Neal 0:11
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of befrienders of the realm this time going out as a bonus, this episode I've got Josh from the Kombat Time Podcast. He is also a graphic designer and a writer. And at the end of the episode, he talks about a pretty cool writing project that I was definitely, definitely blown away by, that you all should know about too. I don't want to be the one to say it. So stick around for the whole episode. Or, you know, if you're a jerk, skip to the end and just get the cool news. Just listen to the whole thing. Anyway, we're gonna jump right into this episode of Befrienders of the Realm. Make sure you subscribe to Kombat Time in your podcast app. Follow them on Twitter at combat time pod, you know the drill. Corey and I will be back at you later this week with a commentary on a very strong episode of Mortal Kombat Conquest, episode eight 'undying dream'. And again, plugs up top follow the show on Twitter @MKpodquest, MKpodquest.com. Find links to all our stuff subscribe to Coreys show "they made another one" in your podcast app. Link in the description below. You know you know the drill, supersecretWhiteLotussociety.com et cetera. Let's just get right into this episode of Defenders of the Realm with Josh from the Kombat Time podcast

Josh 1:41
..get to the, episode two where they got the sister machine gun song. that one remix song dropped in there get a little bit of cool tunes.

Neal 2:01
Arguably cool tunes.

Josh 2:02
Arguably cool tunes. I like the sister machine gun song

Neal 2:05
Are me and Corey just haters? because you're not the first person who said that to us, but I don't know.

Josh 2:11
Really?

Neal 2:11
Yeah,

Josh 2:12
it's like and I'm not a fan of the band. The only reason I knew the band was from the soundtrack to the first movie which they had the you know, you're like a burning flame that song

Neal 2:22
and that song song from that Defenders of the Realm episode is on the More Kombat album.

Josh 2:28
Yeah, then the other song in that episode too. They just like decided to pull songs from that album I guess to have some lyrics

Neal 2:35
we noticed a thing watching if you watch Conquest with the subtitles on the official subtitle track it'll subtitle music during fights that isn't the music playing in the show but it'll pull lyrics from some of those songs that were on like on like these threshold released albums so

Josh 2:51
God songs and conquest would have been out of place.

Neal 2:54
I mean, it is mostly like the techno you know, like the mortal like every now and then in the conquest fight. You'll just see during the fight in the subtitles, it'll be like, Lou King, Johnny Cage, Sonia, Mortal Kombat. Like it'll just drop in the lyrics from that or weird or quotes and stuff that were in some of these like Dance instrumental songs that were on the album's so I'm wondering if they pulled those out for release? Or if that was just like filler music

Josh 3:19
maybe because that show too, I watched during broadcast, the great bulk of it, and I never remember any lyrical songs. Yeah, so that's, that's interesting. That's that's a little bit of trivia. I never knew

Neal 3:30
it's a mystery. And we didn't really realize it until we started doing the commentaries where we have the subtitles on so we can tell what's going on. You know?

Josh 3:37
Yeah

Neal 3:37
Yeah, welcome to befrienders of the realm.

Josh 3:40
Thank you. I'm glad to be here.

Neal 3:42
I covered this in the last episode. I'm gonna just do it again here because maybe maybe some people don't like Jay and they're just want to listen to your episode, you know? That this is a sub series I'm doing on the podcast where I'm bringing on friends to talk about Mortal Kombat memories write stories about how Mortal Kombat impacted your life could be anything from you know, discovering the games to like kicking ass in an arcade to like watching the TV shows or the movies any any way that Mortal Kombat. Like any strong memory you have that kind of highlights your love for the series or something that really stands out for you. And it's a good excuse for me to get more of my friends on the podcast today. I'm here with you, Josh, one of the Kombat boys from the Kombat Time podcast. You got a story for me, don't you?

Josh 4:28
I do. I had one in mind. And well, unless you got anything else to add. I guess I can launch right into it.

Neal 4:34
I'm happy to launch right into it. But maybe if you could sum up the story, this is not something you're prepared for. Like the elevator pitch of the story, the theme, the lesson from it. If there's something you know, elevator pitch, the tagline.

Josh 4:49
It's not necessarily a one single self contained story. It's more like a series of vignettes Okay, centered around probably the greatest memory making aspect of this franchise maybe arguably the 95 Mortal Kombat movie

Neal 5:07
Oh hell yeah *airhorns sfx*

Josh 5:08
Aw yeah

Neal 5:11
everyone gets an airhorn

Josh 5:13
Johnny gets an air horn, Liu Kang gets an airhorn

Neal 5:15
Everybody but striker gets an air horn.

Josh 5:18
Everyone but striker

Neal 5:20
This is striker gets the uh *sad trombone* man. I don't use that button enough. That's a good button.

Josh 5:28
Oh, I thought it was Kombat Time.... I like the sound. sad trombone. I got a sad trombone. Like when he guested with us last time we managed to get a sad trombone in there.

Neal 5:37
I think so. Yeah. I try to I try to get them in whenever I can. I

Josh 5:40
can't remember what it was for now.

Neal 5:41
I don't know man.

Josh 5:42
Something pertaining to how awful those movies that we watched were.

Neal 5:45
Well, that last Tekken movie just wasn't a movie. It wasn't a movie at all.

Josh 5:48
No, it wasn't. the worst thing imaginable. Luckily 95 is one of the greatest video game movies ever.

Neal 5:56
Oh, absolutely.

Josh 5:58
Me and the Kombat Boys. Have a joke that we call it the greatest story ever told.

Neal 6:04
I mean, it is I can't think of a greater one. Certainly

Josh 6:07
even though it is pretty much just Enter the dragon.

Neal 6:12
Oh, sure. Yeah.

Josh 6:13
You know, and Liu Kang is Bruce Lee. And, you know, Johnny Cage is John Saxons. Sonya I guess it's Jim Kelly. You know, he got your Shang Tsung and Goro with Han and Bolo you know, it's only there's there's magic.

Neal 6:30
Sure. Yeah. It's Enter the Dragon meets Big Trouble in Little China.

Josh 6:35
Yeah, exactly. I definitely wanted to talk about it. Because yeah, it is not to sound sappy.. 'magical.' And so I'll launch into my vignettes, which do kind of have a center point.

Josh 6:48
But basically, like I said, I think almost everyone will agree that the Mk 95 movie is probably one of the biggest, nostalgic, like, points of the franchise. Like everyone's played the game and like, I play the game before the movie. That's why the movie was like, oh my god, I can't wait. It's mortal freakin Kombat. There's probably kids that didn't play Mortal Kombat and saw it and still thought it was awesome. So Oh, yeah, I think, you know, for Mortal Kombat fans, if we're talking about the whole fandom, if there's younger fans that didn't grew up with the movie, they might not hold it as special. Like, I would hope that they'd see it and like, appreciate it. But you know, they might not think about it the same way I do. But at least for our generation. Yeah, that's that's the jam. That's the fucking movie. And I apologize if I cuss a lot.

Neal 7:36
Oh swear all you want. We curse all the time

Unknown Speaker 7:40
Yeah, it's like, I know you do. But it's like, I think I cuss a lot.

Neal 7:43
My bit when I do other people's podcasts is to start swearing, and then ask if I'm allowed to after I've already done it. I've done that to you guys a couple of times.

Josh 7:53
So you dropped like five F bombs. And we're like, Oh, that's okay. Right.

Neal 7:56
I think I went like hey, can I think I like just said something was fucking stupid. I said, Hey, can I swear on this? And you guys were both like, you're all like, Have you listened to our show? Of course, you can.

Josh 8:08
My sister listened to our show recently. And she commented that I swore the most. And I said, Yeah, I pretty much use F words as filler word instead of "uh" it's the F word.

Neal 8:18
Sure. Yeah.

