.

Craig
Hang out with the cartel.

Shawn
I still did the Oscars podcast out in the front yard, like I usually do.

Craig
How'd it go?

Shawn
Your neighbors loved it.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
The police, not so much. But yeah. So the Oscars came and went and they were the lowest rated Oscars. Now I attribute a lot of that to just the way the world is right now.

Craig
Well, I think there's a couple of things going on generationally too. I mean, hey, I'm in my 50s and I don't subscribe to any kind of cable television, so I don't even have the, you know, access easily.

Shawn
Well, and that's why it's going to YouTube.

Craig
You know, every younger generation basically goes to YouTube and that's why it needs to go to YouTube. Otherwise, I think the numbers will probably go up if it's more accessible. So I think that's part of it. I also do kind of wonder with the messaging from actors, you know, if you're, if you're not against Trump, you're against us and this whole kind of like very political messaging. It's tiresome.

Shawn
There was, I mean, people are over that.

Craig
The recruitment base was kind of right. You're an actor. Just.

Shawn
Yeah. Get your award. Shut people and sit down.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
Don't, don't try to tell us you have no education. So.

Craig
Yeah. He was fucking genius, really.

Shawn
Yeah. Yeah. That was the best. But I didn't, I felt like there wasn't, they didn't cram it down our throats as much this year.

Shawn
I, I, I watched the Oscars. I sat and watched it from the beginning to the end. I only do it because I've grown up doing it and that's a ritual for me. I love the Oscars. So I enjoyed it and, and I thought it moved really well, even though it was still super long. Of course, it always is.

Shawn
But I felt like for the most part, people got their award and they got off. And, and so, and I thought Conan was great. He did what he was, you know, his purpose was to, to deliver a funny evening to everybody and sort of not get overly political.

Craig
No, he made a couple of references to Trump. I, I felt sorry for Conan at times or anyone who was trying to make a joke. It was like the audience was absolutely you know, afraid to laugh, just in fear of, presumably, of, you know, causing offense. And it's just like, fucking chill out. Like, this is the thing.

Susie
Did feel really muted. Like, and whether.

Craig
But you said there were audio issues as well. Is that what I heard?

Shawn
Well, right away you could tell there were audio issues because it didn't sound like the regular Oscars. Like there was a weird, I don't even know what was happening with the mic cutting to the audience or not cutting to the, I don't know. It was strange.

Craig
Yeah. It was weird.

Shawn
Right off the top though, of course, what everybody was talking about was Timothée Chalamet.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
And the fact that Conan went right after Timothée Chalamet, after Timothée Chalamet, of course, made the comments about nobody watches ballet or opera. That's a, you know, so we were talking about that the other night.

Craig
We were. We were.

Susie
Yeah. Yeah.

Shawn
You can't be at an arts awards show and, and you're going to offend somebody, obviously, if you make those kind of statements.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
If you're in the arts.

Craig
Right. I think we.

Shawn
Whether or not it's true or not.

Susie
Wrong or indifferent. It's a hard sell to that community for sure.

Craig
Actually.

Susie
It's probably not that wrong. Like.

Craig
I kind of like him. You know, he's not.

Shawn
He makes some interesting movies.

Craig
He's likable and does good work. And I just kind of wonder if they were kind of lambasting him a little bit too harshly. I know, I know the Oscars is all about roasting. I get it. But it's like, it seemed to be a little bit of a pile on.

Shawn
Well, he had such a heavy, heavy campaign for Marty Supreme.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
He, he looked at it like he was opening another movie again. It was like he was on every channel doing something.

Susie
Right.

Shawn
Sports channels, on, on literally doing, so he was really marketing this and pushing it like it was a business or a sports team even. And so, and he's a big sports guy. So I think the art, the art community sort of looked at that and going, hey, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
Slow your roll here, dude. You're not De Niro here, okay? Like, or you're not.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
So I think they kind of pounded him down. Now, hey man, it's a tough, it's show business, baby.

Craig
It is. It is.

Shawn
So.

Craig
15 minutes to make your mill.

Shawn
Your, your, yeah. And your, your girlfriend's got some coin too. So I think you're good.

Susie
Going to be just fine.

Craig
Yeah. She's.

Shawn
I mean, she's one of the richest women in the world.

Susie
I think so.

Shawn
What really stayed with me with the Oscars this year was the, the In Memoriam. And, and I thought it was the best one they've done. And I, probably ever. And the fact that Billy Crystal came out to kick that off because I, Billy is my Oscar host, right? Growing up in the 80s and the 90s. It was, it was his show.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
And so seeing him again.

Craig
He had this I think he hit all of the major elements of being an Oscar.

Shawn
Likability.

Susie
Likability. He was a natural performer. He could, he not the greatest singer.

Shawn
He can deliver a line.

Susie
He can sing. He can also dance and he can be playful. But the key thing is there to stand up on that stage in front of millions of people and just have a calmness about yourself. Like you're, like you are meant to be there. Even Conan looked a little bit kind of awkward at times. Like most.

Shawn
Big shoes to fill.

Craig
That's it. It is challenging.

