Neal 0:05
rollin, rollin. We gotta get we hit record after saying thick, thick smoke ropes so well okay,

Corey 0:18
you said 'thick' once don't fucking lie to our listeners.

Neal 0:22
I said okay, I'm saying thick thick smoke

Corey 0:25
Hold on, hold on hold on hold on. Timeout is has an update? Okay, he's changed. I've scrolled down. Uh huh. And right past the timezone list. Yeah, it is a video playing of this day in history.

Neal 0:41
Holy moly.

Corey 0:43
And below that there is a purple box with a quote from Miles Davis always that says, I always listen to what I can leave out, which is sort of like how we do this podcast because

Neal 0:55
that's exactly that's certainly how I do this podcast.

Corey 0:57
We've really, you know, tried to be the Miles Davis of Mortal Kombat of femoral podcasts.

Neal 1:06
I think we've mostly succeeded in that.

Corey 1:08
I think, when you consider how incredibly specific that demographic really is? We couldn't help but succeed.

Neal 1:20
And let's be real here. Miles Davis, like, you know, his he's always said that one of his biggest musical influences was Jonathan Sloate. Who did the music for Mortal Kombat conquest.

Corey 1:33
Yeah, also, I know that we said before we hit record, that we were gonna stay on top and away have such an important question.

Neal 1:41
Okay. Also, his other influence was the guy who did the music for Raven. I can't pull his name Christopher some. Christopher Franke. Got it. No, no edits. One One and done. What's up?

Corey 1:53
Jeffrey Meek. So according to a tweet. I just saw, did the here in my garage guy by RadioShack?

Neal 2:00
Who the fuck is that here in my garage guy?

Corey 2:03
Oh, come on.

Neal 2:04
This is this is a Canadian thing.

Corey 2:06
No, no!

Neal 2:07
Here in my.... Yes. You know who this is? Guy under the

Corey 2:12
fucking YouTube guy whose like in his garage talking about books or whatever.

Neal 2:16
This dumb motherfucker. (typing) here in my garage guy radio. This guy sucks

Corey 2:25
Uh, according to one tweet I saw,

Neal 2:29
Yeah,

Corey 2:29
he resurrected. RadioShack I don't know if that's true. Hang on. I can't figure this out. God. Well, it's autofilling Ty Lopez. RadioShack. Ty Lopez. Lopez. Krypto RadioShack crypto pivot

Neal 2:45
Jesus fucking Christ. I am

Corey 2:51
prodos.com Apex slimeebag Ty Lopez, their words not mine, infamous for bragging about his lavish lifestyle is now appropriating radioshacks name is a smokescreen for a dodgy initial coin offering. I don't know what that is. Mike. Anyway, the beanbag garage guy turned RadioShack into like,

Corey 3:11
a crypto shell company,

Neal 3:14
motherfucker.

Corey 3:15
Anyway, I just found that out literally right now.

Neal 3:18
That's weird that that was on the time.is website on that was right after the Miles Davis quote.. Should we? We might as well not. But let's clap in 20

Neal 3:29
We will clap at 25 All right.

Corey 3:32
Oh yeah we haven't clapped!

Corey 3:33
Can we clap at 30

Neal 3:34
we can clap at 30 You're forced me to do an edit.

Corey 3:37
No, you're not. You don't have to. Okay. My clap was really bad.

Neal 3:44
I heard it. It's staying in, we're not doing another one. Ladies and gentlemen, also just this ladies and

Corey 3:50
gentlemen. It's 8pm Tuesday.

Neal 3:53
We're recording late both in terms of days for when I have to put the episode out and also like

Corey 3:59
the lives we have left to live because we both feel like shit garbage.

Neal 4:03
I have a cold. For sure. Corey, uh,

Corey 4:08
just have like human frailty. I think yeah, that's what I'm suffering from.

Neal 4:13
He, you found you'd forgotten when you drink that old water that you'd also like frozen a little bit of it in ice cube trays. And you just happen to like drop a little bit of old water into your coke starlight. So you're not like feeling the full effects. You've just like just a hint

Corey 4:28
If you put mentos in Coca Cola starlightd you die?

Neal 4:32
Probably. I would imagine so, yeah, it would like it would weirdly burst into flames

Corey 4:43
just like space.

Neal 4:44
Yeah, that's that weird silence is staying in.

Corey 4:47
It's called a pregnant pause

Neal 4:49
This is a fucking nightmare. For my inability to I'm going to end up editing this thing I can already tell

Corey 5:00
My fan has just started making a very fucked up noise It wasn't making before.

Neal 5:04
Well, I cannot hear it on your My version of your track that I'm recording,

Corey 5:08
I can hear it through my headphones

Neal 5:10
So maybe I'll just use your audio and just I'm just gonna hit publish on this thing right

Corey 5:15
I don't know if it's picking up or not. But I know we said no edits and that's not even me doing a bit. It was just such a notably different sound that I thought it may be broke. So that's good. Yeah, that's good battle wave.

Neal 5:30
We are here today to talk about some comic books, Corey.

Corey 5:35
Comicbooooks

Neal 5:35
Yeah, man. World of Betty and Veronica jumbo comics Summer Fun special

Corey 5:42
in your library? When you were in school of whatever level? Did you have graphic novel Bibles?

Neal 5:48
We did not. I don't not as far as I know

Corey 5:51
Well, they're real. And this is basically what Mortal Kombat Battlewave is

Neal 5:55
It' a graphic novel Bible. Yes. Yeah.

Corey 6:00
That's absolutely correct. There's also a manga Bible. Like it was intentionally like it was in it like it was made by English people was not

Neal 6:08
so these are like the Bible as graphic not like the Holy Bible as

Corey 6:14
Christ's book. Yeah.

Neal 6:16
Holy shit. That's not I thought like I was thinking like,

Corey 6:19
no, like the King James.

Neal 6:21
I was saying like, almanac book. I was seeing like an almanac of graphic novels. Like

Corey 6:25
no, absolutely not like, like Christians Christ's Bible.

Neal 6:29
Fuck me. That sucks. Dude. Did you read them?

Corey 6:33
Fuck no. Did I ever look at one? Yeah, sure. Oh, wow. They've updated there's something called the action Bible.

Neal 6:42
Oh, I've heard of the action Bible.

Corey 6:44
That's a new thing. This just looks like conehead. This is fucking crazy.

Neal 6:47
You walked all over my joke. I said did Jim Lee do the artwork for the graphic novel Bible?

Corey 6:53
Who's Jim Lee?

Neal 6:54
nevermind.

Corey 6:56
I'm an idiot. I don't know who Jim Lee is.

Neal 6:58
Danny gets it. shout out to Danny! Mortal Kombat Battlewave issues one through three. Ready to just get into this bad boy Corey

Corey 7:11
Yeah, the clock's ticking on the rest of my life and I think if I want to spend it talking about Mortal Kombat battle with the time to start is right now

Neal 7:20
then I better do a quick quick quick Neal Nook here

Corey 7:28
is that pause staying in?

Neal 7:30
know I that one I can find because I've got a sound I got a sound drop like right there. I can just chop that fucker. Right out man. The soundboard is a mess. I gotta reorganize everything.

Corey 7:41
"a mess"

Corey 7:41
Issue one of Mortal Kombat battle wave titled Where the Wild Things Are was written by everybody's favorite Mortal Kombat writer Charles Marshall. penciled by Patrick Rolo, as many of these are inks by Abraham Madison and Richard Emond letters by Joseph Allen and Scott Catanich and Scott Sava on colors. And it took two guys to edit this book mark Paniccia and Dan Saheen. let's jump into this thing we open with like a good look at Dragon faced Shao Kahn, the emperor, right? Yeah.

Corey 8:25
Can I lodge a complaint?

Neal 8:27
Yes.

Corey 8:28
I thought that motherfucker was supposed to be Goro and I spent so long looking at the page, just like he's talking about Goro Goro is not here. Who the fuck is this guy?

Neal 8:39
I guess he's a little Goro looking.

Corey 8:41
He doesn't look like any Shao Kahn I've ever seen in my life. In my beliefs.

Neal 8:45
Yeah, well, you you only seen the human the human man Shao Kahn is from the nonsense that we watch.

Corey 8:51
Yeah, and I don't have a lot of you know, I'm not a very like, I don't accept change. Right. So they can't do this to me. And that joke aside, I just I just thought it was kind of weird.

Neal 9:08
Jokes a little strong there. Yeah, I mean, he's always like had a cool dragon head in the games particularly in like the 3d era when they can you know, sculpt it?

Corey 9:18
Right. I never played those never heard of them.

Neal 9:20
Yeah, but also like Mortal Kombat nine and 11 He's got that dragon head. I don't know if you ever seen 11 But you definitely see it in some of these. Yeah, I remember it throwing me for the first time I saw it also, which wasn't this comic. It was in the video games. I like my dreams. It kind of was I like a dragon headed. Shao Kahn over human headed Shao Kahn. But Shao Kahn,

Corey 9:48
Dragon headed Shao Kahn say anything's glorious.

Neal 9:55
Shao Kahn is kicking it with King Gorbak and Kintaro And they're all just kind of ganging up on Shang Tsung for like fucking up Mortal Kombat.

