Eden
Welcome back to the middle of culture. I'm one of your hosts, Eden.

Peter
And I am one of your other hosts, Peter. And I guess I'm usually the only other host, so I don't know why I said one of. I don't know.

Eden
It's Jeremy, remember?

Peter
What it what you know That's right.

Eden
Jeremy, the silent poltergeist?

Peter
I forgot about Jeremy.

Eden
He's not talking.

Peter
What was I thinking?

Eden
That's because he's too quiet. Jeremy, you need to speak. Anyway, how you been, Peter? What you been up to?

Peter
You know, same old, same old, just working. Trying to think of anything else really. No, mostly it's just been work the last little bit. But, you know, not today, which is nice.

Eden
It is. And listeners, we are recording on the High Holy Day that is the 4th of July. And I say that as a joke, because it is not a holy day. It is in fact a profane day. Where we celebrate a terrible country being terrible.

Peter
You know, i it is a day that I am having a much more difficult time feeling positive about than I have years passed. I mean, it's and it's been kind of a a gradual descent into Oh, golly. I don't know this toxic hell stew that it seems that we are now living in, but you know, it just Yeah, yeah not not feeling it.

Eden
Fair. There's not a whole lot to enjoy about it. But here we are, and we're going to talk about something that is not about The US. But we'll get to that in a minute.

Peter
That is correct.

Eden
First, we got to talk about what you've been up to. What you've been checking out? Anything fun?

Peter
Reading a little bit of Words of Radiance and finished the Stick With It book that I think I mentioned I was reading last time. Now working my way through Atomic Habits by James Clear. Again, still kind of on my self-improvement kick that I've been on for a little bit now. Other than that, you know, not a whole lot in terms of new music other than I somehow stumbled across an album that came out sometime last year in 2024. I don't remember exactly what time. But I had somehow missed that a band called High Parasite had released an album. Their debut album, and I'm looking up really quick what the title of the album is: Forever We Burn. Now, High Parasite, the reason it caught my attention is because it is a side project of The former, maybe still current, but kind of hard to tell because everybody's being a little cagey, lead vocalist of My Dying Bride, Aaron Stainthorpe. I love My Dying Bride, one of my favorite kind of doom, death, doom bands. And one of the keys to My Dying Bride for me has always been Aaron Stainthorpe's vocals. They're very unique. And I like them. I like them a lot. So they were supposed to go on tour, I think, last year. And suddenly just canceled the whole tour. And there were rumors that it was, oh, burnout. And, you know, Aaron Stainthorpe had said something about, oh, we needed to not do this so that we could stick together, blah, blah, blah. And then fast forward to 2025, and My Dying Bride announces that they're going on tour, but that the lead vocalist of Swallow the Sun Is going to be the vocalist for this tour, not Aaron Stainthorpe. So who knows? Maybe he is still the vocalist, maybe he is not, and they just haven't made it official yet. But anyway, he had a side project that released this album, High Parasite, and it is in the vein of My Dying Bride, a little bit. It's less doomy and a little more goth rock. So it's if you took a little bit of My Dying Bride and kind of Paradise Lost in their icon draconian times era, little bit of maybe some typo negative, and blended it together. And it's pretty good. It's a fun album. With again some good Aaron Stainthorpe growls, but a good mix of different vocal styles used, and a little bit more fast tempo for the most part than My Dying Bride. but a nice kind of gothic rock slash metal feel. And I've been jamming that a lot this week. So been really into that album.

Eden
That sounds pretty cool.

Peter
The other thing that I was going to mention is about almost two weeks ago Alyssa and Gareth were up in Missoula for a swim meet. And so I was home alone, and I had the opportunity to sit down and watch Murderbot on Apple TV Plus.

Eden
Okay.

Peter
And I first of all, a very bingable show. The episodes are only about 22, 23 minutes long. uh not too long, moves fairly quickly. So I sat down and I started watching it and watched all of the episodes that were out and then watched uh episode eight when it came out. Episode nine is now out. I have not had time to watch episode nine. But I have enjoyed it. I don't think that it's gonna blow anybody's hair back, but I think that it's a fun show. It looks good I think that as with really all of the Apple TV Plus sci fi stuff that they have done, it looks really great. I mean, they've done a nice job with all of that. I, Foundation looks incredible. This looks good. I watched some Invasion, which is actually a show I want to get back to. That looked really good from everything I heard. Dark Matter, again, looked great. So it doesn't look cheap, which that's one of the things you have to be careful with sci-fi and fantasy both is that they can occasionally look really cheap. That was one of the issues I had with season one. of the Wheel of Time on Amazon TV or Amazon Prime video, especially comparing it to Rings of Power, which no story, but like looked incredible.

Eden
Sure.

Peter
This is fairly true to that first novella that we read, All Systems Read. There are a few little changes, there's an extra character they throw in at one point. But I do know that Martha Wells was a consulting producer on it, so she's had some involvement in its production, which I think is always good if they have the person who created it involved. But yeah, I enjoyed it. It's definitely something that I'm looking forward to watching episode nine and finishing out that series. Or that season. And then, you know, I think that there are supposed to be some more seasons, hopefully, because I think that they've done a good job. And we talked about a little bit Alexander Skarsgård and how he was not, you know, not really androgynous. as described in the book, where it's all very much an it instead of a he or a she murder bot.

Eden
Sure.

Peter
But I think he plays that pretty well and does a good job and And kind of murder bots lack of understanding for humans and Just sort of undercurrent of contempt that he has for people comes through really, really well. I mean, he does a great job just being absolutely disgusted with these squishy flesh bags. The final thing I will say is they have filmed little moments and snippets of the dramas that Murderbot likes to watch. And so every once in a while you'll get a brief little scene of, oh, whatever, Sanctuary Moon, which is the main one, or a couple others. And they are hilarious. They are so ridiculous. And it is one of the most delightful moments of the show when all of a sudden it slips into a brief episode of Sanctuary Moon, and you've got John Cho as the Is the captain, and you've got Clark Gregg as you know, like the first, you know, command, like the basically playing like the Spock role or something like that. With just this ridiculous, like mutton chop side burns that go out, and this big handle, like it's delightful. The sanctuary moon moments are absolutely over the top and hilarious. I don't know what the general consensus online is. I haven't bothered to look because I don't really care. I have enjoyed it. I think it's a fun show, and I thought they did a pretty good job. I'm curious to see how they wrap it up. But so far, I think they've done a nice job. of adapting it and I've really enjoyed it. So I give it a pretty good recommendation.

