Tereglith: Good idea20:21
Eric: oh yeah
Eric: Other rooms!
Eric: Sweet
Eric: jonx sg
SG Standard: Stephen's a pro
Tereglith: We haven't liveblogged anything in so long
Tereglith: I wanna watch James Franco's Mother May I Sleep With Danger remake at some point
Eric: Yeah that would be a good one to do
Tereglith: Maybe we should ease everyone back in with some Ancient Aliens first tho
SG Standard: It got a shout out on the best of 2016 article today haha
Tereglith: All right let's get started
Tereglith: 3
Tereglith: 2
Tereglith: 1
Tereglith: go
Eric: That escalated quickly!
Tereglith: haha
Tereglith: sorry
Eric: SG for a second I thought you meant Ancient Aliens
SG Standard: Haha if only
Eric: Right to the nested flashback!
Eric: No messing about
Tereglith: I can't believe they still use Scantrons in this technologically advanced alternate timeline
Eric: VLC is not doing great with this big file
Eric: haha
Eric: I've always wondered what the psychological motivations for Speed Racer were
Tereglith: Y'know I used to think it was weird they named their kid Speed Racer but if Speed Weed can produce CW shows any name is possible.
Eric: I bet Wile E Coyote had an interesting childhood
Eric: hahaha
SG Standard: This is indeed cartoony
Tereglith: Yeah it's almost a shock when you go outside the relatively mundane school set.
Eric: Hey it's the QB from Friday Night Lights
Eric: It definitely feels like an acid trip sequence
Eric: or the perspective of a crazy person
Tereglith: I remember reading about the technology behind these all-CGI 360 degree settings in like Popular Science and Discover when the movie was coming out.
Eric: cool
Tereglith: In its own way this was just as much a revolutionary FX film as Avatar, just Avatar made all the money while this one made no money.
Eric: Needed more blue people
Eric: tail sex
Tereglith: haha
SG Standard: And more Dances with Wolves
Eric: and murky allegories
SG Standard: And more Charlie Humnam
SG Standard: Er, wait
SG Standard: Sam Huntington
SG Standard: No
Eric: haha
SG Standard: Liam Hemsworth?
Tereglith: Jai Courtney?
SG Standard: JAI COURTNEY WAS GOOD IN SPARTACUS, DAMMIT
SG Standard: Like, really good.
Eric: Rainbow Road: The Motion Picture
Eric: I guess in an alternative universe where Speed Racer was a big hit
Eric: Emile Hirsch would be a big lead movie star?
Tereglith: "Holy cannoli, Speed" good read
Eric: haha
SG Standard: And there would be a Speed Racer land at Disney World
Eric: Yeah!
Tereglith: It would make a badass refit for the Rock'n Rollercoaster
SG Standard: I can already tell that Speed Racer lends itself more to a Disney ride than Avatar haha
SG Standard: Ooooooh I like that idea
Tereglith: Also there is an ape in this picture
Eric: haha
Tereglith: I like the everything-turns-into-hearts shot
Eric: It's been established in Pumpkin that Christina Ricci is pretty into mentally handicapped dudes
SG Standard: I want to eat a ton of Pixie Stix and then do a Speed Racer/Scott Pilgrim double feature
Eric: lol the package is a bomb
Tereglith: I feel like there were quicker ways to get it out into the driveway...
Eric: hahaha
SG Standard: Engineers, y'know?
Eric: But we know Trixie is cool cause she thought almost being blown up was awesome
Eric: lol
SG Standard: All the newscasters speaking different languages reminds me of Willy Wonka when they were reporting on the golden tickets from around the world
Eric: "If you leave this bunker, you'll never survive!"
Tereglith: The Racer family has a kid every twelve years or so I guess.
Eric: haha
SG Standard: If you have to do a major exposition dump to open a film, there are worse ways to do it than with a hyper kinetic day-glo race going on in the background
Tereglith: I assume this old guy is a famous racing commentator irl
Eric: wait are the cars intangible?
Eric: ike holograms?
