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Insights Into Entertainment: Episode 129 ”Dusting Off The Old Favorites”

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Today in our Disney Detective, Wonder Woman and the Evil Queen, and can the Main Street Electrical Parade solve Disney’s problems yet again?

In our Tales from the Edge of the Galaxy, an unnecessary origin story for an irrelevant character, plus is there an Old Republic movie in the works?

And for our Entertainment News, Netflix maybe coming to Jersey and the unfortunate passing of Dean Stockwell

And as always we’ll finish up with our Insightful Picks of the week….and some afterthoughts

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Show Notes

[INTRO THEME]

[INTRODUCTIONS] (2-3 minutes)

  • Insights Into Entertainment: Episode 129 “Dusting Off The Old Favorites”
  • My dedicated and talented co-host Michelle Whalen

[SHOW SUMMARY] (2-3 minutes)

  • Today in our Disney Detective, Wonder Woman and the Evil Queen, and can the Main Street Electrical Parade solve Disney’s problems yet again?
  • In our Tales from the Edge of the Galaxy, an unnecessary origin story for an irrelevant character, plus is there an Old Republic movie in the works?
  • And for our Entertainment News, Netflix maybe coming to Jersey and the unfortunate passing of Dean Stockwell
  • And as always we’ll finish up with our Insightful Picks of the week….and some afterthoughts

[Show Plugs] (2-3 minutes)

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[TRANSITION]

[SEGMENT 1: Disney Detective] (8-12 minutes)

  • Wonder Woman’s Gal Gadot Will Play One Of The All Time Great Disney Villains In An Upcoming Remake
  • https://www.cinemablend.com/movies/wonder-womans-gal-gadot-will-play-one-of-the-all-time-great-disney-villains-in-an-upcoming-remake
  • https://bit.ly/3D3iNSd 
    • Back in June, it was announced that Disney’s upcoming live-action remake of Snow White had found its star to play the titular lead, as the production hired Rachel Zegler to play the beloved princess. She will be playing Maria in the upcoming adaptation of West Side Story
      • The actor has spent the months since then as the only member of the cast, but now that has changed in a major way, as the news has broken that Gal Gadot has come aboard the upcoming blockbuster to play the role of the Evil Queen.
    • The Hollywood Reporter has shared the latest update about the Disney production, which has Amazing Spider-Man director Marc Webb at the helm. 
      • The film marks the second time that Gal Gadot has been a part of a project at the studio, as she previously voiced a character in 2018’s Ralph Breaks The Internet.
    • Known for her spectacularly intense vanity, the Evil Queen in the tale of Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs is famous for her regular check-ins with her Magic Mirror, requesting affirmation that she is the “fairest of them all.” 
      • When her enchanted looking glass one day returns the unfortunate news that the story’s eponymous protagonist has her beat in the looks department, the wicked royal makes plans to kill her – though those machinations don’t quite work out as planned.
    • Gal Gadot will be the third actress in the last decade to take on the role of the Evil Queen in Snow White in a Motion Picture – though her portrayal will be the first to be specifically based on the classic version of the character from the animated Disney film from 1937. 
      • Charlize Theron played the part, named Ravenna, in 2012’s Snow White And The Huntsman, starring opposite Kristen Stewart. 
      • Later that same year Julia Roberts played “The Queen” in Mirror Mirror with Lily Collins.
      • One of our favorites from TV to play the Evil Queen was Lana Parrilla, from Once Upon a Time
      • It should be a cool opportunity for Gal Gadot, as a number of big stars have made an impression playing live-action Disney villains in the last few years – a couple of the most notable being Angelina Jolie as Maleficent, Emma Stone as Cruella de Vil, and Cate Blanchett as the wicked stepmother in Cinderella.
    • With production on Marc Webb’s Snow White not set to start up until next year, it’s probably going to be a minute before fans get to see Gal Gadot in action as the Evil Queen – but the good news is that the wait for new Gadot content in general isn’t long at all. 
      • The Wonder Woman star has two movies set to debut in the next four months, the first of which is coming next week. 
      • Red Notice, which co-stars Dwayne Johnson and Ryan Reynolds, will arrive on Netflix on Friday, November 12, and Death On The Nile (the sequel to Murder On The Orient Express), is scheduled to hit theaters on February 11, 2022.
  • Disneyland is bringing back the Main Street Electrical Parade. Some say it’s too small a goodwill gesture.
  • https://www.sfgate.com/disneyland/article/Disneyland-is-bringing-back-the-Main-Street-16566121.php?fbclid=IwAR2FaYkWf-e1Q6_16jSDtxbdK8KMQaY5T6ow7W-DyW3kQ3krlM9crtEepu8
  • https://bit.ly/3qkBXzI 
    • The optics for the recent developments at Disneyland have not been pretty lately. 
      • Sold-out Magic Key annual passes. 
      • Parking price hikes. 
      • A new, highest-price-ever ticket for the most in-demand days like holidays. 
      • At least two more months without parking trams.
      • And that’s all just this week.
    • But there’s one bright spot in all of this, literally: The Main Street Electrical Parade appears to be coming back to the park soon. 
      • The iconic and much-beloved parade started at Disneyland in 1972, ran through 1996 and features what’s believed to be approximately 500,000 light bulbs on its floats, which depict iconic scenes from movies like “Peter Pan” and “Alice in Wonderland.” 
    • According to Disney blog Allears.net, when it was retired, the parade “had been performed almost 3,600 times for more than 75 million guests.”
      • Disney hinted at the parade’s return on TikTok this morning via a video of a sparkling snail, one of the Electrical Parade floats, headed towards a Disneyland truck, followed by the message “to be continued.” 
      • Fan reception on social media has been positive, but many have been wondering whether it’s a move designed to engender goodwill towards the company in the midst of such a prolonged bad news cycle (including an ongoing lawsuit in which 25,000 cast members are suing Disneyland for a living wage).
        • “There are few guarantees in life,” @MadnessKingdom tweeted, “but Disney trotting out the Main Street Electrical Parade whenever they’re having some sort of trouble at the California parks is one of them.”
    • The move wouldn’t be without precedent. Disneyland has a history of using this particular parade to smooth over rough patches at the park. 
      • When the park retired the parade in 1996, the company used the idea that it was the last chance to see it to create a huge boost in attendance and profits. 
      • Then in 2001, it brought the then-retired parade to Disney California Adventure to combat lackluster attendance numbers. 
      • There, it became Disney’s Electrical Parade since California Adventure doesn’t have a Main Street. 
        • “Disney’s California Adventure opened in February 2001,” Disneyland history blog Yesterland wrote. “When expected attendance levels failed to materialize, [the park] had to take quick action. It’s not surprising that their first big initiative involved the Main Street Electrical Parade.
        • “If killing the parade could work such wonders, how about bringing it back from the dead?”
    • Although the parade was popular enough to keep it around for several years at California Adventure, it didn’t solve the underlying issues with the park. 
      • “If the parade was meant to provide an instant fix to the park’s attendance problems, it failed,” Yesterland wrote. 
      • Main Street Electrical Parade also made brief reappearances in Disneyland Park in 2017 and 2019. 
    • Considering the Walt Disney Company’s enormous year-over-year profit and the launch of paid fast passes earlier this month, some Disney fans have noted that this parade — using equipment that’s existed for nearly 50 years and requires no real investment of time or finances that a new show would demand — feels convenient.
      • “Is this just a new [and] inexpensive way to get a parade going?” one commenter on the TikTok asked.
      • “Y’all made your customers angry so you gotta drag this out again, huh?” another questioned.
      • “I’m in the most toxic abusive relationship ever with Disney,” another said. “Raise prices but wait I love you here’s the MSEP.”

[AD 1: SSE]

[SEGMENT 2: Tales from the Edge of the Galaxy] (8-12 minutes)

