Episode 97: Transcript
Episode 97: The internet is still weird, with Vinny Thomas
Transcription by Keffy
Annalee: [00:00:00] Welcome to Our Opinions Are Correct, a podcast about science fiction, science and the universe. I'm Annalee Newitz. I'm a science journalist who writes science fiction and my most recent book is about archaeology. It's called Four Lost Cities: A Secret History of the Urban Age.
Charlie Jane: [00:00:18] I'm Charlie Jane Anders. I'm a science fiction writer and I have three books out now. One is a young adult space fantasy epic called Victories Greater Than Death. Another is a how to writing book for surviving Hard Times called Never Say You Can't Survive. And finally I just published a short story collection called Even Greater Mistakes.
Annalee: [00:00:41] So things are pretty dark and dystopian out there. Which is why this week we are looking at the world exclusively through sparklevision.
Charlie Jane: [00:00:48] Yay.
Annalee: [00:00:48] We're exploring the future of comedy with one of our favorite comedians, Vinny Thomas, whose videos on Twitter have introduced us to characters like the poor bureaucrat at Starfleet who has to interview humans about their sad little request to join the Federation, and to the true opinions of the female condor who just hatched some babies without ever mating with a male. Yeah, that actually happened, by the way, so look it up.
[00:01:12] So we'll be talking about social media comedy, what makes science funny, and then we'll ask Vinny some important questions about the future of our civilization.
[00:01:22] Also, on our audio extra next week, we'll be talking about what happens when science fiction parodies go bad. By the way, did you know that this podcast is entirely supported by listeners like you? If you join us on Patreon and become a patron, you get an audio extra with every episode! Plus, you get essays and reviews and access to our Discord channel where we hang out all the time, Charlie Jane, right?
Charlie Jane: [00:01:48] We do, we do.
Annalee: [00:01:51] We're in there. We're like talking about toothpaste and the future of teeth. It's amazing and it can all be yours for just a few bucks a month. And any money you chip in helps to make our opinions continue to be mostly correct. So find us on Patreon at Our Opinions Are Correct. And now here's the show.
[00:02:13] OOAC theme music plays: Drums with a bass drop and more science fictional bells and percussion.
Annalee: [00:02:40] So we're talking to Vinny Thomas, an amazing comedian. He's performed in Second City. He's a writer for NPR’s “Wait, wait, don't tell me.” He's done a bunch of improv, and he's probably best known to many of us from pandemic times as having done incredible videos on Twitter and Instagram that have been brightening our favorite hell sites for the past couple of years. So welcome, Vinny.
Vinny: [00:03:04] Oh my gosh, thank you so much for having me. This is incredible.
Annalee: [00:03:06] Isn't it? Isn't it great, this resplendent virtual studio that we're all in?
Vinny: [00:03:12] Oh, yeah, I can feel the Hugo Award winning just emanating.
All: [00:03:16] [Laugh]
Charlie Jane: [00:03:18] Every surface is just a rocket.
Annalee: [00:03:19] Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:03:19] It’s just like we’re sitting on rocket chairs.
Annalee: [00:03:21] Every surface is being penetrated by pointy silver rockets.
Charlie Jane: [00:03:26] Exactly.
Annalee: [00:03:25] So I wanted to start by asking you about just the process of doing comedy. So how do you pick a topic to satirize? Like, what makes a science story or science fiction story funny to you?
Vinny: [00:03:40] Oh, boy. Well, I think science fiction is always at its funniest when it's like, a human bureaucracy.
Charlie Jane: [00:03:48] Mm hmm.
Annalee: [00:03:48] Yes.
Vinny: [00:03:48] Like in some fantastic, limitless context, right? So, Star Trek is great and I love Star Trek. But a lot of it is very funny, because it's still like a corporation. You know, it's like this human business in space. They have their cute little uniforms. And when you're in it, it's great. But sometimes you take a step away, and you're like, “Wow, this is objectively funny and ridiculous.” So yeah, I think science story, science and science fiction are both funniest when you think about, like, applying it to a human context, or like applying a human context to that. Does that make sense? Or have I just said context too much?
Charlie Jane: [00:04:30] I feel like there’s a context clue in there somewhere, I don’t know.
Annalee: [00:04:31] Yeah, I don’t know. We need more context for the context. I know what you mean, because I feel like, especially things like Star Trek, where we do get this glimpse of a kind of, it's like a corporation, it's like the military and they're kind of off in the background, doing a bunch of stuff and we barely ever meet them.
Vinny: [00:04:49] Yeah, you don't really know who they are. You know there's a beep every now and then coming from the back.
Charlie Jane: [00:04:56] Yeah. So one of things I love about your videos that you post is that you’ll kind of create these characters who are like, you know, like, my favorite video of yours is the one where the person is kind of interviewing us to see if we can join the Galactic Federation.
Vinny Vid Clip: [00:05:08] How fast are your teleporters? No teleporters. Flying cars? No. A high speed train that goes around the planet? No, you don't have that either. Okay. What about? Does everyone have health care? Is there enough food to go around? It looks like some people are starving. You do have enough food. Then why isn't it? Logistics? You want me to write logistics? Okay. Starving because of logistics.
Charlie Jane: [00:05:39] How do you go about creating a character that is going to work for a one minute or two minute video like that? And where do you use that start from?
Vinny: [00:05:48] Well, let me tell you, I'm a I'm a born rambler. And I don't mean that in a cool way. I mean it in that I will just talk and not shut up. So like, whenever I make a video, it is usually I'll just sit down for five minutes and think about how that character sounds or how they act. And then I'll just talk for five minutes straight, and then I'll just cut it down.
Annalee: [00:06:11] So there's a lot of editing.
Vinny: [00:06:14] There is.
Annalee: [00:06:13] And is it all improvised? Or do you like, jot down some ideas first or what?
Vinny: [00:06:17] Oh, it's all improvised, buddy. Sometimes I’ll… if while I'm prattling on, I hit upon something that I think is like a gold nugget, I'll go back and do it again. But I never write things down and read them off of a script. And I think part of that's just because my eyes are huge. And you'd notice.
