238. The Boss Baby: Family Business (2021)

[00:00:00] This show is nominated for a 2026 Golden Lobes Podcast Award. Get in!

[00:00:42] Welcome to SpyHards Podcast, I'm Agent Scott. And I'm Cam the Provocateur. And Scott, I will have you know, there is no crying permitted in the separation zone. I mean, I feel like I've been in the separation zone for years now. No more crying, Scott. No more tears, as Ozzy Osbourne would have said. Oh, I just want to separate myself from you really.

[00:01:09] You see, I'm crying all the time. I want you separated. I'm like, please, please. The distance between Zoom slash Zencaster is not enough. I need more. What they don't know is the Atlantic Ocean is actually built from your tears. That's right. It's a moat. Very salty. It's a deep, deep moat. The moat of Smith. The Smith moat. The moat of Smith? I don't know what-

[00:01:35] The moat of Smith, I suppose. You know, you're an Anglophile anyway. You wish you were British. So I guess that's how we would do it. I'm in British Columbia, so I guess- Right? We're the bigger better. Whoa! I'm not sure that's true at all. Shots fired in the Boss Baby 2 episode where no one will hear them. I'm pretty sure 35% of our listenership of 12 will be very offended by that comment.

[00:02:04] Ah, I kid out of love. I'm talking about the 12 people that are turning up for Boss Baby 2. Hi everyone, how are you? Welcome, welcome. You're in a safe space now. We're all gathered in the separation zone together. Hey! We're separate from society for a reason. That's right. That's our business. Our family business. But we have to keep up with the tradition, Cam.

[00:02:35] We tackled a Spy Hard special last week and I did make a joke last time that this one might be a tougher one to get some responses to. But Only the Brave did stir up a couple of notes apparently. Well, Scott, we didn't exactly get an influx of letters coming in regarding Only the Brave, but there were a couple of fun comments that happened along the way, shall we say.

[00:03:02] One of my favorites was from Maynard, who is at Maynard, C-O-M-A-U. The lead singer of two? He's learning to swim, Scott. He's learning to swim in those tiers. Maynard over on Twitter posted his handle is at Maynard Como and he really got a huge laugh out of me with his comment. He said,

[00:03:27] Just like both of you, I can't get out of bed without tripping over a copy of this Gary Cooper film. Only the brave this. Only the brave that. It's everywhere. Your most obvious choice this decade. This is exactly why I introduced this section of the show. I love it. And Maynard, clearly you're a Gary Cooper fan. I mean, how could he not be?

[00:03:52] The fact that like he's acknowledging kind of the, I believe this is in reference to, of course, this episode was a spy hard special tackling this 1930 Gary Cooper civil war film. But in the conversation, we talked about how it's posted everywhere online. It's really easy to find a streaming version of only the brave and how we said, you're tripping over them. They're everywhere. And so he was kind of making fun of us for that. I also quite like the idea of him being sick in bed and listening to only the brave reviews.

[00:04:25] Something quite sadistic about that. Like only your enemies would do that to you. Right. Yeah. But then I suppose only our enemies would be listening to boss baby too, too. That's right. That's right. And actually speaking of the star of that film, Gary Cooper, Space Odds 1985 on Twitter brought up the fact that Gary Cooper could have been James Bond. And it would have happened if Gregory Radoff had produced a version of Casino Royale for 20th Century Fox.

[00:04:54] And Cooper was someone he really liked for the role in an alternate dimension. Could have been interesting. Do you think Gary Cooper, let's put aside the fact he's an American actor and that's not who you want as James Bond. But let's just look at it from the point of view of acting style and presence. Do you think he could have been a good James Bond? If only the brave is anything to go by. No. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:05:22] Um, but I, I don't think it would be a James Bond as we know and love it though. I think it'd be a very different interpretation, much like card sense. Jimmy Bond was a different interpretation. What I can't shake is the frankly hilarious vision I'm having in my head of, uh, 20, 24's Flash. Um, and there being some sort of like multiverse version of a CG resurrected Gary Cooper in like gray, like with these hands on his hips, just looking off and smiling.

[00:05:51] And the entire audience going, who's that? Yeah. Yeah. Huh? Yeah. Um, because like, like for some reason he's like fighting a giant spider with laser eyes and long hair. Yeah. Yeah. Um, it's funny cause like Gary Cooper, when you see something like high noon, you say he has like the presence and you can imagine him in those scenes of like bond level action.

[00:06:18] I just don't know that I've seen an actor willing to like, I haven't seen it in him. Like that ability to play someone who's basically a charming sociopath. Mm-hmm . That's the part I'm having problems with. He wouldn't be a gentleman spy like Roger Moore. I just don't think he has that. Uh, that's just not him. And also I don't, I don't think that he would be willing to take the amount of damage that James Bond is supposed to take.

[00:06:44] Cause you gotta remember that the bond books come from a very sadistic mind. Yeah. And very much like punishing bond. So he can go through a physical trial in the books. And he does a lot in the films too. I just, I, I almost could see Gary Cooper winning every single fist fight. I mean, in an alternate universe, we have versions of this. We have the Alfred Hitchcock, Cary Grant, James Bond film.

[00:07:09] But I feel like in both Cooper and Grant circumstances, the role is being radically molded around the star value of Cooper and Grant. Which at a certain point, is it even James Bond anymore? Or is it a vehicle for those guys? What's a funnier moment? Gary Cooper doing the Tarzan yell from Octopussy.

[00:07:33] Or the propped up carcass of Gary Cooper going into the shower with Stacy Stutton at the end of a view to a kill. Oh, I'm thinking, I'm thinking of Gary Cooper in the car with JW Pepper saying, I sure am boy. I almost feel like Gary Cooper is the kind of guy that would get on with JW Pepper.

[00:07:57] I think it would be a less of a mismatched pairing that Roger Moore and JW Pepper. Yeah. I feel like he might feel at home in that car. Oh, Gary. He might. Oh, Gary. Pull up, Gary. Pull up. One other fun note. The official Gary Cooper account on Twitter, or X or whatever, started following us because of the episode. Oh, nice. Okay.

[00:08:24] Well, I'm sure we'll have more Gary Cooper content in the future. So there you go. I don't think they listened to the review though. And definitely not the Boss Baby 2 episode. But, you know, there you go. Anyway, that was our exploration of Only the Brave, another Spy Hard special in the book. You know, a lot of you just turn up for the Bond. And then, of course, you've turned up to hear me talk about this at the beginning of the Boss Baby 2 episode. But I love it when you all turn up for these insane little breaks that we have. Yeah.

[00:08:54] And as much as we've been joking in this intro, be prepared for an interesting conversation ahead about the Boss Baby 2. Yeah. It's deep. It gets deep and we're going to go deep. So without further ado, let's do it. Okay then, Cam. Well, it's been too long since we've done this. And frankly, my diaper is full. Are you about to have a number two?

[00:09:23] You could call it that if you'd like. Okay. Are you talking about the movie or are you talking about the movement? Um, well, the movie will go with the movie. Oh, okay. Okay. Yeah, let's have a sequel. Yes. It's time. It's time. The people have demanded it. It's time. And it's here. Oh, have they? They've been sending all sorts of stuff. Actually, they've all just been sending in used diapers. Which we took as a sign to say you want more Boss Baby, right?

[00:09:52] I mean, we had a P.O. box, but now it's a P.U. box. Am I right? Am I right? Where's your slide whistle gone? Yeah, that's a good point. I should like start being like Sideshow Mel and cueing all my like jokes with a slide whistle. I think you should. I'll do Sideshow Bob and just walk onto Rakes. Which I felt like I did for about two hours today. Oh, wow. Okay. Well then, spoilers. I'm kidding.

[00:10:21] Actually, I've got a lot to say about this film. But Cam, what is said film? We are tackling 2021's The Boss Baby, Family Business, the sequel of course, to the 2017 hit animated film from DreamWorks. They say you should never get into business with family. Wise words. Right. Right. Actually, genuinely true. Although my experience was always good. Did you ever work with any of your family? No, never. No. I know your family.

[00:10:50] They couldn't deal with you. Oh, well, or vice versa. Either way. Either way. Okay. Well, if you haven't drunken the pleasures of Boss Baby 2 Family Business, here is your synopsis. The Boss Baby, the Boss Baby, family business. Playtime is over. The Templeton brothers, Tim and his Boss Baby little broadhead have become adults and drifted away from each other.

[00:11:19] But a new boss baby. But a new boss baby with a cutting edge approach and a can do attitude is about to bring them together again and inspire a new family business. Listen, folks. Listen, folks, what you're hearing is a lack of imagination. What you're hearing is a lack of enthusiasm from my co-host in Canada over there.

[00:11:45] He cannot bring himself to be funny right now because he's had all the strength sapped from him. I was going to say, it's too bad they called the animated series on Netflix back in business. Yeah. Because they could have used the tagline for this movie, back in business, baby. Oh, yeah. You could do that. Right? It's pretty good. Pretty good. I was really concerned because, by the way, folks, there was a TV show in between and I'm sure we'll cover it on the Patreon at some point. Yeah.

[00:12:16] Yeah. It's Scott. Scott. I've got a revelation. I was saving this for my notes when we get into the behind the scenes, but I'll just announce it now. Because, you know, I did a deep dive into the world of the Boss Baby for this episode, as I did with the previous one as well. But I came across a revelation. Oh. A revelation that could shape the future of the Spy Hearts podcast. And you refer to the Patreon show OSS on the small screen where we could look at the Boss Baby TV show.

