Pop Culture Has Become an Oligopoly!!

Hi, this is John Delancey, and you are listening

to the GeekCast Radio Network. You're tuned in

to Steve Megatron on Altered Geek. Hello, and

welcome to... altered geek i'm your host steve

megatron and joining me on this adventure into

geekdom is tfg1 mike hello hello i don't want

to oligopol anything i don't want to do it either

but you know that's what the that's what these

companies think we should do because you know

pop culture has become an oligopoly yes you sent

me this article a little while ago it was posted

on may 2nd by Adam Mastronani? I'm sorry, Adam,

if I just detangled your last name. After reading

this, I found him on Twitter so I could follow

him because I think he's a really interesting

dude. Maybe we can have him on at some point

or another to discuss this. But he wrote out

this article where he shows graphs and charts

and things about how... A cartel of superstars

has conquered culture. How did it happen, and

what should we do about it? And he was not wrong.

No, he's not wrong. My college professor actually

talked about this in different terms when I was

still, I think it was like 2016, 2017, he was

talking about it, and I figured out if I could

get him talking about this stuff, we didn't do

any work the entire time, which was great. Uh,

but I was genuinely interested too. So he says,

you know, basically how all these companies are

using tent poles and playing to nostalgia and

playing to things more or less guaranteed to

make money instead of anything original and using

them as their tent poles. And like companies

like Disney, where they tried to no avail outside

of the pirates movies, they really didn't have

anything going for them. for anything original

or I forget. There was like, it was something

Carter. They tried to make the long Ranger into

something. They tried to make a few of the others

into something and just nothing was, nothing

was taking. And so what did they do? They bought

it. They bought Lucasfilm. They bought Muppets.

They bought Marvel. They bought star Wars. And

so they ended up with their own tent poles because

if you can't create it, buy it. So then they

become the one -stop shop for all your nostalgia

needs and pop culture needs. And so therefore,

they control you on every front. And so the funny

thing about this article, and it speaks true

of just about everything out there, I mean, whether

you're into Transformers or into Ninja Turtles,

Batman, Star Wars, Star Trek, any of it. All

of the popular things are remakes, reboots, or

sequels, or spinoffs, or some expanded universe

of some kind. And the writer goes to the mentioning

of the year 2021 and saying one of the top grossing

movies was Ryan Reynolds' Vehicle Free Guy, which

was an original. And there were only two original

movies in 2020's top 10 and none at all in 2019.

And this person saying that, you know, people

blame this trend on greedy movie studios or dumb

moviegoers or competition from Netflix or, you

know, humanity running out of ideas. And it's

a sign at the end of movies. Others claim that

there's nothing new about this at all. And which,

yes, there's nothing new about stealing ideas,

recycling things. But there's a way that they

can make a new movie and not make it a part of

something else that's out there. So, you know,

some of it, the writer says, you know, some of

these explanations are flat out wrong. Others

may contain a nugget of truth, but all of them

are incomplete because it isn't just happening

in movies. It's in every corner of pop culture,

movies, TV, music, books, comic books, video

games. And, you know, the smaller superstars

of these things are claiming a larger and larger

share of the market. What used to be winner takes

some has grown into winner takes most and is

now verging on winner takes all. Basically, this

is where they get the term of the oligopoly,

which is like a monopoly, but with a few players

instead of just one. Yeah, it's crazy. And this

actually ties into something I want to do on

Studio 2009 in the future, where we discuss...

the evolution and de -evolution of movie studios

because I... So with... I'm trying to think.

Yeah, it was because we did our Spider -Man episode

over on studio celebrating 20 years of the first

film. In the first theatrical teaser that they

eventually... replaced because of 9 -11 in that

they show the Twin Towers. Well, honestly, I

hadn't seen that teaser in at least 20 years.

I had forgotten that the original teaser starts

off like a bank robbery, but it doesn't give

you any indication, doesn't give you any, like,

you know, we've talked about this for years now.

but how trailers and teasers and how I say they

are advertisements to get you into or not into

the film or whatever. But literally, that original

teaser was such a tease because you didn't realize

it was a Spider -Man movie until you saw the

webbing. But my point in bringing this all up

is, at the very beginning, it has the Columbia

Pictures card. Because at the time, back in 2002,

Columbia Pictures was still, like, I looked up,

who owns Columbia Pictures? Well, somebody else

owns it now. It's not its own studio anymore.

