Episode 26: (21 BBY) Clone Wars S1 E19, 20, & 21

At some point in the history in which people started separating people out by the...

Because that's how people are, that's what people do.

I know, and I say that looking back at the history of the entire world.

Yeah, have you...

And it is that way.

Have you met humans?

Yes, sir.

In this episode, Ahsoka is both an incompetent and yet brilliant tactician,

abandoned kids truly are the key to victory,

and Mace Windu is one bad mother...

Discuss Clone Wars episodes 119, 120, and 121 on this edition of the 11 Parsecs Podcast.

Hello and welcome to podcast number 26 of the 11 Parsecs Podcast.

My name is Eric, I'm here with my good buddy Jon.

Hello.

And tonight we are reviewing Clone Wars episodes 19, 20, and 21,

which is a cool little write-off arc.

Jon, before we get started though, shall we have some brews?

Please.

Yeah, I'm thirsty, I'm thirsty tonight.

This pollen is killing me in the South.

I wish I could explain to people that don't live in the South.

Well, it's like this everywhere, I shouldn't say the South.

It's yellow snow.

Yeah.

No, if you don't live here in Atlanta, and people can tell me I'm wrong, that's fine,

but if you don't live here in Atlanta, I don't think you grasp the concept of yellow snow.

Yeah, it is absolutely horrible.

So if my voice is a little bit shakier tonight, or what have you,

please just blame it on the pollen, and all the fact that I have, I guess, like flower sperm in my mouth.

Is that really what we're going with? I guess that's what we're going with.

What are you drinking?

We don't need to point that out.

One quick thing though, because I found this absolutely amazing.

So we take the car into one of the car wash tunnels, because we want to get it cleaned up real nice.

And so we come out of the car wash tunnel, by the time we'd gotten to the exit of the parking lot of the establishment,

you couldn't tell.

Yeah, it's pointless to try to wash your car. I totally agree with that.

It's like, why?

Even if you have a garage, and you store your car in your garage, it's still yellow.

It's still yellow. It's crazy.

Everything is yellow.

It really feels like the end of March, early April is when it's just almost unbearable.

And then it clears up. It's really weird.

And also too, everybody's like, oh, you guys get rain, blah, blah, blah.

Rain gives you like a 24-hour reprieve.

Yeah, that's right.

After that, it's done. And usually you start seeing puddles with yellow rings around them.

Yeah, don't get me wrong, the rain is glorious when it comes, but no, it's very brief.

What are you drinking tonight, John?

Don't say anything with pollen in it.

It is Pontoon Brewing's Center of the Universe.

Now, Pontoon always has the awesome labels. What's on this label?

It's like a cartoonish one, right?

I can barely see it in the dark of the studio here, but it's triple IPA, and it's got some kind of sundial sort of thing going on.

Like Aztec sundial-y?

Yeah, let's go with that. It's really hard to tell.

Well, tonight I am drinking a Rolling in the Haze, a New England-style IPA from Back 40 Brewing, who is from, I believe it was Alabama, if I remember.

Yeah, Gadsden, Alabama.

So I've moved to state over, because Pontoon's here in Atlanta, I think, right? Or they're in Georgia, not Atlanta.

They are local. I don't remember where.

If you sponsor me, I'll remember.

Yeah, seriously. Sponsoring is a free six-pack. I think you can say it way better.

Anyways, are you ready to crack them?

Yeah, let's do it.

Let's go.

Ooh, nice.

There we go.

I'm all over the nuts.

You have a tendency to spill all over something.

I do. I think what happens is I get really free-form with the beer in my hand when it's closed, like looking at it and reading it and describing it to everyone listening on this glorious podcast.

And then when I actually crack it open, I'm like, I shouldn't have done that. I should have just kept it pretty stable.

All right, tasting.

Yep, tasting also.

Oh, that's so good.

Pretty good.

We've talked before about how I'm a triples guy, and it is a good triple.

Yeah, mine's good. It's not, it's not, this is my first one of the six-pack. It's not my favorite hazy, but it's not bad by any means.

It's almost like a little bit, well, I, it's a New England style IPA, so it's probably supposed to be a little bit more lighter than a normal IPA, hazy IPA.

So I shouldn't, I shouldn't knock it for that.

Tastes pretty good.

So Clone Wars 19, 20, 21.

Stormover Ryloth is the, is the first guy.

Let's just go through these real quick.

It was a, it was a good little mini arc.

Let's talk about each one and see where we're at.

Episode 19 was the Separatists invaded the Twilight Cone with Planet Ryloth.

Anakin and Ahsoka lead a squadron of fighters against the Trade Federation battleship commanded by a Nemoidian Capitan, Capitan?

Captain Martuk. I enjoyed the fact that a lot of this episode was in space. I thought that was a neat because we've been rescuing people on planets for so long on these episodes so far.