  • ‘Star Wars’ Reveals The Full Origin Story For Supreme Leader Snoke
  • https://insidethemagic.net/2021/10/star-wars-snoke-origin-story-th1/?fbclid=IwAR0lmFdLPb4R09GObMq10HORqGCnocBtjBL1C0HfU1ZjzYaoYXmApGITMks
  • https://bit.ly/3C3M8uz 
    • It has been almost two years since the finale to the Skywalker Saga, Star Wars: Episode IX — The Rise of Skywalker, debuted in theaters. 
      • JJ Abrams’ movie, for some fans, further tarnished the reputation of the Star Wars franchise, leading to a call for a rewrite of the entire sequel trilogy.
    • While some praised the reprisal of the villain, Emperor Palpatine AKA Darth Sidious played by Ian McDiarmid, others saw it as a complete U-turn on the sequel trilogy’s direction, especially after Rian Johnson’s Star Wars: Episode VIII — The Last Jedi killed off its antagonist, Supreme Leader Snoke. 
      • Now, Star Wars has given an in-depth account of Snoke’s origins. Finally.
    • Supreme Leader Snoke played by Andy Serkis first appeared in Disney and Lucasfilm’s first Star Wars venture, Star Wars: Episode VII — The Force Awakens in 2015 as the leader of the First Order, alongside General Hux played by Domhnall Gleeson and master of Kylo Ren portrayed by Adam Driver.
      • It was Johnson’s sequel that flipped the franchise on its head after killing Snoke with a lightsaber and teaming up Ren and Daisy Ridley’s Rey in an impressive battle sequence. 
      • This shocking moment was just one of the polarizing parts of the sequel trilogy’s sophomore Star Wars movie.
    • The Star Wars galaxy hasn’t really been the same since. 
      • Projects like showrunner Jon Favreau’s and executive producer Dave Filoni’s The Mandalorian have started to stitch the fandom back together with new adventures happening somewhat separately from the franchise’s trilogies. 
      • One contentious part of the saga though is still the plot holes and retcons of The Rise of Skywalker.
    • Star Wars often uses multimedia to further explore and explain events in the movies. 
      • Just recently they announced a brand-new Luke Skywalker project set in between the events of Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens which is said to include elements of the Sith Order and Exegol — the Sith hideaway prominently featured in The Rise of Skywalker where Palpatine was located.
    • Now, Star Wars has revealed a more detailed account of Palpatine’s cloning process on Exegol, the Sith Eternal, and how he managed to coordinate his return to power and control of the First Order. 
      • For context, it was only a few months ago that Star Wars quietly confirmed that Snoke was an “evil duplicate” of Palpatine for the first time in canon.
    • Star Wars fans can rejoice as more information has come to light surrounding this “duplicate” villain. 
      • Thanks to Jacob’s Quest (@JacobsQuest) on Twitter, who has shared excerpts of the new book Star Wars: Secrets of the Sith, we now know the full origin story of Supreme Leader Snoke.
    • We can see from the information here, and straight from the source too as the Star Wars book, Secrets of the Sith is narrated by Palpatine himself, that Snoke was a “temporary measure at best”. The excerpt of part of Snoke’s backstory reads:
      • My new body’s deformities were severe. 
      • Unable to leave Exegol, I would have to spread my influence across the galaxy through less direct means. 
      • As part of their genetic experiments, my followers had attempted to create another being that came to be known as Snoke.
      • Although his body proved unworthy of containing my dark essence, Snoke’s natural sensitivity to the Force would make him a powerful puppet nonetheless. 
      • Through my manipulation of Snoke, I began gathering forces, building an army capable of opposing the New Republic that had risen in my absence. 
      • Through Snoke, I would make certain that the First Order would be mine to control.
    • Palpatine’s declaration that Snoke was a “temporary measure” is sure to take on a rather meta meaning for Star Wars fans, as the sequel trilogy’s muddled storyline perfectly demonstrated what “temporary” means. 
      • Marc Sumerak’s Secrets of the Sith also recently gave fans their first canon look at Sheev Palpatine’s master, Darth Plagueis, in a new image featuring Darth Sidious and Darth Vader.
      • The section goes on to discuss Palpatine’s “son” and how this cloned subject eventually led him to the “Heir to the Empire”, his “granddaughter”, Rey. 
      • Many fans will know the outcome of Rey’s discovery of Palpatine, her Force Dyad with Ben Solo AKA Kylo Ren, and the reasoning behind her abandonment on the planet, Jakku. 
      • The conclusion was cluttered with unwarranted reveals but at least now, fans can rest easy knowing the full thought process behind the creation of Supreme Leader Snoke, at least from Palpatine’s perspective.
    • Ostensibly, Star Wars has been hinting at Palpatine’s survival and his cloning experiments in both The Mandalorian through the inclusion of Grogu AKA “Baby Yoda” and Dr. Pershing’s mysterious infatuation with him, and in Filoni’s The Bad Batch. 
      • The latter saw the Star Wars Legends location, Mount Tantiss, appear, which has ties to Emperor Palpatine and to Grand Admiral Thrawn’s cloning program…
  • Did a Star Wars Old Republic Movie Replace Rogue Squadron?
  • https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/star-wars-old-republic-movie-rogue-squadron/ 
  • https://bit.ly/3qrzvaI
    • The big Star Wars news of the week: Rogue Squadron, the movie helmed by Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins, has been delayed from its 2023 release date. 
      • The Hollywood Reporter reports that Jenkins’ other commitments, including Wonder Woman 3, will prevent her from being able to film the first post-Skywalker Saga Star Wars movie next year.
    • Since this was the only upcoming Star Wars film with a confirmed release date, this now potentially leaves the franchise’s theatrical side in limbo. 
      • But if another rumor that’s spread through social media over the past few days is to be believed, there may be more to this delay than meets the eye.
    • On Friday, Twitter user @BigScreenLeaks, who has recently scooped details about upcoming Marvel and Star Wars releases claimed that a new Star Wars movie would film in 2022, and that it wasn’t a project announced at Disney’s Investors Day broadcast last year.
      • Adam Frazier at Slashfilm, retweeted and responded to @BigScreenLeaks’s claim with his own cryptic message, suggesting that the unannounced movie would be set during the Old Republic era before the events of the Skywalker Saga.
    • The Hollywood Reporter confirmed that Rogue Squadron would no longer be shooting next year. 
      • As yet no major news outlets have confirmed the rumors
      • However, this isn’t the first time we’ve heard that Lucasfilm is making an Old Republic movie. 
      • In 2019, Buzzfeed reported that Lucasfilm was developing a Knights of the Old Republic movie.
      • The report followed Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy’s own acknowledgement that the studio was thinking of how to do more KotOR: 
        • Kennedy said in an interview at the time “Yes, we are developing something to look at. Right now I have no idea where things might fall, but we have to be careful that there is a cadence to Star Wars that doesn’t start to feel like too much.”
      • Lucasfilm has yet to officially confirm that an Old Republic movie is in development. 
    • Could this turn out of be part one of Rian Johnson’s long-lost trilogy of Star Wars movies that was announced in 2017? 
      • GOD I hope not!
      • Fortunately for Star Wars fans he is busy with his Knives Out sequels for Netflix. 
    • The pace at which things seem to be moving in the galaxy far, far away right now is at least compelling, and making the lead up to all the Disney+ Day news much more exciting. 
      • We’ll know what’s what on Friday at 9 am ET, which is when Disney plans to drop all of its big updates on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.

[AD 2: TEENS]

[SEGMENT 3: Entertainment News] (8-12 minutes)

  • Netflix Wants to Turn New Jersey Army Base Into Film, TV Studio
  • https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-10-26/netflix-wants-to-turn-new-jersey-army-base-into-film-tv-studio
  • https://bloom.bg/3D6gLki 
    • Netflix Inc. is looking to acquire an old army base in New Jersey and turn it into a large production facility for film and TV projects.
      • The streaming company will bid on a 289-acre (117 hectares) chunk of Fort Monmouth, a 96-year-old army base that closed in 2011. 
      • The property is about 50 miles south of New York City. The facility would be one of Netflix’s largest in the U.S., second only to its hub in New Mexico, according to the New York Times, which reported on the plans earlier Tuesday.
    • Unlike most of its rivals, Netflix doesn’t own a large Los Angeles studio and has leased or acquired production space all over the world as it has scaled up production. 
      • The company opened a facility in New York earlier this year, but the New Jersey space would dwarf that.
    • The bidding process opened on Oct. 16 and runs through early next year, Netflix said.
      • New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy has been courting Hollywood studios for a couple of years, pitching his state as a business-friendly alternative to production hotspots like Georgia and New York.
    • “America’s first movie studio was in New Jersey, and today it’s home to many talented people working in entertainment,” Netflix said in a statement. 
      • “Governor Murphy and the state’s legislative leaders have created a business environment that’s welcomed film and television production back to the state, and we’re excited to submit our bid to transform Fort Monmouth into a state-of-the-art production facility.”
  • ‘Quantum Leap’ actor Dean Stockwell has died at age 85
  • https://www.npr.org/2021/11/09/1053851755/blue-velvet-and-quantum-leap-actor-dean-stockwell-has-died-at-age-85
  • https://n.pr/3kq94Oy
    • Actor Dean Stockwell, known for his roles in Quantum Leap and Blue Velvet, has died. 
      • He was 85 years old. 
      • According to family spokesman Jay D. Schwartz, he died of natural causes at his home in Hollywood, Calif., on Sunday morning.
    • Born Robert Dean Stockwell, the Academy Award nominee had multiple careers in acting. 
      • He started as a child actor. 
      • At age 7, he was working alongside Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly in Anchors Away. 
      • By the time he was 11, he had a star-making role in the 1948 antiwar film The Boy With Green Hair. 
      • The movie turned Stockwell into something of a star, and he felt ostracized.
        • “Wherever I went, I was treated as something different,” Stockwell told WHYY’s Fresh Air in 1988. 
        • “I didn’t feel marked for something special. 
        • I felt I was being treated as something special then, and I didn’t like it and I wanted to get out of it.”
    • After he graduated high school at age 16, Stockwell changed his name and left Hollywood. 
      • He eventually found his way back to acting, notably in Sidney Lumet’s Long Day’s Journey Into Night from 1962, but spent the majority of this stretch of his career in television. 
      • By the late ’60s, he once again dropped out of acting for a few years. 
      • When he returned, he found work hard to get.
    • Stockwell nearly changed careers altogether in the ’80s. 
      • He got his real estate license in New Mexico, and ran an ad for himself in Variety. 
      • Instead, that led to a string of memorable movie roles in Wim Wenders’ Paris, Texas, David Lynch’s Dune and Blue Velvet, Robert Altman’s The Player and Jonathan Demme’s Married to the Mob—the last netting him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor.
    • Stockwell was perhaps best known for his role as Admiral Al Calavicci on the sci-fi television series Quantum Leap, which ran for five seasons. 
      • He’d go on to roles in such shows as The Tony Danza Show, JAG, and the acclaimed 2000s run of Battlestar Galactica. 
      • After that he slowed down on acting yet again—this time to focus on his career in visual arts, working mainly with paper collage.
    • He is survived by his wife, Joy Stockwell, and their two children, Austin Stockwell and Sophie Stockwell.

[TRANSITION]

[SEGMENT 4: Insightful Picks of the Week] (8-12 minutes)

  • Michelle 
    • “La Brea” – NBC
    • https://www.nbc.com/la-brea/about
    • https://bit.ly/3koS4bP 
      • When a massive sinkhole opens in the middle of Los Angeles at the site of the La Brea Tar Pits and Wilshire Boulevard, hundreds of people and buildings (including the distinctive Petersen Automotive Museum) are pulled into its depths. The survivors find themselves trapped in a mysterious and dangerous primeval land where they must band together to survive. The show follows one family (father, mother, son, and daughter) who are separated by the events and attempting to reunite. The father has visions providing glimpses of when and where his wife and son are. The sinkhole and the sudden appearance of the Teratornis has attracted the attention of the United States Department of Homeland Security who are studying a similar event in the Mojave Desert.
  • Joe
    • Third Eye Spies
    • Amazon Prime Video
    • https://www.amazon.com/Third-Eye-Spies-Russell-Targ/dp/B07T6DZZBB 
    • https://amzn.to/3bYVdKQ 
      • For more than 20 years the CIA studied psychic abilities for use in their top-secret spy program. With previously classified details about ESP now finally coming to light, there can be no more secrets.
        • Two physicists discover psychic abilities are real only to have their experiments at Stanford co-opted by the CIA and their research silenced by the demands of secrecy. 
        • Yet, as both these ‘remote viewers’ and the audience learn, the ‘more you hide something, the more it shines like a beacon in psychic space and this ancient truth can no longer be suppressed.’ 
        • The true story of Russell Targ and America’s cold war psychic spies, disclosed and declassified for the first time, with evidence presented by a Nobel Laureate, an Apollo Astronaut, and the military and scientific community that has been suppressed for nearly 30 years, now able to speak for the first time. 
        • Targ’s understated mantra that “the evidence for extra sensory perception is overwhelming and shows a talent we all share and deserve to know about, leaves us not just with a greater understanding of this unique chapter in U.S. history, but perhaps most importantly a greater understanding of who we are and our larger connection to the world. 
        • The CIA, NSA and DIA used it, your tax dollars paid for it, and now you deserve to know about it.
      • This documentary might just be enough to turn the non-believer into a disciple of ESP.
      • Through a collection of interviews, stock footage and recently revealed documents it tells a compelling story.
      • While the evidence provided for these remote viewing powers is historical and there’s no contemporary demonstrations of such phenomenon in the program the viewer must trust the information present here in order to buy into the reality of whether ESP exists or not.
      • However, there is ample evidence presented here to suggest that the United States government not only believed in ESP, they invested heavily in it.
      • I’m not sure I’m100% on board with the everything in the documentary.
      • They provide a compelling story, and if nothing else it makes for a great cold war thriller the likes of a Tom Clancy novel.
      • But they started to lose me when they interviewed Uri Geller as a purported psychic agent of the Israli government
        • Geller, if you don’t know, is a somewhat well known illusionist, magician and television personality who claims to be psychic.
        • He’s famous, or perhaps infamous for his spoon bending illusions which have been debunked as just simple conjuring and slight of hand tricks.
      • Up until Geller appeared the program seemed to have some legitimate weight, assuming you could believe what they were presenting.
        • Sadly the Geller arrival kind of killed the possibility of realism for me
      • But don’t let that dissuade you, if nothing else the program made for an interesting story.