[00:12:46] Mm-hmm. You don't have to worry about staying tuned for that one anytime soon, I think. But, but, that's because there may be more pressing matters. Matters that may fall in the dwindling months of a year when perhaps Christmas is in season. And did you know there is a 2022 Netflix Christmas special called the Boss Baby Christmas Bonus? I didn't. And I guess that's what's happening in December.

[00:13:15] I mean, we're always like looking for other Christmas episodes of TV shows to tackle at that time of year. So, that is a shout out to everyone listening right now, who's especially on the Patreon. If you are listening to this, to these words we are saying, with a sense of building dread for what's to come in the future. It is your job now to be the hero. To throw down the roadblock and say, hey guys, by the way, by the way, you did Man From U.N.C.E last year.

[00:13:43] Here's another great spy TV show that had a Christmas episode. Do that. Do that. Divert us. Aim us in a separate direction. Ah. You're giving them a challenge because, you know, by firstly the thing you stated before, not only would that necessarily put people off from joining the Patreon, that announcement could potentially lose us people on the Patreon. It's that critical. This is like the censor room or, what was it? The, what is it at the end of this movie? The server room. Yeah.

[00:14:12] This is like the server room and it's a last minute moment to save the day. Mmm. The Boss Baby Christmas Special is lingering in the future. There's only one way to stop it. And that is up to you. If you didn't get the message there folks, we will be tackling the Boss Baby Christmas Special this year unless we can think of something better. Help us think of something better. The gauntlet is thrown.

[00:14:41] It has to be a TV special or episode of a television show that is a spy show that has a Christmas special. We did Totally Spies two years ago. We did The Man From Uncle last year. Yes. So. And we're very quickly running out of tinsel if you know what I mean. And maybe don't point us in the direction of the I Spy Christmas episode. That one could just sit on the sidelines for a bit. I think we'll skip that for now. Yeah. That might be more offensive for Christmas. Yeah. What's worse?

[00:15:09] Oh, I'm going to lean towards that. I think that's probably a good choice. Yeah. We'll follow that up with a review of that spy movie he did. Right. Right. Yes. The one that's. Which apparently we'll never cover. I don't know how to cover that. So, yeah. It's more than marketing. Like, can I flood Twitter with posters of that guy? Exactly. What is the name?

[00:15:37] Actually, the name is escaping me because there's context here missing for some people. Yeah. I think it's like Leonard part six, isn't it? That's it. Leonard part six. Yeah. Hmm. Hmm. Well, you know, that's very problematic, which we won't talk about, but so is diapers full of doo doo. And we need to change our diapers now in the process of talking about this film. Originally, I pitched Cam for me and Cam to do this as like mummy and daddy.

[00:16:06] Cam physically threw up when I suggested that. So, I think we're just going to tackle this like a normal review. I think so. That would be too much for people. Too much. I think also we would be playing into a couple of people's slash fiction if you started calling me daddy. So, if it's that way round. I'll leave that to your imagination. Yeah, wait, why are you casting me in that role? Like, what the hell? He's got so defensive about that. Oh, all right.

[00:16:36] Hmm. Hmm. It's not often I agitate Cam like that, but that one really got under his skin. Like the fact that he would be the mummy of the mummy and daddy, if you know what I mean. Well, if it is the brains behind the operation, then perhaps that is the accurate choice. Oh, look at Cam there. He makes a like a gender positive statement and he saves the day at the same time. Thank you, Cameron. That's why we keep you around.

[00:17:05] And waxes my own ego. Yes. Of course. And that's all we ever live for really. But, uh, boss baby too. I didn't see the first one and I never saw the second one. So that's easy. Even today. Yeah. I'm making this up. I couldn't bring. I just watched a high. I watched one of those like five minute recap videos on YouTube. I got the idea. Okay. I don't recall if I had any idea this movie existed until we started looking at, you know,

[00:17:34] the master list and looking for what spy kid movies there were that we would put on the list. I'd heard of the boss baby. I remember that being a big deal, but this being a pandemic release. Yeah. Even though, and we'll get into the box office, like even though it did okay money for that time period, I just don't remember this being a thing. Like I don't recall a release. And so I was really oblivious to this one. I got to say. And, um, so that meant I just never caught up with it.

[00:18:03] And, uh, I wasn't thrilled when I realized that I would have to pay money to watch this, uh, as a rental. And so Scott, I did something I don't normally do. I took a trip out the door to the local library to see if they had a copy of the boss baby family business and lo and behold, they did. Wow. Did you have to request it to be ordered into the library or was it there on the shelf?

[00:18:32] Like you had that moment of just pure bliss of seeing boss baby two on the shelf. I had that moment of seeing it on the shelf. Yes. You should have taken a picture. I should have. And like, had like that added like white or a, like, you know, glowing light. Like an aura. Yeah. An aura. Um, that would've been cool, but, uh, they didn't have it on blu-ray. So I had to go with DVD, which was actually kind of surprising to me that like, who would be buying a DVD of that movie in like 2023 or 2022 when it would come out? Who would be buying a blu-ray of it?

[00:19:02] Well, blu-rays are more common in terms of people that would be buying physical media at that point. I don't know who's buying DVDs. Nah, blu-ray is a more popular format in many ways. I understand, but like, I'm, I think DVDs still outsell blu-rays surely. Is it just a price point thing? I think so. Also, if you're buying, I mean, you're not buying, okay. If you're a cinema fan or a collector of film, I don't think you're running out to get the Boss Baby on 4K. Sure. So really you're buying it for kids.

[00:19:32] That's true. And do kids care about HD? No, that's an excellent point. And you just buy them like the $15 DVD or whatever and do it cheap. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. And I will note there was a slight scratch on the DVD. And so I missed maybe like- Was that someone trying to get away from watching it and they were just like clawing at the sides? Well, I can only imagine the, the trials that libraries go through with kids DVDs. Sure. Of course.

[00:20:00] Can you imagine how often you'd be replacing those? Like, good Lord. But, um, so I missed maybe 45 seconds of this movie. Oh, it did skip. Oh, hell yeah. Froze. Yeah, yeah. Wow. Okay. Yeah. So I had- The stories that DVD could tell. Right. It was the part where, uh, the Boss Baby was in the office of Armstrong, Dr. Armstrong or Professor Armstrong or whatever. And there's like the robot suit reveal. Yes.

[00:20:28] And it was right after that, it froze. Okay. And then it cut back to, um, I don't know, hijinks. And then like the Boss Baby in that room with the tree and discovering the, uh, the trap door that led underground. Yes. And so I was actually really confused how he went from being in his office to suddenly being in a separate room looking at a tree trap door. I think you missed a couple of minutes. Was it a couple of minutes? Yeah. Because there's a scene of them in the office talking first.

[00:20:58] That's- I got all that. It froze after the robot suit reveal. And then it cut- Where it cut back in was stuff with young Tim and the other kids. So it was cutting to that stuff, which was fine. And then it was the- Then it was the Boss Baby in the room with the tree. Okay. Fair enough. Well, I'm glad you made the effort. It's actually streaming here in the UK when we recorded this at least anyway. So I didn't have to pay. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah. I mean, to me, there's something wrong.

[00:21:26] Just fundamentally wrong about kids' movies not streaming. Like, just have them out there for the kids. Yeah. Who is it for at that point? Exactly. Like, if you can't get instant access to Hotel Transylvania 1 through 5, what are you doing, DreamWorks? And I seriously doubt there's that many parents buying rentals to these movies. They're probably just like, okay, well then watch something else on streaming. Well, the thing is with rentals now, like buying it's always like $2 more.

[00:21:56] Yeah. And so most of the time you're just like, whatever. Yeah, I did that with Sinners the other day. I was going to watch it before the Oscars. I'd seen it before, but I wanted to watch it a second time. And it was like, I could rent it for $4.99 or buy it for $9.99. And I just went, okay, I'll just buy it. Like, whatever. Can you hear that? Yeah. Is that the ice cream man? The ice cream man's here. He's a fan of the boss baby too. Wow. Wow. I was like, that's weird. Just for reference, folks, I'm recording this in March.

[00:22:26] That is a very hopeful ice cream man. No kidding. Wow. Hey, if I weren't doing this, I actually would go get an ice cream because he parks just outside our house. That is perfectly themed for this week's movie though. That is great. It's like I paid for that. Yeah. It's like a kid's movie. And now we have the ice cream man rolling through. In fact, I'll catch you later, folks. Cam, you do this. Bye. What's your ice cream van order? I can't even remember.

[00:22:54] I don't remember the last time I got ice cream from the ice cream truck. Where's the joy in your heart gone? I can't remember the last time I bought ice cream from a van. Like what? I probably, it was probably like when I was 13 or 12 years old. What? Yeah. I buy it every year. Well, that says more about you. Oh. You're like pushing children out of the way to get to the front of the line. I'm the boss, babies!

[00:23:21] What I remember liking back in the day though was they would put out the themed, I don't know if they're ice cream. I think they were more like ice desserts, but like the Ninja Turtle or Batman one. Or Spider-Man. I think Spider-Man and Ninja Turtle, the two I remember. They never, they always looked misshapen. They had gumballs for eyes. Yeah. Yeah, those. I'm a classic 99 with a flake. I don't.