Shawn
Here's the thing though, that Billy, with Billy too, and Conan to a certain extent too, I, because I, I love Conan, is that they have the wherewithal to be present so that if something happens during the Oscars while they're out there, they can react to it.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
That is, that's the key.

Susie
That's right.

Shawn
That's like, do you remember the classic Jack Palance winning the Oscar for City Slickers and him doing the pushups with one hand and Billy like would go on throughout the evening making jokes about that and bringing it back and bringing it back and bringing, that's it. Like, because it's a moving target, the Oscars. You got to be riding around it, not two months, three months before.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
So having Billy come out and kick off, of course, the Rob Reiner tribute and I'm sure everybody's seen that by now. They brought out all of the different cast members from some of his biggest films. And it was, it was unbelievable. And, and it was just incredible. And then, of course, we had the Canadian Rachel McAdams come out and talk about Diane Keaton and Catherine O'Hara.

Craig
Yeah.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
So it was a lot of Canada in that. And, and it was just, just so great. And, and I, and then.

Susie
Rachel McAdams. She did a great job. She did. She got emotional at the end too. Like it really meant something to her.

Shawn
She worked with.

Craig
Feel it. Yeah.

Shawn
Family Stone. The Family Stone, I think, is the movie. Anyways.

Craig
Some notable omissions as well in the memorium. Like, you know, apparently they didn't even acknowledge Bridget Bardot, Farrah Fawcett. Like.

Shawn
Well, Farrah Fawcett. Yeah.

Susie
Maybe she missed the date.

Shawn
These are TV, not Bridget Bardot. She's definitely movies. But there's a lot of movie, TV actors. Like that's the thing. Are we doing, are we doing the Oscars? Are we doing the Emmys?

Susie
Yeah.

Craig
But of course, the, the biggie, what we talked about.

Shawn
Was Gene Hackman. Yeah. But wasn't, was he, I still didn't get the answer to this.

Susie
I read.

Shawn
Was he last year?

Craig
He, I read that, that right after he died, the list had already been made and they didn't change it.

Shawn
That's.

Susie
He'll be next year.

Shawn
I don't believe that.

Susie
He'll be in next year's.

Shawn
That's, that can't be right.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
I always think of the Grammys. Do you remember the night the Grammys were going to go on a few years ago? More than that, but, and Whitney Houston died.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
And they're like, had to change the entire show and like open with a Whitney Houston.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
Like.

Susie
Memorial.

Shawn
Yeah. Or like they came out and learned her songs and a bunch of people did her songs. Like, so you can't just go, oh, Gene Hackman died. We'll get him, we'll get him down the road.

Susie
Later.

Shawn
So anyways, the In Memoriam, and, and of course, Best Picture was what I said it was going to be years ago.

Craig
Yep.

Shawn
Years ago.

Craig
Yep.

Susie
Years.

Craig
Years ago.

Susie
Right when it came out.

Craig
Yep.

Susie
Nailed it.

Craig
Two months ago.

Shawn
Yeah. Anyways, it wasn't, it wasn't hard for me to predict that, please. I knew that was going to happen. Although, I mean, should it have gone to Sinners? I don't know. Maybe.

Craig
I actually enjoyed watching Sinners, although I didn't like some of the messaging. I, I, I thought it was quite a creative. I, I, I did appreciate the fact that kind of everyone in every character had a sinful past, who had done sinful acts. So that was kind of a little bit refreshing. And I just thought it was overall really entertaining. But is it Oscar material because there's not a lot of options? I don't know. What do you think, Sean?

Shawn
I will tell you what's Oscar material. The next film we're about to talk about.

Craig
Hamnet.

Susie
Yeah.

Susie
No.

Shawn
Oh, Jesse Buckley.

Susie
Yes.

Shawn
Like everybody predicted.

Susie
She won.

Shawn
Would win.

Susie
I feel like I had to bring that up before we move on to, you know, the movie.

Shawn
Yeah. We don't need to talk about the Oscars. I think people are over the Oscars now, aren't they?

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
It's like three weeks ago.

Susie
Yeah. It's so old news. It's like,

Craig
eh. So Sean, let's talk about Project Hail Mary. Did you know anything about it before you went into the movie last night?

Shawn
Very little. I saw, so they, they, they've been marketing this for like over a year.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
So they, this trailer popped up last summer when I went to see a movie.

Susie
Okay.

Shawn
And I thought, oh, this is, this is my perfect kind of movie. Like, because I love science fiction. Let me just preface, Interstellar is one of my, you know, that's, that's the bench for me, right? That's the bar. That's the, and so I saw the trailer and, and I went, oh no, no. It actually, I thought, oh, I, I don't know if I'm going to like this.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
Because of a certain aspect that they showed me. And I was like, oh, I don't know. But after seeing it yesterday at three o'clock in the afternoon, I, I was like, boy, does the world need a movie like this right now?

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
Boy, with all the stuff going on right now in the world, do, do we need something that's unifying and.

Craig
Aspirational.

Shawn
Beautiful and just bigger than the greater picture, greater than the sum of all things. Here's, here's an interesting question. Talking about the Oscars, is this, is this movie, it's up for Best Picture if it's this year, isn't it? With, with what we just saw against Sinners and.

Susie
Oh yeah. Absolutely.

Shawn
Right?