It's under a tent pole of somebody, which I don't

have pulled up right now. Anyway, yeah, this

goes to the whole thing of we don't have original

anything anymore. like new and original because

everything is filled with the landscape of prequels,

sequels, three quills, fourth quills, fifth quills,

you know, movie universes and whatever. And I'm

all for a decently set up movie universe, but

universe got to die sometime, bring Unicron in

and have them blow the shit up, you know? So

that's, that's kind of how they do it. As they

reboot it with some cataclysmic event that reboots

everything. You know, like Endgame in Marvel.

It gave them a soft reboot. Kill off the old

crew, start with the new crew. Yeah. The Spider

-Man movie prompted the multiverse of madness.

Yes, that's true. And they've hinted at, and

I know who happens to be in the Illuminati group,

but I'm not going to say who. most people already

kind of know, but you know, it's it. Yeah. Yeah.

But regardless, it's, it's opening the door to

a whole new universe and new characters and ability

to phase out old ones and start over and kind

of keep that whole universe going. Yeah. Yeah.

It's, it's crazy. Like, I think the only two,

Okay, now I'll say the only five, and I haven't

seen one of them yet, but I want to. The only

five or six projects, films that I've seen recently

were original films. Three of those original

films are Ryan Reynolds movies. Six Underground,

as you already mentioned, Free Guy, and he has

a new one on Netflix now, The Atom Project, which

we will be covering on Studio 2009. The other

two were something called The Protégé and another

film called Gunpowder Milkshake, which I covered

on Studio. I covered both of those films with

my buddy Tom DJ on Studio. Those are the only

wholly original, like I'm sure. Six Underground

has some sort of reference to other spy things

and whatever. And obviously Free Guy, even though

it is an original vehicle, it still has various

references to things. And that's fine. I don't

care if a movie has references. I actually dig

it. I think it's cool. You know, especially Free

Guy with it being a video game film. Well, yeah,

they're knocking off all kinds of stuff. And

being that 20th Century Fox got eaten up by Disney,

they were able to do a lot of that. But the article

continues, like, regardless, the shift is gigantic.

Until the year 2000, about 25 % of top -grossing

movies were prequels, sequels, spinoffs, remakes,

reboots, or cinematic universe expansions. Since

2010, it's been over 50 % every year. And in

recent years, it's been close to 100%. And it's

saying that original movies just aren't popular

anymore, if they even get made in the first place,

which I can kind of see that. Because, I mean,

I watch a lot of sequel stuff, but it depends

now. Like, I've come to this point where I've

watched enough of the natural progressions of

films. Like, take, for instance, the Marvel Cinematic

Universe. Yes, I've watched the television series

on Netflix, or not Netflix, Disney+. But as far

as the films are concerned, I really have no

interest beyond Endgame and the Spider -Man stuff

because they're just starting over with a new

crew. And so for me, the logical ending point

was Endgame and then just leaving it as is. And

I really didn't have a reason to. to go back.

I mean, yes, I'll probably see multiverse just

cause I want to see the few characters that are

in the Illuminati, but I've heard that some of

it was so like jarring as far as what they did

with like Scarlet Witch's character. Yeah. Kind

of ignoring, like doing a redo of WandaVision

is what I've heard. But yeah, ultimately like

I just, I've, I've enjoyed the original movies

we've gotten. I've enjoyed the three, you know,

the three ryan reynolds films that i've seen

recently there's you said six underground there's

another one with uh with the rock uh gal gadot

and uh brian reynolds as well red red notice

red notice and that one was great like i loved

all of them and all of ryan ryan reynolds movies

have actually at least free guy and red notice

are getting a sequel yeah Six Underground was

going to get a sequel, but then things went sideways.