[00:23:48] Which is, I don't know if that travels overseas at 99. I thought I was like blacking out for a second as to what you just said. Like what? Huh? At 99, I don't know where the actual, the etymology of the phrase comes from, but it's, it's basically soft serve ice cream in a cone with a Cadbury's flake in it. Oh. So you're thinking that classic like soft serve ice cream and then like a chocolate flake stuck in the side. That is a 99.

[00:24:16] I am not sure. And I would have to investigate this further that our ice cream men and women of the streets actually offer, actually offer soft serve ice cream. Oh, that's standard in this country. I don't know if it is. I don't think so. But maybe that's just because I was a kid and all I wanted was the themed ice pops. I don't know. Because they have those in the freezer to the side, but then they have a soft serve machine to the right of the person usually.

[00:24:47] Well. I say guy, but anyone can do it. In a couple months then I will investigate this. Okay. We need the video. We need proof. Um, but we are, we are dancing around the subject and we should dance into the fire. Cam, tell us how did we get more boss baby? Well, they actually announced this film as being in development right alongside the release of the first movie in 2017.

[00:25:15] So they didn't even have a creative team announced at that point. They just said Alec Baldwin would be back as the boss baby. And it wasn't too, it wasn't for like two years after that, that they really announced a director and writer. And in that case being the two writers and director who worked on the first film, which is Tom McGrath, who's the director and has a story credit on this film and Mike McCullers, who was the writer of the first film.

[00:25:40] Um, but before we get to them, this was of course also an adaptation loosely of a book by, um, writer and illustrator Marla Frazee, who's from California and had written the boss baby back in the day. And it is very loose in terms of the concept. It's more about the idea of parents having a new baby in the house and how that, uh, and how that baby basically is the boss of the household. Right.

[00:26:06] And that's sort of the basic concept that they then extrapolated into something much more ambitious and weird, frankly, for the film, the boss baby. So there actually was a sequel book called the boss, your baby, which came out in 2016. So even before the first movie, and it was really just sort of a continuation of the first concept. But in this case, it's a second baby. It's a daughter.

[00:26:30] So that does apply to this movie, but it wasn't like they were looking that closely at the text. It was more like, okay, we're going to make a sequel. There is a second book. So there we go. Now, Tom McGrath start out with him because he's the director and has a story credit on this film, uh, born in Washington and started out in animated departments. Like his background is animation, obviously. And so we'd worked on shorts, like one called the thing that lurked in the tub.

[00:26:58] Um, he worked on the TV series, liquid television, did some animation work on cool world and space jam ants, the road to El Dorado, all movies that are whether good or bad were big, you know, releases in the theaters. Sure. Um, and he also did some, um, directing and storyboarding on Ren and Stimpy as well. Great show. And then, I mean, signed his meal check for life by writing and directing Madagascar, which was a huge hit.

[00:27:28] And then he did Madagascar escape to Africa and Madagascar three for dream works. These are all huge movies. He did mega mind, which is a bit of an underperformer, but I'm sure in the long run also made tons of money just in home video sales. And for him, this was actually the followup to the boss baby. So he actually didn't really work on anything else in the four years between films. He was primarily just going from one to the other because these movies do take a long time to make. So he didn't work on the TV show?

[00:27:57] No, he has a credit as a producer, but no. Huh. Okay. And the TV series doesn't even have the same voice cast or anything. Oh, they're not getting Alex Baldwin to come in for the boss baby TV show. No, they are not. No, they are not. And they're not getting Tobey Maguire or James Marsden in for Tim. Marsden, I could see it's not as busy as he used to be, but the other and Toby, but Alec. Like, nah. Marsden's in Avengers Doomsday. How dare you? Yeah.

[00:28:25] In like a blue and yellow uniform that he didn't want, that none of them wanted to wear back in 2000. So, you know, I'm just assuming that dump truck of money appeared outside of his house. How many minutes do you think Cyclops will be in Avengers Doomsday? Hmm. I think I have a general idea of what the plot of Doomsday is in my head. Sure. And I suspect he survives this and ends up in the followup film. Okay.

[00:28:50] So I would say he probably gets about five to 10 minutes in this. Mm-hmm. Um, not all focus on him, but like an X-Men group of people. Mm-hmm. With some hero shots. Mm-hmm. And then I won't spoil what I think is going to happen. If you've read the comics or are aware of the comics, it's fairly obvious. Um, I think he'll then be on the planet afterwards and either make it through or not. Right. I think there's too much of a legacy to like only have him appear in one film.

[00:29:20] Yeah, yeah, yeah. I also think like James Marsden, and this is no knock against him, he's an actor I've liked a lot, but he's not as busy scheduling-wise as some of the other bigger stars in those movies where they have to work around them more, which means less screen time. He can still anchor a film or be one of the leads of a film and has the time for it. So yeah, I can absolutely see him being in Secret Wars and Doomsday. Yeah, me too. I hope so. Actually, just as an aside, like I love the 2000s X-Men films.

[00:29:49] We've spoken about them on the Patreon, at least a couple of them. Mm-hmm. And Cyclops was always my guy, even back to the X-Men arcade game. I was a Cyclops guy. So seeing Cyclops in that trailer, going full blast, I was like, yes, please. Yes, we have tackled the first three X-Men films on the Patreon. So who knows when we'll do Days of Future Past over there? Folks, there could be more X-Men content in the future. Just as I can amooze-bouche to the Boss Baby stuff, they can have some X-Men too. That's right, that's right.

[00:30:17] So the writer of this film, Mike McCullers, started out in the Austin Powers universe. He was a writing assistant on the original film with Mike Myers. And then he co-wrote the MTV special Austin Powers Electric Psychedelic Pussycat Swingers Club. Which I love exists. Me too. I'd like to tackle that on the Patreon at some point in the future. But not on Christmas. That's not your Christmas episode. No, you're not getting away with that one, folks. You've got work to do. That's right. Then he joined Saturday Night Live. Do your homework.

[00:30:47] Then he joined Saturday Night Live for its 23rd season. And then co-wrote the next two Austin Powers films. He wrote Undercover Brother. He worked on Thunderbirds, the adaptation of the beloved TV series. He wrote and directed the 2008 movie Baby Mama with Amy Poehler and Tina Fey. And then he also wrote the Peabody and Sherman adaptation. Which I think was for Dreamworks as well. And then rolled into Boss Baby.

[00:31:17] And this was his follow up to Hotel Transylvania 3. He's currently working on Shrek 5. So he's someone who's very much in the Dreamworks world. And attached to some projects that are guaranteed to make close to a billion dollars if not more. Hey there. You're a rock star. Get your game on. Get paid. Right. Now, the kernel of the concept that made Tom McGrath want to do this movie was that it was drawn from the strained relationship he had with his own brother.

[00:31:46] And here's a quote from him. He said, We kind of lost touch, but I was always envious of him because he had two beautiful sons and a family and I never had kids. At the first movie, I just wanted to make him cry, which worked. And then this one, it was the same reaction. I kind of want to hear the other end of that story. Did they make up? Or is it just like, his other brothers really annoyed at him for making him cry twice now? Or is he crying because he's like, why is he making me watch the Boss Baby films?

[00:32:14] It's his claw marks on the disc. I see him every like few years and this is how he chooses to spend his time with me. He's like, Simon, I've done another Boss Baby film. Yeah. Fair enough. No, like I do hope though, on a serious level that like, there is a personal touch to that because I think a lot of the time, DreamWorks movies in particular can feel kind of like a conveyor belt of content. Mm-hmm .

[00:32:40] And so like, I am glad to hear you have a director and co-writer who's like, there is a personal element of these movies I'm trying to convey. And maybe the number one critic of this concept is the person who is also a part of it and is responding to it emotionally. It shows to me that there is a heart at the core of these movies that I often don't sense in a lot of kind of outside the Pixar realm of animation films.

[00:33:09] Like a lot of the DreamWorks stuff, a lot of the illumination stuff, a lot of it feels like, hey, we found a concept, kids love it, it makes money, make more of this. I mean, I've been joking for the last 20 minutes about this film. Mm-hmm . But there's an element of it that actually really touched me and I'm not, I'm not joking. Mm-hmm . Mm-hmm . I've got four brothers and I really resonate with that little story you told me about the drive to do this.

[00:33:36] And it was clearly in coded into the film as well. Like I grew up with four boys in the house and me, and you know, I didn't have, I had loads of friends, I guess, but like my brothers were my best friends growing up. And because you, I lived with them, like I'd see them every day. They played the same games as me. We were just a group of boys. Um, and over the years, you know, I'm, I'm close to one of them now. Two of them have gone off and had kids and there's always this sort of like disconnect. Mm-hmm .

[00:34:06] I find with people that are friends or family that have had kids and you don't because it's almost like a mentality of all you don't understand. Mm-hmm . Um, I've, I've chosen not to have kids and not incapable of doing it, but it, it's more like, I feel like there's a wall there I can never get past. And then one brother I'm still close to, but has, he's also moved six hours away from me. Mm-hmm . And the other one I, I don't talk to at all. And not through like, we don't like each other, but we just don't talk.

[00:34:34] So I've gone from having four best friends that I live with to zero. Mm-hmm . And, and I do get exactly where that was coming from. And there is a little bit that, there is a, a moment at the end of this film that I actually got emotional about. I think it just sort of got to me a little bit because of that. Was it the snowball fight at the end? Um, just kind of them like kind of forgiving each other and kind of being brothers. It reminded me a lot of, and this is a better film I'm mentioning, the end of Iron Claw.