[TRANSITION]

After Thoughts

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  • Action News anchor Jim Gardner dials back schedule, prepares for retirement
  • https://6abc.com/jim-gardner-retirement-action-news-anchor-6abc-philadelphia-tv-station/11220502/ 
  • https://6abc.cm/3wBQckU 
    • Longtime 6abc/WPVI-TV veteran Jim Gardner announced he is dialing back his schedule with Action News and plans to retire at the end of 2022 after more than four decades in broadcast.
      • Earlier today, Gardner informed his colleagues of his decision to reduce his schedule by continuing to anchor the 6 p.m. newscast but no longer anchoring the 11 p.m. newscast. 
      • His last late newscast is scheduled for early January. 
      • The Network will announce his replacement in the coming months.
    • “It’s hard to imagine that I have had the opportunity to spend a professional lifetime with colleagues so committed, resourceful and wonderful. 
    • They have taught me so much about television journalism and about myself. 
    • I am profoundly grateful,” said Gardner.
      • “I have spent most of my adult life at Action News, and many of our viewers have grown up and experienced life along with me and the on-air team I’ve worked side-by-side with. 
      • I’ve been blessed to raise a family here and to be a member of this community over the past 45 years. 
      • I feel I have a special relationship with our viewers and the communities we serve, and I plan to continue to enjoy every minute with them over the next year.”
    • Gardner has held the long-tenured position of anchor of Action News at 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. since May 11, 1977, after joining WPVI as a reporter and anchor during Noon newscast on June 1, 1976.
    • Bernie Prazenica, president and general manager of WPVI, shared his thoughts: 
      • “For many of us, Jim is the last news voice we hear before ending our day. 
      • He has guided us through the good and the bad with calm confidence for more than 40 years, often reassuring us that tomorrow will bring a better day. 
      • His presence will be missed by our viewers and by all of us at 6abc. 
      • Thankfully, we have another year with him during the 6 p.m. newscast, and we look forward to his continued presence and leadership.”
    • Gardner received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Columbia University in 1970. 
      • Following his graduation, Gardner worked briefly on the radio at the all-news WINS Radio in New York and later WFAS Radio in White Plains, New York.
      • He began his television broadcast career at WKBW-TV in Buffalo before joining WPVI, where he remained for more than four decades.
  • 6 HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE BOOK OF BOBA FETT TRAILER
  • https://www.starwars.com/news/the-book-of-boba-fett-trailer-key-art
  • https://bit.ly/30l1i1H 
    • First teased in a surprise end-credit sequence following the Season 2 finale of The Mandalorian, The Book of Boba Fett continues the adventures of Boba and Fennec Shand as they navigate the underworld and stake their claim on the territory once ruled by Jabba the Hutt and his crime syndicate.
      • Now with our first glimpse at the series, we find Boba Fett looking to make his mark through unity and respect instead of sheer domination. 
    • 1. Return to Jabba’s palace.
      • With a B’omarr monk skittering across the sand, we’re transported back to Tatooine and the palace where Jabba the Hutt once reigned. 
      • But it quickly becomes clear that things have changed since the days when the slimy crime boss was collecting carbonite scoundrels as wall décor and sending anyone who crossed him into the pit with his pet rancor.
    • 2. “Jabba ruled with fear. I intend to rule with respect.”
      • An empty throne, a tense standoff, and Boba Fett showing he isn’t hiding behind his dented helmet punctuate this simple creed. 
      • And with a sideways glance, it seems his partner, the fearless Fennec Shand, is ready for wherever this new adventure takes them.
    • 3. Friends or enemies?
      • From an Ithorian of some authority to a table of former Hutt allies, the trailer is filled with familiar alien species among the denizens of the underworld. 
      • But who among this hive of scum and villainy will prove to be friends or foes?
    • 4. That score.
      • Building on the music that reintroduced the bounty hunter in The Mandalorian, the stringed composition playing throughout the trailer is gritty with a sense of urgency.
    • 5. Surrounded!
      • Boba and Fennec are outnumbered, but that doesn’t mean the two scrappy survivors are outmatched. 
      • Not by a long shot. 
      • Just one look at Temuera Morrison’s wide-eyed rage and you know whoever picked that fight with Boba is in trouble now.
    • 6. “If you had spoken such insolence to Jabba, he’d have fed you to his menagerie.”
      • It’s a great line spoken with precision calm by Ming-Na Wen as Fennec Shand. 
      • A statement or a threat? 
      • We’ll have to watch the series to find out…
    • The Book of Boba Fett stars Temuera Morrison and Ming-Na Wen and premiers on Disney+ on December 29th.
  • In the late ’70s and early ’80s, playing Dungeons & Dragons was all the rage across America. 
    • Back in the day, the TSR Inc.-produced roleplaying game became a true cultural phenomenon, fascinating teens and adults alike. 
    • And like any good pop culture obsession back then, it had an officially licensed magazine to go along with it. 
    • Starting in 1976, TSR published Dragon magazine, the monthly guide to all things D&D. 
    • And if you’re wondering, yes, there was a companion magazine called Dungeon.
  • Now, thanks to Boing Boing, we’ve discovered that someone has dug up some old Dragon pages that showcase the stats of some very unusual (but famous) playable characters. 
    • In the April 1981 issue of Dragon, issue 41 to be exact, many iconic cartoon characters had their official stats published. 
    • These include Warner Bros. animated characters like Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Marvin the Martian, and the Tasmanian Devil. 
    • They describe Bugs as “the last of a race of Lepus Sapiens,” and a native of “the Plane of Kartuwin.” (We see what you did there). 
    • He is, of course, Chaotic Good.
  • Popeye the Sailor Man also joined in the fun, as did Donald Duck a year later. 
    • We can’t help but wonder how Disney felt about one of their characters in a magazine celebrating a game that many parents in America labeled as “Satanic.” 
    • Dragon gave them the title of “Saturday Morning Monsters.” Even corporate mascots made the cut. 
      • Because the Jolly Green Giant had an entry too. 
      • Although really, a green giant who shouts “Ho-Ho-Ho” seems tailor-made for the fantasy world of Dungeons & Dragons already. 
      • He just needs a battle ax.
  • This kind of flagrant copywriter violation would almost assuredly not happen now. 
    • But this was a different era, before the internet. 
    • And it probably all flew under the radar. 
    • Still, we hope there was a D&D campaign where the noble Bugs and his knight-in-arms Daffy took on Popeye of the High Seas and champions Rocky and Bullwinkle. 
    • Maybe we see it in a future season on Stanger Things? 
    • If so, here’s hoping Dustin gets dibs on Daffy Duck.
  • The post 40-Year-Old D&D Magazine Has Stats for Cartoon Characters appeared first on Nerdist.
Transcription

00:00:02:02 – 00:00:08:06
Michelle
Insightful podcasts. By informative host.

00:00:15:13 – 00:00:17:04
Michelle
Insights into things.

00:00:18:12 – 00:00:19:19
Michelle
A podcast network.

00:00:21:25 – 00:00:22:04
Joseph
And.

00:00:28:06 – 00:00:48:08
Michelle
Welcome to Insights into Entertainment, a podcast series taking a deeper look into entertainment and media. Your hosts, Joseph and Michelle Whalen, a husband and wife team of pop culture fanatics are exploring all things from music and movies to television and fandom.

00:00:51:08 – 00:01:04:01
Joseph
Welcome new insights into entertainment, this is episode 129, dusting off the old favorites I’m your host, Joseph Whalen, and my dedicated and talented co-host Michelle Rowland.

00:01:05:00 – 00:01:06:00
Michelle
Hi, everyone.

00:01:06:01 – 00:01:06:07
Joseph
How are you.

00:01:06:07 – 00:01:07:03
Joseph
Doing today, dear.

00:01:08:01 – 00:01:09:24
Michelle
Kind of awake, but not really.

00:01:10:10 – 00:01:15:10
Joseph
We’ll take kind of it’s better than average, I think on yeah.

00:01:15:10 – 00:01:17:20
Michelle
Yeah, it’s been. It’s been a long couple of weeks.

00:01:17:22 – 00:01:20:11
Joseph
It has. We were off last week.

00:01:20:12 – 00:01:21:08
Joseph
Right, right.

00:01:21:26 – 00:01:27:13
Joseph
And then we had a long weekend this weekend, right? Our last band competition.

00:01:27:13 – 00:01:32:02
Michelle
Yes, we are officially done with this season of marching band.

00:01:32:03 – 00:01:35:25
Joseph
Yes, we are. So we will.

00:01:36:21 – 00:01:38:01
Michelle
Kind of kind of.

00:01:38:12 – 00:01:40:10
Joseph
Take some time and enjoy it.

00:01:40:19 – 00:01:41:00
Joseph
Right?

00:01:41:04 – 00:01:42:26
Joseph
Was it set up again in March? I think.

00:01:43:00 – 00:01:48:22
Michelle
Oh, maybe. Probably sooner than.

00:01:49:08 – 00:01:49:15
Joseph
We.

00:01:49:16 – 00:01:52:04
Joseph
Probably we have a little. We have a little time.

00:01:52:05 – 00:02:05:27
Michelle
A little a little reprieve. And really, we’re not the ones that are, you know, it’s we’re more the the back and forth getting her there. So, you know, it’s a well-deserved break for for her and all the other.

00:02:05:27 – 00:02:06:08
Joseph
Kids.

00:02:06:08 – 00:02:20:16
Joseph
Although I do have to say I was kind of surprised at the amount of. Interaction on the parents, and it was more than I had originally expected.