Josh 8:19
Unfortunately, it's a habit I got from from college, which college will play into this story.

Neal 8:25
Okay

Josh 8:25
but uh, so basically, Mortal Kombat, there's gaps in my life where I've, you know, gone without watching it. But every now and then there'll be a point where I want it to reassess it as always as good as I remember it. Might even learn something new. And you know, most recently we showed Elliot the movie, so we could, that was actually so we could review it that wasn't even for the movie tourney episode. And I think at that point me and the Kombat Boys had pretty much made it a tradition to watch it annually. I don't know if we've stuck to that scheduled

Josh 9:01
But, to that dedication, but more or less started there. But uh, the first time we really I really, in recent history, watched it to reanalyze it was me and Jae, and Yasin and another friend of ours years before, several years before we started Kombat Time. Yeah. And like we all knew we like Mortal Kombat, and we played frickin nine together and stuff like that. But I don't think any of us actually sat down and watch the movie together even though we all share stuff as a child and Okay, I think it had been a while. And we decided we're gonna we're gonna watch it again. And we did and I think the intent was to kind of reassess it.

Neal 9:01
sure

Josh 9:41
But I don't know I don't know if we got a good reassessment that day, because we also spent pretty much the whole movie- this is where our personal meme that we uttered quite a few times in the show- "It's just like the game!" - that's where that meme was born. Because the second you see right Each shadow with the hat and stuff like it's just like the guy was trying to like, affect what our 12 year old minds would have thought when we first saw the movie. Oh, yeah. So we were very vocal through that. And then I think yeah, the next time after that we showed a friend of ours who was not a mortal kombat fan and who would have fortunately had been subjected to annihilation by us. I don't know why we showed him annihilation first. We wanted wanted to try and make him a believer

Neal 10:28
Sure

Neal 10:28
maybe in the hopes that like, if you're afraid he wasn't going to like or they weren't going to like Mortal Kombat 95 You're like, well, let's show me exactly so the bad one first, and then we'll just make the other one feel better by comparison.

Josh 10:40
It was part of a double bill with Street Fighter the movie so the idea was cheesy movie night and we almost backed out and did 95 But they're like, no, let's stick to annihilation is a good feature though. Yeah, it was a good double feature almost as good as my idea for a Batman or Robin and the Super Mario Brothers movie. Oh my god. That was offense inspired.

Neal 11:00
Yeah, I'll tell you what's good. He

Josh 11:01
He didn't like Street Fighter.

Neal 11:03
I'll tell you what's a good double feature. This is a class this is a classic that I like to pull out on occasion but this is not bad, it's not a bad double feature this is good double feature.

Josh 11:11
Well, Mario Brothers and Batman good double feature...

Neal 11:14
Okay. All right. I take it back. I might I'm sorry. I apologize. Evil Dead two and Robert Rodriguez's Planet Terror.

Josh 11:22
Ah, okay. Yeah, that's I can jive with that. actually have not believe it or not, I've not seen planet terror, but I know it's you know, a Grindhouse movie the right in line. That sounds like a fun night

Neal 11:33
Both movies that involve someone losing a limb and attaching a weapon.

Josh 11:37
Oh, that's the theme.

Neal 11:39
Yeah. That's the connection.

Josh 11:40
We also did a movie, night theme of 70s remakes. So we did like the thing. The Body Snatchers,

Josh 11:46
Um, I forget if there's one I wanted to try and get the blob in there. I can't remember. Oh, the fly 80s But still

Neal 11:49
Okay.

Neal 11:56
Cronenberg. Yeah,

Josh 11:57
yeah, that was a good that was a gnarly movie night.

Neal 12:01
I think the weirdest like most unhinged double feature I ever did was blade two, and Blade Runner. 2049.

Josh 12:08
Wow, that's reaching for some themes.

Neal 12:11
They both had "Blade 2" in the title.

Josh 12:14
There you go. It's subtle. So we reassessed it when we finally got her friend to see it. And he actually liked it. He had some backhanded comments. He said it was better than the sum of its parts, basically saying it's not a good movie inherently. But it all comes together. Somehow, I think makes entertaining movie.

Neal 12:33
So I think that's a fair assessment for someone to make who didn't see it at a formative age.

Josh 12:37
Yeah, I'll take that. You know. But you know, so he showed it to him. We showed it Elliot so we've been watching a lot lately, but that that first time Yeah. When when the combat boys plus one rewatched it had been the first time I've actually watched the movie in a good while and before that, the the last time I couldn't remember watching it with the intent to reassess it actually feels like ancient history. It was I was a preteen I had to been like 13 Okay. And so I think I was 11 when the movie came out. But when I was 13 It felt like it had been a while like, I haven't seen this movie in ages. I wonder if it's still good or if it's just installed just like it was two years ago. Dude, it's kind of sad to say, you know, time time goes by at a crawl when you're a kid. And when you're an adult, it just shoots by like, as Nabokov said that like in one of his books was "Ada or Ardour" if youve read that

Neal 12:37
I have not

Josh 12:53
all the the early chapters when he's a child are like super long and all the chapters towards the end of the book are like lightning quick deals of the nature of time. It's kind of headtrippy

Neal 13:52
That's pretty fascinating. I should probably start reading books that don't say "Tomb Raider" on the cover.

Josh 13:57
Hey, not hey, there's nothing to knock some good junk food reading too. Gotta have a diverse diet

Neal 14:04
sure, yeah,

Josh 14:05
at that time as a kid I don't know if I did or not as far as entertainment goes, but I wanted to watch Mortal Kombat again. And it was around I was I remember was around Christmas time. My family didn't do a whole big deal for Christmas. I think that year we didn't have a tree we usually did I think you know, as you get older, you know? Yeah, but I had a little tree in my room with multicolored lights like the red and green ours are usually white downstairs. So kind of had this nice, vibrant, kaleidoscopic, you know, effect on my walls as I'm settling in here to you know, boot up into my VCR I mean, my boot up on a computer Mortal Kombat and you see that first scene with a really bad green screen sky. Sure. Yeah. And it held up like I was bummed out around that time too. And it was also kind of an attempt to like you know, something, just look at my mood and it it works and Kinos red I floating in the shadows amidst The colorful lights in my room from the Christmas tree is a weirdness logic memory that I instantly latched on to like, instant nostalgia.

Neal 15:09
Man, you are a writer. I said you are a writer. You're really paint a picture here.

Josh 15:13
Hey, thanks. Yeah, I try. It's like, instant nostalgia is something that I experienced every now and then where it's like, yeah, people might call it comfy. That overused word that people like to use to describe something, but it's like you feel something and the instant memory of it already feels nostalgic. And that was one of them. And I still hold on to that memory.

Neal 15:32
And man, it's a cozy, like a cozy memory that just snaps you right back to where you were. And that, and, you know, the strong visual style of Mortal Kombat. 95. Like, that works on me every single time too like, I'm, I'm pretty sure I enjoyed Mortal Kombat conquest 10% More than I would otherwise because it relies so heavily on B roll from the Mortal Kombat movies to like, establish atmosphere.

Josh 15:57
I think I find conquests so good, because it just feels once again, comfy. Yeah, it's that that that Xena, Hercules, you know, really? Minimal sets, fucking video footage, just somethib comfy about that. It is really Yeah, that's a good show.