Annalee: [00:06:41] How do you pick an accent for one of these characters? Do you have like a set of accents that are your like, go to accents?
Vinny: [00:06:47] Yeah, I think anyone who does a lot of sketch or improv, and is more character-y definitely has a stock. And my stock includes like, Southern waif. And, yeah, I just got my solid go tos that I usually lean on heavily. Sometimes when I want to challenge myself, I'll try something new. But it doesn't always pan out as well. I think even with, did you guys see the fly video? I did a video where I was a fly.
Vinny Fly Vid: [00:07:20] It looks like I found my way in, but I cannot find my way out. Oh, it's too hard. There is no way to live. I will just sit on fruit and rub my hands together like this. And rub my hands together like this. And when you get close, I run away. I fly fly away. But you will never catch me.
Vinny: [00:07:44] I didn't do the Italian voice for that one originally. I cycled through a few and it didn't sound good until the fly was Italian. So sometimes the voice has to kind of suit whatever the character is and I don't know until I try it.
Annalee: [00:07:58] Mm hmm. So flies just struck you as particularly Italian.
Vinny: [00:08:02] They are particularly Italian. They're gregarious and a little irritating.
Annalee: [00:08:08] Yeah, I really loved the cow video that you did.
Vinny: [00:08:11] Oh my god, what are you drinking? Are you just drinking a glass of my milk? Like with nothing in it, just a plain glass of cow's milk? Now I'm not being judgmental. It's just like, you know, it's for babies, like little babies?
Annalee: [00:08:27] And I felt like that was… like the cow was just like some kind of Zoomer, you know, just like really skeptical. Like, what? You're just… why are you drinking that milk? What? What’s wrong with you?
Vinny: [00:08:39] Milk is such a freaky concept.
Charlie Jane: [00:08:41] It really is, oh, my gosh.
Vinny: [00:08:43] Milk is a science fiction thing in and of itself. Like what a weird evolutionary route that we've taken, where we domesticate this creature just to drink from it. Like, how strange.
Annalee: [00:08:57] It's really disturbing. Yeah, I just finished a science fiction novel that I am about to turn in next week. And it has a character in it who is a cow, who is deeply disturbed by dairy.
Vinny: [00:09:08] [Crosstalk]
Annalee: [00:09:08] And there's like a whole subplot about dairy trauma. So I think you're hitting on something important there.
Vinny: [00:09:15] And you know what, that's really brave, because people talk a lot about representation. But who is speaking for the cows?
Annalee: [00:09:21] That's what I want to know.
Charlie Jane: [00:09:22] That’s a really good point.
Annalee: [00:09:22] And that's what I'm answering in this book, so. And there's, moose in there also. So you know, I'm handling it.
Vinny: [00:09:29] Amazing.
Annalee: [00:09:32] So you get a ton of feedback online, like maybe more than you want, and I'm wondering how much that affects you. Do you think about what people are gonna say on Twitter when you when you post something? Or are you just like, nope, I'm just in my head and then it goes out into the world and people can make what they want of it?
Vinny: [00:09:48] Oh, no, it affects me deeply. Very, very deeply. Sometimes I will delete videos. I feel like that's one of the things I'm known for, unfortunately, is I will just take a video down. Not necessarily if the responses are mean, but even if they're just like a little weird. If I get too much of a response, that's a little weird. I'll just be like, you know, wait, am I allowed to? Can I swear on this podcast [crosstalk]?
Annalee: [00:10:12] Of course.
Charlie Jane: [00:10:12] Of course.
Vinny: [00:10:12] I'll just be like, fuck it. You know what I mean? Like, throw it away.
Annalee: [00:10:16] Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:10:16] Aww.
Vinny: [00:10:16] Because the vibe—oh, well don’t sound sad. I don't want it to sound sad, Jesus.
Charlie Jane: [00:10:22] I’m just like, that’s… you know. You just—
Vinny: [00:10:23] But that's the way it goes. Sometimes the energy needs to be kind of fun. And if it's weird, it's thrown off a little bit.
Charlie Jane: [00:10:34] Like weird how, like, what is it? What do you what's a weird response to a funny video?
Vinny: [00:10:39] Oh, boy, I made a video about a chicken who was talking about how it used to be a dinosaur?
Charlie Jane: [00:10:47] Relatable.
Annalee: [00:10:47] Yeah, fair enough.
Vinny: [00:10:50] I was using this reference. It's a very Black community reference of like, a Hotep. I was using a Hotep map over talking about, you know how we used to be blah, blah, blah. And I didn't see this coming and I probably should have, but I had a lot of white people of a certain age, commenting. “We were kings and queens,” unironically. And I was like, ugh, it just feels a little weird. I don't like it as much. So I went ahead, and I took that puppy down.
Charlie Jane: [00:11:15] Oh, man.
Annalee: [00:11:16] Yeah, that's, I mean, but that's so funny.
Vinny: [00:11:21] It is, it’s a funny concept.
Annalee: [00:11:22] But I guess it’s like when you're trying out comedy material at a club, and you're kind of waiting to see oh, did this one land? Or did this one not? And like that's kind of, Twitter gets to be the club?
Vinny: [00:11:35] Yeah, except the difference with the club is you know, you can leave a behind in the club.
Charlie Jane: [00:11:38] Right. [Crosstalk] And there's a two drink minimum in the club so you know they're gonna be at least a little wasted.
Vinny: [00:11:44] Oh, my gosh, yes.
Charlie Jane: [00:11:44] You know, this is the thing I do. I do some comedy, like not a lot. But I do, I host events and I do kind of comedy in bars. And I'm like, as long as I'm less drunk than the audience, it's gonna be fine. As long as the audience is pretty… So actually, that leads to another question like, you've done improve, you've done stand up, you’ve worked on “Wait, wait, don’t tell me.” How is doing comedy on the internet different from those other formats and those other kind of? You kind of talked a little bit about this, but I'd love to hear more about that.
