Dead Space: Martyr - Part 5

It is finished! This podcast is CLEAR! We wrap up Dead Space Martyr in this super sized episode because we just couldn’t fathom our longest series being devoted to the worst book that we have read on the show. SO it’s done! As an aside this is possibly the funniest we get on the show so buckle up!

Automated Transcript

Yeah, nice, nice. It goes down smooth. And it always tastes fresh.

Phil  0:06
Indeed. Especially fresh, just like this mithya I'm drinking.

Kevin Erhard  0:11
Yeah, yeah. Speaking of fresh Hey there, buddy. Welcome back to pixelate, my name is Kevin, with me as always as Phil. Hello. And today we're come hell or high water, we're finishing Deadspace martyr,

Phil  0:26
we're done, we're done. We're done here, if this is like a double, you know, you know sized episode because this is

Unknown Speaker  0:34
I can't talk about this.

Kevin Erhard  0:38
We can't keep coming back to it.

Phil  0:40
And it's only been made worse by the fact that I started playing dead space two, I beat the first one, I started playing dead space to the other day. And it's so much better than the first one. And the first one was great. And I'm just like marveling and how good it is. And, and so I have to I have to pretend that martyr doesn't exist, I have to get on with my life.

Kevin Erhard  1:00
So you're saying that a lot of people love this book.

Phil  1:03
I did the research again. We were talking earlier. And out of morbid curiosity. There is a second book, there are only two Deadspace books. And this is the first one obviously. And the second one is called Catalyst. And just had a some sick, morbid curiosity. After I finished this, it was like you want to check out the sequel. And I was like, kind of for some reason. And while I was doing that, I couldn't help but notice that it's got like crazy high ratings on Amazon. And I said, Well, holy shit. Maybe Maybe maybe the second one's really, really good. And we really should get to the second one. I don't know. And so but then I went to the page for Deadspace martyr. And it's got through the roof, like overwhelmingly five star reviews from everybody.

Kevin Erhard  1:52
Wow.

Phil  1:54
Yeah. And it's it's like, and you and I both came to this independently like our, our, our opinion of this book. Yeah, we're, you guys wouldn't know, to listen to the show. But Kevin and I talk almost every single day. And when we're working on these projects, we're very we we kind of tiptoe around that first, you know, when you when you take the spoon and crack the top of the creme brulee. We're very careful for that first moment, we don't want it to we don't want to influence the other one to

Kevin Erhard  2:25
really try to avoid talking about about the book until that first episode.

Phil  2:30
Exactly, exactly. And this one, and and I mean, this one Bloodborne. Those two strike me as the ones that this year have just been the ones that have just really struck us. Yeah, in the negative sense, right. And both of them we came to an independently we had no idea that the other one felt a strongly equal A and I don't I'm trying to figure out what it is. If you guys, you know, we are attracting a small following, which is fucking great. And I assume we didn't we get a comment from somebody out of the blue. Somebody on

Kevin Erhard  3:07
our Twitter. Yeah, somebody on our Instagram asked us if we were going to be reading catalyst. Right? Because they're ostensibly a fan of Deadspace catalyst. And I said, Maybe we we we don't necessarily like martyr that much.

Phil  3:25
Right? I mean, if you're you guys are listening, and you think that we are giving martyr like just a, an unfair shake. And you know, and that's the thing. That's where subjectivity comes in. sharees you know, let us know what it is like we we you know, we make fun of this stuff. Because it's because if we don't, we'll cry. But, But in seriousness, you know, if you were not going to disrespect or be nasty to somebody who just disagrees with us on an opinion of a book or a video game or anything else like that. So tell us what it is. I would really like to know what it is that people because the because the I just don't when I look at the reviews, they're things like, Oh, this is this is like it's it's got the the tone of Deadspace just right, and I'm like, Oh my Oh, no, I don't agree. I

Kevin Erhard  4:16
don't think it has any tone of Deadspace anywhere.

Phil  4:19
Oh, not at all. So it's things like that. So I just I would love to hear from people like explaining what it was that they dug. You know, it's like there are plenty of books out there. I'm sure it's the same thing for you Kevin. Like we we read a lot. Yeah, and there are plenty of books out there that I read when I was much younger that I thought of as masterpieces. Yeah, come back to later and like, oh, that's actually good. Is Yeah. Is it possible that you read this book when it came out? You know, or 12 years ago all

Kevin Erhard  4:50
hopped up on the Deadspace train? Sure. And you just needed more

Phil  4:53
Deadspace content right the fuck now? And that's or or is it just that you simply disagree in You You are in a mile a minute loving it and, and fuck me I guess you know, I really would like to know. Anyway, I guess I guess we're top loading our ultimate opinion on this.

Kevin Erhard  5:12
Yeah, we're, I mean cuz we're gonna wrap the book up but yes today's it these days it we're gonna we're gonna run through the last two parts one is when it's regular length the other part is kind of tiny and then there's a little epilogue that kind of wraps up what happens to our protagonist and and all that fun stuff but yeah, I totally agree it is yeah, I would love to have somebody on the show, you know I would like to, I would actually, I would actually love to have a guest if we knew somebody if a friend of ours was like, Yeah, you guys are totally wrong. You're totally missing it.

Phil  5:52
I would I would love that I would I if you're listening and you did, please, we will have you on this show. Assuming you're not crazy and we know you.

Kevin Erhard  6:00
Exactly. You gotta you gotta satisfy at least at least that we know you part.

Phil  6:06
Yeah, yeah, please. You know, I would I would love that I would really love I would love to have that. Not above it. I would love to hear more perspectives on it. But but but we can't we can't do that until we get to the end of this one. So

Kevin Erhard  6:21
the end part six hell unleashed.

Phil  6:25
Hell unleashed and which could have been you know, the first part but right on,

Kevin Erhard  6:30
right on and yeah, where do you think a part called Hell on leash should start. But the what I assume is the Watergate Hotel. Hotel

Phil  6:48
make a point of saying it's the water. Like, it's it's an interesting little detail. You know? Yeah. So Altman is like, yeah, he's on his press tour. Ladies, gentlemen. He's gotten away. People are taking him seriously. Uh huh. There's a quote here says, but he's talking about like, they openly say they're like, Yeah, look, you know, he knows that what he's saying is a little out there. And plenty of people just treat him like a crank, quote, but there were a few people who asked more serious questions. And once they had answered, once he had answered, they looked at him with a different in a different more thoughtful way. Like, sure they did. Show that it Yeah, no, like, no, no, I don't believe you at all. You you are on you are on Geraldo Rivera. And and that's it. We're done.

Kevin Erhard  7:45
The historic Watergate Hotel, and I just would, I'm just wondering what the Watergate Hotel looks like at this point, because the building would be you know, several 100 years old. If it's if it's right, we're in like 2200 or something like that are right,

Phil  8:03
right. Yeah. It's it's thing never give us a year do they

Kevin Erhard  8:07
ever give us they? I don't think there's a specific year and if there is who cares? Doesn't really matter that much. It's the future. Right. But yeah, the Watergate Hotel for those of you who don't know what it is, it's in Washington, DC, and it is where the Watergate the name of the Watergate scandal comes from. It is the the hotel that the DNC offices were at a reelection committee, or election committee offices are at and that's where that's where creep broke in the committee to re elect the president, which were Richard Richard Nixon's men, they broke into the office, and then they tried to cover it up and it brought down presidency, but the Watergate Hotel is a four and a half star hotel that overlooks the Potomac, I think, and I think yeah, yeah, something one of the

Phil  9:01
it's it is the most famous Hotel in Washington basically. Yeah. You know, when you hear about any scandal that ends with gates, there was only a single time when that actually made sense as when it was the Watergate and that's when it was the Watergate and had nothing to do with water. So yeah, that's that's that's where he's at. And wouldn't you know it he heads back up to through his room it's got a great big hole in it. Yeah. There's there's our cast of characters he walks in there's plaster all over the place. There's a giant hole in the wall because next door Markoff cracks anybody else says it just like the the it's just the the, the who's who of asshole Ville in this book, checked into the room next to him and

Kevin Erhard  9:54
then broke through the old row the whole they broke through like Kool Aid man

Phil  10:00
All right. They didn't, they didn't like you know, this, like they, they, this tells you everything you need to know about how incompetent these people are. It's like what we want to basically because they're coming in there, they're gonna they're trying to intimidate him and take him back, you know, to to the the base, the beginning of the Great back and forth of that I mentioned before, and instead of like checking into the Watergate and like, I don't know, breaking in to his room, it's just got to be easier, quieter, frankly, than drilling a hole in the wall and drilling are they but they they like like, like over the top bond supervillains they drill a hole in the wall. And and they hold them at gunpoint. And, and they threaten them, you know? You're gonna come back? Yeah. Oh, we're gonna kill your girlfriend, basically. Yeah,

Kevin Erhard  10:53
they really get a lot of mileage out of that.

Phil  10:55
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Kevin Erhard  10:57
So So then they see both of them. And I love the you're a real bastard said Altman and mark of retorts with takes one to know one. Now be a good boy, take your medicine,

Phil  11:11
and take your minutes. And so for an entire chapter, Altman has been on this press tour. And now he's back. And in the next chapter literally begins with and so Altman was back where he'd started

Kevin Erhard  11:26
it. The Press Tour, like basically happened in between chapters. And then there's like a little bit at the beginning of 52, where he's like, yeah, he he's wrapping up the press conference. And then it's like, he's being kidnapped. And it takes like a page of of Weasley back and forth between Markov and Altman. And now he's back. And he's, he's back. He's back. And ADA is gone.