Eden
Uh so is that first season basically just that first novella we read?

Peter
Yes, it is.

Eden
So it seems like it's going to be wrapping up basically right where we uh right where we read to, basically.

Peter
I would imagine that's, you know, again, at the end of episode eight, they're getting close to the end. They've figured out, again, kind of who the bad guys, quote unquote, are. Yeah, so I think it's going to be that first novella will be that first season.

Eden
Okay, interesting. I mean, that gives them a lot of space for future growth because they know there's a boatload of those novellas. Um but, you know, I I'm curious to see how long it goes. I I know that Apple TV seems to put a little more Faith in its stuff and give them a little bit of time to really grow into it in a way that some of the other studios, Amazon, maybe don't.

Peter
Or Netflix. I mean, look, I'll be honest, they're There are shows on Netflix that I had on my watch list, and then I heard that it got shit canned, you know, one or two, or maybe three seasons in, and it didn't finish.

Eden
Netflix is terrible too. Yeah.

Peter
And so I'm like, well, I'm not going to go watch those shows.

Eden
Yeah. Like, for example, uh Paper Girls is a comic I really like, a Brian Vaughan Cliff Chang comic. Supposed to be two seasons. They adapted the first season. It was clearly half the book. Then they were like, they had been greenlit for two whole seasons. The plan was for it to be two seasons. Season one comes out, doesn't do great in the first four days it's out, and Amazon's like, no, canceled four days after it came out. So no time for word of mouth to even do anything. And supposedly was really good. My friend, who's also a big fan of the comic, Said it was a really, really fine adaptation of a comic that I think is really good. Um, just taken behind the barn four days after it came out. And that's a real bummer because it, like you said, it makes you not want to have faith in anything. It makes you not want to get invested in anything until you know that you're going to be able to get the story because. I don't want to get invested in something that I can't enjoy and that I can't get some sort of resolution for, some sort of denouement. And you know, that's not true of everything. There are things sometimes I start a thing because it seems cool and I'm like, I hope it ends. And that happens a lot more often, I feel like, in books or comics or things like that. But you're Netflix, just just pay the damn money. Also, put the things out faster, but pay the damn money Disappointing.

Peter
Well, and you know, one of the things that especially with it's it's especially with adaptations where it bothers me. So we'll go back to Amazon and we'll use the Wheel of Time as an example. So they do the Wheel of Time for a season. According to everything I heard, it does pretty well. There's some. You know, there were quite a few changes to that first season compared to certainly the first book, The Eye of the World, that some fans had a hard time with, but I know that people who are diehard fans of The Wheel of Time enjoyed it for what it was. And then and so I watched it. And then season two came out and I kind of got behind. And then season three came out and I kept thinking, oh, I should go back and watch it. Well, Amazon has canceled it. And so I have zero desire to put in the time to go watch seasons two or three because It's just going to leave you hanging. And sure, I've read all the books, so I know how that story ends, but they've made some changes. So it's in. Some ways its own story, and I'm not going to put in the way I'm not going to waste in my mind the time to get invested in a story that's not going to finish.

Eden
Yeah, that's super fair. It's dumb. It's just dumb.

Peter
And like you said, I think the big advantage, and this is why it's frustrating with Amazon. I understand with Netflix. Netflix, this is their whole business. But Amazon and Apple This is not their whole business.

Eden
Yeah.

Peter
This is like a side thing. And so Amazon, though, still treats it very cutthroat. I appreciate that Apple's like, look, you know, we're a three-plus trillion-dollar company. We have more money than any other company on the planet. And we can let this thing burn for a little bit. So, an example that I haven't watched, but I want to is slow horses. So, I don know if you are familiar with Slow Horses on Apple TV at all.

Eden
Never even heard of it, I'm not gonna lie.

Peter
So, it is an adaptation of a bunch of series of spy novels from the UK. And Gary Oldman is the lead in it, who I think he's just a phenomenal actor. And the idea is that it's a It's a bunch of sort of not great cops in Sloughhouse. They're sort of: here's the old cases, or the unsolved cases, or the cold cases, or the dump cases that get sent down to them, and then they're figuring it out.

Eden
Mm-hmm.

Peter
And I've heard nothing but great things about it, but you've never heard of it.

Eden
No.

Peter
There are like, I don't know, four or five, six seasons of it, or at least there's six seasons I think green lit because Apple TV Plus was just like, yeah, let's do two seasons at a time.

Eden
Jesus, I if Okay.

Peter
So they'd film two seasons at a time. And yeah, so there's four seasons out. And I think seasons five and six are both being filmed. and in production now. Because it's again, critically, it's well received. People who watch it like it. And I appreciate that Apple will just be like, yeah, this This is a good thing. We have faith in it, and we'll write it out, let it finish its thing. So, you know, hopefully, that happens with Murderbump.

Eden
It's interesting to me. It feels like. When it comes to TV specifically, like I basically know what movies are coming out and what movies are popular. Even if I don't see them, I still know what they are. I know when they came out. I have a general idea of what's happening in the space. You know, I know Jurassic World 4 is coming out. I saw a really stupid spoiler about how there's basically like resident evil monster dinosaurs now. There's this one that looks like a beluga whale with seven Six arms, and I'm like, okay, maybe they're getting stupid enough. I want to actually watch these movies again. But anyway, I know what's happening when it comes to movies. Like, I have an idea of what's going on. TV. There are so many shows that are extremely popular that I don't know a single person who watches. Do you know anyone who watches Yellowstone?

Peter
Yep. I I do. I know a few people who are like die-hard fans.

Eden
You got you you got some you got some rural you got some rural family on your your partner's side. I don't.

Peter
Well, it's actually not them.

Eden
I got a bun is it not?

Peter
This is people that I these are people from work who Who are like die-hard Yellowstone universe fans?

Eden
Interesting.

Peter
Because I guess there's like a there are multiple series within this Yellowstone Universe. That seems bonkers to me.

