Spotlight – BJ Williams

These guys at the GCRN would make great Green

Lantern Corps members. Seriously. Who are these

guys? You're tuned in to Steve Megatron on Altered

Geek. Hello, and welcome to Altered Geek. I'm

your host, Steve Megatron Phillips. Today, I'd

like to welcome to the program BJ Williams, a

pop culture superhero classic sci -fi aficionado

who also hosts The Pilot Podcast. Welcome, BJ.

Hi, thanks for having me. Hi, everyone. BJ Williams

from The Pilot Podcast. You can find us at thepilotpodcast

.com. uh long -winded uh introduction uh what

can you tell the listeners about yourself and

sure uh so i think i'm just like an average geek

happen to also be a scientist so when it comes

to the sci -fi angle of things i can be a little

critical just due to my background also an avid

fan of tv you know after you're working all day

you got to relax somehow and what better way

than to Basically tear apart and review the pilot

episodes of TV shows and decide if these people

are doing a good job. That's actually really

interesting that you mentioned that you're a

scientist, too. Yeah, it comes up a lot whenever

we see like medical related shows or science

fiction shows where I start asking myself, is

that really how it would work? Like even in a

fantasy show, I start to question. Does that

even make sense? Yeah, because there seems to

be a lot of that in television of just kind of

throwing things and seeing kind of what sticks

with really anything, especially in a pilot.

A pilot's very raw and full of issues too. And

so they don't really do their full due diligence

usually on research on whether it's possible

or not. Exactly. A lot of times they might not

have the full concept for the show set down because

maybe they don't know if they'll get a full season.

And because of that, they'll really just throw

out anything in that first episode. So what are

some that you've specifically noticed or just

on a whole that whether it be a particular genre

of series that seem to have the most? flaws with

them right uh so i'd say two main genres the

first one which i'll be honest i'm not an expert

in but anything involving time travel i feel

like you're just asking for trouble continuity

what are your rules can you change the future

are you going to an alternate timeline all of

that can get very messy but some shows do do

it well There's things like Russian Doll, which

is a new show that came out. I think they do

a good job of having a time loop that kind of

makes sense as you're reiterating each time.

And I think a lot of things related to kind of

health. So there's a lot of things. I'm thinking

Night Flyers or The Passage. These are some new

shows that came out where they're talking about

kind of... messing with your brain and enhancing

genetics. And I actually did biomedical research.

So when you start talking about genes, that's

when I'm really like picking up on that's not

a real technique or that doesn't actually apply

to the human body. That has to be annoying, just

sitting there watching and knowing that it's

just totally full of crap in certain situations.

It can be frustrating. And it's... What makes

it more annoying is that you can tell they put

in a little effort because they'll use related

terminology or real scientific words. But the

way they kind of string it together or the situation

they're applying it to, it just makes me want

to like rip my hair out. But I just have to step

back, have fun, ignore their logic. See, I have

fun with... I don't pretend to even understand

remotely any of the stuff when they're talking

about the brain or the superhero -type information,

although those come from the comics. They're

still not based in reality in any stretch of

the means. But the one I do have fun with is

time travel because I like trying to play around

with the chrono. chronological uh aspect of it

in in my head trying to put together the canon

and try and see how uh it may have connected

despite the uh the paradox or or the the ripple

effect definitely i feel the same way whenever

i watch time travel shows or movies i'm trying

to piece it together in my mind and then i start

asking I wonder if the writers wrote this all

down. Do they know the timeline, or is this just

the fans that care about it? Now, are you a fan

of Star Trek? I hesitate to say yes, because

you might ask me some trivia questions. I would

be gentle, but I know entirely too much about

it. yeah um that's a separate podcast i host

um but uh no i i only bring that up because time

travel is that that kind of one constant in just

about every series uh where they they tend to

play around with that either falling back in

time messing something up and having to fix it

or um Having an undesired future and certain

members going back to the past to alter it to

make it have the events unfold as they would

like to see it. So it gets very confusing if

you're not familiar with the canon to begin with.

I can see that, yeah. Although I will say one

of the best knocks that they hit with canon...

uh, in, in their, their time travel was, um,

not only pretty much in the Star Trek films,

uh, Star Trek four, they use time travel to go

back and get some whales, which kind of a lame

premise, but yeah, but you know, they, they bring

it back to the future and it's like, Oh, the

whales to an alien probe were saved. And then

it goes on its merry way. But Probably the best

example would be First Contact with the Borg

going back in time. And there were some that

were frozen in the more or less ice caps. And

don't feel bad if I'm glossing over this, but

there's an episode of Enterprise which takes

place like 100 years after the point where the

Next Generation crew went back to. and inadvertently

awaken these drones that are frozen in ice during

that timeline. So it's kind of interesting how

they play that into it. But some of the technologies,

however, despite the timeline, seem to not line

up in that show. Yeah, that can be annoying.