Look, I'm okay with it. Like I said on the episode

with Tom and myself, Gunpowder Milkshake, they

set it up to maybe there would be a sequel. But

for me, there doesn't have to be one. With The

Protege, they didn't really. They might have

set it up. But again, I don't. I miss the days

of having a one and done film. Like beginning,

you start off your story, you do your opening

credits, you whatever. Like when we were, when

we just did Spider -Man part one for, for the

summer of Spider -Man over on serial 2009. I

remember when I was in the theater in 2002, I

had no inclination. that there would ever be

another Spider -Man movie. And then two years

later there was, you know, it is what it is and

that's fine. And that's great. But I miss those

days of not knowing. And with the internet, we

can never not know because it's all here. And

you say you're not interested in phase four,

correct? Like in general, just a general thing

here. Yeah. So. I did this on one of the Hawkeye

episodes that Allison and I did where I went

through and I listed off everything. I went to

the Phase 4 Wikipedia article and I just looked

at the contents. So Phase 4 with the films starts

with Black Widow, Shang -Chi, Eternals, No Way

Home, Multiverse, Love and Thunder, Black Panther,

Wakanda Forever. Ant -Man and the Wasp, Quantumania,

Guardians Volume 3, The Marvels, and then it's

going to end with Fantastic Four, according to

this. For television series, we have WandaVision,

Falcon Winter, Loki Season 1, What If?, Hawkeye,

Moon Knight, Ms. Marvel, She -Hulk, an untitled

Halloween special, Guardians Holiday Special,

Secret Invasion, Ironheart, Armor Wars, and an

untitled Wakanda series. Out of all of this,

besides the stuff that hasn't released yet, I've

seen No Way Home. I've seen halfway through Black

Widow, but I still know what happens because

I'll read a Wikipedia article more than I'll

watch a movie sometimes. Well, we know what happens

to her character after because she goes into.

Obviously. Yeah. Yeah. Then she dies. So. Yeah.

But like with the TV series, I've seen Wanda,

I've seen Falcon, I've seen What If, and I've

seen Hawkeye. Me too. I have zero interest in

Loki because I don't care about Loki as a character.

I will eventually, but I just, I don't know.

And Moon Knight, I don't even know. I mean, I

know Moon Knight's been around for decades. I

have no clue who that guy is. He's like third

tier Marvel. Yeah. And honestly, like Loki, it

was more of like just there's nothing else to

do than anything else. So like while I enjoyed

it, it's not something I'll go back and revisit.

Yeah, I mean. I get it. They want to continue

on. And look, I loved What If. You listen to

all the ToonCast episodes that Allison and I

did. We enjoyed the What If animated series.

I don't know if What If is coming back. Because,

you know, we just don't know. Because I read

articles recently where it's like, yep, nope.

No more what if, or we're not doing what if now,

or we're pushing it off, or we're doing this,

or we're doing, I don't know what it said. But,

you know, I don't know. It's one of those things

where, yeah, oligopoly, it's everywhere. I mean,

even in the late 90s, 75 % or less of best -selling

video games were franchise installments. Since

2007, it's been above 75 % every year, and sometimes

it's 100 % at the top of the charts. It's all

Mario, Zelda, Call of Duty, and Grand Theft Auto.

And they say, why is this happening? Well, any

explanation for the rise of pop culture oligopoly

has to answer two questions. Why have producers

started producing more of the same thing, and

why are consumers consuming it? I think the answers

to the first question are invasion, consolidation

and innovation. I think the answer to the second

question is proliferation. And this these are

this guy's words, not my own. But, you know,

he says invasion is software in the Internet

made it easier than ever to create and publish

content. Most of the stuff that random amateurs

make is crap and nobody looks at it. But a tiny

proportion gets really successful. This might

make media giants choose to produce and promote

stuff that independent weirdos never could. like

an Avengers movie. This can't explain why oligopolization

started decades ago. And, you know, then, then

you go to consolidation, big things like to eat,

defeat, outcompete smaller things. This kind

of goes back to the tent poles that my, my college

professor brought up with, you know, big Disney.

Right. The competition defeated their competition.