Eden
Yeah, there's like five series. They have a bunch of episodes each. The guy who made the series is like a wild narcissist who, when Kevin Coster like, I don think I want to be in this show, they killed him off and made himself the main character. So, like, he's a wild person. Taylor Sheridan, clearly a bad person, like a terrible person, but makes TV that people seem to like. But that's just the tip of the iceberg. Yellowstone's just the tip of the iceberg. How many other shows are there that I've never heard of that millions of people are apparently watching? And it just feels weird to me. That I feel so on the periphery. Whereas when it comes to comics, I obviously know a lot of what's going on because I work at a comic shop, so I need to for my job. But I know that stuff. Whether I'm reading it or not, I know what's happening. I have a bit a pretty good idea of what's happening in the like popular literature space outside of like You know, like YA, I don't know what's going on there, but like lit for adults, I have a good idea of sort of what's happening there. Um, I know, again, I know what's happening in the movies. But TV is just like this huge hole. And I don't know why that is. Like, I don't watch that much TV. I don't think that's part of it, but it maybe is. Because I'm just like. I don't know. I'm not a TV person. I used to be. I used to watch a lot of TV, but when given my drothers, I would rather put on a podcast and play a mindless video game for a while or build a model kit and I don't know why that is. I know T V's just like a weird Liminal space where I don't know what's happening. And plus, part of it is like there's so much old stuff I've still never gotten around to. If I'm gonna watch TV. Why am I not watching Ideon finally? Like, why would I watch some new drama when I could watch a show that has been recommended to me by dozens of people whose opinions I trust?

Peter
Yeah. I think part of it for me often is the commitment, at least the perceived commitment that is involved with T V shows, where Yeah.

Eden
Yeah, it's just a lot more. The the time is considerably greater than, oh, a movie is two hours, maybe these days, three hours, but like A T V show, especially if it is a, you know, hour-long TV show, has 12 to 18 episodes, if they're generous, that's still like, you know, over 10 hours.

Peter
That was and that was honestly one of the things that I think me think made Murderbot kind of go down so easily was just the fact that, hey, it was again 22 minutes an episode.

Eden
Oh, are they their half-hour episodes?

Peter
Oh yeah, yeah.

Eden
Oh, that's good to know.

Peter
So they're they're they're fairly short. Again, nothing longer than 25 minutes. They go down pretty easily. So it didn't feel like a huge commitment because at this point, when I started watching it, there were only seven episodes. And again, I was home alone for a whole weekend. So I knew I had time. But you look at something like, I'm interested in slow horses because I've heard enough people. on podcasts and stuff whose opinions I at least respect, whether or not I agree with them, speak very, very highly of it.

Eden
Sure.

Peter
And I've thought to myself, well, I should watch that. But then it's like, okay, there's four seasons. Now, granted, I think there are like six episodes a season, but they're closer to 45 minutes to an hour long.

Eden
Sure.

Peter
And so then that level of commitment where Yes, of course. Can you just turn it off if you're not super into it? Yeah, but what if you're into it just enough that you want to know what happens, but not so much that it's exciting to watch it? Then it's. That can be an odd place to be where it seems easier to me for some reason to put down a book that I'm not enjoying or put down a game maybe that I'm not vibing with. I don't know. It's a weird place that my head goes.

Eden
Yeah, it's interesting.

Peter
So Twenty Right.

Eden
I feel a weirdly conflicted way about TV because I don't watch that much TV, but then I'm also like. But they need to make 22 episode seasons once a year again. Because this I hear about all my friends who do watch and like Stranger Things and they're like Will this show ever end? Will I ever be free from the curse of Stranger Things? And it's like those kids are supposed to still be like 12, and now they're like. You know, getting second mortgages on their third house. Like, they're 45 and they're still supposed to be playing teenagers. What are you doing, Netflix? Put out some goddamn television. And so, you know, I do feel conflicted because, like, I'm not going to watch it. But for the sake of everyone else, we got to go back to 22 episodes a season and you get a new season every ding-dang year. The shows were not more consistent, but it was less of a big deal if it didn't always hit. You know? Like. I I have some friends who are big Star Trek fans and, you know, they s they like Strange New Worlds okay. Discovery had its moments where it was good and a lot of times where it was bad. Picard was almost universally terrible, but like, whatever. But it's just not that much. Like. Eight episodes of Strange New Worlds every two years versus in the heyday of Star Trek in the nineties, there were three twenty-two episodes a year. You had 66 episodes of Star Trek to watch in a calendar year. And now you're lucky if you have eight every two years. And so it doesn't matter if some of the you know, it's Star Trek. A third of those episodes are gonna suck. Okay, but I had 44 pretty okay ones. Whereas when you get eight episodes, if a third of those suck, we got four, five good episodes. Great. That feels like a waste of time. So they got to cut the budgets. They got to put out more T V. And then everyone would be happier.

Peter
It's true. So, final thing, and this isn't something I've been checking out, but I thought this would be the best place for us to talk about it. And then we'll hear what you've been checking out because I'm excited. So we know that Superman is coming out soon, right?

Eden
Indeed.

Peter
So this morning I happened to see on Reddit the Daily Beast. Posted an early review that then quickly got pulled down, but at least the title got leaked and it says super oh, wait.

Eden
I too saw this.

Peter
And I want to put this into just a little perspective, and that is that apparently. The person who wrote this review thought well of Guardians of the Galaxy 3, Thunderbolts, The Batman. Dune Two, even Captain America W uh Brave New World, I think, was mostly positive on. The title of the review, Superman Review Superman Review, Terrible Reboot is Final Nail in Superhero Cinema's Coffin.

Eden
Ufa Doofa I think it's going to be real bad.

Peter
Now, one review leaked early, it's been deleted and taken down, so who really knows? But You know, the more I see about this upcoming Superman movie, the less Interested, I am. I mean, again, there's more characters in it. There's more people that are getting crammed in, and I see all this. Oh. Here's a quick look of this character who I've never heard of, and here's this character I've never heard of. And then I saw a clip just scrolling where apparently, I don't know if this is when, because Lex Luther is acting like this is when he is meeting Superman for the first time, but. Superman comes, you know, bursting through the door, throwing the desk, like is all super hyper angry and violent because, you know, he wants to know where the dog is. I'm assuming that he means crypto. And I'm just watching this and I'm going. I don't know, man. I really don't know.

Eden
We are going to go see it as we're going to go see it as a comic shop together on the stores dime.

Peter
I think so, too.

Eden
So I'm going go see it. And I fully expect to be able to report back, yeah, that sucked. And that's because I am not even that big of a James Gunn fan. So I can't even be out here being like, I love Guardians 3, I love Suicide Squad. And my favorite part, the part that I think is funniest, is all of the people who really want that Superman movie to be good. Pushing back on that reviewer, who, like you said, has had positive reviews for various and sundry movies that are kind of mid. Apparently, really did not care for sinners. And so everyone's like, hated sinners, opinion discarded.

Peter
Yeah, I heard that.

Eden
And to be fair. Sinners was really, really good, so I think he maybe was wrong on that one single movie, but I don't think that invalidates the rest of his opinions just because he didn't like Sinners the way that you liked Sinners.