00:02:20:26 – 00:02:43:11
Michelle
Well, and not to to really get into this because it just so happens that next week. That’s true on insights into teens. You’re going to be doing a podcast about marching band. And as I was kind of briefly explaining to somebody, I said, it’s it’s as rigorous as a sport because there’s so much involved with practice and

00:02:43:11 – 00:02:48:23
Michelle
things like that. But when you go to competitions and do things, it’s very much a family.

00:02:48:26 – 00:02:51:26
Joseph
Yes, it’s a very supportive community, right?

00:02:51:27 – 00:02:53:23
Michelle
Among other bands like.

00:02:53:23 – 00:02:57:04
Joseph
You have rivals, but there isn’t a rivalry atmosphere.

00:02:57:05 – 00:02:57:15
Joseph
Right?

00:02:57:16 – 00:03:02:25
Michelle
It’s like, Oh, I want to do better than them. But when they go on, you still cheer just as loud.

00:03:02:25 – 00:03:10:10
Joseph
Edinburgh with the bands were coming out. You had the band that was coming off was wishing the band coming on. You know, the group of guys have a good time.

00:03:10:10 – 00:03:15:28
Michelle
Right, where when you go to a sporting event, the two football teams or the two soccer teams.

00:03:16:06 – 00:03:16:19
Joseph
Or.

00:03:17:11 – 00:03:36:11
Michelle
You know where you know, that was probably the best part of this last competition was one of the moms of one of our seniors. She’s all cheering. Come on, cookie, you know, and then and it was just so infectious that parents from a rival school were like, Oh my God, we got to cheer for.

00:03:36:11 – 00:03:39:29
Joseph
Them to just give her a hand. You know, when just on team spirit?

00:03:40:00 – 00:03:49:10
Michelle
Exactly. So it’s it is. We didn’t know how much more it was going to be involved. So we need a break.

00:03:49:20 – 00:03:50:01
Joseph
Yeah.

00:03:50:17 – 00:03:53:12
Michelle
You know, from all of it as well.

00:03:53:12 – 00:04:00:19
Joseph
So we’ll be enjoying the downtime. But yes, next week we’ll have a yeah, special guest on insights into teams and we’ll go into it a lot more.

00:04:00:20 – 00:04:04:15
Michelle
So there’s our little plug for for next week’s episode for you guys.

00:04:04:25 – 00:04:18:28
Joseph
But obviously, that is not what we’re talking about this week. Not at all today in our Disney Detective, Wonder Woman in the Evil Queen. And can the Main Street electrical parade solve Disney’s problems again?

00:04:19:00 – 00:04:20:11
Joseph
Probably not. No.

00:04:21:27 – 00:04:32:19
Joseph
Than in our tails into the galaxy and unnecessary origin story for an irrelevant character. It’s the camera, the camera’s overheating is what of it.

00:04:32:21 – 00:04:33:24
Michelle
Oh, is that what that.

00:04:33:24 – 00:04:48:00
Joseph
That’s what the beep is and it changes the camera angle here. So I have to figure out what I want to do to cool that off. OK. Anyway, in our tales from the edge of the galaxy, an unnecessary origin story for an irrelevant character.

00:04:48:00 – 00:05:10:13
Joseph
Plus, is there an Old Republic movie in the works? And for our entertainment news, Netflix may be coming to Jersey and the unfortunate passing of Dean Stockwell. And as always, we’ll finish up with our insightful picks of the week and a few dwindling list of afterthoughts ready to get into it.

00:05:10:16 – 00:05:11:24
Michelle
Sure, let’s do this.

00:05:11:25 – 00:05:30:11
Joseph
All right. Before we start, though, I would invite our listening and viewing audience to subscribe to the podcast. You can subscribe to the video version of his podcast listed as insights into things. The audio version of the podcast can be found listed as in Science in Entertainment.

00:05:31:23 – 00:05:47:18
Joseph
We are available on Google, Apple, Stitcher, Amazon pretty much any place you can get a podcast these days. We would also invite you to writing, Give us your feedback. Tell us how we’re doing. Give us some show suggestions.

00:05:47:18 – 00:06:07:24
Joseph
Give us some of your conventions that we can plug. You can email us your comments and insights into things. Dot com. We are on Twitter at Twitter. Dot com slash insights underscore things on Facebook. You can get us at Facebook.com Slash Insights and the Things podcast on Instagram, where it insights into things.

00:06:08:13 – 00:06:15:08
Joseph
We can get links to all those on our web site and insights into things dot com. Shall we get started?

00:06:15:10 – 00:06:15:27
Joseph
Sure.

00:06:15:28 – 00:06:27:13
Joseph
All right, here we go. Go for something that I did not push the button for on this side here because I haven’t done this and.

00:06:27:13 – 00:06:27:21
Joseph
Said.

00:06:28:24 – 00:06:29:20
Joseph
Joe Fuentes.

00:06:31:05 – 00:06:54:25
Michelle
So it seems that Wonder Woman’s Gal Gadot will be playing one of the all time greatest Disney villains in an upcoming remake. So back in June, it was announced that Disney’s upcoming live action remake of Snow White had found its star to play the title lead as the production hired Rachel Zegler to play the beloved princess.

00:06:55:02 – 00:07:13:22
Michelle
Now, her name might sound a little bit familiar because she’s going to be playing Maria in the upcoming adaptation of West Side Story. So the actor had spent months, had spent the months since then as the only member of the cast, but now that has changed with a mate in a major way.

00:07:14:04 – 00:07:33:24
Michelle
As the news broke that Gal Gadot had come aboard the upcoming blockbuster to play the role of the evil queen. The Hollywood Reporter had shared the latest update about the Disney production, which has Amazing Spider-Man director Mark Webb at the helm.

00:07:34:09 – 00:07:58:19
Michelle
The film marks the second time that Gal has been part of the project, has been part of a project at that studio as she previously voiced a character in 2018. Ralph breaks the internet so known for her spectacularly intense vanity, the evil queen in the tale of Snow White and the seven Dwarfs is famous for her regular

00:07:58:19 – 00:08:18:18
Michelle
check ins with her magic mirror requesting affirmation that she is the fairest of them all. When her enchanted looking glass one day returns the unfortunate news that the story’s protagonist has her beat in the looks department, the wicked royal makes plans to kill her.

00:08:18:25 – 00:08:32:25
Michelle
Though those obviously don’t quite work out as it’s planned, so Gal Gadot will be the third actress in the past in the last decade to take on the role of the evil queen in Snow White in a motion picture.

00:08:33:13 – 00:08:54:27
Michelle
Though her portrayal will be the first to specifically be based on the classic version of the character from the animated Disney film in 1937, Charlize Theron had played the part named Ravina in 2012 as Snow White and The Huntsman, starring opposite Kristen Stewart.

00:08:55:11 – 00:09:15:00
Michelle
Later that same year, Julia Roberts played the Queen in Mirror Mirror with Lily Collins, and not to try to forget about another evil queen. one of our favorites who played the evil queen from television in Once Upon a Time was Lana Parilla.

00:09:15:28 – 00:09:39:09
Michelle
So it should be a cool opportunity for Gal, as a number of big stars have made an impression had made an impression playing live action Disney villains in the past couple of years, most notably Angelina Jolie as Maleficent, Emma Stone as Cruella de Vil, Cate Blanchett as the wicked stepmother in Cinderella.

00:09:39:21 – 00:09:58:15
Michelle
So with the production on Marc Webb’s Snow White not set to start up until next year, it’s probably going to be a while before fans actually get to see her in action as the evil queen. But obviously, there’s some good news as well, because she has a couple of other movies coming out beforehand.

00:09:59:03 – 00:10:15:20
Michelle
So Red Notice, which costars Dwayne Johnson and Ryan Reynolds, will arrive on Netflix actually this Friday. And Death on the Nile, which is the sequel to Murder on the Orient Express, is scheduled to hit theaters February of 2022.

00:10:15:28 – 00:10:25:03
Joseph
Very cool. And I think that’s probably one of my favorite, and I don’t know why, but it’s one of my favorite Disney princess movies.

00:10:25:09 – 00:10:25:24
Joseph
OK.

00:10:25:25 – 00:10:29:03
Joseph
And I think it’s because it’s such a good villain part.

00:10:29:17 – 00:10:30:01
Joseph
Yeah.

00:10:30:04 – 00:10:36:06
Joseph
You know, it’s a it’s a it’s a good villain park that’s not like a supernatural style, you know.

00:10:36:18 – 00:10:37:29
Joseph
Right? Dragon type.

00:10:37:29 – 00:10:45:29
Joseph
Thing. And it’s just such an the the evilness is so. It’s it’s rooted in human nature.

00:10:46:00 – 00:10:47:14
Joseph
OK. I can see that.

00:10:47:24 – 00:11:01:26
Joseph
It’s not like some artificial evil that comes out of it. It’s, you know, it’s it’s almost like you can see a real person being like that. So that’s kind of something that always compelled me about that particular character.

00:11:01:26 – 00:11:04:08
Joseph
But I think Gal Gadot was going to do a fantastic job.

00:11:04:09 – 00:11:06:13
Michelle
Yeah, it’ll be weird to see her in.

00:11:06:21 – 00:11:07:13
Joseph
As a big guy.

00:11:07:13 – 00:11:22:22
Michelle
As a bad guy, because, you know, she’s Wonder Woman. Yeah, can’t be bad. But I could definitely see her playing, you know, like, I’m the fairest of them all under the radar. And, you know, being that vainqueur character that you know, it’ll.

00:11:22:22 – 00:11:22:28
Joseph
Be.

00:11:23:01 – 00:11:26:18
Joseph
It’ll be interesting seeing her in a non-action.

00:11:26:18 – 00:11:27:25
Joseph
Role. Hmm.

00:11:28:07 – 00:11:32:08
Joseph
I can’t. I can’t see her throwing too many people through walls.

00:11:32:08 – 00:11:33:16
Joseph
And stuff like that, right?

00:11:33:25 – 00:11:37:29
Michelle
Yeah, yeah, I can. I could see that not being, you know, the thing.

00:11:37:29 – 00:11:41:15
Joseph
So I think she’s going to she’s going to knock it out of the park.

00:11:41:18 – 00:11:41:27
Joseph
Mm hmm.

00:11:42:13 – 00:11:43:11
Joseph
What else did we have?

00:11:43:21 – 00:12:10:07
Michelle
So, so Disneyland, it seems, is bringing back the Main Street Electric Electrical parade, and some say it’s too small of a goodwill gesture. So the optics for the recent developments of Disneyland have not been pretty lately. So you have the sold out magic key annual passes, you have the parking price hikes, you have a new high priced

00:12:10:10 – 00:12:30:04
Michelle
ever ticket for the most in-demand days like holidays, and then you have at least two more months without parking trams. And that’s just been the last couple of weeks. But there’s one, I guess bright spot, literally is that the Main Street Electrical Parade appears to be coming back to the park soon.

