Lex Luthor, Batman Casting, and Kids Podcast Services

Hey you guys, this is The Mask, and you guys

are listening to the GeekCast Radio Network.

And you know what? You are smokin'! You're tuned

in to Steve Megatron on Altered Geek. Hello and

welcome to Altered Geek. I'm your host, Steve

Megatron Phillips, and I'm flying solo. I hope

you guys have been enjoying the beginning. of

the Altered Geek Spotlight episodes that have

been coming out on Wednesday, being that there's

only one so far that has been released, although

there's four, five, six more in the can, ready

for consumption on following Wednesdays. I hope

you guys enjoyed the first one with Matt Betts,

writer, poet, author, doer of things, pop culture

aficionado. Godzilla and horror fan sci -fi so

yeah it was a lot of fun talking with him it

was a lot of fun talking with everyone that I've

talked with so far and you guys would kind of

get that and hopefully enjoy what transpires

upon the continuing episodes of this this episode

will continue to be that the topic episode or

the news episode that comes out on Fridays and

and we'll have the interview episodes until I

basically run out of people to talk to or pre

-recorded episodes. So I'm just going to rip

the band -aid off here with a little bit of update

news on myself. I again have been let go. Seems

to be a trend. So if you're looking in the job

market, let me know. But anyways, that aside...

We've had quite a bit of cool stuff kind of pop

up. Shortly before recording this episode, we

got our first look at John Cryer as Lex Luthor.

It was on the CW stream image and it says Max

Security, Lex Luthor, and then it's got him showing

his face, more or less. He looks pretty menacing

like it's crazy to think about this is the guy

from two and a half men who was like the bumbling

idiot brother and and then you look at this and

he's just He's got the the mustache and beard

like goatee looking thing and just bald head

and he just looks mean So yeah, it's gonna be

interesting to see him him jump back into Television

and especially being a super villain mastermind

I kind of look forward to seeing how he portrays

it because the last time we got a live action

Lex Luthor on television, it was Michael Rosenbaum,

the animated voice actor of The Flash, and I

don't know about you, but I'm kind of interested

to see what they do with this. At first, I was

kind of totally against any of these situations,

but I think that they're kind of dying for a

really good villain at this point. Eventually,

I'm sure they'll reintroduce Superman, but I

don't think it's going to be anytime soon. Although

it would be funny to have the Justice League

or the Flash and Arrow and those guys kind of

join over on Supergirl's world to kind of help

out at some point. but I wonder if his introduction

has something to do with kind of the Elseworlds

play that has been kind of coming on. We'll find

out more about that in the fall for sure, but

it's kind of interesting that this is kind of

going on. Side note, I've been playing Arkham

Knight, and against other people's thoughts on

this, on the storyline anyway, I've decided on

normal mode if it plays anything like Arkham

Asylum and Arkham City where you get to play

the Like normal plus or hard plus where they

they when you beat the game they unlock the Other

version of the game where you can use all of

your gadgets from the get -go I mean you still

have to collect them in game, but You start out

with them you start out with all your upgrades

you get to continue to upgrade uh... which allows

you more right ability in the game uh... as you

progress and uh... there's also the the fact

that you can use the skins so like i could use

the eighty nine batman uh... skin on on the character

and i can use it for the batmobile now if they

had the animated series one of the all over that

way you wouldn't believe But I'm kind of I'm

kind of geeked for it I decided to skip all the

side stories which everybody told me not to do

because you you missed part of the story, but

I I watched it all on YouTube when the game was

new I bought the game for like six bucks a while

ago, and so it was like a Christmas or Black

Friday special a New Year's special or something

on stream, and I bought it for like six bucks

and so It wasn't a bad deal for me I mean, I

don't have any of the DLC. I don't have, like,

the Game of the Year edition like Arkham City

is. And I've beat that already. That didn't take

me very long because I kind of knew what I was

doing. Whereas Arkham Knight, I did not. And

so, like, I'll play typically until I cannot

figure out what I'm supposed to do anymore. I'll

watch a YouTube video. I'll try it again. And

if I just keep dying, I know that it's time to

put the game up for a while. And then I'll get

it back out later, another day. And then and

then go at it again until I get stuck But I did

manage to get all the way to the point where

You take down the Arkham Knight and his tank

and the cloud tank and then I'm on my way towards

Well, actually Ivy just died at the point where

I'm at the game and so, you know taking care

of the cloud burst and in all the Toxin in the

city. So now all the side missions open back

up again So I'm thinking just for the sake of

it because I'm like, it says I'm 90 % done with

the Scarecrow storyline. I know where it goes

from there. So I'm thinking as I progress from

here on out on the rest of this game, I'm going

to take a step back of the Scarecrow storyline

and then I'm going to finish all the side storylines.