Corey 10:04
Shang Tsung has never looked like more of a pussy.

Neal 10:08
He's like begging for his life. He's like he has never

Corey 10:11
looked more like a shamble is a wreck of a man.

Neal 10:14
I think they throw him off the tower at one point, but then

Corey 10:17
oh hell yeah, they do. They're like, we're not ever gonna kill you because that would be too nice. Which is a classic Mortal Kombat trope in a world full of death. The meanest thing you can do to somebody is not let them die.

Neal 10:27
Through Yeah, there are face worse than death. And we don't know what all three of these issues we don't really find out what happened to Shang Tsung But uh, yeah, my note says Shang Tsung is begging for mercy like a little wuss. Shao Kahn is like on to him. He's like, I know what you pulled. You tried to get ultimate power from the doubt Ajahn and overthrow me and you lost Goro right. Goro back Goro is Daddy wants you dead but I've got something much worse in store for you.

Corey 10:58
Loo, my guy I'm staring right into your eyes. I can see it you tried to get the ultimate power didn't you?

Neal 11:03
He did yeah

Corey 11:04
You dumb motherfucker

Neal 11:06
He spent seven comic books. Fucking Scooby doing around trying to get that book open.

Corey 11:12
Also, lest we forget really quick that the 1990s as introduction to this dragon headed man includes the line his list of crimes would fill a phone book.

Neal 11:22
Shout out to dead technology

Neal 11:33
Yes, is yellowpages.com Even still like around?

Corey 11:37
We're gonna find out. Yeah, we can ask me a question like that. And I started it happened yellowpages.com It was dark. Can we buy?

Neal 11:44
Yeah, we can. Actually,

Corey 11:46
Listen to uh, MK Podquest at yellowpages.com. Yeah, no, it very much is a functional website. And their logo is is YP. The real Yellow Pages. Try to fuck with me with the fake Yellow Pages. I will I swear to God, I will come to your house. And I will force install a bunch of toolbars into your Microsoft Edge browser.

Neal 12:11
absolutely wild that this entire website is just a list of Shao Kahn crimes too

Corey 12:17
Yeah, except for the question and answer section which you can only ask questions about Shao Kahn. Various myriad crimes.

Neal 12:23
Would Shao Kahn commit this crime has Shao Kahn committed this crime so

Corey 12:27
your magic eight ball where you just ask it about like what kind of crime would Shao Kahn commit and the answer is just like yes or whatever?

Neal 12:36
Stealing Oreos? Yes. pantsing a clown? Totally.

Corey 12:45
Yeah. Murder

Neal 12:46
riding a motorcycle on the sidewalk? All day long. Whatever other crimes, pirating Japanese television shows, you got it, dude

Corey 12:58
download a car?

Neal 12:59
Sure. He's definitely yeah, he's the one person who successfully downloaded a car

Corey 13:05
Convince a kid who is doing crossing the road after school and there's a crossing guard there to get on their hands and knees behind the crossing guard, and then engage in a meaningful conversation with the crossing guard just long enough to push them over the kids so they fall.

Neal 13:22
Yeah, yep, yep, yep.

Corey 13:24
And I'm gonna level with you, Neal, that's not as funny as anyone downloading a car and I can tell that you wanted to keep going. But I had the idea and I if we're not doing any edits, I can tell the bad jokes I want is all I'm saying.

Neal 13:35
God, I hate you. Mortal Kombat after dark.

Corey 13:40
Mortal Kombat 8:19 PM!

Neal 13:42
So we cut to a warehouse where Kano is tied up. And some guy named Osaka who's like a big Lear Leaguer, big leaguer in the black dragon is is calling him a failure and

Corey 14:00
What SNL impression of somebody was that? it wasn't.

Neal 14:03
It was just me stumbling over words fuck you

Corey 14:09
"A big leagueer" "My Fellow Americans" this way just imagine Joe Biden saying "big leaguer."

Corey 14:20
Fuck you. I'm a big leaguer.

Corey 14:28
That's like, yours is like, Fuck, I'm not gonna think of their day, but it's like it's gotta be breath here. Yeah, I

Neal 14:36
don't have a lot of breath. Man. My throat is kind of sore. Let's keep going. Anyway, some guy named Osaka is saying he embarassed the Black Dragon, which like, didn't Osaka read the Special Forces co mics or like watch that Debt of the Dragon episode of Conquest? Cause uh the Black Dragon's always kind of been an embarassment.

Corey 15:06
Right

Neal 15:07
Like, Kano successfully esaped from prison. That's pretty, that's the most impressive thing the Black Dragon has done so far.

Corey 15:15
Did you know that the hit television show Prison Break is based on the time Kano broke out of prison?

Neal 15:20
I did know that actually. They changed names for legal reasons, but it is basically exactly that.

Corey 15:25
It was called Kano break before that was Yeah,

Neal 15:30
totally. We cut to the same warehouse. We're already in. read my notes wrong.

Corey 15:40
Cut to the current location.

Neal 15:42
Yeah. Kano is like tied to a chair and his feet have been like cast in concrete. And Osaka like, pulls the lever for like a Looney Tunes style trap door. And quinoa falls into the water below the warehouse.

Corey 15:58
It's crazy that you caught that there was somebody named Osaka.

Neal 16:01
Well, I immediately was like, Osaka. That sounds familiar. I was thinking of Osato. Right? Yeah. And then I was thinking of, I can't pull his name the guy um Cary Tagawa plays in Raven. And it's, I was like, is similar. Like, wouldn't that be a cool shout out if it was the black dragon guy from Raven? But I don't think it is.

Corey 16:26
I can figure this out.

Neal 16:27
Yeah, you figure figure it out, while I described Kano sinking to the bottom of the ocean, but managing to break his hands free of his ropes and then start beating on the concrete block. And still it breaks where he can then swim back to the surface because Kano has unfinished business.

Corey 16:47
osato osato

Neal 16:48
Osato. Close, but no cigar.

Corey 16:52
Wait, we've definitely had this. Oh, wait, it's a different one. Nevermind. Sorry.

Neal 16:58
No, you're good. What was Bruce Locke character in Robocop three? That was Otomo. Yeah,

Corey 17:04
Otomo yeah. Yeah. How can I ever forget?

Neal 17:07
Sure. We've got the trilogy. Oh, Osato, Osaka and Otomo. Anyway Kano gets to the surface of the water. And then Rayden is just like right fucking there. And he's like, come with me Kano I have a job for you. And then Kano is going to disappear from this comic book series along with Rayden for a while, because they're gonna go fuck around in their own mini series, right? Yeah, yeah, we're gonna read that next. But let's check in on Liu Kang, who lives in Chicago and is sitting at what looks like a drafting table.

Corey 17:43
Yeah, I was trying to figure out. So my notes are a bit of a is Liu kang a journalist, like fucking Superman. And then my next note is, oh, he's sitting at an easel.

Neal 17:57
It's definitely like a drafting table. I mean, Chicago, he also

Corey 18:01
seems to be like some kind of corporate head.

Neal 18:05
Who knows

Corey 18:05
He seems important.

Neal 18:07
Yeah, yeah.

Corey 18:08
I don't wanna say like the people doing the drafting aren't important. But you get the distinction that I'm trying to make

Neal 18:13
sure, but he could be like a civil engineer or an architect. I mean, Chicago is like well known for its architecture.

Corey 18:20
That's why they got the beam.

Neal 18:22
Exactly.

Neal 18:23
So like I think that they were like referencing that especially because later on we're going to see him take a meeting in Willis Tower, formerly the Sears Tower, they drew that into the comic book. So

Corey 18:37
Did they rename the Sears Tower after Sears got like, cancelled or whatever happened to Sears.

Neal 18:42
Yeah, they lost the they lost the naming rights. Yeah, it's the crypto.com Tower. It's well it's the Willis Tower.

Corey 18:51
It's the Tai Lopez RadioShack tower.

Neal 18:53
Yeah, it's the Tyler the Creator tower.

Corey 18:55
That'd be way fucking cool.

Neal 18:57
It would be cool. Yeah.

Corey 18:58
That would be fucking Awesome.

Neal 19:00
Petition, petition to get the Willis Tower renamed to the Tyler the Creator tower

Corey 19:05
Tower the Creator. It's like a toddler trying to say his name

Neal 19:13
yeah.

Corey 19:17
I weally like yawnkers.

Neal 19:19
And I like my fries qwanchy Oh, boy. Anyway,

Corey 19:26
Chewwybomb is undewwated. All right. That jokes out.

Neal 19:32
There was you doing a toddler voice. Specifically a toddler voice.

Corey 19:38
Oh, yeah. Yeah,

Neal 19:40
stayin in. So Liu kang is just like talking to his boy Johnny Cage on the phone when suddenly ninjas start attacking him for the third time this month. Right. So like he has this weird monologue as he's kicking their asses or he's

Corey 19:55
like he's getting tired of this. Yeah,

Neal 19:58
I thought I thought Liu Kang was done with Mortal Kombat whatever else right?

Corey 20:03
Can I just say that :Liu Kang is getting tired of this" is extremely "George's getting upset."