Neal 16:17
But anyway, I'll let you continue

Josh 16:20
Yeah, we're gonna go, we're gonna go on tangents. But so this leads my story into basically, that was between that and when me and the boys watched it felt like, you know, that was the gap in my life where like, I'd gone without seeing Mortal Kombat. But there is one other distinct memory that it crops up in between that and that's when I was in college. So I guess the theme of this is Mortal Kombat. The 95 movie seems to be something that just pops up every now and then at different landmarks in my life. And it's always sweet every time it does, yeah. But this instance, and this is the funniest memory that I have of watching a movie as I was in college. And we were in the dorm and the day room. And the dorm we I lived in was like this little brick historical building. And so the day room was like a living room. It felt like just a house. Like what that a bunch of people lived in. It was pretty chill. And you know, there's couches and easy chairs down there and people chill out down there and watch TV sometimes what put in a movie. And you know, the way it goes, you know, just people kind of gravitate. Someone's watching something cool. And I'm like, Oh, hey, that's cool. Like I was watching the first Ultra man show. I've got it and DVD and I just felt like watching downstairs instead of my room. And yeah, people started coming like Oh, shit, ultra man. And you know, it's cool.

Neal 17:41
That's fun dude.

Josh 17:42
Yeah, it's super fun. So one day, somebody's sitting there, a couple people are just chillin. And I don't know if it was on TV, or if they put on the DVD, but Mortal Kombat. So of course, I'm in I'm going to sit down, gathered people. And we just start watching Mortal Kombat, and it was a total who everyone was getting into it. So this is actually a military college that I went to. And it's important to say that because our battalion commander was on her way out she's a woman senior. Tough as nails take no shit type of person is kind of the type of person that when she shows up, everyone's like, oh, shit look busy. So we're all watching this movie. And she's coming down the stairs and the way the the foyer and the living room are relate to each other is you're coming down the stairs, and the door the front door is right there. The magnetic lock and there's a little archway to the right where that's the entrance into like the living room dining room area. And the TV is against the wall that is shared between the two rooms. So she can't see the TV right? But we could see her Okay, so she's coming down the steps. Right as we're in the Kano Sonya fight.

Josh 18:57
The first thing she hears is "what did it hurt baby?" That really funky KMFDM you could see her stop, do a quarter turn. I could see the look on her face like "no. No" and shake her head and just walks out.

Neal 18:57
Oh boy.

Neal 19:19
Oh my god grunting and all the stuff in that oh boy. Yeah. Man,I like that-

Josh 19:27
That's probably the the funniest stories. memory I have a watching that movie that still-

Neal 19:34
She's like like "there's just in the middle of the day watching Poison Ivy 3:, the New Seduction. What's going on?"

Josh 19:43
Yes, exactly. We're actually I don't know if that came out that year

Neal 19:48
I don't know what your that came out in 97. I think you think I'd know. You think I'd be an expert on it by now.

Josh 19:53
But I mean, is it any good? I'm okay, for an exploitation movie. Every now and again

Neal 19:58
I mean, it's a it's a horny soft core movie. They're our worst ones.

Neal 20:03
But is it good?

Josh 20:05
there's always something worse

Josh 20:05
always somewhere.

Neal 20:06
I mean, it's no it's no,

Josh 20:08
it's no conquest?

Neal 20:09
it's no body double, you know

Josh 20:11
if we're gonna talk about hirny soft core, you know, media, conquest-

Neal 20:15
It's not not as good as Mortal Kombat conquest, that's for sure. But, man, I love the idea of your what was her? What was her rank?

Josh 20:22
Oh, believe she was a second lieutenant

Neal 20:26
sexond lieutenant and she's in charge of your your dorm here. And she's

Josh 20:29
our battalion, basically, or your second battalion

Neal 20:33
she just comes down the stairs are people here's this Industrial Techno score. Here's Kano being like, I mean, it was he was very obviously being weirdly sexual in his interactions with Sonya in that movie. And she's just like, "nope," and just exits. Like, "I can't deal with this right now."

Josh 20:52
Yeah, that in fact, that might have been what was going through her mind.

Neal 20:55
She's like, I'm just boys will be boys. I'm out of here. This is too much for me.

Josh 21:00
Well, we never heard anything about it after that.

Neal 21:03
Maybe she secretly recognized that as Mortal Kombat.

Josh 21:07
You know, she very well could have. Oh, they're just watching Mortal Kombat. Yeah. Circa 1995. The best story ever told?

Neal 21:13
Sure. So what was your, Did you see Mortal Kombat 95 In theaters was that?

Josh 21:20
Oh, yeah. I mean, there should be memories attached to that. But like, so these are the most colorful ones. But yeah, I course I had to be there in theaters. Me and my best friend dragged my mom to it. And my mom, of course, slept through most of it to the point where like, in looking back and remembering it. Referencing scorpions. She was like, oh, yeah, that guy would like the morphing Metal Head or whatever. It's like, there's a skull mom, and you're not paying attention. Not paying attention to the fucking movie?

Neal 21:49
not a movie for parents, I don't think.

Josh 21:51
No, it's definitely not a not a parent movie. Although she did like Christopher lamb bears voice and she was very fascinated, I think even probably had a crush on Cary Tagawa.

Neal 22:02
Okay well i mean, who doesn't? she would be weird if she didn't

Josh 22:05
She was entranced by Cary Tagawa. But, you know, yeah, it was the best effing movie that could have seen me my friend. And in a funny that exact scene the keynote Sonia seen I do have a distinct memory of a kid much younger than me and my friend in the behind us. When that scenes playing, saying, Mommy, I don't like the music.

Neal 22:28
Boy, boy, is that kid wrong!

Josh 22:30
Yeah, that kid's wrong because I had the sou- I don't know before or after I saw the movie. But I had the soundtrack. I went out and got the soundtrack. I actually that's how I got into what type of negative I think that's the only band. I followed up with that.

Neal 22:43
I have it right here.

Josh 22:44
Oh, hell yeah. See, I had it on cassette. I don't know if I even have it lying around anymore. Probably not. So

Neal 22:50
I've got the soundtrack. The CD in my hand. This was my friend, my best friend Barrett's copy. He gave this to me a couple of months ago. He found it going through his old room. He was in town. He found it going through his old room in his parents house and was like, If anyone is going to have this, it should be you. And he gave it to me. So

Josh 23:07
that's a good gift.

Neal 23:08
Yeah, so I haven't had a copy of it. Or I'd never had a copy of it before then. But I do remember in fifth grade this one kid named Ryan, like me and my friends. Like, this is when we were all snotty and like emulating our older brothers and like trying to get into cool music like Yeah, so I was like, on the playground. We're like, what kind of music do you listen to? And this kid Ryan's like, my favorite song is the Mortal Kombat theme song and I was like, Yeah, you're right. That's you're correct. Like that's totally valid. Type O negative blood and fire. That's the song right there that got you into Type O Negative.

Josh 23:43
Blood and, uh, no more nights. Yeah.

Neal 23:46
And then the immortals plus a little bit of score here Goro versus RT and the demon war Yeah,

Josh 23:51
It's a good name. What's your favorite? What's your favorite of the Romero's?

Neal 24:11
It's a good name. What's your favorite? What's your favorite of the Romero's? Oh, man,

Josh 24:16
Oh, man, I have a different one every day. I used to say Don Yeah, but I really think day

Neal 24:21
day has been, consistently been my my pick. I just came across my DVD of Day of the Dead today actually. Oh, nice. Yeah,

Josh 24:29
I'm gonna say it's day because every time I just want to pop in, I start to accidentally the whole movie specifically, that giant boardroom scene that goes from him threatening to shoot the main heroine to Dr. Frankenstein coming in and just the whole like the best parts of the movie don't even involve zombies it just is great.

Neal 24:49
All right, that's it. That's Romero's strength really, I mean, his whole thing of "Yeah, man. We're the fucking zombies bro." Right?

Josh 24:54
Yeah. Like he had at the end a diary. The Dead is starting to go Oh with a good message there about the nature of reporting and all that and then he asked to drop in the final message where you know there's a video of some rednecks, you know, just Yeah, abusing I don't know if you can use the word abuse for a zombie but you know, but yeah, assaulting the zombie for fun.