[00:35:05] Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah. You know, that line where he says like, I used to be a brother. Mm-hmm . And that, that cut me so deep in that film. I mean, that, that film spoke to me on many levels anyway, cause I'm a wrestling fan. But that line at the end really hurt me. Mm-hmm . And this, at the end of this film, it's a, it's not as overt as the Iron Claw when it comes to brother tragedy. But, um . . . Sure. Yeah, it, it got a, it got something out of me, I have to say. Hmm. Iron Claw, very underrated movie.

[00:35:35] I, more people should have seen it. I, I do not understand why it just sort of blipped and it was gone. It was actually a bit of a shock that it didn't get some sort of Academy attention at the time. Because it had many elements that deserved recognition, but weird. Weird. His, his, I can't remember the chap's name. He's gone out of my head completely. Zac Efron. Yeah. His, I think his best performance I've ever seen. I agree. Yeah. Check it out folks. Iron Claw. Yes.

[00:36:02] Uh, so, originally, uh, the character of Tina had a pretty small role in the movie. And that changed with the casting of Amy Sedaris, who, um, Tom McGrath was a big fan of for her comedy work. And from that point forward, they were so inspired, they actually rewrote the story to give her character a much bigger focus. Should they have? It's a good question, Scott.

[00:36:28] I will have some things to bring up when we, when we move into the review. That is for sure. Um, this was a pandemic project. Mm-hmm. Of course, the pandemic kicks in March, 2020. And so a lot of this movie was done with people working at home. I don't know that you can tell, like, the thing is, there was a lot of movies being made under very questionable circumstances and a lot of movies or TV that looks really bad now when you go back to it.

[00:36:55] But I really don't think you see the seams in an animated film at all. Um, the only thing I really noted was, like, I was doing some, you know, I was watching some interviews with cast members because a lot of that stuff. I find with kids' movies, you don't get the text interviews as much, which is kind of frustrating for me because I like to be able to kind of, you know, browse just text interviews and find quotes for the episodes. Yeah. But, um, with kids' movies, they like to have more short-form videos of the cast. Yeah.

[00:37:24] And so I was just watching, like, Alec Baldwin and Amy Sedaris just saying that they really wish they'd gotten to work with one another and actually play off each other because they're friends. But because of the pandemic, that wasn't the case. You know, and it's, it's still nice that films like this happened. You can, when you're talking about, like, live action films, you can definitely tell when they're filmed during, like, lockdown and stuff.

[00:37:48] Spider-Man No Way Home is a completely different film when you look at it through the lens of something that was shot during COVID. Mm-hmm. Like, the blocking, the lack of anyone else in a room at any time or, like, people on streets or anything like that. It is very odd. It's like watching The Avengers 98 with a lack of people. But there's lots of other examples, TV shows, films you could look at. But animated, you, like, you could never tell this was a pandemic film. No.

[00:38:17] I remember in No Way Home, it was really, like, telling when they had all the bad guys in the, you know, all the villains in the cells. Yeah. And it was like, oh, yeah, they've green screened each of them in, you know, on their own and shot their own footage. And it worked in terms of an entertaining movie. I still like that movie. But it's like, you could see the seams more so. Yeah. I don't, I don't begrudge them. I'm glad they were making films and people got paid. Yep. Exactly. Mm-hmm. So there was some recasting for this movie.

[00:38:46] Obviously, Tobey Maguire didn't come back for whatever reason. And so James Marsden stepped in as Tim. And also, Ariana Greenblatt took over the role of Tabitha, which in the first film was done by Nina Zoe Bakshi. I suspect that was more of an age thing because it was a small, tiny role in the first film. And they wanted someone who's a more practiced voice actor for this movie. And rightly so. It makes sense. This one is not a controversy in my eyes.

[00:39:15] And they wanted someone that could probably sing. Sure. That too. Yeah. I'm assuming that it's the same person. That's right. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So the movie had a budget of $82 million. Domestically, it did $57.3 million. International $89.5 million. For a worldwide total of $146.8 million. But this is pandemic dollars. That's actually not too bad for that time period in particular. Yeah. But it was released simultaneously on the Peacock streaming network.

[00:39:46] And the numbers that they have- What happened to that? Well, it was not a popular streaming network. But this movie was streamed apparently 783,000 times. It always feels like not a lot. Or households, I should say, not times. It still doesn't feel like a lot. It doesn't actually, does it? No. I mean, yeah. I suppose if you say there's four people in each of those houses, you times it by four, you've got 3 million. Yeah. So that's not too bad.

[00:40:12] And if all those 3 million people bought tickets, you're looking at 30 million or 60 million on top. Yeah. So you could extrapolate that to be it was a success. Yeah. I'm sure it did what they probably wanted in that time period where you couldn't really count on anything when they were just like, please someone watch our stuff. No, it's just like we got eyes, yeah, eyes on our service and people signing up to Peacock. That's all they wanted.

[00:40:41] If this had been on Netflix, like, you know, the numbers would have been massive. It would have gone gangbusters. And I'm sure it will find its way to Netflix at some point. Yeah, exactly. So I think that speaks more to the success of the Peacock streaming network than the movie. What was the one that the community season six went on that like destroyed itself after a few months? Was that Google screen? Maybe. I think that's what it was. There's going to be some sort of documentary all these lost streaming services at some point where we've amalgamated all into one.

[00:41:11] We're all back to Netflix again. There was that one that did the Mad About You reboot as well that I was like, what is that? When they announced the name of the network and I still don't know. And it doesn't exist, I don't think. I mean, I only subscribe to Netflix and Prime. I don't have anything else. I've got Disney Plus. I've got Shudder. I've got Apple. I have Apple for free. Okay. So I don't count that. I do pay for Apple.

[00:41:40] Big Ted Lasso fan, are you? No, I've never seen it. But they have a lot of good movies there. Okay. I'm trying to think. I guess that's it for me. I mean, I tend to use Tubi a lot for a lot of Spy Hearts movies actually. Yeah, Free V is our version of Tubi. Yeah. Yeah. That comes in handy but you haven't got to sign up for it. Pluto is another good free one. Right. Yeah. And like Shudder, I wouldn't have.

[00:42:07] I signed up for it to watch some horror movie at some point and then went to cancel it. Then they offered it to me for like $2 a month and I was like, sure. Have you watched it since? Yeah. Oh yeah, definitely. I was trying to see if they've made money off you or not. They probably have but I've watched it enough that I can justify it in my own mind. Yeah, that's fair. And we should note that part one of this film made $528 million worldwide. So, yeah. It was a success but not a phenomenon.

[00:42:36] It was not a billion dollar cracking movie which in that time period was not uncommon for kids movies. Well, it never... I don't think it ever had a chance to really generate some sort of like pop culture phenomena. You think about minions. Yeah. And now you've got like the gentleman minion thing where they all go and dress up as suits and watch the film and stuff. There's a meme culture attached to it. Mm-hmm. So like older generations watch the film. That Boss Baby hasn't got any of that.

[00:43:03] And it didn't seem like it locked into something like say the Madagascar films did that McGrath made. Where it's like kids just want to see animals. They want to see animals on the screen. I don't know that a lot of young kids are as desperate to see babies. I will bite back on that one. You just look at any number of kids TV shows and it's about kids doing stuff. Rugrats go from there.

[00:43:26] Like it is about seeing the world through a kid's eyes and you can put yourself into these, like the bodies of these kids and live their life, their adventures or whatever. But are they putting themselves in the body of a baby? Um, I guess they can understand it. Can they? Like if we're talking about kids, they can understand the life of a baby more than the life of an adult. I don't know that the age of four that I could really relate to a baby. Yeah, but the age of four, I don't think you really had taste in films.

[00:43:57] I did actually. I was watching the original Star Wars at that point, Scott. Oh, Kurosawa only for me, I think you'll find. So this was number 32 for the year between a writer's odyssey, which was a Chinese fantasy adventure and Paw Patrol, the movie, another kids movie. So it actually beat Paw Patrol. So Paw Patrol is pretty popular. So yeah, and that's a, that's a brand. That's a brand. Yeah.

[00:44:24] Um, and the top three for the year. Number one was Spider-Man. No way home. There you go, Scott. There it is. Number two was the battle at Lake Shangjin, which was a Chinese historical war epic. And third place went to High Mom, which was a Chinese time travel comedy. This was a year where it's always going to look a little strange when we look at box office records, because this is where China dominated because their theaters were much healthier than North American ones were. Because there was no COVID in their theaters.

[00:44:53] Exactly. They cured it. They, they cured it. Well, they never had it. True. Hmm. Anything else for us? Uh, well, yes, there's a couple notes. Oh, this movie was not nominated for the animated film Oscar. Unlike the first film. So here are the five films. Okay. And you're going to tell me what one. Am I? And they're an alpha, and they're an alphabetical. So number one, Encanto.

[00:45:22] Number two, Flea. Number three, Luca, the Pixar film. Number four, the Mitchells versus the machines, which was from the company that made Spider-Man, the Spider-Verse films. All right. Okay. Never seen this film, but all right. It's really fun. It's from Lord and Miller who made the Spider-Verse movies and a very, very funny movie. And number five, Disney's Raya and the last dragon. Encanto. Bingo. You got it. That took it.