Isn't the whole thing in space? Yeah, it was. So I appreciated the fact that this episode was in space and I like that. I like space battles. I like that difference in environment and context of the episode, the characters.

But I cannot help but sit there and be like, like Ahsoka is just absolutely like, like just ignoring stuff and just getting people killed left and right. And then she loses the whole battleship.

Like, like the whole the whole thing just it's gone because of her bad judgment. And then they get back onto the other ship and she starts running the whole squadron now.

Or she starts running the whole thing. I'm like, what is happening here? Like, literally my notes are Ahsoka's hubris is crazy weird this episode. Like so defiant. And then they lose the whole cruiser.

And then my next note says, so now she is commanding the rest of the fleet. Like, it's like, what is happening? Like, I don't understand this. It's this episode was really good in showing how disposable the clones were to me.

Sure. And it's actually the first note that I made was that I just, again, we talked about this before with one of the comics way back. I don't get the Jedi's are generals thing. I don't, it doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

Yeah. Yeah.

It's yeah, they're superheroes, but it's what I wrote down was it's like Ant-Man commanding a platoon. It doesn't make any sense.

Yeah, agreed. It's not that it's a natural fit. Like, I understand that if you have this massive army that has no leadership, you would probably go with the Jedi at this point only because they're the only people that could do it.

But they're not here for strategy for armies. I mean, they're here for like, missions that they need to get accomplished. Like, it's weird. I totally agree with you that it's weird.

That's the thing. They're put in positions of they're not wielding their force powers. They are trying to come up with battle strategy. And I, is that a power of The Force? I don't think so.

I mean, you can't say that Anakin doesn't do a good job of that throughout, you know, going through all The Clone Wars.

There can be the exceptions.

Yeah, agreed. In general.

And she's a kid. But yeah, but Ahsoka, well, that's the thing. That's what killed me was just like, she literally just lost one of the two. You came in here with two massive ships.

She just caused one of them to be obliterated. They're gone. Everybody on board the ship's gone. All the clones, everybody.

So now you're going to give her control the rest of the fleet? And I'm like, what is happening here?

Like what? Well, see, that's the other thing. Yeah. If you're a normal human, are they humans? Whatever. If you're a normal person and you fail miserably, right, there's consequences. You get demoted. You get removed from command.

That doesn't ever seem to happen with these general Jedi's.

Yeah, no, not at all. And I totally agree with that. It's very, it's a weird. Yeah, I don't know. It's it's it was a weird episode to me.

I mean, in the end, I kind of like the episode because of just the way the spacefights. I mean, I enjoy the spacefights. I love getting, you know, I love getting to see a pure an episode that is just purely spacefights.

But I still thought it was weird. I don't know. I did not overall care for it.

The initial attack was stupid. Yeah. And then the moral lesson you get from Anakin when he's talking or I guess he's berating Ahsoka, you know, you should always follow orders unless you should disobey them, unless you should follow them.

It's all over the map. Yeah. And he doesn't he doesn't know how to teach at this point. He has no clue on how to be a Jedi Master at this point.

Do you think that's meant to do you think that is meant to be conveyed? Because I didn't get that. I think they are they really showing that?

I think they're showing the fact that he is inept at leadership at this point. He's very good at what he does. But he's inept at leadership.

And not only is that getting people killed, clones killed, but like his decision making on letting her then follow the, you know, follow more money, follow follow the bad money, you know, with more money.

It's just like, I don't know. I thought it was a weird episode overall. And I thought it showed that he was not inept, but but not very good at being a leader.

Yeah, not not a good episode. They made the classic mistake of kind of painting themselves into a corner. Yeah. And then Ahsoka has to come up with the solution.

And her solution is a battle tactic that they actually point out is really old. But she doesn't know that she thinks of it on her own.

So she reinvents this known battle strategy that has been discarded because it doesn't work. It's too risky, but it works like a charm. Yeah.

Didn't like nothing about that pleases me. Yeah. You know, I enjoyed the aesthetic of it being spent.

So let's talk about the second episode. Innocence of Bryloth.

To sabotage a powerful Separatist weapon, Obi-Wan and small clone forces enter an occupied town and discover that its residents are being used as a living shield.

Nira! Nira!

Watch inboard again. Although I did like Obi-Wan Mace hitting the town. That's pretty cool. I like that.

I thought it was really cool because you see the characters. I'm sorry, what are they called again with the head tails?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, tail heads. I have that in my notes. I said Commander Cody. Was that a slur almost? Like a trail head?

I don't see how you could say tail heads or hear tail heads and not think that it's taken as a slur or given as a slur.

It's a species slur. To some degree. But what I thought would be cool is this. I'm getting a slur after this man. This is not.