Phil  11:56
Yeah, yeah. She doesn't know where she is. Yeah. And so they're keeping him kind of like, they still see some value in keeping him around, I guess. And I have a note here, like the whole him leaving and coming back. I have a note here that just literally says, What was the point of that? Turns out there is a point but we're not going to get it until the very, very, very end of this

Kevin Erhard  12:20
set. It's basically it's a Yeah, it's a, it's a setup, for a punch line. That could have just been, it could have just been rewritten to be better instead of

Phil  12:32
right. We were gonna run into that a lot.

Kevin Erhard  12:35
Yeah, we're gonna run into that when I could have just used another pass of writing,

Phil  12:39
you know, it's like it this is this is indeed how things happen in real life, real life is filled with those little moments where it's like, alright, well, I went home and wouldn't you know, I forgot my key. So I actually had to go back out again. And when I got it went to the grocery store came back and when you know what, I forgot the butter I had the so I literally had to go out to the grocery store three times today. And and so that's, that's why I'm in a bad mood. And that's real life, you know, but But did you know the in books, you can just make shit up,

Kevin Erhard  13:11
you can make shit up in you can skip that you and you can just skip all that. If you need to write that you went back and forth to the grocery store, you could like have some text about man's repetitive nature and they just keep doing things over and over again until they die. Like the cyclical nature of life. You could layer that kind of stuff on top of it.

Phil  13:35
Or you can be like a Gus Van Sant film, and make us watch every stupid fucking second of it. Yeah,

Kevin Erhard  13:42
that's true. Good old guys.

Phil  13:45
Yo, Gus. I don't miss film school. Do you miss film school?

Kevin Erhard  13:50
A little bit? A little bit? Only? Not the school but the the people? Well,

Phil  13:56
yes, that is true. That's always fair. Yeah. Just gonna reminisce for the rest of the book. So he's back and he's been separated for everybody. And now just for whatever reason. He's being tortured by cracks. You guys remember cracks? Don't you crack was this really?

Kevin Erhard  14:19
Dantec replacement?

Phil  14:20
Yeah, the dance is is a super valuable character. And he exists to torture. Alton for now. Like in weird little, you know, I will say it is kind of gross. Yeah, it's I don't like it. Yeah, I'm not a huge fan of it myself. Hey,

Kevin Erhard  14:39
you know what? I just wanted to point out this one line before he even gets tortured. He's talking to Stevens right. And the psych psychiatrist. Altman shook his head, the marker is dangerous. He said I'm sure of it. And then Stevens retorts, and yet you're fascinated by it. And he says it as if this is sort of some sort of Gotcha. And the thing that really that popped immediately into my head is that Matt bores cartoon where there's the the guy working a medieval peasant, working and saying we should improve society somewhat. And then somebody popping up from a well saying, you participate in society curious. I am very intelligent,

Phil  15:23
very intelligent. Yeah, it's very much that it's like, you get the impression that Markoff has a great future as a pundit for the GOP. Just yeah, it's yeah, you're fascinated by uh, yeah, I mean, yeah. Yeah, of course. But yeah. My fiance has come home and watched cult documentaries every afternoon. Because it's insane and fascinating. And she she has not yet run off to join a cult. Right. Although it maybe I should go check on her. Yeah, but no, it's it's not the same. It's weird. It's weird that a character just kind of like fallacies themselves. Yeah.

Kevin Erhard  16:10
Yeah, there's not even not even now it is like setting up a straw man of yourself to argue against.

Phil  16:17
Right, right. Exactly. So

Kevin Erhard  16:21
So yeah, cracks does this torturing he, he, he's using whatever

Phil  16:25
reason, by the way, for whatever reason. So yeah, but they're, they're gonna take him out of that, you know, because Stevens's saying like you know, he's gonna be more valuable to us you know, if he's not if he's not harmed, which which raises the question of like, well, yeah, sure. That makes sense. It makes sense that he'd be valuable to you. Why are we torturing him? Yeah. To keep him here.

Kevin Erhard  16:52
I don't understand the torture. And there's this part where Markov like while the torture is taking place, it's Markov POV and Markov things were always cracks. He's supposed to keep shit like this from happening. And then he remembered cracks was with Altman and smiled.

Phil  17:14
Yeah, yeah. What's the age I guess? Just because he doesn't like him.

Kevin Erhard  17:20
He doesn't like them. And then this and then like a paragraph later, he Stevens, the Stevens the psychiatrist comes back and he's talking to Altman and says, I can send you back two cracks at any time. Keep that in mind as well. So everybody's just doing this like, yeah, mustache twirling now, now that now, right, like Stevens, who is the psychiatrist, who seems like on the level in the earlier sections is now like, just as villainous as Markov.

Phil  17:48
He's just kind of out of nowhere. And that's just three too many mustaches.

Kevin Erhard  17:52
That's too many. You got too many mustaches twirling and in the pot. You're You're spoiling the broth with with the mustache.

Phil  17:59
Executive, the mustache broth. And if you if you if you save it, here's the thing. Here's a little tip for those of you at home, if you save your mustache is keeping the freezer. When you build up enough of them. You can make a wonderful broth homemade mustache broth, is it's always better than then. Storebought just just little tip Prometeo Yeah. Tip God. So basically, yes, that's that's one that's going in for the books. Yeah, so they they get them out of torture land, I suppose. Because they need him to go and talk to the fanatics. Yeah, the religious group is only getting bigger, they're only becoming more of an issue. And so they see and they see that they kind of trust him. I don't know how much they know, about, like, their desire to make him into some kind of profit or what have you. Right. Um, but they do they do see the value in him going and maybe talking to them. Yeah. You know, he wants to see at first you know, they're like, Fuck, no. And then he goes, Well, I guess I'm going then. They promised that if everything goes well, he can talk to her. Yep. So he gets sent out to go to the mass eels. Yeah, the masses. Exactly. Exactly. Just to see you know, what he can do with them and they're just it's clearly becoming a more organized religion

Kevin Erhard  19:30
basically. Yeah. Yeah, they have I think this is the

Phil  19:33
first time we hear the word unit ology, or am I making that up?

Kevin Erhard  19:37
No, I think this is the first time more and more people people believe in our unit tautology is his field says and I think that is the first time and that's a lowercase unit otology as opposed to the proper uppercase unit ology it is not a proper noun yet it is just it is just a fake word right now.

Phil  19:59
Yeah. They're all and they're all wearing. Yeah, it's just a fake word at this point. And they're all wearing symbols of the the the devil's tail. Basically now I've played the video game enough to know exactly what that symbol looks like, what kind of what metal smith do they have working for them? It's very unique crafted design. It's not an easy one to just a shape in metal.

Kevin Erhard  20:27
The scientists really stopped doing their work and are now just embarking on metallurgy.

Phil  20:33
Yeah, they're just they're just hobbyists to this where they're looking up shit on YouTube, and, you know, tick tock and then figure it out. I make necklaces. Cool, you know. They're just close to they're doing some

Kevin Erhard  20:45
sort of synchronized dance.

Phil  20:49
Yeah, they're this close to becoming like homesteaders. This is just so. Yeah, like he gets he talks to them a little bit, but nothing really gets done. Yeah, it was. It's kind of a strange interaction that he has with them.

Kevin Erhard  21:06
He ends up talking to Stevens again, right. Yeah, he does.

Phil  21:09
He does seek out Stevens and Stevens kind of admits that. He's still hallucinating like everyone. Yeah,

Kevin Erhard  21:14
illusion. Yeah. And Stevens. Stevens brings up Pascal's Wager. And yeah, Altman being the insert of the audience says, who's that?

Phil  21:27
Right, which, which we are I just, I didn't buy anyone who's Yeah, anyone who was on the ad? I'm not saying that. You're dumb. If you've never heard of Pascal's Wager, I'm just saying like, these are scientists. Yeah. intellectuals. Yeah. Pascal's wager is pretty, like theology. 101. Yeah, he about these, he would have heard of it.

Kevin Erhard  21:48
In the first first, like philosophy or theology 101, he would have you would write heard of Blaise Pascal,

Phil  21:55
especially with what a Mary Sue. Altman is like the fact that he admits that he doesn't know anything is shocking. Yeah. And this point

Kevin Erhard  22:05
of the book, or Gary stew,

Phil  22:08
Gary, all right, your students right? Gary's to

Kevin Erhard  22:11
it. So it's a place Pascal, also a mathematician, am I?

Phil  22:16
I think so. I mean, frankly, back then, like, they were intertwined, because universities, colleges, that sort of thing. They tended to be founded around churches. In fact, Thomas Jefferson's University of Virginia, that was the first time that a university had ever been founded around the library. And there's a

Kevin Erhard  22:35
famous assist. He, he, he, there's he did a lot of work in hydrodynamics. and probability. So as a scientist, there is no way that Altman would have not known who Pascal was,

Phil  22:53
it would have been very unlikely. But for those of you who are listening, again, we want to re emphasize, just because you don't know we're not saying that you're dumb if you don't know what that is, but but Pascal's Wager, essentially states that you've got two choices, you got a you can believe in God. And maybe if you're right, you go to heaven, and you have a great afterlife and everything like that, or you can not believe in God. And if you're right, you you just die. But if you're wrong, on believing in God, nothing happens. You're fine, no harm, no foul, but if you're wrong about believing in God, you're going to hell so it's just there's basically there's more value in pretending it when in believing in a higher power, right than not rightly. And it's a very cynical thing. It is a super cynically thing. You think a Divine Creator would be able to see through that bullshit, but there you have it. But yeah, so that's Stephens way of explaining to him why he believes he is a he is a it's funny, too, because there's actually a line here. After after he explains that to him. Steve is basically saying, you know, I believe because of this, and all that says, Oh, my God, you become a true believer to which I say, No, he literally just told you that.