Neal 25:14
I mean, he has taken them to that point where they were evolving like basically into humans again, right? That's true.

Josh 25:20
Well I mean, diary was like a reboot. So okay, reset, but points still stands. They they have they have some sort of intellect inside of them. Sure. But they literally say the line. We are the real monsters. That's like a little too on the nose, Romero

Neal 25:37
Can somebody let George Romero know that. That's become a cliche, right?

Josh 25:42
Yes. I don't think they did

Josh 31:34
I think so. Yeah, that sounds

Josh 31:37
Gold dust woman. Yeah, that was coolest shit. I didn't see the movie, but I thought like, I wanted to see the movie. I'm like, that looks awesome.

Neal 31:43
Yeah, man

Josh 31:43
I should get around to seeing the first one

Josh 25:46
And I showed Yasin all three of them. Several years back, see, he's not a big horror guy. But like, we were just like Jae was away and we were looking for something so I'm showing him the first one, and then Jae got back and we watched the other two.

Neal 25:59
Nice.

Josh 26:01
I think he liked I think he likes them okay enough

Neal 26:54
It's really good. Yeah, so um,

Neal 26:59
tangents. tangents abound, man. That's the half the show here. So I saw Mortal Kombat 95 in theaters, but I saw it. Like I've had trouble pulling the memories, because all I really like but I've done some digging. And I figured it out. Like I know that I saw it after all of my friends had seen it. And I know that I saw it. I know that I saw it in a theater. So what I have remembered is that I saw Mortal Kombat 95, some weekend, probably a Sunday at a second run theater. Because for the most part, that's when my parents would take us to the movies would be second run, you know, when they're at the dollar. At the time tickets were $1. It was $1 theater. So we're seeing everything after

Josh 27:38
We're not taking you to where tickets are $10.

Neal 27:41
I mean, at the time, I think tickets were probably four or $5. And they were like, No, we're not doing that. Or we're going to the dollar theater. I have a memory of seeing three movies in theaters. As a kid. I know that there were more like I know I'm sure I saw a lot of the Disney animation stuff with friends and stuff. But the three memories that stick out to me are Mortal Kombat, the first Ninja Turtles movie and the Pelican Brief, which I think I just ended up seeing because my parents couldn't get a babysitter. You know?

Neal 28:08
How old were too young to give any sorts of shits about the Pelican Brief? And I

Josh 28:13
probably hopefully that was PG 13 Was there anything particularly violent or sexual in that movie, I've only seen clips

Neal 28:19
someone getting shot in the head and they're in their brains and bloods sort of splattered across the concrete. And that was probably the most Gore I've ever seen up to that point.

Josh 28:28
That's pretty rough. But

Neal 28:29
man, when I saw Mortal Kombat 95 in theaters, and my parents took both my brother and I I'm sure and the thing I remember from that experience was seeing the reptile fight for the first time. And when we left the theater, like I had, like the just the biggest smile on my face from watching that movie, like just like. And I know I came home and started doing jumped kicks off the couch and all kinds of shit, you know, and just marketed myself place. And I think that my parents made a comment about how rowdy my brother and I got after seeing that movie. Like it was like we were rambunctious and probably amped up for the rest of the day off of that thing, you know,

Josh 29:07
lending some credence to all this parents groups that were concerned about its you know, it and Power Rangers and all that stuff.

Neal 29:14
Right, right. But-

Josh 29:15
Maybe they were right.

Josh 29:15
That's a good that's a good three, uh, triple feature

Neal 29:16
But I remember a day where I was home from school. I think that the way it worked out was my my I went to a different like school district, I guess then my brother. And something happened where water like the water went out after a storm in our immediate city. So my brother like the school that he went to, like, plumbing was out or power was still out for them after the storm. So he got a day off of school that I didn't Well comes around the way that they deal with those kinds of things is that then he had to go to school on a day where students would normally be off so then a few weeks later, or a month or so later, I had a day off from school all by myself. He had to go in and make up the day that they had missed due to this You know, emergency, right? So I was younger. I mean, I was this was still elementary school age. So the night before to keep me out of trouble during the day my mom took me to a video store to rent a bunch of movies and the two that I remember the three sorry, the three that I remember renting to watch during the day while my parents were at work and my brother was at school where Beavis and Butthead Do Christmas. Three ninjas, and Mortal Kombat.

Neal 30:27
It was and I watched all of those movies, but I know I watched Mortal Kombat like two or three times.

Josh 30:35
I mean, you get a you get the total sophomore, dirty humor. You get a kid friendly martial arts movie, and then you get kind of a general middle of the road martial arts movie. It brings it all together.

Neal 30:47
Oh, yeah. And I just remember that being like that best day, but I didn't watch Mortal Kombat a whole lot after that. I mean, I've talked about this a few times. It didn't play on TV all that often, but like Mortal Kombat Annihilation played on TV a lot. Yeah. Funny how that works. So this is what they did with the sequels that didn't do so well. Like the same thing happened with the Crow movies you know, City of Angels played all the time, but the original keep forgetting there's more than one pro sequel. There's Yeah, they're arguably at least there's at least one that shouldn't exist. And it's called the CRO wicked prayer.

Josh 31:13
I keep forgetting there's more than one Crow sequel.

Neal 31:13
There's Yeah, they're arguably at least there's at least one that shouldn't exist. And it's called the CRO wicked prayer.

Josh 31:15
I've actually don't don't hate Don't Don't Don't hit me. But I've never seen the CRO. I'm not gonna I actually remember seeing the commercial for City of Angels on thinking with that. They had the cover of gold dust woman for the song. I think so. Yeah, that sounds gold, US woman. Yeah, that was coolest shit. I didn't see the movie, but I thought like, I wanted to see the movie. I'm like, that looks awesome. Yeah, man, I should get around to seeing

Neal 31:43
the first series of angels. Okay, the first one is a masterpiece. Like, it's because it's become like, classics. It's become a joke for a reason. Like, you know, the goth kid being into the CRO like they even made a joke about that right office with white but it's a solid fucking like, it's a very, it's a fantastic movie,

Josh 32:02
Much like Mortal Kombat. Probably a product of its time.

Neal 32:05
Sure, but I would I would almost argue that the crow holds up better. But we're not gonna go we're not gonna litigate that now. You know? My, my DMs are open on Twitter haters, haters. But yeah, I mean, I went through a long phase of not being able to watch that movie and just wanting to like anytime annihilation would come on, I would want to see Mortal Kombat 95 instead. And it wasn't until like, I found it Costco or Sam's Club or something like the Mortal Kombat DVD for like, $7.50. So I mean, we're at the point. Now, I don't know how old I was late high school or something where not only our DVDs common. They are also inexpensive. Right? Right. And that's when I bought it and it had like one of those like cardboard cases with like the plastic latch on it. You know, it wasn't like in my case. I never fully liked. I didn't like it either. But man once I got that thing, and I watched it, I probably watched it every day for like three or four days just having it on while I was doing homework or whatever. Because I was like, God damn, this movie still fucking holds up and there is something special about

Josh 33:09
it. I have almost as much love for annihilation, because I think it's infectiously fun. And yeah, when I does come on TV, I'm like, hell yeah. Put on annihilation. But yeah, I think you know, before you know, modern 2000s era I had it I owned it. This I guess like anytime I wanted to watch that put it in, but I owned it on VHS. That's pretty. And I never went and bought it on DVD. Because I think then when you know, YouTube and all that I just I just want to watch the reptile fight. It's there. Yeah, that's true. Unfortunately, I lost a lot of my VHS tapes due to mold of where I had been stored. And I unfortunately had to part ways with the Mortal Kombat 95 VHS days of sad face, but I never went ahead and I need to I need to get those but you know, they're just so readily available. I got HBO so right there just right there whenever you want them. Yeah, that one. I don't think 95 is an HBO but annihilation was for time and 2021 Definitely

Neal 34:05
is so it was conquest conquest is on there. So that's yeah, hell yeah. And legacy, but yeah, and legacy and legacy. Yeah. And like Oh, man. All right. We're getting to the end of this, but I got a few questions for you. If you don't mind answering. I'm gonna put a little spin on this. I gave you a heads up on some of these but I'm gonna throw you a curveball at the end. So

Josh 34:28
for me a Commonweal hat as it were.