Call everybody tail heads. A bunch of tail heads.

I'm rallying against this. These fake characters should not have to deal with this.

Humans come in. We're just pieces of toast. From white bread all the way through the brown spectrum to black.

But that's all we got. These guys. How cool would it be if we had humans like all these different colors?

Aquamarine, royal blue. I mean how weird would society be at that point?

Agreed. It'd be so moot. It'd be a moot point.

I don't know about that. I don't know. Unless there was some point in the history in which people started separating people out by the color.

Because that's how people are. That's what people do.

I know. And I say that looking back at the history of the entire world.

Have you met humans?

Yeah, seriously. But still, I don't know. It's a very interesting species.

I have in my notes, right there in the smack dab middle, of course they find a kid. That's the one thing.

So the fact that the robots used all the carbon bags for shields was kind of interesting though.

That they made that decision. That they're like, no, no, no, we're robots but we're still going to use your humans as shields.

Which is an interesting thing on its own. Not even outside of this episode.

And again, Obi-Wan with the animal husbandry.

Oh, hardcore.

Yeah, when we read the Obi-Wan book and the apprentice, Master and Apprentice, you could see that he was very good with the animals and such.

That was kind of a neat touch.

I liked it better than the first episode from a writing perspective.

But I still, I'm just kind of ho-hum with this arc.

I don't know. I'm just not into it for this arc. I don't know. What do you think?

Same thing. I liked it better than the first episode but it didn't really grab me all that much.

I mean, it's paint by the numbers. When they come across a kid, you know where it's going.

You know where that's going to go.

And I don't think that's a factor of it being, how old is it at this point? 13, 14?

2009.

Yeah, so it was paint by the numbers back then too.

Okay, and the final episode of this arc is Liberty on Ryloth.

This is episode 21 of season 1.

Let me read a little quick synopsis here.

Mace Windu and his clone troopers aim to liberate the Ryloth capital of Lesoth, but need to acquire the help of the Twi'lek resistance group led by Cham Syndulla in order to do so.

I know that Cham Syndulla is a character that we will see a lot in canon.

I don't really know that much about him.

He's the first character that I know that we should be looking at and making sure we kind of understand when we see them in these early episodes of Clone Wars.

But I don't know that much about him at this point.

This was kind of interesting to me because I've heard that name bounced around from other people and talked about.

I just never knew who the character really was.

Have you heard that name before we watch this episode?

Nope.

Okay, good.

So just keep our ears open to the way he works in this episode because it'll have ramifications down the road from what I understand.

Final episode of the arc, I liked some of the best out of the three, personally.

It was Windu being a badass.

He was still, you know, the cool walkers.

That was the first note I made there was a lightning squad.

First of all, where did that come from all of a sudden?

I don't know.

And they are kick-ass.

Let's do that all day long.

Yeah, seriously.

It was really good.

I enjoyed that little bit of the A-Team almost.

And then I enjoyed the fact that Wat Timbor is in some kind of hot water and that Doku is like, we're going to burn the city.

You need to get all the money out of it now.

Trouble you you screw this one up and yeah, and I like how he's kind of forced to to not only like reckon with the fact that

You know his forces are gone

But also the fact that he needs to get all this money out of here and that's why or this treasure

I guess I should say and that's why Mace is able to kind of formalize this plan that seems to work across these

Really cool looking laser bridge things. They reminded me of like Rainbow Road Mario Kart

It was good it was it was it was

Now the the bridge scene was good action it

I have so much more respect for Windu now because in that sequence. He's literally a superhero

Yeah, yeah the whole sequence where he's flying around in the air on the on the droids like back and forth and stuff is amazing

It's great. I love it. That's that's what I enjoy about

Mace Windu, and I enjoy about seeing like these kind of like

Cartoonish almost you know episodes is that I like that I'm fine with that show me how awesome

He is just draw it out for me, and then I don't know if you caught this but

The people charging the bridge mm-hmm. We're going full speed that bridge turned on at the last second

Oh, yeah, those people yeah, yeah, they were committed, and they had that that's how much trust they had yeah

Mace Windu they were willing to plummet to their deaths if he was half a second later

And then there was also this little like

Exposition part about the droids where they talked about their makes their models

Which I don't know if you caught that or not it was really small probably like 30 seconds, but it showed this like kind of

Classing of the droids like these droids knew that they're better than these models

So like that like they hold them in contempt a little bit like it was kind of a neat play also

You know kind of on the the way that the droids were talking about the the twi'leks earlier in the second episode too

Which was kind of cool, so you're saying that droids are racist too. They are

Now that what it shows you is the inherent nature of

Well, or did we program or did we program the AI?