Neal 20:11
I don't get the reference is this a Seinfeld thing?

Corey 20:13
George is upset is from Seinfeld.

Neal 20:14
Yeah. See, I don't I barely remember any Seinfeld.

Neal 20:19
Damn, that's fucked up.

Neal 20:20
Yeah. Listeners write in with your Seinfeld memories. Tweet us at Mr. Corey Bryce,

Corey 20:26
tweet us at Jerry Seinfeld.

Neal 20:30
Yeah, so like he's mad about this and mad about all of the ninja attacks and mad because he keeps getting drawn back into the world of Mortal Kombat.

Corey 20:41
Literally 'drawn' because this is a complicated

Neal 20:42
Hey, yo, if I were on the right page, you'd get a rim shot for that. Let me let me go back right now. Vamp

Corey 20:48
I just get the discord sound.

Neal 20:53
There you go. Discord sound is not going to come through yet, but I got it. You got it. Anyway, so after he like complains about all of this, he then throws all four of the ninjas out of the window of his like high rise apartment or office or whatever. He just

Corey 21:12
murder straight up murder those people just absolutely.

Neal 21:16
And like, I mean, imagine the pedestrians on the street. You know, he probably like killed several innocent people in this.

Corey 21:24
You know, it wouldn't be as dangerous though, to just throw a penny out of the window. Because like, you think about it. Terminal velocity and all that

Neal 21:34
If you zoom in, you can see that he drops a penny at the same time as the first ninja. And they're falling at the exact same speed.

Corey 21:44
Yeah, and they also I think how it works is everything weighs the same when it hits the ground. Yeah, that's, that's right. Yes. So if you throw a penny out, it will weigh as much as Black Dragon ninja. Is that what I'm saying?

Neal 22:01
Yeah I think so

Corey 22:02
Is that what Isacc Newton was saying?

Neal 22:03
that 100%. That's exactly what he said it was the theory of black dragon relativity.

Corey 22:08
If you've got ti time.is hat is you can scroll down and you'll see a quote from Isaac Newton that just says, Yeah, that's what I was saying. Yeah,

Neal 22:13
it's right there. On the website.

Corey 22:15
It's in the text.

Neal 22:17
Meanwhile, Jax is just like, pumping iron somewhere.

Corey 22:24
Jax is is on vacay.

Neal 22:26
Yeah.

Corey 22:28
He's about to be on a much longer one.

Neal 22:30
500 reps on the bench press with massive weights on it. Like, was it just me like I was a little confused looking at the art. I was like, Is this just the bottom side of a CD? But no, it was the weight on the side of his dumbbell. It was humongous.

Corey 22:46
Yeah, he's, he's huge. He's jacked.

Neal 22:48
500 reps, dude. He's like, that's like a world record shit. I'm sure

Corey 22:54
525,600 reps. Yeah, I think I got the number. I don't know. Who cares?

Neal 23:02
Yeah, how do you measure? Anyway, he's like "Man. I can't believe Kaino broke out of prison in that three page story from Special Forces issue one I really want to go capture Kano" but then the lights get cut off in this gym and somebody absolutely lays his ass out with the barbell. And it's, it's fucking it's Goro. Goro is here. Everybody. The Prince of pain makes his appearance.

Corey 23:33
Appainance?.

Neal 23:34
Yeah,he makes his payments.

Corey 23:37
Is that a thing?

Neal 23:38
No. Good. Good try though, man. They can't they can't all be winners. Elsewhere

Corey 23:47
You're right. So

Neal 23:54
we go to, So we got to Outworld

Corey 23:56
sorry. I was gonna I just I just started laughing at my own note. Okay.

Neal 24:06
What is your note say?

Corey 24:07
It's coming up.

Neal 24:09
All right, it's coming up. Alright, so elsewhere in Outworld in the Wastelands about world more specifically.

Corey 24:16
We missed something important. Jax bleeds.

Neal 24:20
Jax does believe we got blood

Neal 24:21
real ass blood.

Neal 24:22
This is the first time we had real ass blood in the comic. I think you're absolutely right about that.

Corey 24:26
Yeah. And I was always literally Wow, blood. That's not what I was laughing at. Also like he's got a portrait of Sonya on the wall.

Neal 24:33
Well, they're BFFs he's probably working out like at the Special Forces, like vacation home, you know?

Corey 24:39
Yeah, that's why I there's I have a 27 by 40 movie poster side portrait of you in my house.

Neal 24:47
Yeah, well, that. You know, I'm honored. It was not easy to stay still so long for that oil painting to be completed.

Corey 24:55
And then we had to ship it.

Neal 24:57
Yeah, and shipping art is expensive, with the insurance

Corey 25:01
In these trying times gas prices are so high, yeah. How would you gas in our world?

Neal 25:07
The fucked up part was I sat through that entire oil painting session and then they were like, "great. Can you just like fax it to me?" Like, I can't run this painting through a fax machine, do you?

Corey 25:17
Okay, well, we don't need to re litigate this because we're, we see this differently. You could?

Neal 25:23
Well, I mean, the size the dimensions are all you could do

Corey 25:26
You could do it. Just get a bunch of fax machines. I don't understand why this is so hard, we talked about it

Neal 25:31
I know you said cut it into like a bunch of eight, eight and a half by 11 or a four or whatever size you guys us up there in Canada, and just feed it to each

Corey 25:39
one Celsius but yeah, okay.

Neal 25:41
And then your fucking kilogram paper or whatever. Yeah. And then

Corey 25:47
A1 but it's "Eh"

Corey 25:48
A joke for he paper heads in the chat.

Neal 26:00
The fax machine just was not a viable option. Dude, it wasn't gonna come through in color or anything. Anyway.

Corey 26:08
I'm picturing fax machine just pouring a bunch of paint out.

Neal 26:12
It just squishes all the oil paint off

Corey 26:18
and sends it like through the secret wires

Neal 26:25
Jesus Christ. All right.

Corey 26:30
So what's coming up so

Neal 26:32
Alright, so we're in Outworld. Baraka and Kung, Lao and Kitana are meeting at like a big stone conference table in the middle of a desert cave. Right? Because overthrowing Shao Kahn, I feel like we missed something. I feel like we missed I feel like the Kitana Mileena one shot must have happened or something like we're missing

Corey 26:53
the pace at which this has all been moving, not just with the world gang, but just to reestablish the context of all the characters at the beginning of this book. For what it's worth. Everybody gets like two pages is a breakneck speed. Yes, like it is. It's a frankly, unenjoyable to read pace, because too fast. But then I got to write my funny note, which is we get here and I just wrote in all caps. OOH, LET'S GET PLOTTING, BESTIE!

Corey 27:30
Which is something that Kung Lao would say, Yeah,

Neal 27:34
he did. He did say it actually. That's from the text. You're just it was it was Kitana and baraka and Baraka was all like Baraka must defeat Shao Kahn. And Kitana was like Kitana will stop Shao Kahn's conquest over all the realms. And Kung Lao was like, let's get plotting besties

Corey 27:59
and Sub-Zero said, "I brought krispy kreme

Neal 28:03
He said, Who wants ice cream? Right? Because it he's cold, anyway. Yeah,

Corey 28:12
he said, oof. Ouch. My bones

Neal 28:18
Kung Lao doesn't trust baraka and Baraka is like talking shit about Kung Lao. So they fight right and Kitana tries to stop it, but it's no good and then shut up. Sub-Zero shows up. And Frozone is baraka and is like, Who wants ice cream? So that's the game right? Sub-Zero Baraka, Kung, Lao and Kitana all meeting and Outworld to overthrow Shao Kahn. We will be referring to them from now on as kids and the boys also that but primarily Kitana in the boys. Okay,

Corey 28:49
it is that I want to get this out of the way now. Just aggressively frustrating to read. Yeah, the segments. It's like they were challenging everybody to make it miserable to read. Yeah,

Neal 29:08
yeah, these parts are are bad variants.

Corey 29:11
Do you want to read? People bicker, but largely in sentences that gesture at being one liners or are just like generic blas speak that doesn't mean anything right. Cease your hostilities mutant or you shall be left in the cold Hey, yo. Oh, you're so funny Sub-Zero. Like shut the fuck up man. Nobody likes this. Baraka super fucking annoying do toxic fucking, like a Christmas tree would talk. Like I came.

Neal 29:48
He's still talking like a caveman. Yeah.

Corey 29:50
And it's just people bickering.

Neal 29:53
Sorry,

Corey 29:54
it's super annoying.

Neal 29:56
cave person. I'm sorry. Anyway, Uh, yeah, I don't like those parts either. But we're, yeah, whatever. We got to talk about it anyway. We got to the inverse fortress, right? And Mileena is there just kicking the shit out of reptile because she's-

Corey 30:15
Mileena isthere. And don't worry. She's also going to say her name so we know who she is. Because lest we forget every single person this book has said their fucking name. 800 times again, we're back to our old habits. Like Goro does it when he murders Jax, everybody in the fucking Outworld group basically does it Liu kang says Liu kang is getting tired of this. Do you think I'm getting tired of this?