Kevin Erhard  24:13
Yeah. Then Altman says, well, that's not how belief works. And he's and yeah, like, yeah, um, and he just told you that he's like, you can't just decide to believe and Stevens is like, but I did.

Phil  24:25
That's that's exactly what he's getting at. So yeah, so they all they'd say, just hangs up on him. So basically, it's another chapter of Altman realizing just how deep all of the theological intentions of the people around him is getting.

Kevin Erhard  24:42
So fun fact, a Pascal named after Blaze pet Blaise Pascal is a unit of measure as well used to quantify internal pressure, stress, Young's modulus and ultimate tensile strength which I feel like Yeah, another another thing that he he would have known.

Phil  25:06
Yeah, yeah, that's that's

Kevin Erhard  25:08
why I'm paying this hill to die on for this book.

Phil  25:12
You need something at this point.

Kevin Erhard  25:15
The fact that he doesn't know Blaise Pascal is as a scientist really bugs me.

Phil  25:21
Right? It's it's, it's it's not the exactly the same, but it's kind of similar to like, you know, English professor something like you mentioning a great historian or some of the Magellan. You know, do you know, Magellan is like, oh, no, of course you do. You know, Magellan is

Kevin Erhard  25:41
have you Do you know who Thoreau is?

Phil  25:46
Right? No, tell me more. So, the next chapter we get gonna look at the site, the scientists are having breakthroughs by studying the marker. And they basically get the idea that the the the symbols that are all over it might represent DNA. Yep. And it's a representation of some sort of DNA sequence. So right, they're playing with that and trying to figure it out. And see, and they they find through it that there's like a genetic code that's similar to humans,

Kevin Erhard  26:26
right? Yep. And show Walter is working on it. Altman's talking to show Walter and grow to get the

Phil  26:39
good game, right.

Kevin Erhard  26:40
That is a good that is a good German name.

Phil  26:43
Just just another name that is in no way shape, or form. stupid as hell. Yeah, I

Kevin Erhard  26:52
mean, listen, I have a I have a German, I have a German last name, but grow to Guth. Ghouta is like, Come on, man. That's like, like, Is he is he wearing later? Hosen to

Phil  27:05
skin Alpine horn? Yeah. So he sent to him. And he finds out that garota Gupta is a true believer, like everybody in this place, believes in some way, shape or form. And they're having trouble. They're basically having trouble sequencing everything and getting it right, right. Trying to try to figure out that because something doesn't fit in the pulse that the the marker sends out versus the code that they're figuring and

Kevin Erhard  27:32
yeah, it's it's just, it's just wrong. You know, there's something right. It's it's not it's not it's not right, and, and Altman leaves Ghouta is thinking that he's surrounded by Mad Men, fanatics, he calls them right. I'm sure Walter, I think makes the and this is like the cool thing. I feel like it's almost a subtle reference to the thing where show Walter explains because Altman had there was a chunk of the marker missing right that the drill had had broken a chunk off, and Altman had it and he was like, well, maybe we tried to put it back in or whatever and show Walter says it doesn't make a difference. The missing piece isn't crucial. In fact no single piece is crucial the marker is a complex but internally replicated structure the same way for instance header of a nautilus replicates even as it tightens so it's like it's like each piece of it is its own single piece, you know, sort of like in the thing

Phil  28:37
right, right. That's the I my bullshit that's the is that the Fibonacci sequence

Kevin Erhard  28:45
making that up? What the Nautilus

Phil  28:48
yeah like that so it makes me think of like it's it's it's replicating itself even though it like it's no matter how small or big it is?

Kevin Erhard  28:55
Yeah, right. The Nautilus is Yeah, it is the shell of the Nautilus is like the literal Fibonacci sequence. Like Raj realized. Yeah. Oh, just keeps like spinning out bigger and bigger. Yep.

Phil  29:10
Right. Right. So yeah, that's basically what it is and and, and they points out that the only way to stop this from working is just a pulverize the goddamn

Kevin Erhard  29:18
thing. Yep. You'd have to destroy it.

Phil  29:22
Right. Right. Which which, you know, for whatever reason doesn't seem to pique an interest and oltmans Mine. Yeah,

Kevin Erhard  29:28
at this point. All goes back to bed. Yeah, at this point. Altman. I feel like should be trending more towards John McClane. Yeah, yeah, in terms of solving this, but he's not.

Phil  29:43
Yeah, yeah. He's not He really isn't. It's not until the last second he gets he puts things together and starts

Kevin Erhard  29:49
really up kayang

Phil  29:52
Oh, believe you me audience. There's lots of up kayang to come out of nowhere. So we get to hear Dr. Ghouta. I guess he has it, save it. Yeah, you too. And he is trying to figure out he sees left alone in his lab, he sent the technicians home because they're all exhausted. He's been awake for days. And he starts hallucinating this woman that I don't think I think they say he never actually spoke to her. He just saw her and became infatuated by her.

Kevin Erhard  30:28
Yeah, it's a real creepy, it's creepy.

Phil  30:34
If you guys ever get a chance, listen to Henry Rollins, his story that he told to Tom Waits. He met Tom Waits backstage and tells him this great story that has a lot of a lot of the same feelings here. So he's, he's talking to this this woman. And and he says, he says, Then you died. And I thought I'd missed my chance. But now you're here again. And the ghost says, I'm just a projection of your mind. Do you know that? You told me that yourself? You know that I'm a construct made from your memories. So you know, it's it's it's just coming out and saying it like, I don't know if anyone? I don't know if they've actually yeah, straight up said that.

Kevin Erhard  31:14
Right. Yeah. But yeah, she's, she's a projection. And it's really the first time that we have, like one of these these constructs admit that they are just a construct which, right believe should do more towards like, rate, you know, making that sanity meter go back down? Sure. Like, yeah, I don't know why

Phil  31:34
Google makes him go a little crease here.

Kevin Erhard  31:36
Yeah, yeah. Because then he starts seeing his his, his dear grammar, his grandmama. Which, which,

Phil  31:45
why? Because because this is another example like going back and forth, and not not really having a reason for it. Like it very, has a very blase background thing, where they just kind of candidly mentioned, that she she'd been killed, not that she died, but she killed a man, then they just kind of leave it alone. And it's like, why do that? Why not just keep it on this other woman that he actually wanted to talk to? But yeah, whatever. Whatever she starts, yeah. And he's, and she starts freaking him out. And he's, he's getting really worked up talking to the ghost of his grandmother, because he doesn't really want to talk to her the way that he wanted to talk to the woman that he didn't know, which is odd. But he doesn't. And so he starts trying to set up a sedative for himself, right? He wants to set it up so he can actually go to sleep. And wouldn't you know it, the sedative turns out not to be a sedative at all. But it's actually he has injected himself with the flesh sample that they had gotten from space, or space from the CBIC. It's I wish I was in space. It's from underwater. He somehow he somehow sucks up this pledge sample. It says that it's way harder than usual for it to get it into the Supreme. Right. And so he stood up and fix himself. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. And he gets it into his arm. And and it's clearly shifts going wrong.

Kevin Erhard  33:24
Yeah, immediately should has gone wrong. So his arm starts tingling and then go numb, and then it starts getting funky. Yeah, yeah. So he's, he's trying to go to he starts running to a marker to figure to go talk to the marker about his arm.

Phil  33:44
Right, right. Yeah, they, they that his his, his grandmother, quote, unquote, tells them that there's like a dead space. There's the title.

Kevin Erhard  33:52
That's the name of the book. Yeah, it surrounds

Phil  33:54
the marker. And if he's right there at the marker, then it'll keep the horrible thing he's injected into himself from progressing,

Kevin Erhard  34:03
right? Yeah. And then, so he gets inside. And then cracks rolls up and shoots him in the head.

Phil  34:13
Yeah, for all intents and purposes, he passes the guards he runs by he and it does work it seems work like when he's at work or whatever is inside of them stop freaking out, mutating and it's and then crack shoots him in the head. Yep. And, and they so they take the body and mark off wants them like they're gonna they're gonna examine the body. They gave it to the some lab people.

Kevin Erhard  34:35
And this is really where shit starts hitting the fan. Right?

Phil  34:38
This is where we finally get into anything that you could reasonably refer to as dead space.

Kevin Erhard  34:44
Yeah. Because basically, they take the body and they, they, they bring it to the morgue. And a couple of scientists there are like, hey, you know, let's let's talk about fields, you know, while they're talking a field about the dead body, whoops, the body's still doing things. It's still mutating.

Phil  35:12
Listen, it's more slapstick, by the way more slides deck. Yeah, it's covered in a sheet and like they're talking amongst themselves, and they're like the sounds of bones snapping into the body settling.

That's the it's the body settling no big thing I've heard lots of body settle. You haven't heard it yet. You know, but it's it just gets really, really stupid. And and before you know it, Dr. Hare Dr. Gutierrez, you know, monster neck remor corpse body is tearing people to shreds.

Kevin Erhard  35:46
You want an acro? Morph? That's how you get a neck or more you get you get you?