Craig
Well, and you know though, you better than I do what's coming in the summertime will maybe supersede this movie, Project Hail Mary, with Spielberg.

Shawn
You saw the trailer last night, right? Because it was, I saw it. They, they showed the preview.

Susie
Yeah.

Craig
It was.

Shawn
Is it, what's it called? Declaration Day? No.

Craig
Disclosure Day.

Shawn
Disclosure Day.

Craig
It looked good.

Shawn
It does look great.

Craig
Yeah. Yeah. And Christopher Nolan's movie coming out too.

Shawn
There's some big films. There's no doubt. My, my question is though, it came out right after the Oscars. Now we got a year.

Susie
Well, that's what's.

Shawn
Is it going to generate, it's going to make a billion dollars a year.

Craig
I was thinking about that watching the movie last night going, why, why this timing?

Susie
Why, right?

Craig
Like, is there, is there a benefit to it? Like.

Shawn
Did they not have a lot of faith in it or what? But they spent $200 million making it.

Shawn
Yeah. This

Craig
is an Amazon production too, right?

Shawn
Yeah. Sony and Amazon.

Susie
That was my thought.

Craig
Oh, Sony too. Okay.

Susie
That was my thought too. Like why right after the Oscars, then all these other movies are going to come out and it may it be forgotten a little bit by the time we watch this.

Shawn
It will lose, it will.

Susie
But if they make a billion dollars.

Shawn
It's going to make a billion dollars.

Susie
It won't be forgotten.

Shawn
You know why? Because it's accessible to every age.

Craig
Totally.

Shawn
Age.

Craig
And, and internationally too. I mean, it was smart when you think about it. Whenever you do these kind of like, kind of world.

Shawn
Save the Earth.

Craig
Save the Earth thing. Everyone's got to come together.

Shawn
We all have this in common.

Craig
I feel like we're going to see.

Shawn
We like the Earth.

Craig
Yeah. We're going to see a lot more of these type of movies.

Shawn
Yeah.

Craig
But you know, you because of your love for cinema, I, I think you were telling me earlier that lots of people come up to you and talk to about these things and they're telling you to go see Project Hail Mary. You got to see it. You got to see it. And their sentiment generally was, it was what we talked about, a good feel-good movie.

Shawn
Yeah. I mean, a few people, I didn't like it as much as a few of these people. I, I really liked it. I didn't like it as much.

Craig
Right.

Shawn
There was a few little things, but, but the more that I think about it this morning after seeing it yesterday, I, I found that I couldn't stop thinking about it today and going, I could probably go see it again, actually.

Craig
Oh, interesting.

Shawn
Because there's a lot, what, what really, really, really stayed with me and blew me away was how great Ryan Gosling was in that film.

Susie
Yes.

Shawn
Yeah. He's basically pulling a Tom Hanks and cast over.

Susie
Yes.

Shawn
With Wilson the Volleyball. He's acting for most of the film with a rock.

Susie
Yes.

Shawn
I had a pet rock in high school, elementary school. I wouldn't leave to go back and get that rock though.

Susie
Yeah. Leave your life.

Shawn
But, but, but he was so, such a great balance of nerdy.

Susie
Yep.

Shawn
But heroic, but, but also terrified.

Craig
Yeah. Aloof too.

Shawn
And aloof.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
And, and it was, he just did such a great job of keeping me in that movie.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
And I got, I just think that he should get an Oscar nomination for this.

Craig
Seemed believable.

Susie
Oh, and even in, you know, the, the whole Rocky movie reference and Rocky, and then, and then is the gear that he's dressing up in with the hat and the hoodie over, like in the training of Rocky, that's what he wore. And I was just like, God, could there be, like there were quite a few references to that movie.

Shawn
Wow. They, they named the planet.

Susie
Adrian.

Shawn
Adrian or whatever the.

Susie
Oh, the whole thing. So that was like a little cool flashback for me because like we grew up on that Rocky movie, those Rocky movies. But he did an amazing job.

Shawn
He, he was an interesting character because he was isolated right off the top, which, you know, we've seen this before in, in these kind of movies where, you know, they're on a stage, space station, and they're isolated and all that kind of thing. But he was also isolated on Earth. If you noticed, he had no family.

Susie
No family..

Craig
That's exactly right.

Shawn
And he was a teacher. And I think that was his outlet with people was that.

Craig
No, no mate.

Shawn
That's how he communicated.

Craig
No girlfriend, no, no dog, which they make a reference. You don't even have a dog.

Shawn
She was great.

Craig
She was.

Shawn
She was the perfect person to play that because she was kind of had that cold, tactical.

Craig
German?

Shawn
German, of course. In, in the book, she's Danish, I guess. And they, they went with the German thing because she's German. And actress, I wrote her name down and I feel terrible. I don't know this. I should know this. But she was so great. Last year, I mean, of course, she was nominated, she was in two Best Picture Oscars.

Susie
Oh, wow.

Shawn
Movies that, you know, she was in.

Craig
Sandra Huler.

Shawn
Yeah.

Craig
Sandra she plays Eva Strott. Yeah.

Susie
Sandra Huler.

