Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - QQ ep 92 - The Actual, Real Life, Very Last After Hours

Episode Date: June 4, 2021

In this very special edition of Quick Question, we're surfacing up the very newest and very last After Hours episode, with some of your favorite Cracked Alum! That famous Daniel and Soren dynamic is back Babyyyy!  And as always big thanks to our sponsors. Thanks to Hawthorne. Take your quiz and get 10% off your first purchase at hawthorne.co with code QQ. And thanks to Hello Tushy.  10% off + free shipping HelloTushy.com/QQ

Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of Quick Question with Soren and Daniel. Daniel and I are taking this week to do, let's say we're hunting down new scoops for this podcast. We're out there following the leads. Instead, we wanted to let you know that we recorded a new and absolutely last After Hours episode with Michael Swaim and Katie Willard. Yes, we got the band back together and did a brand new quarantine After Hours episode with Michael Swaim and Katie Willard. Yes, we got the band back together and did a brand new Quarantine After Hours. Some of you may remember, we reunited in 2020 to perform an unreleased episode live to raise money for COVID relief. And thanks to all of you, we raised over $12,000. touched by not only the generosity everyone showed, but with just the support and the love that many of you still showed for this project that we used to love to make and that

we just couldn't anymore. Now, because this new episode is essentially just a table read anyway, we thought it actually translates pretty well to the audio medium. So without further ado, we present the final and absolutely very last, please don't ask for any more, episode of After Hours. If you also want to watch it, you can go check it out on YouTube as well. You can find it on Daniel's Twitter account, my Twitter account, Michael Swaim's Twitter account, Katie Willert's. Anywhere you follow any of us, we've been posting about it. So please enjoy.

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Dad deserves something that will last him a lifetime of flushes. Refresh your gift game and his butt. Get 10% off plus free shipping and get your butt clean at hellotushy.com slash qq. It's been 28 minutes. Should we just reschedule or? It's quarantine. What else do you have to get to? I don't know.

I have to wind my watch. I do things. Wash your hands. Thank you. Well, my phone usage has just gone up week over week thanks to this. So I'm already, I'm'm really I'm in too deep. Which is to say what is up? Katie and I both desperately want to escape the four walls of our homes while Daniel is happier than Smeeta the clam not having to interact with anyone. Yeah no one shits while I'm talking to them except my dog it's a delight.

Wow it's comforting to know that we're still on brand after all these years. Boners! Jesus this is the conversational equivalent of an escape room. Hey, let's do one of the word wrestling matches you three like so much. That always seems to cheer you up. I've got one, and it's topical as shit, too. Okay, if you could escape quarantine by going into any movie's fabricated reality, which would it be? Okay, I'll go first. I know exactly where I'd want to go.

The spaceship from Wall-E. Think about it. You get to have every need met and anticipated while zooming around in a hover chair. And it counts as a false reality because the real reality is the horrible trash planet Wall-E boots everyone back to at the end. Classic asshole move, Wall-E. What a prick. No, he saved them. You want to be one of the mindless sheeps stuck on a spaceship for the foreseeable future because we decimated Earth? How would I even know that? I'm too busy chatting it up with my online friends and having food delivered directly to my mouth hole.

She knows about Postmates, right? Oh, yeah. Postmates is great. Sometimes, after a late night- Sorin, stop. Sorin, this is not a podcast recording. Sorry, it's just a force of habit. I'm already living a sedentary lockdown life with no joy,

but what my screens pump into me, and as a WALL-E zombie, I'd only be cognizant of my online life and delicious meals and forget the rest. And I'd get to wear a bitchin' stretchy jumpsuit while doin' it. But the whole point of the movie is that the megacorporation, and large created a secret directive to keep the Axiom on autopilot even if it was possible to go back to Earth. Yeah, they're essentially holding Earth's inhabitants hostage. Lick that space boot, Katie! Plus, how do you poop in those hover chairs? Yes, that is a good point. Okay, I'm sorry if during a worldwide pandemic I want to be wrapped in a gossamer blanket of comfort and solace

to shield me from the fact that my government doesn't give two shits about its citizens. I take a megacorporation fulfilling my every need over that anything. There's no way around being complicit in all the horrible shit that is the cost of technological advancement. All I can hope to do is not worry about it. Still, fuck Jeff Bezos, though. Sure, but this is all about what alternate reality do you want to live in, though. Not just, like, bare minimum exist. We want to see you thrive, Katie.

I'm living my best life when robots feed me chocolate, and if you disagree, you are fat-shaming. But that's arguably not even a truly fabricated reality, just a very specific perspective. If we're talking actually fake, like the winner and still champion is clearly the first, the OG ARG, the granddaddy simulacrum. You want to live in a magic eye painting? I, I think I'd get a headache eventually, right? No, he means Jet of Blood, the Artaud play that founded the theater of cruelty and defied both staging and the contract between performers and audience.

No he doesn't. Look at him. He clearly doesn't mean that. I know. I just need people to know how smart I am. The Matrix! Alright, the Matrix, you insufferable best friends who I hate, may peace be upon you. Real mixed bag there. Also, we already did a whole Matrix evening, remember? I'm sick of talking about the Matrix. Oh yeah, you did that whole deep dive into the mythology. I hated it. I feel like we're close enough now that I can say that.