Tereglith: Only the memory of his brother's car
Eric: Or was there just a hologram of his brother's car
Eric: ah ok ty
SG Standard: Yeah, it was a ghost car like in Mario Kart
Tereglith: Oh I guess it may have been a literal hologram. They do that with the Olympics now.
Eric: To mark old records?
SG Standard: Ahhhhh that could be
Tereglith: The Racer parents' naming abilities really got worse and worse over time.
Eric: There are a lot of English people living in America in this world
Eric: haha
Tereglith: Yeah I'm very intrigued by the alternate history of this world. There was some sort of HUGE post-war technology boom but there's no indication of what caused it.
Eric: I would figure the old announcer & the monkey are from the cartoon, but I don't know
Tereglith: The monkey definitely is.
Eric: cool
SG Standard: I know the monkey is. Not sure about the announcer
Eric: Englishmen, technology boom, clearly this planet is occupied by the empire pre-new-hope
SG Standard: Pancakes are love, it's true
Tereglith: This guy is channeling Otho
Eric: Maple Syrup = 2nd base
Eric: haha John Goodman's skeptical face
SG Standard: Commodore 64! It does take place in our world!
Tereglith: I forgot the Commodore 64 ref, I guess that pins it close to the present day
Tereglith: They're going to Zootopia!
SG Standard: The 80s were *crazy* in this timeline
SG Standard: Needs more Shakira-llama
Eric: In that world, the Commodore 54 is like a military jet
Tereglith: This kid's got a case of Ted Cruz Face
Eric: lol
Eric: *64
SG Standard: I'm picturing this kid growing up into Bobby Moynahan
Eric: hahaha
Tereglith: I want to see the no-dobut extreme Segway races they have.
Eric: O'm holding out hope that this movie has like 1 40 year scope and we watch everyone grow old
Eric: 1 = a
SG Standard: Maybe this is the timeline where the Segway actually did change the world
Eric: Will Arnett is supreme lord
Tereglith: It's like the Axiom in Wall-E!
SG Standard: Ok, now I'm REALLY getting a Willy Wonka vibe
Eric: haha
Tereglith: Yeah for sure
Eric: The guy touching his nose while he holds the ring
Tereglith: This is probably the cartooniest part of the whole movie which is saying something
SG Standard: I'm amazed that the Wachowski's somehow managed to out-live-action anime themselves. They looked at the Matrix sequels and said "we can go bigger".
Tereglith: It really is a singular aesthetic.
Tereglith: John Goodman recites Bernie Sanders' stump speech to Susan Sarandon's intense approval
Eric: haha
Eric: I feel like everything Goodman said applies to this movie
Eric: wow that was an unexpected cut
Tereglith: Love those sideburns
SG Standard: Yeah, those two have found their lane and they are staying in it. If nobody else wants to be in it with them, they're fine. Gotta respect that.
Eric: The sideburns?
Tereglith: hahaha
SG Standard: Those too haha
SG Standard: That alarm is the same sound as my alarm clock in the morning
Eric: Guys I don't wanna sound crazy but
SG Standard: That threw me off for a second haha
Eric: I think maybe Rex is The Winter Soldier
Eric: lol sg
Tereglith: hahaha
Tereglith: Love the emoji-based targeting computer
Eric: nice
SG Standard: This is Dick Tracy + Scott Pilgrim vs the World, aesthetically speaking
Eric: haha yeah
Eric: The villains are very Dick Tracy
Tereglith: Yeah, hadn't thought about that but the Dick Tracy comparison is very apt.
Tereglith: They both go the extra mile in creating a super-heightened color palate
Eric: Filling a frame with pastel/prime colors, foreground and background, is a Godard thing
Eric: pre-CG but I guess Dick Tracy is pre-CG too
SG Standard: Did that business card say Inspector Detector?
Tereglith: It did!
SG Standard: That's awesome.
Eric: haha
Tereglith: Also from the cartoon I believe
Eric: Now they're gonna eat pancakes
Tereglith: How are Wednesday's eyes so big
Eric: Generations of Addams incest
Tereglith: Raising the question, why does a high-end racecar have so much trunk space?
