2025.11.14: Funding The AI Arts

Speaker 1 I have approximate knowledge of many things.

Speaker 1 Hey! We're recording the podcast!

Speaker 2 Gut up!

Speaker 1 Good morning to you, wherever you are, because it is Morning Subway!

Speaker 1 For November 14th, 2025. My name is Bernie Burns, sitting right over there.
She'll be nice to your delicates. It's Ashley Burns.
Say hi to Ashley, everybody.

Speaker 2 Just wait till you hear my jingle.

Speaker 1 Quick little bit of housekeeping. We have a contest winner and an uncontested contest winner, Ashley.
Yesterday for the drop contest, it was Chuck Breezy on the Rooster Teeth website wrote, the drop.

Speaker 1 I'll play you the dropper here. It was this one.

Speaker 2 Yum.

Speaker 1 The drop is from Sabrina Carpenter's washer and dryer sketch. A few weeks ago on SNL, she portrays a washer and Veronica Slovaskosa.
Slovakoska? Slovakoska.

Speaker 1 Slovakoska portrays the dryer in a musical bit to where Sabrina's line, yum, is in response to Veronica's statement of, We ate some of your clothes. And he was exactly right.

Speaker 1 So he gets a t-shirt code. So coming his way.
So good job, Chuck Breezy. He was met, he managed to get all of that from just the yum and recognizing and is the only one who got it, right?

Speaker 1 Yeah, here's the actual clip from the SNL sketch, the end of it. They're washer and dryer, and they play a special jingle, but then they took that to an extreme.
How many days?

Speaker 2 We ate two of your shirts. Yum.

Speaker 1 The crazy thing about that is, is that Veronica Slookowska, she is new to the SNL cast this year, and we had just started following her on Instagram. I was like sending you reels from her.

Speaker 2 Like a month. She's the dancing girl, right?

Speaker 1 You call her the dancing girl. The sketch that I love that she does, she plays a,

Speaker 1 her Instagram account is Veronica with a K.

Speaker 1 Veronica underscore is cool. And she plays a character that I would describe as a cringe character, but I don't like cringe comedy.
And I was shocked at how much I liked her stuff.

Speaker 2 Yeah, it's like very like endearingly awkward stuff.

Speaker 1 Awkward. Right.
And it's really fun.

Speaker 2 And I'm in a similar boat. There's a lot of cringe comedy, like really beloved stuff like the office that I just, I can't watch because it makes me so uncomfortable.
watching it.

Speaker 2 I need, I just need to go do something else. I need to be anywhere else.

Speaker 1 You know, actually, I'm actually glad to hear you say that because I have a theory. I have a theory that if you don't like cringe comedy, it's because you have a higher level of empathy

Speaker 1 and you watch people go through those scenarios and just like, I can't do it. I can't watch someone go through that.

Speaker 2 It's just too much. So, first of all, thank you.
That's that says something really nice about me. And also, apparently, everyone who likes the office, you're on notice.

Speaker 1 No, no, well, the office is a little bit, yeah, yeah, yeah. The office is a little bit different because I think they do a very good job

Speaker 1 of threading the needle, especially for American audiences. We're talking about the American officer, not the British one, which is, wow, it's brutal.

Speaker 1 They do a good job of threading the needle of like, they show you something cringy, and then they also give you a moment of like nice joy, like pure heart and things like that. And the relationship.

Speaker 2 They show you in what connection.

Speaker 1 Exactly. Yeah.
It's like, you know, when you go from like a sauna to a plunge pool, you know, and like they jump in the ice, those Nordic people when they do that. It's that kind of thing.

Speaker 2 Right. Okay.
That's fair enough.

Speaker 1 And it sucks, but it makes you healthier over time.

Speaker 2 yeah i don't think i'm not sure i've ever seen any of the british office so i can't speak is that is that as uh as difficult to get through like to watch does it make you like want to crawl inside your own skin honestly when people who love the american office go to watch the british one the original one with rich gervais uh

Speaker 1 Whenever you go to watch a British sitcom, it's always like, oh my God,

Speaker 1 it inspired this huge character and now this huge run of shows shows in the U.S.

Speaker 1 Do I have the time to go back and watch it? The good news is, all British sitcoms are like 10 episodes long.

Speaker 1 That is true. In total, that's it.

Speaker 2 That is true. That makes them really easy to recommend, though, right? Like, you're not being like, okay,

Speaker 2 it's eight seasons, but just get through to season three, and then it really starts getting good. Exactly.
It's like the whole thing, like this whole legendary series. Yeah, it was 10 episodes.

Speaker 1 Listen to this. So, one of the most beloved British sitcoms back from the heyday of television, like in the 80s, is a show by John Cleese called Faulty Towers.

Speaker 2 Oh, yeah, absolutely heard of it. It's one of those shows that it is a legend.
Everyone talks about it.

Speaker 1 Legendary. The entire run of the show was 12 episodes across two seasons.