Really? That week of research was one of my more productive freakouts. I stalked, caught, killed, and ate a white rabbit. Didn't help. Uh, I don't even... What does that mean? Trinity's hacker name is White Rabbit. Oh. See, I actually haven't even seen it.

As a monument to genetic perfection, I find the idea of superior machines just unbelievable. Whoa, are we talking about the Matrix? You know, that would be the ultimate fake reality to escape from quarantine. Wow, he's worse than usual. Come on, think about it. It's like regular life, but better, because it's regular life from early 2000s, which I think we can all agree at this point was right before things started to slide to shit.

No rampaging viruses, no resurgent fascism, just steak that tastes like steak and ladies in red dresses rocking out to vertical horizon. Still systemic racism though. Oh, and I could fly! So you want to live in a bubble of information and data that makes the world seem to be one of your liking? That's called fake news, baby, and it's all readily available to you right here and now! Yeah, but I can't live in it!

Plus, I'm assuming you'd get the same deal as Joey Pants, where you get a sweet life and your memory wipes so you never even know you're a stooge. I mean, sure, a careful mix of alcohol and prescription medication can provide a similar effect, but my doctor says he's not a doctor, so I'm thinking of cutting back. But you would be susceptible to computer viruses, or whatever Agent Smith was. You'd still be living under the boot heel of a totalitarian machine regime, whether you knew it or not. I mean, same reason we shot down my argument. Worse, at any moment, you or your loved one could get turned into an agent and

rewritten out of existence. All of that stuff is true of my life now. Who knows when I'll kick it? Who knows when the things of the internet will finally come for me? I told you it's internet of things. At least this way I'm essentially in a mundane open world video game with all of the cheats toggled on. I don't think you could fly, though. Not fly and have no understanding of the machine threat. Neo can only dodge bullets and whatnot because he's genetically modified and destined to transcend the fake reality. The only way to have superpowers in the Matrix universe, we'd have to be aware of the fabricated nature. It's that awareness that allows Neo to bend the rules of the world around him. Knowledge is quite literally power.

And with that power comes the responsibility of destiny. Of course! You could still be a regular Matrix denizen living out a fake, boring 2000s era life. No. Nuts to that. I only want to go back to the year 2003 if I get to do wire work and am blissfully unaware of why. I mean, can't I just be A, the one? I want to fly around in a trench coat but not have to reload or revolve anything. Nope. Them's the matrix rules.

You can be the one or you can be some schlub in a pod. I mean, I'm that now. Dang. You guys are silly. Hey, fuck you, pal! This is easy. I don't even know why we're talking about this. I can win this thing in five seconds.

Why are we talking? Because we're friends. We haven't seen each other in years. But fine! Win the conversation. End our fun game in five seconds and the three of us will just continue being friends without you. Happy?

Even Soren? No, of course not, buddy. I'm sorry, I'm not gonna lie to my boy ward. Great! Here comes the dunk then. I pick Ready Player One. Terrible movie or the so-so book that everyone fucking loved until they fucking hated it? Both, but

more so the book because of one small change that I'll get to. I like when he gives us little previews for what he's gonna say later. It increases my watch time within the context of this conversation. Yeah, it's like he has a table of contents for a talk he somehow already had without us. Please, Katie, you don't mention the table until minute nine. But as I was winning with, Ready Player One, think about it. The real world in Ready Player One has completely gone to shit and to escape it, everyone goes into a much better virtual reality world called the OASIS. Ready the Protagonist, Wade, ends up

beating the game, winning a ton of money, as well as the Oasis network itself. But even before that, he still enjoyed escaping to it, and he still preferred playing and searching for virtual Easter eggs to living in the slums of, ugh, Ohio. Much like Katie, I'm not going to pretend staring at a screen all day is any different from how I've spent quarantine. So, wait a minute. Your table of contents included my Wally argument? How is that even possible? Section two, the part about the books. In the movie, Wade is played by your standard, blandly, handsome, young actor,

which makes sense because movies need their protagonists to look like superheroes. But in the books, Wade starts out as a chubby loser. Then, as he advances and does well in the game, he accepts virtual sponsorships, which give him lots of credits, which allow him to get a whole bunch of cool, expensive shit in the game and in real life. His virtual character gets to drive around in the Back to the Future car, and his real-life self gets a sweet new apartment and awesome gear,

including fancy futuristic machines that let him work out while playing the game. And he gets in great shape. He starts out poor and out of shape and friendless, and then he ends the book as a ripped, famous billionaire with an according to the book cool girlfriend because he solved all the game's puzzles. And how did he solve those puzzles, you ask? My precious babies! Psych, we're not even here. Shit, I wasn't timing. Has it been five seconds yet? Because he had a deep well of pop culture knowledge. The world of the Oasis was set up by a guy who was infatuated with 80s and 90s nostalgia

to reward other people infatuated with 80s and 90s nostalgia. A world where someone like Wade could thrive. Wade, who was so obsessed with pop culture, some could call it, uh... Uh... My tone is implying that you should finish that. Oh, fuck it. Do we have a clip?