Eric: haha
Eric: It's bigger on the inside
SG Standard: Christina Ricci actually managed to transform herself into a cartoon
Eric: This movie is actually about what happened to Cool World
Eric: The govt had it locked away for years
Tereglith: I wonder what Royalton is doing with two facilities in Antarctica
Eric: haha
Tereglith: It must have been an interesting experience for this kid to hang out with a chimpanzee every day for months.
Eric: lol. I hope there's a dvd feature about that.
Tereglith: See this is what makes the timeline so fucky. Ben Burns is still alive in the film but he competed in a race in 1943.
Eric: Yeah
Eric: I just figure it's set in the present
Eric: an alternate present
Eric: where jolly ranchers had a big influence on the infrastructure
Tereglith: Probably.
SG Standard: Forget influence, the infrastructure might actually be made of jolly ranchers
Eric: haha
Tereglith: "Turn of the last century" yeah I guess it's post-2000
Eric: Don't let that kid and monkey make a dent in the freeway by eating it
Tereglith: There's a lot of weird cuts in this movie
Eric: Yeah there are
Eric: and time devoted to tangents
SG Standard: The kid is a metaphor for the whole movie
Eric: haha
SG Standard: And yes, the film is simultaneously self indulgent and whittled down to the bone
Eric: Man they are telling him the race doesn't matter in the first hour
Tereglith: This guy's having so much fun chewing the scenery
Tereglith: One of Vincent Adultman's lesser-known early roles
Eric: haha
Tereglith: This race feels less finished graphically than the others. It's almost like they ran out of money.
SG Standard: I was wondering if that was the film or my stream haha
SG Standard: This is like F-Zero: The Movie!
Eric: They couldn't afford to finish the track!
Eric: lol SG I was just gonna say that
Eric: Apparently a lot of the drivers die in this sport
Tereglith: Really it's remarkable that they made this for just $120M when every single shot is an FX shot. Just 4 years later, a 'huge flop' started costing twice as much.
Tereglith: No they get shot out in giant foam bubbles remember?
Eric: I missed that
Eric: I'm only seeing about half the movie cause my player can't handle the file
Tereglith: Happens in the first five minutes to establish people aren't dying left and right for the rest of the movie.
Eric: ah ok
Eric: ty
Tereglith: See more timeline fuckery. This does not look like a man who could've won a race 65 years ago.
SG Standard: I had that same thought about the death Eric
SG Standard: Maybe we invented anti-aging technology?
Eric: haha
Eric: Turns out eating huge quantities of candy prevents aging
Tereglith: Being surrounded by fluorescent hypercolor keeps your skin nice.
Tereglith: I wish there was a movie about a world where people take Battlebots as seriously as they take racing in movies like this or *Cars*.
Tereglith: One that's not Robot Jox.
Tereglith: Shit stream cut out
Eric: pause
Tereglith: back
SG Standard: "Don't open that door!"
Eric: ok
SG Standard: The tables have turned, John Goodman!
Eric: We need to co-ordinate time stamp
Tereglith: 58 minutes
SG Standard: Shall we pause?
SG Standard: 58.35
Tereglith: pause for about 15 seconds and we'll be coordinated
SG Standard: Ok done
Tereglith: 59:00 right now
Tereglith: How do they not recognize their own son's chin when it's standing in their house
Eric: haha
Eric: He's lost about 1/3rd of his facial width
Eric: Maybe in the universe of this film years are only like 4 months?
Tereglith: Cheerios are still good for you cholesterol in this universe!
Eric: haha
Eric: Some things are just universal!
Tereglith: "Here are the features you will use exactly once each over the next half hour."
Eric: haha
Tereglith: (I love that kind of thing though)
SG Standard: Needed more !
SG Standard: Q
Eric: Yeah...no ejector seat?
SG Standard: The Wachowskis are so in love with this universe. It's adorable.