Neal 30:38
Do you think in real life Charles Marshall does this about himself in conversation?

Corey 30:42
Oh, 100% do talks like fucking Elmo.

Neal 30:44
I love it. Neal loves that. Yeah. About Charles Marshall. Yeah, Mileena says, quote, "Mileena has had it with your groping and pawing," which like to chill out. That's fucked. Like, clearly you're in the friendzone. Stay there, right. So they fight and try to kill each other. But then Shao Kahn shows up holding a big orb. Do you think it's the warrior? Kings orb? I think it's the warrior kings orb. He's just holding the big orb.

Corey 31:21
Yeah, look, we got to give ourselves something right at this point in the lore.

Neal 31:25
It's got to be the warrior kings. Oooorb.

Corey 31:29
Reiner. corbs. orb?

Neal 31:30
Yes. And he tells them to stop fighting. And he needs them to get along. And then he's like, I have I know what's coming in the future or something like that? I don't really know. And then it cuts to a fucking Scorpion. Who is literally leading an army of the dead.

Corey 31:51
Where have we heard that before? Oh, writers. This ripped off Mortal Kombat conquest.

Neal 31:56
Defenders of the Realm Episode Two also. It's all about Scorpion leading an army of the dead. You tell

Corey 32:04
me which one did it first? I'll tell you buy favorite.

Neal 32:09
That's the end of issue one.

Corey 32:11
Yeah, I gotta be honest. I'm not. Not not very not very good.

Neal 32:18
Nothing really happened a lot of like setting up

Corey 32:22
We're gonna reestablish every character again, because somehow you've forgotten. And beyond that. I've just like every single one of these books, by books, I mean series just for like, clarity sake, but they're all the fucking same thing. And like, and they're all structured very similarly. And I know it's the same writer. So this is maybe a week complaint really, they're all written in a language and tone that are just like, yeah, man, I've been here before, and like not in a way that makes me want to do this exact same thing over again. I wanted to do that. I'd go read this so malaria and or whatever, that

Neal 32:56
you haven't read The Silmarillion. Dude, I thought you were Lord of the Rings fan.

Corey 32:59
No, I watched The Hobbit movies. And then I just decided I was going to call myself a Lord of the Rings fan. You

Neal 33:05
fake fan. You fake fucking fan.

Corey 33:09
I was really, I mostly showed up for GoPro shots.

Neal 33:11
Have you eveb seen The Ralph Bakshi, Lord of the Rings movie?

Corey 33:15
I've heard of him.

Neal 33:16
Okay.

Corey 33:17
I haven't seen that though.

Neal 33:18
It's I like that movie.

Corey 33:20
I follow him on Twitter. And like,

Neal 33:22
do you really follow him on Twitter?

Corey 33:25
Yeah, fuck yeah,

Neal 33:26
Why don't I?

Corey 33:28
cuz you're fucking you fucking slack it.

Neal 33:30
I love that man. I feel like he's probably a little problematic.

Corey 33:36
You want to see some titties on Twitter? Fuckin follow Ralph Bakshi dude, shit.

Neal 33:39
I mean there's other places to see those but yeah,

Corey 33:41
but are they animation cells?

Neal 33:45
Well, I have most, I own most of his movies. So yes,

Corey 33:48
riddle me this Batman.

Neal 33:53
I Hold on. Wait, why am I not signing into our account on my computer? Well, I'll just follow on from mine for now, Ralph. Bakshi how's it

Corey 34:05
just be real for a second so Ralph Bakshi goes fucking crazy.

Neal 34:09
Dude is an all star

Corey 34:11
Dude's cool as fuck

Neal 34:13
We should watch fire and ice that movie rules anyway. Yeah, issue one not great. Certainly not as good as a Ralph Bakshi film. A lot of like, not even like setting up the chessboard, right?

Corey 34:30
Like just like it's setting up the fact that chess boards have pieces

Neal 34:33
They're waiting for a free board at the park and getting ready. Like, getting the like the pieces are still in like your pockets. Right? It's introducing the concept of a game. Right? Yeah, it's it's not even chess. It's reading the instructions. It's reading the back of the box before you open it to get to the instructions. Anyway, Issue two is called a fighting chance. We've got a new Artists on this one vi t. HK, VT Heuck on pencils, I believe. John Miller, David Mallory, and somebody Reed-

Corey 35:16
I mean, this is the first one that starts with the Siskel and Ebert jokes so I guess it's better than if you want

Neal 35:22
S. Reed on inks, they only got an initial in the little little creator box. Dave Lamphere on lettering and Joan Igawa on colors. So like a pretty heavy, like creative team changeover for this issue, except Charles Marshall is still writing.

Corey 35:42
He certainly is.

Neal 35:43
We opened on

Corey 35:44
You can absolutely tell.

Neal 35:47
We opened on Johnny Cage who has won an Oscar for his film sudden violence that was one of the ultimate combat quiz trivia questions.

Corey 35:55
sequel is in production and Siskel and Ebert have already given it to them so thumbs

Neal 36:01
up those dudes lack integrity and can be paid off for good reviews. According to comic book

Corey 36:09
which is a big fucking swing to take my guy Rog. The fucking audacity.

Neal 36:17
your guy Rog. Yeah. Yeah. Remember,

Corey 36:20
Ive got a 27 by 40 oil painting of his portrait in my house

Neal 36:24
Remember when Gene Siskel Printed Betsy Palmer's address=

Corey 36:28
It's crazy. Right?

Neal 36:30
So that fans so that people could send her hate mail for being in Friday the 13th so that's pretty fucked. He doxxed Betsy Palmer What an asshole. Anyway relighted

Corey 36:42
Twin Peaks who dogs to Betsy it's much more straightforward

Neal 36:54
like someone just opens the newspaper. Oh, Gene Siskel.

Corey 36:59
What does that fucking t shirt,

Neal 37:00
but it was written backwards. All right. So Johnny Cage finishes like faking his way through an action scene. Right? Because he's a big fucking faker. I challenge you to a fight Johnny Cage. And he goes back to his dressing room where Sonya Blade is just sort of like chillin holding his Oscar.

Corey 37:23
Yeah, he's just sort of carrying it around.

Neal 37:26
Yeah, of course he is. He's Johnny fucking cage. Look

Corey 37:29
if I had an Oscar, which I don't. Right. I'm just to be clear. Yeah, I'd probably carry it around.

Neal 37:38
Yeah. Everywhere you go. Sure to like get better seats at restaurants maybe board the plane early.

Corey 37:45
Also, conveniently, this is the part where we discovered that Jax was only nearly killed.

Neal 37:51
Yeah, we find out right away

Corey 37:55
at booths that we couldn't

Neal 37:57
Yeah, we're not Yeah, we're not allowed to kill the main. The main cast members just invent people like hydro and Grum to get

Corey 38:07
and like sigh uh, si, si, Siren?

Neal 38:12
Pete Jesse Sylence. Sylence, Sylence made it through.

Corey 38:20
Kind of its Yeah, I was trying to avoid defaulting back to Crimmins. But if it ain't broke,

Neal 38:26
now it's Crimmins is good. There's always Shamoboa. I don't forget about Shamoboa. How could I forget? Go listen to our mortal kombat 95 novel episode. If you want to learn all about Pete Crimmins Jesse and Shamoboa. Anyway, she's like Hey, someone tried to kill Jax. We need your help to figure out who did this and go after him and Johnny Cage is like I'm making a fucking movie. No way. Right?

Corey 38:53
So so much production on this bad boy you don't motherfucker

Neal 38:56
Siskel and Ebert already gave it two thumbs up we have to finish it.

Corey 39:01
At that point, why bother finishing if the reports are already say they liked it. There's like let people imagine what the movie will be conceptually in their own brains.

Neal 39:08
Right. Better idea better, better movie probably certainly,before Prometheus came out. I imagine a much better movie than I ended up getting. So yeah

Corey 39:21
You're not not a Prometheus head?

Neal 39:23
Not a Prometheus head

Corey 39:24
Listen to Crew expendable on fucking Apple iTunes. Um, lot of people that I feel like Prometheus is really heavy like a critical reappraisal moment and I'm surprised to hear that you don't like it. Yeah, I assumed it was really the deep cut dudes. The DCDs

Neal 39:40
it's it's

Neal 39:41
dc deez nuts. orry.

Neal 39:42
Go Go. Go listen to the episode. I'll plug it at the end of the show.

Corey 39:49
I'll admit I just did too many bits at once.

Neal 39:52
This is off the fucking rails. No edits. Yeah, man. I don't know Prometheus is fine. I don't like what it did to the mythology mostly, like they also, the engineers are fine. It's not so much that but like, also like everyone in that movie is a dumb fucking idiot. Right? Like the whole, like, it's just incompetence all around on that Prometheus mission. If you watch that movie,

Corey 40:15
I guess that that speaks to real life, doesn't it?

Neal 40:18
sad, sad way that just kind of means that we're all fucking doomed.

Corey 40:24
The future hasn't gotten better because there are still

Neal 40:28
anti maskers Basically,

Corey 40:30
yes. Talking to egg snakes, right, and I think I'm wrong in Danny McBride's in a cowboy hat

Neal 40:40
is that that's that's a that's Alien Covenant. Yeah, so that's the nex

Corey 40:44
I knew I was wrong. And I was like, maybe he's about what?