Peter
Yeah, like I say, I don't think it's going to be great. So I've been listening to, and I think I've mentioned this before, I listen to the kind of funny in review podcasts. They do movies and they focus tend to focus on franchises. So, you know, a bunch of the DCU, the DC stuff. And there are somewhere I just don't care, so I don't listen to it. But there are somewhere it's been entertaining to listen to. And They've been going back and they watched Superman the movie. Superman 2, Superman 3, Superman 4 came out this week. And interestingly, many of the people on this show. Had either never seen these old Superman movies or maybe had seen the first one or something.

Eden
Short Oh, I think those people are going to be sorely disappointed because they watched the best Superman movie ever.

Peter
So it's been kind of hilarious listening to. The descent into madness that these folks are going through as they're reviewing and watching Superman the movie, and then Superman 2, and then 3, and then 4. But the part that has made me a little trepidatious for these folks as a whole is the number of times They have said how they are ready for Superman, James Gunn Superman, to shoot right to the top of the rankings and be the best Superman movie ever. And I think correct.

Eden
It was 1978's Superman, as we discussed last episode.

Peter
Yeah, yeah, I think they're gonna be in for a a treat that is most foul.

Eden
Yeah, well Fingers crossed.

Peter
But who knows? We're going to go see it as well because I know that Alyssa wants to see it because again, she's a Rachel Brosnahan fan from her time in Marvelous Mrs. Mazelle. So I expect that hopefully by the next time we record we have both seen it and we can have some we can have some thoughts. Well, what have you been up to? What have you been checking out?

Eden
Um not a ton, frankly, not stuff worth talking too much about. I've been reading Apothecary Diary still. I'm almost through with book seven. Still good. Um been playing more video games, but just the games that I always play, so there's nothing really to say there. I do have to tell I have one funny thing to tell. This is the one thing I'll mention and then we'll get to our topic. So the other day, I was like looking for something. I just wanted to try something new. And this new gotcha game came over across my Reddit feed or whatever. And people were like, hey, check it out. It's kind of cool. It is a book called Re Memento White Shadow, which is clearly trying to traffic in the metaphor ReFantasio name with the Re-Memento bullshit. But regardless, it is. is a turn-based uh RPG. Um it has it it looks like dog shit. Don't get it tw don't get it twisted. It looks terrible. The designs of the characters are um Every woman breasts very boobly across the screen at all times. Regardless of how much you think physics should work like that, they don't. It doesn't work like that. So, like, it's really.

Peter
Okay.

Eden
They turned the jiggle to 11 on all of these women in this game. And it's not like it looks kind of like shit. All of these character designs, most of them kind of are bad. But it has an interesting combat loop because it does a lot of the things. It is similar to, in a lot of ways, what Honkai Starrail does. Except the way that you do stronger and weaker attacks is kind of shared in a way that is only sort of true in Star Rail. So I think like there's an interesting nugget to the combat. So, you know, I was like, nah, I'll play through a few missions. I'll do some pulls. I'll get that dopamine hit of doing some gotcha pulls because. Sometimes you just want to pull, and you're not going to give him any money because this game sucks and is not good looking and all that sort of stuff. Mere days after I started playing, three, four days after I started playing. The company that owns this game laid off 70% of their workforce in an aggressive restructuring Game had been out for a month, maybe a month and a half in the global.

Peter
Oh, man.

Eden
It's a South Korean game. It was out in Asia. Came out global, and it was clearly a matter of like they had said they wanted to do it late 2025, maybe early 2026, and then they rushed it out. And again, boy does it show. It has the roughest translation of a video game I've ever played. Ever. It was clearly done by machine translation and not checked at all by an English speaker. Because, like, the yeah. I don't know how much you know about Korean. Korean does not use pronouns very often. Pronouns are almost entirely implied by the way that you're speaking and gestures that you make. That's how Korean works. That's not how English works.

Peter
So here's what I'll say about that.

Eden
What's that?

Peter
I was going to say, here's what I'll say about that. I have decided that to be, you know, my wife and I, we never really did anything for neither our 20th or our 25th wedding anniversaries because life got in the way.

Eden
Sure.

Peter
It is our twenty seventh this year, and we're still not going to be able to do much of anything this year because wedding and son getting back from mission.

Eden
Heyo.

Peter
But we have decided that we're going to Japan next year.

Eden
That's exciting.

Peter
So I am now trying to learn Japanese in Duolingo, and I have noticed sort of a similar thing where it's like I'm translating, and it's, you know, it is.

Eden
Well, have fun with that.

Peter
It's all context. There's no you or he, or I mean, if somebody's name is in there, then you know that the sentence is about them. But short of that, it's like, good luck, bitches. Hopefully, you can figure it out.

Eden
Yep, that is exactly the way that Korean works too, but that is not how English works. And so you can tell what has happened here is that each of these lines was fed discreetly into the machine translation, which means that it keeps changing who every subsequent sentence is talking about.

Peter
That is very correct.

Eden
I, you, he, she, they, no context.

Peter
So, no context window being fed to the There, you go.

Eden
It will you have to completely infer what is actually being said in this conversation. Because in this conversation between the main character and these other NPCs, The pronoun, they will all be talking about this one specific person, and the pronoun will change six times during the course of that conversation. It's truly one of the most dismal things I've ever seen. And so clearly, what had happened is they like were flailing, not making enough money, shoved the global version out as fast as they could. And clearly, that has not worked since they've laid off 70% of their staff. So, game is dead.

Peter
Yeah, no doubt.

Eden
Game is dead. And I think that that is kind of sad, but also a little funny. But anyway, today we are going to talk a little bit about I want to talk a little broadly about This media property as a whole, and then we're going to dive into a specific thing that we read for today. And what we read for today was the first six issues of, I think, this first issue came out in 2023. 2023's Transformers by Daniel Warren Johnson. At least this first six issues, he does the writing and all the art for it. And we're going to talk specifically about this comic, but first I want to get like a temperature check. We've talked a little bit sometimes about Transformers here, but like. What is your feeling about Transformers as a media property? What is your experience with Transformers? What have you liked? What have you not cared about? What's the vibe when you think of Optimus Prime, Peter?

Peter
So when I think of Optimus Prime, honestly what I go back to is as a young child when Transformers were the hot toy. And for Christmas, our parents conspired so that my cousin Jeff got Optimus Prime and I got Megatron, and I always was a little bummed. That I got Megatron because look, Megatron as a robot looked cool, but then Megatron transformed into a pistol. And he, you know, just driving around with this cool semi-truck and the bed that opens up into a base, and I've got a gun.