Eric: yeah, I am surprised they weren't made to edit about 40 minutes of this out
Tereglith: I really don't know why but the shine of the Matrix kept the studios absurdly indulgent towards them for a decade and a half and I'm not complaining.
Eric: "What?? Like.........hell they are."
SG Standard: There is no reason why this needs to be two hours and 15 minutes long. I admire the Wachowskis for using their FU Matrix clout on this
Eric: Yeah haha I think u must both be right
Eric: They had the cache
SG Standard: Nope! Everything they've done since has been Peak Wachowski, and more Peak Wachowski is a good thing. Even when its not good, its worth watching because there's nothing else like it
Tereglith: This is a big-ass building
Eric: I guess the Matrix sequels did good box office even tho they are not thought of very fondly?
Eric: haha
Tereglith: Oh nice rainbow cartoon explosion.
Eric: Or they're taking a lot of left turns we don't see ;-)
Eric: oh, nevermind
Eric: They're in a desert now
Tereglith: There was another driver bubble. They all survive!
Eric: wait, helicopter coaching is allowed?
Tereglith: Apparently.
SG Standard: The opposing teams are basically gangs from The Warriors haha
Eric: Trixie is like the Bill Belichick of racing
Eric: lol
Tereglith: haha the dollar signs in their eyes
SG Standard: He used the flippy car move twice!
Tereglith: Those are a standard feature of racing in this world though.
Eric: also buzzsaws
Tereglith: If he'd watched more battlebots he'd know buzzsaws are no good as a weapon. Should've gone with vertical drum spinners, those are the new meta.
SG Standard: Did one of the Vikings try to use Mjolnir as a weapon?
Tereglith: nothing matters except the beehive
SG Standard: WITNESSSSSSSS!
Tereglith: I think they borrowed some Bollywood tropes for these sequences too.
Eric: haha
Eric: I like that the kid solved his paleness problem
SG Standard: He's wearing the Speed Racer outfit!
Eric: nice
Eric: Matthew Fox is playing Britta's favorite superhero, the X Man
Tereglith: haha
Tereglith: "Quicksave" that's what the bubbles are called
Tereglith: also "Inspector Detector suspected"
Eric: hahaha
Eric: The deep secret of this family
Eric: is that the Dad is really Mario
Tereglith: hahaha
SG Standard: That's like some high level rap assonance going on in that line
Eric: Moses Supposes
Tereglith: I'm just picture Daveed Diggs in Speed Racer: The Musical
Eric: lol
SG Standard: I had his "I'm in the cabinet" line from Washington on Your Side in mind when I wrote that haha
Tereglith: Maybe all the changes in this universe can be traced back to the moon being super big and/or close.
Tereglith: Feel sorry for that ninja.
Tereglith: Just tryna do his job and he gets squished by a couch.
Eric: He was one day away from getting his pension!
SG Standard: It's too bad that the one person who isn't acting like this is a live action cartoon is the title character
Eric: That was pretty funny, that they just grabbed his legs
Tereglith: My favorite line coming up
SG Standard: Ok, that zoom to the ring was something special
Eric: more like a non-ja?
Tereglith: yuuuup
Eric: lol good choice
SG Standard: BAHAHAHAHAHA best scene in the movie
Tereglith: John Goodman should say "more like a non-ja" in every movie.
Eric: haha
SG Standard: Dude just told Jack Shepherd not to tell him what he can't do
Eric: hahaha
Tereglith: these zooms
SG Standard: Yup. More conversations should be shot that way
Tereglith: "They're pounding one another bumper to bumper, rail to rail" was also a line in the Speed Racer Porn Parody
SG Standard: Gah I'm buffering all of a sudden
Tereglith: pause?
Eric: haha tere
Tereglith: I paused at 1:26:12
SG Standard: I'll pause when I get there and see if it can catch up
Eric: cool
SG Standard: And now it's not letting me pause haha
Tereglith: Weird
Tereglith: Should I press go again?
Eric: yikers
Eric: yeah are we go for go?