Riddler, I doubt I'm going to finish, only for

the fact that... His stuff usually is insanely

difficult, and I really don't like the tanks

floating around bothering me in the middle of

the city. It really bothers me. But yeah, I've

been doing that a lot of the time when I've not

been doing the interviews, and so it's been fun.

Definitely fun. So, side note here. They also

drop news that, well Sam Jackson dropped news,

that Captain Marvel can apparently time travel.

Which is a very nice bit of information to know,

which could mean that the reason why she's not

aged a day in her life is because she immediately

time travels from the point of the end of her

movie. the transponder that Nick Fury has sends

a message to her while in her movie like towards

the end of her movie and then she appears after

the snap or the other likelihood is that they

have her come back during the Avengers movie

or some point so that they can fight Thanos prior

to the snap But yeah, time will tell what they

do with that. But it's interesting that they've

revealed this revelation before the movie hits,

March 8th. And we already know that Spidey is

back, and it's pretty much after the snap. Feige

already pretty much said it is. It's after the

events of Avengers Endgame, and so being that

it comes out... after Avengers Endgame, which

comes out in April. So you get Captain Marvel,

which sets up Endgame, and then you get Endgame,

and then it sets up Spider -Man, and so then

you get Spider -Man, and then you've kind of

got the whole giant package of probably eight

hours of movie. So I'm kind of looking forward

to seeing how this whole thing with the Marvel

Cinematic Universe transpires, unlike the cluster

that is Warner Brothers. They've already said

that Shazam is gonna be its own standalone film

which honestly all the film should have been

standalone and maybe have like Their one together

if they're gonna do it basically, you know Set

up their universe first have their couple of

movies have their their couple of joint battles

and then separate But the Warner Brothers is

more or less leaked at this point or announced

that they're gonna recast the Batman, which we

kind of knew, and they've stated that they're,

you know, for the Matt Reeves film that the Batman,

the film, they're gonna find out who the new

Bruce Wayne is by November, which is almost like

what happened with the original way back in episode

one of Altered Geek, like, or early on when we

discovered who the new Batman was gonna be, or

that... We were insinuating what we were hoping

the uniform and the batmobile and all those other

things would turn out So get your speculations

in now of who who they may cast It's it's gonna

be fun to see all the various rumors going around

trying to figure out Who's the bad man? Who's

the new one? Yeah I don't know who they're gonna

cast. I honestly don't care at this point But

obviously gonna go younger because it's gonna

go earlier in the timeline But I'm okay with

it it we got We got Affleck and honestly, I enjoyed

His look and his his version of the character

for what it was Much in the same way. I enjoyed

Christopher Nolan's Christian Bale's iteration

but yeah I mean time will tell time will tell

we'll see what happens it's it's still a matter

of time so it's gonna be interesting and in the

movie verse for a while so we'll just leave it

at that So, I don't know if you've been paying

attention to the smartphone war going on right

now, but a lot of people are having fun talking

about Innovations that might survive or you know

revive the slow smartphone sales The the conversation

surrounding this is that you know Yeah, they're

they're incrementally changing they're updating

every you know few years they're evolving upon

their previous predecessors. And yeah, they're

faster, they've got better processors, more storage,

you know, more cameras. You know, it's... Do

we really need it? And that's kind of the thing

that I've been playing around with for years,

and I've been playing this game of will I, won't

I get a new smartphone? Of course, every time

I'm thinking about it I get laid off, so I guess

that's the answer to that question, but... um

the funny thing is is that the old smartphone

still works as a phone as messaging and web browsing

video streaming social media games and why the

other thing is is you know after they killed

the two -year contracts phones are just expensive.

And so I had fun looking at this article on commando

.com, which is K -O -M -A -N -D -O .com. And

this radio technology host, Kim Commando, was

talking about the fact that the problem with

smartphones now is that the prices keep skyrocketing.

And they killed the two -year carrier contracts,

which In turn people are just not upgrading to

the latest and greatest smartphones like they

used to so They're talking about you know what

could possibly turn it around and Their answer

in this article is the foldable phones and They

they mentioned how Samsung's got you know their

It might be named something of like Galaxy Flex

or Galaxy Fold or Galaxy F or something. But

it's essentially a foldable smartphone and they

unveiled it, you know, earlier this year. But

I guess they've been teasing it since 2013, which

I really didn't pay attention to back then when

the show started. Although I may have noticed

it and mentioned it in the podcast and totally

forgotten about it because, you know, let's face

it, that's six years ago. But. It remains to

be seen how it works in an actual function and

how long it lasts in the grand scheme of things.