I always think about... The new episodes of Star

Wars when it comes to technology, like Episode

1, 2, and 3, everything looks really shiny and

cool. And then you get to 4, 5, and 6, and it's

like, I know the Empire took over, but you guys

threw away everything? It's all hand -me -downs.

Apparently, like, we're not manufacturing anything

new except more replicas of Death Stars. although

they get shiny again in seven and eight so yeah

there's some people found some money now we can

have shiny new stuff again as we retread all

of the old storylines yes well that's another

yeah we'll see how episode nine comes out yeah

it's one of those things i'm gonna see it anyway

so like doesn't matter if i complain or not they

have my money yeah What are some of the films

that you're looking forward to that are coming

out in 2019 that you think could have potential

problems or could be good? I realize you're probably

going to see them regardless of your thoughts,

because that's my mentality on it. Yeah, unfortunately.

Well, you know, I don't mind. I'm going to see

a lot of movies this year, regardless if they're

good or not. I am interested to see Avengers

Endgame, how they're going to wrap that up, how

they're going to explain everything. I have a

feeling they're going to go the less is more

approach when it comes to details and just leave

those open -ended questions for fans to go crazy

about. And I'm fine with that. I'm also very

curious if the Dark Phoenix movie is actually

going to come out and what that's going to mean

for the future of the X -Men movie universe.

I have very low expectations for that film, though.

I'm very much looking forward to seeing how Captain

Marvel ties into... I'm more curious about...

you know, Nick Fury and Coulson being in it,

but, uh, and, and Captain Marvel and seeing how

her character kind of jumps into the, the Avengers

timeline. But I, I'm very invested in end game

regardless of what happens. Uh, and then I have

a, a weird time travel fan theory on, on the

Spider -Man movie far from home, uh, which I,

which I think ties into, uh, infinity war. Okay,

okay. Do we know when Homecoming is set? They

haven't really said, and that's why I'm playing

with this headcanon here until we see otherwise.

I'm thinking that originally when we see Parker

driving across the bridge in Infinity War in

the bus, which they're in a bus again and far

from home. And I'm wondering if it technically

was that same point where he was going on this

trip and then inadvertently got pulled into the

Avengers battle with Thanos. And so I'm thinking

that that's where that happened. And because

of whatever they're going to do in Endgame, it's

going to retcon Infinity War completely. and

so more or less he'll never get that Iron Spider

suit. He'll still be in his other suit, and everybody's

life will move on in their merry little way,

but there's no mention of Stark in the Far From

Home, so I'm wondering if it was like an ultimate

sacrifice type thing, and Far From Home takes

place during the point of where Infinity War

would have taken place. Okay, so kind of like

after Endgame. when they fix everything, we'll

kind of rewind, and then Far From Home will kind

of start from that new point in the timeline.

Yeah, essentially erasing the snap and the bloodshed

of the whole Infinity War battle. So I think

it takes place during that same point, but we

won't know until after Endgame and until Far

From Home comes out. But that's my theory. I

like that theory. I think that's a nice... clean

disney marvel way to kind of like save everyone

and start fresh with some new plot lines only

time will tell it is marvel so true true this

will be an interesting year for marvel i am also

excited for captain marvel and that i don't know

if there'll be time travel there but we are gonna

go back in the past i'm wondering how that's

gonna cross over with movies we've already seen

if we'll see any other superheroes besides, um,

Colson. Um, cause I guess cap, no, Captain America

was frozen at that time. Was anyone around in

the nineties? I don't think so. They, they, I

don't even think possibly banner and, and Hawkeye

and, and black widow. But I don't think, uh,

cause Stark didn't have his. his bomb explode

yet or Cap was still frozen and Thor hadn't crash

landed yet. Oh, so I guess she really can be

the star in the 90s. Mm -hmm. Which makes it

nice for her whole 90s -based website. Yeah.

Okay, I have to ask this question since we've

gone deep into Marvel. Do you like Hawkeye as

a character? I really don't know. My, my exposure,

like I grew up on DC, so my exposure to Marvel

was like the nineties animated series of like

Spider -Man and fantastic four and, uh, Iron

Man. And so I'm familiar with those and The Incredible

Hulk as well. So I'm familiar with those shows

of the 90s, but I'm more of a DC fan overall.

But my main exposure to the Marvel characters

has been the films. And I don't think we've really

had Hawkeye fleshed out enough to really get

a vibe of who he is. And so I think that he's

kind of like that tertiary character that, yeah,

he kind of matters, but... You saw how much he

mattered when he wasn't in Infinity War? Very

true. I think you have a very fair approach to

assessing his character. While I take the very

harsh, you don't seem that important, yet they

keep bringing you back. I don't understand. Well,

I think it's the we got to get the original band

back together type thing for the new movie. Because,

you know, everybody else is dead. True, I guess

they have limited numbers. And they do have Rhodey.