Yeah, they didn't come from nowhere, so we have this inherent need to

Both belong and other eyes yeah, those who do not belong yeah

It's like it's like it's like just one big compare contrast exercise

on the next version of

But but I do enjoy these kind of like little uh

If you catch them you know inside the episode you're just kind of like yeah

It's pretty good it may be

The it just may be in the context of the last five years and these writers had no clue you know that this was gonna

Be so resident in the end, but I enjoy those little things personally because I'm just gonna like yeah

That really does apply a little bit today

You know these droids are literally being racist about their their other

Classifications of droids or other versions of themselves and that's kind of neat

But did did humans or did we create the AI that that allowed that to happen or did they naturally just start doing that?

And it's you know. I don't know it's an interesting philosophical conversation overall

What'd you think give me a give me a one through a hundred on the entire arc well first?

I want to say that I'm I'm actually really glad that you brought that point up because I glossed right through

I know what you're talking about, but I glossed right through it mm-hmm and

Gosh that does not speak well of me and my sensibilities because I just accepted that that robo racism

without thought

Well, I mean that that's yeah, that's that that and that I did too

I just kind of question and again like I'm saying though

It's like in the context of today it takes on different back when they're writing this thing they had no clue

You know that AI and and racism inside AI would be you know such a big deal and something that we've really got to be

on the lookout for

You know and you know it's something that you know it's something that as well

But those kind of guys could think about all day long and it realized that we were headed this way

You know Black Mirror esk type things, but I just thought it was deep because it portrayed really it was just a snippet

That's you know this has to do with what we're going through now, and it's just kind of like oh

That's actually kind of you know on key for today, so right and they may not have meant that whatsoever I

I I probably doubt it, but it is fun to talk about to answer your question

Wait am I giving a score for the for the arc you're giving me a score for the whole let's yeah

Let's go for the complete arc like do we both agree that the third episode was the best one oh?

Yeah, yeah

So the third episode of the arc episode 21 was the best one in our opinion

But what would you give the entire arc and when I say the arc think of it in the context of like a mini movie?

Maybe you know what I mean like not each episode averaged out. You know

I

Somewhere in the low 70s yeah, that's what I was going to 73 yeah, that's how I was actually gonna go

I had 73 in my head

Yeah, like it. Yeah, I was thinking I was like 72 maybe a little bit more 73 74, but yeah

I settled on 73 also. It's good. It's you can watch it

Not my favorite arc that we've seen thus far

I'm I'm hesitant to say filler just because we seem to be so close to the end of the first season they really kind of

Start knocking it out of the park, but I guess the only thing that we really see right now is the end of the season

Progression wise is, you know, of course the Ryloth people are freed and that also Wat Timbor is on Doku's bad list from the Trade Federation.

But other than that, story wise, nothing really moves forward in my opinion.

Maybe Ahsoka gains a little, you know, battle experience and that type of stuff.

But I don't know.

Well, it seemed like they were setting up the the the political stuff with the Twi- are they Twi'leks?

Yeah, Twi'leks.

Yeah, correct.

Yeah.

They seem to be setting that up for something maybe.

Yeah, that's true.

Yeah, I didn't think about that.

Yeah, about the Senator and then making the deal with the general.

Yeah, I agree with that.

Yeah.

Which I honestly don't really care about that much.

Yeah.

But it seemed like it was important to the people writing the show.

Beyond that, no, it's just more fighting The Clone Wars, you know, thing.

All right, Jon, so what have you been been watching?

Have you watched any of the Moon Knight?

I watched the first episode and hated it so much.

I'm not going to watch anymore.

That's surprising.

I did not expect that opinion from you.

No, I'm kidding.

I watched first episode and went on vacation.

So I what are we two episodes?

No, tomorrow will be two episodes.

No, tomorrow will be three episodes.

The first three episodes, two of which I've not watched.

So I think I'm just gonna-

We're not gonna give any spoilers for this.

We're just giving opinions.

I don't think I mean, I don't know what I know.

I know nothing about Moon Knight at all.

I think you're a big fan, aren't you?

Yeah, he was he was one of the characters that I like, like the Eternals.

I didn't know that much about, honestly, I just never read those comics.

Moon Knight, I definitely did know something about.

I'm liking it.

I'm liking it so far.

I'm really enjoying it.

And I think it's I think it's really complex writing and I like it.

Yeah. And I think the cinematography is great.

And I think the way that they do visuals is great.

And yeah, I'm not gonna give anything away because everybody needs to watch it.

But it's good.

I like it.

I think I'm going to enjoy it.

I'm interested to see where it goes, because, again, I knew nothing about it.

I am pretty excited about the Obi-Wan.

Yes.

Very.

Yeah.

Yeah.

When is that coming out again?

May 24th, I believe.

OK.

All right.

They may have pushed that back another two days.

I remember reading something about how they pushed it back.

But they were going to.