Eric: drop the flag?
SG Standard: I'm back at 1.26.12
Eric: ok cool
SG Standard: Gimmie a minute to let it buffer ahead and then we can drop the green flag
Eric: allright
Tereglith: This movie is like a more cartoonish version of Cars
Eric: haha
Tereglith: Should I use this interlude to talk about the Speed Racer Lego sets?
Eric: and with a monkey instead of Larry the Cable Guy
Eric: so a distinct improvemnt
Eric: Sure!
Eric: Are there a lot of them?
Tereglith: There was a single wave released as copromotion with the movie
Tereglith: The late aughts were a big branching-out time for lego licenses, which had previously stuck to proven franchises like Star Wars and HP after being burned by Galidor
Eric: (sidebar, are legos big in Japan?)
Tereglith: This was one of the first flops for which they produced sets, but no the last.
SG Standard: Ok I'm gonna give it a shot again
SG Standard: Y'all ready?
Tereglith: There's an active Lego community in Japan but not "big in Japan" levels.
Tereglith: yes
Tereglith: count us down
SG Standard: 3
SG Standard: 2
SG Standard: 1
SG Standard: start
Tereglith: The sets mainly consisted of pairs of cars for a quite reasonable price with a revolutionary new curved windshield piece. I sort of regret not buying any.
Tereglith: There was also the big red gangster truck and a large Grand Prix playset.
Eric: So like cars you'd build? (Not tiny lego-man size?)
Tereglith: They were minifigure scale.
SG Standard: The monkey threw poo
Eric: haha
Eric: But also, ewwww
SG Standard: I suppose that was Chekhov's Poo Toss
Tereglith: I think John Goodman just killed two dudes
Eric: hahaha Checkhov's poo toss
SG Standard: If you introduce a monkey in Act 1, it must fling poo by act 3
Tereglith: For being gangsters these guys are pretty shit at fighting.
Eric: No, Tere, uhhhh, magic bubbles....healed their wounds...
SG Standard: Kurt Angle approves of that ankle lock
SG Standard: Except that guy
Eric: Gangsters from the UK are mostly decorative ;-)
Tereglith: Also Chekhov's eating-of-a-minor-antagonist's-fingers-by-piranhas
SG Standard: That was a nice bit of setup haha
Tereglith: The kid and the monkey would've gotten banged around more in that trunk than Indy in the fridge
Eric: Man, 45 more minutes...they could set up more villains
Eric: haha Tere
Tereglith: O GENIE OF THE ICE
Tereglith: (did either of you watch Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July?)
Eric: Don't trust that ice, the corporation might have had it shipped in from their base in Antarctica!!
Tereglith: haha
Eric: (I did)
SG Standard: I used to have a slot car set with that same giant mouth at the entrance of a cave thing
Tereglith: This is a very pretty sequence
Eric: It is!
Eric: I wonder if, in the movie's world, people use some of these features in traffic ev eryday
Tereglith: It seems like it since the Racer family has no compunctions about using the Mach 5 as a driving-to-school vehicle
SG Standard: I would just like to point out that this is a qualifier for the actual final race
Eric: haha
SG Standard: I would use that flippy jumpy trick ALL THE TIME
Eric: awww, I was hoping we'd just get 40 minutes of the kid and monkey trying to steal more candy
Eric: (The fish is his son)
Tereglith: haha
Eric: There's gotta be more to the plan tho cuz Racer X was in on it
Tereglith: Whoever owns this track should probably put tighter security on it at night.
Eric: haha
Eric: "No I just watch you from a helicopter, like everybody else"
Tereglith: "Actually, Speed, I'm your cousin Randy. Sorry to disappoint."
Eric: lol
SG Standard: I was gonna say, that's an odd way to handle that reveal haha
Eric: I just figured it was a fake-out
Tereglith: (it is)
Eric: Rex had facial surgery or something
Eric: ah ok
Eric: His face flips around
Tereglith: haha
Tereglith: it's a special feature they installed
Tereglith: he can also put buzzsaws out his nostrils
Eric: haha
Eric: "No, don't sneeze!!"