They do have Rhodey. Yeah, it's like every sidekick

is now on the A -team. Well, they've got the

original Avengers, and then they've got War Machine

and Ant -Man. Which, that was an unforeseen one

until the trailer, which is kind of a nice way

of bringing him into the fold of changing things

up. Yeah, I appreciate that. I feel like he is

underappreciated and underrated as a superhero.

It'll be interesting to see them explore the

quantum realm, too, I think. Yeah, that's where

things could start to get confusing. I hope that...

Actually, I'm confident they've planned this

out well enough that they'll make it easy for

us to understand as well. Or they'll put so much

action in, we won't have time to even concentrate.

Exactly. A cool battle, then it's over and we

won't even ask questions. You know, like the

whole battle of Loki. So what are some of your

favorite superheroes, whether it be of the 90s

or of now? So I am a 90s child, child of the

90s. So my first exposure to superheroes was

actually the Power Rangers. So they will always

hold a special place in my heart. And I thought

the recent movie was acceptable. But I think

nowadays I've moved on to Marvel. I didn't really

keep up with them growing up. But the Marvel

Universe has taken over and now I'm a big fan

of Thor. And Captain America. I think those are

my two favorites. And I'm actually looking forward

to Shazam. I don't know much about his character,

but I'm looking forward to this movie because

I think it's going to be a fun take on the superhero

film with some good humor, kind of like Thor.

He adds some good funny moments. See, I didn't

even like Thor, the films, until we get to the

third one. Because they added in the fun. And

it was serious, but it wasn't taking itself too

seriously to where it wasn't enjoyable. And Ant

-Man can be a little bit over the top, but it

was fun and enjoyable as well. And I think Shazam

is going to be along those same lines for DC,

which will be a welcome addition. considering

everything's dark brooding and just, you know,

that whole tone. Yeah, as a DC fan, how do you

feel about the DCEU? I never really was a fan

of the DCEU. I was kind of glad to see the Justice

League come together, although the movie was

hot garbage. Yeah, yeah. It didn't help that

DC and Warner Brothers constantly was interfering

with the directors and the writers. uh, every

step of the way and, and having so much, uh,

they, they weren't really allowing their creative

control to be let go of enough, like saying,

look, this is our overarching guideline. You

know, you just have to connect point A to point

B. Um, but you know, as a whole, this, you know,

have fun with it, you know, kind of like what

they've done with Marvel, you know, it's, it's

kind of, you know, we have to hit this note,

but do what you're going to do you know and so

I think that that's kind of the missing point

and why you've seen so many actors bail on the

characters or why there's so much delays or um

let me just look at the whole debacle with Batman

I think Affleck would have done really well at

it had they actually let him play the character

yeah I liked him in the role he didn't have the

best scenes to act out but i i thought he fit

well as batman i think so too and he fit really

well as bruce wayne although now we're gonna

get to see what they do with the batman and the

only nice thing that we'll get out of it is um

we'll get to see the finally the detective part

of him instead of the brooding you know beat

him up or or boohoo my girlfriend died Yeah,

he's very mopey, a mopey vigilante. And I feel

like they should add a little bit more to his

character in the films. I want to see more of

the Arkham games, I guess. That would be entertaining.

Do you think we'll ever get another Superman

film, solo film? I think so. I don't know if

it'll be Henry Cavill. Oh. Poor guy. Which is

unfortunate because they moved from... They should

have just done solo films for all the characters

and then just had a culmination film or started

them all out in a Justice League film. Instead

of coming together, they're already established

and then just going off in their separate directions.

Yeah, but they had to catch up to the Avengers.

There was no time for solo films. I guess the

only thing they beat them out on is they did

make Aquaman relevant, and they did do the first

superhero female film of Wonder Woman. Yeah,

I guess those were their two highlights so far.

And I was actually surprised how cool they made

Aquaman seem, because on paper, not that impressive,

talking to fish, breathing underwater. Every

time I see him, I see the old 1970s Super Friends.

yes and then he just starts talking to fish and

he did that too so it's yeah it's i don't know

i think the implementation in live action is

so much better in this instance um so what what

prompted uh what what kind of drove your your

fascination with with pop culture and whether

you know classic or or modern or any of that

uh i'd say being an only child and having a lot

of free time to watch tv surf the internet and

play video games i think one of the things that

brings me into pop culture and liking like Why

I like to stay up to date with it is that I'm

always thinking about new ideas. You know, you're

a podcaster as well. You know, it takes some

creativity to put out new episodes, come up with

new content. And I think that also makes me want

to engage in what other people are doing. Obviously,

there's certain niches like superheroes that.

will stick out to me more but i definitely like

to engage in other people's ideas and i think

that also inspires me as well um so i think that's

kind of what draws me into pop culture and drives

me to want to stay updated about what's going

on in different genres i can definitely see that

it's i i've been into pop culture since the early

nineties when I got my first taste of like, uh,

Batman comics, uh, um, Ninja turtles on television,

uh, the, the old nineties DCAU and, you know,

X -Men and, and, and the Marvel, uh, cartoons.