00:12:30:17 – 00:12:50:20
Michelle
So the iconic and much beloved parade started at Disneyland in 1972 and ran through 1996 and features what’s believed to be approximately 500,000 light bulbs on its floats, which depict iconic scenes from movies like Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland.

00:12:51:04 – 00:13:17:24
Michelle
Now, according to the Disney blog, All Ears Dot Net It. When it was retired, the parade had been performed almost 3600 times for more than 75 million guests. Disney had hinted at the parade’s return on a tick tock earlier this week with a video of a sparkling snail, which happened to be one of the electrical parades floats heading

00:13:17:24 – 00:13:46:07
Michelle
towards a Disneyland truck, followed by a message to be continued. So fans on social media have been positive, and many have been wondering whether it’s a move designed to sort of have some goodwill towards the company in the midst of such a prolonged bad news cycle, including an ongoing lawsuit which has 25,000 cast members that are suing

00:13:46:07 – 00:14:01:27
Michelle
Disneyland over a living wage. So one person had tweeted There are few guarantees in life, but Disney trotting out the Main Street electrical parade whenever they’re having some sort of trouble at the California parks is one of them.

00:14:02:10 – 00:14:24:11
Michelle
So the move wouldn’t be without precedent. So it seems that Disneyland has a history of using this parade to kind of smooth over rough patches at the park. When the park retired the parade in 1996, the company used the idea that it was the last chance to see it before and basically to try and boost attendance and

00:14:24:11 – 00:14:49:00
Michelle
profits. And then in 22,001, it brought back the then retired parade to Disney California Adventures to combat a lackluster attendance numbers that were at that park. And there it became known as Disney’s electrical parade since the park didn’t have a main street, so they had said Disney’s California Adventure.

00:14:49:06 – 00:15:15:06
Michelle
Oh, I’m sorry. They said Disney’s California Adventure had opened in February 2001, which Kate, which was quoted from the Disneyland history blog Yester Land. And they said when expected, attendance lever levels failed to materialize. The park had a quick went into quick action, and the first thing that they did was they brought back the parade.

00:15:15:16 – 00:15:30:16
Michelle
So they said if killing the parade could work such wonders, how about just bring it back from the dead? So although the parade was popular enough to be kept around for several years at California Adventure, it didn’t solve the underlying issues with the park.

00:15:30:29 – 00:15:55:07
Michelle
If the parade was meant to provide an instant fix to the park’s attendance problems, it failed. So the parade, you know, made some reappearance is in 2000. 17 and then 2019, so considering that the Walt Disney Company’s enormous year over year profit and the launch of paid fast passes earlier this month, some Disney fans have noted that

00:15:55:07 – 00:16:11:20
Michelle
this parade using equipment that existed for nearly 50 years and requires no real investment of time or finances that a new show would demand feels convenient. one person had said Is this the new and inexpensive way to get a parade going?

00:16:12:06 – 00:16:29:07
Michelle
Then somebody else said, Y’all made your customers angry, so you got to drag this out again. And finally, somebody said, I’m in the most toxic, abusive relationship ever with Disney. Raise prices. But wait. I love you. Here’s Mainstreet Electrical Power.

00:16:30:04 – 00:16:30:08
Joseph
He.

00:16:31:26 – 00:16:40:09
Joseph
You know, it’s good to see that I’m not the only one that sees these. I’ll even go so far as to say villainous acts by right.

00:16:40:28 – 00:16:41:09
Joseph
Right.

00:16:41:23 – 00:16:49:15
Joseph
And then and then it’s it’s these kind of half attempts at trying to resolve things when the root of the problem is.

00:16:50:05 – 00:16:52:18
Michelle
You need to fix the other problem.

00:16:52:18 – 00:16:58:17
Joseph
You need to stop stealing money from people and you need to fix the problems that are going on in your.

00:16:58:17 – 00:16:59:14
Joseph
Parks, right?

00:16:59:14 – 00:17:08:00
Michelle
And not like, Oh, we’ll throw this parade at you, or we’ll throw this snack at you and throw you know this at you to make up for.

00:17:08:00 – 00:17:08:06
Joseph
And.

00:17:08:17 – 00:17:08:26
Joseph
All this.

00:17:08:26 – 00:17:09:11
Michelle
Other stuff.

00:17:09:14 – 00:17:30:23
Joseph
The one thing that pointed out, the fact that basically you’re throwing something at us that doesn’t require you to invest any money in anything and you’re still raking in profits that are ridiculously above what they should be. It’s, you know, this is another sign that the Disney under the current leadership, is going in the wrong direction.

00:17:31:12 – 00:17:36:19
Joseph
And the more stories like this I see, the less inclined I am to go to a Disney park.

00:17:36:22 – 00:17:37:06
Joseph
I know.

00:17:37:20 – 00:17:43:21
Joseph
So they don’t need my money. I have plenty of other ways to spend it besides giving it to someone who doesn’t need it.

00:17:43:25 – 00:17:44:06
Joseph
Yeah.

00:17:45:19 – 00:17:46:20
Joseph
Sad, but true.

00:17:46:24 – 00:17:47:03
Joseph
Hmm.

00:17:47:06 – 00:17:48:13
Michelle
Yeah, unfortunately.

00:17:48:15 – 00:18:14:06
Joseph
So that was all we had for our Disney detective this week. We’ll be back in a brief moment with our tales from the edge of the galaxy. For over seven years, the second Sith empire has been the Premiere Community Guild in the online game.

00:18:14:07 – 00:18:16:10
Joseph
Star Wars The Old Republic.

00:18:17:06 – 00:18:34:10
Joseph
With hundreds of friendly and helpful active members, a weekly schedule of nightly events, annual guild meet and greets, and an active community both on the web and on Discord. The second Sydney Empire.

00:18:34:14 – 00:18:38:00
Joseph
Is more than your typical gaming group. We’re family.

00:18:39:09 – 00:19:00:22
Joseph
Joining us on the star forward server for nightly events such as operations, flashpoints, world boss funds, Star Wars Trivia Guild Lottery and much more. Visit us on the Web today at W W W. But the second sip and fire icon.

00:19:02:11 – 00:19:31:06
Joseph
Well. From our tales, from the edge of the galaxy, Star Wars reveals the full origin story for Supreme Leader Snoke, and no one cares. It’s been almost two years since the finale to the Skywalker Senate saga Star Wars The Rise of Skywalker debuted in theaters.

00:19:32:06 – 00:19:51:12
Joseph
J.J. Abrams movie for some fans further tarnish the reputation of the Star Wars franchise, leading to a call for a rewrite of the entire sequel trilogy. While some praised the reprisal of the villain Emperor Palpatine, a.k.a. Darth Sidious, played by Ian McDermid.

00:19:52:02 – 00:20:13:08
Joseph
Others saw it as a complete U-turn on the sequel’s sequel trilogy’s direction, especially after Rian Johnson’s disaster of a movie Star Wars The Last Jedi killed off its antagonist, Supreme Leader Snoke. Now, Star Wars was given an in-depth account of Snooks Origin, which no one cares about.

00:20:14:10 – 00:20:39:27
Joseph
Supreme Leader Snoke, played by any circus, first appeared in Disney and Lucasfilm’s first Star Wars venture. Star Wars The Force Awakens in 2015 as the leader of the first Order alongside General Hux, played by Domhnall Gleeson and master of Kylo Ren, portrayed by Adam Driver, it was Johnson’s sequel that disaster of a movie that flipped the franchise

00:20:39:27 – 00:21:06:13
Joseph
on its head after killing Snoke with a light saber and teaming up Ren and Daisy Ridley’s Rey in an impressive battle sequence. The shocking moment was just one of the many, many polarizing parts of the sequel trilogies. Sophomoric and sophomore Star Wars movie The Star Wars Galaxy hasn’t really been the same since that disaster.

00:21:07:17 – 00:21:28:18
Joseph
Projects like showrunner Jon Favreau and executive producer Dave Filoni as The Mandalorian have started to stitch the fandom back together with new adventures happening somewhat separately from the franchise’s trilogies, which to be honest with you, if I had a project with Star Wars, I wouldn’t want to be associated with the sequel trilogy right now, either.

00:21:29:16 – 00:21:53:25
Joseph
one contentious part of the saga, though, is still plot holes and retcons of The Rise of Skywalker. Star Wars often uses multimedia to further explore and explain events in the movies. Just recently, they announced a brand new Luke Skywalker project set in between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens, which is said to include elements of

00:21:53:25 – 00:22:15:15
Joseph
the Sith Order and Exegol that planet no one ever heard about until The Rise of Skywalker, and they have to kind of invent the planet to try to fix the problems. You know, it was the Sith hideaway featured in Rise of Skywalker, where Palpatine was located with some mysteriously created fleet that they never really explained, and a

00:22:15:16 – 00:22:23:18
Joseph
bunch of shadow guys in the stands that did nothing while Palpatine was slaughtered and all kinds of really crazy, questionable things from that movie.

00:22:23:23 – 00:22:24:04
Joseph
True.

00:22:25:11 – 00:22:50:00
Joseph
Now, Star Wars has revealed more detail, a more detailed account of Palpatine’s cloning process on Exegol, the Sith Eternal and how he managed to coordinate his return to power and control the first Order. For context, it was only a few months ago that Star Wars quietly confirmed that Snoke was, quote, an evil duplicate of Palpatine for the

00:22:50:00 – 00:23:16:14
Joseph
first time in canon. Star Wars fans can rejoice as more information has come to light surrounding the duplicate villain, which no one cares about. Thanks to Jacob’s Quest on Twitter, who has shared excerpts from the new book Star Wars Secrets of the Sith, we now know the full origin story of Supreme Leader Snoke and still don’t care

00:23:17:26 – 00:23:34:17
Joseph
. We can see from the information here and straight from the source to the Star Wars book Secrets of the Sith is narrated by Palpatine himself, and that Snoke was a temporary measure at best. The excerpt part of Snooks backstory reads Should I do it in voice?

00:23:34:18 – 00:23:36:03
Michelle
It’s entirely up to you.

00:23:37:22 – 00:23:50:27
Joseph
My new bodies, deformities were severe, unable to leave Exegol equitable, or I would have to spend. So it’s, you know, I can’t I can’t do it and read the lines too. That’s my problem.

00:23:51:01 – 00:23:51:24
Michelle
I’m so sorry.

00:23:52:22 – 00:24:10:12
Joseph
Unable to leave Exegol, I would have to spread my influence across the galaxy through a less direct means. As part of their genetic experiments, my followers had attempted to create another being that came to be known as Snoke.