I know that they've got, you know, they're saying

like these phones fold into a tablet with a 7

.3 inch display and, you know, can it be folded

back into a smaller flip phone like gadget for

a 4 .5 inch display? And I guess that they said

that you know you could run multiple apps at

the same time like up to three or something and

on the bigger display and multi active window

and so like basically four standard size displays

a tablet and a smart phone rolled into one But

it's gonna cost like $1 ,800 to $2 ,500 Not something

I'm gonna spend the money on and then you get

the iPhones which again, you know Samsung and

Apple have been floundering in their prices and

their recent sales over the last couple years,

but really there's not been that much innovation

to warrant people paying the prime dollar. Plus,

for $1 ,800, I could buy a pretty sweet rig for

my computer. I could upgrade it. I could fix

this leak on the back of my sunroom. I could

buy... a couple of cheaper phones. I don't know.

There's so much other stuff. I could buy a fully

decked out Apple laptop for that price and not

have to even worry about it. I just don't get

it, spending that much on a phone. But they said

that some of these factors play into the fact

that the iPhone sales were down last year too

and the weak demand for it and the expensive

price tags, cheap battery replacements, less

than compelling feature updates, and so the incremental

upgrades on processors and storage aren't really

cutting it. And then the fact that they may switch

from the lightning cable to USB -C, which would

be helpful because most people don't want to

have to buy multiple cords. And I personally

don't like the fact that you can't just use a

random USB cord. Which is another thing keeps

me away from them, but Yeah, I don't know like

there's a lot of features You know like the 5g

longer battery longer battery and honestly better

price are the two main things like I could care

less about the The distance charging and notchless

screens and fingerprint sensors I want long battery

life that I don't have to charge in the middle

of the day and I want better pricing and I realize

that comes with innovation. Now, the only thing

that has me remotely interested in the flip phone

thing is because I used to have a Motorola Razr,

and I loved that phone. The design, everything

about it was awesome. Now, they're talking about

the reboot, and mind you, I covered this a while

back, and now all the sites are starting to cover

it, which is hilarious to me, because now that

the 3D renders are publicly out there all over

the place, people are starting to get into it.

I'm having fun with this. But they've mentioned

that the flip phone is gonna make a comeback,

and this time it'll be a cutting -edge foldable

smartphone with a hinge and a flexible screen

that folds inward plus another smaller exterior

screen. So that little tiny exterior screen that

was on the original one is just gonna be bigger

on the front and be fully LCD or LED or whatever

OLED. However, they're gonna set it up in this

because I'm sure it's gonna be expensive and

it's gonna be nice. But unlike Samsung's foldable

phone, which folds onto a tablet -sized gadget,

the 2019 Razr appears to be a smaller, pocket

-sized phone that expands into a regular -sized

display, which honestly is something that I would

prefer. I would like a regular smartphone, and

then it folds into the compact kind of thing

I used to carry in my pocket. And so with the

shortage of smaller smartphones in the market,

it kind of makes the best... compromise between

the the pockets and you know display size. Apparently

Lenovo though that owns Motorola plans to manufacture

only about 200 ,000 of the phones which are expected

to have still expensive price tag of around 1

,500. I think if they can lower that like if

if they could make it like 900 or something like

I think that more people would jump on board

with it being that it's already expensive to

buy phone like I'm looking at the Google Pixel

phone right now. And the only phone I would even

jump remotely from the Pixel 2 is the Razer V4,

which in the renders look almost identical to

the old Razer as far as the button placement's

little notch at the very bottom of the smartphone

that kind of sticks out and the way the outside

looks and the side buttons. I love the look.

of the old phone. So if it's even remotely close

to the renders, I would be all over it, although

I wonder how many times you can bend that thing,

as Michael Powers had mentioned before, that

hinge wears out. And I know I kind of covered

a little bit of this last week as well with the

CES stuff, but to be honest, I'm kind of excited

about this phone if you can't tell. I love the

original one, and so to me, this is kind of the

nice innovation. Plus, if I could just not have

That gargantuan phone up to my ear and have the

smaller one and just hold it or even Bluetooth

I'm thinking about getting another Bluetooth

headset so that I can use that but But yeah,

I'm kind of kind of excited to see you see where

this stuff goes in this technology as we progress

through through time on this So I'm gonna take

a quick break come out on the other side with

a rather short topic and We'll see where things

go from there At this point, he probably is.