Tereglith: This is where he recruits Speed to the AC Repair School.
Eric: hahaha3
Eric: You all know the rules of the Grand Prix, cause there arrrrrrreeeen't any
Tereglith: Jesus, [whoever was DoP on this movie], are you on crack?
SG Standard: Yes, Pops, you do want salt on your eggs.
Eric: lol
Tereglith: See that line places it in some alternate '90s
Tereglith: maybe they don't use the Gregorian calendar. That would explain a lot.
Eric: haha
Eric: which line was that?
SG Standard: The DoP was David Tattersall, who was also the DoP on the Star Wars prequels
Tereglith: "They've known the winner for the past 50 years" in reference to the '43 Prix and presumably the 50 subsequent ones
Eric: ah ok
Tereglith: obligatory "It's so dense, every frame has so much going on"
Eric: haha
Eric: He had so much more pod racing he wanted to shoot!
SG Standard: So this takes place 48 years after the GP they keep mentioning, but it sounds like 43 refers to the number, not a year
SG Standard: THIS KEEPS GETTING EVEN MORE CONFUSING
Eric: haha
Eric: Maybe there are no years in this world
Eric: They only measure time in Grand Prixs
SG Standard: haha
SG Standard: The Year of the 91st Grand Prix
SG Standard: That's like some Infinite Jest stuff
Tereglith: I like it
Eric: Yeah!
Tereglith: That's some effortless worldbuilding right there.
Eric: Pancakes are love but PB&J are stable, practical marriage
Tereglith: I enjoy how visceral the power of the cars is. Even though they're clearly weightless VFX the sound design and the way they're animated sells the weightlessness as a consequence of their physically impossible power.
Eric: nice
Eric: It's the effects of the huge moon!
SG Standard: It's the opposite of most CGI fests these days, where everything feels totally weightless. This stuff has some oomph behind it
Eric: tho I suppose that would actually do the opposite
Tereglith: I mean these feel weightless too but they use it to their advantage.
Eric: This is like the scene in Hoosiers
Tereglith: They move like you imagined your hot wheels moving as a kid
Eric: where Gene Hackman measures the court
Eric: That's interesting, Tere
SG Standard: Buffering again!
Eric: I didn't really think of it that way
Tereglith: pause?
SG Standard: If you please
Tereglith: 1:51:46
Tereglith: I'll try to expand on these thoughts in the message board.
Eric: cool
SG Standard: I agree with both of you!
Eric:
thumbs2.ebaystatic.com/d/l225/m/mXxl81uzL7DdXYYk_cyn1Uw.jpgTereglith: While we're waiting have a look at the Speed Racer Lego sets.
brickset.com/search/?query=speed+racerEric:
vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/speedracer/images/b/b6/Legograndprix2.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20080511181713Eric: Did they really make the monkey? haha
SG Standard: Aight, let's give this another go
Eric: Those're pretty cool tho
Tereglith: That's a standard Lego monkey that's been around since the first Pirates sets in the late 80s
Eric: ah ok
Tereglith: count us down
Eric: Someone being clever
SG Standard: Monkey!
SG Standard: Ok here we go
SG Standard: 3
SG Standard: 2
SG Standard: 1
Tereglith: spam?
Eric: This ain't a race, this is a showdown
Tereglith: You with us SG?
SG Standard: Yeah, I was flooding haha
Eric: haha I hate that
SG Standard: Did y'all start back up?
Eric: I did
Tereglith: Quadrinaros can't get out of the gate!
SG Standard: cool cool cool
Eric: Need us to re-sync?
SG Standard: hahahaha
SG Standard: Nope, I started when y
Eric: cool
SG Standard: ou guys did so we're good
Tereglith: I wish real racetracks had zoetropes on the sides
Tereglith: Futurama!
Eric: We've switched from Rainbow Road to more of a Marble Madness motif
Tereglith: It really is kind of weird how much more finished this sequence looks than the tropical race. I wonder if they actually did run out of money/time and this was the first one they completed.