Vinny: [00:12:14] Oh, people threatened to report you way more on the internet than they do live. For sure. Yeah, internet stuff, internet comedy sketches, that wasn't even something I had considered doing. It wasn't even on my radar until le pandemique.
Annalee: [00:12:30] The panini.
Vinny: [00:12:30] And then I just started, headlong, posting videos all the time every day just because it was something to do. But it is a lot different than performing live. I think mostly because it's not improve, so you never have to worry about it being bad.
Annalee: [00:12:49] Right? You can edit it.
Vinny: [00:12:51] Yeah, you can clip it out a little bit.
Annalee: [00:12:54] Do you feel like you lose something, though, because you don't hear the immediate response of like laughter, or recognition on people's faces?
Vinny: [00:13:02] Hmm. Oh, my gosh, that's a very, that's a very good question. I think I lose something, but I gain something else. I think I gained a bigger audience.
Annalee: [00:13:13] Yeah.
Vinny: [00:13:13] For one, but I do. I do yearn for some claps and laughs every now and then, yeah, for sure.
Charlie Jane: [00:13:18] Yeah. Do you feel like part of what you're doing? I mean, I don't want to sound too serious or important, or whatever?
Vinny: [00:13:25] God forbid.
Charlie Jane: [00:13:25] Do you think part of what you're doing is to kind of educate people a little bit about science or to kind of draw people's attention to scientific discoveries or sci fi concepts?
Vinny: [00:13:34] Yeah, I think there's a lot of science and historical and archaeological news that is very, very interesting to me. And I think it's interesting to a lot of people, too. It's just never been like a hugely fertile ground. You know, a lot of people will kind of avoid these subjects, because they maybe think it's boring or not enough people are interested. But I found that whatever you're very interested in, people will kind of latch on to you. Like, regardless of how far flung or strange it might seem to them. If it seems like you're into it, then they're kind of going to be into it, you know?
Annalee: [00:14:12] Yeah. So it's really about the enthusiasm that you bring to it, not about the subject matter?
Vinny: [00:14:18] Exactly. That's, that was perfect. That was eloquent. That was very well put.
Annalee: [00:14:23] Yes. Well, I am a science journalist, so I have feelings.
Vinny: [00:14:27] Ehhh.
Annalee: [00:14:27] Yeah, exactly. So I wanted to ask you about politics in comedy, because occasionally you will post about people who are getting grumpy at you for being political. And you often throw in political jokes, kind of as asides in your videos. And I'm wondering, like, I have a couple questions around this. But I think my first question is really, is it actually possible for comedy to not be political? Is that even a thing? Like, it feels like people are constantly asking for that.
Vinny: [00:14:58] Yeah, I don't I think it's possible. I think even when you're not being political, you're being politicized. So, it doesn't matter what you're doing, someone's going to have some perspective on it, or someone's going to have some twist on it that makes it political. It also feels a little weird to me sometimes. Like, I'll go a while without posting a video if the mood, if the zeitgeist feels like it's focused on a more important issue, right? I'm not going to jump up and make another fly video. It just wouldn't land right, and it would feel weird. And that's not something I would really want to do.
[00:15:38] But at the same time, I don't like to jump on things. You know, there's a Twitter, what's the word like “Person of the Day, sometimes.
Annalee: [00:15:45] Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:15:45] The main character.
Vinny: [00:15:46] Yes, yes, main character, that's the term. Is a Twitter main character that everyone kind of jumps on sometimes. And I know everyone's gonna make a video about it or everyone's gonna make a joke about it. So then it's like, eh. You know what, I mean? Everyone else could have it. They’re gonna do a better job. It's gonna be funny. I don't need to do it. Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:16:07] So speaking of which are there forms of online humor that you don't like? Or that you find her annoying or that you know, just you don't think they work?
Vinny: [00:16:17] Oh, well, let me tell you this one works but I don't always find it very funny. When people are crazy mean, like beyond the pale, just like mean. And not in a funny way, just like a list of insults. Which is obviously, that's something that social media just naturally responds to and latches on to, but I don't always get it. You know? You say your thing. Unless it's a supervillain you know what I mean? Obviously, make your Kyle Rittenhouse jokes, please. But you know, if it's just some guy, like, come on.
Charlie Jane: [00:16:51] Some dude who took out the trash and his trash can, whatever, his trash bag broke, and we're just gonna dunk on him for three days because his video went viral or whatever.
Vinny: [00:17:00] Yeah.
Annalee: [00:17:00] Or somebody and a foolish thing. And… you know.
Charlie Jane: [00:17:00] Yeah.
Vinny: [00:17:05] I'll tell you guys here. I think y'all remember bean dad? That was nuts.
Charlie Jane: [00:17:08] Bean dad, like the fucking bean dad. Like, dude.
Vinny: [00:17:10] Bean dad was the craziest thing. Okay, he made a kind of cringy speech about how his daughter should open beans.
Charlie Jane: [00:17:17] Whoop-de-doo, you know.
Vinny: [00:17:17] But we don't need to, like, cyberbully this person off the face of the earth.
Charlie Jane: [00:17:21] I feel like bean dad is kind of like the mascot of how the Twitter main character thing can get really toxic.
Annalee: [00:17:29] Yeah.
Vinny: [00:17:29] Out of hand, man.
Annalee: [00:17:30] Yeah, and it wasn’t just comedy. It was like, people were really angry, like, this man is abusive. And like, we need to report him to the authorities. And it's like…
Vinny: [00:17:39] Oh, can we talk about that, too? It's so many words that people just be saying. Abusive? For opening beans? Sir.
Charlie Jane: [00:17:49] I mean, God.
Annalee: [00:17:50] Yeah, but I think it is that, the reporting people to the authorities thing is like kind of a social media response. That that's part of what we do. Like you were saying, like, people will tell you like, I'm gonna report you. You're gonna get, this is terrible, like, gonna take you to the teacher or the principal's office or whatever.
Charlie Jane: [00:18:09] I'm going to tell. I’m going to tell!
Annalee: [00:18:11] Yeah, I'm going to tell on you. And of course, going to the principal is about as effective as reporting someone to Twitter. You know, it's like nothing changes.