Legally, I don't believe we can. Oh. PCD. That does not compute. This bit's getting cut. My point is, I would crush in a world that lets you live inside a video game and advance the ranks simply by knowing pop culture. Doesn't that story end with him realizing real life is better and he'd rather spend

time having sex with his according to the book cool girlfriend? Doesn't have to. Doesn't have to? I wouldn't be Wade. I'd be me, doing whatever I want. Okay, Daniel, I'm gonna say this as gently as possible. Ooh, I bet it's still gonna hurt a little, though. You're 35.

Ah, I was right. What video game do you play most? Does the New Year Times crossword puzzle count? Or no, you can play Mario 3 on the Switch now on Mario All-Stars. So yeah, a tie between those two. Mario. Exactly. Do you have any idea what a current video game even looks like now?

It's virtual reality games where you win by dance fighting with lightsabers. That's right. Much like lovemaking, it's a mixture of dancing and swordplay. Is that something you think you could do? I mean, with training... No? And that's just a fraction of the skills required to be good at video games currently. If someone was gonna make an Oasis-style VR world right now,

they'd be utilizing all the tech that's available at this moment. And I- I'm sorry, but today's games have left you behind, buddy. And not just you, by the way. Did you know that a lot of games just straight up don't have an easy mode anymore? There are games average to above average players will just never finish because they're too damn hard. Want to see how Bloodborne ends? Say goodbye to everything else in your life

because winning that toy is reserved for elites. You'd only get the fun in-game toys if you were really good at the game, which, again, you won't be. Also, the fancy futuristic machine that lets you work out while looking at a screen? That's a treadmill, damn. What if I don't do, like, missions or fighting or whatever? Couldn't I just exist in the OASIS and, like, take walks take walks and fish? Speaking of which I can't believe we're not talking about fishing more. Okay you'd have no credits right and everyone else would see you as an obvious mark and kill you for the experience points. Wade did enjoy his time as a boring egg hunter but honestly I'm not sure you could even do that. You spend five minutes trying to figure out which button makes you jump,

and meanwhile a swarm of twelve-year-olds would show up and shoot you to death. And then you'd start back at zero. You'd never be good enough to make the game enjoyable for you. Hey, buddy, you'll always have Mario 3. It can't get past Morton Cooper Jr. That's not even the last- Never mind. But hey, you'll always have the crossword.

We can't get past Wednesdays. That's not even the last- Nevermind. Who's up? Okay, so let's see. Uh, Katie, Matrix, Michael Wally, and Dan, uh, ready to wear was it? None of those are right. Daniel, and mine is more not right, right? I think we can agree. I just went. Doesn't matter. What's important is that I have waited patiently while all of you have taken your little stabs and now I get to go. Because as we all know and for reasons I don't completely understand,

whoever goes last always wins. That can't be true. It is. And even if the answer isn't the best, we'll all just talk ourselves into believing it is just because it's the last one. So for me the obvious answer to the best fictional vacations, not even the topic, is Total Recall. Okay, obviously bad fave prologue for starters. Also bad entry for fictional vacation.

Also, also impossibly bad choice for the actual topic. Besides, Recall as a technology is a huge disaster. Huge. They accidentally activate a terrorist with their synthetic reality machine. We shouldn't even be entertaining this as a real point in the conversation. Although...

Stop. No. Daniel? My ward? It is a bad option if you're Douglas Quaid because he's a spy who's already had his mind wiped, but for the average person recall is all the false memories of a great vacation dropped into your head in nine minutes. As false realities go, it avoids a lot of the pitfalls of the others.

Hey, yeah, that's right. What do you mean, hey, yeah? This was your point. It messes someone else up too, doesn't it? Quaid's construction boss said it gave somebody an embolism and left their mind blank. But Quaid brings that up as a concern before trying, and the man at Recall says that that was an early bug. They solved all that. It's... Ancient history.

A real holiday is a pain in the butt. You got lost luggage, lousy weather, crooked taxi drivers. When you travel with Recall, everything is perfect. We're not doing vacations! We sort of are, though. The problem with all our escapes is that they're still sucking away the most valuable thing you have. Your time. Imagine if you could have all the memories of the perfect life, whatever that is to you,

without losing any time at all. And now you can, with recall. Recall, recall, recall. Okay fine, it worked. Yeah, free vacation, no time loss, no consequences in your real life. I'll buy that. Yeah. Okay, but you guys realize that we can never have one of these conversations again

knowing that we'll all just be waiting to go last, right? Oh, yeah, 100%. Agreed. He ruined it forever. Okay, so that's it then. I mean, we're finally done no i mean we're still friends we can still talk to each other about things other than movies and shows yeah totally So, Biden's, uh, um... Are Jupiter and Saturn still super close?

I think I heard. Katie's right. Soren killed a spy. Wow. That was abrupt. Hey, uh, gang, I got another call, and I better get to work if I'm gonna squeeze out another Duke before that one. Laters.

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