Neal 34:30
What was your introduction to Mortal Kombat? Was it movie game TV show? Was it like Mortal Kombat for you? No,

Josh 34:38
not definitely the game. The very first game. Okay. So when just the movie? I guess I can tell I've been there since the beginning. Sure. Yeah. Almost because it was home release. I actually talked about this on the first episode of combat time, actually kind of we shared a little bit of a roundtable but my experience was, I was in the third grade and And some kids have brought in a Game Gear.

Neal 34:55
Oh, nice!

Josh 35:01
I was a Nintendo bro so I didn't have I remember the Genesis and the Blood Code.

Neal 35:08
I remember hearing about this because I got psyched.

Josh 35:10
Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah. So they they brought it in and they were playing Mortal Kombat and I was just looking over the shoulder. I'm like, Oh, that looks cool. And you know, I kind of got shoulder in there and play a little bit and experiment with first Johnny Cage and then scorpion. And so next thing you know, I'm searching that out for Super Nintendo. Sure. Yeah, I wouldn't. I don't even think they're playing the blood version on that point and say I just wanted to be able to fight ninjas and stuff and loyal follower of the franchise ever since then, I was waiting for to to appear on shelves. Nice. And it wasn't long.

Neal 35:43
I love that, that the Game Gear version of Mortal Kombat one was your introduction because it was actually I think my introduction to I really Yeah, I became aware of Mortal Kombat, when Mortal Kombat two was coming to home consoles. Okay, and I and when it came out, like I definitely had friends who had it and my brother's friends who had it and would bring it over. But the very first version I played and technically owned, I borrowed it from a friend and still have it was the Game Gear version of Mortal Kombat one and I played that thing like crazy for a very long time. Not even knowing that there was a blood code for that version,

Josh 36:11
and you were perfectly content

Neal 36:20
2-1-2down-up is the blood code for the Game Gear and Master System version of Mortal Kombat one, I squeezed it in any chance I get

Neal 36:20
2-1-2-down-up. Okay. I owned a Game Gear for a brief period years after that, too. Didn't last long. Wasn't a long period. Oh, yeah. Man, I that was too inconvenient of the system to

Neal 36:42
Right I, I still have mine. the screens in speaker have gone bad on it. But I still have it, I haven't replaced it. Because I've got other ways of playing my game gear cartridges, I actually have a Retron five with the Master System adapter, which you can plug again your cartridge into and play it on your television, so Oh, cool. But I also have a Master System collection and just have the Master System versions of most of the game your games I had, which are just higher resolution versions of those.

Josh 37:08
Man, I'd love to see- I know you got a collection. Tons of cool shit.

Neal 37:12
Yeah, I got I got I got a lot of stuff. But yeah, man, I had a lot of I have a lot of love for those for those 8-bit Mortal Kombat games.

Josh 37:22
A lot of fun.

Neal 37:22
Alright, so next up, out of all of the Mortal Kombat games that you have played, because again, there's a lot there's some weird, obscure ones like Mortal Kombat advanced and Mortal Kombat tournament edition on the Gameboy Advance, right? Yeah,

Josh 37:35
if you want to count those Sure. We can basically say 11 mainline games and a bunch of side games.

Neal 37:40
Yeah, three, three spin offs, you know, and then your your trilogies and whatnot. Which Mortal Kombat game that you've played is your all time favorite?

Josh 37:49
Well, I might be biased towards the 2d games since that's what I grew up with. I never got to I played you know, deception a little bit like that. And all that but they would have originally said ultimate MK three. That's the point where I had been to the franchise a bit and it just blew my mind. It was like a party game. It's like all right, we got all the ninjas and secret characters

Neal 38:12
robots, Centaurs

Josh 38:14
Robots, centaurs, everything. but looking back as me and the Kombat Boys have gone through the games and replay them to reassess them I'm actually gonna say the first one

Neal 38:27
Wow, very cool

Josh 38:30
I you know when we went to play the second one my enjoyment of that was hampered a good bit by the AI

Neal 38:34
bYeah, the AI super cheap in Mortal Kombat 2

Josh 38:35
it's fucking unwinnable against Mortal Kombat two granted, it's a different different ballgame when you're playing it with a friend a mortal kombat two is ostensibly bigger and better everything but I for summary, I really enjoy the simplicity of one not just like the character roster I mean, but like, you know, everyone gets one finisher the move sets simple Yeah. And even actually playing with other people you're seeing contrasts me into but I can beat them pretty good and one so I like it better because of that

Josh 38:44
yeah, I think it's a it's a much more even playing field. Like overall like

Josh 39:16
it's just because it's so clunky and they hadn't refined it yet. And maybe everyone, any anybody anybody can play yeah, maybe that's it, and I'm not good at I guess I'm not good. So

Neal 39:26
I mean, I'm not good at any of them. But yeah, dude, I like that. I mean, for me, it's Mortal Kombat two, but Mortal Kombat one is is very close I find myself popping that one in a lot just when I want to kill some time you know,

Josh 39:39
I used to would have I would have used to dismiss it because I'm like, I own Mortal Kombat two and cartridge. Not a childhood copy. Like I bought it you know, in the past like maybe several years. And one was available that same store and I didn't care to get it and like why would I want one I remember it being really slow and clunky and I got two that's all I need. But looking back had it once. I mean, Super Nintendo version one's not that good. Not because it doesn't have blood, but it is kind of clunky to play. Yeah. But the arcade? Yeah, no, definitely my favorite arcade

Neal 40:10
versions pretty solid compared to the console versions for sure. On any system. I liked that. Okay, last question. Well, second, the last question, actually, what's your favorite Mortal Kombat thing? That is not a video game, movie, TV show, soundtrack, action figure, whatever. And because of your story, I'm going to put the asterisk in that you're not allowed to pick Mortal Kombat 95 either, because I think that's a clear answer for you.

Josh 40:39
clear answer? Yeah. Oh, boy. You know, I didn't soundtracks and everything to me mooted.

Neal 40:45
Sure it could mean anything with the Mortal Kombat branding.

Josh 40:48
I mean, my next answer would be annihilation, because I do have such a I recognize and I recognized as a kid that this is a bad movie. This is not a this could this is not cut from the same cloth as the first one. Except it kind of was because it's still Lauren's cast now. Sure, but I'm not going to make that my answer. Okay, I'm gonna make mine and answer that you're gonna like very much. I tried to scrape my brain and think of any other thing, but I can't think of any other thing. Conquest.

Neal 41:17
Yeah, it is.

Josh 41:22
It's probably not my only my favorite non game related thing, not counting the 95 movie. It's probably the best MK media period.

Neal 41:31
I think I honestly think so. I mean, clearly, I'm biased, right? So I want the people to hear from you. Not from me, because they know where I stand.

Josh 41:39
I mean you could say it's cheesy. Say, it's got some 90s cringe, and you could say, the sets and the costumes and the, but it's so I can't I want to use the word wholesome. That's the wrong word. Because it's not very wholesome at times. But uh, once again, comfy there's just something really warm, warm. There's something warm about it.

Neal 42:04
Yes, totally. Yeah, it feels like a natural extension of the movie universe also.