Neal 40:47
We haven't we haven't covered that episode yet. Probably Jade on for that one actually.

Corey 40:54
Instagram at JadeShark

Neal 41:00
Where the fuck are we? Oh, yeah. Johnny Cage is like, I'm not helping you guys. I gotta make a movie. And so Sonia like leg flips him onto the couch and like, tells him he's a dumb motherfucker and she's gonna go find Jackson's killer alone. And then we cut to Kitana and the boys posing like badass is in the wasted plains of Outworld.

Corey 41:20
And then my brain wants to turn off completely and forever.

Neal 41:24
We're going to rush through this Sub-Zero talk. They are being followed. It's reptile Baraka tries to kill reptile but reptile spits acid that Baraka, Kung, Lao and Kitana kick the EverLiving shit out of reptile. Reptiles like I'm going to go tell Shao Kahn what you guys are doing I'm going to tell him all about this because he his his because he's a reptile man. And Kitana and the boys are like Nope, you won't or Baraka will kill you and reptiles like fine. I'm gonna give you all the information

Corey 41:55
great line. Yeah, now you must deal with the cold border. You're now you must deal with Sub-Zero. Yeah, we do that really encapsulated. They all talk stupid. They say their own names. They're all just saying nothing but catchphrases and I don't want to be

Neal 42:16
well, we're out of there now. Right? We're back with Shao Kha-

Corey 42:21
The Scorpion did army art does look pretty funny. We're also not just seeing some doofy dudes.

Neal 42:28
It is funny to see some doofy dudes. We're not actually back with Shao Kahn. That note is about what reptile tells them about Shao Kahn, he is pissed about losing Mortal Kombat and Goro he punted Shang Tsung somehow baraka and his mutants, because that's what they call the torque cotton's in this have all deserted Shao Kahn. So they had been replaced by a legion of undead warriors led by Scorpion. Something, something something Baraka will finish you in cold blood. Oh, that's right.

Corey 42:59
He's really the Dragon King Onaga of this book.

Neal 43:02
This is This is so fucking stupid. So. So Sub-Zero wants more information out of reptile. And Baraka is like, not that he's not going to tell us anything more. Let's kill him now. And Sub-Zero is like, No, we're not gonna kill him. Now I want more information. And that leads to just Sub-Zero and Baraka fighting for two pages.

Corey 43:24
Dude I know, it's like, this isn't enjoyable to read. And I want to make a complaint that I made earlier in our comics discussions. And I know some people may not agree with this. But for me, the way that combat is presented in these books is strangely non kinetic. So because Mortal Kombat is built around, fighting, they include a lot of it. But it's this thing where like, it's just like, it essentially just amounts to like poses for pages and pages, and pages, and pages. And it's just like, this isn't doing this isn't accomplishing. For me as the reader, what you're thinking is going, which is like the transition of a really fluid, really dynamic fight. It's just like, it's two old men screaming while they, like, flail around, and I'm just like, man, good for me.

Neal 44:23
I'm gonna go to bat for some of the action panels, but I think

Corey 44:27
some of the arts foundationally cool.

Neal 44:30
There are other books, I'm not going to be all these links. But there are other books that like I've seen the creator's talking about them and they're like, Yeah, I have a hard time mixing in dialogue into the action. Because like, you can't just have people like citing monologues while fighting so it ends up being a lot of talking. And then like a few action panels, and then a lot more talking. And that's the vibe that this book kind of has, right? Like, Charles Marshall is just putting I think a few too many words in Every panel to really like make it feel like a kinetic action sequence. Like that's part of it for me anyway.

Corey 45:08
Yeah, yeah, I would. It's just it's not working for me. And it seems to default back to that fairly frequently. Right? It's just makes it like a frustrating lead. Because we're a couple of series and at this point, and like structurally and in terms of the tropes they'd rely on, they've all kind of moved in the same fashion. And I'm not expecting big swings, like these all came up probably in relatively close proximity. It's a very similar creative team. I'm not saying like, everything needs to be this like earth shattering like Dostoyevsky, fucking, you know, like Journey to soul. But like

Neal 45:40
the most action packed, best fight scenes ever in journey of the soul. Honestly.

Corey 45:44
Yeah. My favorite Johnny Cage movie, but um, it's just this thing where like,

Neal 45:51
your library have Dos, Dosto graphic novels? Yeah,

Corey 45:54
Yeah, they were. Good. I didn't have a joke for that. Um, but, uh, I feel like the tweaks to make seem obvious to me. I know that they rely on my own preferences, but like, yeah, it just feels like it gave me and it never gets there.

Neal 46:13
That's fine. I I'm having I'm still having fun, alot of fun with these. It's supposed to

Corey 46:18
It's supposed to be like we gave Liu Kang an office job, right? Who is this new guy?, et cetera.

Neal 46:24
Anyway, while Sub-Zero and Baraka are fighting, reptile just snuck away the Kitana and the boys are just outmatched by fucking everything so far, dude, it is embarrassing. Right?

Corey 46:39
Kung Lao really feels like he's there just to see how badly this could go.

Neal 46:43
Yeah, He's not doing shit

Corey 46:44
He's like Sure. I'll hang out. Fuck you guys. Kitana and I are similar of will or something. Anyway, shut up.

Neal 46:52
my note says that this gang is Defenders of the Realm levels of incompetent.

Corey 47:01
my note says, Yes, he could absolutely still give you away without telling Shao Kahn, he gave up the plans the file,

Neal 47:08
right? Because that's what Kitana is like, Oh, it's fine.

Corey 47:11
He could never say never give us our scheme way to Shao Kahn, without saying that he told us what their plan was. And it's like, yes, he can.

Neal 47:21
What are you talking about, IDIOT, yes

Corey 47:23
He could you just he could just like it's not even a lie. Because as you said he could lie by omission. And just not say it he could just not say it because nobody asked like,

Neal 47:34
but also later he does say it he says all of it. Like maybe this you just know him and it's like no, he's an idiot he's either gonna say all of it or not say any of it. And I think he'll not say any of it. She bid on the wrong fucking side of the coin on that one. There's a saying that people know, uhhhh

Corey 47:53
If you're on the wrong side of the tracks and you're and it's it's too late at night to be early in the morning. But it's it's too early in the morning for the diners to be closed. You can just take a walk on the wild side and get your eggs over over animal style. And it's your make friends along the way. Thank you.

Neal 48:15
In Chi-town where Liu Kang is going to a business meeting and the receptionist calls him Lou crane, which is fucked.

Corey 48:25
Just just patently racist. Like there's just as to she didn't even try to say it right. Like

Neal 48:32
you must be Lou crane. Yeah,

Corey 48:34
You must be the First Neal for Luke. Same level of

Neal 48:42
Okay. All right. This is the meeting that is at the Sears Tower that's what it was called back then. It is

Corey 48:49
how did you know it was the Sears tower by the way? What gave it away?

Neal 48:53
I recognized it as the Sears Tower.

Corey 48:56
Isn't he inside when?

Neal 48:59
No. Okay, the panel before he's inside it shows Chicago like it shows a building. It shows a building that is the Sears Tower and like just based on context clues they then cut to him inside what you would assume was that tower.

Corey 49:16
Way too much arts made just for Americans. How am I supposed to know about the Sears Tower?

Neal 49:20
I don't think anyone is supposed to I just think is a nice detail that they put the Sears Tower in there. That's - the building in the front of it -

Corey 49:27
Jesus Christ. That's Jason Bourne voice. Jesus Christ. That's the series.

Neal 49:32
I don't recognize the building in the foreground with that kind of steeple on it. It's

Corey 49:37
that's where they make the action Bible.

Neal 49:40
That must be Yeah, that's midway headquarters. But yeah, I yeah, I recognize the Sears Tower anyway. Liu Kang thinks he's meeting a Mr. Gold right booster game inside this 108 story. Monument of engineering. But instead of finding Mr. Gold, he finds Mr. Goro

Corey 50:08
Go-ro

Neal 50:08
He walks into this, like Office suite, and it's all shadowy. And he's like, Mr. Gold. You wanted to see me? There's some kind of a problem. And he's like, the problem is I'm actually Goro and you're the problem, motherfucker. And Goro just starts, like swinging Liu Kang around this office suite. I can't stress enough I cannot stress this enough. Goro sitting behind a desk in a high rise office in Chicago

Corey 50:43
Bankers lamp just like I have.

Neal 50:46
Bankers lamp. Yeah,

Corey 50:47
I have one of those. You know that right? We've talked.

Neal 50:50
We might have talked about it

Corey 50:51
on my desk literally right now I have one of those green bankers lamps.

Neal 50:54
My dad had one of those.

Corey 50:56
So I have to tell you the reason I got it then. So

Neal 51:00
RIP my my dad's lamp, go on.

Corey 51:02
Rip your dad's lamp. So I have, um, so I always want to mostly because I thought it'd be funny. Turns out they're more expensive than you'd think for it to be really worth just a joke.

Neal 51:13
Sure.