Speaker 2 That seems, yeah, it seems about right. Mr.

Speaker 1 Bean, who's iconic, Mr. Bean is like...
I want to say like 14 episodes or 15 episodes, something like that.

Speaker 2 Yeah, but Mr. Bean is a little bit different than something like Faulty Towers because it also, I think there's like an animated Mr.
Bean show or something.

Speaker 2 And then also there were were a bunch of Mr. Bean movies.
And I think, I feel like the movies are what caught on in the U.S. And so that's where most of our American exposure to Mr.

Speaker 2 Bean would have been. But oddly enough, I think I associate Mr.
Bean with a movie that's not Mr. Bean, but it was Rowan Atkinson.

Speaker 2 And it was, it was a movie where a bunch of people are trying to like, they're like trying to like race and win like a million dollars. I think John Cleese is in it as well.

Speaker 1 And is it Mad Mad, Mad World?

Speaker 1 No, no.

Speaker 2 Is it Rat Race? Yes, yes, it's Rat Race. Rat Race, okay.
You know, and he's, I think Rowan Atkinson, he's narcoleptic or something, so he just keeps falling asleep.

Speaker 2 And he goes, and he's like, I'm winning, and then falls asleep. And so that's what, oddly enough,

Speaker 2 like my association with Mr. Bean is for a not Mr.
Bean thing.

Speaker 1 I'm a little distracted over here because you said Rowan Atkinson and I did like a fact check in my head. Is that the right name?

Speaker 1 And it reminds me that yesterday we were talking about Xbox and I called Phil Spencer Phil Specter. Yeah.

Speaker 1 And I caught it and everything and I wouldn't talk to you about it. I go, I called Phil Spencer Phil Specter.

Speaker 2 Yeah, my response was like, nah, okay.

Speaker 1 People know what you mean and they realize it's just like a flub and you said the wrong name. Obviously, two different people entirely.

Speaker 2 Yes. But speaking of, though, of following up on things from previous episodes, Bernie, Waymo, which we've talked about in a previous episode,

Speaker 2 has a new development. They're now going to go on the highway.

Speaker 2 And this is a big deal for Waymo, and it's a big deal for you in particular because you had, like, you, when we were last in Austin, you took Finn on a Waymo ride.

Speaker 1 I did. It was not easy.

Speaker 2 And when you, you texted me and told me that you got Finn a Waymo, and it was this, yeah, it was like a whole, it was an effort on your part.

Speaker 2 I went to the end of the driveway and I waited with my camera. I was going to record you arriving home with Finn in the Waymo.
It was going to be this exciting moment.

Speaker 2 And then like 30 minutes later, I messaged you. I'm like, where the fuck are you guys? I'm just sitting at the end of the driveway here.

Speaker 1 And I think my response is, oh, you need to come pick us up yeah you're like oh you need to come get us because the Waymo wouldn't come to where our house was I did full research about this where I looked at how do we get a Waymo it used to be a service and you could request them directly and you couldn't I think I talked about this at the time but anyway we had to take an Uber into a certain region of Austin, like in the center of Austin.

Speaker 1 And I had to go in to buy a UT shirt from the like college bookstore. And so we did that and we Ubered in there.

Speaker 1 And then I like booked a ride within that region, just like we went to a coffee shop, the one that used to be next to our office downtown in Congress and got lucky and pulled a Waymot because it was just random whether or not you would get it.

Speaker 1 But you could, I learned from my research, you could nudge it by requesting an e-car, like a green car.

Speaker 2 Yeah, like you could request like certain type of cars in this area.

Speaker 2 And then I'm sure all the human drivers are constantly getting really irritated because someone will book, like, will request a car and they'll book it and they'll like cancel on them because they're not going to be able to do it.

Speaker 1 Probably.

Speaker 1 Right. I had considered that, but I didn't do that.
I thought, oh man, am I going to have to take like a $5 ride somewhere and then do another one? But we got lucky and we got a Waymo.

Speaker 1 But I didn't know this at the time. One of the reasons for the restriction of the region is that they didn't let the Waymos go onto the freeway.

Speaker 1 They would only drive on surface streets, which, of course, you want to do only in the central area where there's a lot more surface streets.

Speaker 1 But now apparently, they're letting them go on the freeway.

Speaker 2 Yes.

Speaker 2 I don't think they're letting them go on the freeway in Austin yet, but they're rolling it out to, it looks like

Speaker 2 San Francisco Bay Area, Phoenix, and Los Angeles. So Austin will come.
Go ahead. What's the recommendation?

Speaker 1 Regardless of what kind of driver you are, whether you're a new driver, an old driver, or an autonomous AI driver, don't go on the freeways at Austin.

Speaker 1 As a general rule of thumb, just don't do that.

Speaker 2 Well, you know what, though, is freeways in Austin might get better once the only people allowed on the freeways are the autonomous AI drivers.