[00:45:52] Is that the, is that the Bruno film? That's right. Yeah. Yeah. That's the only of those five. It's the only one I've seen. Um, I've seen all except Flea. Luca. I really liked Mitchell's versus the machines is really good. And I thought I've seen Flea. Have you? Um, yeah. The chili peppers were in town a few months ago. Oh, I know where that was going. I was like, even before I asked that question. Oh. Cam's trying to get to higher ground. Oh boy. Yeah.

[00:46:20] Raya and the last dragon's the only one I would say was, it was fine. It was serviceable. Cam wouldn't want to do any more puns. He said, don't stop. The final notes I've got on this movie. I'll be, I'll be hiding under the bridge. During a Twitter Q and a promoting this film. Without those. For many Sedaris. Yeah. When celebrities were on Twitter. Mm-hmm.

[00:46:45] They announced that there were rumblings that a third film was in development. Oh. That announcement was responded to with 65 likes. Oh. that's not the most is it I mean I can put a post up of like Anya Amosova and get 200 likes so yeah 65 likes 17 reposts that's like an average

[00:47:14] spyhards post where no effort goes into it like that is this is announcing a new film that is shocking although not a lot of babies are on Twitter to be fair I think that like the perpetually online crowd is not the audience for Boss Baby 3 there's a little bit of snobbery I'm sure for things like the Boss Baby I would imagine so do you remember when I think it was Rita Ora

[00:47:43] who is an artist who has a little bit of fame at one point in England and did a little bit in America too and she has some number ones here I think certainly high charting songs and she tweeted this post gets 10,000 likes and I'll release my album two weeks early or something like that and it got like barely a couple of hundred and then a few hours later she deleted the tweet and said her account got hacked

[00:48:13] it's like ouch baby very ouch yeah that's rough although again I don't know if DreamWorks was caring that much about the the Twitter crowd response to Boss Baby 3 yeah the letterbox.com uses like oh Boss Baby oh yeah yeah so and Tom McGrath actually in an interview said that he had considered a third film but what he thought would be really interesting would be to do another 25 year time gap

[00:48:43] so this film it's 25 years between young Tim and parent Tim and so he thought it'd be interesting to now jump forward another 25 years so grandparent Tim I guess so yeah so I guess Lisa Kudrow's dead I would say so yes sorry Lisa no payday for you or Jimmy Kimmel yeah I'm fine without that ouch ouch yeah well okay are you ready to Boss? I'm ready to baby

[00:49:14] okay um it's interesting I went into this and the first note I wrote down was I genuinely sighed when I pressed play Scott I have a story about this myself so do you want me to interject it or is there more you want to say? no I have things to say about this film but that feels like it's connected go ahead I think I have my answer for the movie I dreaded watching the most um when we do our year-end wrap-up all right because we talked about the Boss Baby 1 a movie that

[00:49:43] we found positives in it but it was not a movie that filled me with any sort of passion I was like uh yeah okay fine um you know didn't loathe it by any stretch of the imagination but it was just there's some animated films I can watch that I go this is an entertainment for me like some of those nominees Luca I loved watching Luca I thought it was terrific the Boss Baby did not have a similar effect where I could love it as a family film it felt much more like a kid film to me and so

[00:50:13] I was sitting down yesterday morning and I was like okay I've got a couple hours I'm gonna watch the Boss Baby 2 and then maybe go grab lunch and do some other stuff sure and I sat on my couch and then I was like oh hey the Spider-Man trailer's up for a Spider-Man brand new day I watched that and then I was like you know what I'm gonna sit and I actually had the DVD actually playing in my player like not actually the movie playing but like it was on the main menu sure and I was like but hold on I'm gonna start diving down into looking at the Spider-Man stuff

[00:50:43] okay and then I was like you know those dishes need to get done oh boy got up did that and then I came over Scott and I turned off the DVD player and I went and edited some work for SpyHards I did the Patreon episode that needed to be edited for the OSS episode for this for the The Bond Maker episode that's now out I did that and then I went out for lunch oh then I went to the comic book store and bought some Guardians of the Galaxy vintage comics from the 90s

[00:51:13] uh-huh then I went grocery shopping and then I came home and then I sat down to start it again and thought you know what I gotta set up that cable box so I can tape Survivor tonight I recently got a cable box from my uh internet provider uh for part of their package deal and so I sat and I spent the next hour and a half setting up the the uh the uh the box to be able to record Survivor for that night Box baby yep go on and then then I started the Boss Baby 2

[00:51:43] and that was literally the last time you could probably watch it before this review I assume it was basically like I had to watch it in the last couple of hours before my girlfriend got home from work and yes that was it okay see I left mine to the last minute purposefully because I knew I would find things and I would have that exact process but it's nice to know how many steps you went through to get here yeah yeah not easy uh yeah and I don't this is not like bashing the work I will get to the work but it just

[00:52:13] like we saw the reaction online when we put the Boss Baby 1 out we saw the downloads it's not a favorite those of you that have made it this far into the episode your stars congratulations well done for being here um we we did this to ourselves we said we have to cover all the spy movies except Leonard part 6 and so um you know this is we done it to ourselves so we will do this and if it's a bad week for downloads

[00:52:43] not that we really track that it's just the way it is yeah exactly um but we'll try and have fun along the way so strap in so yeah I was a bit hesitant and you know it it's too long it's definitely too long yeah it doesn't really do anything to expand on the first film if anything it takes steps to undo the first film

[00:53:12] and do it again which bugs me but I will say there is sort of a earnestness that I quite like to this film and a little bit of a manic energy at times that I enjoyed in the first film that is still in this film uh it feels like there are some ideas that were interesting that they explored with this and then of course I had that sort of emotional reaction at the end so like ultimately I can't sit here and bad mouth this film too much

[00:53:41] because I felt something whereas I've watched so many of these Spy Hearts films over the years and just left cold nothing like I have notes I can make jokes but I didn't feel anything The Boss Baby 2 actually made me feel something so I have to give it some credit because ultimately like I don't want to get meta about it but what is cinema what is art if not to make you feel something and it did I didn't feel anything uh watching it so I didn't have the emotional

[00:54:11] sort of uh connection to the material um sure I'm trying to think of whether to expand upon your it's too long point or dive into my own thoughts maybe I'll give my own thoughts and then we'll get back to the it's too long part it's a dislike isn't it so we'll come back to the too long yeah yeah so um this one to me actually when it started I was actually getting actively annoyed with it right uh there was elements of it that like I was like this is really annoying me because the idea

[00:54:40] of the first one was it was kind of this ambiguous is this real is this not is this young Tim's imagination yeah you know and so like all the events of the film could fall into the umbrella of well it's like a I don't know how old he was like six year old kid or something like that um you know having his imagination run wild and that's how he creates the relationship with the new brother which I actually thought the some of the loopholes he had to go through in that first film were a lot but I thought like the

[00:55:10] emotional core of that one did work when the two of them actually did bond at the end like I thought it was a really nice ending of the boss baby coming back and becoming part of the family it was sweet I agree um and then when this one starts I'm instantly less um giving in a sense when I'm like it's adult Tim and he's like and I still let my imagination go wild and I'm like okay and I see him playing with his kids great stuff like that's it it's always cool you know it's like the dad who's getting into the fantasy stuff with the kids that's great

[00:55:39] um but suddenly it was the reunion he had with Wizzy the wizard clock from the first film and I'm like so is this man losing his grip on reality oh okay I didn't come at it this way go on then I'm going well this is getting really frustrating because the first film makes sense because it is like the imagination of a small child you know we see that slow motion big action sequence in the backyard and the cars jumping over

[00:56:09] each other and stuff and then with the parents see right yeah in the first movie and then we get to this movie and I'm like is this all the fever dream of like a 35 year old man is it is it a midlife crisis it was my third note it's worse than a midlife crisis this is someone who's like basically in a straight jacket in a mental asylum because like people can't even figure out where he is he's like vanished his wife is like oh he's out again okay and I'm like is Tim running madly around the backyard

[00:56:39] by himself talking to himself I never looked at the film this way but I guess it really could just be like oh Tim being Tim again he's going on one of his walks he'll be back in a few days he'll be fine he's screaming at a lamppost again that's just him it's how I met Cam funnily so then I'm going if the concept of the original if I'm supposed to completely lose that

[00:57:09] and just say okay no all this was real well then that sort of colors the first film in a weird way kind of removes I that definitely taxed me at the run length you were referring

[00:57:39] to but it's like if you're going to at least have that balancing act I go well that's interesting from a storytelling perspective and this one I have no idea what any of it meant which was frustrating and yes there's the odd joke thrown in for adults when he says let's pull a Shawshank and escape the kids play room I'm like I get that reference I've seen that film yeah the one that made me laugh more so was when he referred to the young kid that had the sign for unionizing and he

[00:58:09] said sit down Norma Ray I was like I'm old enough to get that one I felt like that was a joke you would get I didn't get it yeah it was very good movie but that kind of made me snicker a little bit but overall like this movie I this is a positive I think like it

[00:58:39] frustrated me up front and I began to go like oh my god am I in like retread territory without the imagination is that where I'm going yeah piece and we get like kind of the body horror stuff of the baby in a human robot suit and the big battle for the sensor and the idea of a heist like setting up