Corey 51:14
What happened is in my third year of university, the room that I lived in, the only way I could make my bed and desk fit because if you looked at it through the door, there was this weird enclave on the opposite wall that had a window on it. That was like three portions. Can you picture what I'm saying? Like it's stuck back a bit and like a weird shape.

Neal 51:34
So the only like a bay window,

Corey 51:36
kind of Sure. Kind of like, that probably is right. But in any case, I'll send you a picture of it later to communicate it. If I find it. I'll send it now just so you know what I mean? But my desk had to face the door of my room. So if I was sitting at my desk, I was looking out to the door. Anybody entering my room, so So I decided it would be really funny. And that really thought I thought about getting a name plate but stepping into my office,

Neal 52:09
I love it dude

Corey 52:11
It's really funny. Worth it. I can definitely find a picture to this if you give me a sec.

Neal 52:17
Yeah, I'm just gonna talk about how

Corey 52:19
this will be worth the visual bit audio payoff. Trust me.

Neal 52:23
Absolutely kicking the shit out of Luke King in this office. And he's saying shit, like, you came into my home. My home should embarrass me and now I am coming into yours to embarrass you. You ruined my life. You motherfucker.

Corey 52:39
That's what he says. It's really weird.

Neal 52:42
Yeah, it's nuts. He's like going off.

Corey 52:44
It's weird when Goro said, You've ruined my life motherfucker.

Neal 52:48
It should be noted that at this point, Liu Kang is fully dressed in like a suit. Right?

Corey 52:52
Yeah, it's business Kang. Yeah,

Neal 52:54
Yeah, it's a business meeting. Right? So then suddenly, like Liu Kan

Corey 52:59
Ah I found a picture before I had the lamp that doesn't help anybody. That doesn't help at all. That's not what we want. though. It might be the only one that I find.

Neal 53:07
All right, let's just we'll just deal with it later. Now Goro's talk about how he's gonna like kill Jax or he already dispatched Jax and he's gonna like take out all of the other Earth Realm warriors one by one when suddenly man named Bo arrives

Neal 53:29
Bo knows best

Neal 53:30
Bo.. And Bo is a big giant bald dude in a suit and like a Heisenberg Breaking Bad hat.

Corey 53:37
He is a mob bodyguard.

Neal 53:40
He's just Johnny Cage's personal bodyguard.

Corey 53:44
No, not anymore. Now he's Liu Kang's personal bodyguard.

Neal 53:47
Johnny sent him because he was worried about Liu Kang who kept getting attacked by ninjas. And Goro goes to a punch him. And Bo just like stops the punch. And he's like, I don't know any fancy karate Kay-Rate I think is what he says.

Corey 54:06
Kayfabe.

Neal 54:08
But I do know how to kick butts and take names pic. picture to my mind's eye

Neal 54:14
That is a bay window by the way I didn't own the lamp yet. That is a bay window by the way it

Corey 54:18
It is okay, great. I had a bay window and then my desk was there.

Neal 54:22
Wild. It is a little interesting that it goes all the way. It's not like a window seat. Usually they're like a window seat built in there. But that's very good.

Corey 54:28
Yeah. And then there's also a point in my life where I thought I needed to own Funko Pops glad that's over.

Neal 54:35
Nobody does.

Corey 54:38
Anyway that room kind of sucked because I barely had any space with my desk and my bed. But this picture is kind of cool. Like, it looks like a good room layout until you realize that's the entire room. Sure.

Neal 54:53
Look, I mean it's kind of spacious. My feelings are your desk is a little big. But um,

Corey 54:59
I think you're Just thinking small.

Neal 55:01
Can't believe you owned a Mac.

Corey 55:05
Oh yeah, I was Big Mac guy for a long time. And you can actually see that over the course of this. My Mac had died, and I got a razor blade. Over the course of these two photos, I got a banker's lamp and a razor blade.

Neal 55:22
Boy, there's gonna be some edits.

Corey 55:24
Visual comedy. You don't need to make that many edits, though.

Neal 55:29
No, but I'm gonna make a few. I mean, just make a note here.

Corey 55:32
We're almost to the funny new guy.

Neal 55:35
Anyway, yeah uh Bo just kind of like can beat up Goro

Corey 55:41
Yeah, Bo does not fuck around. I wouldn't be surprised if they revealed that Bo was secretly like, I don't know important. I don't want to take the low hanging fruit and just say like Bo'Rai Cho, haha

Neal 55:51
Yeah. Bo is secretly Bo'Rai Cho.

Corey 55:53
He's got some like, Mediterranean war cult magic or something. Dude can fucking throw a punch man.

Neal 56:00
So like he and Goro are tussling a little bit. And then Liu Kang, who is now shirtless, jump kicks Goro out of the fucking window. Liu Kang just kicking people out a Windows like non stop and these comics. And Liu Kang is like I don't believe that this wall is going to kill him. So Goro can potentially survive 108 storey fall out of the Willis Tower. It's Mortal K

Corey 56:29
as we've discussed, Goro famously weighs as much as a penny when he falls from the Sears Tower.

Neal 56:35
Yes, yes. Liu Kang once again dropped a penny at the exact same time and they hit the ground. boom. Anyway, yeah, Bo's now hanging out with Liu Kang. We cut to an intensive care ward, some hospital at midnight, presumably in Chicago. Everything else is, right. Where Jax is hospitalized and a couple of new characters show up. Jade and smoke are here to beat up a nurse. Which they do.

Corey 57:09
First of all. Why does smoke say toasty?

Neal 57:15
Well, yes, smoke it does, in fact have a catchphrase in this and that catchphrase is in fact, toasty.

Corey 57:22
He has one line he says twice.

Neal 57:26
Do you know where smoke smoke came from?

Corey 57:31
All the weed I'm smoking. No, I'm not. No, I don't remember. I smoke. I know I'm sure I do. Could I tell you what the answer is right now? Absolutely not. You put a gun to my head right now and Neil I would die because I can't give you the answer.

Neal 57:46
Okay, I won't put a I will not put a gun to your head. Don't worry, smoke and Jade. Both were hidden characters in Mortal Kombat two unplayed unplayable, you could see them kind of like popping out behind the tree in the living forest. It was a nice background detail. They How did you fight smoke so smoke the way you fought smoke in the game, it was a hidden fight, is you had to be in the portal stage. And perform an uppercut on your opponent. And that uppercut had to trigger Dan Florida and popping out in the corner and saying toasty. And if he did, you would have to press down and start.

Corey 58:32
That's so specific. How did people ever find shit like that? Like

Neal 58:37
Gamepro magazine.

Corey 58:39
then who told GamePro? Did Dan Forden tell GamePro how to

Neal 58:43
Dan Forden it might have. Eh you know kids, kids figure this shit out. They'd mash buttons in arcades and then try to recreate it or the developers just like send it to the magazines because it's gonna like drum up you know, it's it's publicity, right? It's gonna get people start feeding quarters and trying to make this happen in the arcades, or like buy the Genesis copy to do it or whatever. So that's why he smoke says toasty because smokes very first appearance was heavily tied to Dan Forden popping out of the corner of the screen and saying dusty

Corey 59:14
Now what's interesting is Dan Forden also never said anything else in his life other than the word toasty.

Neal 59:19
No, He only spoke in the word toasty and like all of the music from the Mortal Kombat games just that was him talking, it just came out of his mouth like already composed.

Corey 59:32
terrible taste of of trumpets.

Neal 59:37
Anyway, that's that is the reason that smoke says toasty in this but okay, yeah, the reason Jade and smoke are teamed up in this book is because they were the two hidden characters in Mortal Kombat two when this book was being published

Corey 59:50
now does any of that explain why in the art where they show up smoke is half made of smoke and is like rocket shipping his torso away? does it explain that?

Neal 1:00:00
cuz it fucking rules

Corey 1:00:02
funniest thing I've ever seen in my life. Yeah

Neal 1:00:05
well smoke didn't have a move set at this time. So

Corey 1:00:09
for all we knew he just turned into a smoke torso Or human torso smoke legs. And uh just could rocket ship around like Jimmy neutrons dog.

Neal 1:00:19
Yes basically he didn't have a move set he wasn't a playable character he he I think he just like borrowed some of the other ninjas moves. And then same with Jade. I think she just borrowed like Kitana and Mileena moves. Somebody will correct us on that. I don't remember. But yeah, so this is just the much like what Mortal Kombat conquests had to do several times. This is pre those characters having lore and background so Charles Marshall is just making this shit up as he goes.

Neal 1:00:49
But yeah, they're there to kill Jax right and they're going to kill Jax with smokes smoke fist and Jade's green energy Psylocke hand. Right? But before they're able to do that Jax wakes up, grabs their arms and bashes them together. And they just sort of like run through a portal and say they'll meet up with each other again in Goro's Lair, and Jax gets out of bed because modern medicine ain't got nothing on the will to live. Apparently.

Corey 1:01:22
He just adrenalines it mostly.

Neal 1:01:25
Pretty much that is the end of issue two. Issue three, No guts, no glory. Patrick Rolo is back on the pencils. Richard Imani is handling the inks Joseph Allen is lettering and Joan Egawa is once again coloring this issue looks the most like blood and thunder.