Speaker 1 It's funny you say that because I think about that. It's like when I, when I read this article about Waymo and they just announced, hey, we're going on the freeways.

Speaker 1 And it's just like, okay, whatever. You know what I mean? It's like, it's almost like a footnote.
Nobody even really cares about it.

Speaker 1 But I feel like the people that were at the tip of the spear for the autonomous driving movement for the last decade have been Tesla, right? Yes.

Speaker 1 And it just goes to show the difference when you have good PR, good brand, and when you don't, or just non-existent brand acknowledgement. Like nobody has an opinion really of Waymo.

Speaker 1 It is autonomous driving.

Speaker 1 But every time people would talk about Tesla and autonomous driving, you would always hear about like every time an autonomous vehicle got in an accident, you'd have to hear about it and read about it everywhere.

Speaker 1 And I feel like it's getting less and less like this. And I can't help but feel like because it's becoming less and less associated with Tesla as a brand.

Speaker 2 It could be. I mean, there was a time when

Speaker 2 if a Tesla was involved in a collision, it was a headline, right?

Speaker 2 Every, every single one, based on the headlines, you would think that the Teslas do nothing but crash and to be fair There were a lot of videos of like drivers literally taking a nap at the wheel which does not help the PR you know, but Waymo's also had meme videos of like oh look they got stuck in a drive-thru they got gridlock and like yeah like they it couldn't find its way it's like someone uh poured salt around it and it stayed that you know and now and now it's contributing

Speaker 2 like a vampire yeah like a demon uh you know it's things like that uh so it you know it has happened but the scale that tesla got it is like another level.

Speaker 1 Well, it wasn't just that either. It's like it's, there was, we're all going into Thanksgiving.
Well, the people in the U.S. are going to Thanksgiving.

Speaker 1 We have those family dinners and you talk to people about things. And there was a point in time, like in the late 2010s, when you would talk to people and you'd say, oh, I got a new EV.

Speaker 1 And you'd have some uncle or whatever go, I'd never buy one of those. They catch on fire.

Speaker 1 Because every article about EVs, which really meant Tesla at the time, was how every single one of them caught on fire. And if a Tesla somewhere in the world caught on fire, it was national news.

Speaker 1 And they enormous studies. There's a lot of data about this.
And they broke it down how many internal combustion engine vehicles catch on fire every year. EVs pale in comparison to that.

Speaker 1 And not just by how many are on the road, but even per capita. Go figure the vehicles that are filled with combustible gas and catching fire.

Speaker 2 The ones that are like micro-dosing explosions just to run.

Speaker 1 Exactly. Exactly.

Speaker 1 Tech bro, micro-dosing on petrol.

Speaker 1 But yeah, and it's

Speaker 1 yes, the fires are different and the approach to them is different, but there was an

Speaker 1 and it's not the media's fault. People wanted to read about Tesla's catching on fire.
If there was an article about a Tesla catching on fire, people would post it other places.

Speaker 1 They would click on that article. They wanted to read about Tesla's catching on fire.
Same thing goes with autonomous driving. The data.

Speaker 1 of number of miles driven on the road, autonomous vehicles are safer than human drivers. Well, everything supports that.

Speaker 2 It's because they're not trying to like, they're not trying to like juggle like the, like, the soda while also like, you know, making sure their makeup looks okay and like shouting at their boyfriend on speaker.

Speaker 2 Or

Speaker 2 like zooming down the freeway going, for God's sake, Dave, I told you what kind of milk we need.

Speaker 1 I saw one of these dash cam videos where they were filming the driver as well.

Speaker 1 It was, they even said when you clicked on the video, the driver doesn't look up for 75 seconds. And I watched the whole thing going,

Speaker 1 I know the outcome. And I'm like, please look up.
Please look up. It's like, how can you be looking down that long?

Speaker 1 But the bottom line is, but now that that brand is moving more into the background for those technologies, people are becoming more accepting of it. I think.
It's also a factor of time as well.

Speaker 2 Yeah, the associations you have with specific brands and specific technologies is interesting. Like there was a time I would have associated Nvidia, right? Specifically with video games.

Speaker 2 And then it became a company that you associate specifically with like crypto mining. And now it's a company you associate with AI, right?

Speaker 2 Like it's gone through a lot of like iterations of associations, but it's very heavily associated with industries at different times.

Speaker 1 It is interesting because sometimes you can be too close to something and you don't really see the potential in it because you're too close to it and you know what it does.

Speaker 1 Like when Nvidia became one of the biggest companies in the world, I think a lot of gamers were like, the video card company?

Speaker 2 We're like, wait, you mean Nvidia, Nvidia? Like our Nvidia?

Speaker 1 Yeah, that company is one of the biggest companies in the world.

Speaker 2 I like their cards, but are you sure?

Speaker 1 Yeah, because we all knew what they did and their start and how they got going, right? You know what I mean?

Speaker 1 Or even like, you know, in web, it's like one of the biggest, Justin TV became one of the biggest sites on the web.