Phil  35:50
Yeah, there you go. My friends. Will you wanted a neck or morph? We got a goddamn neck or morph.

Kevin Erhard  35:54
Yep. Meanwhile,

Phil  35:57
in Meanwhile, back at the ranch, and

Kevin Erhard  36:01
grandma was beating off anyway.

Phil  36:05
Oh, hold on. I want to finish this chapter. Yeah, so omens having a dream of Aida. And she tells him that, basically the thing that's going to help their relationship is she wants to have a baby. Which is usually around the time most of us are like, Hey, listen, this has been real cool. And all. You're a swell gal. But instead he wakes up to field calling him

Kevin Erhard  36:39
Yep. Yep. And field basically is just just informing Altman that things are happening.

Phil  36:49
Yeah. Right outside of his door, too. He can hear screams and stuff and fields tell him that the swords are sprouting from its back, which is a weird way of putting it. Yeah, we're

Kevin Erhard  37:02
worried to call them swords. And right phones. They use sides at some point. Yeah. Which makes

Phil  37:09
sense. Still feels a little d&d nerd. But you know, I'll take

Kevin Erhard  37:14
it. Yeah. From this point on. It's mostly action sequences of like, just trying to just running around my moment. My favorite description, is the man screamed. This is when one of the creatures is killing a scientist named White, who don't know. Man screamed and tried to run the creature sides were gouging into whites back, which had already grown bloody it pulled them close, like a lover.

Unknown Speaker  37:47
To its neck.

Phil  37:49
It's like we got we got and this is the same writer who referred to being punched in the stomach almost lovingly. You know, it's funny because my favorite description is right after that, but it's for somewhat different reasons. It goes on right directly from there. It was terrible to watch white flopping like a fish out of water screaming in a way. Altman had heard only once before when a rabbit had been shot in the head but lived long enough to realize it was desperately hurt. This is this is the this is it. And this is an A doesn't go on. We don't get a new scene. We don't get a like a flashback. It's just this little moment. And I'm just imagining him like, going far away in his eyes that far away look, and just imagining this moment that really doesn't matter. Yeah, and like and Showalter being like, hey, snap out of it. Like

Unknown Speaker  38:42
we've got to deal with this.

Phil  38:44
If you're gonna do it go all the way or don't like just don't but you don't need we don't need one sense of like, there was this one time he saw rabbit that's like, no, fucking get on with it. Get on with it. We are we are 80% done with this book. Either go all the way and give us something that matters. Or don't bring it up at all?

Kevin Erhard  39:04
Yes. Just move it along. Right. So yeah, they they realize that they're gonna have to dismember white.

Phil  39:16
That's right.

Kevin Erhard  39:17
So the two of them were standing together. So basically, they, they they rip them apart so he doesn't transform. Altman says I'll never be the same.

Phil  39:27
And never be the same. It's this deep moment. It's this deep moment. We can't make fun of his deep moment. Kevin.

Kevin Erhard  39:34
Can we share a cat? Sure

Phil  39:37
cat it was really,

Kevin Erhard  39:39
really stupid.

Phil  39:41
We are we have had one moment before we talked about where he he's dealing with like when he when he has to strangle the one guy and it doesn't go down as fast and everything like that. And that was and I and I stand by what I said before that was pretty effective storytelling. With this You've literally dismembered another human being like you've taken him apart limb from limb removed arms, legs, sockets, elites, all that shit. Yeah, yeah, you're gonna say a sub that I don't know if I'll never be the same is going to click comical at that point, you know it seems a little silly right so anyway, Altman is gonna get more opportunities though to just get his John McClane

Kevin Erhard  40:31
on yeah meanwhile Markov is basically just watching all this happen on his screens and he's telling cracks like yeah you got two seconds to tell me what's going on and cracks is like well the monsters

Phil  40:47
yeah well monsters I don't know how much else like and yeah I don't know how many more details I can offer you here pal

Kevin Erhard  40:56
yeah

Phil  41:01
they basically they come up with an escape route they

Kevin Erhard  41:03
they're figuring out how to get out of there they're gonna exact they're gonna get out of there and then in 50 Chapter 59 Altman and show Walter are talking about Markov. And like what about him? What does he think about all this and show authors like I don't fucking know, man? Well, he doesn't say that. But he should have

Phil  41:25
should have. In that way show Walter would be speaking for all of us. Yeah, like they're just sitting here having these conversations about people who aren't there. While they're like literally gunning down

Kevin Erhard  41:38
monster, monster neck or more S.T.A.R.S They're just like

Phil  41:42
this isn't normal guys. This is not how you do these things. So and we do have by the way, this is where we get we get our first bit of equipment that would be similar to what you'd see in the game. We've got the plasma cutter. Yeah,

Kevin Erhard  41:56
we get ourselves a plasma cutter. Yeah, we achieve

Phil  41:59
you know, I never I don't know about you, Kevin. I never really used much else other than the plasma cutter and again, yeah,

Kevin Erhard  42:07
no if you if you have the plasma cutter like fully leveled up it's yeah, you can pretty much just stick with it for the entire game. It's

Phil  42:14
pretty efficient. Yeah, I'd have that and I'd have the the torch you know for when the little guys Yeah, it'll Gribble the guys came right but that was it yeah so so pretty effective weapon

Kevin Erhard  42:23
Yeah, it is it when you're dealing with neck or morphs? There's nothing better than the plasma cutter

Phil  42:30
oh my god we need oh my god where's the nearest plasma cutter we need we what advertising can we do for them? This is this is our this is our big break. This is our break man. This is the moment

Kevin Erhard  42:43
so there's a there they basically start getting picked. There's like three of them. There's Altman show altar and a guy named for

Phil  42:54
Yep, firt was just the third dumbest name in this book.

Kevin Erhard  42:58
And they're they're working their ways down down some hallways and they basically just get picked off one by one. Show Walter having the worst of the deaths. He has the he falls into a puddle of goo a creature tackles them and then there's this puddle of goo that's just like expanding forward at one point the creature and show alter fall into the goo and are just consumed I guess I think of the 1980s version of the blob is basically what I'm

Phil  43:35
moving fucking rules. That's exactly what I was thinking to. It has such a funny because it's like it is it's basically what it is. It's a gelatinous cube. And it's making it and it's growing as it consumes things and it's great line how big would it get? Were there any limits would have consumed the entire world. Love that line so much. Because I because here's the thing, we've made fun of them for some stupid dialogue here. That's actually something that I believe a person would sit say or think to themselves, when faced with this kind of just absurd horror. Like like you're just you're just completely cracked looking at all these horrible things happening. People are dying and you see somebody then you're like, can it eat the planet? I don't know. Man. I actually believe a person would say that. But yeah, by the way, this whole time. Altman is just a badass, by the way, like he's

Kevin Erhard  44:38
suddenly like, Gary stewing it up. He's he's making a stew it down there.

Phil  44:45
Just yeah, he's just he's just he's just a crack shot just a badass nut and cool as a cucumber. Cool. Cucumber is so weird and nonsensical, but I thought about it a little bit today and it You know, if you think about it, that is kind of how Isaac is in the video game. He's an engineer. He's not a soldier, right? And he does kind of step to the plate and become a step up to the plate. Yeah, yeah, marine style badass kind of. forgive that.

Kevin Erhard  45:17
I think the thing that makes sense for Isaac, and it's a good it's a it's a nice storytelling devices, because he is an engineer. And the tools that he uses initially, are literally just engineering tools. Like he's, he's using what he knows, which is like a plasma cutter

Phil  45:40
just happens to be a point and shoot

Kevin Erhard  45:42
item. Right, exactly.

Phil  45:45
Right. Yeah, that does make sense that yeah, that at least makes some level of sense. But yeah, anyway, so they're, they're just shooting their way through and suddenly it's just down to old man.

Kevin Erhard  45:55
It's down to all men. He is the final girl. Yeah, he is.

Phil  46:01
And he's running up those steps to the top of that house. Yep. He's a super smart guy.

Kevin Erhard  46:07
He sees a he gets a message from Aida Mahalo COVID. But they can't really talk to each other. It's just like a recording that's being broadcast over and over again. Right. It's the I am recorded. It's pre recorded. I have a feeling that this is a this is a hallucination. Because yeah, in the game, hallucinations also took the form of hollow vids or, or screen messages, right. Sure. I think I think they did.

Phil  46:41
I think so too. And it makes and it makes sense for the real realization that like that, that he comes through, he kind of starts to realize that he eventually just thinks about it. It's like he just did. He just kind of comes to that conclusion. Yeah. And it kind of matches up that way.

Kevin Erhard  47:00
Yeah, he wrote because he realizes that the the only people that you hallucinate about are dead people. Right? Sees like, oh, that must mean ADA is dead.

Phil  47:11
He finds he finds field eventually and is asking field like, you know, ages around here, right. And feels like I haven't seen her. I have no idea where she is. Yeah. Which, which kind of between that and the fact that the only people who you hallucinate are the dead kind of makes him draw to that conclusion.

Kevin Erhard  47:27
Right? Yep. And so Altman and fields basically meet up and they're making a run for it they they're basically climbing the final ladder. Get sliced up,

Phil  47:43
feel field just goes down fine. The poor field or

Kevin Erhard  47:47
field field would have gotten out how do you not waited for Altman? Basically, what

Phil  47:51
does that say? It's true. It's absolutely true. And we actually I will say this for this book,

Kevin Erhard  47:59
the guy who Altman eats waste and save Altman.