Eric: I like how the announcers are as cheesy as real sports announcers
Tereglith: I think they mostly are real sports announcers
Tereglith: Or maybe I'm thinking of Cars
Tereglith: Wikipedia says some of these announcers were voice actors on the original show though so that's neat
Eric: o rly?
Eric: Yeah that's pretty awesome
SG Standard: Maybe that's who the old guy was!
Tereglith: "Cannonball has Speed pinned as they grind" is also in the Speed Racer Porn Parody.
Tereglith: I like how this feature of the track is also a slide at Wet 'N Wild
Eric: hahaha Tere
Tereglith: This sequence gets beautifully abstract
Eric: Evocative flashback to 30 minutes ago
SG Standard: This score is so playful. It's like the musical version of Giacchino's punny track titles
Eric: Yeah it's trippy
Eric: He went into the ending of 2001 wormhole
Eric: Which would explain the monkey
Tereglith: I sort of feel like Star Trek '09 went for a watered-down version of that super-shiny aesthetic.
Tereglith: WHAT A TWEEST
Tereglith: Through the magic of surgery he went form one bland white guy to another bland white guy.
Eric: lol
Eric: "Make me look I aged pretty much appropriately"
Tereglith: THEY PUT THE MONKEY IN A TUX
Eric: "Doc, make me look 20 Grand Prixs older"
Eric: haha
Eric: nice
SG Standard: hahaha
SG Standard: Callback!
Tereglith: Visual callback to the everything's-hearts shot
Tereglith: This end credits song is the clearest indicator that this film was made in 2008
Eric: haha
Tereglith: I like the samples from the cartoon audio tho
Eric: Rapanese!
Eric: I never really watched the cartoon
Tereglith: Nor I
Eric: I read one comic book when I was a kid
Eric: From which I knew the Racer X story
Tereglith: Whoa Young Trixie was the Moder nFamily girl
SG Standard: Whoa
Eric: haha really?
SG Standard: I never would have noticed that
Tereglith: "You're looking at me in a very strange way, Speed" final porn parody line
Eric: LOL
Eric: 10 years later, they discovered that legit racing is actually super boring
Eric: and Speed Racer 2 is about Speed trying to fix the races again
Tereglith: Also the kid brother dies a early-onset Type II diabetes
Eric: haha
SG Standard: hahaha
Tereglith: Impression on rewatch: It's a film that's very uncompromising in its aesthetic, for good and ill. But the race sequences are some of the most fun and prettiest action of the 21st century
Eric: Yeah
Tereglith: How do we post the transcript?
Tereglith: Pastebin maybe?
Eric: I sort of admire them trying to shuffle or structure the narrative to tell a more all-action, unflagging story, but it might've lost viewers
Eric: That it didn't feel like there was a clear motivation/obstacle throughline
Eric: as Aaron Sorkin would say
Eric: Oh yeah
SG Standard: Impression on first watch: I don't think it's necessarily a good film, but it's a fun film. There is more inventiveness and creativity on display here than you could see in entire years of filmmaking. In typical Wachowski fashion they go as BIG as possible, and they land a couple of trademark moments of emotional beauty (that montage during the last race) to go along with the moments of aesthetic beauty (all of the race scenes).
Eric: I'm not sure if regular cut and pasting would keep the format intact
SG Standard: I agree, Eric. There wasn't exactly a story there to speak of. Just a series of incidents.
Eric: yeah well put
Tereglith: The story hinged on us caring as much about the corporate side of racing as the characters do, which is a... dicey proposition, since no analogue exists in the real world. (Cars has this problem too, to a certain extent, but you can also root for the revitalization of Radiator Springs in that movie).
Eric: Yeah that was interesting, that they went early on to the idea that corruption had always clouded the sport
Eric: I think that's how a lot of sports fans feel
Eric: That the game's fixed
SG Standard: And because of that, it made it difficult for us to really latch on to the stakes
Eric: Yeah I agree