Speaker 1 Like, how did that happen?

Speaker 1 Yeah, that's a story. When did I blink? But I was thinking about too, like, you know, how, you know, people are unfair to something when it's a new technology or associated with the brand.

Speaker 1 But there's also the flip side of that when something is technology versus other things.

Speaker 1 I was thinking about this the other day with generative AI and these big tech companies, they put out this program where you can type in a sentence and then the computer will generate a video of a dog flying out a window and then turning into a fart, you know, whatever these goddamn AI videos are.

Speaker 1 And everyone goes nuts and they see this. Like all the investors go nuts and like, holy shit, we got to get more of this.
The computer can make these horrible videos and these terrible pictures.

Speaker 1 Oh my God, how do we, how do we fund this? How do we, how do we scale this? How do we get get bigger? How do we help? And basically, we go all in. Our whole economy now is based on this.

Speaker 1 And it's like, what do you guys need to make this happen? It's like, well,

Speaker 1 we need more computer chips. It's like, okay,

Speaker 1 tariff war. And we'll negotiate these deals for like rare earth elements so you can have everything that you need in order to do this.
What else do you need? It's like, well,

Speaker 1 we need energy. You know, these data centers are going to be huge.

Speaker 2 Boot up the nuclear reactors.

Speaker 1 Yeah, or let's fire up the coal plants, right? It's like, we can get those things. They're just sitting there.
Yeah, Yeah, we'll just roll back every climate protection we've got.

Speaker 1 You know, what else do you need? Do you need like, do you want like human sacrifice? Would that help? It's like,

Speaker 1 it's like, whoa, whoa, wait, what?

Speaker 1 It's like, we used to sacrifice humans. We could start doing that again.
Do you need that? What is it going to take? And it's like, you look at our whole economy now. It's based on this stuff, right?

Speaker 2 On making this stuff happen. Right.

Speaker 1 I'm making sure that this happens. On the flip side of that, if you have a group of humans, humans making art, and you say, hey,

Speaker 1 they need some money in order to make the art. We should fund the arts.
People are like, are you money for arts? Are you crazy? What's the purpose of that? Are we pussies?

Speaker 2 What are we going to do? Destroy this starving artist fantasy? That's what they fantasize about, right? Is starving. Right.

Speaker 1 Yeah. Meanwhile, the guy in his studio, like throwing paint at a canvas in some experimental way, I don't think that guy's going to eliminate 500,000 jobs in the process.

Speaker 2 Well, I mean, I guess if it's a really good canvas. But you're going to, there's, there's actually something happening in that space.

Speaker 2 You're going to like Bernie, uh and that is um jack dorsey is bringing vine back i think they're calling it divine this time they already brought it back once right it was like vine 2.0 or something well he's bringing it back again it's going to be called divine this time and one of the rules like one of the bullet points for this platform is no generative ai allowed okay so it's going to be like an ai free vine platform this is from tech crunch two days ago jack Dorsey funds Divine a Vine reboot that includes Vine's video archive.

Speaker 1 Well, that's a big deal.

Speaker 2 Yeah, that's going to be really cool, right? I I mean, like, we, oh, man, Vine is like a treasure trove.

Speaker 1 Uh, it will give access to more than 100,000 archived vine videos. Look at that.
It's like a resurrection across the board.

Speaker 2 I know, I love it. It's like, you know, we look at like all the billionaires that are like building themselves bunkers on secret islands or something.
And we're like, man, fuck off.

Speaker 2 And then like this guy's like, you know what? You guys can have Vine back. And I'm like, I love you, man.

Speaker 1 Can I be honest with you, though? People always say like, man, if I was a billionaire, I would just be on a beach. Like, you wouldn't even find me.

Speaker 1 I'd be out there enjoying life, drinking, just funding stuff that I want to see made. And that's it.
And I would, but yet, when a guy does that, everyone's like, that guy's kind of lame.

Speaker 2 No, I don't know. I don't know about that.
Cause like Tom from MySpace, that's what he did, right? He made MySpace, he made it amazing. Uh, and then was like, all right, I'm off to do my thing.

Speaker 2 I'm gonna go live on a boat, right?

Speaker 1 Is that what he did?

Speaker 2 I think so. Tom from MySpace just like went and did his own thing and like funds his own little passion projects and does whatever he wants to do.
Like Tom did it right.

Speaker 2 He gave us the top eight and fucked off.

Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 And, you know, and like, I'll always be, I'll always be happy for the time that I had with MySpace.

Speaker 1 Was that, would you say, was that the first social media?

Speaker 1 MySpace?

Speaker 2 I'm not sure which came first, MySpace or Facebook, but I was definitely on MySpace first because there was that early period of Facebook where it was,

Speaker 2 you had to have a university email address to sign up for it because it was specifically social networking for university students.

Speaker 2 So I was on MySpace, like, you know, making it zhuji with my custom HTML and like updating my song every day because you could have like the song that was part of your page.

