It's time to get back in the Cage! Nicolas Cage is now starring in his very first TV series, a pseudo-spinoff of SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE in which he brings the character of Spider-Man Noir from animation to live-action. The full season is available now, and the Mikes have thoughts on the first two episodes!
[00:00:27] Hello and welcome to episode 180 of The Complete Works Season 1, a deep dive into the career and films of actor Nicolas Cage. My name is Mike Smith and joining me on this journey into the world of true cagedom is my friend, co-host, and fellow Cajunolic, Mike Tricio. How'd you do today, Mike? I'm doing great. I'm suffering from podcast whiplash. What year? What season is it?
[00:00:57] Yes, we just right before this recorded an Elijah Wood episode, but we have to do an emergency cage stop. Yes. And I saw you do a double take when I said episode 118. Crazy. Because that is how many episodes of season one of The Complete Works there are. We've done it. We've, Nicolas Cage in a lot of stuff. He's in a lot of stuff. And if anyone knows that, it's us. Yes, absolutely. So a couple years ago, Mike, Nicolas Cage gave an interview that suggested that maybe he'd be slowing down a little bit with movies.
[00:01:26] I think he was like, I'm done with fucking movies. I think he did say, he did say something like that in the interview and he suggested that his future for acting might be in television. Uh, and the story goes that his son Weston finally got Nicolas Cage to watch Breaking Bad and he was like, Whoa, this is really good. Hold on. Like 10 years later, he's like, Oh, Breaking Bad. Huh? This is interesting. Uh, and so he became curious about what he could do in a longer format form of acting. So cage has not really slowed down in
[00:01:56] years since, um, he was in three movies last year, uh, has another one coming out this year. And, uh, he has five or six in various stages of post-production. Uh, he has shot quite a bit. Um, but he has finally made good on his promise to star in a TV series. If you don't count the history of swear words, which we did cover on this podcast. Yes, we did. That's right. I forgot about that. He was the wraparound host guy. Yeah, absolutely. So that was like a history of swear words was like a, I love the seventies.
[00:02:24] I love the eighties kind of show, but for swear words, right? That was, I'm like thinking back on it. We watched the whole thing. I think it was like six episodes and each episode was like, each episode was like 15 minutes or something like that. And it was just like, each one would be focused on like shit or something. And Nicolas Cage would be like there in the beginning and the ending and maybe some interstitial stuff, kind of just introducing each segment. Uh, so it wasn't like a full on, like, I would imagine if his work on that show was like a day at most,
[00:02:51] right? Like he just kind of filmed for a day or two and then he was done. Yeah. Yeah. It was, uh, what was the best of the week? What was that show on VH? What was that? Best week ever. Best week ever. Yeah. Born out of the aisle of the seventies, out of the eighties, uh, stuff. Yeah. And that's basically what it was. Yeah. I used to DVR best week ever every week. I really enjoyed it back in the day. Uh, had to get my Michael Ian Black fix, you know? Yep. But the birth of this TV series, what are you going to do without Hal Sparks? How would you, Hal Sparks from that one scene in Spider-Man two? Uh, yeah, that's right. Yeah. It's,
[00:03:21] it's weird to think that the greatest movie of all time has Hal Sparks in it, but there you go. Uh, speaking of Spider-Man, by the way, Mike, so the, the birth of the TV series that we are talking about today actually does have its origins in a movie that Nicolas Cage starred in. And that is Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse. Yes. My number three Nicolas Cage movie of all time or whatever. I cheated with that one. I think I probably had it at number three or four when we did our
[00:03:49] Nicolas Cage ranking when we finished season one. Yeah. And it might even be higher now for me. I don't know. It's, it's pretty great. You know, we're now eight years removed from the release of Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse, which is crazy. We still don't have the third one. We're going to get it. It's going to happen. Maybe next year. Uh, we'll, we'll see, but I think it's safe to say that Spider-Verse, the original and across the Spider-Verse. Sure. Uh, but the original, one of the more influential movies of the last decade, I think. Oh yeah, for sure. I, somebody
[00:04:16] not particularly tapped into like the animation world necessarily, but I could, even I can feel that that completely changed American animation. Yes, absolutely. So after it came out, suddenly every superhero movie was about multiverses a year or two later, every animated movie was imitating its art style. And in terms of comic book movies, it is now like widely considered to be, I think one of the greatest ever made. And that movie came out the same year as Mandy, which, uh, I think we like
[00:04:42] to use as like the demarcation point as the beginning of the cage-a-sance 2018. It was a big year. And so Nicholas Cage, always a long time comic book fan got to appear in Spider-Verse as Spider-Man noir, the Spider-Man variant who made his comic debut in 2009, a hard boiled noir version of our beloved Peter Parker. Had you any familiarity with a Spider-Man noir before Spider-Verse came out, Mike? Possibly. I don't really remember the timeline of all these things, but when did the, uh,
[00:05:13] PS4 game come out? Was that 2018? That was, yeah, that was 2018 actually. Is that the same year as Spider-Verse? That was a big year for Spider-Man. Which certainly was. You know, cause that was, A, that game rules and then you had Spider-Verse coming out. Also Spider-Man was in Avengers Infinity War that year and died. Uh, yeah, yeah, right, right. Uh, but yeah, some like major Spider-Man stuff happening that year for sure. Right. But I was going to say, I think there is a Spider-Noir costume in that game. I believe that's true. Yes. Uh, that might've been where I was like,
[00:05:39] what is this? But I don't remember when the movie came out versus when the game came out versus all that stuff. Who knows? Gotcha. There was an earlier Spider-Man game, I think on the PS2, maybe the PS3, uh, that I think was called Spider-Man web of shadows. And that actually had like a multiverse kind of thing where like a few different Spider-Men were in it and Spider-Man and Spider-Man Noir was one of them. Like he was in that game as well. But yeah, I've always been a Spider-Man guy. And, uh, even like when I'm like in and out of comics over the course of my lifetime,
[00:06:05] like I was pretty aware of who Spider-Man was, uh, who Spider-Man Noir was before, you know, Spider-Verse came out and all that kind of stuff. And so I was, he was actually, when it was announced that Nicolas Cage was playing Spider-Man Noir in Spider-Verse, I was losing my mind. I was, that was like, Holy shit. That's insane. That's incredible. I can't believe that's a thing that's going to happen. Although I'm trying to remember back when we were in college together, I remember you used to keep me up on what was going on in the, in the spider, uh, whatever the major
[00:06:34] crossover was that Spider-Verse? It might have been Spider-Verse. Yeah. So that was the, uh, there was Spider-Verse was a huge comic book crossover in like 2014, 2015, which is when I was getting really back into comics in a big way. Cause I remember I got back into comics in a big way, like senior year going into senior year college. And it was right around the time Amazing Spider-Man two came out the movie, right? Which we saw together. That was the very first movie that you and I ever saw together was Amazing Spider-Man two. We, I think we were at a party the night before we were both hung over the next day and we're like, want to go see Amazing Spider-Man.
[00:07:04] Yeah. And so we did. Uh, and then I think afterwards, like maybe later that week or something like that, it might've even been that day. I think it was free comic book day. I think it was, I think we went to the comic book store and Marvel had just like relaunched, uh, Spider-Man. So there was a new number one, right? Uh, to time out with, you know, the release of the movie. And so I was like, well, you know what? No better time than to just jump right back into Spider-Man. And shortly after that, that's when the Spider-Verse crossover
[00:07:29] happened, uh, which led up to was led up to with the edge of Spider-Verse series, uh, which I think was like five issues, each one focusing on a different Spider-Man variant. And I think the first one was Spider-Man noir, uh, because it was such a popular thing at the time. Yeah. So you explaining to me what Spider-Verse was, it's probably where I first heard about Spider-Man, Spider-Noir. I was all in on Spider-Verse, the comic book crossover. And I couldn't believe that like a year or two later, it was announced that my favorite guys, Phil Lord and Chris Miller were
[00:07:58] making a Spider-Verse movie. Uh, it was animated. I was so stoked for it. And that movie rocked. I was, I was so, uh, happy with, uh, Spider-Man into the Spider-Verse. I've seen it many times since, but Cage's take on Spider-Man noir quickly became a fan favorites, even though he has relatively little screen time in that movie, like comparatively to everyone else. Right? Yeah. He's definitely one of the lesser Spider-Man variants that you see. Yes. But it's runtime wise, at least. Sure. Yeah. I mean, he's one of like the three extra ones that kind of get tossed in on the back half
[00:08:25] of the movie. It's him and Penny Parker and Spider-Ham. Right. They all get thrown in there, but he does get a lot of the best lines in the movie. Uh, I often, not that I often say this, but I often think about his line reading of, do you ever get weighed down by the more Olympic? You would have your violent action. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes I'll let him match, burn out of my fingertips just to feel something, anything, you know, all that stuff. Amazing. He's so good. So that about punch and Nazis, I think, right? Isn't there? Yeah, I think so. Yeah.