And we're back. So we've had multiple conversations

about this pertaining to kids and technology

and their exposure to various things. Like, my

kids got kindle fires for Christmas and We weren't

sure how they were going to play out as far as

what they can use it for, what educational games

and everything, because we kind of use it for

part of the homeschooling. The hard part is finding

games that are suitable and kind of teaching,

and it's kind of difficult anyway. Like we don't

want anything super flashy, we just want something

that kind of teaches and is kind of repetitive

in a way, but... Every time I think of that I

think of the old 90s games that we're learning

that I used to see on DOS and in like school

so They don't really translate well and most

kids wouldn't play stuff like that today because

of what they've been exposed to Even my kids

with their limited exposure wouldn't find that

very entertaining Although they might I don't

know I'd have to get access to some of it again

on one of my many burnt CDs from the 90s But

Interesting enough, there's a company called

Pinna, which wants to be basically Netflix for

kids podcasts, which is an interesting concept

when you think about it, because really, you

don't know what's suitable for kids. I mean,

yeah, you can look at the clean rating, but that

doesn't necessarily mean it's actually fully

clean for kids or suitable for children. this

service just launched and it's ad free which

it's a good good concept because honestly you

can't let your kids watch YouTube nowadays because

half the ads that come up are for films or just

random commercials that you don't really want

them watching in the first place or services

that have nothing to do with the kids and so

having an ad -free streaming podcast service

for kids for like the podcast themselves and

audiobooks and music is kind of a novel concept

and kind of one that I could kind of get behind

honestly as a parent. So it's gonna start at

$7 .99 per month which is actually less than

a Netflix subscription at this point. or $79

.99 per year. So I guess it began as like an

umbrella of Panoply Media, like a pilot project

thing in 2017, and they spun it off into its

own separate company. But it's backed by Slate

and Panoply parent Graham Holdings. And some

former Scholastic executives are involved with

this, or as the CEO and... They said that Maggie

McGuire of Pinna, that's such a weird name, said

that in this one app, parents can trust they'll

find quality, age -appropriate entertainment

in a variety of audio formats and story lengths,

spanning all of their favorite themes while covering

multiple age levels, all free from ads. And it's,

I guess, not the first podcast service in kids

programming. which I didn't know, but I guess

there's another one called Bela and Kids Listen,

which kind of tap into that market, which I'm

totally oblivious to any of this because I kind

of hang out in the normal podcast realm. I've

never even thought as far as the kids are concerned,

but I definitely see that age appropriate and

safer stuff with no advertising for children

is a much better option. But I guess pin is launching

with a large catalog with more than a thousand

audio shows and podcast episodes audiobooks and

songs And it has partnered with other children's

programming brands like scholastic highlights

in American public media, which Any kid even

from you know millennial age or before remember

scholastic or highlights magazine? Scholastic

had the plethora of books that filled the library

and in Highlights magazine was that giant time

waster book that most people read, most people

played in, and then they quickly discarded. But

I guess they said too that the platform already

features several award -winning podcasts, including

the Peabody award -winning podcast with Gen Z

media, the unexplained disappearance of Myers

Patel, which I've never heard of, which tells

you how much I pay attention to things like that.

But I guess the Pina app is available in the

app stores with plans to launch an Android version

soon, which is unfortunate for me because I don't

have an Apple device, although... Technically

I do. I have an iPod. And so technically I could

use that, but I'm probably not going to. We have

mostly Kindle fires. We have two, actually three

Kindle fires. One's a like second generation,

which is a dinosaur and won't install anything

anymore. Completely useless, including for videos

and various other things at this point. The two

new ones are difficult. to traverse, like, there's

too much operating system in the way on their

highly loaded Android version of Kindle, and

so it frustrates my wife to have to use it, and

honestly myself too, whereas I would just prefer

to use an Android tablet at this point, or some

other device entirely. But yeah, I think it's

kind of interesting though that kids are starting

to get content that's specifically for learning.

uh and and honestly like i i think i'm gonna

try it out and test it and see what happens um

just to find out more information about it uh

because that might be another avenue i know uh

lavar burton has a service it's not podcast it's

like video but it's lavar burton reads um and

he or LeVar Burton Kids, and he has LeVar Burton

Reads, which is basically a live tour, a tour

that goes around, and he picks different pieces

of short fiction, reads it to the kids, he has

a podcast, and he's also kind of the, he does

award -winning SkyBerry app programming, and...

He's also got a plethora of other things that

he's just involved with Including his lavar Burton

website where he Has various things that are

in the in in the realm of like mr. Rogers so

Any any really any of these guys that are that

are educational like that I can get behind I

thought it was kind of an interesting concept

and something to kind of explore if you're somebody

with kids and trying to help them learn and kind

of have that audio book or podcast or music experience

that we get to have as an adult but without all

the having to worry. I would be interested in

finding out more about the services themselves

to see if they're actually what they claim to

be. I think that about wraps this episode up.

We've covered a lot of ground. We're going to

have more topical -based stuff coming up. I'm

hoping to reconnect with Booth Ninja in the future

and Birdman Dodd so we can have an actual episode

of the content and the podcast. We'll see what

happens. Until next time, thank you for listening.

You can get ahold of us on the Twitters at Aldergeek

or at SCP -21 for myself. And until next time,

get altered, get geeky with the Altered Geeks.