And then, uh, the original power Rangers on through

to zero Zio is when I watched. And, um, so like

the old school crew and, uh, Why'd you stop?

There's so many more seasons. I did go back and

not necessarily watch every episode of every

season, but I have gone through and kind of blitzed

through some of the series to kind of catch up.

And I love the crossover episodes with past crews

and modern ones. Yeah, that's always fun. like

forever red or the, the mega force episode was

kind of a, yeah, but it was, it was interesting.

Uh, and then the most recent one where they had,

um, Tommy and the, the mega morpher and, uh,

kind of jumping between his different characters

against the, uh, the robo clone. And yeah. Yeah,

I mean, it's been interesting. I've enjoyed what

they do with it, and I think that it'll get more

interesting now that Hasbro has the rights to

it. Yeah, I think it's going to improve now that

Hasbro is taking over. I think they are willing

to put in a little more money than Bandai was.

Oh, definitely. Hasbro's got some dough. Yeah.

Even seeing their Toy Fair figures, they look...

Crazy impressive. Yeah, and they're always ready

for a new franchise, especially since I feel

like Transformers is hitting a rocky point where

Bumblebee didn't really reignite things like

they might have hoped. I don't think it reignited,

but I don't think it flopped either. But I definitely

like the direction that they went with it. I

just think they should have done that 10 years

ago. Yeah, yeah. It's like, I'm glad you're thinking

about that now. Hopefully you'll keep trying

so we can get more movies like that. But they

are having more new series. There's going to

be a new one on Netflix. Oh, I didn't know about

that. Yes, a new Netflix Transformers cartoon.

Since Machinima went belly up, they had to find

a new partner for the animation. So they have

Rooster Teeth. Netflix as partners for that.

That should be pretty good. Remains to be seen

what they do with it, but, you know, could be

worse. Could be Cartoon Network. Yeah, Cartoon

Network or even Nickelodeon. I mean, I feel like

those are the biggest two options for these children

programs, but neither of them handle some of

these shows very well. No, especially Cartoon

Network. They seem to botch a lot of series.

Yeah. And their schedule. I have all these flashbacks

to Adventure Time and how they would just break

up these seasons over an entire year and just

randomly throw out episodes. They need more respect

for the fans. Yeah, totally. And that was one

thing that's kind of irked me about Cartoon Network

for years is that it seems like they get their

hands on something and then they kind of put

all the effort into it for the first season.

And then after that, they're like, death slot.

And then they put everything on the other content

that they have that's original to them. What

are some projects that you have coming up or

some episodes that you're working on? Yeah, so

our most recent episode I think might work well

for your fans as well is the Umbrella Academy

on Netflix. We have some interesting thoughts.

My co -host and I, when we go over that episode,

it's some cool superhero elements with a nice

dark twist. And some time travel as well. So

everything I love criticizing. And then next

week we're going to do some more mainstream things.

Seeing some new shows on NBC, Fox, ABC. A lot

of procedurals. But sometimes a good procedural

is fun. It just kind of lets your mind unwind.

So those are our upcoming pilot episode reviews

that we're planning. And there's also a potential

for a new project where I don't have too many

details where we might do kind of a radio show

style podcast where we're going to tell a long

form story through different episodes. So that's

something that might come up in a few months.

Awesome. Awesome. Yeah, definitely be interested

in hearing that too. Original content is always

a fun thing to get to listen to. Yeah, yeah,

and it's fun to create as well. Definitely. Then

you get to have a whole voice cast. Yeah, it

could become something pretty big, but I'm excited

to see where that goes. Well, good luck with

that. Thank you. So how can the listeners get

a hold of you and find out more about you and

your podcast online? Sure. So the easiest way

to find us is to go to thepilotpodcast .com.

That's where you can find all of our episodes,

all of our social media links. We're on Instagram,

we're on Twitter, we're on Facebook. And you

can also subscribe to us on iTunes and Google

Play. So check us out. Awesome. Definitely do

that, guys. And I'd like to thank you for taking

the time out of your busy schedule to hang out

with us here on Altered Geek. It was my pleasure.

Thanks for having me. So until next time, get

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