Vinny: [00:18:19] And you know what, that's so sad because I know you've got a story about that. I can't even talk because I'm such a snitch on Twitter, I be snitching on people and blocking people 24/7 and I don’t care.
Charlie Jane: [00:18:32] [Crosstalk]
Annalee: [00:18:31] Oh yeah, blocking is one thing, yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:18:33] I will block all day. I’ll block all day.
Annalee: [00:18:35] I block and report but what I'm saying is like, when I report stuff, like I don't feel like it does any good. You know.
Charlie Jane: [00:18:41] It's therapeutic. It's just, you know.
Vinny: [00:18:43] Yeah.
Annalee: [00:18:43] It is therapeutic.
Vinny: [00:18:45] It’s beautiful.
Charlie Jane: [00:18:45] It's kind of a catharsis. I'm just like.
Vinny: [00:18:48] Ooh, catharsis.
Annalee: [00:18:48] It's nice to have that button.
Charlie Jane: [00:18:48] It's, you know, like, yeah, I should just put a button on the side of my computer. That's just like, a big red button that I can pretend gives an electric shock to whoever I'm annoyed at on the internet. Like you just press it like and be like yeah, you take that! And like, they don't know that I did that. It's not actually giving anybody an electric shock but I can feel like they really—
Annalee: [00:19:10] You want the big red button from Squid Game. No, no, no, no, no.
Vinny: [00:19:13] Yes.
Charlie Jane: [00:19:14] I still haven’t watched Squid Game.
Vinny: [00:19:16] Why haven’t you watched Squid Game? Now we can’t talk about it and that was going to be a whole quarter of this interview.
Charlie Jane: [00:19:21] I mean, you guys can talk about it. I'm just, you know, I don't know.
Vinny: [00:19:25] No we can’t. We can’t spoil that.
Charlie Jane: [00:19:27] I like squids. I feel like they should get to choose what games they play. I feel like—
Annalee: [00:19:30] Oh, well. That's true.
Charlie Jane: [00:19:32] I feel like people are always trying to get squids to do things.
Annalee: [00:19:34] Yeah. And then there’s the whole cuttlefish question.
Charlie Jane: [00:19:37] Can you get inside this bottle? Can you do this puzzle? Can you…
Annalee: [00:19:41] Vinny, I actually need to ask you about cuttlefish. Do you have any thoughts?
Vinny: [00:19:45] Oh my God, please. Well, first I have a thought about squids and it's that they do love games, specifically wrestling with sperm whales.
Annalee: [00:19:53] Yes.
Charlie Jane: [00:19:53] I’ve heard that.
Annalee: [00:19:53] Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:19:55] You know.
Vinny: [00:19:55] And cuttlefish, my friend, Amar Risbud, whose username is @bummer_no_b on Twitter. He actually studies cuttlefish. And he studies the camouflage. I think they're very beautiful and very sad because they don't live long, cuttlefish. They just live fast and hard lives and then they die. But they're so smart.
Charlie Jane: [00:20:19] Leave a good-looking corpse.
Vinny: [00:20:20] And it’s crazy to me.
Annalee: [00:20:20] Yeah.
Vinny: [00:20:21] They’re gorgeous dead things just like a soggy loogie.
Annalee: [00:20:26] They also, with their camouflage, they can be… on one side, they can have male camouflage and on the other side, they can have female camouflage.
Vinny: [00:20:35] Oh yeah.
Annalee: [00:20:35] They can just slide right down the middle, which I find very exciting.
Vinny: [00:20:36] Gender is dead to cuttlefish, it simply doesn't exist. But it is weird to think about something so smart that just doesn't live for like, more than two years. Isn't that crazy? Like they're smart, very smart. And that's just it.
Annalee: [00:20:51] Yeah. Okay, so we're gonna take a quick break. And when we come back, we're going to ask you more important questions, not just about cuttlefish, but about everything.
[00:21:00] OOAC theme music plays: Drums with a bass drop and more science fictional bells and percussion.
Annalee: [00:21:07] Okay, so I have a set of questions that you need to answer. And if they're too much, you can just run screaming from the room as we previously agreed.
Vinny: [00:21:17] Yeah, that was the agreement.
Annalee: [00:21:20] Mm-hmm. Okay, question number one. Are you secretly an environmental scientist?
Vinny: [00:21:26] No, I am not. But I do love animals and biology. I've loved them my whole life. And I was a conservation communications intern at a large aquarium.
Annalee: [00:21:35] What? Where?
Charlie Jane: [00:21:37] Oh my God. You communicated?
Vinny: [00:21:39] At Shedd Aquarium in Chicago.
Charlie Jane: [00:21:40] Oh, that's lovely. Okay, so why haven't we found aliens yet? Why aren't they talking to us?
Vinny: [00:21:46] Oh, because we're tacky.
Charlie Jane: [00:21:49] True.
Vinny: [00:21:49] You know, I feel like aliens aren't what we think they are. I think they're beautiful, like pieces of flesh fabric floating through space or something. And they just don't care. We're not important.
Charlie Jane: [00:22:01] Relatable.
Annalee: [00:22:00] So what's going to happen to Elon Musk's Mars colony?
Vinny: [00:22:05] Given Elon Musk's core demographic, I think he's gonna bring people to Mars that support him, which means they'll probably die from a nutrient deficiency because they're all eating shitty chicken fingers.
Charlie Jane: [00:22:20] They're eating Soylent.
Annalee: [00:22:20] Yeah, Soylent for sure.
Vinny: [00:22:21] Oh, my God, forget what I said. They're eating Soylent. And they're inhaling like, way too much Axe from within their little suits.
Annalee: [00:22:30] God.
Charlie Jane: [00:22:30] That is a real problem. So why is Lil Nas X an important science fiction creator?
Vinny: [00:22:37] I think more than being an important science fiction creator Lil Nas X is going to be an important religious figure.
Charlie Jane: [00:22:43] Well, yeah.
Vinny: [00:22:43] In about 2000 years.
Charlie Jane: [00:22:46] I mean, I think he's already an important religious figure. But yeah, he'll get more important.