Eden
Yeah.

Peter
So I always kind of felt like I got the short end of the stick there. But no, I liked Transformers as a kid. I always, because it was one of those, it really was kind of a seminal cartoon for when I grew up, that initial one.

Eden
Mhm. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Peter
And because again, you know, I'm old enough that I was right at the right age when that was coming out. And so I always had a soft spot for it. I never ever did get into any of the other Transformers. Cartoons or shows that were on TV. I love the original Transformers movie. I think that there's a lot of silly things that it does, but I think that still Just something about the over-the-top ridiculousness of it and the soundtrack and everything. It's just a glorious encapsulation of the late 80s that I again desperately love. And then, you know, the Michael Bay movies are absolute dog shit.

Eden
Yes.

Peter
And so. I haven't seen, I don't know, the most recent, the last one or two because they were so bad. Kind of want to watch Bumblebee just because I heard good things and have never just gotten around to doing that. But. Transformers is one of those things where I have a strong affection for the property, but I haven't really gotten into it. Now, I will say, because I'm a sucker. The folks who did the G. I. Joe compendium comics on Kickstarter, which I have in the closet here behind me, like four.

Eden
Oh, do you have the big fatty?

Peter
Oh, yeah, I got all four big fat volumes in the box.

Eden
Oh, is the full box already out? Because in the comic shops, all we can get so far is Compendium One.

Peter
Oh, yeah, no. Should we do a little show and tell here really quick?

Eden
Please, please, I want to see it Jesus Christ Jesus Christ, cheese and rice and Biden.

Peter
I can Okay, let me grab it. Give me a second. I should be able to do a desk view here with my camera if I can figure out how to make that happen.

Eden
Holy Kazzoli. And how is that all three hundred issues?

Peter
Yep, so that's that's volume one.

Eden
Jesus. Yeah, that's the one we can get currently in the direct market. The only one we can get is volume one. And we got a couple of the hardcovers in for folks like who special ordered it. Obviously, we don't carry the hardcover in the store because it's a It's too much money to justify having on the shelf in the hopes that someone buys it. But we do have the paperback version, which is shockingly light for how fat that book is. Because it's on newsprint, shockingly light. And because it's on newsprint, you know that that binding is never going to fall apart. It will last until the heat death of the universe.

Peter
Yeah, so I got I got that and of course then when they recently announced uh the Transformers uh compendium thing that includes that includes both the US and the UK uh issues and and combines them somehow or something like that.

Eden
Yeah. I was gonna say, did you get the box set that's going to weave the two stories together rather than be here are the UK, here are the US ones?

Peter
I don't know. Oh, yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah, no, I totally did.

Eden
That's good. That's real good.

Peter
So so again, I have a strong affection, but In modern times, I have very little exposure. That's the best way I think I could describe it.

Eden
That's a good way to describe it. Well, I similarly, I was the younger sibling, which meant I got all the toys that you weren't interested anymore. So that is the genesis of my love of Transformers, is a whole shitload of hand-me-downs. And that's cool, because I played with those babies a ton. And I too love the Transformers, the movie, the 86 film. I will love it till my dying day. Stan Bush's The Touch is the greatest 80s power ballad of all time. Whether that's true or not, in my heart, it's true.

Peter
Yes, no, no, no, it is.

Eden
That is the greatest 80s power ballad.

Peter
It is totally true.

Eden
And it starts, and I tear up thinking of Optimus Prime sacrificing his life to save his people and stopping Megatron's attack. I mean, and it's, and it. It looks incredible. The animation is so lush. It is the 80s and it is done by a Japanese studio. So they had more money than God. And they worked those animators till they died in their chairs, and it looks like it. You don't see animation like that after 1992, 1993. You just don't. It's incredible. And then I was perfectly aged to be into Beast Wars, the follow-up to the original cartoon, because I was like. I think that started in 96, 97. So I would have been 13, 14. That's the perfect age to want to watch some robots transform into rats and dinosaurs and tigers. So, I really loved The Beast Wars show. I was very fond of it. And, you know, I've just, I too have always just had this affection for Transformers. We had a few early issues of the comic that I would, you know. Voraciously read over and over and over again. You know, we had that issue one with that incredible Bilsenkevich cover where Optimus is the size of a Freaking kaiju. He's like 300 feet tall, and you're like, Bill, he turns into a truck. Why is he so big? He's grabbing, he's holding a fighter jet in his fist. Bill, what are you doing? Anyway, and then the Michael Bay movies start, and they're terrible. And I have seen every one of them. I own them all on DVD. Yes, not Blu-ray, DVD, standard definition. Thank you very much. 'Cause that's when I started collecting them and then I like, Well, well maybe I'll switch to Blu-ray someday. Um, you know, w I talked last year about going to see Transformers One and thinking, Hey, this was a pretty good movie. Is it more explicitly a kids movie than any of the live actions one ones were? Absolutely. It's still really quite good. So, I have a lot of fondness for Transformers. I still collect them sometimes. Like, I have a modest collection of Transformers. I'm a kid with ADHD, and when we moved to virtual meetings for all work meetings, and I could do things with my hands just off screen to help me pay better attention in meetings. Listeners, let me tell you, a transformer is the greatest thing in the world for that. Because I can just have a transformer on my desk right underneath the camera view and just go, car, robot. Car, robot, car, robot, and then I can pay attention in a meeting. I think they're great. And so, a couple of years ago. IDW lost the license for Transformers. I've read most of the IDW comics. They're quite good. Like, it really goes some places. You know, it. The Marvel the Marvel comics are also good too. I'm very excited for you to get that box set because the Marvel US and UK are both extremely good. The only thing that kept me from doing it was the fact that it was like $300. And I was like, I don't really. I don't have in my budget right now $300 to drop on this. So I am going to get the compendia. The first one's out in paperback. I haven't gotten it yet. But I'll probably end up picking them all up in paperback. And then I don't have the cool integrated reading that you're gonna get. It's gonna be: here are the US ones, here are the UK ones, but like, well, I'll make do. But, you know, buying them for $65 twice a year for the next couple of years was a little more manageable to my budget. But anyway.

Peter
Yeah, I mean, I don't even want to tell you. Again, I'm the idiot who I was like, well, if I'm doing this, I'm going all in. So I actually kick-started at the don't tell anybody the $700 level.

Eden
Okay. You know, you got the disposable income.

Peter
So, y you know, that's what I like to think of it as.

Eden
You d you're you are stimulating the economy.

Peter
I'm helping out these creators, bring their vision to life.