[00:59:09] a heist and then going through that classic film template of here's what the heist is now we watch how it really plays out yeah you've seen it before in like oceans 11 and stuff like that or this isn't just let's just phone it in like there is effort like heist movies are really tough to put together famously and so it felt like they were going the extra amount to try

[00:59:39] to pull something off I don't know that it was like gangbusters to me I was not screaming this is the new oceans 11 but I it does some interesting things with ambition with kind of taking the premise and expanding upon it but it was an experience I found often very

[01:00:08] taxing and it really does fall down to I have an adult attention span and this movie is often playing at a kid's attention span but for a very long time which can be quite draining if the message isn't for you you're a brother you can understand sibling dynamics but it didn't speak to you particularly that's absolutely fine

[01:00:38] and I don't think my experience was meant to be the typical experience I think mine is quite an interesting take on it because I have some context but I just sit there and think about the average whenever we talk about kids films I try and experience it as just a viewer and I get my experience for that but then I try and think about the film as a parent in a cinema with a kid watching it is this a bearable experience for someone who

[01:01:08] has no maybe they haven't even seen the first film or they have seen it a thousand times maybe because these things get played to death what is that experience like and I

[01:01:41] was thinking about this because I saw the Pixar movie Hoppers a day before watching this which I really enjoyed a lot I thought it was really funny really smart but I watching it was thinking like I wonder if little kids would get lost in this because it is kind of complicated from a plot perspective right and you're right we often think well I'm a 45 year old man what do I think of the boss baby too but I do try to think about what would I think as a kid and

[01:02:12] I think for me when I look back at Disney movies at that time period the ones I grew up on they were typically about 75 minutes long I had 80 minutes in my and then when you get to the Disney renaissance and you get stuff like Beauty and the Beast Aladdin etc

[01:02:41] those are about 90 minutes never at any point in my young life watching these movies that I treasured did I ever think these are too short these are way too brief they don't feel like they're telling a whole story it they were perfectly paced for the stories they were telling and they gave you a sense of grandeur even if they were only bite sized stories in a sense being so short this movie what the hell were they thinking with a movie that's almost two hours

[01:03:11] long to me this is like kind of unforgivable because look at a child's attention span parents struggle to get kids to sit through half since both of our childhoods which were at different ages to be fair but you were born in 80 I think it was you had time in

[01:03:56] it just feels and I think part of this and I wrote this as a theory as to why they did this because I was trying to get to the bottom of it I feel like they only wanted to come back so Tom McGrath and the team if there was a message and there's quite clearly not only the brother message in but there is

[01:04:26] something they're trying to get at and I feel like they've added in the brother stuff they've added in the people brainwashed by their phones and they've just got lost in it they think they're from the

[01:04:55] first there was moments where you just look at the faces of the characters and you could just see it was like oh this isn't the fully refined animation that we're used to you got the B team here it felt like that at times I would like notice more so some of the animation during the chase sequence on the road where I go okay well a lot of their efforts being put into this and this had some kind of like fun little comedy moments throughout it it was manic but when you get to the big set piece at the end it feels like

[01:05:25] that's where the animation attention is going but there was a lot of faces that looked kind of like when you go back and watch Toy Story the original which again great film 80 minutes long but you look at the animation of those characters faces now and you doing the baby voice is not matching what the mouth is moving right

[01:05:55] there's words coming out where the mouth is either closed or a completely different shape to what that word would be I'm not saying it last stand thank you that's got like three stories and it's because it's about

[01:06:25] three different plots all woven into one and the film suffered for it and I would pitch I would assert I would presume that part of this reason is because you've got filmmakers here that perhaps want to do something that isn't a kids film but are stuck in the realm of doing kids films yeah well it's it was interesting to me because I didn't realize this when we did the first one that Tom McGrath doesn't actually have kids of his own and has been making

[01:06:55] boss baby movies and is tying them to his own personal adult relationships in couple decades I actually haven't seen the sequel I don't think I need to I like the sequel it's not quite on par

[01:07:25] but I think it did tackle things like anxiety very well maybe I'll put it on my to do list but the first one was a revelation for me I don't really like animated films but that one really hit a nerve and yeah you can talk about big ideas in a I feel like they got lost in their own story of what they were trying to say instead of just making it a fun film you can do that in 90 minutes

[01:07:54] do you think you would have enjoyed this when you whether it's into the spider verse or across the spider verse those would have been mind blowing to me as a kid oh

[01:08:24] yeah I'm sure because it had a character I knew like spider so that probably would have been fine but yeah and I liked I have to say I did like a lot of Nick tunes and I did like things like the Batman animated series and Spider Man the animated series and X-Men I liked all this sort of stuff and I keep going back to X-Men but yeah I don't think this would have stood out to me too much as a kid yeah and I you know going back to that length thing it was interesting in that note that he said Amy Sedaris led to the

[01:08:54] expansion of the Tina character and it really did feel like there was sometimes you got to kill your darlings when it comes to writing and especially with a kid's film where you want things to be I think fairly concise and move at a decent pace and this movie is crazy in that you'll watch a sequence that

[01:09:30] halfway through this movie I feel like I've just watched like seven movies I had a similar experience at the exact same time it is a bit nutty and I

[01:10:00] editor could chop out 10 15 minutes of this pretty easily I think there's a lot of refining that needed to be done yeah and I also actually let's save that I've got some notes about dislikes we'll get there but let's celebrate the bits that we

[01:10:30] and I think it's also perhaps the failing of this film is that's a very specific message whereas a sibling having a younger sibling and that fear of getting replaced is a far more generalized feeling than the one they're trying to evoke with this

[01:11:00] or siblings no because you can't see on his part that it connected

[01:11:30] with you at least as an adult but I think the problem is that's probably a rare experience with this film because it's just not as generalized a feeling not everyone has brothers and not everyone has disconnected from their brothers so you're just ratioing down to small amounts of people but it did work for me and I was surprised I got to the end and I didn't start weeping but I got a little emotional

[01:12:00] I wept when I hit play it's funny but I did I felt something that stirred something in me I watch a lot of films and often times I just go okay yeah that's fair I was meant to evoke certain feelings didn't get anything at all I talked about the English patient yes yeah

[01:12:29] okay yeah right just I just hated everyone in English patient I wasn't very patient for being English but let me pivot into something else that I like we is Alec Baldwin yeah I never seen him put in a particularly bad performance even in quite bad films

[01:12:59] so you're going to get a good Alec Baldwin performance and he is funny as the baby yeah enjoyable and some of the other cast they don't jump off the page Lisa Kudrow is just kind of there James Marsden is fun I would say Amy Sedara drains me a bit I don't really find a particular form of comedy that funny her saying daddy a lot does disturb me but are you familiar with her

[01:13:46] like the mandalorian and I just shrug my shoulders at that that's what I know her best from I think I've never watched strangers with candy nor I I

[01:14:16] mean you talk about reading the phone book I would happily listen to Jeff Goldblum read the phone book because it would be a delivery that no one else would ever even think to approach it with only if he did it as his character from the fly the Brundle fly yeah that would be interesting but yeah I think he was an inspired choice and I think he gave a little bit of energy to that villain that I have some other notes about yeah and I actually thought his final moment in the movie was actually really

[01:14:45] quite sentimental yeah it was that actually worked a little more so where it on one hand it definitely strains credulity in terms

[01:15:15] of being a real world at all but I thought it was a very nice little moment and I think ultimately we all long to go home there's that safety and warmth of youth that you think back to and I like to think that he found that again that's quite nice but what about you Cam is there any particular likes you want to shout out Goldblum was going to be my big one I will say like some of the heist stuff I thought was actually really

[01:15:45] well put together and it days and so the fact it was having fun with that I thought was a smart observation the fact they used that as the way to

[01:16:35] her father won't be to see it so it was actually I think a really good juggling of a heist sort of ending with emotional stakes for a character where you actually do care because you realize how important this is to Tabitha Tim is very you know he

[01:17:05] in a shorter film because i think if you built up to that in like a 90 minute movie it could have played like gangbusters versus me being kind of exhausted at that point yeah but i give them points for pulling it off because i actually do think it was pretty effective no i agree i think the last sort of half hour of this is is actually pretty good it's the middle second act really that just bogs it down um but yeah and i think we can all put ourselves into that sort of performance

[01:17:33] anxiety issue for singing i mean me and you have both been on stage multiple times in different formats different things podcasting together other stuff music for me um and that it's quite terrifying yeah totally so i thought it tapped into something that maybe might be relatable to kids watching the movie like they may not be able to understand the estranged older brothers uh like

[01:17:58] you know middle-aged brothers but like the idea of being a kid in a you know on stage in school is something that's maybe a little more universal that i think works um yeah the other like i had though uh was some of the 80s stuff um is obviously an attempt to kind of pander to the parents who are bringing their kids to this movie but when they're having like skeletor show up throughout this movie

[01:18:23] and he-man's arm and sword yeah yeah and you've got the backdrop of the castle gray skull play set which i had as a you know four-year-old kid or five-year-old kid uh that sort of stuff i go you know what shame on you for pandering to me in this way but at the same time i am nostalgic for that castle gray skull play set right now you should go pick one up i think uh i don't have the space for

[01:18:48] it i i have had those weak moments usually around like one in the morning where you go like what would happen if i like got all of my original action figures back and then you realize like how much that would cost nowadays because those ninja turtles figures or he-man figures that i collected as a kid that i loved are now just enough money that if i were to start buying like all of them back i'd be looking at like hundreds and hundreds of dollars would you be buying them like in the box