Speaker 2 So it would automatically play and taking a new mirror selfie and stuff to look really cool. And, you know, and making sure that my top eight reflected my current grudges and friendships.

Speaker 1 Ooh, that, see, top eight, I'm glad we moved away from something like that where you'd put your. eight favorite people, right? That's what that was?

Speaker 2 Yeah, it was like, these are my eight best friends.

Speaker 1 Thank God we don't have that. That's like that early days, we didn't realize how bad that was.

Speaker 2 Yeah, like, like, sorry, Tiffany, you didn't make the cut.

Speaker 1 That sucks, dude. That really sucks.
I mean, I've always felt bad for a generation of kids who grew up with a number next to their name.

Speaker 2 That sucks. Yeah, that's tough.

Speaker 1 But to have an app made by adults telling you to pick your eight favorite friends,

Speaker 1 that's a nightmare. That's a social nightmare.

Speaker 2 Yeah, but then we were comforted by the dulcet tones of like my chemical romance.

Speaker 1 Right. Also, yeah, being introduced to someone else's favorite song is also a negative consequence of visiting as well.
I can't make fun though.

Speaker 1 When I put out the trailer for red versus blue, I used limp biscuits break stuff for that. Nice.

Speaker 1 In my defense, in my defense, Ashley, My Chemical Romance's Welcome to the Black Parade had not yet come out. Okay, okay.

Speaker 2 Well, and you know, the moment it did, we did have to update our mirror selfies to reflect our new normal.

Speaker 2 But, you know, the best part is like going back to explain to like your MySpace self that like the the guy who sang for Fallout Boy is now also the singer for your kids favorite cartoon is like

Speaker 2 that's the moment what's the cartoon uh he does the theme song for both hot wheels let's race and um spidey and his amazing friends oh no really

Speaker 2 i heard it and i was like i was like wait a minute this sounds even like this sounds an awful lot like my early 20s who on earth is that but you know all the moms are bopping

Speaker 2 the thing is he's a really good singer yeah absolutely But there's a lot.

Speaker 1 I mean, there's something weird about the My Chemical Romance guy, too.

Speaker 1 He's got a weird connection.

Speaker 2 Maybe he's a scientist. There's a lot of musicians who are like crazy science.

Speaker 1 No, no, that's the queen guys.

Speaker 2 No, yes. But I'm actually thinking of like the singer for offspring is like a molecular offspring.

Speaker 1 I know. We got to stop.
We're going to have to post this podcast on MySpace today.

Speaker 2 No, but I think, no, I think My Chemical Romance, the lead singer, is, oh, I think he writes comics. He's the one.
He's the one who wrote

Speaker 2 Doom Patrol and Umbrella Academy, both of which we'd be acquainted with because they've both been made into TV series adaptations.

Speaker 2 Did you ever watch Doom Patrol? It was on HBO.

Speaker 1 No, so let's test here my knowledge by cultural osmosis because you watched it. That had Brennan Frazier in it.

Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah, that was like one of his first like... comeback roles, but it was before, it was kind of before the comeback comebacked.
Right.

Speaker 1 Like before the whale, when everyone really got on board with him, he was on this show.

Speaker 2 Yeah, it's a fantastic show. I don't feel like it ever really got like all its flowers, but absolutely like bonkers show.
It's super weird, but really fun.

Speaker 1 Well, he plays in that, if I recall correctly, he's a guy who's trapped in a giant robot body.

Speaker 2 Yes, that is correct.

Speaker 1 Yeah. It reminds me, it's actually in my head.
That character merges with, there's a character on the show, Invincible. Okay, that's the animated show, right? Yeah, called Robot.

Speaker 1 It's from a graphic novel. It's written by the guy from My Chemical Romance.

Speaker 1 and that's voiced by zachary quinto who i i i really like i like his voice he was in uh he played spock in star trek and uh he was in that show heroes he played skylar he was yeah he was incredible as as uh skylar and heroes but uh he yeah he was a wildly attractive spock i feel like he may have ruined an entire generation of girls for spock that was a very attractive cast i'm i'm across the board i how do you feel i like those movies i did too i like the movie.

Speaker 2 I like the first one. The first one, I think, was definitely like the strongest entry, but even the ones that were not as great, I still liked them.

Speaker 1 How did they cast those movies? Did they just like stand at the end of a beauty pageant stage and said, you, you, you, you.

Speaker 2 Right. Like, you, you, and you, come with me.
We're going to do something incredible.

Speaker 1 Here's how beautiful that cast is.

Speaker 2 The hottest universe.

Speaker 1 Zoe Saldania's in that. We were talking about

Speaker 1 who is in the most like big pop culture franchises. She's in Star Trek too because she plays Uhura.

Speaker 2 Oh my, that's her, right.

Speaker 1 Oh my god. Yeah.
And girls got it all. Here's a crazy thing too.
This is how beautiful this cast is, how deep the roster is.