00:24:11:20 – 00:24:33:28
Joseph
Although his body proved unworthy of containing my dark essence, Snooks natural sensitivity to the force would make him a powerful puppet nonetheless. Through my manipulation of Snoke, I began gathering forces, building an army capable of opposing the New Republic that had risen in my absence.

00:24:34:28 – 00:24:59:10
Joseph
Through Snoke, I would make certain that the first order would be mine to control. End quote. Palpatine’s declaration that Snoke was a quote temporary measure is sure to take on a rather meta meaning for Star Wars fans as the sequel trilogy is muddled, storyline perfectly demonstrated what quote temporary means.

00:25:00:11 – 00:25:22:12
Joseph
Mark Cimarex Secrets of the Sith also recently gave fans their first canon look at Shiv Palpatine’s master Darth ligase in a new image featuring Darth Sidious and Darth Vader. The section goes on to discuss Palpatine’s son and how this cloned subject eventually led him to the heir to the Empire.

00:25:23:00 – 00:25:52:03
Joseph
His granddaughter, Ray. Many fans will know the outcome of race discovery of Palpatine or Force Dyad with Ben Solo, a.k.a. Kylo Ren, and the reasoning behind her abandonment on the planet Jakku that nobody goes to anymore. The conclusion was cluttered with unwarranted reveals, but at least now fans can rest easy knowing the full thought process behind the

00:25:52:03 – 00:26:03:22
Joseph
creation of Supreme Leader Snoke, at least from Palpatine’s perspective. Oh, thank goodness we know now because it makes that movie make so much more sense now that I know that.

00:26:05:14 – 00:26:10:10
Michelle
I kind of sense a little bit of sarcasm. I’m not really sure.

00:26:10:13 – 00:26:11:14
Joseph
OK. Just making sure.

00:26:12:02 – 00:26:36:29
Joseph
Ostensibly, Star Wars has been hinting at Palpatine survival and his cloning experiments in both The Mandalorian through the inclusion of Grogu, you and Dr. Pershing, the mysterious infatuation with him and Fellaini’s The Bad Batch. The latter saw the Star Wars legends location of Mount Tantas Appear, which has ties to Emperor Palpatine and a Grand Admiral Thrones cloning

00:26:36:29 – 00:26:51:11
Joseph
program. And this kind of brings me back to what we had been talking about for quite some time now. And that’s the fact that they had the entire storyline laid out in a nice, neat trilogy.

00:26:51:11 – 00:26:55:16
Joseph
That I don’t know.

00:26:56:10 – 00:27:19:15
Joseph
Who wrote it. The Throne Trilogy Timothy Zahn, right? Timothy’s onJ trilogy of Thrawn and the return of the Emperor and the cloning and all that stuff. It was the perfect sequel trilogy. And when Disney came in with their strong arm tactics, they declared, All that stuff is not real, and we’re going to make it up as we

00:27:19:15 – 00:27:26:29
Joseph
go along, and they screwed it up royally. Mm-Hmm. And now they’re going back to all that original material and slowly bringing it back.

00:27:27:01 – 00:27:31:19
Michelle
Right because they realized they made a huge mistake and they need to fix it.

00:27:31:20 – 00:27:44:14
Joseph
You know what, man up throw out that steaming pile of crap that is the sequel trilogy pretended. That’s non-canon, right? And then bring in Timothy’s on the right, the new trilogy and just do it. Do it right? Mm.

00:27:44:28 – 00:28:11:04
Joseph
And make everybody’s world. Anyway, so we know France, we know snow snowshoe origin and. It doesn’t make me care about him or the the movies or characters anymore. It makes no sense. They’re desperately trying to justify the short cuts and the disaster that they started.

00:28:11:14 – 00:28:28:05
Joseph
And the sad thing is they started out pretty strong with Force Awakens, and they could have really done something with it. And then Rian Johnson, for some reason, they let Rian Johnson literally just come in and flush the entire sequence, the entire series down the toilet.

00:28:28:29 – 00:28:32:19
Joseph
And nobody at Disney did anything to stop him from doing that.

00:28:32:22 – 00:28:34:15
Michelle
Yeah, that’s kind of surprising.

00:28:34:17 – 00:28:35:07
Joseph
Well, every.

00:28:35:07 – 00:28:49:02
Joseph
Executive who made the decision to not make a decision on that should have been fired. And you should have threw the movie out before it even hit the press before it even came out and started over again and just bit the bullet on.

00:28:50:06 – 00:29:02:01
Joseph
Instead, you wasted a whole nother movie trying to retcon man, and that turned out to be a disaster. And, you know, poor JJ, who’s a very talented individual himself wound up taking heat for trying to clean up to.

00:29:02:01 – 00:29:02:26
Michelle
Try and fix it.

00:29:02:27 – 00:29:04:02
Joseph
Ryan Johnson’s mess?

00:29:04:04 – 00:29:04:13
Joseph
Yeah.

00:29:06:29 – 00:29:07:15
Joseph
Anyway, if.

00:29:08:02 – 00:29:08:24
Michelle
You feel better.

00:29:09:02 – 00:29:11:12
Joseph
No, not really. I actually feel much worse now.

00:29:11:12 – 00:29:13:02
Joseph
To through that room.

00:29:14:05 – 00:29:16:15
Joseph
Because usually I rent on.

00:29:17:14 – 00:29:18:20
Joseph
This Disney.

00:29:18:20 – 00:29:24:13
Joseph
And not Star Wars. But anyway, there is a silver lining in the works here is there. There is.

00:29:24:14 – 00:29:25:18
Michelle
Why don’t you tell us about it?

00:29:25:19 – 00:29:48:03
Joseph
Let me tell you about it. So did Star Wars The Old Republic movie The Big Star Wars Old Republic Movie Replace Rogue Squadron or Den of Geek seems to think so. The Big Star Wars News This week, Rogue Squadron, the movie helmed by Wonder Woman director Patty Jenkins, has been delayed from its 2023 release date.

00:29:49:00 – 00:30:06:18
Joseph
The Hollywood Reporter reports. Because that’s what Hollywood Reporter does, they report? Is it that Jenkins other commitments, including Wonder Woman three, will prevent her from being able to film the first post Skywalker Saga Star Wars movie next year after many years in a row there?

00:30:07:21 – 00:30:24:29
Joseph
Since this was the only upcoming Star Wars film with a confirmed release date, this is now. This now potentially leaves the franchise’s theatrical side in limbo, which in reality is not that big a deal because their television site on Disney Plus is running so strong now.

00:30:25:01 – 00:30:44:18
Joseph
They’ve got so many projects going on, so I’m not overly concerned about the franchise as long as they don’t put Rian Johnson back in charge of anything. Sure, OK, but if another rumor that spread through social media over the past few days is to be believed, there may be more to this delay than meets the eye.

00:30:44:18 – 00:31:02:14
Joseph
And no, it’s not Transformers. On Friday, Twitter user Big Leagues, who has recently scooped details about upcoming Marvel and Star Wars releases, claimed that a new Star Wars movie would film in 2022. But not with that angry camera that keeps beeping.

00:31:03:14 – 00:31:28:05
Joseph
And it wasn’t a project announced at Disney’s Investors Day broadcast last year. Adam Frasier at Slashfilm retweeted and responded to big screen leaks claim with his own cryptic message suggesting that the unannounced movie would be set during the Old Republic era before the events of the Skywalker saga.

00:31:29:03 – 00:31:43:25
Joseph
The Hollywood Reporter confirmed that Rogue Squadron would no longer be shooting next year as yet, no major news outlets have confirmed the rumors of the Old Republic movie. However, this isn’t the first time we’ve heard that Lucasfilm is making an Old Republic movie.

00:31:44:16 – 00:31:59:29
Joseph
In 2019, BuzzFeed reported that Lucasfilm was developing a Knights of the Old Republic movie. The report followed Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy his own acknowledgment that the studio was thinking of how to do more Knights of the Old Republic.

00:32:00:26 – 00:32:16:02
Joseph
Kennedy said in an interview at the time, Yes, we are developing something to look at right now and have no idea where things might fall, but we have to be careful that there’s a cadence to Star Wars that doesn’t start to feel like too much.

00:32:16:19 – 00:32:35:06
Joseph
That was before twelve more television shows were announced. Obviously, Lucasfilm has yet to officially confirm that an Old Republic movie is in development. Could this turn out to be part of one of Ryan Johnson’s long lost trilogy of Star Wars movies that was announced in 2017?

00:32:36:07 – 00:32:55:04
Joseph
God, I hope not. Fortunately for Star Wars fans, he’s busy with his Knives Out sequels for Netflix. The pace at which things seem to be moving for the galaxy far, far away right now is at least compelling and making the lead up to all the Disney Plus day news much more exciting.

00:32:56:00 – 00:33:13:15
Joseph
We all know what’s in store on Friday at 9:00 a.m. Eastern Time as we record Wednesday of this week right now, which is when Disney plans to drop all of its big updates on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. So what do you think?

00:33:13:23 – 00:33:17:15
Joseph
I mean, you’re not that big on the Old Republic side of things.

00:33:17:26 – 00:33:36:23
Michelle
Right? But I think there are enough people out there. There’s enough of a fan base that could definitely make it worth its while. You know, you have the games that that are part of that and the books and the stories and and other things like that.

00:33:36:23 – 00:33:56:12
Michelle
And I think this kind of goes along with what you’ve been saying for a very long time is that they need to step away from the Skywalker storyline of things like that and that you you saw with The Mandalorian that you can do it and be very successful with it.

00:33:56:12 – 00:34:07:11
Michelle
So. You don’t have to do a solo story, you don’t have to do, you know, all these different back stories to be successful. You know.

00:34:07:11 – 00:34:08:09
Joseph
People want to.

00:34:08:12 – 00:34:09:08
Joseph
See there’s a lot of.

00:34:09:09 – 00:34:09:24
Joseph
Stories.

00:34:09:24 – 00:34:26:19
Michelle
Out there, so there’s a lot out there. So could this be the turning point that they kind of needed? You know, because everybody else is busy doing other things and, you know, maybe they’ve had this script and now, you know, kind of comes to.

00:34:26:19 – 00:34:32:08
Joseph
The other interesting thing is they recently announced that they’re rereleasing the Knights of the Old Republic.

00:34:32:14 – 00:34:32:28
Joseph
OK.

00:34:33:19 – 00:34:34:15
Joseph
The video game.

00:34:34:17 – 00:34:34:28
Joseph
Mm hmm.

00:34:35:01 – 00:34:49:08
Joseph
So that’s getting a remake itself. It’s a fantastic story. It’s a story that’s carried through two sequels of video games and into an online MMO. It has several novels associated with it, a whole series of novels associated with it.