Craig
The powerful and no-nonsense head of the International Mission to Save Earth, essentially the person running Project Hail Mary and directing Ryan Gosling's character.

Shawn
Is there her other two movies there from last year? Because she was in two Oscar-nominated films at the same time. It was insane. She was nominated for both. No, she, Sandra, she.

Craig
Zone of interest.

Shawn
Zone of interest.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
Zone of interest. Have you not seen that, Craig?

Susie
No.

Shawn
Oh my, you got to watch that tonight, man. You've not seen that?

Craig
It was right about Nat C and Auschwitz.

Shawn
It's, it's one of the best films you're, it's so good.

Susie
I love a good Auschwitz movie.

Shawn
It's such a, I know. That's why I'm shocked. You haven't seen that.

Susie
I know.

Shawn
It is such a different perspective. You're going to, it's.

Susie
Okay. Let's watch it tonight.

Shawn
Anyway, she's in that and she was in.

Craig
Anatomy of a Fall.

Shawn
That's it. Anatomy of a Fall. So those both came out. They were both nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars with her, like as the lead in both. I mean, it's incredible. That never happens. So you're the actress in two films. She was great.

Shawn
Okay. Funny story about that actress. One of the greatest scenes in this movie last night, I thought, was right in the middle of all this science fiction we're getting, you know, in science and all of that. She does this karaoke number.

Susie
Yes.

Craig
Right?

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
Wasn't in the script, wasn't in the movie.

Craig
Okay.

Shawn
And, and so Ryan Gosling would hear her on set singing in between takes and stuff. It's just something she does, I guess, to keep her. And he's like, man, you're actually a pretty good singer. So they had, they had to add something to sort of, you know, in one of these scenes.

Craig
Humanize her because she's.

Shawn
Humanize her bit.

Craig
But I love that part where.

Shawn
So that's ad-libbed and she sings that, they, in one take, and that's the Harry Styles, Harry Styles song.

Susie
Oh yeah. And then she cuts it and she goes, that's enough.

Shawn
That's enough.

Susie
That's enough.

Shawn
But that's her and that's their, that was Ryan's. I think that's a funny story.

Susie
That's awesome.

Shawn
That that's not in the movie. And it just, it's one of the best scenes in the film because it brings the whole humanity kind of question together, right? So.

Craig
I just like that part where Ryan said, Ryan Gosling said this must be very difficult for you to be basically sending people to a, you know, a one-way street to their death. And she just goes, no.

Shawn
Yeah.

Craig
It's not that hard.

Shawn
Yeah. And, and so she's the leader of Project Hail Mary, basically putting this all together. So this film too, before, you know, we get into it too, is this is Phil Lord and Chris Miller. And they're the directors and they've, God, they've got an interesting story. Like they, they've, of course, you'll know them from like the Lego Batman movie.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
The Spider-Verse into the Spider-Verse, which those movies are great. So they've done a lot of this stuff. Now they came off quite a blow. They were, they were going to shoot Solo, the Han Solo movie.

Susie
Oh, okay.

Shawn
Right. And they were fired from that project. And then they.

Craig
Why is that? Because Solo was a disaster.

Shawn
Well, they, they were filming. They were in the middle of shooting that film and they were fired by the studio.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
By Disney or whoever. Now, so they brought in Ron Howard to finish that. And so now after seeing Project Hail Mary, I'm like, God, I wished I'd seen their, their Solo movie, their Han Solo movie.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
So coming off of that, that could have destroyed, that could destroy your career. I mean, you get fired on the biggest, you know, project. And so for them to come back and do this.

Susie
Do this.

Shawn
Yeah. This movie is going to be huge.

Craig
So let's, let's talk about, we, so far what we have not done is talked about, about any two particular details. So we haven't really done too many spoiler alerts. We just kind of jumped around the broad-based things, but we talked about it being, you know a kind of a likable, you know, aspirational kind of feel-good movie. And it's very straightforward. I mean, you have two characters. You have Ryan Gosling, who is the only survivor on this ship. And he.

Susie
The one astronaut.

Craig
Yeah. Yeah. And he, he does this.

Shawn
He's a high school science teacher.

Craig
Yeah. And, and.

Susie
He's got a PhD in.

Craig
Microbiology, I think it is. Yeah. And he is you know, it's one of those kind of like, what? But it, I, they, they did it fairly well because he wasn't just the only one. They, they, they were, had already sought out hundreds of people to see if they had this solution. And then it just ended up being this kind of like quirky, thinking out of the box kind of guy.

Shawn
And we should tell people that, that the Earth is, is going to, in decades, is going to basically freeze to death because the sun is being destroyed.

Susie
Astrophage. The sun is dying.

Shawn
Astrophage is eating the sun. Is

Craig
eating and killing the sun.

Shawn
Not just our sun, but all of these stars.

Craig
That's right. Suns, stars. Yeah.

Shawn
In the, you know, out there.

Susie
In the, yeah.

Shawn
Killing.

Susie
Except for the one.

Shawn
And we've seen this before and, and like Interstellar and like where we're tasked with traveling a great distance to, to explore this and see if we can come up with a solution and fix it.