[00:08:51] Uh, so after the success of Spider-Verse, uh, there were a lot of different projects that were announced. They of course announced a sequel, which, uh, eventually came out across the Spider-Verse in 2023. They very ambitiously said two part sequel. First one's coming out this, this year, next one's coming out six months later or something. And then that didn't happen. Uh, third one we are still waiting on, but supposedly 2027. They also announced an all female spinoff movie, uh, centered on Spider-Gwen, Spider-Woman and Silk. Uh, we have yet to see
[00:09:18] anything come from that. Uh, they also kind of talked about a series of shorts centered on Spider-Ham, uh, which there is one Spider-Ham short on the Spider-Verse Blu-ray that you can watch. Right. Uh, but in the eight years since Spider-Verse came out, other than the sequel across the Spider-Verse, only one other project has made it across the finish line. And it's this one, a live action version of Spider-Man noir, once again, starring Nicolas Cage in TV series form.
[00:09:44] Uh, so not a movie. They decided to make it a TV show and Nicolas Cage came back to portray the character in live action. The project was first announced in 2023 as an MGM plus exclusive series in the time since they realized nobody has MGM plus. So they put it on Amazon prime. Also, uh, it is available on MGM plus if you go there, but I can't verify that because I don't have MGM plus cause no one has MGM plus. It's not a real place. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Uh, so the whole season
[00:10:13] was released at once just a few weeks ago. And since Nicolas Cage is in it, we've got to talk about Spider-Noir. Tell me why. You already know how it ends. Well then start from the beginning.
[00:10:30] The ticks and impulses. Manage to suppress them.
[00:10:51] Most of the time. What's going on, Ben? Wait, what the hell happened to him? I beat up some guys in a bar and I got blood. All right. Now Nicolas Cage is once again playing Spider-Man noir. However,
[00:11:18] unlike in Spider-Verse, he is not playing Peter Parker in the show, Mike. Yeah. Crazy. Yes. He is instead playing, uh, Ben Reilly, uh, in this series, also known as the spider, uh, Ben Reilly in comic book continuity. Uh, one of the clones of Peter Parker. He is a Spider-Man version like in mainline comic stuff. But, uh, yeah. So I think in terms of what this show is and the show actually even opens like with narration from cage being like someone once asked me what's what universe this
[00:11:45] was or something. So it is like kind of alluding to Spider-Verse a little bit, but I don't think this is supposed to be the same character from Spider-Verse. Sure. Sounds like comic book bullshit. Yeah. Yeah. Fair enough. But I know in across the Spider-Verse, you see a couple of like live action clips of like Andrew Garfield, right? And Donald Glover and stuff like that. So I think if you are in a live action universe, you are still live action in the Spider-Verse movies. Uh, so I think this is just another variance because the multiverse is endless and so many different things.
[00:12:13] Yeah. The Spider-Man noir in Spider-Verse is Peter Parker. And this is a version of Spider-Man noir that is Ben Reilly, but they still Nicholas Cage. He's just like that now. Yes, exactly. But he is in this show also in the main cast of this show are Lamorne Morris from new girl playing Robbie Robertson, a reporter and friend to cage, uh, Lee Jun Lee from sinners, uh, plays cat Hardy, uh, who is a reference to black cats, uh, you know, Felicia Hardy, black cat. It's all there. Remember the black cat
[00:12:41] silver, the black cat, silver, silver, silver, sable movie that, uh, Sony announced. Yeah. There were a million, uh, Spider-Man movies that were announced where there was also going to be like an aunt may, uh, as like a sixties spy kind of movie that they were talking about all that stuff. I just remember the running bit that I was right. I was riding so hard for the black cat, silver, silver, sable. That, uh, was an early one for sure. And you know what they, of all the movies that they've made, cause they did make a few other movies. They made the Venoms,
[00:13:09] right? Which made Morbius. They made Morbius. They made Craven the Hunter. They made Madam Webb black cat, silver, sables right there. That one could have done well. That could have been good. There could have been a version of that that worked. Uh, my God. Uh, it's, you look at like how Sony has handled Spider-Man and all that stuff over the last, like, you know, 20, 25 years, obviously now they like work with Marvel and like their live action stuff is like the stuff with Spider-Man and it has Tom Holland in the Marvel universe, all of that. But like, you look at how
[00:13:39] all that stuff happens and it's like, man, it's a miracle. The Spider-Verse movies exist. Uh, it's like, it's crazy how good those movies are considering how wackily run the entire, uh, series has been by Sony. Well, I'm just full in on the, uh, sort of conspiracy thing, even though it's not a conspiracy at all, because this is absolutely how these things work. Uh, a la Warren Beatty and Dick Tracy, like they just need to make shit to retain the rights to them. And it's like, yeah, whatever. Although they're spending a lot of money to have that be the only reason
[00:14:07] they're doing it, but like, yeah, I believe that now. Absolutely. I mean, you know, at least Venom made sense. That character is popular, you know, like that's like, okay, I can see why you would want to make a Venom movie. Uh, and even almost to a degree, I can sort of see Craven the Hunter, like in the distance, but I don't know why you would do a Craven the Hunter movie and not have him be a villain in a Spider-Man movie first or something, you know? Right. And then like Madam Webb and Morbius just like, why, what are you guys doing? This is insane. So yeah, at some point
[00:14:36] they could have made black cat, silver, sable could have been nice. Uh, they were also trying to do that Sinister Six movie, uh, after amazing Spider-Man two came out and all that stuff never got off the ground. But anyway, Lee John Lee from sinners plays Kat Hardy. Karen Rodriguez plays Janet cage, a secretary, Abraham Papula from Morbius and the marbles. Uh, he plays Lonnie Lincoln, AKA tombstone. Uh, Jack Houston from boardwalk empire plays Flint Marco, AKA Sandman and Brendan Gleeson, uh, is the main villain. He plays Finn burn, AKA silver, man. Uh,
[00:15:05] it's not silver, sable, silver, man. Uh, but these are all like familiar Spider-Man characters, but just kind of given the noir touch to spider noir also popping up as recurring cast. In these first couple of episodes are Amanda Shule from suits as Ruby cages, dead fiance, uh, Lucas Haas from brick as a Winston who works for silver man. Uh, as soon as he showed up, I was like, this guy looks really familiar. I know this guy from somewhere. And then I realized it was brick and I was pretty excited to see him and witness Lucas Haas. He's actually, yeah, absolutely. Uh, Carrie Christopher who played Alex in
[00:15:34] weapons. He's the main kid in weapons. Uh, he plays Frankie, the news boy. Whoa, cool. Yeah. Right. Michael Kostroff from the wire plays Alfred Morris, the mayor of New York. Scott MacArthur from the Mick plays Perry, one of silver, man's henchmen and Cameron Britton from mind Hunter. The guy who played Ed Kemp, uh, right. Ed Kemp on mind Hunter. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He plays Patrick Donegal, another PI, uh, in the first episode. Cool. Uh, so yeah, there you go. The show was produced by Phil Lord and Chris Miller, uh, and developed
[00:16:01] and show ran by Oren Uziel, who also worked as a writer on movies like 22 Jump Street, the Cloverfield Paradox, Son of the Hedgehog and Mortal Kombat. Steve Lightfoot, who also show ran the Punisher on Netflix was hired as co-showrunner as well. Okay. Uh, and then Spider Noir debuted on MGM plus on May 25th, 2026 Memorial day. It came to Amazon prime two days later and they opted for the, uh, full season release all at once rather than once a week. Uh, which I think is kind of a bummer. Uh, I think, uh, there could have been more
[00:16:30] momentum built behind the show if they had done a weekly release just because I feel like, and I don't know if you've had the same experience, Mike, but I haven't seen that much people talking about Spider Noir online or anything like that. I feel like there hasn't been that much conversation around this, which seems crazy because it's a Spider-Man TV show starring Nicholas Cage. Right. Yeah. I mean, I think, I think we've, we've gone, you know, uh, back around, we've boomeranged back to the, the weekly release model. Um, which for the record, I was always
[00:16:57] steadfast in my belief that it was the superior model. Okay. Culturally we've, we've boomeranged back. Um, and now I think when a show is released all at once, I think the studio thinks it's bad. Um, it's like what it feels like now because post the pit post, uh, whatever, I don't know. I can't think of widow's Bay. Like I just, the way that these things can build so much hype week to week,
[00:17:19] it's like, Oh, it's coming out all at once. Uh, Oh man. Oh no. Yeah. Um, even if, even if I don't know, I mean, I guess I don't really, I haven't really been able to come down on like what personally I prefer, I guess I prefer the week to week cause it's like more fun, but I also do like being able to just be like when a show hooks you just while I'm watching all of it. Oh baby. But yeah, no, I, uh, it was the original. Oh yeah. I saw, I did see some people, um, talking about it,
[00:17:47] particularly like Matt Zoller sites, who is a big cage stand and all this stuff. Uh, and a couple other critics, like when it first dropped posts, some like reviews and like, Oh wow, actually like this is crazy. Like, you know, same thing as Spider-Man TV show starring Nick Cage and it's good. Like, Oh yeah. But it's been two weeks and I haven't heard since like, you know, it's gone, which is a bummer. And it's a weird thing because, uh, you know, Amazon, I feel like they do like half and half. Sometimes they'll do a full on season release. Sometimes they do a week to week and like, you know, the boys I know has just ended and I have not watched