[01:19:16] though are you happy to buy used ones uh i would probably buy used i i would not be buying packaged um but at the same time even then the costs are pretty high okay especially if you're looking at ebay i did once have a weak moment though i collected the dick tracy figures when i was a kid i had almost all of them except for the blank figure which was only released in limited quantities and costed you about a thousand dollars to get one now uh but uh i had all of them and i really love those figures

[01:19:45] i love that warren beatty film and um someone on uh i think it was craigslist was obviously like getting rid of stuff in their attic and was getting rid of all the figures for about 25 dollars oh so i bought it i took a train like it was probably like a 45 minute commute to get them but it was like this woman showed up who's like probably like 75 years old it was clear that like you know her older son was out of the house and long gone and she was just selling stuff off

[01:20:12] getting rid of it and uh i think she was maybe surprised when she saw my agent be showing up to get them but uh you know she happily handed them over to me and i i do have them but the thing was there was only i think like 10 figures so it doesn't take up a lot of space oh okay i i mean i i definitely couldn't recreate the collection i had as a kid yeah i had the biggest collection i had was

[01:20:35] basically most of the 90s playmates star trek line from figures to vehicles yeah yeah to play sets uh i had most of it i definitely couldn't do some of that now i mean i had the odd bit um and a couple of ships but yeah i i and i've been to enough conventions with you to know that it's not feasible no and also at this point too much of your space is taken up with your boss baby action

[01:21:02] figure collection so we interrupt this program to bring you a special report agents where are you why do you hide follow that patreon trail and make spy hearts your guide that's right from spy tv reviews covering the antics of george smiley jack bauer and the slow horses to reviews of non-spy movies from your favorite spy actors there's no more secrets over on our patreon but cam

[01:21:31] tell the listeners about this week's top secret broadcast scott i am glad you asked because in april we had a great time over on the patreon on the agents in the field series it was animated april so we took a look at the prince of egypt and also spider-man into the spider-verse and then over on on the small screen we took a look at black doves season one we had a ton of fun we think you will too

[01:21:56] so check it out so tar tune your dial to patreon.com slash spy hearts and spice up your podcast feed but before knickknack runs out of tabasco resume the spy jinx well dislikes we've already spoken about a lot of them so this is gonna be very quick and rattled through i'm just gonna jump off i feel like the villain is not fleshed out at all hmm i do not know exactly why he wants to destroy all adults apart

[01:22:26] from the fact that his adults were mean to him i don't know if it was that they were mean to him so much as like they were i think there was something they were trying to also like dive into again they were diving into too many concepts it's almost like they were like we're never gonna get another boss baby movie so let's come up with every idea we can throw all the ideas we're all them all in there because there's also the idea of like these parents who are putting their kids through intense academic challenges at a very young age which is a common thing nowadays i know people that have done this

[01:22:54] which which mirrors the kid as well yeah exactly yeah and the idea is that like by doing this they've created a child who no longer needs them because now he academically is far beyond them so like there is a kernel of idea there but it's a lot of kernels going on this is a lot of popcorn overflowing out of a bucket here there's a lot of kfc metaphor that's right yeah yeah no and i agree i think it is

[01:23:20] too much on top of each other but you know you've got jeff goldblum's performance and that was razzle dazzle most people that you don't think about the villain but at some point i just sort of stopped and thought why is he doing this yeah there's he went to a lot of he built a school to do this he had babies building apps to do this there is a deep-seated hatred for adults that is very easily forgotten

[01:23:47] at the end of this film yeah like as much as i like that moment at the end of him reconnecting with them there's not a moment of him learning and the it's pretty easy to do pretty easy to do you have him witness uh tim and the boss baby going back into adult form and reconnecting with tabitha and you see have him witness that what you want to add more stuff to this film well i'm saying that

[01:24:14] like you need to have him realize that the real love that exists between the parents and the child and that that's what he doesn't have in his life and that's why you get him going back at the end again you've got to go back there's a lot of script problems in this movie you got to go back and scrap a lot of it and refine it and have it much more focused can we just agree that you just scrap amy sadaris didn't they set that up at the end of the first movie were they stuck with it well they had a

[01:24:44] whole tv show in between that's true and i was i was actually quite worried going into this about boss baby law there was the part at the start where they acknowledged like the mayor and the three triplets and i was like i have no idea who those characters were well the mayor was a was a big thug from the first one i don't remember the triplet so the like the baby was the big thug yeah

[01:25:07] was that the main villain was that steve usemi no no no no no it was one of the babies that was working with alec baldwin's baby uh and i think got turned against him in the end but he was a big baby in a diaper oh like with massive broad shoulders and stuff that was the same character yeah as the mayor in this movie yeah okay okay i think that's and i think there are actually was triplets so i think that no i think it's just referencing the first film but there you go

[01:25:37] worrying about boss baby law and if anything we're always worried and concerned about boss baby law here on spy hearts podcast if they make a third film can you imagine the uh connections they'll be making back to the first film that will be completely lost i i can't wait uh you know you think of all these accredited authors who write about james bond and mission impossible all these books that get published should we be the first boss baby book publishers nope nope okay yeah fine moving on um

[01:26:06] did you have a dislike cam uh wizzy uh that was a real disappointment i actually thought wizzy was pretty funny in the first movie yeah please stop doing that on me ah and that's us baby cam wizzy wizzy no cam go to the bathroom stop that character to me was never funny in this movie he was actually quite irritating i feel like he was used just about enough if i had more wizzy it would be annoying but i think he's only in a few scenes i

[01:26:35] don't think that really ground me down i i do laugh about like the whole toy being discarded thing feels like toy story 4 and then you've got like the ipad at one point and i'm like that's toy story 5 yeah the frog ipad yeah which i had to pause the movie and look into whether those are a real thing because i was like wait a second is toy story 5 ripping off the boss baby 2

[01:27:00] and they actually first they actually are a thing uh it's like i think it's called like leap pad or something like that yes it is yes now you've said it out loud leap pad is a is a baby ipad or baby pad yeah i wasn't aware of those when neither of us have had babies boss that's right that's right not yet not yet i don't think i'd give my baby a leap pad i don't think so see the problem is and this is what i've witnessed from having siblings who have kids and friends who

[01:27:29] have kids etc etc is that unless you put your phone down and never experience and never sort of show yourself using the phone to your baby they will want to do what the adult does which is play on a phone yeah now you could get them a light up thing for a little while but once they get to about four or five and they can understand language they're going to know they're being lied to they want to

[01:27:53] actually interact with something so it's it's very hard to escape yeah my my wife is a godmother to a couple of kids and you know quite a well-off family um very intelligent children gone to very good schools i go around every time and they're still glued to their ipads yeah despite them having very high reading levels and stuff like i think it's just a thing that kids do now yeah well i mean it's

[01:28:18] like i look back at you know me playing video games right like i was obsessed with nintendo sure and it's probably no different like when you are a kid your attention span can lock into video games in a way that you can't as an adult and it would be the same for you know an ipad i i will jump on my high horse a little bit though oh people listening people watching the video on youtube if you're watching on youtube leave a like subscribe if you're listening leave a five-star review if you've got this

[01:28:47] far in the boss baby episode and you haven't left us a review somewhere what are you doing because you are the purest of spy hearts fans no kidding congratulations i i i bow to you sirs and madams but um i'm all for kids using an ipad from time to time it's not a problem because it's just like gaming is it you know they're playing their nintendo they're playing their playstation whatever it's the same it's the same thing uh what i do have an issue with is parents

[01:29:14] that let their kid play on their ipad when they're out to dinner or something like that or on a train or on a plane or at the cinema and they have the fucking sound on i just what grinds my gears this week it's that do you remember that time we were at the star trek convention and that mother had brought her like two-year-old or something to the convention which is very selfish i gotta say but also gave the kid like an ipad with the volume turned up playing games

[01:29:44] yeah and the problem is like they the kid wants the sound because it's you know yeah it's the sound yeah but you've just gotta build boundaries for things or buy them headphones or don't come to a star trek convention with a young kid sure if they've not got the attention span to be able to sit through a uh walter koenig one hour interview then then they do not belong at a star trek convention although to be fair if you were to look around that room you'd see a lot of people look at their

[01:30:14] phones a lot of people look at their phones a lot of people very close to the grave too boss grandpas uh okay well let's get to final notes i have a couple of little interesting notes i picked up um and little funny things i saw along the way uh i did i did laugh at baby seals instead of navy seals oh that was good yeah yeah yeah good good little joke um

[01:30:41] did you catch the uh little tone that was played on the xylophone no i didn't so at one point amy sadaris's uh baby was it judith uh uh tina tina i'm sorry tina uh gets the attention of the room by playing a xylophone the tone that she plays is the nbc tone oh peacock

[01:31:04] network okay yeah yeah got it got it um did you see the star trek reference and this is one of the first times it's actually been an overt star trek reference in a spy movie so we're not talking out of place here folks are you talking about when he was wearing like the blue shirt with the yellow insignia on his chest he was doing science class and he was standing on the bridge of the enterprise if he looked the the classroom became the bridge of the original series enterprise yeah yeah that was

[01:31:31] cool yeah i don't has star trek ever been on nbc i think it was originally in the 60s i believe so yeah yeah yeah it had the peacock logo so yeah there you go nice connection uh cbs now though of course for all its faults uh cam do you have anything to add um i had a couple things at one point when they are in that madcap chase they crash through a movie theater and on the theater screen