Vinny: [00:22:50] The book of Call Me By Your Name is going to be… wars are going to be fought over that. Let me tell you.
Charlie Jane: [00:22:54] I can believe it. But he has videos about time travel and having sex with Satan. And, I mean, he's creating some important science fiction right now.
Vinny: [00:23:05] Yeah, I mean, he's creating some important science fiction, and he's also creating some very shocking moments for all of our grandmothers to talk about at Thanksgiving. Which I think is also important.
Charlie Jane: [00:23:16] Very important.
Annalee: [00:23:18] Yeah, and bless him for it. See, I'm already in the religion. I'm ready.
Vinny: [00:23:23] Oh yeah, we're all in the religion.
Annalee: [00:23:25] It's pretty true.
[00:23:27] Okay, how are we going to deal with climate change?
Vinny: [00:23:30] Oh, at this point, it's probably just gonna be body augmentation. Right? Like, we're not really going to fix climate change. I think we're just going to fix ourselves so we can live underwater or live in the desert.
Annalee: [00:23:44] Oh, man.
Charlie Jane: [00:23:43] Stillsuits!
Annalee: [00:23:45] Oh yeah, exactly.
Vinny: [00:23:45] Oh, my God. Yes. Stillsuits.
Charlie Jane: [00:23:47] We can drink our own pee.
Vinny: [00:23:48] And like, fennec fox ears and yeah. And horses that don't need water.
Annalee: [00:23:55] Awesome. Okay, so that's your future is stillsuits with self watering horses.
Charlie Jane: [00:24:00] And fox ears.
Annalee: [00:24:00] And fox ears.
Charlie Jane: [00:24:01] The fox ears are important.
Annalee: [00:24:02] Yeah, okay.
Vinny: [00:24:02] Yeah. Write that down.
Charlie Jane: [00:24:03] No, I like it.
Annalee: [00:24:07] Which non human animals do you think are mocking humans the most?
Vinny: [00:24:12] I think it's pigeons.
Charlie Jane: [00:24:13] Ah.
Annalee: [00:24:15] Wow, interesting choice.
Charlie Jane: [00:24:17] No, that makes total sense.
Annalee: [00:24:19] Wow. I always thought we were making fun of them.
Vinny: [00:24:22] Yeah. And that's what it is. I think they’re a much more vengeful people than we give them credit for. And so I think under their breath, with like, their full chest, they're calling us like featherless little, little skinny bitches. You know, just really going in on us.
Charlie Jane: [00:24:39] I mean, yeah. I can believe it.
Annalee: [00:24:39] Also, we're so attached to our feet. You know what I mean? Like, they're probably just looking down on us, like, you know, we can live footless. Can you guys do that?
Vinny: [00:24:47] You know. They’re also attached to their feet, and they don't have to be. Look, every time I see a pigeon in the road. It waits to the last minute to run out from in front of a car and I've seen a lot of flat pigeons. And they could simply fly away.
Annalee: [00:25:04] Yeah. Well, maybe, you know, maybe the last laugh is on them. Although we don't know.
Vinny: [00:25:08] I feel like…
Annalee: [00:25:08] They could be uploading their consciousness somewhere and like there could be a pigeon overmind. We don't know what's happening.
Charlie Jane: [00:25:14] On the internet.
Vinny: [00:25:16] Honestly? Every time we hear a pigeon coo, it's probably a slur.
Charlie Jane: [00:25:19] That makes total sense, actually. Yeah. So what's the most ridiculous alien on Star Trek?
Vinny: [00:25:25] Oh my God, there's so many to choose from. I would say the Ferengi. And I know that might not be a crazy choice.
Charlie Jane: [00:25:35] No, it's just clearly the right choice.
Vinny: [00:25:36] But they are just weird.
Charlie Jane: [00:25:36] It's clearly the right choice.
Vinny: [00:25:39] It’s one of those things where their lore was written at a time when people weren't super worried about the lore and sometimes it just doesn't make sense.
Annalee: [00:25:48] But they do have Oo-mox, so.
Vinny: [00:25:51] That’s true.
Charlie Jane: [00:25:51] They do have Oo-mox.
Annalee: [00:25:51] It’s really important that there's a special kind of blow job just for ears.
Charlie Jane: [00:25:57] I mean, I feel like the Ferengi, like there's a whole category of Star Trek aliens who have butts on their heads. Like there's [Talosians] in “The Cage” and then there's… There’s a bunch of buttheaded aliens in Star Trek.
Annalee: [00:26:08] I never thought of them as having buttheads, but you’re so right.
Vinny: [00:26:12] No, but—
Charlie Jane: [00:26:11] Then the Ferengi are kind of the ultimate evolution of buttheadeness, kind of.
Annalee: [00:26:17] I feel like they have—
Vinny: [00:26:18] Because they're all male.
Charlie Jane: [00:26:19] They're all male, but they have like these—
Vinny: [00:26:21] They’re all like, I look at him, and it creeps—
Charlie Jane: [00:26:22] Like, two giant globes on their heads.
Annalee: [00:26:23] No, they have four globed. I think they have four buttocks.
Vinny: [00:26:27] Oh, because in the back.
Charlie Jane: [00:26:27] They’ve got a double butt.
Vinny: [00:26:31] Isn't it like a party in the front business in the back type situation?
Charlie Jane: [00:26:33] Double—
Vinny: [00:26:34] Or, it’s a Ferengi, so business in the front, business in the back.
Charlie Jane: [00:26:38] Yes, exactly.
Annalee: [00:26:38] Well, they’ve got their ears for all of the real business.
Charlie Jane: [00:26:42] Oh my God.
Annalee: [00:26:42] Oh, sorry, sorry.
Vinny: [00:26:45] No, it’s actually beautiful.
Annalee: [00:26:45] Okay, back to science. What is the most underrated ecosystem?
Vinny: [00:26:50] Oh, the swamp.
Annalee: [00:26:51] Yes!
Charlie Jane: [00:26:51] Yeah, no, totally. Swamp.
Vinny: [00:26:53] It’s got to be the swamp. The swamp gets shit on so much. And I think the swamp is beautiful. And look, I've had my fair share of terrible experiences in the swamp. Like many children, I tried to catch minnows in the swamp and fell waist deep into a bunch of quicksand. But I moved past it. You know.
Annalee: [00:27:13] You learn to love the quicksand.
Vinny: [00:27:15] I learned to love the quicksand. Even though it took my knock-off Walmart Croc off of my foot and to this day, I don’t know where it is.
Charlie Jane: [00:27:21] Aw, man.
Annalee: [00:27:21] Wow, there's so many sad stories here.
Charlie Jane: [00:27:26] Just slow down, quicksand.
Vinny: [00:27:26] I’m sorry, is it too sad?
Charlie Jane: [00:27:28] Why are you in such a hurry?
Vinny: [00:27:26] I keep mentioning dead animals in quicksand. Let's talk about something happy in the swamp like gators. Gators sit in the swamp and vibrate and lay eggs. How fun is that?
Annalee: [00:27:37] I know, and they're always smiling.
Charlie Jane: [00:27:40] Gators are awesome. I'm a gator stan.
Vinny: [00:27:44] Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:27:46] So which X-Man or which mutant character in the X-Men really needs therapy the most?
Vinny: [00:27:52] Oh, God.
Annalee: [00:27:55] We’re putting you on the spot, here.
Vinny: [00:27:57] Yeah, I truly don't know much about the Eternals, but X-Men, I would say Storm. And she needs therapy just because she's been carrying the weight of mutants as a people for her entire existence.
Charlie Jane: [00:28:08] Right.
Vinny: [00:28:08] And she just terraformed an entire planet. So like—
Charlie Jane: [00:28:14] That’ll take it out of you.
Vinny: [00:28:14] She needs some time for herself. Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:28:17] Yeah, I mean, I was gonna say Nightcrawler because he looks like a blue devil guy but he became a Christian priest at one point and he he teleports everywhere. I don't know. He's got a confusing life.
Annalee: [00:28:27] Yeah, I really—
Vinny: [00:28:29] The devil to priest track.
Annalee: [00:28:28] I want Storm to have some self care.
Charlie Jane: [00:28:31] I think Storm definitely needs to like have a spa day.
Vinny: [00:28:34] Yeah. Oh my god. Could you imagine she runs a bubble bath and then she heats it up with lightning?
Charlie Jane: [00:28:38] Yeah. Oh my God. This would—I feel like in the ‘80s, they used to do an issue where all the ladies of the X-Men would just hang out and go to the mall or whatever and that would be the whole issue. They should bring that back and just have Storm’s spa day. And like, Storm and a couple of her friends.
Vinny: [00:28:52] Yeah, but it’s just Storm.
Charlie Jane: [00:28:53] Storm and maybe Jubilee? I don't know.
Vinny: [00:28:55] Oh, yeah. Yeah, Jubilee has to go.
Annalee: [00:28:58] Yeah. All right. So, final question. What is the future of comedy?
Vinny: [00:29:08] Oh.
Charlie Jane: [00:29:07] Really, really easy question. Really, really simple.
Annalee: [00:29:09] We were working our way up.
Vinny: [00:29:10] [Crosstalk]. Oh, God, the future of comedy is… it's bright and contentious and filled with twists and turns. And it's all happening underground in a vast compound. And—
Charlie Jane: [00:29:29] Like with mole people?
Vinny: [00:29:29] Yes, yes. All of the Mole People are comedians. And all of the people who watch them are Snake People. And the comedians who do poorly are consumed immediately on the spot by the snakes in the audience.
Annalee: [00:29:45] Wow. It seems… it sounds like TikTok.
Charlie Jane: [00:29:47] It sounds like a metaphor.
Annalee: [00:29:50] Yeah.
Vinny: [00:29:50] Could you imagine if it was?
Charlie Jane: [00:29:55] I mean…
Vinny: [00:29:54] That would be great.
Annalee: [00:29:56] All right. So, thank you so much for joining us. I feel like we learned a lot about the future and about the animal kingdom.
Charlie Jane: [00:30:05] So where can people find you online?
Vinny: [00:30:05] You can find me at @Vinn_ayy, on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok.
Annalee: [00:30:18] Alright, we're gonna take a quick break. And when we come back, we're going to dive into the research hole.
Charlie Jane: [00:30:26] Whooooosh!
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Annalee: [00:30:34] Alright, so in this segment, which is a very irregular segment that we bring back whenever we've been doing too much research. We each talk about something that we either accidentally or deliberately started researching and then just fell into a giant hole. So Charlie Jane, why don't you start us off?
Charlie Jane: [00:30:52] Yeah, so I've been kind of obsessively reading up on the backstory of Marvel Studios. And, you know, it started because there's a new book out which, full disclosure, I haven't actually read yet, but I've read a million articles about it. And I've got it, and I'm gonna read it soon. It's called The Story of Marvel Studios, The Making of the Marvel Cinematic Universe by Tara Bennett and Paul Terry, and it's kind of the inside story of Marvel.
[00:31:16] And basically, there's been a spate of articles basically about the revelations in this book. And one of the big revelations that people were kind of excited and fascinated by was the notion that there was this entity at Marvel called the Marvel Creative Committee, which was made up of people who'd worked at Marvel Comics, like the comic book side of the company, plus just some, people who were movie bigwigs and it was kind of under this guy, Ike Perlmutter, who's like a billionaire who was running Marvel and kind of wanted to micromanage everything himself.
[00:31:47] And apparently that the movie, Captain America: Civil War, which, as we all remember, ends with like a big climactic fight between Captain America and Iron Man. And that's kind of the whole point of the movie is that it leads up to the two of them having it out and kind of slugging it out with like, his suit of armor versus Captain America's shield. And it’s a whole emotional kind of thing between these two dudes who have been frenemies for a long time.
[00:32:13] The Creative Committee really strongly pushed to get rid of that ending and replace it with an ending where the bad guy, I guess Baron Zemo has some super soldiers who he's created and they show up and Captain America and Iron Man have to team up to fight these super soldiers which is… Part of why that fascinates me is because that's basically the ending of Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice which was the other kind of big movie about heroes fighting each other that came out almost right exactly the same time I think those movies came out like two months apart. And like part of what's disappointing about Batman v. Superman is that Batman and Superman fight and it's not very interesting.
Annalee: [00:32:51] It's the worst fight. It’s the worst.
Charlie Jane: [00:32:53] It’s dull and it’s just—
Annalee: [00:32:54] All I remember is one of them breaks a kitchen sink over the other one’s head.
Charlie Jane: [00:32:58] I mean—
Annalee: [00:32:58] No, no, a bathroom sink.
Charlie Jane: [00:33:00] There's, you know, I once wanted to do a supercut on io9 of people breaking bathroom sinks because every superhero movie, someone destroys a bathroom sink. It’s a thing.
Annalee: [00:33:08] It’s true. Also, like a whole trope of discovering you have superpowers.
Charlie Jane: [00:33:12] Yes!
Annalee: [00:33:12] You're in the bathroom and then you grab the sink and—
Charlie Jane: [00:33:15] You destroy the sink. Yeah, I mean, I wanted to do… I never got around to doing it. But I wanted to do a video of every time somebody breaks a sink. Like Wolverine and the first, the Wolverine: Origin movie, he destroys a bathroom sink because he's like, argh! I've got metal claws now. Oh, yeah, it's a whole thing.
[00:33:29] So anyway, you know, it would have been hilarious if like the Civil War movie and Batman v. Superman had had exactly the same ending. Because in Batman v Superman, they fight and then they have to team up to fight Doomsday who's basically an incredibly nondescript… I mean, in the comics, Doomsday is a whole fucking thing. But in the movie version, Doomsday is just some dude, I guess it's a zombie General Zod who has been, I don't know. Doesn't make any fucking sense. It's really crappy.
Annalee: [00:33:56] All I remember is that he's played by Mark Zuckerberg. The end.
Charlie Jane: [00:34:00] No, no. Lex Luthor is played by Mark Zuckerberg.
Annalee: [00:34:03] God, I can't even keep track of all the badguys.
Charlie Jane: [00:34:05] He creates Doomsday randomly for reasons.
Annalee: [00:34:08] Okay, so he creates Doomsday.
Charlie Jane: [00:34:08] I think so.
Annalee: [00:34:09] Right. So Mark Zuckerberg is behind Doomsday.
Charlie Jane: [00:34:11] God, that movie, but it would've been hilarious of both of those movies had the same ending. And basically, this Creative Committee really pushed to do that, to make the ending of the movie, something really kind of dumb and formulaic. And Kevin Feige, who is in charge of Marvel Studios, had to push back and ultimately, obviously, he won.
[00:34:31] And this kind of led to the thing where Kevin Feige finally got them pushed out and got complete creative control over the Marvel movies. And so, things have come out in dribs and drabs about the clashes over the shape of Marvel movies between Kevin Feige and Ike Perlmutter on the other side with the Creative Committee working with him.
[00:34:52] And you know, I had to go back to like some articles that were published in 2015 when they finally got rid of the Creative Committee, but also some articles from 2018 when there was a new news cycle about it. It's super interesting.
[00:35:04] Like apparently, one of the things that Ike and the Creative Committee kind of pushed through was like, when the first Iron Man movie was like a hit. They were like, we have to rush Iron Man 2 into production and put it out immediately. And so that's how we got Iron Man 2, which is you know, there are other, like you can debate what's the worst movie that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has had. And you know, different people would have different answers, but in terms of what's the most unnecessary movie, what's the most kind of pointless movie, the movie that just like has nothing to say and no reason to exist? Iron Man 2 is the clear favorite. There's nothing to that movie. It's just a bunch of set pieces.
[00:35:42] I've often described the plot of Iron Man 2 as, “Tony Stark tries to throw a trade show and people try to sabotage his trade show, which actually, if it had been really about that, if they just been like the caterers didn't show up, because they got the flu because someone gave them the flu.”
Annalee: [00:35:57] No, it's like them going to CES.
Charlie Jane: [00:36:01] Yeah, I mean, I feel like a movie about trying to throw a trade show could have been great. But instead it's not. It's just a bunch of really boring fight scenes with like, Mickey.
Annalee: [00:36:09] Is it true that that movie was also like a lot of improv, too? That's what I read.
Charlie Jane: [00:36:12] Well, the first Iron Man was a lot of improv.
Annalee: [00:36:15] I thought Iron Man 2 was like exclusively improv.
Charlie Jane: [00:36:18] I think that both of the first two Iron Man movies heavily involved a lot of improv. And it works incredibly well in the first Iron Man, because they had a strong script, or at least they had a script. I mean, there are differing accounts of how much they had a script when they were working on that movie. But there's a story to it. And it has an it has a framework, it has an arc of like, Tony Stark’s origin story, whereas Iron Man 2 just, you know, you could skip that movie and miss nothing.
[00:36:45] But also apparently the Creative Committee, one of the things that they did, which I found in a 2018 article, was that they really did not want the 1970s music soundtrack in Guardians of the Galaxy. They were like, no, it should just be like generic superhero music.
Annalee: [00:37:01] Oh, no!
Charlie Jane: [00:37:02] And it’s like, that would have just torn the beating heart out of that film. And like they also—
Annalee: [00:37:08] Also, I’m sure they've sold a jillion albums, too.
Charlie Jane: [00:37:11] I’m sure. I mean, God, I've listened to the Guardians of the Galaxy 1 and 2 soundtracks like more times than I can remember. And like they also wanted Ronan, the villain, I think they did succeed in making Ronan, the villain, more kind of a just a straight up bland comic book villain, which is what he is in that film. But there's a bunch of other ones. And apparently, they were the reason why Edgar Wright kind of had to quit directing Ant-Man because they just kept butting in with their ideas about what it should be.
[00:37:41] So, it's super interesting. And obviously, there's a certain amount of like the victor's writing history here, I'm sure. But still, it does sound like there was this filmmaking by committee. And then, you find these articles from, again, from 2018, which kind of argue that when the creative committee was pushed out, when Ike Perlmutter was no longer in charge, suddenly, that's when you get things like Thor: Ragnarok. And you get some, kind of more. I mean, Marvel movies are very kind of crowd pleasing and mainstream, but they did kind of push the envelope a little bit more after 2015. And they did kind of go in some pretty intense directions that might not have worked previously.
[00:38:21] So Annalee, what is your research hole?
Annalee: [00:38:25] So I have been, for the past year, actually, researching my next nonfiction book, which is going to be about psychological warfare. And so I've been really diving deep into some pretty weird byways of the culture. And one of the most interesting factoids that I learned just recently, was when I was interviewing Audra Wolfe, who is this incredible historian who writes a lot about the history of science. And she has this great book, which I would highly recommend, called Freedom’s Laboratory. And it's basically all about how the Cold War changed science and about how the US and the Soviet Union were it locked in a kind of scientific battle, actually, mostly over biology, not over atomics, which is what you would think. You'd think it would be like the physicists fighting it out, or Sputnik versus the US space program. But actually, a lot of the funding for US scientific endeavors was coming from the CIA.
[00:39:33] And so one of the things that Audra Wolfe was telling me about was that as she was researching the book, she discovered that this really little known group called the Asia Foundation, which still exists, by the way, it was founded in the ‘50s. And the idea was that it would just be an organization, a nonprofit, for scientists to engage in kind of like international collaboration. The idea was to spread Western scientific knowledge to the world, specifically to Asia. And they did a lot of like making textbooks and things that are really innocuous, you know, holding conferences that would like bring together international scientific researchers.
[00:40:18] And it turned out in 1967, the Asia Foundation's cover was blown, and it was revealed to be a CIA-funded operation. And one of the things that Audra Wolfe is really careful to explain in her book, and that she was careful to say when I interviewed her is that that doesn't mean that the organization was controlled by the CIA. The CIA wasn't calling the shots. Usually what it meant to be a CIA-funded organization like this was just that they'd give you a little money, and you would share information with the CIA.
[00:40:50] And so that's what was going on with the Asia Foundation. In part. There were a lot of other things happening. But one thing that the CIA did… And the thing is, is that when I was talking to Audra Wolfe, I kept saying, “Wow, there were just this incredible number of these scientific organizations being funded by the US intelligence agencies. And is that just because the US was richer in the 1950s? Like, is that the kind of thing that you do if you're just a country that's so has so much money to throw around that you're like, sure.” Because, you know, the CIA also funded a bunch of artistic organizations, too. Like Jackson Pollock was kind of indirectly funded by the CIA. And I was like, “This just sounds crazy. It just sounds like they had too much money.”
[00:41:31] And Audra Wolfe was like, no. Actually, this was really cheap. And the example she gave was that at one point, the CA gives the Asia Foundation $10,000. And they're like, hey, guys, we got this $10,000, we want you to use this money to buy memberships in the Asia Foundation for prominent scientists throughout the world who are sympathetic to the United States, right?
Charlie Jane: [00:41:54] Holy cow.
Annalee: [00:41:54] So specifically thinking of scientists in areas that were either communist, or that were had a lot of communist sympathies. So they wanted to identify who these people were that they maybe could call on at some point to do, I guess, science for them in the name of Western civilization or something.
Charlie Jane: [00:42:15] Wow.
[00:42:15] So the point is that what they did was, they were like, just buy these… You guys are the experts at Asia Foundation, you know who the best scientists are in all these countries. You know who the elites are in these countries. You go ahead and just, it's up to you, you invite whoever you think the best scientists are. And we just want to know their names and their contact information and the organizations they're associated with. That's all. That's all we want.
[00:42:39]And that was one of the things that they did. And that was one way that the CIA was indirectly gathering intel, was by kind of funding these organizations, and just for 10,000 bucks. Now they've got this heat map of Western sympathizers among the scientific elites in these countries that were that were communist sympathizing or directly communist.
[00:43:04] So the thing I loved about that story was, one, I love that it was so cheap. And too, I love that it's so close to what we're dealing with now, when we think about surveillance, and we think about how indirect surveillance can be when you have big data. And, there's sort of a joke among my paranoid friends about anytime you sign up for some kind of app, who knows where that information is going. Maybe that app is owned by fascists and they're collecting your data, or maybe it's the CIA, we don't know.
[00:43:42] And it turns out, sometimes it is. Sometimes you join an innocuous scientific organization, and your information is going directly to the CIA.
Charlie Jane: [00:43:51] That is amazing.
Annalee: [00:43:51] That is the story of the Asia Foundation. The Asia Foundation has a long and interesting history. They are no longer a CIA operation, apparently. As far as we know.
Charlie Jane: [00:44:01] Does it say that on their website? Does it say no—
Annalee: [00:44:03] No longer funded by the CIA! No, they do actually mention this on their website, which is what was really funny. Because the first thing I did, of course, when she told me that was like, oh, my God, what the heck? And no, they don't mention that.
Charlie Jane: [00:44:15] Surprisingly.
Annalee: [00:44:15] But if you want to hear more about this and all of the other scientific organizations that were funded by the CIA during the Cold War, check out Freedom’s Laboratory by Audra Wolfe.
Charlie Jane: [00:44:26] That is so fascinating.
Annalee: [00:44:27] All right, well, thank you so much for listening to Our Opinions Are Correct. And if you would like to be a patron and help support this podcast, you can find us on patreon at patreon.com/OurOpinionsAreCorrect. You can find us on Twitter at @OOACpod. And if you are downloading this podcast using Apple podcasts, we'd love it if you would leave us a review. It helps people find the podcast. And thank you so much to our intrepid producer Veronica Simonetti. Thanks to Women's Audio Mission, where we record these podcasts every other week. And thank you to Chris Palmer for the music. And talk to you later and if you're a patron, we'll see you on Discord where we hang out all the time.
Charlie Jane: [00:45:14] Bye!
Annalee: [00:45:14] Bye!
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