Craig
Yeah. And, and, and of course, you know, we won't get into the details of what they do to, to kind of save the day in a sense, but because it, it actually had some turns and twists that I didn't anticipate. And I think that was, that was, was nice because I was watching this movie going, okay, what's next?

Shawn
There's, there's a big twist at the end.

Craig
Yeah. And it was, it was neat. It was nice. It was nice. It was it, in some ways, it kind of made sense, right? Did I feel emotionally connected to this movie? Like I, I agree with you. You said it was a very good movie. Was it great? No I agree. Like if I'm going to give it.

Shawn
It's growing on me though. I'm, I'm thinking about it and it's kind of, sometimes movies take a little time.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
And they kind of, you think more and more about them and you go, hmm.

Susie
Oh, good. I am not like, like you guys in this genre. It's not my thing. And so like not my total thing, but I was totally entertained and, and bought in. Like he did a great job and they also.

Craig
I kept looking over to see if you were asleep or not and you were awake.

Susie
Yeah. I was awake.

Shawn
You were throwing nibs at her.

Susie
My only complaint is that I had someone sitting beside me whose cologne was so fucking strong.

Shawn
Craig.

Susie
Not Craig. On the other side.

Shawn
Was it Blue, Blue Stratos?

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
It was so.

Susie
Drakkar Noir. Drakkar Noir.

Craig
That was me 16, man.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
Anyway.

Susie
Anyway, it was, it was.

Shawn
That was what I left for you guys, cologne. I sprayed it all over the seats.

Susie
Jesus. But anyway, I pushed through.

Craig
If you're going to go to the movie theater, because what they do is, you know how that, that commercial going, don't be that idiot.

Shawn
Yeah. Shallow.

Craig
You know, actor or whatever.

Shawn
Yeah.

Craig
It was, it was a bit.

Susie
A seat stealer.

Craig
But what they didn't include was don't wear too much fucking cologne. Like, dude.

Shawn
Okay. Note to self.

Craig
Yeah.

Susie
I actually.

Shawn
Last Drakkar Noir.

Susie
I actually thought, you know what? This also would look really good on our TV. We could watch it again on our TV.

Shawn
That's the first, like, thank you for bringing that point up. This is a movie, if ever there was one, you have to see on the biggest screen possible. Yeah. The visual effects will win an Oscar.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
It is amazing looking. Yeah. And that's because these aren't fucking CGI sets that they've added. These are all built.

Craig
Oh, is that.

Shawn
Everything in this movie is built.

Craig
Practical effects.

Shawn
There's scratches on everything. There's, everything is built. Not only is it built, there's models. All those ships were models.

Craig
Ah.

Shawn
There's, of course, there's going to be a little bit of CGI, I'm sure, somewhere to fill in. All of those sets are real and built on these huge sound stages. And not to mention one of the main stars that they didn't put in the trailer, and this is a spoiler alert, but I'm sure you figured it out by now, is an alien. There is an alien in this movie and it is a puppet.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
It is not CGI-ed. If they pulled that CGI bullshit, I wouldn't have been connected to this thing.

Craig
No, it's so funny.

Shawn
And I'm like, wow, I'm actually connected to this thing, this puppet.

Craig
Yeah. Isn't it interesting how we've come full circle and we should because.

Shawn
Getting angry.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
Whenever CGI comes up, I'm getting angry. These are the kind of movies I've been talking about.

Craig
But why is that? It's kind of funny. Like it's like we, because we know.

Shawn
Oversaturation.

Craig
Yeah. Well, that's the thing.

Shawn
Marvel.

Craig
CGI was able to do it in a way that looked like practical effects. Would we still have the, or is it because we psychologically know that it's CGI?

Shawn
We know human beings like worked and worked on this to make it, build it. But you have human

Craig
beings work on code and.

Shawn
Not the same.

Craig
I, oh, I, I know. I hear.

Shawn
I'm talking with your hands and you're somewhere physical and you're.

Craig
Yeah. I get it.

Shawn
The elements and.

Craig
Yeah. I'm a fit.

Shawn
Building sets.

Craig
Kinesthetic guy myself. I like to work with my hands. So I, I totally appreciate that. So I, I, I can't tell if it's like that psychological part of it.

Shawn
It's a little bit of both.

Craig
Yeah. But it's certainly the end result is you just prefer it that way. And it feels real.

Shawn
If you want to go out and make a great film, you got to go out and shoot it.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
That's how I feel. But I'm old. So that's, that's the way it is. But I could tell watching that film last night, I had those feelings. I, I, because I was going, this is like the production crew that worked on this.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
This is amazing. Like, so it looks great and it sounds great. The score is unbelievable. There's so much, there's actually some Interstellar stuff in there. The music, I was going, is this Interstellar?

Craig
Well, it's funny because I'm being rocked in the fucking D-Box chair. I, I got a little bit distracted. I have to watch it again because I didn't, I can't remember much of the score at all.

Shawn
Well, they mixed it and some people might not like, I'm, I don't like always when they put the rock music in these things because, you know, Guardian of the Galaxy did that.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
And they kind of did this. There's a great Beatles song at the end.

Susie
Yes.

Shawn
But, but, you know, it's okay to do it a bit, I guess. But the actual score is Daniel Pemberton is the score, the guy that produced the score and created it. It's, it's got hints of like Interstellar and other things. It's very creative, but it worked. It worked. So the music, the visuals, everything is 10 out of 10 for those, for me.

Susie
Yeah. I would, and I would watch it again for sure. And I would normally not.

Shawn
It's a little long. I thought it could have been a little shorter. It's 2 hours and 36 minutes. It could have probably done it at 2 hours, maybe.

Susie
Yeah.

Craig
Yeah. Totally.. The original source material really focused heavily on the science fiction part about, the, like the math and the.

Shawn
Now, have you read any of Andy Weir's books? That's a big thing. The Martian Andrew the, yeah, The Martian or this one, Hail Mary Project. There's another one in the, in the tank coming out of.

Craig
I don't do fiction.

Shawn
You don't do.

Craig
Fiction.

Susie
Fiction.

Shawn
Okay.

Craig
I I.

Shawn
I'm sorry.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
Yeah.

Craig
I know it's, I know it's a problem.

Shawn
You won't allow yourself to use your imagination.

Craig
No. Thanks. And I'm the history guy. I, I find that I, I, I just stick with nonfiction. I don't know why. I don't want my brain.

Shawn
Well, it's something we can discuss in therapy. Anyways, yes, go on though. So you guys just, you saw The Martian.

Craig
Yeah. Yep.

Shawn
And, and there was some parallels to that movie for me.

Craig
Totally. Totally.

Shawn
Like we're going to science the shit out of this, right? So that's sort of what came up for me.

Craig
And the singular guy, you know, the lone guy. Yeah. Kind of.

Shawn
And the music.

Craig
Yep.

Shawn
They had ABBA and all that. And The Martian, you remember, they used a lot of that. So there's a formula.

Craig
Yep.

Shawn
For these, you know? I love The Martian. I thought it was, by the way, The Martian is Ridley Scott's highest grossing movie of all time.

Craig
Wow.

Shawn
And I go, wow, this is the guy that did Alien and Gladiator. Wow. So, so I love The Martian. I thought that was an incredible film.

Craig
It was also, yeah, very good. I'd say it was, you know, equal to Project Hail Mary.

Shawn
Yeah.

Craig
You know, it's, it, so it's not Interstellar. And Interstellar has, I think, like what Space Odyssey 2001 would have when it first came out, it just had a gravity. Sorry.

Shawn
Oh, gravity was good too. Sandra Bullock, you could count, compare that.

Craig
That's right.

Shawn
She's stuck in space and.

Craig
That's right.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
And I just don't know why. I, I think the difference is, and, and I thought about this when I was watching this movie, it's trying to cover a lot of territory in those, you know, you talked about it being a bit long, but it's trying to cover a lot of territory in a way that has a nice sequential order to it that didn't rush any area. And so I thought they did quite a good job in that regard.

Shawn
But the one, my one critique about this, this movie is that they were basically trying to accomplish so many things in such a short period of time. Whereas if you're watching like, you know, 2001 or Interstellar, you felt that you were out in space and you lose the concept of time and you just, you just, everything slows down. And it's almost weirdly this expansive place, but it's claustrophobic at the same time. And I think that's what gives these movies that greatness.

Shawn
You know what? Am I making sense here? Yeah. No, I, I agree. I agree. A hundred percent. I thought that that, this film had moments of that and it did a great job of mixing comedy, because it was funny. It had some, he was very funny in it.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
He has some great lines.

Susie
Yeah. And even great, like facial expressions with, you know, he just, he's in it and he does this, and the glasses that hang over his ear and below.

Shawn
Did you notice the editing mistake at the end?

Craig
No.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
That they're not there anymore. They're hanging off as in one shot and then they cut back and they're not there.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
Oh. I stood up in the theater. I went, I got you. I got you. You missed this.

Susie
You missed it. Who the fuck?

Shawn
Oh, there goes their best editing Oscar.

Craig
That's right.

Shawn
What do we think about, about The Alien? It was interesting. Like they, the theater, the marketing and the theaters are so funny. They have the, they have the so they, they have the Rocky Habitat popcorn holder.

Craig
Oh God.

Shawn
So the, and, and it's like a plastic bubble.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
That your popcorn goes into. Because, because, because Rocky, spoiler alert, has got to live in a plastic bubble basically. He's the boy from the plastic bubble.

Craig
Glass.

Shawn
Yeah.

Craig
Frame.

Shawn
Right. Because the radiation or something or.

Craig
Yeah. I don't, I don't, did I miss it or?

Shawn
There's a lot of science. All the other Rockies died, right? Because of, because of.

Craig
Radiation exposure.

Shawn
Something like that it was.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
But, which is weird.

Craig
He's the last one.

Shawn
Yes. Yeah. Of, of out of 26 or so.

Craig
Yeah. So, and, and just like Gosling's character, he's there doing the same thing that Gosling's doing.

Shawn
That's what I liked about the movie is like they didn't feel like you had to inject like Netflix would do, like, like action scenes that were unnecessary. These were smart. Like they, they, they had their big action sequence at the end, right? Where he's outside collecting, you know, like where he, you know.

Susie
Samples.

Shawn
Yeah. The samples.

Susie
I had a little thought about, okay, I know he's a PhD and I know that he's a smart guy, but he figured out how to fly a spaceship when the, like, there was a.

Shawn
I just assumed he, that was all programmed in or something. But yes, you're right.

Susie
There was just a few times where I was like, really? Like, would he have really made like, but.

Craig
Yes.

Susie
He carried it off and that was just my sci-fi world questioning me.

Shawn
Yeah. I'm sure there's, yeah, there's a lot of that stuff. Yeah.

Craig
It is sort of, I don't want to call it this, but it's, it's for, for every age group. So you got to take in mind that there's younger people coming to see this.

Susie
Right.

Craig
And so I think.

Susie
So there were lots of kids when you went.

Craig
There were lots of kids at the three, not lots, but a fair amount. And that's right away when I said to myself, I have to change my perspective before I watch this because once again, I'm going into this going, this better be Interstellar. Right.

Susie
Right.

Craig
And I'm thinking, no, no, no. There's going to be an alien, a cute kind of this. So this is going to be ET meets Interstellar meets something else. And that's kind of what it was. Yeah. And so when I took it a little less seriously, I went, okay, okay, I like this. I get it. I get it. You know, like it's, it's, don't, don't, don't try to over critique this or.

Shawn
Well, and to be fair, the alien was different from your typical alien. Like.

Craig
Well, it had no face.

Shawn
It had no face. I like the concept. And yet it was able to.

Susie
When he was eating, when he was feeding himself.

Craig
Yeah. Well, there, there was, that was a good comedic moment. Yeah.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
There's lots of funny little things.

Craig
Actually, that was one of my.

Shawn
Bump my fist.

Craig
Yeah.

Susie
And the thumb.

Craig
No, fist my bump.

Shawn
Fist my bump.

Susie
And then the thumbs.

Craig
Yeah. Thumbs up.

Susie
But he can't do thumbs up. So just thumbs down.

Shawn
And this puppet was by was worked by this guy that's a puppeteer. And I guess they work so closely. I had all this written down, by the way, and I don't have any of the names now. So I apologize to everybody. I had the name of the puppeteer. And the reason I did is because he worked with Ryan on the set so much that eventually Ryan just said, because he was doing the lines with Ryan and everything, Ryan said, you got to do the voice. And so.

Susie
Gave him a voice.

Craig
So, so when you say a puppet, it's not like a Yoda puppet. Oh, it is. Oh, oh, I just assumed it was a mechanical. They had like servos.

Shawn
No, they, they had wires attached to it to move it and, and, and sticks and, and so they this is going to be the.

Craig
That's why it had, that's, okay. That's why it had.

Shawn
Same as Grogu. Grogu. Like there's going to be two movies with puppets this summer.

Susie
Oh, nice. Yeah.

Shawn
Which is good. I'm, I'm glad. I'm glad. But they gave the guy, they, Ryan said, yeah, you're, you're doing this and we're connecting emotionally and like doing these scenes. He's like, you got to do the voice.

Susie
Oh, good.

Shawn
So he ended up supplying the voice for the in the movie. That's the voice you hear on the, and that's a funny scene too. They try to figure out the voice.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
Because he's, that's another thing. If you want to break down and kind of go, how did they do this? He came up with that translator pretty quickly.

Craig
That's right.

Shawn
That vocal translator. So he could talk to the alien.

Craig
Yeah. Again, that's what I want to nitpick too much.

Shawn
No, no, no.

Craig
The hard part, it is a sci-fi movie.

Shawn
Yeah.

Craig
You know, and probably, you know, because the original source material was more science, this was more phi fiction, you know, and, but you're, it's trying to find a nice balance. And overall, I just have to say it's just a little bit refreshing and 2026 is starting off to be a good year. I got to say, I feel like the last four years or plus, I've just been, not to say there haven't been good movies, but just.

Shawn
Well, if you look at the box office and this movie is opening incredibly well, which I'm so happy to hear.

Craig
Why is that? Because we know we were talking about in previous episodes about like the death of cinema.

Shawn
Well, I'll tell you why. Because it's like what you just said. It's an original.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
Smart.

Craig
There we go.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
Film.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
And it's, it's, it's practical effects and it's, it's people.

Craig
And people are going to the movie theater.

Shawn
Want to see this on the big screen.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
If you look at the last top 10 movies of last year, they're all sequels or superhero movies or something like that.

Susie
This is new.

Shawn
This is an original.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
And this is what we really want. We want to think, we want smart films that look good and feel good. And this message wasn't crammed down our throat. It was done in an entertaining way.

Craig
That's right. Susie leans over right before the movie begins and says, when was the last time we were here?

Susie
In a theater.

Craig
And it was Oppenheimer.

Shawn
There you go.

Craig
So that, and I would say.

Shawn
And that's another great film.

Craig
Movie theaters are so much nicer today.

Susie
Oh yeah.

Craig
I can't believe not that many people going and seeing them.

Susie
Well.

Craig
When you have.

Susie
A hundred bucks.

Craig
It's like a first class seating kind of chair, which reclines and your feet go up and you got this massive space. You don't feel jammed in. And with a state of the art sound system, it is lovely. And.

Susie
80 bucks. That's why people don't go.

Craig
Well, we bought the D-Box upgrade.

Susie
Okay.

Craig
So I don't know.

Susie
We didn't, we did not buy the Planet Popcorn Bowl for plus two drinks for 30 bucks.

Shawn
Your loss. I'll be eating out of that tonight. Here's the thing. I, I just love that we need all this stuff for movies now because, and here, here I go again, but when I was a kid, we sat in a fucking hard plastic wooden chair and we loved it. We didn't care because now my back would care nowadays.

Susie
Yes, yes.

Shawn
But, but the movies were just great. It didn't matter. You were just so happy to be at the movies.

Susie
Yeah.

Shawn
Now it's like, I need a reclining first class seat. I need a server. I need a waitress.

Susie
Yeah.

Craig
That's right.

Shawn
And I'm like, who's eating Lambrack and drinking fucking fucking CABSAV?

Craig
Which you can at this theater.

Shawn
I'm sure. I don't want to, I don't want to smell your fucking sushi.

Susie
Yeah.

Craig
The problem is, is I think what's happened is that the Game of Thrones series that were never meant for movies were so epic and on their scale, they actually kind of took a little bit of the kind of mojo from cinema. And so I think what cinema has to do is kind of like up their kind of scale game, you know?

Craig
And you felt that with, with Project Hail Mary. You felt this kind of enormity or whatever it was about.

Shawn
The streaming networks they, they, they snapped into our addictive sides. That's what they did.

Craig
Yeah.

Shawn
They, they gave us products that we needed to have all at once over and over and over again. Like, don't you think? I mean, how many times do you say, what'd you do yesterday? Oh, I binged. I binged this. I binged that. I binged this. Like.

Susie
Totally. And now we're going back to having to wait a week for the new release of.

Shawn
Which I think is good. It's

Craig
the best.

Shawn
I think it's good because we need to, we need to pull back here a bit.

Susie
Slow your roll.

Craig
So yeah. It's like A Night of the Seven Kingdoms, right? They that was also a phenom kind of response. People freaking love that. And it's, it's true. When you have a weekly release, you end up, and it's really well done, you kind of want to talk about it. You want to go to work, water cooler, chat, and then you kind of talk about it and getting ready for the next week. And it just becomes this kind of cultural, you know, zeitgeist.

Shawn
Going back to appointment viewing. Because if you don't, and I was trying to, to wait and binge it, but if you do that, then you're, you're out of the conversation.

Craig
That's right.

Shawn
Because you can't talk about the show with anybody.

Craig
It's not something that weirdly is fun. It's like what we're doing here, right? It's just, you kind of get caught up in something.

Shawn
No, it's fun. Not, not what we're doing here.

Craig
Damn you.

Susie
Boom, boom.

Shawn
Yeah. Yeah. So just back to Project Hail Mary. If this is an indication of what we're going to get this summer, I'm, I'm excited with Spielberg's movie coming out and the Odyssey coming out. I mean, yeah, I'm going to be spending, I already do spend the summer at the movies. I'm one of those guys that has to go, but.

Susie
Yeah.

Craig
And I'm definitely going to see Sheep Detectives.

Shawn
Sheep, how about, how about Masters of the Universe? What a, that looked like a piece of shit. They, they, they, they were pumping out the the trailer when we saw it for He-Man, Masters of the Universe. You saw that, right?

Susie
Oh. I.

Shawn
You guys don't remember?

Craig
The guy with the sword, he's trying to, yeah.

Susie
Yes. Oh, yes. See, not my, not my.

Shawn
See, that's the stuff that I'm trying to get away from. And I, don't get me wrong. I love, I love, you know.

Susie
I'd go to Sheep Detectives.

Shawn
That kind of stuff, but I'd go to Sheep Detectives first.

Craig
Oh, fuck yeah, man. Talking sheeps.

Susie
Voices. Oh.

Craig
That's some good shit right there.

Susie
  I know. That's funny.

Shawn
Yeah.

Craig
Well, how do you want to wrap this up?

Craig
It was a kind of neat storyline with the kind of full circle where he starts in the classroom and then ends in the classroom, but instead of teaching little human beings, he's teaching little Rockies. And that was kind of sweet in a weird kind of way.

Susie
Yeah. Like.

Craig
Like assuming that their education is similar where you're, you know, stand and deliver and stuff like this as a teacher. I kind of found that a little odd.

Susie
Yeah. On the holiday.

Craig
Here's this.

Susie
All on the holiday. He's on a beach in the fog and then goes to his little cave space and is.

Susie
Yeah. Which they created for him and, you know, for an environment that's like Earth, but this is a, this is a very advanced species that has this very advanced spaceship. And they got like a chalkboard type, you know, learning environment. And anyway.

Shawn
You know what they should have done? They should have had them running up the stairs together with the Rocky thing.

Susie
Get in hell now.

Shawn
Right? Dun, dun. Dun, dun. Dun, dun. Dun, dun. At the end. No, see, this is why I'm not writing movies. Get out.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
That's, that's the Miller, Miller and Lord telling me, get out.

Susie
Oh.

Shawn
All right. Well that, that.

Craig
That was awesome.

Shawn
That was awesome.

Shawn
Hey, move your basket.