[00:18:15] the boys. I've heard good things. Uh, although I've heard maybe the final season was not as good. Uh, I don't know. I, I never watched it. Yeah. Uh, just trying to keep up with the cultural conversation or whatever. Uh, but that was always week to week. And I feel like I see people talk about the boys every single week when it was on. Right. And it's one of those things it's like, yeah, you know, you can learn from that success. And even Netflix has been like, uh, for some of their bigger shows being like, okay, I know we like where the drop all at once guys, you know, we got to drop them all at once, but maybe strange things can be dropped in like three chunks,
[00:18:42] you know, maybe we do like three episodes now and four episodes then. And then the finale on new year's Eve or something like that. Like they, they've been trying to do that with stranger things and a few other things too. Uh, and so, you know, it's just interesting that, uh, this kind of got dumped and it's a shame because I think it's actually really good. I had a great time in the first two episodes, uh, but we'll talk about it in a second. But, uh, May 25th was the debut for this season. If you went to the theater that weekend instead, opening number one was, uh, an attempt at a
[00:19:09] big blockbuster movie. Mike, do you know what it was? So this, uh, podcast time travel was two weeks ago. Yeah. I have no fucking clue. Uh, what came out on Memorial day weekend? It was a, a, a big franchise. Uh, actually, if we're talking about streaming TV shows, uh, got there, it's their big screen debut. I got nothing. Uh, star Wars, the Mandalorian and Brogu. That's how absolutely out
[00:19:39] of my brain. Star Wars slash Mandalorian is slash. I heard this movie is terrible. Uh, uh, uh, I saw Mando and Brogu in the IMAX, Mike. And, uh, I mean, you know, it is what it is. It's, you know, it's that's the new star Wars movie you're talking about. I know. And I, I do think it's better than the rise of Skywalker, but like, that's the, uh, the floor is low essentially there, you know, I do think, uh, if you like the Mandalorian, I think this is three episodes of the Mandalorian,
[00:20:08] and strung together. And, uh, you know, and it's paced like that too. So it just feels like, yeah, we're watching three or four episodes of Mandalorian just in a row. And that's fine. It's also like not better than the best episodes of the Mandalorian. So it's kind of like, well, why did we do this as a movie? Why, why wasn't this just Mando season four? Well, yeah. Uh, I heard that it was supposed to be anyway. Um, it was originally supposed to be and it kind of got reworked into, uh, to a movie, right? Yeah. But I did hear there's like basically a Bobby Frick episode. Uh, yeah. And that's the best part of the movie is like,
[00:20:37] there's like a 25 minute stretch where it's just Grogu and four Babu Fricks. Uh, and just whatever I'm picturing that in my mind. Um, what a delight. I don't care. Yeah. It's fantastic. And it's, and it's all, you know, puppetry and it's all just like, they're basically the minions of the star Wars universe now, right? These Babu Frick characters. And I had a great time watching them just on their little journey. Uh, that was a delight. So more of that, please. That's, that's what I want out of, out of these movies. Next movie, forget Mandalorian and Grogu.
[00:21:07] It's Grogu and the Babu Fricks. Uh, we don't need the Mandalorian. He's absolutely the most boring part of the movie. We need Grogu and the Babu Fricks, but yeah, that was number one at the box office. That's right. We can't have a band cover band name. Yes. Uh, Grogu and the Babu Fricks. I like it. Uh, I think, I think their actual species name is the Anzelans, but to me, they're just Babu Fricks. They're little tiny Babu Fricks. Uh, yeah. So Mando and Grogu opens
[00:21:34] number one this weekend. Opening to number six was a horror movie. Mike, do you want to guess what this was? Um, which one is it? Uh, was it back, back rooms? Is that, did that come out? Uh, not back rooms. Back rooms is the following week. Uh, obsession. It's not obsession. Obsession and Hokum are already out and they are in the top 10 or at least at least obsession is, but, uh, yeah, it's not either of those either. Oh, I don't know what else came out. Uh, passenger was the number six movie that opened a real movie. I'd never even heard of that shit. Uh, well then you haven't
[00:22:02] been to the movies in a while because every movie I saw for like three months had the passenger trailer attached to it, uh, which is a horror movie where like a guy's in a car and he's driving and then there's a guy on the side of the road and then he keeps driving and he sees the same guy on the side of the road and he keeps driving and he's the same guy on the side of the road. And then he turns and somebody's in the passenger seat and goes, blah, cut to credits, 20 bucks, please. Yeah. And that's passenger. I didn't see it. I heard it's not great, but that, that did open
[00:22:29] number six, uh, opening to number eight, uh, was an independent film, Mike. Uh, sorry. I was just reeling at the, blah, um, an independent film that opened at number eight, two weeks ago from a, from a rapper turned director, a rapper turned director. Oh, uh, uh, what's the boots, Riley movie. That's the one. Yes. Uh, I'm not helping you. You got to come to it on your, uh, I, I, I love
[00:22:57] something. I love boosters is the, yeah, you got it. I was going to say boppers or something. I couldn't think of it. You would have been close, but yeah, I love boosters opens number eight of the box office. Rest of the top 10 consisted of obsession, Michael devil wears product to sheep detectives, mortal combat to the super Mario galaxy movie and project hail Mary. Speaking of other Phil Lord and Chris Miller, uh, things Kings of the box office. Yeah, absolutely. Uh, and the IMDb plot
[00:23:24] synopsis for spider noir reads Ben Riley, a seasoned down in his luck, private investigator in 1930s, New York is forced to grapple with his past life following a deeply personal tragedy as the city's one and only superhero. Uh, so Mike D going into spider noir, uh, and I think we should clarify, uh, the entire season is out. We have only seen the first two episodes. Is that correct, Mike? Yes. Correct. Okay. Yeah. So I, neither of us have watched past episode two of spider noir where,
[00:23:51] uh, this is our usual process for watching TV series. If, uh, one of our subjects is in it, we watched the first episode or two kind of get a sense of the show, maybe down the line, we might finish it. And I think I will probably finish spider noir at some point. Uh, if Mike D chooses to as well, then maybe we'll do a followup as a followup episode where we talk about the whole season. Right. Um, but we're just talking about the first two episodes here, talking about our sense of the show and all that stuff. But, uh, Mike D, what were you expecting from a spider noir TV show starring Nicholas Cage in his very first TV role? And what did you get coming out of it? What did
[00:24:20] you think of these first two episodes? Yeah. Going into it, I wasn't sure what to expect as far as like the tone of the movie or show. Um, cause like we talked about, uh, the spider noir, the spider verse movie is like kind of a joke, right? You know, it's like, or it has silly L. I mean, it's like spoofing how serious he is. Right. Like you said, yeah, it's playing on the comedy. It's, it's mostly a comedic character. I mean, uh, the, the great thing about spider versus like everybody
[00:24:46] does kind of get their own like dramatic moment towards the end. Right. And like you kind of take every character seriously, but you're also dealing with a movie that has spider ham in it. Right. Spider noir. And so it's, it's playing into like the noir tropes for like comedy for the most part. Exactly. Yeah. And like, like you said, I heard sometimes I let a match burn down on my fingertips just to feel something like that's a hilarious line. Um, and so I wasn't really sure what to expect with that regard. Um, and I think this movie or the show like kind of threads the
[00:25:12] needle there. Like it is very funny at times, but also very serious and, and, uh, noiree, like it plays into the kind of tropes of the noir genre and stuff. And, uh, I think it's pretty fun. I, I, it didn't grab me as much as I wanted it to, but I might have to go back and try again. Cause it was definitely like one of those situations where I was like, just everything I tried was like, I'd get 30 minutes in to a movie and be like, Oh fuck this movie. Like whatever. And then we watched the TV show. Oh my God, whatever. And it's just like, I
[00:25:41] couldn't get like into it. And then I was like, Oh man, I got to watch the noirs. I will. Okay, sure. So like I had fun with them and it's cool. And like, I'm in the bag for noir stuff. I love that genre. I love all those things. Um, and this movie has the show has all these things and it looks great by the way you can tell I keep saying movie and not TV show. Um, yeah, it looks amazing and it's got the, we'll talk about, did you watch the black and white color? Did you, I did one in one. Did you do one in one? Okay. I, uh,
[00:26:08] I thought about doing the black and white. I want, I was initially when this show was first announced. So this show offers you the option of watching it in both. You can watch it in black and white if you want to, or you can watch it in color. Yes. And when Spider-Man noir was announced and I saw the trailer in black and white and I was like, hell yeah, they're doing it. And I was like, I gotta watch it in black and white. It's Spider-Man noir. I mean, you watch spider verse and it's like his whole thing is he's, he's in black and white. Everything else is in color, right? Right. He can't, he doesn't understand a Rubik's cube right in the, in the movie, right? All that stuff.