Josh 42:10
Yeah, but it's, there's just like some, this is enough time to grow the characters and these morality tales and stuff like that. And just the drama. Like, even in the first episode of Kung Lao wanting to run away of Jan. It's just like, Yeah, you don't get anything like that. And another Mortal Kombat story. This is like, you know, this is the drama you want to tune into every week. Sure.

Neal 42:30
Yeah. If you're like into, I mean, the casting is great. The storytelling. Yeah. I mean, it's it's ninja of the week, right. But it's also just in terms of runtime, the longest Mortal Kombat thing to watch or to digest, right?

Josh 42:46
Like, because each episodes like, what? 40 minutes,

Neal 42:47
right? Sure. And there's 22 of them. I think we've been going through for the time

Josh 42:51
where like, we're used to one hour TV shows nowadays. Yeah, back then. That was like, Oh, this is an investment. This isn't just a quick 20 minute show.

Neal 42:59
We've been going through the Malibu series, and I'm having a lot of fun with the Malibu comics as a whole, but there's not a lot of content in them, you know, like, yeah, you know, you don't spend a lot of time getting to know the people, right. It's kind of frustrating. It is. It's still fun. Like, I think I described this on our last issue in the comics remind me of setting up your action figures as a kid and, and playing with those

Josh 43:24
and making up backstories to each of them, I remember you saying that

Neal 43:27
So I mean, I'm enjoying, I'm enjoying going through the full comic book series. I've never read it all before, even though I have collected it all over the past few years. But conquest, it runs long. It's compelling enough. It's entertaining enough every episode is yeah, it's just

Josh 43:45
It has one golly womper of an ending. Of course, they were intending to continue it. But you know, well, yeah, it works as a standalone ending.

Neal 43:53
It also somehow works as a standalone ending also, like Yeah, all right, good.

Josh 43:57
Alternate Universe Mortal Kombat

Neal 44:02
Good answers

Josh 44:02
Backstory

Neal 44:02
Now here's the final question, this is the curveball that I just thought of doing. Out of all of the 'Mortal Kombat' everything, games and spin-offs, what is your least favorite? I'm not gonna say 'hate' I'm not gonna put that, that anger cause I mean, I don't know if you're a fan like me where like, even, you even enjoy the bad stuff even if you're not gonna revisit it a lot because it's just more of the the hing you love, you know?

Josh 44:25
Well, like, Annihilation is a bad movie but I enjoy the hell out of it

Neal 44:28
Yeah, Annihilation, like, it's it's immune to criticism in some weird way because if you sit down to critically deconstruct it there's not a lot it's got going for it but I'll still watch the entire thing if it's on TV right?

Josh 44:02
Same, that's another movie that I will 'accidentally the whole movie' and uh, I actually hate the word, I talked with Yasin about this and I think he agrees with me, I hate the word "so bad it's good" cause if it's bad, if it's enjoyable, then it's good.

Neal 44:42
right

Josh 44:42
Like if it's, if they succeeded in giving you entertainment maybe you know they knew they weren't making Shakespeare with you know 'insert bad movie here' but they just wanted to be fun. And if it's fun, even if it's fun because it's ridiculous, well then in some aspect it's a good movie.

Neal 45:12
sure totally

Josh 45:13
a bad movie like a truly bad movie has got to be like so, um, like like Tekken 2 Kazuya's Revenge

Neal 45:21
Right

Josh 45:21
That is a movie that has no joy at all.

Neal 45:23
That wouldn't even be a fun movie to like watch with your friends and make fun of because it's just

Josh 45:29
Oh yeah, you cannot mst 3k that No, no, you probably could if you have the right friends and the right energy. Maybe you could really tear to have some fun of it. But you really got to be creative

Neal 45:39
for a room full of nihilists. Maybe But yeah,

Josh 45:43
in the realm of Mortal- 'Realm' no pun intended, anything too not just movies games...

Neal 45:52
I'm gonna give you the full spectrum. I'm working on this system out as I'm going. Right? I just added this question. I'll fine tune it for the next one.

Josh 45:52
And not, not necessarily hate just my least favorite. I'm going to go ahead and say, even though this falls in the realm of it is entertaining and an aspect except that it is so unprofessionally made and makes you feel like how the hell do they pieces together? Sure. And I'm never going to want to watch it again. Granted, I haven't seen Federation of martial arts, which you and Cory have covered and that sounds like a whole nother oh boy bag of worms. But I'm going to say we were talking about this earlier. The Mortal Kombat The journey begins.

Neal 46:31
I knew it as soon as you started describing it, I knew it man.

Josh 46:34
It's just you know, the Interestingly enough, the 3d segments were slightly more enjoyable than the majority segments. And the 2d segments were awful. The animation was awful. Story was really, it's like, one of those lowbrow kid shows, you know, like a kid show where they I hate when they do this. Like they talk down to you. Yes to you. If you're a kid, you know what I mean? It's like, Good kids programming shouldn't treat the kids like their stupid, right? Yeah, this is something that it assumes you have brain damage. And can't discern action on screen.

Josh 46:34
And that was another thing. That was a thing that I had nostalgia for for a long time. And then I sat down and revisited it and I was like, Oh, this is just color garbage.

Josh 47:25
Maybe that's part of it too. Because I don't have nostal- like I remember seeing advertisements for I remember seeing like a clip for I think on the Mk 95 VHS or

Neal 47:34
I read an article about it in GamePro magazine. Like

Josh 47:37
Nice.

Neal 47:38
Yeah, dude

Josh 47:38
I knew it looked like okay, this isn't something to get excited about. So it never was on my radar. I don't know if I saw a VHS of it in the stores or not. I just never encountered it so the Me and the boys watched it recently. And maybe that's why because like another similar movie like that is you know, most people of our generations like childhood. Holy Grail Transformers The animated movie.

Neal 48:02
Oh, sure. Absolutely.

Josh 48:03
I I've actually never seen it as a kid. Okay, I recognize like I understood as I grew up that it is what it is because they kill off Optimus Prime and all the other you know, famous Autobots, and it's really dramatic and it's got a rockin soundtrack. And like I think my only like appreciation of it on the same level as all the kids that grew up with it was the when they made the the flash animated short, Mr. T versus Unichron, One, two and three.

Neal 48:28
I've not seen that.

Josh 48:29
I recommend watching him read it. I haven't watched him since college. But for me that was the epic giant intergalactic story about Mr. T and and Kramer from Seinfeld and Fonzie from Happy Days and alpha and everybody teaming up to fight Unicron.

Neal 48:46
This is ringing a weird Bell this might have been something I encountered actually.

Josh 48:50
New Grounds it's probably archived. Yeah, but I had then then then I finally saw Transformers Animated Movie J showed it to me because Jae loves that movie. Yeah, I think he admits that it's bad, but he loved and you know what Jae didn't grow up with it, either. Jae is of a type of mind that saw it as an adult and was still able to appreciate it.

Neal 49:08
Okay

Josh 49:08
and he tried to show it to me. The reason we watched it too, because because we were waiting to go somewhere. We were waiting to go on a road trip and we're waiting for our friends to show up and they were running late and we had nothing to do so watch transformers. So I couldn't escape. Because I really wanted to I wanted to run away but I couldn't.

Neal 49:26
Right

Josh 49:26
It's so fucking I couldn't stand it.

Neal 49:29
Oh, boy.

Josh 49:29
There's something about the pacing. There's no sense of-,

Neal 49:33
It's a weirdly paced movie. I watched it late in life too. I wasn't crazy about it. But I don't know. Yeah, I get what you're saying there with the Transformers movie.