Phil  48:04
I think he might be the best developed character in this book.

Unknown Speaker  48:07
He actually has an arc. He has an arc like he changes

Phil  48:11
he grows and then he dies. And I thought at the very beginning like you know if you listen to the first episode, after after we the last time we see field I'm just basically certain we're never going to see this guy again. Yeah, and I'm so wrong. And he grows I think he's the best default character in the book. It's so ridiculous. He

Kevin Erhard  48:32
has a really grotesque death though.

Phil  48:34
He does he does you know, which I take as a sign of love Yeah, from the

Kevin Erhard  48:40
from the author. From a little love letter from author to field as feeling fields head popped off like a grape funking down to the floor below the body knocking against the walls, and the ladder swiftly followed it.

Phil  48:55
And it's an it's an It's so fucking funny. Because literally half a page later, Altman's gotten away. He's He's, he's he gets into one of the boats. He climbs into it gets the motor going. And who's, uh, who's fucking next to him? Like he just he's just he like just there his whole Hello oldman somewhat said, leave me alone field just goes back to the beam all this big so blase with these ghosts. I'm like, come on field, not again. You know, and the ghost basic because he's trying to escape. He's trying to leave. And the ghost is like, Dude, it's not done. You know, you did the convergence is still going to happen. Yep. You have to go back and you have to stop all of this. And an oltman thinks I'm not going back. And then in the next chapter, he he basically gets started on

Kevin Erhard  49:56
going back. Yeah, yeah,

Phil  49:59
but not before he gets to land, he gets

Kevin Erhard  50:01
to land and, and who do we find? But Java and Java, Java and the town drunk who had lost his name? It's just like,

Phil  50:11
why? So yeah, and this is another this is the next step in the great grand back and forth,

Kevin Erhard  50:21
back and forth thing.

Phil  50:23
Yeah, the creepy Exactly. He goes and he and he makes his way to the like the the outer gate of the government building that's right there on land. And he's he like, he tries to get in and they and who is it but it Terry Terry. Oh, Terry Terry. Lonely or Terry Now Terry is just

Kevin Erhard  50:45
all alone now.

Phil  50:46
Yeah, but he's been nice garden this this building. Altman says, you know, can I come in? And Terry says no. And all that when it goes fine, fuck you. And Terry seems to then realize who he is. And he goes, hold on, you're not gonna leave. You're coming in. You're coming with me? Yeah, at all. But since I first they can't come in and then you're insisting that I come in, which is exactly yes, you're right. That's the dumbest thing ever. It's so ridiculous. Any any any and they can get into this fight. And Altman like cuts his arm off or

Kevin Erhard  51:28
head off. It's basically like the Han Solo grito seen before. Right? The like, like, like, it happens in an instant. And like, Terry is just kind of standing there and is like, and just like falls off.

Phil  51:50
Yeah, it's like that scene in Resident Evil village where we're dressed like just puts your cloth. Just like he's exactly what it is. So he gets away any like any and he's gonna he's gonna go and Chavo wants to come with him for some reason. Cuz I guess child has been spending this whole time just going fuck. I should have been there to help him kill some zombies. Yes. I don't know. He wants them.

Kevin Erhard  52:20
This scene is so weird. It's like it's so really jumbled. Basically, the long and short of it is like, they, I think, is it Java? Java shows them weapons. Chop. Yeah, right. Java. Java gives them guns. And a chainsaw.

Phil  52:40
The chainsaw, let's not forget. And he says he says they came from his father Java's father, his line. What did what exactly does your father do? Yes, he is for the people. He is for a moment. He couldn't think of the words and then it suddenly came to him. Ecological gorilla. Oh, right. That all chestnut fucks with the story.

Kevin Erhard  53:03
He says, like, to me, it's Altman is now played by Bruce Campbell. And it's like, it's like it like does it Crash Zoom and into his face. And he says, Thank God for tree huggers. And he turns the chainsaw, like, he doesn't turn the chainsaw on the book. But I think he might be

Phil  53:25
well oh my god, it's just yeah, it's such a silly moment and

Kevin Erhard  53:32
the chainsaw and left the rest.

Phil  53:35
Right. And he he's like, and he'd stop speaking in contractions again when he's around this boy. Yeah. Like he says, No, it is not a game. You cannot come I must find weapons and go alone. And it just sounds like it sounds exactly like that. Like, like some American insisted that if I speak loudly and with nice,

Kevin Erhard  53:58
yeah, he's actually yelling into this.

Phil  54:00
Right? Right. If there are no apostrophes in my speech this this kid will understand me better. And so basically

Unknown Speaker  54:11
these monsters are they trees?

Phil  54:14
Right? That's right. He's got a chainsaw against his these monsters. Are they trees? It was like, oh, oh, good. That's that's a totally normal thing.

Kevin Erhard  54:26
To have. Yes, they're trees. But how can trees be monsters? It's hard to explain. And what kind of tree jesus christ

Phil  54:37
jesus christ. Can we get on with it? Like, I don't know. I don't know if like the author or or the editors or something. Were like, Hey, come on. You gotta bring back the funny Mexican kid. Just for some some much needed punch up, like humor. You know, like just some dialogue. Yeah, that'll be fun.

Unknown Speaker  54:55
And also like

Kevin Erhard  54:57
yeah, continue, continue. I just Let's just

Phil  55:01
we're so we're so close.

Kevin Erhard  55:04
And the trunk, the trunk by the way, why was he even in the scene to begin with? If there's a void right out of the scene

Phil  55:13
immediately

Unknown Speaker  55:16
he was thirsty.

Phil  55:18
Right? Like he's there. When the guy shows up. He doesn't speak a goddamn word. And then when he comes back from the the government building, whatever job is there by himself, he's like, where? Where's the drunk? It goes, Oh, he was thirsty when they will. Good. Great. That's great. We just we really earned that scene, didn't we? What the

Kevin Erhard  55:39
fuck? We earned the crap out of that scene.

Phil  55:43
Yeah, absolutely.

Kevin Erhard  55:45
So I'm in talks to cracks.

Phil  55:48
Yeah, he sees cracks on the end. And they just they have a you the usual like, they have a tennis shoes. She's She's here. She's here. Like, you know, he threatens he's on. He's on a phone with him. And he says, you know, you know, eight is here. And if you come back to the government building, boy howdy, will we let you see her? And he's like, put her on it goes she can she's having period stuff or whatever. I get it. She's just too embarrassed.

Kevin Erhard  56:19
You know what it would have been cribs are so bad. It would have been perfect. If if cracks just held her body up. Like anyway. With sunglasses on and it was right. Weekend at Bernie's Weekend at Bernie's.

Phil  56:38
Hi, baby. It sure would be cool of you to come back and hang out with me. And he's got the best weed hits. Awesome. Yeah. So yeah, oh man hangs up on him. And he's and makes his way to the to the boat and makes his way through the water and he is going back. He's the the. He just gives the great back and forth of robbery

Kevin Erhard  57:10
back 10 years. He has a really big backhand. And yeah, the great back end in the fourth inning, it's over. We are now at the back inning. And absolutely, he has a lot of like introspection about the marker and chapter 61.

Phil  57:28
He he he thinks of ADA some

Kevin Erhard  57:31
more. Yeah. What did she mean by having a baby like she would? What do you? What did you mean? It was on your head man?

Phil  57:40
Right? Yeah, there's you dude. Like, and you know that too? I think he's very fully aware of the fact that this is all in his head. Yeah. So what does she mean? Well, what do you what do you think she means? Let's Let's examine that. You know what, let's not

Kevin Erhard  57:53
Yeah. Is Stephens dead? Can you hallucinate the psychiatrist and work things out with him? Yeah, that would

Phil  57:59
be very convenient. You know, it's like, well, the therapist is dead, so I don't have to pay him. So that's good.

Kevin Erhard  58:05
What if humanity is going to die either way, this is these are the deep, deep thoughts. And then we get to part seven, the end of the worlds,

Phil  58:13
the end of the world.

Kevin Erhard  58:15
And this part seven, no joke is basically just, it's just Evil Dead to our Army of Darkness. Yes, he has a chainsaw. And he's just going to town on Nacra morphs for the most

Phil  58:30
part, it is it is it is both it is both physically smaller than the other parts of this book. Like there are fewer pages. And there's even less actual stuff going on in it. So it feels like we're tearing through it. Rest assured it's mostly because mostly because it's a it's a really, really short, just action style sequence. And partially also because we just want this to be done.

Kevin Erhard  58:58
Yeah, he he's basically. So yeah, he gets to 60 Chapter six to first chapter in Part Seven. He throws open the hatch and it's just becomes a sneaking mission. And he finds he the first thing he comes up is he sees the field monster. The monster that field became fields where field or field it's still hanging around the ladder. Yeah, and he runs it. Like there's a lot of descriptions of the neck or morphs in the following pages that are it's like, yeah, it's like you remember this one from the game like

Phil  59:40
we told you we'd reference the game. I hope you're enjoying it. Oh, yes. Final 20 pages. Yeah, this. Yeah. He sneaky basically sneaks until he can't sneak no more. He brings out his chain blade, ribs that cries out for the Emperor and starts you know dismembering neck grow more laughs

Kevin Erhard  1:00:02
cries havoc and let slip the dogs before I

Phil  1:00:07
write I need to get my head to get my prerequisite. Warhammer 40 sure for sure

Kevin Erhard  1:00:12
yeah one per episode we got to have at least one per episode or else one per baby the, the universe collapses in on itself. Exactly. You don't want that gets we get the same exact joke from earlier in the book where basically there's somebody else still alive and the guy's like who's there who's in the system and all men get almonds the here's here's the narration the man was vaguely familiar it was he realized the man who had taken him to see the marker in its chamber for the first time. What was his name harm something? Yes that was it Harmon

Unknown Speaker  1:00:53
and brief every

Phil  1:00:56
it's better than it's better than some kind of breakfast food. Yeah.