[00:26:37] So I was like, I gotta watch it in black and white. Uh, and then I saw some clips from it that were in color and I was like, actually the colors in this look kind of amazing. Like they look really good. And so I started watching an Amazon prime and you can actually like toggle it back and forth, uh, in the Amazon, like you change it to like x-ray mode or something that becomes black and white. Um, but it automatically started on color and I kind of just kept watching it and I was like, I'm kind of just locked into this color version. This is a beautiful, like it does a really good job of replicating that like technicolor hue of like old
[00:27:05] school, like the color noirs, which, uh, don't often get like an, as much attention as like the black and white stuff does, uh, from the forties and fifties. But I remember criterion channel did like a color noir collection a while back and had a similar thing there too. So yeah, I ended up watching both episodes in color and, uh, I highly recommend it. The colors look amazing. I was like, this looks better than most movies. Like this is insane. Yeah. That was actually one of the, so I was like, Oh, well it's black. I gotta watch it black and white. So I watched one episode of black and white. Yeah. Uh, and then I was like scrolling
[00:27:33] on blue sky and I saw one of the like artist people that I follow, uh, like lamenting the fact that like they finally made something in comic book color. Um, as opposed to like the, the gritty Netflix daredevils that everything's in like blood reds and whatever, all in gritty stuff. Um, and like, but it's the show you're meant to watch in black and white. Um, and I was like, huh, that's interesting. Let me watch this episode that I was like, Oh, let me watch the
[00:28:02] second one. Cause I didn't even cross my mind that I would ever click on the color. So I was like, it's black and white is the noir black and white. Um, and so I watched episode two in color and like, Holy shit, it looks incredible. It's so vibrant. It's so cool. It's so tragic that this is that that happened, that it is the show they made in comic book color, but you're like quote unquote supposed to watch it in black and white. Um, so yeah, that was real fun. So I think that's a real like fun experiment thing too, where it's a, like it looks great in both versions, I think. Um, yeah, absolutely. And I think, and I think that's why,
[00:28:31] you know, you look at something like, uh, when Mad Max Fury Road did like the black and Chrome version or whatever, right. You know, I have only ever seen bits of the black and Chrome version because I'm so addicted to how good the colors look in Mad Max Fury Road. Uh, but I think that's why the black and Chrome version looks as good as it does, uh, is because, you know, when you have a black and white filmography, you know, I, I think this is, this is a mistake a lot of filmmakers make, uh, if they're trying to shoot something in black and white is that, uh, in order for the black and white to really pop, the colors on set do
[00:28:58] have to be like very vibrant or very drastically different and that kind of thing. If you look at the set of like an old, you know, uh, a black and white movie from the forties, like if you actually like look at a set photo, if, if those exist like at that time, right, you're going to see like the weirdest colors you've ever seen because that's how it, because that's how you make the black and white look good on screen. Exactly. Right. And I think now it, because it's so easy to just put a black and white filter on like a normal image, uh, we've, we've lost that a little bit. Right. And so when you have something
[00:29:26] like Fury Road, that is so colorful, that's what makes the black and Chrome look pretty good is because like it's so vibrant in its color. Uh, and similarly, it feels the same way with a Spider-Man Noir, Spider-Spider Noir, where it's like, this was kind of meant to be seen in both ways. And you're meant to see both the color and black and white version. Yeah. One of the craziest, the coolest parts about the black and Chrome thing, which I'm sure you're well aware of is the, uh, which is like one of my favorite little details of that is this, the scenes in Fury Road where in particular the big sandstorm
[00:29:53] when it flips to black and white, uh, it flips a color in the, it's like, hell, let's go. This fucking rules. Um, so, uh, anyway, yeah. Spider-Dwar looks great in both versions is what I, what I'm getting at. Um, and I think this, the show does avoid event like, uh, after episode one, I was a little nervous that, that whole, uh, opening voice, you know, uh, narration thing, prologue about his wife dying. And it's been five years since he's been the spider and
[00:30:21] he's left that world behind. And I was like, is this going to be a surf Dracula thing? Like we're going to spend the whole fucking season. Uh, and it's really by episode two, he's like back. I mean, you know, he, he puts the, or he gets the man. Oh no, he does use the suit and stuff. He gets the costume back in like midway through episode two. And by the end of it, he like has an action scene in the spider costume. Yeah. Uh, so thank God. Um, because I was going to be just, I was like rolling my eyes and I was like, Oh no, like, is this going to be the whole thing? Like they're going to do the thing, which is, you know, the
[00:30:50] tweet surf Dracula tweet. Uh, right. I forgot the exact context of it, but basically it was like, you know, show in the eighties called surf Dracula. He'd be, uh, having that fool. Yeah. Having adventures while surfing every single week or whatever. Right. And then in the streaming era, it takes 13 episodes to finally get, get him his surfboard at the end of the first episode or the end of the first season or first season. Yeah, exactly. Um, so I thought that's what this was going to be, but no, he's, he's the spider. He's back, um, by the second episode, which is great. Uh, and
[00:31:18] Robbie Robertson's great. Like that whole, that whole dynamic of like a reporter who knows, uh, knows the secret on the beat working with the PI, uh, character, like Ben Riley, like just my chef's kiss. Um, so there's a lot there to really like, uh, I also really love, uh, Brennan Gleeson saying spoiler, uh, all the time that rules, but, uh, yeah, it just like, didn't like hook me. And I, I think that was like a me thing. Cause like, it's got all the pieces there for me to really love it. So I'm gonna have to go back one day and like, okay, let me,
[00:31:47] let me give this a fair shake. But, uh, yeah, that's spider noir. Okay. Fair enough. Yeah. I have seen the first two episodes of spider noir and I really dug them. I had a great time with these first two episodes. I really liked the way that it, uh, it captures that feeling of the noir films of the thirties and forties and fifties, um, both in its, uh, coloring and it's, you know, both in its cinematography and the way it like plays with color slash black and white, but also the way it kind of messes around with Dutch angles and all that kind of stuff, uh, which is very, very fun. But also it has that like very
[00:32:15] snappy, like rat-a-tat noir dialogue, uh, you know, and there's a lot of just great moments that play into noir tropes in a very fun way. Like the femme fatale who you get introduced to. I mean, you see her earlier in the movie, in the show, but like when you, her first like full on scene, of course, she's like a sexy seductress, uh, singing a song at a nightclub and that kind of thing. And that seems amazing. It's like incredibly well shot. The performance is great. All that stuff. It's really, really good. And so, and cage at the center of it all
[00:32:43] is so good in this. He's, uh, he's having so much fun. This is like very much a role that I feel like he was born to play. And, you know, we've, we're going to talk about how, how we, how we think this fits into the cage roles we've seen so far. And obviously Spider-Man noir he's done before in voice form. Uh, the thing that I kept coming back to is that scene in dying in the lights, uh, where he does a Humphrey Bogart impression for 15 minutes. I was like, is it dog eat dog? What was the movie? It is, it is dog eat dog actually. Yes. It's not, it's not
[00:33:12] dying in the light. Yeah. Dog eat dog. He does like a fifth. There's like a whole scene towards the end of that movie where he's doing a Humphrey Bogart impression. Yeah. And now he finally gets eight episodes to do that impression. Uh, and it rocks. It's so good. The whole time I was like, what fucking movie was it? What? Yeah. I'm so glad you remembered that too. That's great. Uh, cause yeah, he's, he's phenomenal in that. And, uh, you know, he gets to do that impression, but also I think gets to play a lot of really good stuff. He gets to do a lot of great comedy stuff. There's great dialogue for him to play. You know, when the first guy walks