Josh 49:41
And it's hard to stomach. I was disappointed because I almost got to watch it in college. Like I was gonna borrow from somebody and it's like, now that I finally saw it. I'm like, Well, maybe if I was eight when I've seen it. I I'd appreciate it.

Neal 49:53
I do think I would still take it over the Michael Bay ones though. Honestly.

Josh 49:57
Yeah, that's another I have another friend that At after we graduated college, she saw it and for some reason loved it. She doesn't like sci fi movie. She hates alien movies. I don't know if it was Shaila or the cool cars but she loved it so much. She wanted me to buy it and she sent me a check so I could go by Wow movie. This is very strange. Love a friend. Yeah, right. That's what a friend and you know what, I kind of enjoyed it. Like, I wasn't expecting them to be so cartoony and talk. I know that's something Michael Bay didn't want but there was a little bit of a charm to it that I'm like that action scenes and special effects were actually pretty good. Yeah. And I'm like, I'm kind of enjoying it. I rewatched it sometime later. And I realized all those signature Michael Bay things in there that started to annoy me. Yeah, and I only ever saw the second one after that with same friend. And that's the last Transformers movie.

Neal 50:51
So I remember being excited about the Michael Bay one and and being disappointed in the theaters.

Josh 50:57
Like I was like, yeah, it was like hyped up, you know, because oh, man, Transformers

Neal 51:01
like, this is just kind of sloppy and the editing is kind of bad. And this like,

Josh 51:05
yeah, that that was that was my takeaway when I rewatched it I'm like, oh, what I thought before wasn't exciting. set pieces. Really fucking all over the place. Yeah. Not another fan of those movies. Not to mention all the cringy humor.

Neal 51:19
Oh god. Yeah, way too much. One of the sequels one of the Transformers just straight up has balls.

Josh 51:25
In the second one.

Josh 51:26
What are you doing dude?

Josh 51:27
Like pickup trucks do

Neal 51:29
Yeah, it's, what-whatever

Josh 51:32
Yeah, tacky movies. Not in a good way

Neal 51:34
I will not be podcasting about the Transformers film franchise.

Josh 51:38
I hope you never do.

Neal 51:39
One of the few things I will not podcast about

Josh 51:42
although except for maybe Bumblebee. I heard that was good.

Neal 51:44
Oh, yeah, I haven't even seen it. I saw the one the one the first one that Mark Wahlberg was in and like the second he in his thick Boston accent was like, you know we got to stand down here in Texas. I was like you're you're not into you don't talk. We have a saying in Texas. You are absolutely from Boston. I don't believe this movie for a second like I was-

Josh 52:05
Wow, I didn't know he was supposed to be a Texan. Yeah, but I don't know jack shit about those his movies.

Neal 52:10
I was like this this movie know what it just did?

Josh 52:13
That might have been a conscious decision to

Neal 52:15
He couldn't have said "you know, we had a sayin back home in Boston." Right like that. Like just once you cast Mark Wahlberg just changed the one line.

Josh 52:22
Yeah, in fact, I don't know why they couldn't just set it in Boston and just let Mark or mark that Mark Wahlberg be himself.

Neal 52:28
Yeah, imagine all the park the car jokes they could have made.

Josh 52:32
See your ma- you're starting to frame a movie I wouldn't mind watching. that sounds entertaining

Neal 52:36
not the movie we got in Transformers 4 or whatever.

Josh 52:40
Yeah. Five and six.

Neal 52:44
Well, nothing like ending on a down note.

Josh 52:46
Why couldn't there be six good Mortal Kombat movies?

Neal 52:48
right or give me another season of conquest. God dammit.

Josh 52:51
Oh, yeah. Get our promised, promised second season of that. Get all the actors back.

Neal 52:56
Bring them back. They all still look fantastic.

Josh 52:59
Awesome. There you go.

Neal 53:00
Makes sense that they would age a little bit. Let's do it. Daniel Bernhardt. You've never been hotter. I mean, his career, but also, but also I'm just saying like now's the time HBO Max. Let's get on this.

Josh 53:13
Let's send out some letters.

Neal 53:14
Sure. I'm yeah, I'm gonna reach out directly to Adoni Maropis.

Josh 53:18
Do it.

Neal 53:20
I think it's time to wrap this up though. Dude.

Josh 53:22
Yeah, we've gone on gone quite a bit hearty conversation.

Neal 53:26
Yeah, man. Thanks again for doing this

Josh 53:28
Yeah, no problem.

Neal 53:29
You know, I had Jae do this last time and these are going to release in pretty close proximity. So I want to hear you plug Kombat Time and then the listeners can judge who does a better job. He didn't know, it was acompetition. You do so you've got a little bit of an advantage there.

Josh 53:46
i Yeah. Who's better? I mean, I don't know boy do I gotta think of how I can do a radio voice. Well, stay tuned to Kombat Time and

Neal 53:54
it's got to be strong enough so that when Yasin is uh is on soon, he can't compete either.

Josh 53:55
Oh, yeah, that's true. Boy, I wansn't prepared for this. And of course, what ruins it My dog is walking in the room clicking and clacking, so hopefully didn't click and clack over my voice. Thanks, dog. You screwed it up.

Josh 53:58
Oh, hold on. Be nice to the dog because that's gonna get that's gonna score you points with the listeners, right?

Josh 54:15
Yeah. Hey, dog. Hey, buddy.

Neal 54:17
Like when someone's cat walks on the screen during the Zoom meeting

Josh 54:20
This is actually perfect then. Yeah, so Hey, buddy, what's your favorite podcast to listen to?

"Josh's Dog" 54:26
Well my favorite podcast is Kombat Time!

Neal 54:30
Why does your dog sound like an old man?

Josh 54:33
Because he's a basset hound. So Sandy is an old man

Neal 54:35
perfect. Okay

"Josh's Dog" 54:37
You can you can listen to Kombat Time at KombatTimepodcast.podbean.com

Neal 54:42
There you go

"Josh's Dog" 54:43
can also check out their Twitch channel because they started doing twitch and playing video games. twitch.tv/kombattimeod.

Neal 54:53
Very nice.

Josh 54:54
And on our Twitch we have only We've only played one game and their correction you seen has only played one game. went there and that is Mortal Kombat mythologies. SubZero. We did not save the recordings for that one because it was our first time kind of sure testing it out. But what pretty well, so I mean, you were on a couple earrings at Aaron's streams. So we're planning on playing some more games there. So yeah, stay tuned to that.

Neal 55:17
Very cool.

Josh 55:18
And in case you couldn't tell by my accent, that's KombatTimepodcast.podbean.com

Neal 55:22
Nice. And you guys are on Twitter and Instagram @KombatTimePod

Josh 55:27
Oh, crap. I'm gonna lose. I didn't have that stuff on hand.

Neal 55:29
It's fine. It'll be it'll be in the description. Yeah. Do you want to plug yourself?

Josh 55:34
Oh, no, um not much of myself to plug. So you know, Kombat Time as a Twitter. Yasin and Jae have their own separate Twitter's I don'.t I used to have a Twitter. It got taken over by Russian bots.

Neal 55:46
Oh, shit

Josh 55:47
long ago, like 10 years ago.

Neal 55:49
Oh my god. And you

Josh 55:49
I think, yeah, I think I tried to rescue it. And then it got taken over again. I just abandoned it. I don't really use social media. I am a writer. So it should be you know, I probably should promote myself but I do a lot of pseudo anonymous writing so I don't don't kind of need a social media presence. I'll go ahead and plug a project I worked on recently recent in recent history, though, that I guess it's kind of slightly prestigious. I've got my name out there but uh, so you know, Gamera, right?

Neal 56:22
Gamera?

Josh 56:23
Yeah, you're Godzilla and then Gamera was the kind of Godzilla knockoff giant monster that started in the 60s

Neal 56:28
Jae and I were just talking about the Kaneko Gamera trilogy. There you go. I love those movies.