Oh, yeah. But just just a couple of days.

Yeah.

There are two episodes instead of one episode.

So, I mean, you get like a double.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That one really that to me is a big filler.

No, not not a filler.

No, not no, no, no, no, no, no.

It's a big test of whether they are able to play in that gap.

Oh, in a meaningful and interesting and developmental way.

Interesting.

Right. Because you're you're in a sandbox.

Yeah. Right.

Yes. A sandbox.

But it's it has walls.

So you can play all you want, but you got to fit in the sandbox.

And can you tell a compelling and interesting story

that doesn't have the same old Star Wars stuff?

You know, it's got to have this and it's got to have that.

It's kind of it's a checklist.

Can they can they defeat that mentality?

Finally, they have the acting chops for it.

I'll say that, like everyone, everyone, the budget for the acting.

Yeah, absolutely.

The big screen.

They got you know, they got they got they got Ian McGregor,

you know, on board for the six, you know, just saying, look, I'll do six.

That's it.

So that means that your writing has to be really, really good.

You know what I mean?

Like, it's got to be top tier.

See, I didn't know it was just six.

And that that. OK.

It's not it's not it's a it's a it's a what do they call it?

A TV event versus an actual like series.

A miniseries. Yeah.

A miniseries. Yeah.

Used to be called a miniseries back in the day.

Yeah, but that's not what we call it today.

But it's like it's not a series, but it's not.

Yeah, it's not. It's a miniseries.

It's a series because they're not serial.

I mean, it's it's it's there's six episodes that all have the same story.

It's just that and who you know, who's now?

Maybe they throw so much cash and I'll come back for another one.

We don't know that.

Stranger Things, I'm a big fan.

Go ahead. I'm a big fan of the Zurk.

I'm a big fan of more like a 10.

If you're into a miniseries, 10 episodes.

Yeah, because that gives you a little bit of breathing room.

Six is tight. Six is really tight.

Yeah, yeah. And that's fine.

And actually, but don't say the Moon Knights only six to.

You're probably right.

I mean, but there's no there's no room there.

There's there's not there's none whatsoever.

You can't have a bad episode in that because if you don't.

Not just that, you can't have a developmental episode in that.

You have to kick, you know, boom, boom, boom.

Go, go, go.

I might I might go a little bit less than you and say eight is my is my

my happy number there.

And the only reason I say that is generally that

actually that eighth episode in a 10 episode series,

that seventh, eighth episodes,

they're trying to build up a little more mystery and things like like.

I'm trying to think what was Expanse the last season of Expanse?

Like six. Yeah, no, no, no, no, no.

Sorry, not the last season.

The season before it was like 12.

Mm, something like that. Yeah.

Sometimes you just get.

You take expanse out of your f***ing mouth.

I don't know. I feel like you, toward the later end of those episodes, I feel like you get some episodes that are like, like just trying to keep the cliffhanger going until the ninth or the tenth episode.

Well, that's just bad writing. That's that. That is you know what that is?

Because I think you want to talk about Stranger Things 4. That is in Stranger Things that the infamous What's Her Face 11 goes off to like Chicago or something.

Yes. Yeah. I agree. That was a terrible episode. I agree with that. And yes, I'm biting into the bit right now to talk about the Stranger Things 4 trailer.

But, but yeah, I agree with you. That was a terrible episode. That was that. That might be one of the best examples of what are we doing here?

Like, like what is happening? It served no purpose. It was like you really had nowhere to go with this.

It was another series that I watched over COVID that I thought the exact same thing. I just can't remember what it is where I'm like, what did I just watch?

Oh, yeah. Let me say this. Let me say this. What?

Mandalorian. The Boba Fett does that, but I actually enjoyed it. It goes off rails a lot, but I enjoyed it. So I can't say that that doesn't always work. You know what I mean? But...

See, okay, I've seen other people make we're going to spiral now. I've seen other people make that criticism about the Big Book of Boba, how it became like Mandalorian, you know, whatever 2.5.

I have no problem with that. Follow the story. Interweave. It's cool. It's showing the it's filling out the world.

It's filling out the entire Mangalore.

I mean, it's like, you know, Boba Fett in this episode, I'm mad. I mean, what is that about?

Yeah. No. Yeah, no, I agree with that. But that's what I'm saying, though. There was a part of that where I'm like, what is this episode about? Like, what are we watching?

And then I'm like, OK, I like that because it did just recited the history and brought everybody back up to speed. And I liked it a lot. But but I will say that there was one more show and I can't remember what it was that about three fourths of the way through the season.

It just takes this wicked turn and it's only for one episode. And I remember I'll remember. I'll remember at the end of this podcast.

I'm so curious.

Yeah. And I just remember sitting there being like, is this is very Stranger Things. Like, this is very odd. But anyways, season four, Stranger Things, the second to last season, I think the last season, I think.