[00:33:41] in, um, and he, uh, is asking Nicholas Cage to, you know, to trail his wife cause he thinks he's cheating on him. And he sees a picture of his wife. Who's like the most beautiful woman in the world. And it looks back at the guy who's just like a schlubby dude. And he's like, you are, you are a wealthy man, Mr. It's like, Oh, sorry, sir. What it's like composed of a keen wit then, huh? All that very, very funny. So he gets a lot of very funny stuff, but also gets to play into the, uh, the tragic stuff of his, uh, backstory as well. Uh, you know, because of course he's Spider-Man, uh, and you know,
[00:34:11] if we want to tie it back into like the other universe stuff, if this takes place in the multiverse of across the spider versus stuff, that movie establishes like every Spider-Man has that Canon event where like a person who is close to them dies and teaches them that with great power comes great responsibility and all that stuff. And this show has that, but it's all done in flashbacks. So that's, uh, he's been Spider-Man noir for a long time. Uh, he's been the spider for a long time and he's retired for a long time and now he's kind of coming back. So you're kind of coming at him at like a different period of Spider-Man's
[00:34:38] life than you usually get. Uh, which I think is interesting. Yeah. He's an old man, you know, compared to Peter Parker's usually barely out of high school. Yes, absolutely. Nicholas Cage is in his sixties, right? So he's like over the, he's an over the hill PI, uh, at this point. And so, yeah, it, and it takes place like during the great depression, they make reference to it and all that stuff. And it's, it's still that like stylized superhero New York and it's playing around with different Spider-Man things. Like I, I, I forgot for a while that I was watching a Spider-Man show. I feel like, uh, you know, cause I think for a while
[00:35:07] you're just watching Nicholas Cage, you know, doing hard-boiled detective stuff, being a PI, tracking people down and all that stuff. And then suddenly Sandman shows up and you're like, Oh, right. This is Spider-Man. I forgot about that. And it does a good job of just being the hard-boiled noir show. And then the Spider-Man stuff also works, I think. Um, so yeah, I had a great time. Spider, uh, the first episode Spider-Man noir, uh, big, big thumbs up from, uh, old Mike. Yeah. And I think, um, the comedy stuff of episode two was like, you know, episode one,
[00:35:34] obviously it's table setting. It's all that stuff. It's establishing everything. And then, uh, episode two gets to be a little, you know, we get to spend more time with him. And there's one moment where these kind of like two thugs come to his apartment. He does the like, ha, and he like puts his hands out. Like he's going to shoot webs at them, but doesn't. And he's like, uh, it's this new thing called Tai Chi. And he's like, starts like striking poses, which is very funny. Um, and he pretends to, I think he throws a toaster at one of them or something, right? Yeah. It just like bounces off his face and doesn't do anything.
[00:36:02] And he's like, ah, sorry. I threw that so hard. It's just great. Um, and then later he pretends to be a plumber to get into somebody's apartment and he's like, got his hat brim flipped up and he's wearing funny glasses and he's like doing a voice and stuff. It's like, we get a cage voice, which we haven't, uh, got to experience in a while. Yeah. So he gets to lean into him being kind of silly, uh, stuff, you know, uh, the fast talking noir ratatat stuff. Um, yes. Uh, that, that scene where he is pretending to be a plumber because he's, he's going into this apartment
[00:36:31] where like his, his costume has been stored. It's like in the walls of this old apartment, I think. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's his old place. And he goes in and he breaks the, the bathroom wall while like the couple is like standing outside listening to him. Yeah. I was like, what's going on in there? And he like picks up the costumes. Like, uh, honestly, uh, to be honest, sort of an existential crisis over my toilet. That was a very spider verse, like Phil Lord and Chris Miller type. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh,
[00:36:59] yeah, I, I think he's phenomenal in the show. I think this is like kind of the, the genuinely like, like, Oh yeah, this is what I want Nicholas Cage to be doing. He's killing it in this. He's great. And I think the supporting cast around him is really great. I really loved, uh, Janet, his secretary, uh, who is that one scene where, uh, you know, I think I forget who pulls a gun on Nicholas Cage in the office, but then Janet like stands right behind him and she has a gun on him and all that stuff is, is very, very fun. You know, and she gets like the sarcastic secretary lines and all that. She has like this, you know, he's a poor PI can't afford to pay
[00:37:28] a secretary. And she's like, yeah, my husband has this annoying habit of demanding food on a daily basis. So it's got the noir thing. I love it. Yes, absolutely. So she's great. What's his name? Uh, Robbie Robertson, who's played by Lomar and Morris, uh, Winston from new girl. Uh, he's also a lot of fun as you mentioned. Uh, and I was super psyched. I was like to see Brendan Gleeson in the show cause I didn't know he was going to be in it. Uh, you know, that was cool to see. And it's cool that he's like the overarching villain, but I was very psyched to see Jack Houston in the show
[00:37:54] playing Flint Marco, uh, AKA Sandman who was on Borbuck empire. He was Richard Harrow on Borbuck empire. The porcelain mask thing. Yes. Yeah. He was the guy with like the, his face who had been blown off. So we had a porcelain mask and he was like an easy highlight of Borbuck empire. Like he was one of the best characters on that show. He was incredible. Did you ever watch Borbuck? Not all the way through or anything in any serious way, but I have a bunch of episodes. Yeah. Okay. Boardwalk was like my HBO. Like that was my gateway HBO drama series. Like that was the one that I like locked in on
[00:38:22] because it was like, Ooh, Martin Scorsese is directing the pilot. This must be a real TV show. You know, I knew that. Oh yeah. Martin Scorsese directed the pilot. And then it was, the show was created by Terrence winter who then also went on to write Wolf of wall street. So there was a working relationship for a while too. And then they both, and then I think Terrence winter also created vinyl and similarly Martin Scorsese directed that pilot, but that show did not go as long. Uh, yeah. But yeah, but anyway, Jack Houston played, uh, Richard Harrow on Borbuck empire. He was amazing on that show and I haven't seen him in a long time.
[00:38:50] So I was excited to see him pop up in this. Uh, cause I guess as soon as he started talking and he's doing the Richard Harrow voice, it's like, Oh yeah, there he is. There he is. She's back baby. Uh, so yeah, supporting cast of the show. And again, uh, the, uh, the girl from sinners, uh, whose name I'm blanking on now. Uh, yeah. I wonder Lee. She's great. She's wonderful. Yeah. I wondered why she looked familiar, but I was like, Oh yeah. Sinner like sinners. Like there it is. She's great. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So yeah. Nicholas Cage in, uh, in this movie, I guess we kind of talked about it already. You think, you think
[00:39:17] he's also good in it? Like I do. Yeah. Yeah. Like I could, like I said, I could recognize a lot of the parts that I was like, Oh, I like this or would like this or whatever. Uh, but I was just like in that, in that mode where I was like, ah, fucking, I can't, I can't sit down long enough to like enjoy this. I don't know what was happening. Um, right. Maybe my brain's been rotted by the internet too much that I can't watch a 45 minute episode of a show. Uh, uh, yeah, I want to go back and check it out again and give it, give it another shot or watch another couple episodes and see if I like really get in. Cause it's also like, you can kind of, by the end of episode
[00:39:46] two, it's like, Oh, I see where we're, you know, we've got Sandman. Who's, who's these other guys. There's, you know, we, I think, uh, the lizard or whoever you can tell the, the, like there's going to be more of the like kind of classic quote unquote Spider-Man villains are going to start showing up. Uh, right. So that's cool. Um, so, uh, yeah, Cage is, Cage is great. I think, I think it's like, it's right in his wheelhouse. Like we said, we even like the, the dog eat dog thing is so funny that it's like, we saw him almost do this a little bit, uh, for a while.