00:34:49:24 – 00:35:03:09
Joseph
So there’s a ton of story of where maybe this is. Disney realizing the error of their ways of let’s stop trying to reinvent the wheel, let’s work with the material that we have and enhance it now.

00:35:03:16 – 00:35:19:19
Michelle
Also, what about Taika Waititi’s right Star Wars? Is this maybe part of it? Like, we really don’t know much of his Star Wars movie that that’s supposed to be coming out. So, you know, maybe.

00:35:19:26 – 00:35:25:06
Joseph
He was already, you know, reportedly shooting locations, finding, you know, scouting or counting locations.

00:35:25:06 – 00:35:30:25
Michelle
So I don’t know, maybe kind of combination of everything, I think.

00:35:30:26 – 00:35:47:11
Joseph
I think it’s good news if they go in this direction and hopefully after we start, because Sunday was scheduled to start our next roleplaying session, which is going to be a Star Wars roleplaying that is set in the Old Republic with some original storyline that I wrote there.

00:35:47:11 – 00:35:50:06
Joseph
So hopefully it might even, you know, you might even start to get into.

00:35:50:06 – 00:35:51:09
Joseph
It a little bit. There you go.

00:35:51:29 – 00:36:00:00
Joseph
So but there’s a there’s an entire galaxy, literally a galaxy and thousands of years of history to play with.

00:36:00:00 – 00:36:00:23
Joseph
Here, right?

00:36:00:24 – 00:36:13:11
Joseph
Why do they keep playing in the same sandbox? It blows my mind. How many stories can you set on Tantawi? How many movies can go detached? Like there’s like billions of planets in the galaxy. People use them.

00:36:15:17 – 00:36:18:24
Michelle
Anyway, and that has been our Star Wars rant for the day.

00:36:20:10 – 00:36:27:09
Joseph
That’s it for our tales from the edge of the galaxy. We’ll be back in a moment with our entertainment news of the week. There’s a button here.

00:36:27:09 – 00:36:28:14
Joseph
Somewhere there is.

00:36:29:16 – 00:36:30:29
Michelle
Oh.

00:36:35:18 – 00:36:59:27
Michelle
Insights into teens. A podcast series exploring the issues and challenges of today’s youth. Talking to real teens about real teen problems. Explore issues from braces to puberty, social anxiety to financial responsibility. Each week we talk about the topics concerning today’s youth.

00:37:00:15 – 00:37:24:29
Michelle
We look at how the issues affect teens, how to cope with these issues and how parents, friends and loved ones can help teens handle these challenges. Check out our video episodes on YouTube.com Backslash Insights Into Things. Catch our audio versions on podcast insights into teen XCOM.

00:37:27:03 – 00:37:30:15
Michelle
Or on the Web at insights into things dot com.

00:37:32:16 – 00:37:32:27
Joseph
Well.

00:37:40:11 – 00:37:41:15
Joseph
Go for entertainment.

00:37:41:15 – 00:37:41:26
Joseph
News.

00:37:42:08 – 00:38:04:24
Michelle
So it seems that next, Netflix is looking to acquire an old army base in New Jersey and turn it into a large production facility for film and TV projects. The streaming company will bid on a 289 acre chunk of Fort Monmouth, a 96 year old army base that closed in 2011.

00:38:05:09 – 00:38:22:02
Michelle
The property is about 50 miles south of New York City, and the facility would be one of Netflix’s largest in the U.S., second only to its hub in New Mexico, according to the New York Times, which which reported on the plans earlier this week.

00:38:22:19 – 00:38:40:24
Michelle
So unlike most of its rivals, Netflix doesn’t actually own a large Los Angeles studio and has leased or acquired production space all over the world as it has scaled up production. So the company opened a facility in New York earlier this year, but the New Jersey space would dwarf that.

00:38:41:12 – 00:39:02:21
Michelle
So the bidding process actually opened on October 16th and runs through early next year, Netflix said said. New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy has been courting Hollywood studios for a couple of years, pitching his state as a business friendly alternative to production hotspots like Georgia and New York.

00:39:03:05 – 00:39:27:03
Michelle
America’s first movie studio was in New Jersey, and today it’s home to many talented people working in the entertainment in entertainment. Netflix had said in a statement. Governor Murphy and the state’s legislative leaders have created a business environment that’s welcomed film and television productions back to the state, and we’re excited to submit our bid to transform Fort

00:39:27:03 – 00:39:30:26
Michelle
Monmouth into a state of the art production facility.

00:39:31:15 – 00:39:33:00
Joseph
I think that’s actually kind of cool.

00:39:33:04 – 00:39:34:18
Michelle
Yeah, I think it is.

00:39:35:00 – 00:39:45:19
Joseph
It’d be nice to see because there’s, you know, we are a couple of. Well, there’s a lot of military bases that were shut down or shut down around the country, it’s nice to see people be able to go in and re-use these.

00:39:45:28 – 00:39:46:16
Joseph
Yeah, the.

00:39:46:16 – 00:40:01:19
Joseph
Only concern that I have and this is one of the companies have run into repeatedly with these are older military bases and that’s hazardous material remediation. You know, you’ve got a lot of like this is almost 100 years old, right?

00:40:01:21 – 00:40:04:24
Joseph
You know, you’ve got a lot of lead paint. You’ve got a lot of asbestos.

00:40:05:02 – 00:40:05:16
Joseph
Got a lot of.

00:40:05:16 – 00:40:16:12
Joseph
Chemicals that were used here that may have been stored in tanks that are leaking and stuff. Mm-Hmm. I can’t only help but wonder what kind of problems they’re going to run in through here and who’s going to pay for it?

00:40:16:13 – 00:40:16:25
Joseph
Right?

00:40:17:05 – 00:40:24:26
Joseph
And I could see Murphy basically giving away the farm here and paying for all that remediation just to bring them in.

00:40:24:27 – 00:40:25:07
Joseph
Mm-Hmm.

00:40:26:07 – 00:40:28:29
Joseph
And then what kind of bottom line does the state see?

00:40:29:00 – 00:40:29:23
Joseph
Right, right.

00:40:29:29 – 00:40:31:04
Michelle
Well, that’s true.

00:40:31:18 – 00:40:44:19
Joseph
But either way, I think it’s encouraging to see that that one Netflix is looking in New Jersey because it’s, you know, stories, right? Where New Jersey was, where the first movie studios were for Thomas Edison.

00:40:44:19 – 00:40:44:26
Joseph
Yeah.

00:40:45:23 – 00:40:50:28
Joseph
It wasn’t until the 1920s or so before everyone moved out to California because of the weather.

00:40:50:29 – 00:40:51:11
Joseph
Right?

00:40:52:01 – 00:41:01:02
Michelle
So yeah, that’s really the biggest thing. But you have so much land where you could build soundstages or things like that, so you don’t have to worry about.

00:41:01:04 – 00:41:04:03
Joseph
Well, and you look at the well, the article mentions Georgia being.

00:41:04:19 – 00:41:05:03
Joseph
Oh yeah.

00:41:05:20 – 00:41:18:14
Joseph
You know, I mean, you’ve got so many productions that are happening in Georgia now. You’ve got the studios for Walking Dead purchased a huge amount of land down there, which I have no idea of what they’re going to be doing once the.

00:41:18:15 – 00:41:19:23
Michelle
Once the show ends. Yeah.

00:41:20:18 – 00:41:23:28
Joseph
I assume some of the studios probably want to pick all that stuff up.

00:41:23:28 – 00:41:37:27
Michelle
Yeah, but you figure this is land that’s not being used for anything, right? You might as well put some investment into to redevelop it versus. Building someplace where you have to tear down.

00:41:38:06 – 00:41:38:24
Joseph
Well, I’d.

00:41:38:24 – 00:41:44:23
Joseph
Rather see a new fresh industry come into the state than turn it into condos.

00:41:44:29 – 00:41:45:12
Joseph
Or.

00:41:45:21 – 00:41:47:13
Joseph
A shopping mall or something like.

00:41:47:13 – 00:41:52:07
Michelle
That. Yeah, because how many defunct shopping malls do we have all over the place so quickly?

00:41:52:15 – 00:41:59:19
Joseph
And I think bringing that kind of industry here to New Jersey is good for everybody, especially when you’re that close to New York.

00:41:59:20 – 00:42:00:25
Michelle
Absolutely. Yeah.

00:42:01:13 – 00:42:03:22
Joseph
So I think that’s good news. What else do we have?

00:42:03:25 – 00:42:22:27
Michelle
So we had some sad news that was reported yesterday, actually. So quantum leaps Quantum Leap actor Dean Stockwell had passed away at age 85. Actor Dean Stockwell, known for his roles in Quantum Leap and Blue Velvet, had passed away.

00:42:23:06 – 00:42:39:15
Michelle
He was 85 years old and, according to a family spokesman, he died of natural causes at his home in Hollywood, California, on Saturday, Sunday morning. So born Robert Dean Stockwell, the Academy Award nominee, had multiple careers in acting.

00:42:39:24 – 00:42:57:22
Michelle
He actually had started as a child actor at age seven. He was working alongside Frank Sinatra and Gene Kelly and anchors away. By the time he was eleven, he had a star making role in the 1948 anti-war film The Boy with Green Hair.

00:42:58:04 – 00:43:16:28
Michelle
The movie turned Stockwell into somewhat of a star, and he felt kind of ostracized, he had said in an interview. Wherever I went, I was treated as something different. I didn’t feel marked for something special. I felt like I was being treated as something special then and I didn’t like it and I wanted to get out of

00:43:16:28 – 00:43:37:27
Michelle
it. After he graduated high school at age 16, he changed his name and left Hollywood. He eventually found his way back into acting, notably in Cindy in Sidney Lumet Long Day’s Journey Into Night from 1962, but spent the majority of the stretch of his career in television.

00:43:38:09 – 00:43:56:11
Michelle
By the late sixties, he once again dropped out of acting for a few years, and when he returned, he found work was hard to get. Then he changed careers altogether. In the 1980s, he got his real estate license in New Mexico and ran an ad for himself in Variety.

00:43:56:25 – 00:44:18:15
Michelle
Instead, that led to a string of memorable movie roles in Wim Wenders Paris, Texas, David Lynch’s Dune and Blue Velvet. Robert Altman’s The Player and Jonathan Demme is married to the Mob and the less, which actually netted him an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor.

00:44:19:01 – 00:44:38:27
Michelle
Stockwell was perhaps best known for his role as Admiral Al Ricci on the sci fi television series Quantum Leap, which ran for five seasons. He’d go on to do other roles in TV shows as the Tony Danza Show JAG and the acclaimed 2010 run of Battlestar Galactica.