Eden
Here's the thing. Image is not a big company. You are genuinely helping a small company when you buy Image Comics. Like, it is not a big company. I think they have like. 30, 40 employees outside of like the creators of the comics. So, like, yeah, I mean, it's fine. It's fine. Anyway, so I was working at the comic shop last year. I read back to the IDW comics. I've read most of the IDW comics. They're really good. They go in a lot of really weird places because at one point, someone asks the important question. The war is boring. What if we didn't do that anymore? What if the war ended? And then we had to deal with how do you rebuild after a war is over? And that is a lot of what the IDW comics are about: is, you know, how do we reconcile as a society, as a people, after in that continuity, millions of years of fighting? How do we rebuild? And so, what happens is they basically build these two crews out of former Autobots and Decepticons and send them out into the world and be like, we have to like. Find a way to coexist. And it's pretty good stuff. I'm really excited for them to hopefully get to the reprints of that as well. As they have I mean, I believe Skybound has the license to all Transformers comics. And I believe, as far as I've heard, the plan is to also do like a big fancy version of the IDW books, which I think is going to be really good. I'm excited for it. So, again, working at the comic shop, this book comes out, Transformers, issue one. I'd read a couple comics by Daniel Warren Johnson before. I think he's got like really cool style when it comes to his art. He did a Wonder Woman comic, an Else World's Wonder Woman comic called The Dead Earth, which is like, what if Wonder Woman was in a Mad Max world sort of thing? It's pretty dope. She uses Superman's spine and skull as like a whip. It's pretty cool.

Peter
Okay.

Eden
He died. He got might as well put it to good use.

Peter
Totally.

Eden
He's made some other comics that I thought were pretty cool. He did a comic about wrestling called Do a Power Bomb, which I think his love of professional wrestling is relevant to the comic we're going to be talking about today. Um, and then he gets hired for this. And he does the first arc. He does all the writing and art for it. For the subsequent three arcs, he has just done the writing, and they've had other artists. Jorge Corona most prominently has done About two-thirds, three-quarters of it, and then fill in artists for some of the like flashback issues and things like that. But this series is sort of coming to a conclusion, at least this version of it, in the next couple months, because he said he was on for 24 issues. He's coming up to his 24th, and then it's going to get issue 25 with a new creative team, which I have very conflicted feelings about. Robert Kirkman is going to be taking over as the writer. And Dan Mora is going to take over as the artist. I think Dan Mora is really talented. He kind of got his start in like Power Rangers comics, so he knows how to draw like a mech. But I don't think it has as much verve as the art does that we're going to be talking about today. And I think Robert Kirkman writes a boring comic. Everyone loves Invincible. Everyone loves Walking Dead. I think they both suck. And I understand I'm an outlier here. So I'm not excited about it. But I really like this book. And I and so that's why when I was like, I want to read a comic, I want to read something that'll be fun, kind of self-contained, a good place to just read a little bit and talk, I figured, why don't we read the first arc of this Transformers comic? So, Peter, how did you find it? What did you think about this comic I had you read for today?

Peter
You know, I enjoyed it. I will admit, I think I read it like all over the weekend, so it's maybe not quite as fresh.

Eden
Mm-hmm.

Peter
But I thought it was I thought it was an enjoyable take on kind of the whole idea of the Transformers. There were things that both felt Familiar, and then other aspects about it that I appreciated that it felt like, again, for me, with very limited exposure to Transformers in the last twenty, thirty years. I felt like it was okay, that's a nice little different way to take this. So, yeah, it was enjoyable, and I appreciated what at least appears to me to be. The ever-present idea that Starscream is psychotic and a power-hungry loser.

Eden
Oh yeah. He is he is the most bitch made man alive. Starscream is the worst.

Peter
Yeah, totally. Totally.

Eden
And he always has been.

Peter
And I appreciated that they they like kept that up.

Eden
You know, we remember that movie where, you know, he throws Megatron's corpse out of the back of Astro Train, goes back to Cybertron, and gets himself crowned.

Peter
Exactly.

Eden
As the king of Cybertron, only for Galvatron, who used to be Megatron, got changed by a Unicron into Galvatron, now played by Leonard Nimoy. Shows up and blows his brains out and steps on his crown. And it's like, yeah, that's what happens when you're bitch-made like are, Starscream. And that is exactly how he is portrayed here as like.

Peter
Oh, yeah, a hundred percent.

Eden
Utterly inept, utterly unworthy of the mantle of leadership, and yet somehow, through events, in charge of this band of idiots who Shouldn't be listening to him even a little bit. And, you know, if you continue reading, maybe, maybe those challenges might be placed before him, which adds a lot of complications to the comic.

Peter
I believe that.

Eden
Like I said, I think this book is really fun too. I really think that the art is very dynamic. I think that it does a really good job. of making me care about the human characters in a way that is often the hard part for Transformers media to do. I mean, Beast Wars had it easy. It was set 4 million years in the past. They weren no humans. It was fine. You didn't have to worry about it. It was just the robots. It's harder when you have to be like, okay, you've got little humans running around in this war between these large car-sized robots. How do you even rate? How do you even hold a candle to that? And, you know, that is often one of the conflicts and difficulties when it comes to a Transformer story. And I think they do a good job here of making you care about these characters. I will say it is extremely beholden to, and I think this is why you were like, I saw a lot of things that I recognized. It's really beholden to that G1 aesthetic. and story of Transformers. It is not pushing the boundary into anywhere outside of, hey, did you read the Transformers comic in the eighties or watch the T V show? That's kind of what we're doing here: a retelling of those sorts of stories. So, I'm going to do a really quick recap, and then we can get a little more into what we thought was interesting or what we would have liked to have seen more of, and all that sort of stuff. It's a Transformers comic. The Autobots on the Ark crash-landed on the planet Earth. Not millions of years ago this time, maybe just a Few decades ago. It was not nearly as long ago as it was in the original G1. Jetfire shows up, which, if you had been reading one of the tie-in books, Void Rivals, you'd know Jetfire woke up and then flew to Earth to find them. Jetfire shows up, wakes everyone up, starts uh repairing the uh the uh damaged transformers, but Jetfire was gone for so long he didn't even know a war started while he was gone. So he just starts resurrecting people uh using the uh the technology in the ark and doesn't realize he's resurrecting all the assholes. And so eventually, we build a team that's basically composed of Ratchet, Optimus Prime, and Cliff Jumper. as well as parts of other Transformers who they will bring back over the course of these issues. On the Autobot side, on the Decepticon side, you've got Star the aforementioned Starscream. You've got Soundwave and a number of tapes. You've got Thundercracker is one of the other jet-shaped ones who's there. And eventually we they resurrect Devastator, who is the first combiner, who's the five, you know, construction equipment that become a very, very, very large boy.