They're going to do another one. Yeah, I think I think that they they said that we always had in mind a story for five seasons.

That's it. Like, we're done. Oh, no matter what, man, I got I got the feeling that this was it. But OK. Yeah, I think it is.

I think it's five if I remember what I read, but I could be wrong. It could be just this one for my reaction to the trailer is I'm looking forward to it.

I have I'm I'm tempering my expectations about that. OK. OK. I think this.

Yeah, I don't want this to be where the trailer was. The great cuts. You know what I mean? Like the good cuts of me. And then the rest of the episodes.

I could see that. And I agree, because the trailer really got me. I was just like, man, that was good. That was really, really good.

And there'll be one trailer to the same thing for me personally. Like I was like, oh, this looks really good.

I don't want to give my hopes up. It looks really good. And I have to admit, I've been happy with the last couple of series, you know?

Yeah. So, you know, no, no, they they have earned a lot of goodwill.

Yeah, totally. Like I can I can have faith that you're going to tell a good story and tell it well. God knows you got the money for it.

Yeah. Strange things for the yes. There's some foundation there.

I don't know why. Something about that trailer. I guess it was what you said. I started to get the feeling that, you know, you're showing me all the good stuff here.

I hope that's not true. And I don't really I don't really know where we are with that universe at this point.

I've kind of lost track of what it's been. It's been a little bit since I remember seeing like I'm the basics from it.

But there's definitely some going to have to be some rewatches for me, I think, on season three, at least the last two episodes.

Just to remember. I remember. Yeah, I remember not not really liking season three all that much.

And maybe that's playing into it, too. So one thing I know that we both did brought you recently that we both did enjoy is this latest season of F1 Drive to Survive.

That remains for me a very curious program because you are a huge F1 fan.

Yep. And I'm not. I tried after the you turned me on to F1 the first time that the Drive to Survive series on Netflix.

And I gave it a go. I was like, well, this is really, really good. I should watch a race.

Wow. I'm not watching races. No, that's boring. Yeah. So they do such an incredible job of crafting the narrative.

I mean, that's what you do in reality TV, right? That you take you take the pieces and you craft a narrative.

Well, I think they are so good at it. The interesting thing, too, is with this season is that the Russian thing you couldn't have expected that.

Like for those episodes to the core.

And of course, they would be coming out right when Russia began their invasion of Ukraine.

And the world got flipped upside down, especially when it came to the Uyghurs and that kind of thing.

it was a very timely thing. They just happened to get right.

Or just right timing I guess you could say.

Very interesting season. I enjoyed it a lot.

I've learned that, so here's how impressive that, and this is going back to exactly what you were just talking about a second ago.

I think that if I remember right, ESPN paid,

and I could totally be wrong here,

but I'm thinking it was something like $5 million per year

for the rights to F1 for three years,

and that ends next season, or 2023 maybe.

But they are now shopping around the rights

for 75 million a year.

So that's how much American draw has been put into

that series and how well that series has done.

And I'm not saying it's all because of that series,

I mean there's different factors, the new cars,

you know, there's different things going into that too.

They're also doing a lot more American races,

I think there's next year you got Miami,

or this year you have Miami-Austin,

and then they're maybe adding a Vegas for next year.

So they're playing-

I read about the Vegas, yeah.

Yeah, so they're playing a lot more into the American thing

and they're putting more money into it,

so that's part of the draw too also,

and you're also buying for like multiple years out.

But yeah, that series is just so good.

My wife watched this last season with me and she loved it,

and she has no clue who any of these people,

I mean she knows who Liz Hamilton is,

but she has no clue who any of these people are

and doesn't really care about the races either.

I mean it's more like, I wanna see the drama behind it,

you know, like who's mad at who and that kind of stuff.

So yeah, it's-

There's so many aspects to that show that are compelling,

because I wanna learn about the tech, the car design,

the intrigue, the corporate espionage going on.

That was, what was that last season I think,

when Mercedes debuted their new front wing

and it was a big, huge, whatever.

And again, I know nothing about the sport,

so it's all brand new to me.

I tell you what though, when I read that about,

they may bring it to Vegas and you'd have,

like with Monaco, right?

You'd have a stretch down the Vegas strip.

Hell yeah.

Oh yeah. Hell yeah.

I'm on the first one out there.

Yeah, and there's so many hotel rooms there.

So I tried to go to Miami this year

and the hotel prices were insane.

Like it was, it was like, the place that I had found,

and this was a while out before the race,

was like, it was probably 50 to 60 miles away from the track

and you're still looking at like four to $500 a night.

Like it was crazy.

It was crazy expensive.

Now that's Miami.

Miami's a little bit different.

Austin's a little bit easier to get to,

Kota, around that area.