Corey 1:01:47
This issue has some really cool shit in it. Yeah, like laser eyes.

Neal 1:01:54
Yes, famously, Shao Kahn. I mean, that's, you know, he's the most well known for having laser eyes. Like that's not at all true. They made that up for this.

Corey 1:02:05
Also, there is a bold text hahahahaha near the beginning. Yeah, that looks outrageously sick. Like it is the coolest thing that we've seen in the books in a while relative to like being new compared to the character designs. You know what I mean? Like I'm not saying it all looks like shit. But what I mean is the hahaha looks especially cool.

Neal 1:02:28
It does look cool. Yes. Agreed. And it's a classic Shao Kahn line. Like that's his last his laugh from Mortal Kombat two, right? He says, excellent.

Corey 1:02:38
Yeah, he's the only person who's ever laughs like that.

Neal 1:02:41
Yeah. So issue three opens with the Scorpion set up again about dead cameras with his ancestors, blah, blah, blah, blah. But he's put all that on hold. Because he's now leaving for the Emperor and we see him like like, as like the as Shao Kahn is like right hand man. Right. And they're just kind of like berating a mutant, right. A Tarkatan and the cotton's like we will not fight alongside the dead and Scorpion's like don't disparage the dead and then Shao Kahn, like laser blast the dude with his eyes upower Shao Kahn has never had ever but he has it in this.

Corey 1:03:21
But does it look fucking awesome? Riddle me this Batman.

Neal 1:03:24
Yeah, it looks pretty fucking cool.

Corey 1:03:26
Hello, it's me. The Quizmaster and I'm here to ask a question.

Neal 1:03:33
Quiznos man, would you like it toasted?

Corey 1:03:37
Hello. We don't have Quiznos anymore. I don't think we're at least if we do all of them close near me. Can I interest you in a subway?

Neal 1:03:47
We can also toast it.

Corey 1:03:48
I recently found out that Canada

Corey 1:03:50
Toasty! Right?

Corey 1:03:51
haslike the second most subways in the world.

Neal 1:03:54
Who has the first most

Corey 1:03:55
you guys

Neal 1:03:56
of course we do. USA number one baby! toasty!

Corey 1:04:00
the density of like subways to people is like three to one.

Neal 1:04:03
Toasty! I have to say three times.

Corey 1:04:06
You have 1.2 billion subways, or something

Neal 1:04:09
it's not.. to your... there's a lot of them around me actually. I can think of four within like three miles.

Corey 1:04:16
Yeah, those are all yours

Neal 1:04:18
in different directions. Those my personal subways.

Corey 1:04:20
Yeah, they're the Neal ones.

Neal 1:04:22
Well, I never eat there because their food is garbage.

Corey 1:04:25
fuck

Neal 1:04:25
They're just there are a lot of places to get a better sub.

Corey 1:04:28
I can't. Comic Jesus made you four fucking subways, dude.

Neal 1:04:35
Yeah, I have. Yeah, no, I'm not. Sorry. I was trying to think of a word. I don't think I don't think betrayal is RIGHT.

Corey 1:04:46
I mean Jesus knows a lot about betrayal. If that's what you're wondering.

Neal 1:04:49
I have forsaken our Lord and savior comic book Jesus.

Corey 1:04:53
I kissed the subway on the cheek and they knew to kill it. I guess that's what they did to Quiznos? I'm kind of losing the metaphor.

Neal 1:05:02
Yeah, let's just move on with this comic book recap

Corey 1:05:06
what's a comic book?

Neal 1:05:08
Okay all right it's like that Bible you read

Corey 1:05:14
I don't know what the Bible- I'm just kidding

Neal 1:05:17
anyway, Scorpion somehow senses that reptiles in the throne room and he Spikeball pulls him you know get over here whatever and Shao Kahn is like you little motherfucker reptile tell me what you know You reek of betrayal or some shit and reptile tells them all about Kitana and the boys when he didn't have to do that he didn't fucking have to. He didn't have to tell your eyes that like brain seeking vision. Yeah, he would have you would have been fine reptile lizards love it when it's hot. Like laser eyes would make you just for clarity. And then Shao Kahn says it's classic lines excellent and hahahahaha and I will be putting those sound drops in I meant to do it before we recorded but didn't

Neal 1:05:59
back in Chicago. Liu Kang is on the phone with Johnny Cage again. And he's like, Hey, Johnny, why did you send this big lug? I like can't even afford to feed him because dude eats like oh is a lot of food. Like like a chicken like a turkey leg or some shit. He's eating like a like a like a lot of food.

Corey 1:06:22
He's eating like Disneyland Park food.

Neal 1:06:25
Yeah. But the phone call gets disrupted because there's a knock on the door. And Bo of course thinks that must be the pizza he ordered. But it's actually ninjas attacking.

Corey 1:06:37
And then we're like, cool. We're doing the ninjas again, and we start to feel a lot like Luke tank.

Neal 1:06:41
Yeah. Tired of it. But Bo picks up the couch and just sort of swings at like a club. Yeah, just like bowls them all down. But then suddenly, he's socked in the face by everybody's favorite Mortal Kombat character. Henge

Corey 1:07:01
Okay, may I?

Neal 1:07:04
You may I have some things to say as well but please go first.

Corey 1:07:09
Listeners close your eyes. Uh, huh. henge is built like, I want to get this joke right, is built like Rob lightfield Captain America.

Neal 1:07:23
Okay, sure. All torso. Broad chested, in an uncomfortable way.

Corey 1:07:28
Yeah, just the thickest man. Keys sort of crusted like the thing.

Neal 1:07:35
Uh huh.

Corey 1:07:36
He's a gray stone, man. Yeah, with red eyes. Yep. Who's unfathomably buff?

Neal 1:07:44
Yes.

Corey 1:07:45
And also claims to be from the nightmare realm,

Neal 1:07:48
the Nightmare Realm,

Corey 1:07:50
which I guess is how Freddy Krueger ties in later? They were thinking of this.?

Neal 1:07:55
That's the dream realm. But yeah, I think so.

Corey 1:07:58
I mean, if there's a dream realm, there's a nightmare realm if there's an order realm there's a chaos realm, you know,

Neal 1:08:02
sure if there's an Outworld there's an Iworld the world Yeah,

Corey 1:08:06
if there's a rim world there's a ROM world

Neal 1:08:10
there's if there's a rim world there's a disk world that's

Corey 1:08:12
there's a disk world. There's a floppy disk worlds.

Neal 1:08:16
Yes.

Corey 1:08:16
Anyway Hinge is a big fucking Stone Man, like Stonehenge. And he's from the fucking nightmare dimension. And who the fuck is Henge?

Neal 1:08:26
My description for everyone out there? Who knows? Who knows DC Comics is? Picture naked Darkseid

Corey 1:08:35
I'm doing it

Neal 1:08:36
that is exactly what Henge looks like

Corey 1:08:38
picture that talking street now picture a human met.

Neal 1:08:43
Picture Danny the street if he were rubble. Yeah, no henge is

Neal 1:08:49
Picture Jeffrey the Road.

Neal 1:08:53
Fuck you. He's uh, yeah, he looks rad. I'm not gonna lie.

Corey 1:09:00
Well, he's like a big stone man.

Neal 1:09:02
He's let's he's tremor, right? Like here's I'm not gonna say that they did this, but they fucking did this. This is tremor, right?

Corey 1:09:10
Yeah, he's kind of tremor.

Neal 1:09:11
But I mean it's like Mortal Kombat 10 Tremor because because Special Forces game Tremor just looks like brown Scorpion. But this is like Mortal Kombat 10 tremor, but named henge they must be like cousins, right?

Corey 1:09:26
I hate that they isolate though. What do we want to call this guy? Oh, I know fu.

Neal 1:09:32
Hinge.

Corey 1:09:33
That word on its own. I don't support it.

Neal 1:09:36
It is a bad uncomfortable word to say. Let's say it five more times.

Neal 1:09:40
Henge

Corey 1:09:40
Hunge

Neal 1:09:41
Henge

Corey 1:09:42
hinge

Neal 1:09:42
Henge it is hard on my throat

Corey 1:09:46
hange

Neal 1:09:47
Henge *cough* Hennngggeee.

Corey 1:09:49
It's about the Henge we made along the way.

Neal 1:09:54
Henge knocks Bo around some but once again, Liu Kang

Neal 1:09:57
Bo as a reminder, just a big Italian guy

Neal 1:10:00
a big giant refrigerator. Liu Kang hops up suddenly shirtless again. And floors Henge with a with a kick.

Corey 1:10:11
Well those are his fighting no clothes.

Neal 1:10:14
He lost his, he ripped his shirt off to fight Goro and then ripped his shirt off to fight him.

Corey 1:10:18
He's flexing them off.