Josh 56:33
Yeah, it's like, yeah, those movies are chefs kiss. To borrow a phrase Jae uses he probably used it on the recording

Neal 56:40
I think he did in describing those movies actually

Josh 56:44
there's no better description for those movies are the bee's knees because they started out as a Godzilla knockoff in the 60s. And they couldn't decide whether they wanted it to be for kids or wanted it to be scary. And they were just kind of messy movies weren't very good there. There were some gems in them. And then you know, the studio went out went bankrupt. And then I can echo comes around in the 90s and gets hired to make a Gamera movie and it blows the Godzilla movies out of the water. And then they made two more and each one got better.

Neal 57:17
Yes. Revenge of Iris is just it's instant classic. Revenge of Iris.

Josh 57:22
Yeah, yeah. Revenge of Iris. Oh, man, I love that movie. Um, so the reason I bring up camera is because a guy that you are listeners might have heard of named Matt Frank. He was a friend of mine. And he got involved later, you know, I knew him. And after I knew him, he became famous. Like, you know, I knew him before he was famous. I'm not trying to but he he's a Godzilla artists like he was a big person in the fandom and then he lived the dream and was able to work on the official Godzilla comic line that ran in the US.

Neal 57:59
IDW stuff, right?

Josh 58:01
Yeah. uh, it's kingdom of monsters and rulers of Earth.

Neal 58:05
Very cool.

Josh 58:06
Yeah. But the titles run together to me now because they started do so many, but he had an idea for a Gamera backstory comic.

Neal 58:12
Oh, wow.

Josh 58:13
And he tapped me to help him write it. And so I wrote the script for the comic and in he did the comic and we had someone else you know, help with the shading. And it was at first unofficial until Kadokawa. actually picked it up.

Neal 58:28
Wow

Josh 58:28
In Japan, but then Arrow, believe Australian, a European company released a giant Gamera box set that by the way, blew the criterion Godzilla boxset out of the water as far as presentation.

Neal 58:42
I've seen pictures. I haven't seen the actual box set. It's pretty impressive looking.

Josh 58:46
It's pretty cool. And they they put a comics collection as a bonus in it. Like a printed comic collection. That was the Dark Horse Gamera comic that ran back in the 90s. An official English translation of Matt's comic which is called 'The Last Hope'

Neal 59:01
that's incredible, dude. Yeah, that's awesome.

Josh 59:03
Yeah. Anyone wants to check it out It's hella expensive. boxset. But you probably find the comic even by itself on eBay or Amazon. I looked it up. It's floating around out there. I think it's out of print. Now.

Neal 59:14
That's very cool.

Josh 59:15
It's partially responsible for me having a Goodreads page so I have a Goodreads page, believe it or not, there's two items on it.

Neal 59:20
Send me send me a link to it. I'll drop it in the episode description. Yeah, that's That's fucking rad. Dude, you wrote a Gamera comic!

Josh 59:26
It's like Oh, cool. That's me. I'm out there that's on a DVD shelf somewhere. There's a thing on my name on it.

Neal 59:34
Did you consult with Mortal Kombat comic book writer, Charles Marshall at all to figure out how to do

Josh 59:40
I thought about it because he's really inspirational to me. I just I just love how he he puts the name of the character in your head and keeps

Neal 59:49
on every single all the time every single day. My theory is he wanted somebody who found a random page of this that was torn out. of a book to understand who everybody was

Josh 59:59
know why that's probably exactly that was marketing. It's something like that branding. But no I did not. I did not use it for inspiration. I thought about it, but you know, I'm going to be original. I can't. I can't live up to Charles Marshall.

Neal 1:00:12
Kind of weird for Gamera to introduce himself as Gamera on every page especially because he doesn't really

Josh 1:00:18
he doesn't talk yeah

Neal 1:00:22
that's that's sincerely very fucking cool dude.

Josh 1:00:26
Oh thanks yeah it's a great time to do something like that again some time that was a neat experience. One because I never written a comic before but just to it's like Matt's Godzilla fan he got to put his mark officially and now you know now My name is officially not on Godzilla but on Gamera at least and I like Gamera so

Neal 1:00:42
everyone needs to go out there buy this box set leave a review on Amazon that says "I only bought this for the comic"

Josh 1:00:48
yes there needs to be more reviews that say that

Neal 1:00:50
and that's how we that's how we get an ongoing Gamera series. Written by Josh the Kombat Bro

Josh 1:00:57
by the way not to tangent but one one small little ending thing that have you seen Gamera the brave?

Neal 1:01:04
I have seen Gamera the brave. I've seen it once and I remember enjoying it because I had enough distance between the Kaneko trilogy and it

Josh 1:01:11
I was pleasantly surprised by that movie. That's another comfy movie as you can describe it.

Neal 1:01:17
I'm also just a big fan of turtles. So just seeing turtles like little turtle Gamera for a lot of that movie was

Josh 1:01:24
I love turtles. Yeah,I'm fascinated by them. So that helps.

Neal 1:01:27
Yeah, I have a I have a pet turtle, actually. Oh, this is one that was one of my friend's parents gave me when a pet store was closing. And they just they knew I liked turtles so they got it. I've had him for, I don't know, seven or eight years now.

Josh 1:01:40
Wow. Yeah, the suckers live a while my sister has one that's even older than that.

Neal 1:01:44
His name is Admiral Boombox.

Josh 1:01:47
Wow, that is best turtle name.

Neal 1:01:50
Good turtle name. Yeah.

Josh 1:01:51
Admiral Boombox. I love that. I had a pet turtle for all of maybe almost a month I was I was pulling weeds at the side of the driveway. And I saw this weird pattern sticking up out of the dirt. And I pried it out. And it was a little turtle. Boy. It was about the size of a half dollar. Yes. It's real big. It was like, I mean, not big, the big four coins. I mean, it was a tiny little baby turtle and I kept him in a terrarium, and I feed him and watch him come spread out the food with his hands. But he never grew. I don't know how long I guess because they lived so long. But I felt bad about keeping them so I set them out in the wild again, hopefully Yeah, that's a good place to be not unprepared hopefully didn't get killed.

Neal 1:02:30
Like I have this turtle and I'm stuck with it. Because when you do when you do if you keep them in captivity for too long, especially aquatic turtles, and you release them, they don't tend to survive. Because yeah, they're introduced to different like just biol- like environments like biologically, you know, different bacteria that

Josh 1:02:47
Not even predators, but just like bacteria and stuff.

Neal 1:02:49
So like I'm stuck with this guy for the rest of his life. But I'm never going to own a turtle as a pet again, but your little guy I'm sure it's absolutely fine. The thing is, they only grow to the size that their environment will allow. So even though this guy why it wasn't growing several years old at this point, he's not very big like I had. I have had bigger tanks in the past where the totals got very large. But yeah, you set them for you keep them for a month to hang out and set him free. He's doing fine out there. He's still kicking I'm sure

Josh 1:03:15
I gave him I gave him a head start in life. Nice vacation.

Josh 1:03:18
All right, dude

Josh 1:03:19
maybe he turned in to Gamera

Neal 1:03:20
hanks for checking out this episode of turtle time.

Josh 1:03:24
Yeah, right.

Neal 1:03:26
Josh thanks again for doing this man. This is a lot of fun.

Josh 1:03:29
Yeah, absolutely.

Neal 1:03:30
And I don't have a good sign off for the show. We just kind of end things however we want to so I'm just gonna kind of let it trail off.

Josh 1:03:38
The I usually do the sign off on our show, but I haven't thought of one. So

Neal 1:03:43
I think that turtle talk probably covered it.

Josh 1:03:46
Yeah.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai