Tuned In! Ep. 159

So I'm going to talk about something that I really didn't think I'd ever be talking about because I've kind of always regarded it, and I'll say them, with

mild undeserved

disdain, I guess.

But in the past couple weeks, I have watched the entirety of the Cars trilogy.

Oh, um, this is, I think I've said to you that my son Parker is like obsessed with cars.

Um, and so like in general, it just, in general, like everything with wheels is a car, these points car, car, car, car, car.

Um, so we were like, Hey, like let's watch cars, you know? And we, the first one is a little like, I mean, the first one's the first cars, like it's pretty classic.

Um, but I don't think that I'd ever watched the second and the third one.

Um, um, Because, like, you know, with Cars, when you compare it to the other stuff around it, like Up and WALL-E and Toy Story, like, it doesn't carry.

It's not the same.

Yeah.

But Cars is not without its merits.

And Cars 2, and I want to talk specifically about Cars 3, are not bad movies, right?

Yeah, like

I went in expecting this kind of like, OK, here we go.

And Cars 2 is like a wild fever dream where they're like Mater is like our go to guy.

And it's this wild like they're doing races all over the world.

And Mater is basically the main character becomes like a de facto spy with

spies.

That's right.

Yeah.

With with Michael Caine and Emily Mortimer as like spies that they're, you know, it's like the unbeknownst.

mistaken for a spy character you know and that's fine but Cars 3 which I watched the other night is like a really kind of interesting coming of age story wherein it's like, it's so lightning McQueen, Owen Wilson's lead car.

There is like a racer and is getting past his prime and starts to see like all the cars that he's used to racing with retire.

He like can't drive as fast as he can.

He's used to be able to like the new upstart like models, um, model racers are, um, uh you know much much faster and it becomes this kind of like it starts almost like a rocky kind of thing where it's like yeah he's got to go and train to beat the the champ you know

right

um he has like a major crash that's in like the opening act and in the trailer like he has a major crash he's basically out for the season yeah which is like weirdly like dark um And then it becomes like this rocky thing where he's got to train to beat the guy.

And in the process, he kind of like learns that there's more to racing than just like being the fastest.

And that like, yeah, you get old, like you age, like it just happens.

Time makes fools of us all.

And there's something really like.

endearing to it you know you get these kind of moments that are just not like I mean I'm gonna say that are not like what you expect but I'm like but what you expect from a Pixar movie

right

You know what I mean? And, like, Cars gets such a bad rap because it is, like, I think, overly franchised, to be sure.

Not franchised, but there's a lot of Cars merchandising.

Commercialized, yeah.

Commercialized, that would be the term I'm looking for, yeah.

I would say probably more than anything else.

Like, you know, there's a lot of Wally out there, but Cars is everywhere.

Yes.

But like the story in here is pretty solid.

And I mean, it does have its classic turns where it's like, you know, the like I thought of this about the second one, too, where if you took away the cars, if you just took this script and said, we're going to make a live action version of this script.

They're not cars.

They're just people.

And it's weird because I was saying this to Jess the other night.

It was like when you.

look at all deep into the cars, like parallel, it gets really dark, like really quick.

Yeah.

You know what I mean? Like you immediately run into like a whole lot of societal issues where you're like, well, there's all of these like forklifts that are running around.

Like, Are these children? Is this a child labor force? Like, it's clearly a second-class, like, citizenship to all the...

Like, you run into a lot of, like, okay, let's not think about that in human form.

But if you were to take this, the issues notwithstanding, if you were to take this script and... you know, convert it into like a, a live action film with like human actors and like draw a parallel for racing.

That's, you know, it could be say box.

I mean, if you say boxing, it's Rocky.

Totally.

But you know, if you, if you fold it, it's, it folds it into, and it becomes really any kind of sports movie where it's like, yeah, like you can't keep throwing 99 mile an hour fastballs.

You got to figure out how to get like, People out other ways, you got to become a better pitcher and better understand, you know, where it is.

Yes.

Or, you know, you can't.

you know keep taking hits from linebackers over and over and over and over again like you know like you could fold any sports metaphor into it and it like it works and this story i think works because of that and it is very like for kids for sure um but like i was watching this and i was like i'm here like this is like

yeah

there's something here you know and there is a um a character named Cruz Ramirez who starts as a lightning McQueen's like trainer.

Cause he gets sponsored by a new or his company gets bought out and they're like, they're going to train him like all the young hip racers and that's going to make him go faster.

And, you know, Cruz Ramirez voiced by Cristela Alonzo, whom I don't really know from anything.

She was in the laundromat.

And those are her only two credits as my

God.

Yeah, I think she's a comedian.

Oh, interesting.

But, you know, is this trainer who, like, kind of... discovers all the same kind of things that Lightning is discovering as they go and, like, kind of starts to understand racing more in herself and, like, you get this really nice, like...

I'd say, like...

I mean, it's not this is what it is.

It's like a, you know, coach like player dynamic between her and Lightning.

And like where in Lightning is like the coach where like you like teaching her about racing and stuff because he's the old veteran.

And like this was solid all the way through.

Like the beats hit.

Like I was like kind of blown away where I'm like, I'm.

here for this and like i think this is intentional um this is directed by brian fee uh this is his only directing credit

nothing else yeah yeah

you know um the the the humanity is here for this it's like a really kind of strong real story and there are turns you can see like you know where in the big boss is like gonna sit him down or like not gonna sponsor him and all this kind of stuff because he's old and like you know it's all that kind of kind of same like classic stuff but like it's done well and i i was impressed i was like i have been giving cars as a franchise shit for quite a while and i apologize because i think it was undeservedly so

That is not where I thought you were going to be going with this necessarily.

I don't think I've...

I recently watched Cars 2 within the last three years and I remember being like, this is okay.

This is not where I thought the franchise was going, but this is a fun enough movie.

And I never hit play on Cars 3 because I just...

It's Cars 3.

Nobody talks about

it.

Well, and it's like the thing with Cars 2, Cars 2 is definitely like...

they went too big like they were like yeah

yeah

we and it's like it is mater's story like i said where it's like you know this is your center thing and that didn't really carry and like you know there's some weird confusing world building stuff that like doesn't really hit you know and then like michael caine and emily mortimer flying around you know shooting like Emily Mortimer, the car can fly by the end of it.

And you're like, okay, like, so, and that's, it's wild because cars two is John Lasseter.

Um, I know by John Lasseter and it's, you know, all right.

Um, but then like, I mean, and that was also like cars two was 2011 cars.

Three was 2017.

So like, they must've had something here to be like, we're going to come back to the cars franchise.

Yeah.

Big, big jump there.

Yeah.

And it's worth it.

Like, it's like, you know, it's not, a flawless movie it is by no means a bad movie

that's cars cars has potentially the worst reputation of any pixar franchise i feel i feel like the first movie is unfair i was just looking at it on letterboxd and i mean most of the people that i have as mutuals have it as a two-star movie and i'm like i don't think cars is a two-star movie by any means you know i think it's not it's Toy Story but barely anything is Toy Story so I don't know I find it to be a weird like line in the sand where it's like Pixar is great except for cars I'm like okay yeah I mean come on man life is a highway I mean it's like Cars 1's great

it's tough when you like put it around I mean so like the run there was Toy Story Bugs Life Toy Story 2 Monsters Inc Finding Nemo The Incredibles Cars Ratatouille WALL-E Up Toy Story 3 Cars 2 yeah it does

not stand up

yeah Cars 2 I think felt as the one where they started being like let's make sequels to everything because like shortly after that was the Monsters University and then the dinosaur which crashed and then we got Finding Dory and like you know but hey man like it's you know it's 90 minutes long like just I'd be interested to see what you take what your take of it is

Yeah, I definitely want to see it now.

I genuinely don't think I ever would have made my way to it had you not talked about it.

I mean, it's it's weird because I'm like, I don't want to come in here and give the illusion that it's like a, you know, four star movie.

It's a solid.

No, no.

I had a hard time finding reasons for it to be under a three star rating for me.

Interesting.

Damn.

Okay.

Cars 3.

I liked

it better than Hoppers.

Brian Fee.

Oh, interesting.

Okay.

Okay.

Well, I'm going to have to give this a look.

Obviously, I'm sure it's on Disney+, right? It's

on Disney+, yeah.

Yeah,

yeah, yeah.