[00:40:13] And, uh, here he is 10, whatever, 15 years later realizing that dream or whatever it is. I think it's exactly 10 years later. I think dog eat dog is 2016 and now it's 2026. So yeah, I think it's, it's been 10 years. Finally gets the chance to do that for real in a spider noir, which is pretty cool. Uh, how do you think this fits into the other cage roles we've seen so far, Mike, anything else besides dog eat dog or spider verse that, uh, you feel like this kind of relates back to, I'm not sure if I can think of like direct connections other
[00:40:40] than, uh, well, I mean, is it Joe? Is that the movie with him where it's like just poverty porn? Everybody's so poor in that movie. Uh, and this is the great depression. So the people have never been poor. Um, yeah, so there's that, but, um, I think it's interesting. We've kind of charted, you know, the post Mandy era, all that stuff, the sort of just before that, was it like only sort of pay the ghost or whatever was the one horror movie he, which this isn't horror, but genre,
[00:41:06] like, you know, he's pivoted very hard post Mandy in particular, I think into genre movies. Uh, and sure that that has been a lot of his biggest stuff, especially horror stuff. Um, you know, so you have Mandy, you have Colorado space, you have pay the ghost of course. Uh, and then, you know, you have other stuff like prisoners, the ghost land, right. And, uh, at least wonderland definitely in that comedy horror vein pig probably it's playing on genre conventions, but turns into more of a traditional drama, I guess by the end. Right. Uh, you know,
[00:41:35] when he's messing around, he's, he did his first Westerns with butchers crossing in the old way, uh, you know, dream scenario working in dark comedy kind of mode, long legs back in horror, the surfer and psychological thriller, you know, all, all that stuff. You know, it's interesting because, you know, and we, I think we talk about this almost every episode, uh, with cage. It's, it's very much like he does post Mandy. He's been doing more good stuff than he had in a long time. Yes. But he is also still doing the bad stuff. America is a land of contrasts.
[00:42:05] Exactly. So like our last couple of movies were, uh, you know, gunslingers and the carpenter's son, you know, like that was our last couple of cage episodes. Yeah. Uh, and that's rough. Those are rough movies. Uh, carpenter's son is okay. It has moments, you know, attempt. Yeah. Yeah. But gunslingers, one of the worst ones we've ever talked about on the Nicholas cage podcast, right? Yeah. I forgot about that. I mean, it's the second, we're not going to count the flash. That's not a real movie. Uh, I mean, we counted enough to do an episode on it, but, uh,
[00:42:33] he's also like not even in that really. Uh, yeah. But, uh, his second comic book thing other than, uh, teen Titans go to the movies. Well, uh, you know, there's also the ghostwriter movies, Mike, uh, Oh my God, I straight up forgot those movies existed. Yeah. I mean, that's the weird thing. You know, Nicholas cage spent much of his career trying to do a comic book movie because his son is named Kal-El. Yes. His son is named Kal-El. He was going to play Superman in the nineties,
[00:43:02] right? He was going to be in Superman lives. He was going to play Superman. There's a whole documentary about it. It was going to be directed by Tim Burton and written by Kevin Smith. It's one of the craziest what ifs in movie history. And it just, uh, never came together. Uh, just never, uh, got past the finish line for a multitude of reasons. And so, you know, he was kind of coming up in that, in that two thousands and it was sort of a post, you know, peak action star cage post the, we made it by trilogy. Right. Of course, in the mid nineties, you had the rock Conner and face
[00:43:28] off and that was around the time he was going to make Superman. So it would make sense for him to take on a superhero role then. But it was in like the two thousands when like, Hey, the super superhero boom is happening where the Spider-Man movies happening, X-Men movies happening, blades happening. Right. We're bringing back Batman or bring back Superman. And it's like, okay, Nicholas Cage has got to get in one of these. And his turn was ghost rider. That was his superhero movie. And I mean, I guess it probably did well enough to warrant a sequel. They made two of them. You know, two of them. Yeah. They made two of them. And I don't hate either one of them. I think
[00:43:57] they're both fine, but they're also both like relics of like that era of superhero movies in a weird way. Right. Where it's like Marvel Knights. Yeah. I think ghost rider two was Marvel Knights. Yeah. Ghost rider one was before they even had Marvel Knights. Right. I think because Marvel Knights is only two movies, right. It was Punisher war zone and ghost rider two. I think we're the two. Yeah. I think it is. Um, and we've covered both of them. Yes. We have done both of them on the podcast now. You're welcome America. Um, but, but you know, he does the ghost rider movies. He also does kick ass in 2010. Right. Right. Right. Right. Another one. Okay. He's in more than I remembered,
[00:44:27] you know, based on a comic book, it's not a Marvel or DC, but it's, you know, it's riffing on that kind of stuff, you know, and then he has a few years where he's making a lot of direct to video stuff. And then finally they start casting him in voice roles in a spider verse and team Titans go to the movies, both as like nods to what a big Spider-Man fan or a big comic book fan that Nicholas Cage is. And in team Titans case, like specifically, like he's playing Superman in that movie. So it's like a nod to the fact that he almost played Superman. And then, yeah, he kind of just, he he's doing his
[00:44:55] own thing now and it's, you know, he's probably not going to pop up in a full on superhero movie unless they bring back Ghost Rider and Doomsday or something like that. I feel like in a, in an earlier era of Marvel success, there was, I feel like there could have be a glimmer of a chance that they would throw him in a, as like a stunt casting post credits something. Oh, I think there's still a realm of possibility where that could happen, but I mean, yeah, I guess
[00:45:21] who cares about Marvel anymore though? We'll see what happens with Avengers. Yeah. You know, I mean, I'm still seeing everything. I'm watching all the movies. I'm still watching all the shows. Although I actually still have to catch up on Wonder Man, which is the best thing they've made in a while. And it's just like, but that was similarly that came out and it was dumped by Disney plus. It was just kind of tossed on the surface all at once, which really felt like, oh, they have no faith in this thing. It ended up being the most critically acclaimed TV show they've made. And now, now they've actually renewed it for season two, just based on like how much people
[00:45:51] responded to it. But because it all came out at once, I watched the first four episodes and hadn't gotten around to finishing it. It's just having gotten back to it yet. I haven't meaning to, but on the, on the flip side, Daredevil season two was week to week and I was watching it because it was week to week and it's easy for me. It's just more easily digestible for me in that, in that format. But yeah, no, it's a weird, you look at Spider-Noir and then you look at the other superhero TV shows, which there have been so many of them in the last few years. And there have been so many Marvel TV shows. And I know you haven't really kept up on most of those, but you did watch the first couple when they were coming out, right?
[00:46:21] You watched WandaVision and Falcon and a soldier and Loki season one and all that stuff. Yeah. And I think there has been a lot of, I think there has been good stuff in the Disney plus Marvel stuff. There's been a lot of bad stuff. You know, your moon night, terrible secret invasion, terrible, like that kind of thing. But there has been good stuff that said, this feels like more visually dynamic and more just like, I was much more engaged by this than I had been in anything in a while, except for maybe the first four episodes of wonder man,
[00:46:49] which again, I liked a lot and just haven't finished, but I liked it quite a bit. And on the flip side, there's been a couple of DC shows that have been very good. The Penguin show was good. It was basically the Sopranos, but with the Penguin in it and that rock that show. Yeah. Yeah. Remember that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I thought you meant Gotham or whatever for something like, what's that? Isn't he like a become the main character on Gotham? The Penguin is also on Gotham played by Robin Lord Taylor. But yeah, I'm, I'm talking about the Penguin, the one that was a spinoff
[00:47:14] of the Batman. The Colin Farrell. Yeah. Yes. The Colin Farrell as the Penguin. And also really good. I was a big fan of both seasons of Peacemaker. So there has been some good stuff, but I feel like Spider Noir just almost feels like it's, it's operating in its own wavelength. And I think that's because of how stylized it is in a way where I think a lot of the other superhero TV shows like are a little bit afraid to get. And yeah, I appreciated that about Spider Noir. Right. Yeah. I mean, I think even down to like, it's
[00:47:41] on Amazon prime, it's not on Disney plus it's not on whatever, it's not part of all that stuff. And so it's its own unique vision and style and all that. And that's, that's pretty cool. Yeah, absolutely. So what are the moments or scenes in Spider Noir that sent out to you, Mike? Anything else in these first episodes that we haven't touched on yet? Kind of covered a lot, but I think, I think maybe my one complaint, which is like, I don't know, like, I don't know. I feel weird feeling weird about this, but like, you know, it's
[00:48:09] the Mandalorian thing. Like that's not Nick Cage in the suit, obviously. Like, you know, not that I would expect it to be him in the suit. I don't know. Uh, but it's also a lot of the action scenes are just CGI Spider-Man. Uh, obviously it's Spider-Man, uh, you know? So that was the one little like, oh man thing for me, but, uh, but, but they are cool. Like that big, the big, uh, when he becomes the spider finally in, in episode two, when he, uh, assaults, uh, silver beans, like caravan or whatever, and beats them all up and stuff.