Like for instance, once they bought Marvel, They

had a powerhouse going and they destroyed DC

Warner Brothers with it. I mean, because DC Warner

Brothers still can't get their crap together

with all of their various projects. And then,

you know, they outcompete smaller things. So

over time, big things get bigger and small things

should die off, you know. So and Disney with

their hands in every pot kind of lives up to

that. And then they're saying maybe it's inevitable

that major producers of culture will suck up

or destroy everybody else, leaving nothing but

superstars and blockbusters. And, you know, then

the innovation part, they say you may think that

there's nothing left to discover in art forms

as old as literature and music and that they

simply iterate as fashion change. But it took,

you know, humans years of figuring out how to

create. illusion of depths and paintings and

you know various innovation aspects and so they're

saying that it just breeds innovation by having

all of these kind of playing in that that field

because they have to stand out and then the proliferation

is the invasion consolidation innovation you

know can explain the pop culture oligopoly from

the supply side but all three require a willing

audience So why might people be more open to

experiencing the same thing over and over again?

As options multiply, choosing gets harder. You

can't possibly evaluate everything, so you start

relying on cues, like this movie has Tom Hanks

in it, or I liked Red Dead Redemption, so I'll

probably like the second one, which makes you

less and less likely to pick something unfamiliar.

Which, this is one of those tropes that I get

stuck in, because if I don't know any of the

cast, if I don't know... if I've never heard

of it before, it makes it that much harder for

me to watch it. Yeah. Especially when it's TV

or movies, when it's video games, it's, I still

play things that I kind of grew up on, like the

same basic concepts, you know, if it's a fighting

game, you know, like a Dragon Ball Z or a super

smash brothers. Yes. I'm going to, if it follows

that basic formula, yeah, I'll probably play

it. If it's, if it's a franchise I've heard of,

I'll probably play it. You know, if it's, uh,

continuation sequel unless the game i've heard

is crap i'll probably play it or see it or whatever

and so you know it's yeah it's it's it's happening

all across all of culture oh yeah and it's not

just movies it's everything no yeah it is everything

it's all of pop culture and the thing is he mentions

in here about You can only live so long in a

diet of reruns. Not necessarily. I rewatch more

than I can. The new stuff, the new stuff makes

me like, I understand. I, I understand, but that's

my point. That's I'm trying to make the point

of, he specifically says in his article that

you can only, you know, Where is it? God damn

it. Anyway, he says in the article about how

we can only live for so long on a diet of reruns

of whatever it is. And my thing is, that's the

one part of his article that I kind of disagree

with, because like you, I like going back to

old stuff, too, or stuff I haven't seen in a

while or stuff I need to revisit because either

I missed out on it the first time or I dropped

off of it. Right now, as of this recording, I

am in the middle of rewatching Legends of Tomorrow

because it got canceled. And that's fine. Things

can get canceled. Okay, fine. You know, it had

seven seasons. Do I wish it didn't get canceled?

Yes, I wish it didn't get canceled more because

I want those people to have jobs. Go ahead. I've

intentionally stopped watching shows if they're

really bad. knowing that it's gotten canceled

or knowing there's a definitive end, or sometimes

I'll just, I'll, I'll hold it through like supernatural.

I held that through until cause they went 17

seasons or something to that degree. Yeah. And

I watched all of it and I stopped watching it

for, for some time and then kind of blitz through

it. But legends, I quit watching it a couple

of seasons ago because I just didn't care for

the stories or the plot. And, and then, but I've

gone and watched other shows that have a season.

or two under their belt knowing that they got

canceled. And I watched them going in knowing

that it's the definitive end. Yeah. Yeah. And

that's the thing with me with legends. I fell

out just after what was it? Crisis. Yeah. I fell

out just after crisis on infinite earths. I fell

out of that. I fell out of the flash and I am,

Now, I don't know if I'm going to go back to

The Flash and start at season one, but let me

tell you, watching through Legends so far, I've

had the rainbow of emotions that you can imagine.

I've laughed, I've cried, I've whooped, I've

hollered, I've whatever, you know. I'm really

enjoying it. It's an enjoyable show up to at

least the third season so far in my rewatch.

I have rewatched a number of shows just because

I like having them on for background noise. I

can't tell you how many times I've watched the

CBS drama Numbers with Bernard from Santa Claus.