Kevin Erhard  1:01:01
bacon and ham and in Harmon Yeah. Hammond in harmony with teenage names.

Phil  1:01:08
It's the HDH those are the ones they're just beyond him for

Kevin Erhard  1:01:11
whatever yond Altman Actually no, it was the car it was I forget who who did the bake in line but so Allman makes it his his his mission to come and get Harmon which basically it's this is like your basic knit. He wants to do it. But now he can't. There's like there's something in the way so the way to go is through submarine Bay. It feels very you know what it feels like? It feels like suddenly we're in a mission from pray the the arcane game where it's like, oh, in order to get to this part of the space station, you actually have to do a spacewalk around. Right so Allman has to basically do a swim around swim

Phil  1:01:57
walk. Yeah,

Kevin Erhard  1:01:58
walk.

Phil  1:01:59
Yeah, he's gonna it's very old. It's very tense. He, he he realized that he's he takes the plasma cutter with him because that one's going to work underwater for whatever reason. Sure. Where's the chain sword? won't.

Kevin Erhard  1:02:14
Why not?

Phil  1:02:15
Yeah, why not? And, and he has a lot of moments of finding little pockets of air. You know, it's, it's, I did have the almost drowning theme from Sonic the Hedgehog playing in my backyard. In the background. Did it? Yeah, like like, the whole time I was reading this. And eventually, I did. I laughed out loud. There's a moment where he finds this. He's like, he's figuring it out in his head. And he's like, holy shit. There's no way I'm going to live like I can't the basically where I'm trying to get is too far. There's too many things for me to wiggle around. I'm going to drown. And he finds this little pocket of air coincidentally, and and he rushes up to it's so hard that he smacks his head to the metal piping above it. And it was just like, it's, I will say there was something so evocative about that, that I actually put my hand on my head because I've absolutely done that kind of shit. Yeah, like just the top of your head, like banging right into something above you. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, my God. So he does

Kevin Erhard  1:03:26
that he beats searching for air, and he finally gets through. And now he? It's a whole lot of like, back and forth to get the door open. Yeah. And then he is basically it becomes a sneaking mission again, and he has to sneak down a bunch of hallways in order to get to harm and yeah.

Phil  1:03:45
Oh, and by the way, he's woken up, he passes out, he blacks out. And he's woken up by the ghost of his father. Who this is the first time I believe his father's been mentioned, isn't it? I think?

Kevin Erhard  1:03:58
I think so. Yeah, it's like

Phil  1:04:00
and like it just kind of casually slips in that. His father like, helps him up and he can smell liquor on his father's breath. And this is another malt it's the exact same thing as the rabbit thing. We're just talking about where I'm like, motherfucker, we don't have time. Yeah. Like, why are you introducing something? It's like either either give us the whole thing or don't bring it up at all. What are you chewing

Kevin Erhard  1:04:25
pick a lane just take a lane either. Yeah, either Orman's backstory matters or it doesn't. Really one, right?

Phil  1:04:33
It's like, like, alright, so So his father, they reenact the daddy drank sketch from kids in the hole. And, and he finally makes his way to Harmon. Yeah, who is nuts?

Kevin Erhard  1:04:47
Who was just like, off his rocker?

Phil  1:04:50
Yeah, he's completely cracked. He's he's got, you know, he. It's actually really funny. It's actually a genuinely funny moment. where, as I knew, I knew they the marker would. I knew that the marker would save me. And it's like, actually, it was me who saved.

Kevin Erhard  1:05:10
I actually I called you and told you I was coming. No, you didn't tell me I knew.

Phil  1:05:16
It's like, you know what, that actually is pretty smart on as far as like religious fanatics are concerned. That's, that's, that's actually.

Kevin Erhard  1:05:28
So and then Harmons, like, touch the marker, touch it,

Phil  1:05:31
touch it, touch it. He says it'll, it'll, it'll love you. You'll feel its love If you touch it. And so finally, basically just to like, get Harman office dick, essentially, he touches it. And instead of, instead of like, love, he basically starts hallucinating everything, everything, like everything they've they've lived with, up until

Kevin Erhard  1:05:57
that right, which I think is something I happens, which happens to Isaac as well. In the Deadspace games, but yeah, he He sees everything. And I think it like breaks Isaac's brain. Yeah, like, that's part of the thing is like Isaac needs is like, gonna die because his brain is broken from the mark.

Phil  1:06:23
Right? Right. It's, it's yeah, he starts the he he said, there's a great line here, the hallucinations had been trying to protect them. But they had failed, right? Basically, like the the, the the hallucinations are not, it's weird, it isn't clear, because the marker clearly wants him to spread all of this shit here. But the hallucinations are some sort of side effect that's trying to protect

Kevin Erhard  1:06:50
Yeah, the hallucinations. So basically, what I from, from what I understand or gather, and this is like, little bits of lore that I'm picking out of this, and I'm extrapolating on is that in the human brain, there was already a built in, like, defense system against the marker. And these are the and they were the hallucinations. The marker does not want like the hallucinations are not from the marker. They're from our they've come from within ourselves to basically short evolutionary evolutionary defense against what the marker wants.

Phil  1:07:36
That's cool shit,

Kevin Erhard  1:07:37
what it is cool shit, but and that should have been

Phil  1:07:42
WHAT the fuck is that on the book? That's awesome.

Kevin Erhard  1:07:46
That's what I read this right, that that's what I basically took from the hallucinations had been trying to protect them. Also, like the WHO shaves were not a function of the marker, but it's something else. It's student opposition, something that was ingrained into his own brain. So basically, like so like, the hallucinations that's why to lose all hallucinations that are like you must stop convergence. Because the

Phil  1:08:09
clearly but clearly they they've you know, it's one of those evolutionary constructs that isn't really great at its job. It doesn't

Kevin Erhard  1:08:17
it doesn't do great it's it's Yeah, yeah, it doesn't it doesn't work very well clearly.

Phil  1:08:25
But but the one good thing that comes of it is when he snaps out of it, he starts just like dialing in shit on the keyboard and he realizes kind of he's unconsciously doing this he's basically recording the blueprints for a new marker

Kevin Erhard  1:08:43
right yep. Which kind of that sets up the basically sets up the game?

Phil  1:08:51
Pretty much yeah, but

Kevin Erhard  1:08:52
yeah, he he's seeing he's basically seeing through the matrix now.

Phil  1:08:58
Right? Yeah, he's the one he's in Yeah, he's this is this is the moment he knows kung fu. He knows kung fu and yeah, he's doing his best to create something with the marker that will protect them that will that will you know, basically stop the convergence and all that stuff. So while he's doing this he's lying to Harmon and telling him Oh, yeah, this is what the market wants. Yes,

Kevin Erhard  1:09:20
the market wants so he sent they transmit an image of the marker like his creation of the marker back to the marker. And by doing that, it shuts the marker off because right he's saying to the marker like yeah, no, here's the plans for you for making another one of you. That's what you want right? And the marker is like you got it dude and then take basically goes into basically a nap

Phil  1:09:50
right he's got a we got we got we got the plan so you can shut up now. Like yeah, and in Harmon Oh, Harmon pulls, pulls some profits. Sitting here too. He tells him You know, this is what this is what the market wants market to be praised, said Harmon. And then he added Altman be praised.

Kevin Erhard  1:10:09
Oh Uchi spooky so basically he doesn't trust the marker and now they're trying to

Phil  1:10:19
make their escape. Yeah, they're trying to get the hell out

Kevin Erhard  1:10:23
arm and says the marker. The marker wants us to leave.

Phil  1:10:30
It's it really is that simple in many cases, isn't it where you're just like, oh, no, you know, marker told me You guys shouldn't shouldn't be doing this anymore. Yeah, smart. I'm a smarty pants. Yeah. So

Kevin Erhard  1:10:45
basically they start escaping and then Altman uses HARMANs authorization code to begin flooding the lab to basically just sink it again. And then Armen hermit doesn't really believe him. But Altman just kind of like takes him at at like gunpoint

Phil  1:11:15
he's like, I'm gonna save your life or I'm gonna kill you right here.

Kevin Erhard  1:11:18
So we get it. We get a good like, we get a good like countdown sequence now now it's like it's we're Metroid. ng right on out. Yes.

Phil  1:11:29
Oh, yeah. The Mother Brain is dead. The brain

Kevin Erhard  1:11:31
is dead.

Phil  1:11:33
The fuck out of dodge. Yeah, that's exactly it so they get out. Long story short, we got some more swimming sequences you go through, they go through everything they have to get around. Some of the monsters it's actually it is an interesting note that just because the marker shuts down, they notice that the creatures are still active. They're a little lethargic and kind of sluggish, but they're still there. So he plays you know, cowboy, some more badass shoots, man does the whole thing and eventually they get on a boat. They get out for underwater, get on the boat and they start heading back to

Kevin Erhard  1:12:11
shore and Harmon knocks Altman out with the anchor.