Peter
Yes, the constructicons I remember them being called.

Eden
Yes, exactly so. Chaos ensues. They meet some humans. They make Optimus makes friends with humans. Starscream kills a lot of humans. The depths this is a surprisingly gory comic and it and does not pull punches on character death. Which I think uh is to works to its benefit. Um and basically, you know, it's six inch six issues of Both of these ragtag groups trying to use the resources they have to bring more and more of their people back so that they can try to finally defeat the other team. Basically, try to figure out where do we go from here. We are basically stuck on this planet. There are these other things here, these other. Creatures here, these humans who are clear, this is their planet. This is not our planet. And kind of where do we go from here? So Thoughts on it? Like, what did you what sorts of things did you like? Were there any particular characters you thought were cool? Anyone you didn't really resonate with? How'd you feel about it?

Peter
I think the first thing, and this is really the only negative thing I have to say, so I kind of want to get it out of the way, and that is At times, and this isn't, and this is not unique to this comic. I think part of this might be my limited exposure to comics as a whole. But there are times where I found it difficult to distinguish which characters were which characters. Like you said, it's fairly dynamic. There's a lot going on. And so there were times where I was like, wait, which, especially with the transformers, I'm like, wait, wait. Which robot is that? Yeah, there are some of the classic ones. We're obviously Optimus Prime, it's easy to tell, and Soundwave and things like that. But some of the other characters, I was like, okay, wait a second. Who was that one again? And I think that. Like I say, part of that is the nature of Transformers because you go back to some of those toys, and there were a lot that were the same exact model, just with different colors, so that they could sell some more. Important to remember that that's this all started simply as a vehicle to sell the toys. So that was the one issue I had with it. Is there times where I was like, wait a second, But um, Yeah, yeah.

Eden
And it really doesn't help. I don't know. Like, I know in interviews, Johnson has said that he had pretty much free reign to pick who he wanted to be on his teams. So that is why there are some certain choices that are made. Bumblebee gets his brains blown out six pages into the first issue of this comic. Bumblebee is not here. He is D-E-A-D dead. So, who's here? Cliff Jumper. Oh, guess what? Cliff Jumper is the same fucking model as Bumblebee, except he's red. Literally, the same toy with a different head. And so, like, there's little things like that, or like. I'm not sure why he chose to do all three of the Blowjob Brothers, Starscream, and the two other jets that are literally the exact same toy. Just in slightly different colors. One's white, red, and blue. One's blue, uh, black and white, one's purple, gray, and blue. Like, it's hard to keep track of who's who there because they are identical. Like you said, these are three identical toys. And so, why did you have a panoply of people you could have picked? Why'd you pick three dudes who are identical to each other? Because then it makes it a little hard sometimes to follow on the page. Which of these Jabronis is it? Because I'm only seeing their face and they all have the same face.

Peter
But I did like so as you said, there is no question that you feel the peril the humans are in. I mean, when Starscream picks up that one dude and just you get the red bloody word squish on the page as he just, you know, pops the guy.

Eden
Yeah.

Peter
I was like, okay. This is not Transformers for little kids. This is this is their stakes here. But um I I liked again I like that we have Optimus Sacrificing himself, but at the same time, because look, let's all be honest, as much as I love.

Eden
Yeah.

Peter
That original Transformers movie, Rodimus Prime, is a big downgrade.

Eden
And here's the thing. We all know why that happens at the start of Optima of Transformers 86. It is explicitly. We got to sell some new toys. So you're killing all the old guys and putting in some new guys so we can sell some new toys. So when you think about it that way, you're like Well, Optimus's great sacrifice is a little anticlimactic when you're like, this happened so they could sell Rodimus Prime as a toy. However, it's still it's it's a well enough made movie that it still has emotional resonance.

Peter
Uh-huh. Correct.

Eden
But I do think that you're right there.

Peter
Optimus is missed in the rest of that movie.

Eden
He absolutely is.

Peter
Now, again, so I liked that we set this up, and especially for someone like me who's major touchstones with the Transformers is back to the eighties. I see Optimus, the matrix of leadership or whatever. I don even remember if that's what they call it in here.

Eden
It that's what it's called in the old movie.

Peter
I just remember again.

Eden
I don remember if that's what it's called. I think it's just called The Matrix in the comic.

Peter
Yep. Yep. No. So he's getting ready and all of that. And you're like, there's this part of it that's like, no, we can't lose Optimus again. And so.

Eden
I mean, Ratchet explicitly says that multiple times. He's like, dude, if you do this. You're gone, and if you're gone, we all die, dude. You can't do this.

Peter
Yes. Yes. But you get that set up and you feel, again, that look, it was traumatic. It was traumatic as eleven year old me.

Eden
There is an exact panel. That is laid out in the exact same shape of Optimus lying on the table dying from the 86 movie. The angle is the exact same. The placement of the people around him is the exact same. RC is standing in the exact same spot she was standing in the 86 movie. And so it hits you when you're a kid who watched that and like felt that emotional connection to that scene to see that on the page again and be like, you better not be killing Optimus, dude.

Peter
Oh, yeah.

Eden
You cannot do this to me again.

Peter
Yep. So so I I liked that they got us there and they pushed us right to that precipice. But then I appreciated that they pulled us back again, and I was like, okay, okay, I can read a little bit more. At least I finished this first one. I bought the others, but I haven't read them yet.

Eden
Okay. I and to be fair, spoilers for what happens, listeners, but like What how they like avert that disaster is like also kind of touching because you know in this comic are three main human characters are Spite Spike Whitwicky, you know, the main kid from the original T V show, his father, Sparky, um, and then his friend, uh oh, damn it, what's her name?

Peter
So. Yeah, totally.

Eden
Uh Carly, Carly, who is Spike's friend, girlfriend, maybe girlfriend.

Peter
I can see her face, but I can't yet.

Eden
They were holding hands at one point, but that's all we've seen. But they're the three main characters. Spike gets shot at one point during this because the humans they clearly live in like this weird backwater town filled with like paramilitary types. Because as soon as the Autobots show up, or as soon as the Transformers show up, The whole town gets mobilized and they're all pulling out their guns and their bazookas and all this.

Peter
Yep. They're all armed and ready to go.