Neal 1:10:20
It's he must be and then Liu Kang's like Bo we got some unfinished business I got some unfinished business. I gotta go back to Outworld right. Meanwhile,

Corey 1:10:32
cut to somebody that has nothing to do with henge

Neal 1:10:35
Sonia and brand new character Sergeant Walker and some other special forces Red Shirts

Corey 1:10:41
Texas Rangers

Neal 1:10:41
are in are in the Special Forces battle boat racing towards Shang Tsung Island or at least where it's supposed to be. Sergeant Walker isn't getting any readings and Sonya's like it's totally there

Corey 1:10:53
Hey, man, there's no island here, you're fucked. And then they're like, Oh, don't worry. What if I told you there was one here?

Neal 1:11:02
And then there was and then there was and they take a raft to the island. And Sony's reasoning like I don't think the islands here all the time, but I think it appeared now because it wants us to find it. And sergeant, what's his face is like, do you think it's a trap, and then boom, like they're immediately attacked by those like cat mass guards that we see in the games? And motherfucking Kintaro is here, right?

Neal 1:11:31
This, I liked I liked this Kintaro scene. I mean, they do the whole thing like oh, he lived under the shadow of Goro. It's his turn to prove himself his worth to the Emperor et cetera, but like the splash page of forearmed Tiger cat man, right. strangling Special Forces people in three of his arms like great, great use of the multiple arms like this was a really good, good, good drawing. And then he still has one arm free to knock Sonya unconscious. And that's that for the Sonya, part of this comic book. You still there?

Corey 1:12:13
Yeah.

Neal 1:12:13
Okay.

Corey 1:12:14
I'm sure your sentence had just ended.

Neal 1:12:17
There's a little bit of a delay maybe.

Corey 1:12:19
Yeah, like your sentence had ended and there was like a beat and are you still there? I'm like 'yeah man.'I'm too busy reading Matthew Lillard tweets.

Neal 1:12:32
about NF Ts.

Corey 1:12:34
This one wasn't about NF T's. I also wasn't actually reading his tweets. It's just I have two screens, so Twitter is open in one of them.

Neal 1:12:42
Gotcha. Back in Outworld Kitana and the boys continue to do fucking nothing. Kitana just talks about how awful it is that every dead warrior ever is now undead and marching throughout world under the command of Scorpion under the command of Shao Kahn. Baraka thinks it's no big deal. Sub-Zero thinks it's a pretty big deal. Kung Lao was also there. I guess they decided that they needed to go after Scorpion to take care of this army first. I don't really fucking know.

Neal 1:13:12
Two days after that. Johnny Cage and Jax are flying in Johnny's private jet to Sonia's last known coordinates. Sure, why wouldn't they be suddenly their plane hits turbulence and smoke starts billowing out of the cockpit. And all fuck Jade and smoke are on the play.

Corey 1:13:32
They don't explain how Jade got in the plane.

Neal 1:13:35
But it's toastyyyyy, right? Toastyyyyyy

Corey 1:13:39
Jade turned into a second plane.

Neal 1:13:44
ToasI can't even do the high pitch because my voice is fucked.

Corey 1:13:48
How's that?

Neal 1:13:49
Toasty! thats not right it's like hoarse sounding. Not like the animal

Corey 1:13:55
You should say it like the animal now

Neal 1:13:58
Toasty! (but like a horse)

Corey 1:13:59
thank you listener

Neal 1:14:03
of Issue three.

Corey 1:14:04
Live from Chicago, it's Tuesday night.

Neal 1:14:08
What a journey this was

Corey 1:14:14
Wait with your horse Neal there's a horse loose in the comic book. Okay. It's enough for that.

Neal 1:14:25
Yeah, end of Issue three of Battlea

Corey 1:14:28
that joke forever. And also issue three of battle.

Neal 1:14:32
And also our friendship

Corey 1:14:35
Why is it called Battlewave?

Neal 1:14:37
Well, I don't know. Maybe cause of the boat?

Corey 1:14:39
there haven't been like a particularly high amount of battling relative to-,

Neal 1:14:43
a lot of ninjas getting kicked out of windows and then the wave is the wave from the boat. Yeah, I don't know man. We're not there yet. We're getting there. Still a sick title, battle wave.

Neal 1:14:55
What was the blood? Where

Neal 1:14:56
was all the blood and thunder in blood and thunder? Come on.

Corey 1:14:59
It's actually All for blender and it was a good number of days

Neal 1:15:03
where was where were the Special Forces in Special Forces? you know what that's actually

Corey 1:15:08
They kind of got that in one.

Neal 1:15:10
This entire uh Special Forces team we see in this comic book? None of them from the Special Forces book. Not a single one.

Corey 1:15:18
Well the Special Forces is a lot of people

Neal 1:15:20
I know but like it was so, like, but why did they fucking set that team up with Sonya Blade and Jax to then like be like, "well not anymore!"

Corey 1:15:29
this well those characters are too important. This was just a minor mention.

Neal 1:15:34
Do you don't want to see fucking torque up here work in like in Mortal Kombat like fighting Kintaro

Corey 1:15:40
And cistern and like fucking jungle man and whatever his name was

Neal 1:15:44
Could you imagine Vapor versus Smoke? Dude, could you imagine?

Corey 1:15:49
Literally no. Genuinely No.

Neal 1:15:55
vapor is the one who can turn to vapor

Corey 1:15:58
vapour

Neal 1:16:01
Sylence vs. Jade. Come on. The book writes itself. Maybe that'll be our Christmas special this year.

Corey 1:16:10

What would we write that?

Neal 1:16:12
Yeah, maybe I'll maybe I'll write one of the. Anyway, yeah, I don't know. stuffs starting to happen.

Corey 1:16:19
It's offto an eh start.

Neal 1:16:22
They're starting to put the pieces on the board, right?

Corey 1:16:24
They're arranging the chess pieces. And by the end, they may have set up them all.

Neal 1:16:29
My fear is that they're going to set up for the next three issues and then try to work everything out in Tournament Edition number two, kind of like they did with blood and thunder. You know what I mean?

Corey 1:16:41
Right.

Neal 1:16:42
But what are you going to do? We're going to take a little side trip next time we talk about comics to talk about the Rayden and Kano three issue miniseries. But before that, dude, we are finally at the the first Quan Chi episode of Mortal Kombat conquest for our commentaries. I'm excited about that.

Corey 1:17:00
This is a big day.

Neal 1:17:02
I think that's coming up next. Until then, Corey, let's get the fuck out of here. Let's, what do you got going on

Corey 1:17:11
Uh fatigue mostly. But also other podcasts for sure. A couple of those.

Corey 1:17:20
Two or three

Corey 1:17:21
two currently. After that, who can say? So we've got They Made Another One. sequels, reboots, remakes, movies, occasionally TV shows. All that stuff. Double sided. Double sided. What? I was laughing No, but like, Why did I say double sided?

Neal 1:17:43
I don't know why you said I don't know why you say a lot of things you're saying honestly. I just roll with it, man. It's usually funny. I like it. It's usually pretty funny when you say things.

Corey 1:17:55
Anyway, there's two other co hosts Liam and Mitch. Double Sided oh my god.

Neal 1:18:03
Side A and Side B. On one side TV on the other movie. It makes sense. So

Corey 1:18:09
Well, this week we're watching the blob from 1988.

Neal 1:18:13
Nice

Corey 1:18:14
Oh the episode coming up this week if I have my shit straight, is Nightmare on Elm Street part 2: Freddy's Revenge

Neal 1:18:22
Hell yeah, a weird classic

Corey 1:18:26
And that's @theymadeanother on Twitter and "They Made Another One" for listening to podcasts. And also Strat2 is the name of a podcast where I talk about F1 with my friend Callum you can look it up, it's the like the short form of 'strategy' and the number after 1.

Neal 1:18:41
Yeah, I'm gonna put a link to that in the description. I think I've been putting one in every single episode. So there you can find me on Twitter @FinalNeal, on Instagram @FinalNealRetro and, big news! Got another podcast of my own to plug. Corey kind of gave it away earlier. Thanks for that.

Corey 1:19:03
Just censor that name.

Neal 1:19:05
It is a show called "Crew Expendable" where me and my buddy, our buddy, Kenny, are taking just a ridiculous a deep dive into the Alien franchise all of the movies, you know, alien aliens, et cetera. Prometheus, comic books, novels, video games, just everything in the alien media universe that we can get our hands on, and a little bit of predator stuff in there to where it's necessary. You can find that on Twitter @CrewExpendapod or go to our website crewexpendable.net or just search crew expendable in your podcast app. Subscribe. I think there's three episodes up right now. Might be four by the time this is out.

Neal 1:19:53
Yeah, go check it out and check out our website for this show. MK podcast.com to find links to our store, our ways to support the show our, ko-fi account, YouTube channel, et cetera. Follow this show on Twitter and Instagram at MK pod quest. Rate us give us good five star ratings and write nice reviews. We love it. Follow us on goodpods do the goodpods thing. You know that, you know the drill rate us on Spotify. share us with your friends do all that all of that stuff.

Corey 1:20:28
share us with your enemies.

Neal 1:20:29
Yeah shares if you hate the show, especially share us with your enemies. Because they'll probably like it.

Corey 1:20:38
Law of averages.

Neal 1:20:40
Yeah. And we'll be back next week, I think for our commentary, assuming neither of us gets sick again.

Corey 1:20:48
Can't rule that out

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