So if you really wanna go,

probably to an F1 race in the US,

that's probably the one to go to.

But that being said, yeah, Vegas,

I can't even imagine how crazy that would be.

I mean, like I would worry about people's safety.

Like they better build those fences high.

Yeah, I'm being completely serious,

because that town is just-

They know it, they know it.

I mean, with Monaco as your foundation.

Yeah, but Monaco's classic,

like everybody knows not to do anything stupid there.

Vegas, I think there's people that wouldn't know.

I mean, it's just, you know, yeah, it would be,

if they do announce Vegas,

that's gonna be a huge, huge race

and it would be quite fun to go to.

And to see all the stuff about it

behind the scenes the next year.

Is there another, maybe you know this,

is there another town, through town track

or in town track like Monaco?

For F1?

Yeah.

I wanna say that there's one in South America somewhere.

And then, so I watch a lot of sports car racing

and touring car racing.

And there's tons of in town tracks there, like tons.

Yeah, there's like Le Mans, I mean, Le Mans is one.

I mean, so, you know, you got, you know,

it takes weeks to set up and, you know,

that kind of stuff and get everything.

Le Mans, I think has been doing it for so long

that they know how to do it very quickly

and can get, you know, the parts that are actually

on the country roads done pretty quickly.

But yeah, yeah, there's lots of tracks a lot of that.

And actually I found a video last night

and I'll post it along with the show notes on this too

about a guy that I did not know this,

but it's, his YouTube channel is The Tim Traveler,

not Time Traveler, Tim, T-I-M.

And he went to the very first city in France

that held a sports car endurance race.

It's no longer a racetrack,

but again, it was on county roads.

And they had built up like a whole,

like little mini city for stands and going into the tunnel

for going into the track and all this stuff.

And, you know, it got, I think they quit racing there

and they started in 57, I think it was around 57

and they quit like in the 70s.

So it got dilapidated, nobody kept up with it.

You know, the county didn't want to pay for it.

So it's this little thing that's literally

just on this country road, you know, outside of,

I forget the name, Merham, maybe, or France,

like some city in France.

And people just driving to work

and you drive through literally where the race cars drove

and there's stands on the right side

and like all this stuff.

And it's just like, it's like a little like mini city

and they're starting to restore it now.

And like I said, I'll have to find the video,

but it was really, really good.

Like it was, it was just like,

he went through and he got access to kind of go through

like the tunnels that go up under the track

and like all this other stuff.

And while he's doing the whole, the whole.

There's just people driving by going to work in their cars.

I was joking about it on Twitter. I was like, man, this is going to be a French cop's dream.

If I drove through there, I'd be like, oh yeah, here we go.

Slam my foot down right at the track line.

Yeah, and he's just sitting by the building binging people.

He'd be like, yep, catch another one.

It was a really cool video. I did not know anything about this.

But it was apparently one of the very first F1 races in France.

This place was pretty big.

Very nice. Yeah, I want to see more about that.

Yeah, it's pretty cool.

So, anything else? You've been watching anything else?

Really, the only other thing I can think of is I've kind of fallen back into the Community trap again.

Oh, are you re-watching?

I'm re-watching.

I was just talking about Community Day with somebody.

Really?

Oh yeah, such a good show.

It's an incredible show.

Yeah, I think there's three that if I just had a bunch of time, I would go back and re-watch probably again.

Community, Parks and Rec, and 30 Rock.

Those three are just, to me, the pinnacle of fun.

I saw it on 30 Rock. I think I was...

30 Rock gets a little...

I had seen two.

Yeah, 30 Rock. Oh, you've got to go further than that.

But 30 Rock gets a little bit...

Well, Community does too in the end.

I don't know. Maybe that's me being picky.

No, I remember the later seasons being not so great.

Yeah, I love Parks and Rec a lot, especially towards the end.

I actually enjoyed those episodes a lot better.

Especially. It only gets better.

Yeah.

But yeah, Community, I'd love to go back.

Because there's gaps in my Community.

I know for a fact I watched all the way through Parks and Rec because I wanted to.

Another thing that I did that with is a show called The League, which is like a fantasy football.

Oh, I tried that one. I tried that one.

It's good if you can make it all the way. It's good.

And there's some drier episodes towards the end, but it's still pretty good.

But those two I sat down and watched in contiguous order one time, all the way through.

30 Rock, I actually watched during the week, whenever it would come out back then.

So there's gaps in there that I just happened to miss.

And then Community, same thing towards the end, towards the Chevy Chase part.

There were weeks that I just missed and I just hadn't seen all of them.

But everything up until that was flawless.

For whatever reason, it felt like the time...

It's been several years and it's nice to just kind of kick back at the end of the day.

And chew through two or three episodes with people that you know, right?

Your friends.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's comforting.

It's like, shut up.

That's another thing. I think I told you about that on a podcast.

I started watching that on a plane and I was like, you know what?

I'm going to go back and watch all the old Cheers.

I could not do that.

Yeah.

I couldn't do that.

I watched the pilot and then I watched the first maybe three or four episodes, I think, on the plane ride.

And nostalgia over at that point?

No, it wasn't.

And I was like, oh, this is pretty good.

And then I came home and started watching some more and was just kind of like,

meh, I don't know about this.

This might not be an investment that I want to do.

It might be just a little too much time that I want to devote to that.

So much from, oh gosh, really not that long ago.

I increasingly find it unwatchable.

It's so different.

In every aspect.

80s sitcoms, 70s.

So they're the same show, but Cheers and Fraser are both two shows that, yeah,

there's parts of it that are hilarious and still hilarious today.

But then there's other parts that are really 80s, 90s centric.

Like you got to think back a little bit to really get the humor.

But, what's the name of the show?

Oh, yeah, sorry.

But, of course, there's some that live on forever from that same period,

like Seinfeld, which never stops being funny.

Because it's not very period-esque.

I don't know.

Unless, I'm sorry, unless you were never a Seinfeld fan to begin with.

You don't like Seinfeld?

I feel like.

How do I not know this about you?

I feel like I was defended.

I don't know.

It's not like a hide it.

I never found that show funny.

I never found it engaging.

Oh, my gosh.

I can watch.

You can pull a random episode out and I'll just.

Yeah, like anybody who does that in syndication now,

if I happen to flip through and see that, I'll be like, oh, that's pretty good.

I'll watch a little bit of this and then I'll watch the whole thing.

I tried watching Friends some time ago.

I never liked Friends.

Yeah, I never liked Friends.

I thought it was terrible.

That's like, what's the other show?

Oh, I cannot stand the show.

It's the three guys and the three girls that are.

It's not Friends, but it's like a geeky version of Friends.

Oh, Big Bang?

Yes.

Oh, I hate that show.

I think I've watched like three episodes and all of them I was just like, I don't get it.

I don't get it at all.

I actually watched.

I did.

I watched quite a bit of that.

That was years ago and I was just like, I like what I'm doing with Community now,

except I would just turn on the television and there was Big Bang like 24-7.

Yeah, yeah.

And I was surfing the web.

I just wanted something on.

Yeah, this is a good show.

It was noise.

Yeah.

I think that's the point where I started actually.

and was done with the show.

So focused on geek humor for reverence in the past that just happens to be funny at

that time maybe because of other things.

And to me it wasn't even that funny.

But I can understand why people laughed at it and thought it was funny.

Yeah, some people, someone had this meme where it was like Big Bang is a show about smart

people for dumb people.

I won't go so far as to call people that may listen to this podcast that enjoy that show

dumb.

But that being said though I understand the underlying truth to what that statement just

said.

I get that part.

I totally get that part.

Yeah, I never, yeah, yeah.

Oh have you seen where people do the YouTube videos like they'll take a section of Big

Bang and take out the laugh track?

No I bet that's horrible.

Oh my god.

That's horrible.

It is like so cringe.

Oh I bet it's horrible.

So cringe.

It's like, do you remember the, was it the, oh it was Garfield comic, the comics trip?

Oh Garfield without Garfield?

Yeah Garfield without Garfield.

Yeah, I love that.

I love that.

And you would read it and you'd just be like oh my gosh.

Like what on earth?

It was so good.

It was so good.

It was brilliant.

Yeah it was.

That crossed the line into brilliance.

Yeah it did.

It was its own art form.

Like literally, it's just like oh this is so, so good.

Oh.

Alright John, did you enjoy your beard tonight?

I did, that was fantastic.

Thank you Pontoon.

Yeah, I'm still working on mine but man it's delicious.

It's grown on me.

They're back 40, rolling in the haze.

I thought it was going to be a little bit more hoppy.

It's not, but that's not a bad thing.

It's hazy but it's not very like super hoppy.

I'm enjoying it.

I like it.

On to episode 27 coming up.

I think we'll probably maybe start breaking up some of these Clone Wars episodes just

to give us a little break.

We'll get together sometime this week, figure out what we're going to do the podcast on

and maybe break it up a little bit and make it a little more Celsius.

Sound good?

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds good.

Sounds great.

All right, man.

Cheers and everyone stay safe.

This is the 11 Parsecs podcast, episode 26.

If you enjoyed this podcast, please take a moment to subscribe and leave us a good review.

And be sure to check us out at 11parsecs.com and Discord.

I'm Jonathan Smith with the Lewis Hamilton of podcasting, Eric Thompson.

Thank you for joining us.

You like Big Bang, you're dumb.