Eden
So, yeah, like this is like militia shit. And Spike takes a bullet in one of those things as they're shooting at the Transformers. And so, you know, Spike is hurt, and Sparky like bonds with Optimus over how willing Optimus is to do whatever it takes to keep Spike alive. Because, like, And we'll get to that in a second, but like, eventually, Sparky enters the Matrix, like, gives his own life force to the Matrix. in order to repower it so that it is able to heal Optimus and keep him and like restore him completely and allow him to keep going.

Peter
To power it Oh, yeah.

Eden
And like, that's kind of touching. But he's like, I know I can't keep my boy safe, but this guy can and will. So I will do what it takes to keep my boy safe. I will sacrifice myself because I know that this robot is going to keep my son safe. And like, I think that again, I've had more exposure, I think, to Optimus Prime characterizations because I've dealt with a lot more Transformers media than you have. This is one of my favorite versions of Optimus, and I think a beautiful antidote to the Optimus that we see in the Bay movies because There are so many scenes watching those Michael Bay movies where they have Peter Cullen saying the most. Unhinged, reprehensible lines for a character who is ostensibly the lead hero of this film to say, and he'll be like And that, and like, he'll be saying things like, I will protect these people, while he is just like eviscerating people, like, in the most grotesque way possible.

Peter
He's a it's just so dickish sometimes.

Eden
There is nothing actually heroic about the Bay verse Optimus Prime, even though it is played by Peter Cullen, this voice we've all known since 1984 as Optimus Prime's voice. And it sucks, but like, this is a good characterization of Optimus because he is always willing to put his life on the line to save someone else. There's a scene at the very start of issue two where he is stepping outside and kind of taking in what kind of planet am I on for the very first time after he's woken up, and he steps on a deer.

Peter
Oh, and he's crushed.

Eden
And he's crushed because he's like, everything is so fragile.

Peter
He's gutted by that.

Eden
I come from a world where everything is made of metal. And I am so clumsy and large, and I feel so bad that I've done that. I didn't mean for this to happen. And Spike's like, that's not your fault. And he's like, that doesn't make it okay. And, like, it's just, and that's the way that he comports himself throughout the thing. There is a scene where there, and again. One thing I really want to mention is how dynamic the art is in this. Like, there are real moments of almost body horror when it comes to the Transformers' transformations. Like, it looks almost painful when they transform and the way their bodies mutate. And then he does things like there's a scene in issue three where Optimus' arm gets really mangled. So he fucking rips it off and beats someone with it and uses it as a club because he's like, I can't use it anymore, but I can use it as a weapon.

Peter
Mhm. Mhm.

Eden
And that's like the coolest thing I've ever seen.

Peter
Yep.

Eden
It's this huge two-page spread of him ripping his own arm off, and it looks incredible. And then we get to the great reveal of issue four. Where he's hurt, he's damaged, he can't replace, he can't, they don't have the energy on necessary for them to heal. So, what does Ratchet have him do? For some reason. They've got Megatron's arm with the big old blaster on it.

Peter
Arm Mhm.

Eden
So Optimus hooks that bad boy up to himself. And so for the rest of the comic that we've read so far, Optimus just has a big silver arm with a fuck off cannon on it that he uses to great effect.

Peter
Yep, absolutely.

Eden
And it's cool. It's real cool. I would kill to have an Optimus toy that had that arm instead of the regular Optimus arm. I know they make like A third-party one that you can get for the Optimus toy you already have. And I've thought about it a couple of times because I think that'd be cool, but I haven't pulled that trigger yet. Anyway, I think this is really cool. I think it sets up a really dynamic moving forward. It's really papulsive in its art, in the way it tells this story. But this is like a good way to get into it and say, okay, I'm interested in this. Or you could be like, okay, this was a good story. I had a good time.

Peter
No, and I think it was really good for that. Again, as someone with that history but not a lot of recent exposure, this was a really good As I said, enough notes of things that I am familiar with. But at the same time, a few changes here and there to make it not feel completely mired in the past and make it an interesting thing where I go You know, I see some similarities, but I don know where it's going to go from here, so I'm really interested in reading more.

Eden
Yeah. I like that R C is there because she's my favorite Transformer. If you do keep reading, Alita One shows up.

Peter
Yep.

Eden
She's my second favorite Transformer. So, like, they pull in some of my faves, which is nice.

Peter
There you go.

Eden
And I don't know. I just think it's a fun read. I'm very. Hesitant to see what happens when Kirkman takes over in a few issues. I will give it an issue or two. And then, if I'm not loving it, I'm going to go ahead and save my money.

Peter
Sure.

Eden
We'll see. We'll see what happens.

Peter
Yeah.

Eden
But anyway.

Peter
No, it was good. I I enjoyed it. And again, like I say, I bought all three. I mean, I just bought the digital ones 'cause it's easier and I have enough crap around my house that I try and limit physical crap when I can. Or unless I'm buying huge box sets of, you know But yeah, no, I'm looking forward to reading the next two volumes, and then again, hopefully, once probably once Volume Four is out and I can get that in a in a compendium, I'll get that and then finish at least this first arc out because I did enjoy it for sure.

Eden
Unless you're buying enormous box sets. Yeah, that's fair. I have it in beautiful single issues that get fuzzy with the d blurred background, but I have it in single issues. Um, that was how I started reading it. And like, every time I do that, I think I should have waited for the trade, but I don't. I still buy single issues sometimes. Yeah, I like it a lot. I think you'll really like Jorge Corona's art. I think he's really, really talented too. He really brings a lot of fun things to it. Oh, the other thing I wanted to mention. If you're a wrestling person, I'm not a wrestling person, but my boss at the comic shop is. Apparently, every third thing they do is like a specific named wrestling move. Like constantly. Daniel Warren Johnson's apparently a big wrestling fan. And so, like, Optimus is always suplexing these fools, like, it's a wrestling match.

Peter
Yes, yes, he is.

Eden
And I know what a suplex is. So when I saw him do that, I was like, yo, that's a suplex And that's when my boss at the comic shop was like, oh, yeah, this is an XYZ, and this is an ABC, and this is a DEF. And I was like. Okay, I'm gla good knowledge to have. I don't know these things. I don't go here, but I'm glad you're enjoying it.

Peter
There you go.

Eden
But anyway, we'll be back in another couple of weeks to talk about something new. And until then, you can go leave us reviews, leave us star ratings, wherever your podcast platform of choice might be. It always helps increase exposure. If you have any feedback you'd like to share with us, you can always contact us at feedback at the middleofculture. com. And until two weeks from now, take care of yourselves.

Peter
We'll be back.