Oh, God. David Krumholtz. You know, I watch that

all the time. I used to watch that all the time.

You know, whatever. When I'm done with Legends,

okay, that's my superhero show for now. I have

set myself up to rewatch a really, really old

show. I don't know how far I'm going to make

it with this one, but so far it's wowsers. I

have decided to rewatch Taxi with Tony Danza

and Judd Hirsch and all of those old actors.

It's got Danny DeVito in there on television.

Like, I haven't seen Danny. Okay, I know, yes,

Danny DeVito's on Always Sunny in Philadelphia,

but I've never watched that show. So, yeah. Yeah,

I mean, that's kind of my whole point in saying

any of this is that I will go back before I will.

The problem with trying something new now specifically

to television, because we now have streaming

and whatever else, what if it doesn't last and

they leave it open -ended? Or, you know what

I mean? Like, I can't get invested in new things

as easily as I can. Oh, I remember this. I'll

spend the next two hours watching this. I don't

know. It's just, it's getting to that point where,

you know, like they say in the article, you have

to do some foraging to find these weird and new

programs. Yep. Or, or things, you know, they're

saying that our spirit, uh, cannot survive on

a diet of reruns. And I begged different. I begged

different because honestly, I prefer, you know,

watching a lot of the stuff that's out today

that's a sequel or a continuation of some other

or spinoff of some show that I've enjoyed. Right.

Unless it's like a complete reimagining, which

in some cases works and others doesn't. Yeah.

I prefer the reruns. Like some of the new stuff

just seems lazy writing and just not entertaining.

it's more of a downer. Yeah. So, yeah. I mean,

I just, at this point in my, my life, I prefer

things that are kind of tried and true and then

I just leave it. And that's the other thing,

like things that show me, Oh, you might like

this. And I look at it. Oh, it's horror or it's

horror adjacent. I have no ill will towards the

horror genre or people who love the horror genre.

It ain't for me. I've known that since I was

five years old, seeing nightmare on Elm street

when it scared the crap out of me. So, you know,

but like, yeah, I don't know. Like we said, and

like Adam said, and like I said, I would love

to have him on here to talk about this, but it

just, how can we change it? I don't know. Just

by not going to experiencing the, The difference,

the different stuff, the weird. Well, the thing

is, and I said this on another podcast with somebody

else. This is 2022. In 50, 60, 70, 100, let's

just say 100 years from now. 100 years from now,

as long as Warner Brothers is still a functioning

company. they're still going to be pumping out

Batman stuff. They're still going to be pumping

out whatever's going to make them money. Same

thing with Disney. Now that they own Marvel and

Star Wars, like I can't imagine what a Star Wars

thing from Disney is going to look like a hundred

years from now. I won't be here to see it, but

I'm saying these things, these franchises, these

universes, these characters that are already

like, what is that? 1939, Batman, 2019, that's

80 years. 83 years? Whatever. But the point is,

Batman existed long before I was born. As long

as he's still making the money, he's going to

exist long after I'm gone. Yep. And I hate to

sound like a depressing dickhead about it, but

that's just the way it is. And there really is

no changing that. You're not wrong. I don't know.

All right. Anything else you would like to say

on this? No, I think that's about it. But I think

that the takeaway from it is try new things.

Yep. But if it doesn't work, you always have

your nostalgia to fall back on and you don't

have to rely on the new stuff. Agreed. Next time

around, folks, I have been working on something

and I have been kind of planning because I don't

know. I want to. I want to be able to talk about

various things, and I want us to be able to talk

about various things that we don't normally talk

about. And I figured, hey, let's do a look at

messaging services from their general SMS inception

to Facebook Messenger and MSN Messenger and 404,

message not found. So that's what's coming up

next here on Altered Geek. Sounds good. Yep.

Take us out, sir. So you can get a hold of us

on the podcatcher. You can get a hold of us on

the website, geekcastradio .com, or you can get

a hold of us on Twitter at Altered Geek or myself

at SCP21. How can the good folks get a hold of

you? On Twitter at TFG and Mike. So until next

time, get altered, get geeky with the Altered

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