[01:31:56] someone is sitting there by themselves watching spirit the 2002 animated horse film which i've never seen but also got a sequel shortly after this time period i think or maybe before was it called spirited away uh well spirit was a horse film so if anything it would be one of the films on our master list for horse hearts if we were to tackle and of course there was a horse called precious in

[01:32:20] this film so horse hearts collectors you can add that one to your uh wait what's a group of horses called i was gonna say flock but that's sheep uh herd herd is it a herd or is that a cow oh my god have we just lost our horse heart credentials yeah uh i oh boy you google that scott while i name another like oh no i couldn't help but notice that the um that this was a movie where the spies went rogue

[01:32:49] we haven't talked a lot about the spy stuff but they had a point where they couldn't uh work with the uh the baby company and had to go rogue that was kind of fun to hear mentions of that in a movie with alec baldwin who's in the mission impossible films of course with plenty of rogue uh activity going on including rogue nation uh which is just recent on the main feed so there was that um i thought the

[01:33:13] scary kid like the really weird like girl that would pop up was actually pretty funny quite unsettling yeah it was pretty funny and there's the part where it's like a horror movie where she keeps vanishing in a hallway with the ninjas uh i thought that was actually legit funny and when she would just show up randomly on the horse with them at the end or something yeah that got a laugh out of me and uh just to bring the horse of it all home uh it is indeed a herd of horses thank god sometimes it's also

[01:33:43] called a band of horses oh okay okay um sure yeah so don't worry google saved us although to be fair you'll probably air the whole thing where we look like idiots true true um a couple other notes i had this is a christmas film it ends on christmas and i thought well there goes one of our spy christmas movies without us realizing it's a christmas movie i mean to be fair we did that pretty early on we did like three days of the condor yeah like the first couple of months and that was a christmas movie

[01:34:11] yeah maybe we just revisit them after a while like i i'm pretty sure like month two spy hearts is not doing three days of the condor justice i don't think we'll go back to this being a future christmas movie though i can't promise that at all no um i did also notice that this cast has a lot of similarity to the cast of cats and dogs did you pick up on that okay yeah alec baldwin uh well you had

[01:34:37] toby mcguire in the first one not in this one sure well ali bullman toby mcguire jeff goldblum yeah i think there was one more i can't remember i didn't write it down um that does pop up but yeah it's it's interesting that there is some uh cats and dogs boss baby crossover and the people who finished the cats and dogs episodes are also the spyhards diehards so thank you all for being here the musical number in this movie was much better than the one in cats and dogs 3 i thought it was

[01:35:07] pretty good yeah it was pretty good um speaking of music i had one final note this movie has a lot of needle drops that's that was dude let's take a minute cam that was a good a good segue and a good pun well done it was it was thank you i was good credit where it's due yes uh so this had like needle drops for salt and pepper's push it it had tricky it had the sail away song i think it's by

[01:35:34] enya i think which that song yes it's tough to use that for me now after having seen it in the girl with the dragon tattoo like that movie kind of owns that song in my mind now but uh what happens with that in the film it's where like the killer i don't know if i don't know if i want to spoil it for people haven't seen the movie but uh the killer is the way that they're punished uh you know what i mean yeah he captures someone and he's playing it as he's gonna as he's describing what he does and what he's

[01:36:01] going to do oh okay that's not what i was thinking of yeah uh and uh that scene is like mesmerizing of course it's david fincher but uh when i hear that song now in like the boss baby 2 i'm like this is adding a level of uncomfortableness that i don't like i if you've got that context see this film the enjoyment factor is all to do with context yeah it's all to do with emotional connection i had an

[01:36:27] emotional brother connection you've got an emotional enya connection that's right but what did you think of the needle drops because you know they're just there to make the middle-aged audience of adults in the theater jump i think i'm just sort of numb to them now me too i think after the gardens of the galaxy one two and three you just there is no way you can do this anymore um or like baby driver it's probably one of the non-guardian ones that does it quite well

[01:36:52] um but even like a a future uh who did baby driver i'm forgetting their name now edgar wright edgar wright the next film i think it was um oh last night in soho lots of needle drops in that and i don't think half of them work yeah and it's like when i go to kids movies like shrek was like really getting a lot of attention for using them back in the day and that's in like the start of the 2000s and i remember by the point they were doing i think in the sequel maybe the third one where they

[01:37:20] had the princesses doing uh immigrant song it was like uh-huh okay sure like no one was impressed and at this point in 2021 when this movie's coming out i was even less impressed that's fair and i think the only other note i've got is um i didn't originally know that the voice actor had changed for tim i didn't really note that difference and in my in my notes i wrote down uh toby mcguire

[01:37:45] getting with eva longori you've got to be kidding me that's never gonna happen and then i look and see it's james martin i'm like okay that that tracks that does that does yeah very pretty people unlike us well it's time for

[01:38:11] that's right folks the notclist the need to see official classics of the spy hearts canon we mentioned films like three days of the condor in this discussion that's made the list yeah it did it did indeed did the boss baby one cap it did not but who knows maybe the boss baby christmas special will make the boss list over on oss oh oh and of course you've already jumped past back in business

[01:38:37] so i'm going to assume your answer but cam is boss baby two back in business making the knock list for you a movie clearly so memorable you don't even know the title of the movie uh i would say that family business is not making the uh the knock list um back in business is of course the tv series uh but i can understand why you would mix them up wait are you serious i in my notes i've written down

[01:39:03] boss babe i'm showing this up to the camera back in business nope it's family business oh i'm so sorry that's a genuine mistake on my part i wow okay uh i i'll take that i'll take that l as the kids like to say okay no uh family business is getting nowhere close to the knock list but it's definitely not back in business it is definitely not back in business it's gone bankrupt there's an out of

[01:39:28] business sign in the window the owner is living poor out the back but i will say this this is not a disavowed candidate in my mind uh it's it is what it is uh it's a kids movie that i did not connect with and that i do not think is made at the level that examples that would make the knock list

[01:39:50] are at uh but there are i'm sure that any parent out there will easily point out the names of horrible horrible animated movies and tv series that they are subjected to on netflix and various other streamers that their kids watch like the real bargain basement stuff yeah for sure um it's a not belabor the point because we've got an hour and a half on this film it's a note from me too i

[01:40:16] think the last hour and a half just spelled out why two no's and as such boss baby family business is not making the knock list a dossier on the film is complete and filed as classified and that could be our last time with the boss baby on the main feed okay if you are a gambling man will there be a third film i am a gambling man and i think there will be i think it might be straight to streaming though

[01:40:44] yeah i actually am questioning that because it's like if the tv is a lot of things after watching this i understand well the tv series is no longer running i mean it's out there for people to watch if they want on netflix but like it's not like it's there's this factory cranking out boss baby stuff anymore and this movie didn't perform hugely pandemic i know but like it's not like it was

[01:41:10] a lot of people i don't think know this movie exists and so that's why i'm really questioning whether they're willing to put enough money into a third film to get alec baldwin back and various other people and to still make it like this one was 83 million which is pretty low for an animated film i feel like but uh i just i will be curious whether they're willing to roll the dice on a third one well you never know what the future may hold there could be more boss baby for you all to tuck into

[01:41:36] one hopes that isn't the case but moving on to bigger and brighter things cam perhaps a shiny jewel of some sort what are we talking about next week next time we are reuniting with alfred hitchcock for one of his last films it's in the last little group of movies he made before his passing

[01:42:00] we are going to take a look at 1969's topaz a movie that's quite polarizing among spy fans and also hitchcock fans and uh i think if we can get our schedule sorted we'll have a returning guest for that one who may or may not have asked to come on to talk about this film so you don't know if we have a fan or not you'll find out next week that's right uh your mission folks should you choose to

[01:42:27] accept it is to join us next time as we take a look at 1969's alfred hitchcock film topaz is it the crown jewel and alfred hitchcock spy movie filmography we'll find out next week you can bet your bottom dollar on that if you haven't already make sure you are following us on social media at spyhards s-p-y-h-a-r-d-s wherever you get your social media we've been very popular on facebook and instagram recently we've got a bunch of new followers maybe they're checking out the

[01:42:57] podcast hello a weird time to jump on board but welcome and that they're listening to the end of the boss baby 2 episode to hear the shout out that's awesome yeah you are you are the shining you are the topaz you are diamond you are the emeralds of our lives thank you for following us and enjoying the show i hope you enjoyed this review uh follow us online and if you want more spyhards if you if you

[01:43:23] thought boss baby 2 was not enough you've got a fever and the only prescription is more spyhards well we can give you that prescription we can give you that medicine come over to patreon.com slash spyhards sign up on one of our many levels of patronage get a bunch of bonus episodes and help keep the lights on here keep cam and i stocked up on baby formula that's right and as we mentioned

[01:43:50] earlier lots of x-men stuff if you want some james marsden representation over on the patreon so lots there and and cam of course likes to dress up like an adult baby and those adult diapers are not cheap they are not sir they are not they are not uh join us over on patreon patreon.com slash spyhards we hope to see you there but until next time folks if you've made it this far and you've been paying

[01:44:17] attention don't forget we are going to be talking about the boss baby tv show at christmas unless you give us another idea we're begging you please give us another idea this podcast is part of podomity

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