00:44:39:14 – 00:44:54:22
Michelle
After that, he slowed down on acting yet again, but this time to focus on a career in visual arts. Working mainly with paper collages is survived by his wife, Joy, and their two children, Austin and Sophie.

00:44:55:11 – 00:45:00:25
Joseph
Yeah, this was Santa actually kind of saw. I saw this on. I think Twitter exploded with it.

00:45:00:26 – 00:45:01:28
Joseph
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:45:02:02 – 00:45:06:03
Joseph
And. It’s great actor love him and quantum.

00:45:06:04 – 00:45:06:22
Joseph
Leap, yeah.

00:45:06:28 – 00:45:27:02
Michelle
And that’s where it’s funny, because people of our generation, that’s where we really know him from, and it was funny how many people were talking about, Oh my God, I used to watch that all the time. You know, it was that show where, again, you know, our age group where we were watching it with our families, you

00:45:27:02 – 00:45:45:19
Michelle
know, you didn’t have a lot of, you know, you had maybe one television in your house and whatever somebody was watching, that’s what you all watched. And he was such a likable character on it. And that’s where a lot of people, you know, first saw him where he had been acting again since he was seven.

00:45:45:27 – 00:45:53:22
Michelle
You know, so by the time you know he became the TV actor, you know, he was almost ready to to really retire.

00:45:53:22 – 00:46:07:03
Joseph
Right after that, he was in Battlestar Galactica. He was great in that. And I loved him in Air Force one with Harrison Ford. He was great in that he was a secretary of defense in that. But that was a shame.

00:46:07:03 – 00:46:09:21
Joseph
85 Good year. Good career. Yeah.

00:46:09:25 – 00:46:11:07
Michelle
And it was natural causes.

00:46:11:07 – 00:46:13:15
Joseph
So so yeah, that a good life.

00:46:13:15 – 00:46:14:15
Michelle
Yeah, absolutely.

00:46:15:13 – 00:46:28:05
Joseph
That was it for our entertainment news this week. We’ll be right back with our insightful picks of the week. Go for your insightful pick.

00:46:28:08 – 00:46:45:13
Michelle
So my insightful pick this week is a show one of the new shows that is on NBC. And I have to admit, when I first saw the commercials for it, I was like, Really, this is it. And I wasn’t actually going to start watching it until a friend of mine had started watching.

00:46:45:13 – 00:47:04:23
Michelle
And she’s like, You know, this kind of reminds me of the show under the Dome. You’d probably like it. So I gave it a try. And that show is Libéria. So when a massive sinkhole opens in the middle of Los Angeles at the site of the La Brea Tar Pits and Wilshire Boulevard, hundreds of people and buildings

00:47:05:11 – 00:47:14:13
Michelle
are pulled into its depths. The survivors find themselves trapped in a mysterious and dangerous world.

00:47:14:22 – 00:47:15:02
Joseph
In a.

00:47:15:11 – 00:47:42:29
Michelle
Land where they must band together to survive. The show follows one family father, mother, son and daughter, who are separated by the events and attempted to reunite. The father has visions that provide glimpses of when and where his wife and son are, and the sinkholes and the sudden appearance of this other group of people has attracted the

00:47:42:29 – 00:48:02:24
Michelle
attention of the United States Department of Homeland Security, who are studying a similar event that happened in the Mojave Desert. So it’s it has a lot of. Like government conspiracy theories like they know something’s going on, but not really sure.

00:48:03:02 – 00:48:17:15
Michelle
And it’s kind of like, I honestly, I don’t see it going more than one season because I don’t know where they can go with it, but it’s an interesting concept that, you know, they kind of fell through almost like a wormhole.

00:48:17:24 – 00:48:41:16
Michelle
So they know they’ve realized that they’ve they’re still in Los Angeles, but they’re just in, you know, millions of years before, you know, humans have have arrived. But they’re not the first people to fall into this because there’s another tribe that they’ve found and they speak English, so they’ve been there for a number of years.

00:48:41:17 – 00:49:04:25
Michelle
So it’s kind of like, how many years does this happen? So kind of interesting again. I don’t know where it’s going to go after the one season, so it’ll be interesting to to see. But you know, if you if you watched under the dome and and that kind of concept of of government knowing something but not telling

00:49:04:25 – 00:49:06:22
Michelle
everybody, give it a shot.

00:49:07:04 – 00:49:08:10
Joseph
OK, interesting pick.

00:49:08:12 – 00:49:08:23
Joseph
Thank you.

00:49:14:28 – 00:49:33:28
Joseph
So my pick this week is another documentary called third Eye Spies on Amazon Prime Video. For more than 20 years, the CIA studied psychic abilities for use in their top secret spy program, with previously classified details about ESP.

00:49:33:28 – 00:49:59:00
Joseph
Now finally coming to light, there can be no more secrets. two physicists discover psychic abilities are real only to have their experiments at Stanford co-opted by the CIA and the research silenced by the demands of secrecy. Yet as both of the as both these remote viewers and the audience learn, the more you hide something, the more it

00:49:59:00 – 00:50:26:00
Joseph
shines like a beacon in psychic space. And this ancient truth can no longer be suppressed. The true story of Russell Target, America’s Cold War psychic spies disclosed and declassified for the first time, with evidence presented by a Nobel laureate, an Apollo astronaut and the military and scientific community that has been suppressed for nearly 30 years now, able

00:50:26:00 – 00:50:52:12
Joseph
to speak for the first time. Tar.gz, understated mantra that the evidence for extra sensory perception is overwhelming and shows a talent we all share and deserve to know about. Leaves us not just with a greater understanding of this unique chapter in U.S. history, but perhaps the most importantly and most important and greater understanding of who we are

00:50:52:12 – 00:51:11:20
Joseph
and our larger connection to the world. The CIA, NSA and CIA used it. Your tax dollars paid for it, and now you deserve to know about it. That’s the tagline This documentary might just be enough to turn the nonbeliever into a disciple of BSP.

00:51:12:22 – 00:51:36:16
Joseph
Through a collection of interviews, stock footage and recently revealed documents, it tells a compelling story. While the evidence provided for these remote viewing powers is historical and there’s no contemporary demonstrations of such phenomenon in the program, the viewer must trust the information presented here in order to buy into the reality of whether ESP exists or not.

00:51:37:20 – 00:51:54:02
Joseph
However, there’s ample evidence presented here to suggest that the United States government not only believe the BSP, they invested heavily in it. I’m not sure I’m 100% on board with everything in the documentary. Can they provide a compelling story?

00:51:54:02 – 00:52:17:03
Joseph
And if nothing else, it makes for a great Cold War thriller, the likes of a Tom Clancy novel. But they started to lose me when they interviewed Uri Geller as a purported psychic agent of the Israeli government. Geller, if you don’t already know, is a somewhat well-known illusionist, a magician and a television personality who claims to be

00:52:17:03 – 00:52:37:02
Joseph
psychic. He’s famous or perhaps infamous for his spoon bending illusions, which have already been debunked as just simple conjuring and sleight of hand tricks up until Geller appeared in the program. It seemed to have some legitimate weight, assuming you could believe what they were presenting.

00:52:37:23 – 00:52:49:23
Joseph
Sadly, the Geller arrival kind of killed the possibility of realism for me. But don’t let that dissuade you, if nothing else, the program made for an interesting story. And it.

00:52:49:23 – 00:52:50:10
Joseph
Was.

00:52:51:15 – 00:53:14:29
Joseph
Kind of. Almost the scientific presentation of how these types of studies have been done in the past, whether or not everything is 100% true in the documentary or not. The program is at least intelligent enough to leave that up to the viewer and not make any claims that it can’t back up, which left me at least respecting

00:53:14:29 – 00:53:39:02
Joseph
the director, the producers perspective on things. But that’s my pick this week. third eye spies on Amazon Prime, and we’ll be right back with our afterthoughts. So we have a dwindling list here of afterthoughts as the convention season comes to an end.

00:53:39:03 – 00:53:59:11
Michelle
Right. But we’re getting ready for holiday light season, so maybe we’ll throw some of that stuff in. You know, for for next time. So both of these events happened to be on the same day. So if you are in either of these areas, you’re going to have to pick which one to go to.

00:53:59:11 – 00:54:14:07
Michelle
You can’t go to both choices. So first is the Ocean City Comic Con, which will be on Saturday, December 11th from ten to five. And that is in Ocean City, Maryland, at the Roland Powell Convention Center.

00:54:14:09 – 00:54:15:19
Joseph
Which we actually plan to be.

00:54:15:19 – 00:54:35:16
Michelle
At. Yes, we will be going to that one. And if you are not in that area, but near Allentown, Pennsylvania, there is the Pennsylvania Toy and Comic Super Show, which will also be on December eleven from ten to two at the South Mall, Allentown in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

00:54:35:26 – 00:54:55:10
Joseph
Awesome. Well, I think that’s all we had, but before we do go, I would once again invite our listening and viewing audience to subscribe to the podcast. You can get audio versions of this podcast. Listeners in Science in the entertainment video versions, as always, can be listed as insights into things for all the networks.

00:54:55:10 – 00:55:16:15
Joseph
Network’s podcasts are available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, Amazon, Buzz, Sprout Pod, being Stitcher, Castro, Pandora and pretty much any place you can get a podcast. I would also invite you to give us your feedback. Give us your list of shows that you’d like us to plug here and tell us how we’re doing.

00:55:16:29 – 00:55:19:27
Joseph
You can email us at comments and insights into things dot com.

00:55:20:02 – 00:55:25:08
Michelle
You can find us on Twitter at twitter.com. Backslash Insights underscore things.

00:55:25:09 – 00:55:30:19
Joseph
We do stream on Twitch five days a week at Twitch Dot TV slash insights into things.

00:55:30:24 – 00:55:36:11
Michelle
You can find us on Facebook at facebook.com Backslash Insights Into Things podcast.

00:55:36:19 – 00:55:42:23
Joseph
You can find video versions of this podcast listeners podcast on insights into things dot com.

00:55:42:26 – 00:55:47:21
Michelle
You can find us on Instagram at instagram.com. Backslash Insights Into Things.

00:55:47:22 – 00:55:51:13
Joseph
We’re also on YouTube at youtube.com, slash insights into things.

00:55:51:21 – 00:56:02:03
Michelle
And for links to all of our things that we have mentioned. You can go to our official website, which has insights into things. Dot com.

00:56:02:04 – 00:56:03:14
Joseph
That’s it. Another one in the book.

00:56:03:17 – 00:56:04:22
Michelle
Have a good week, everyone.

00:56:04:24 – 00:56:05:09
Joseph
Bye.