Phil  1:12:15
It is the stupidest sequence like he's literally just gonna read it. He was just thinking he should check on Harman when he realized that he was standing there but behind him he turned and was struck in the side of the head by the anchor knocked out of his seat. I don't know if you've ever picked up an anchor Kevin

Kevin Erhard  1:12:36
Yeah, it is not easy to do strike ins with

Phil  1:12:41
it's it's kind of right there and its name their mount mostly meant to stay put. So this little dorky scientist can get the get the the the drop on all oltman. And it's just this is bad writing. It's just bad. Like MCs he like Harmon says, you know, you're lying to me. I know you're lying to me. And opens like really fucked with that because he's like how I saved you. You know, I saved your life. And now this is how you repay me? So this this writing is just so stupid. All men lay their eyes glazed, a warm fluid was puddling up against his cheek and his mouth. It was only when he tried to swallow that he realized it was blood. It took him another minute to realize it was his own. Are we being paid by the letter here he tasted blood that's all we needed. That's all waited Why is it why is it it's not important that he forgets that he has blood in this oh so important moment it's it's it's just very sloppy. Yeah. Any blacks out for like the 19th time in this book?

Kevin Erhard  1:13:54
And then we we get an epilogue which isn't an epilogue it just should have been the next chapter.

Phil  1:14:00
It's a three Is it three parts three part epilogue

Kevin Erhard  1:14:03
it's it's it's a several chapter epilogue right? It's a three chapter epilogue Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. It's not an epilogue though. It's the the end of the story.

Phil  1:14:14
It's just the end of the story. It's just the end of the like

Kevin Erhard  1:14:17
an epilogue I don't like this is not the function of an epilogue to me I know maybe maybe I'm Miss reading it but it's like this is not an epilogue and epilogue is like it's just a little bit more of the the universe you know tying up some loose ends or what have you. You know it's yeah,

Phil  1:14:33
it's it's basically it's kind of like the cooldown if you think of it like that. Like if you if you work out or something like that. It's like a cool down at the end of the thing so you don't seize up I guess it basically here you go here you got to look it up. The the definition of an epilogue is the section or speech or the end of a book or play that serves as a comment on or conclusion to what has happened, which I get So technically it's what we're doing but it's no different in form or function from any chapter

Kevin Erhard  1:15:07
so right whatever whatever

Phil  1:15:11
anyway so

Kevin Erhard  1:15:13
yeah they basically he's been captured by Markov

Phil  1:15:21
and he gets to sit with the Three Stooges as evil as they explain their devious plan to him yes you know he he has basic Yeah and like it's cracks Markov Stevens. They admit that Ada killed herself cut her own throat

Kevin Erhard  1:15:43
oh no cracks is not there.

Phil  1:15:46
Now this is the very beginning it's a the see this is how long of an epilogue it is. Oh, right. Is it the beginning the very end? Yeah, they have they have a little moment. And then he just stays in a mental it feels like a mental hospital. They put him in like Jacob's Ladder style, right? And they've just got him drugged up and they come back and this time it's just mark off. Is it just mark over Stevens

Kevin Erhard  1:16:09
Mark Robin Stevens and cracks that become expendable.

Phil  1:16:14
That the 19th time we hear that word? Yeah. So they they basically do the James Bond villain thing of explaining their evil plan. But But the difference is there's only like six pages left in the book. And this is the great twist of this book. For anyone who's played the Deadspace games you've you've heard of all men you hear of him as this you know Prophet character who founded the religion and you find out that basically key is more valuable to them as a martyr because they're going to extend legitimacy to the church of unitop ology they're going to make it a real thing. where only the top level people know about all this bullshit. It's very Scientology Right. And, and and they're gonna kill him. Yeah, basically, because as a prophet, so basically you play the game and you may be thought of Altman as this sick, evil individual or something like that. And it turns out he's he's just a he's, he's, you know, been used by these guys as a flunky for for the bad guys who are the real evil behind the whole thing. Right? And the Yeah, it's it's a mess. And so they find out, you know, and then they tell them like, we're gonna kill you. We're gonna kill you. We've got a really really fucked up death waiting for you to you know,

Unknown Speaker  1:17:44
really got so,

Phil  1:17:46
so fucked up.

Kevin Erhard  1:17:48
Basically, they just throw them into a pit to fight cracks, the cracks, monster cracks,

Phil  1:17:53
who has become who has become a monster? Yep. This guy that is in the book for like, 25 pages. Yeah. And I was kind of in fear. And that's the end. That's yet by the way. And so, you know, the the monster lunches after him, and presumably, Allman dies. That's the end of the book. I was infuriated by this. Yeah. It's so dumb. It's useless. Um, it doesn't because they basically said they, you know, said Ada, they first they say to kill herself, and then they kind of confess that, you know, cracks just killed her. Because she was too. You know, she was super dangerous. She wasn't playing ball. And so in this final moment, they're like, Oh, we got a really fucked up way for you to die. Yeah. And so I'm intrigued. They're

Kevin Erhard  1:18:47
gonna they're gonna roll out a monster that's like looking like ADA.

Phil  1:18:51
Yeah, and that was exactly where my head went. I was like, it's gonna be an ADA monster. Like ADA dies. And she's a Niekro morph now, that's that's like a really tragic, cruel, clever kind of way to end this. I was like, Oh, that's pretty cool. At least. Like that's going to be interesting,

Kevin Erhard  1:19:09
right? Oh, no, no, no, no, we don't.

Phil  1:19:11
There's just this this guy who was this bad guy?

Kevin Erhard  1:19:15
Goon that that basically. Altman had zero connection to

Phil  1:19:22
Yeah, he tortured him once he tortured him once

Kevin Erhard  1:19:24
they get that they really got to know each other.

Phil  1:19:27
And any only appears like 60% of the way through the book. Yeah, but he's the he's the one he's the one that's the it's in a be so angry. That was so

Kevin Erhard  1:19:39
dumb because

Phil  1:19:40
it was just right there. It's I don't you know, we've talked about this before. It's not our business to tell person how to write their book. No, you know, but, but it was right

Unknown Speaker  1:19:48
there. It was right there.

Phil  1:19:52
It just, I'm not even I'm not even claiming I'm a writer. Don't get me wrong. Yeah, but I'm here. Yeah, but I'm not claiming like It took any level of skill, right for me to come up with that. Right? It was just like right there. It was a present based on how they were writing things out and was like, oh, obviously that's what happens next. Right? They just made it that much less meaningful.

Kevin Erhard  1:20:16
It could have been, it could have been it would have been more meaningful. If it was like Tim, Tom and Terry

Phil  1:20:22
would have been, it would have been more fun there would have more fun. Like where's the where's that boss fight? I want to fight the Tim Tom and Terry monsters. Yeah, yeah. Come on. That sounds awesome.

Kevin Erhard  1:20:33
And but that was that deal. Hammond down there to? No way bacon bacon.

Phil  1:20:42
No, no, sorry. No, it's another another

Kevin Erhard  1:20:44
bruh Ham. Ham.

Phil  1:20:48
This is another thing. That's another thing. Hammond is the is not a common name. No, no, I think I can be forgiven for assuming that when we're introduced to a character named Hamon near the beginning of the book that he would somehow turn out to be related to or in some way connected to the captain of the ship in the first game, right. And, and I was like, I was like, okay, so they have to be related. And so I'm like, No, it's never brought up again. It's just a coincidence.

Kevin Erhard  1:21:17
Just a coincidence. And it's such sloppy, right is and it you know, it's just like it's sloppy writing and it's it. I got so many problems with this book. All the all the female characters are like, basically. subservient or

Phil  1:21:38
more. There are more ghosts who are female in this book. Yes.

Kevin Erhard  1:21:43
Yeah. More, more. There are more in there never spoken of it. They're never spoken of again. There's Aida. And that's pretty much it as as a as a leading female character. I don't get the vibe. I mean, maybe some of the scientists but it was mostly he. Yeah, it was it was a lot of he's when talking about scientists. I don't recall a lot of She's

Phil  1:22:10
no, no, it was it was. It was mostly it was the brouhaha. The very beginning. At the

Kevin Erhard  1:22:15
very beginning. Turns out to be a ghost. A very powerful, powerful ghost. Oh, yeah. But, uh, Joseph,

Phil  1:22:23
your your footprints?

Kevin Erhard  1:22:27
I guess like everybody was seeing the brouhaha.

Unknown Speaker  1:22:30
Right. Yeah. I think I don't know, the way that we're

Kevin Erhard  1:22:35
the way the brouhaha work was, like, very different than any other hallucination.

Phil  1:22:40
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That one was not one I feel like was left ambiguous to play up like the, the full core, you know, oh, they, they? They may be primitive, but they know things. Certain things that maybe we just don't understand. You know,

Kevin Erhard  1:22:57
horrors of spider islands. Yeah.

Phil  1:23:02
Exactly. Exactly. Man. It just, and they certainly, and here's the thing I would bitch that. What female characters we did have had a very superficial arc. But that goes for everyone in this book that goes for everyone in this book. Everyone got Flucht as far as a plot arc goes, Yeah, that's at least that's at least it's just I mean, that's equal

Kevin Erhard  1:23:29
in the original game is the the game is better at it. Like, there's there are three main characters in the game. Well, for if you count Isaac, Isaac's girlfriend, right who, right? Right so there's, there's basically the three survivors from the beginning. Who there's Isaac, there's Hammond and I forget her name. Yeah, the one who, who has who who basically turns out to be the villain at the end. But yeah, there's three and it's like, oh, it's a woman. It's a black man. Right? And it's Isaac and like the game somehow was more progressive in its character arcs. Then this book was right.