Speaker 1 Not spoil a movie that came out, what, 15 years ago now?

Speaker 2 Let's not talk about that.

Speaker 1 So they branch off from the timeline of the original series because there's somebody who comes back in time and causes a diversion, basically.

Speaker 1 And

Speaker 1 that ship attacks a ship on which James Kirk is being born. James Kirk's father takes over the helm and sacrifices himself, and that's the beginning of the series.
James Kirk's dad is Chris Hemsworth.

Speaker 1 Oh my God.

Speaker 2 When you start off like on that note, of course you have the most beautiful universe of all time.

Speaker 1 Everyone is gorgeous. And his mom is like the, I don't know the name of the actress.
I just saw her in something else, some Christmas thing, but she's the gorgeous lady from house. Okay.

Speaker 1 I think it's James Kirk's mom. It's insane.
It's insane how beautiful that cast is. And I would love to see more of those movies.
They got a little weird, but a a lot of franchises get kind of weird.

Speaker 1 Even the original series for Star Trek got a little weird.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I heard recently, I saw a headline somewhere that they're not going to move ahead with any more iterations of that particular cast.

Speaker 2 They're not going to make any more movies basically set in that specific universe and with that specific cast, which I think is a shame because, you know,

Speaker 2 some of them were better than others, but I liked them. And I think it's a bit of a bummer that we won't get more of that absolutely stunning cast.

Speaker 1 The really weird thing about it, have you ever heard of this before? But the original series of Star Trek movies, I should look at their actual ratings on like Rotten Tomatoes or IMDB.

Speaker 1 There was a weird trend where the odd movies, odd-numbered movies were poorly received. I won't say bad, but they were poorly received.
And the even number movies were amazingly well received.

Speaker 1 The first one was Star Trek the Motion Picture. The second one was Wrath of Khan, which is classic.
Third one was Search for Spock. The fourth one was Voyage Home as one of the whales.

Speaker 1 The fifth one was Final Frontier, where they go to like confront God or whatever. As you do.
And then the sixth one

Speaker 1 was

Speaker 1 Undiscovered Country, which was with the Klingons and everything. And it was amazing.
It was actually a cool metaphor for the end of the Cold War. And then they went into the next generation ones.

Speaker 1 And even that kind of continued the trend where the seventh one was like a one with Crossover with Kirk and it was weird.

Speaker 1 And then the eighth one was an incredible one called First Contact with the Borg. So it was weird.

Speaker 1 It followed a very strict pattern of people love the even-numbered movies and not the odd ones.

Speaker 1 And I'm one of those people.

Speaker 2 I wonder what the science is behind that.

Speaker 1 I have no idea. I have no idea.

Speaker 2 There's got to be some kind of science.

Speaker 1 Maybe they'd make a bunch of money and then like cut the budget on the next one or whatever.

Speaker 2 So here's the solution is just make sure that like there's a Chris Hemsworth cameo in every single one.

Speaker 1 You know, it's funny too, because Chris Hemsworth in that cast, it's like, that cast is gorgeous for Star Trek, but it's not like the current Hollywood gorgeous.

Speaker 1 Now it's like, it doesn't seem to matter what role it is. Maybe it's because there's so many superhero movies.
Every dude is like super built and ripped. It doesn't matter what part they play.

Speaker 2 I've seen

Speaker 2 like some, you know, complaints online, guys being like, I can't believe like this is like the female gaze is ruining this for us, man.

Speaker 2 Like, it's, it's, this, this is, you know, we're being driven to these completely unrealistic standards.

Speaker 2 And then the response is usually like, um, no, that's the male gaze that's doing that to you guys.

Speaker 2 Like, uh, and the, the, the example I always see posted, I'll I'll see if I can find it because it's hilarious, is, um, I think it's Hugh Jackman was on two magazine covers at the same time.

Speaker 2 One of them was like men's health or something. The other one was like good housekeeping, right? Uh, and on the men's health one, he's got his biceps on and he's ripped and he's like, RAAAAAA!

Speaker 2 He's, you know, he's in like, if he's wearing a shirt, it's like a, like a little tank top, you know, just that just like hugs the muscle.

Speaker 1 He's dehydrated himself for five days in order to be able to shoot this photo shoot.

Speaker 2 Every vein this man has, you can see it. Yeah.
And then there's the good housekeeping, and he's like wearing a button-up shirt.

Speaker 2 And it's like, it's like the sleeves are like, you know, like rolled up to the elbow. And he's got the like smile.

Speaker 2 He's like, you know, like leaning against like the edge of the magazine cover or something, just like, hey, girl.

Speaker 1 He's running like a Christmas tree farm in your hometown you grew up in, that kind of thing.

Speaker 2 He's like, hey, girl, I bought you a Starbucks because I know it's your favorite. You know, like, like, that's it.
So it's like, that's the female gaze.