[00:48:38] Yeah. That was cool. Like that was neat. That was cool as hell, you know? Uh, but then like when the spider sits in the car across from Brennan Gleeson and talks to him, you're like, okay, this is ADR, Nicholas Cage voice. Uh, and it's even got like a weird vocal effect on it. Like, I don't know if you noticed that it's, it's like distorting his voice, I think, because it's supposed to be become through the mask or something. Come through the mask. Yeah. So it's, I don't know. That was the one thing that kind of like took me out a little bit, but as far as other stuff, did you do that? Did you have any thoughts
[00:49:06] on that? Like, I mean, I, I actually thought it looked pretty good. Uh, and I think it doesn't look bad, but I, and I think that's maybe because I've watched a lot of these TV shows and I've seen them looking bad, you know? Uh, you know, I, I was in the trenches on the CW watching the, uh, the arrow over shows back in the day, you know, I, I know how rough they can look and sometimes the CW shows looks pretty good. Um, but you know, they were, that was an absolute shoestring budget kind of production for a lot of those shows. Right. And you know, even with some of the, uh, the Disney plus stuff, uh, which theoretically they're pouring
[00:49:36] hundreds of millions of dollars into, uh, it just, it looks like garbage. I mean, it looks terrible. You know, you look at secret invasion and it's the sludgiest, like bad looking shit, like most worst looking show you've ever seen. Like that kind of thing. Uh, I think I saw a clip of the Punisher. I guess there was like a TV movie thing they put out. Right. Which I still haven't watched. I got to catch up on that. Uh, I, even, even me who is somebody who tries to keep up with everything is now falling behind on a lot of stuff. And that's crazy. That's nuts. Uh, but I think there was like an incomplete VFX shot in that thing. And I saw
[00:50:06] like a clip of that, which is like hilarious. Yes. And I, I think they probably fixed that after that. But yeah, no, that, that did happen. And like, there's been, you know, bits that were like out of context bits that get shared every once in a while from like Thor 11 thunder or Black widow or whatever, which is like, you know, even the movies often don't look that great anymore, which is a bummer. And sometimes they do look good. Like guardians of galaxy three, I thought still looked good. You know, that's, that's a James gun joint. That helps.
[00:50:31] But yeah, no, I think there is a, over the last few years, there has definitely been a, a quantity over quality approach to a lot of Marvel stuff. Uh, and a lot of stuff has felt like rushed as a result. And so, yeah, sometimes they don't look as good as they should considering they are like $200 million blockbuster movies that they're spending a lot of money on. Uh, and spider noir, which I'm assuming was made with like a fraction of that budget, like, you know, probably made for a lot less than what a typical Disney plus Marvel show looks like or whatever, like all
[00:50:58] that stuff. Uh, you know, this show I think looks a lot better. And, uh, I think as a result, I'm a little more forgiving to its CGI, uh, Spider-Man action sequences. Sure. Sure. Uh, but I do think it does, I like, even those, I think look better than a lot of the other TV show stuff. Yeah. So what else stands out to me? I mean, the sequence when it's an episode one, when, uh, the guy like you referenced before comes to cage to follow his wife. And that whole,
[00:51:23] whole exchange is very funny. Um, when he, and then he does follow her and it's the woman from sinners and he's following her into the hotel and he climbs up the window and he's like taking pictures of all the other people doing weird stuff. And he's like, well, I need that in the future. Take pictures of all that. The guy putting stamps all over his body or something hilarious. And when he, and then he gets to the room where she is and she's meeting the mayor of New York. Uh, and he realizes like, Oh, I've been set up to take down the mayor. This isn't an actual
[00:51:52] cheating wife. It's a right. The mayor's mistress thing. And, and I like that whole, you know, the noir trope of like caught in a spider's web of, uh, some machinations that he doesn't understand the full scope of yet kind of thing, but he immediately recognizes what's going on and it gets out of there and doesn't, doesn't give him the pictures and all this stuff. I like, yes. I like that whole conceit of like, Oh, this is the noir plot. Oh, that word like embroiled in. That's cool. Yeah. And he tries to like, you know, he tries to avoid that entirely.
[00:52:22] Right. Like once he, once he realizes it, like you said, he kind of pushes the guy out the door and he's like, Hey, here's your money back, sir. And all that stuff. It's like, yeah, I'm not touching this, the 10 foot pole. Like we'll find our money some other way or that kind of thing. Yeah. Uh, and his secretary has the idea of like, well, you could blackmail the girl like the, you know, that kind of thing. It's like, well, blackmail, it's not a terrible idea. It's not a good idea. It was not a terrible idea. Uh, and, uh, and so he goes to the nightclub and that's where he meets her. And, uh, you know, they have a very like fun flirtation, like kind of back and forth.
[00:52:49] And that's where he also meets a Flint Marco, uh, Sandman played by Jack Houston. Uh, and the two of them get into a fight on the rooftop for the pictures. Uh, and you get to see the Sandman, uh, in action where he can't like control the sand stuff. It's like coming, coming, he it's, he's trying to figure that out as the fight's going on. Yeah. There's actually a really funny moment where before that is all happening and Flint Marco is trying to rough him up a little bit and scare him off. Uh, and he like grabs him by his shirt collar and dangles him over the edge of the building.
[00:53:17] And he's like, Oh, he pretends. And he's like, but here's the thing. I'm not afraid of heights. Uh, he's Spider-Man. It's like, Oh, that fucking rules. Uh, and then he, the fight, the fight scene starts. Um, yes, it's a real, uh, like princess bride thing. And it's like, but here's the thing. I'm not left-handed. Uh, um, so that was fun. Yeah. And then, and then he kind of, uh, starts turning into the Sandman and all that. Um, yes. So that, that, that, that whole plot, which seems
[00:53:44] to be hinting at some sort of like, you know, super soldier or whatever world war one trauma, biological warfare thing. It seems to be where that whole plot is going that all these guys were all, uh, in the same unit in the war and they all come back with weird superpowers. Uh, right. So there's the one guy who has fire powers and he acts, he sets fire to the, uh, Brendan Gliese's mansion. And that's why they're out to get him. And then Flynn Marco, of course, becomes a Sandman. And then you also have, uh, Tombstone as well. Uh, Lonnie Lincoln,
[00:54:12] who's, uh, the friend of Sandman, uh, who you meet in episode two, who has like, you know, diamond hard skin, uh, like he does in, uh, in the comics. Uh, yeah. And episode two was about, uh, so at the end of the episode one cat shows up at, uh, Ben Riley's door to tell him that, uh, the man you met last night, Flint Marco, he's disappeared. Uh, and then episode two is about cage trying to find Flint Marco. That's like his next case. Yeah. And, uh, and so, yeah, I mean, I am interested in like, Ooh, what tangled webs we weave. Um,
[00:54:40] but, uh, I gotta go. Yeah. Maybe, maybe I'll give it a couple more episodes, one or two more and then I'll be halfway there and I might as well finish it. So there you go. There you go. I get you. Yeah. Uh, yeah, no, there are eight episodes total of a Spider-Man, Spider-Noir and based on the first two episodes, again, I really enjoyed it. I think these first two episodes are really, really strong. Uh, a lot of very fun moments. Cage is killing it throughout the entire thing. Uh, like it's worth it just for cage's performance. I think like, even if you're not a Spider-Man fan and he, I, and I think even if you're not a Spider-Man fan, even if you've
[00:55:08] never seen Spider-Man to the spider verse, like this show, I think pretty much works on it. It's a total standalone thing. Oh yeah, for sure. Yeah. It's really not connected to the other larger multiverse Spider-Man stuff at all. Other than that he's Spider-Man. Yeah. Other than like, you know, it helps, it sort of helps just for you to have like any kind of like little bit of knowledge of Spider-Man as a concept. Um, but even then, like, you know, you don't need to know who Sandman is to get what Sandman's doing in the show, you know, and you can kind of just get
[00:55:35] introduced to it. Right. Yeah. No, it's just fun. Like when they say like, and you're like, well, like, isn't that his name? Isn't that the name part of it? Or Marco is his actual name in the, in the comics and stuff. And in Spider-Man three played by Thomas Hayden church. He's the same guy. Right. Exactly. So that's, that's fun. Yeah, absolutely. All right. That is Spider-Noir. Uh, it's a entire season's out on Amazon prime right now. I think absolutely worth checking out. And I do plan on finishing the show at some point this summer. Unfortunately, I have to be at a lot of
[00:56:04] baseball games, so I'm not sure when I'll have time, but I do, I am going to watch this show. Okay. Well, maybe one day we'll do a season wrap up review thing then. Yeah, absolutely. Yes. If we both end up watching Spider-Noir, we will do a season wrap up of the show months after it has been released and no one's talking about it anymore, but maybe by us doing that, that'll get it renewed for season to like that. That could be the thing. I will just pause it to you. When has that ever stopped us?