Phil  1:24:18
I think that's that's that's like kind of the the most mesmerizing thing about this whole situation in general is that with a you know you we will all heard the well the movie The movie isn't as good as the book blow blow and and if you're still saying that shut up, first off, right? Don't be that guy. Don't be that because there's a there's a reason that the book tends to be better in our minds than the movie and it's because you spend so much more time with exactly. You know, you have a lot more details. They have a lot more time to tell you details. You know, if you if you read Stephen King's It from cover to cover out loud, it's a about 40 hours long, yeah. To You know, that's how long the audio book is, as I recall,

Kevin Erhard  1:25:05
Jesus 40 hours.

Phil  1:25:08
I think it's about 40 hours, Lord, Lord, something like that. And in, you know, and then both movies put together or like five hours. Yeah, something like that. And so of course, there's, and that's just one example, most of the time, you know, people are making far less out of the same amount or a little, only a little less. And now with video games, for whatever reason, you spend about as much time as that if not more with a video game, depending on the game to end 1520 Sometimes 40 hours. Yeah. But you still, but a book, theoretically, could still give you more insights.

Kevin Erhard  1:25:51
Yeah, cuz game is like, it'll be 40 hours, but it it's not 40 hours of detail and plot, you know,

Phil  1:25:58
right. It's 40 hours, if you swinging from one tree to another, you know, learning this and that and killing things with axes, stuff like that. Um, this might be one of the first examples of like, this is a 500 page book. It's a long book. And I feel like I got more out of the video game. Yeah. Then the like, just for sheer plot, and, and in detail,

Kevin Erhard  1:26:30
more and background because we get into the things that really make we didn't get into the things that make the Deadspace universe interesting, which is we have a little bit on the edges we have the the that capitalism basically has ravaged the the the world and is now basically capitalism is extending its tendrils out into space. Because exactly one of the big things is these planet cracker ships. They're they're basically like, the, the cool thing about the universe is it's so blase about like a Death Star like do you don't really use a Death Star like you didn't build a Death Star to strike fear you do it because you to get the resources you just like

Phil  1:27:17
getting getting all the resources, like sucking a planet dry? That's scary as fuck. And so this is, Oh, yeah. Deadspace is the natural progression of Elon Musk. Like that's what's happening basically. Yeah, it's just like, it's, it's insane. And so there's a lot going on there. There's a lot to chew on. And it's and it's very graceful, and, and scary and smart. And it has no tone problems. You know, it has this book was full of tone issues. It was what the fuck was up with all the silly slap sticky like, Why? Why were they Why is it every time there was a guard? He spoke like a Looney Tunes mob thug? Like, yeah, you know, it's just, I, I have so many questions. So many. And it's, it's such a and I and I have to believe once again, that that this book feels like it was written by committee. Yeah, I agree. It doesn't it i I'm going to give the author uh, you know, the benefit of the doubt here, especially because, you know, as we mentioned before, he's a very accomplished author. He's won some serious planetariums, you know, the Oh, Henry awards. They don't just he's got three of them. And they don't just give those out to any schmuck on the street. Who can, you know, do an A B, A B poem. That is a that is a seriously important award. Same for the thirdly Jackson award. And just like the catalyst book, like kind of morbidly curious, I really want to the irony is that you would think that after this, I'd be like, Well, I'm not reading his shit. Actually, it's the exact opposite. I really want to read the stuff that he's written for himself. Yeah. Yeah. Because I have a hunch that this is not his fault, right.

Kevin Erhard  1:29:14
I have a feeling I got this is not Yeah, not him. By the way, yes, it is. The current audio book that you can get on Audible is read by Steven Weber, who I like Steven. Yeah, he's great. It's 44 hours and 55 minutes long. I have it. Wow, you have a Stephen Weber's voice had to have been rough by the end of it. I wonder how many sessions that took?

Phil  1:29:44
I mean, you would think like the way I see it is like, you know, eight hour work day.

Kevin Erhard  1:29:49
Yeah. So it probably took a little over a week to to record that. Even if

Phil  1:29:55
it's less because obviously a voice is not meant to be used for eight hours straight and so So maybe it was more like a couple of weeks. But God Damn, that's crazy. Good for him. He's easy. He's a terrific guy. So yeah, that's that's a good choice. And you can argue all you want about whether or not it needed to be 45 hours long. Yeah, it was, he was drowning and blow at the time. So it was it was a it was a different time for the old man. But all the same, you know that it's one of those situations where you're going to get way more detail.

Kevin Erhard  1:30:33
You're getting away more detail. You know what it what's funny is I think that moment with the rabbit dying in in Steven Yang's hands, the chapter would have ended there and the next chapter would have picked up within the back of that of that moment, for 30 days. And then it would have come back. It's

Phil  1:30:53
exactly what I was thinking. Yeah, that's exactly what I was even down to it being Stephen King. I was like, I just I was like that is that's that's exactly what alarm bells went on. You know, it's like he he shot the thing in the head. And then he remembered this moment, and then you get a chapter of him killing a rabbit. He learned something about himself loses a little bit of his his childhood innocence. And then suddenly, it flashes back in the creatures making the exact same sound that the rabbit made in that moment, and we move on. And I like those moments I genuinely do. And that's the thing. It's like, you just, there's so many moments like that where it's like, you need to either go for it or just don't fucking bother either do it. And at that point, why are you bothering? Yeah. There were there a lot of choices that that were made. That Hoo, boy.

Kevin Erhard  1:31:53
So it's done. It's done. It's done. And the acknowledgments it Thanks, Frank and Nick Murray. It thanks, visceral. And it calls it a first person they taught he calls it a first person game in the acknowledgments which, oh, boy, oh, boy. Oh, boy. It's fabulous. It's not

Phil  1:32:17
it's yeah, it's it's kind of kind of well known for that fact.

Kevin Erhard  1:32:20
And applause is due especially to my editor, Eric Rob, for his excellent tireless and thankless work.

Phil  1:32:29
You think Rob had something to do it? You think it's him?

Kevin Erhard  1:32:32
Maybe. Maybe he wrote the whole book.

Phil  1:32:35
Maybe? Maybe? It just it just yeah, my conspiracy is feels like a book by committee. I don't I don't know.

Kevin Erhard  1:32:41
I don't take it anyway.

Phil  1:32:43
I don't either. Kevin. What are we reading next?

Kevin Erhard  1:32:45
We're reading BioShock Rapture.

Phil  1:32:49
Okay, okay, now we're back in a lane that I understand I know this this world

Kevin Erhard  1:32:54
Yeah, yeah. Bioshock very pretty. It's a it's a straightforward world of science gone wrong, which is basically we

Phil  1:33:05
another one has capitalism wrong other

Kevin Erhard  1:33:07
what has capitalism rot story?

Phil  1:33:11
I think I think we need to review this book. And then and then we'll go ahead and just go straight into Atlas Shrugged.

Kevin Erhard  1:33:17
Yeah, let's let's get her eine Rand on. Hmm, let's get a random Who is John Galt Right. that

Phil  1:33:26
kids are saying. The kids love golf. Kids love love. They

Kevin Erhard  1:33:29
love John Galt and

Phil  1:33:31
love them. And in fact, actually, I think a little kids actually dude love John Galt. And that's a that's a fact that horrifies me to my bones. That's problem.

Kevin Erhard  1:33:39
Remember Ron Paul, remember when people were really into Ron Paul.

Phil  1:33:44
There was a moment there. We just loved him. You know, it's like that he spoke. I loved him. I remember I went through a pretty, pretty heavy libertarian phase. Yeah, he was one of those guys that it was just like, cool. This is what I'm talking about. I want to smoke weed like that was pretty much Yeah, it's like, you know, he's like, you know, they're systems of government. Yeah. System. System is government out there where you can smoke weed and not ruin other people's lives. Yeah.

Kevin Erhard  1:34:09
Yeah. You turned out to be really racist. Like, oh, yeah, publish those newsletters where he was like, oh, boy, super racist. super racist. Yeah, it's like it's it's never it's always like one step removed. With with it's the the Randy ends.

Phil  1:34:29
Oh, yeah. Yeah, they they're just in my experience, they just tend to be a little smarter about keeping the quiet part of the conversation quiet. Yeah.

Kevin Erhard  1:34:40
Yeah. They're very good at speaking softly about the racism. They're praying smarter, but it's just, it's all over. It's like, hidden in between every word.

Phil  1:34:50
Oh, yeah. It's all

Kevin Erhard  1:34:51
it's all there. So this has been the political lit discourse.

Phil  1:35:00
We'll give you you will have to laughter one day, we'll set up a Patreon. If you pay extra we'll, we'll give you the uncut political ranting, yeah, before and after.

Kevin Erhard  1:35:14
But yeah, if you if if you like us, go ahead and rate us five stars on Apple podcasts that really helps people find us. Follow us on Twitter, of course, go to our website, Piglet pod.com. There's all sorts of goodies on there. And I've been keeping up to date with the guest appearances sections that basically anytime that we show up elsewhere on the internet, I keep it posted right there for your convenience. So go ahead and bookmark pixel@pod.com. That is the end of our episode. That's the end of our discussion on Deadspace smarter. We hope you really enjoyed it. And we're looking forward to you joining us on our journey through BioShock Rapture. Have a good night everybody.

Phil  1:36:02
Night