Speaker 2 The male gaze is like the demanding of the muscles. That's where we've gone.
Not that girls aren't happy to like have a look-see, but that's not the demand.

Speaker 1 Well, to be fair, if I may, I acknowledge what you're saying because there is a thing when you first start going to the gym and people will warn you about it too, which is once you start to build any kind of muscle, then you run into a problem where it's like, you're never big enough.

Speaker 1 And you're never big enough. And a lot of guys fall into it, right?

Speaker 1 Arnold Schwarzenegger talked about it in a documentary that he was in. There's like guys who would like just be in the gym all day.
It really hits some people harder than others.

Speaker 1 And to add a little bit of muscle can take, take, at some levels, can take years to

Speaker 2 unless you're Marvel, right? And then you're hooking people up to like electrons. Right.

Speaker 1 Then it's like 20 minutes with a trainer, I guess. I don't know what it is.
But yeah, but also, I got to be fair, to defend my end of the species here a little bit, there was another thing too.

Speaker 1 We talk a lot about the crossover gaze, like, you know, where the gaze crosses over to the men versus women. There's also a lot of, like you're saying, internal gaze as well.

Speaker 1 There was a guy in Australia, a newscaster, who did a year-long experiment where he wore the same outfit on air every single day for a year.

Speaker 1 And after a year of nobody saying anything about it, he revealed it.

Speaker 1 And the whole thing was, and, you know, my female co-host, if she wore the same outfit twice in six months, she would be blasted for that in the press.

Speaker 1 And every fashionista would be saying, how dare she do this? And it's so unfair. I got to admit, I saw this in the comments.
All the guys in the comments are like, we don't care about, that's not us.

Speaker 1 We didn't notice. We don't care if a lady wears the same outfit twice.
We're not tuned into that at all. That's women on women doing that.

Speaker 2 No, you're right.

Speaker 2 I will give you credit there because I've seen the way that you in particular dress, which is like

Speaker 2 grab shirt, grab trousers. And you're like, do these look okay together? And I'm like, no.
And you're like, nah. And it's like, you know, it's like not a big deal.
Right.

Speaker 2 So I don't see you being, being like, you know, she wore that three months ago. That's really gauche.

Speaker 1 And meanwhile, I'm there going, hey, Ashie, do gray pants go with a gray shirt and a gray jacket? I can't tell.

Speaker 2 No, you're right. So that is something that, like, we do to ourselves while blaming it on guys, I guess.

Speaker 2 That's the, I'm sure that's a, that's a female pressure, especially if you're talking fashion choices.

Speaker 1 It's also, you know, intertwined with everything else and that generates from somewhere. I get it.

Speaker 1 But we do talk about the crossover gaze a lot, not enough what we do to each other, the standards to which we hold one another. That's true.
I got to say, though, too, it's like,

Speaker 1 I was just thinking the other day, let me me ask you this question. This goes back to an etymology question.
So, yesterday, people were saying, like, there is a word for giving people water.

Speaker 1 It's the word hydrate. And they were showing the dictionary definition of the word hydrate.
There's a lot of words that the definition of it can match it. It's not the word we use for that.

Speaker 1 Like, I don't talk about hydrating the kids. Like, that's not, oh, we're going out with the soccer team.
We better hydrate them some Gatorade or hydrate them with Gatorade.

Speaker 2 You also got to watch out because there's technically correct, and then there's the ways in which you,

Speaker 2 I guess, think of the word in your head, like with the context or just the way that you're used to using the word in the real world, outside of the dictionaries.

Speaker 2 You know, if you're not careful, you're like, can you quench that guy for me? And they're going to get Gatorade over the head. I'm pretty sure that's how it started.

Speaker 2 Someone just misunderstood everything. And now winners are just getting dunked with Gatorade because someone used the wrong word somewhere.

Speaker 1 Like, I fed the kids hungry, so I fed the kids hot dogs. The kids were thirsty, so I hydrated them Gatorie.
No, that's not.

Speaker 2 So I hydrated them.

Speaker 1 No, it's by the way, I got lost in the weeds yesterday. I was talking to you about it.
I was convinced.

Speaker 1 I was convinced we had had that conversation before and I was trying to find it in the transcription database.

Speaker 1 And I was like, I don't want to, if we talked about this before, that there's no word for giving someone liquid versus giving them food.

Speaker 1 I was actually confusing with another conversation we had where there's a word for being hungry. But I need food.
There's a word for being thirsty. Yes.
I need liquid. There's no word for

Speaker 1 adjective description for I have to go to the bathroom, which is a basic human function. It's like, that's it.
I have to go.

Speaker 2 Like, I need to.

Speaker 1 I'm full. I'm like,

Speaker 1 there's no word. It's weird that there's no word for the condition of I have to go use the restroom.

Speaker 2 I'm bowly.

Speaker 1 Yeah, right.

Speaker 2 Yeah, okay. I don't have one for that.

Speaker 1 I'm fascinated by things for which we just never came up with a word for.