[00:56:28] Exactly. Yes. We were originally talking about doing a, uh, well, I've been doing a Spielberg sci-fi rewatch in anticipation of disclosure day. Right. And I think originally we were going to be like, okay, and we're going to, before disclosure day comes out, we're going to do the, uh, Mike and Mike episode. We talk about all these Spielberg sci-fi movies and now it's going to be like probably a few weeks after disclosure day comes out, but that's okay. Look, sometimes life comes at you fast. Exactly. That's what we're saying. Uh, which is, uh, a John
[00:56:54] Hughes movie. That's from not a Spielberg movie, but that's okay. Uh, like we're always saying ET phone home. That's exactly right. We're always saying, ah, there's this war on these worlds and, uh, we have to deal with it. But you know, there's a real life, uh, Spielberg sci-fi thing that I do think about it more than I probably should ever consider, uh, the six stick for minority report. That is a psychotic invention in that movie. What was the six stick again? Uh, I just watched minority report
[00:57:23] not that long ago. What was it again? It's the, it's the like stun baton thing they use basically when the, the, the thought police, whatever they're called, uh, Neil McDonough come to attack you, uh, and they hit you and it makes you throw up the six stick. That's fucking crazy. Yeah. Well, the whole concept of minority report, we have to get new eyes in order to, uh, not be tracked by the government is, uh, weirdly prescient. Uh, in any case, shout out to our sponsors, Palantir.
[00:57:51] In any case, you know who should be in a Spielberg movie? Nicholas Cage. It's kind of crazy that he's never been in. Yeah. A little weird, right? I feel like they should have made a movie together at some point. You know, Nicholas Cage has made movies with Coen brothers and David Lynch and you know, other people too. Uh, end of list. Michael Bay. No, of course. Yeah. It's Spike Jon. John Woo twice. John Woo, David Gordon Green. No, a lot of, a lot of very good filmmakers. Scorsese, of course, bring out the dead. Right. Um, but, uh, yeah, never made a movie with Spielberg. Uh, but there's still time. Cage is still making movies. Steven Spielberg still making movies.
[00:58:21] Yeah. Could happen. You never know. Anything's possible. Yeah. What if, what if Oz Perkins drops out of long legs too? And Steven Spielberg takes it off. He's like, it's been too long since I've ghost directed a horror movie. I'm back in. That'd be crazy. That would be insane. And now that we've said it, we've willed it into existence. It's going to happen. We're going to, we're going to see what Steven Spielberg's long legs too. It looks like, uh, in any case that is spider noir. I don't have any letterbox reviews because, uh,
[00:58:49] it's a TV show. Although actually it might actually be on letterbox because it might've counted as a miniseries. I didn't even check, but that's okay. We don't have to, we don't have to look into it. We can just end the episode now. Sometimes it's better to not know. Exactly. Yes. Uh, much like, uh, Adam driver said, and, uh, Noah Baumbach's while we're young. Right, Mike, that is, that is a thing that actually comes up between us all the time. And it's kind of crazy. That was one of the very first movies we ever watched for a film book cast back in the day. It was, uh, while we're young, we saw it in theaters and you know, I liked that movie quite a bit. I
[00:59:17] thought it was pretty fun, but, uh, weirdly that one line has just like stuck in our heads for 10 years. Let's just not know. Like, you know, and, and increasingly I feel myself being like that. I feel like, you know, increasingly I'm like, you know what? I'm okay. Not knowing I'm okay. Yeah. Even if you wanted to know the AI results would prevent you from ever finding the actual answer. So the only good AI is Steven Spielberg's AI from 2001. That's what, um, that's what I'm saying.
[00:59:43] All right. Mike D where can we find you online this week? You can find me at MD film blog on letterbox and blue sky. And if you'd like to donate to support the show, you could do that on our Kofi page, Kofi.com slash Mike and Mike pods, where you can donate $50 and pick a topic on the bonus episodes. Mike and Mike go to the movies. You got a movie you want us to watch such as that's Danny Steven Spielberg. I mean, what are we talking about? A bunch of them on the sci-fi rewatch, but if you want to do a non sci-fi Spielberg movie, uh, what about, what have I
[01:00:11] not seen in a while? Empire of the sun. It's good. Sure. I like that movie a lot. Uh, you know, what else? Uh, what a 1941. Yeah. Never saw it. Uh, saw it in a, in a class in a high school once, uh, which, uh, uh, questionable decision on the teacher's part, but we did watch it there. Yeah. 1941 watch, uh, jaws four. It's not a Spielberg movie, but related to one. Sure. Sure. And any of those, the world is your oyster. If you donate $50 on a Kofi page. And if you would
[01:00:39] like merch, we have merch available on a red bubble, Mike and Mike pods.redbubble.com. That's right. Actually, you know, a Spielberg movie I would like to rewatch. I haven't seen in a very long time. Catch me if you can catch me if you can. Whoa. Yeah. I feel like, I feel like I remember that movie rocking and I haven't seen it probably since I was like 12. So yeah, it'd be fun. It'd be fun to watch it again. That'd be neat. $50. Kofi page. Absolutely. Yeah. I know Mike D just watched Master and Commander. That could be a great episode. Uh, yo, I was shocked. Why were you shocked? I feel like that's got a reputation for being a great movie.
[01:01:07] Uh, but another one I haven't seen since I was a kid. Like I haven't seen it in forever. I remember being just so bored. I was 12 when it came out. I was just like, Jesus Christ, what's happening? Why are you talking about these fucking tortoises or iguanas? Why are these oceans battlefields? Get out of here. Yeah. Come on. No, I was promised battlefield oceans and I've come on the Galapagos. What are we doing? Um, and then yeah, the most recent blank check episode was about that, uh, Peter Weir. Um, and it blew my mind. I haven't watched it in forever and I know it's got
[01:01:34] the whole reclamation project, but sometimes I'm like, okay, but everyone's joking, right? But I don't think they're joking about this one. Okay. Fair enough. Uh, yeah. Master and Commander, another movie I got to rewatch at some point soon. So yeah, pay 50 bucks and make us watch that one. If I'm me online at M Smith film blog and Twitter and blue sky, Mike Smith film and letterbox, radio, Mike sandwich and Instagram. Thank you so much for listening to complete works. I'm Mike Smith. It's my decretio. Don't forget to rate and view the show on Apple podcasts or any other podcast app. And if you want to contact us, uh, go to blue sky or Instagram at complete works pod. You can find the rest of our podcast and Rapture press alongside many other podcasts,
[01:02:04] what kinds of comic books and movie news and all that good stuff. Our theme song was created by Kyle Cullen. He can reach for your own podcast themes at kiles podcast themes, gmail.com. And our logo was designed by Jacob honeycutt or at Jacob honey on Twitter, because of course he designed the, uh, Nicholas Cage season. Uh, yes. Season one way back when. Absolutely. Uh, the Elijah Woods season is of course going on right now. This is interrupting it. Uh, but our next Nicholas Cage episode will
[01:02:29] probably be Madden at the end of the year, 2026. God, uh, the new David O Russell films. So strap in totally normal guy, David O Russell. Yes. Uh, who was an answer that I got right on pop culture jeopardy pretty recently, actually. Uh, it was actually, it was a very tough question. It was, uh, category was, I think 21st century movies and it was a final jeopardy. And the question was two films from this director are the most recent two films to get nominations in all four acting
[01:02:58] categories of the Oscars. Uh, and it was one I had to think about, but I did get it right. And it was David O Russell and it was because a civil audience playbook and a American hustle both came out in back to back years, both got nominations in all four categories. So crazy. There you go. The David O Russell career has taken a dive since then, um, to say the least. Uh, but we will be talking about Madden at some point towards the end of the year. Uh, and who knows there, there could always be a surprise Nicholas Cage movie that pops up between
[01:03:24] now and then too. True. Yeah. Some random streaming something butchers old guns. He's just, he's recutting all three of his Westerns and turning them into just one terrible movie. Yeah. All right. So that's going to be it for this episode. Uh, check out Michael, Michael, the movies, of course. Uh, thanks so much for listening guys. And thanks for getting in the cage.