Speaker 2 And that's a fairly common condition.

Speaker 1 And I get that hydrate. Yes, the definition of it does match what we're talking about.

Speaker 1 It's not the word we use. Probably the word moisturize also fits the same definition.
You wouldn't say, I'm going to moisturize the city of Tehran.

Speaker 2 Yeah, but you also like, I would associate that. You're right.
But I would associate that more with the outside. Once again, like

Speaker 2 drenching. It's like you can drink something, but if you say drench, I'm assuming outside.
That's an external thing that happens outside the body.

Speaker 1 But enough of this defensive tangent that we're on. I have a question about this etymology question again.
Okay, so what do you call, because this is a regional thing in the U.S.,

Speaker 1 what do you call

Speaker 1 when someone wears denim pants and a denim shirt um what do you call that uh canadian tuxedo i don't you know i don't know why either because i don't actually associate denim heavily with canada but it's just always been called a canadian tuxedo that's what i'm that's what i'm getting at because where i grew up was called a canadian tuxedo and then when i moved to texas it was called people would call it a texas tuxedo i actually like the alliteration there so that like let's just keep it it's funny to me though that like in different regions that we have a word for someone wearing a denim top and a denim pair of pants

Speaker 1 a denim tuxedo that that's something that is um both so specific and so widespread that it has its own specific terms and like are there people other people who call like in california they call it a washington tuxedo or something like that

Speaker 1 let me look this up okay so from this is from i andpen.com.

Speaker 1 Oh, it's actually, that's actually the only two words. I guess I just grew up in the two regions where they have the two different terms.

Speaker 1 The main difference between a Texas tuxedo and a Canadian tuxedo is that a Texas tuxedo pairs a denim shirt with denim jeans, while a Canadian tuxedo pairs a denim jacket and denim jeans.

Speaker 2 Okay. All right.
So, so yes, that's a little more formal. That's the, it's the Justin Timberlake look.

Speaker 1 Right, Brittany Spears.

Speaker 1 Speaking of beautiful people, but that's guys.

Speaker 1 Like, even like you talk about fashion with guys, the existence of the tuxedo says everything you need to know about most guys fashion right the fact that there's a like you wear this thing okay and that's it it's like oh and i can maybe slightly vary the color i've never gotten a wedding invitation where they they tell women to all wear the exact same thing right like everyone wear the little black dress i guess like yeah the little black dress would be the equivalent-ish of that i mean kind of even so there's a lot of variation in what the little black dress is is it like is it tight is it loose does it have sleeves?

Speaker 2 Does it go, is it floor length or is it short? Like there's a lot of variation in the concept of the little black dress, right?

Speaker 2 Whereas like tuxedo feels like a fairly static thing, aside from some very creative outliers on like the red carpet,

Speaker 2 the tuxedo is like a thing.

Speaker 1 Here's what they should do for wedding invitations from now on. This is what they should do.

Speaker 1 You should send a wedding invitation and at the bottom, it should have the dress code, like cocktail sunset formal, which every guy's like, what? What does that mean?

Speaker 1 This is immediately like a math problem. I have to figure out.
They should do that and keep it fancy and nice.

Speaker 1 What they should also do for every guy in the world is include a picture of a guy wearing something and like, you have to wear this. And the guy's like, thank you.

Speaker 2 I'll wear that. I got this.

Speaker 1 This I can do.

Speaker 1 I need a picture.

Speaker 1 Too many words. I need a picture with my wedding invitation.

Speaker 1 Just show me what I should look like. And I'll show up like that.

Speaker 2 Attached is a link to the Pinterest gallery.

Speaker 1 No, that's too much work.

Speaker 1 I need like a children's book photo. The words are for everybody else.
Just give me the photo.

Speaker 2 Dress like this.

Speaker 1 If you want to really help me out, the guy in the photo wearing whatever I'm supposed to wear should also be pointing to a watch that says

Speaker 1 when the wedding is

Speaker 2 and holding up a map that says where it is.

Speaker 1 That's it. That's all I need.
Also, tell me how much I should spend on a gift. That's it.
That's all I need. Tell me directly.

Speaker 1 Don't play these games with like flowery, like thick-lined paper with foil on it. Just tell me what I need to do for fuck's sake.

Speaker 2 It's wasted on him. It's wasted.
It's too much work.

Speaker 2 Too much work. All right, well, I want to say a big thank you to some people who are never too much work.

Speaker 2 Sam and Ryan Hathaway, thank you both so much for sponsoring this episode of our show at patreon.com slash morningsomewhere and roosterteeth.com.

Speaker 1 All right, well, that does it for us

Speaker 1 this week ending November 14th. Check the site this weekend for the first episode.
Red vs. Blue Restoration.
And if you're a sponsor, the full movie will be up. That does it for us.

Speaker 1 We're going to be back to talk to you on Monday. We hope you will be here as well.
Bye, everybody.