I’m your nerd host, Chris Hardwick
Nerdist is a place where we nerds come together and share the nerdery that we find. It's also my home to various elements of the Nerdist Empire. You might recognize me from TV. You don't realize that's where you know me from, but it is. You think you went to college with me or I look like your cousin's friend, but that is not the case. At one time or another you stumbled upon me on your moving picture box in such cerebral gems as MTV's "Singled Out" and Noam Chomsky's "Shipmates." and so much more...
Say hello to the contributors.
jj abrams! i am pleased.
I hope there is plenty of Coverfield talk!
No wonder Matt is not here, the lens flare vitriol would never end.
Oh, how I love Dana Lechtenberg’s Nerdist graphics!
Squeee! Can’t wait for this one! JJ Abrams makes good stuff. Period.
Thank you Chris, Matt, and Jonah!
The fun thing about JJ is that you really feel he’s just warming up. Dude is gonna dominate multiplexes for the next 20 years.
OMG!!! commence listening and thinking up of references from his work.
Loved the episode. TOTALLY understand why I thought Trek was so fucking awesome…he made it for me! I’m just like him with Trek and a little with Dr. Who. I WANT to like Who, but I’m six eps in and it’s getting tough. Let’s get an Abrams Dr. movie, I feel like I’d love it. Enjoying my burrito.
J.J. Abrams! Well if I didn’t love The Nerdist before then I definitely do now!
P.S. I loved The Nerdist before too, don’t worry
BUT I LOVE YOU EVEN MORE NOW!
So, I could swear that my auto download for Nerdist just sent an episode titled “J.J. Abrams”. I thought for a second that Comedy Bang Bang and Nerdist got mixed up.
Say hello to another thousand subscribers guys. Great get!
Your discussion about distraction reminds me of Neil Postman’s “Amusing Ourselves to Death”, but only to the point of being ashamed of not remembering something I might have read for a Comm course many, many years ago. Here’s a fun, possibly intriguing cartoon I found:
http://www.recombinantrecords.net/docs/2009-05-Amusing-Ourselves-to-Death.html
Give a watch to Trick ‘r Treat gents! Awesome modern horror anthology. It’s on Netflix instant streaming, in HD. It’s no Creepshow 2, but as horror anthologies go, totally worth checking out.
JJ is such a huge influence on me, I had a mini-freak out when I saw that this was the new podcast. It was awesome. Thanks for the much needed break from studying from finals.
JJ is one of my heroes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So excited to listen to this, my workday just got way better!
Awesome interview. I wish you guys would have brought up Fringe. No one brings it up when they interview JJ.
You guys continue to impress with the catalog of guests you bring. Well done sirs.
why didnt they ask him about the time travel plots in the last season of felicity
I’m a bit shocked there was no mention of Trick r’ Treat, Its an amazing Horror pseudo anthology film. And the entire past year they put out all these great shorts tying back into the film. Check it out!
Good episode
Hey Big C, (absence of) Mirabooey, and Samoa Joe, I was having trouble downloading this episode on my iPod’s iTunes. Not to be the conductor of the complain-train, but could you offer some assistance/explanation.
Super interesting interview!
When Abrams talks about being “alone in a booth”, it brings me back to E.M. Forster’s eerily prescient story “The Machine Stops”, first published in 1909.
Well, well.. JJ. The man that bored me to death with Lost and destroyed any chance of having a new GOOD Star Trek Movie and/or tv series.
thanks for killing ST for us old viewers.
P.S. Fringe is rather good though.
ARGHASDSLFAJDF!!!! I loved everything about this episode right up to the part where you started wrapping it up! When you ended it without even mentioning Fringe I felt like someone had just offered me a cookie… watched me eat almost all of it saving the bit with the most chocolate chips for the last bite… then slapped it out of my hand and kicked me in the balls! OK… enough complaining about something I get for free… Love the podcast, just had to voice my anguish.
JJTrek was complete and utter garbage, not blaming the actors they did the best they could with the dreck they were handed.
Whoever made the decision to hire a man that says about Trek “I was, frankly, never really a fan. I never really got it. I never really cared much about it.” should be tarred and feathered.
Fire JJ!! Reboot the Reboot and get Trek back on track!!
Trick R Treat is pretty fantastic….Right up there with Creepshow 1, and the Tales From the Darkside movie..
Time shifts are OK if they’re built into a series OR effect the original universe, not a reason to write your own stories. That’s called fan fiction or in these case Abrams ego masterbating all over the original characters & plot (which I will agree are weak at times too). But the muthafucker doesn’t have enough imagination to cobble together his own universe (like Whedon), so he takes the lazy way out plot wise, gets a decent cast & slaps some pretty colors over it all & the asshole is a auteur? What a bunch of bullshit.
Hardwick. You are a wannabe of the nerdcore class if Abrams answers went without challenge. Go back to working at the hot topic, you major talent you
The Police Academy guy you’re thinking of if Tim Kazurinsky, and he didn’t appear until the sequel (and #3 and #4) http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0443730/
How mortifying to throw out a Police Academy joke and get the beat-down from JJ Abrams?!
To add the the Horror Anthology discussion, and to back some of the commentators above, I thoroughly enjoyed “Trick r Treat” . . . maybe more of a “Cat’s Eye” than a “Creepshow”, but still great fun. I also understand “Chillerama” is quite good, though I have not yet seen it.
Personally, I’d like to see HBO grow some balls and bring back “Tales from the Crypt”. I think it’s time again, and I’m sure todays talent would line up to write and direct. We should make it a trending topic and at least stir the waters a little bit.
And hey Chris, hit up your pal Rob Zombie and let him know your dilemma. I know he’s a busy man, but DUDE could you imagine a Rob Zombie directed anthology!?!?!? Holy shit!
Just wanna say that right around the beginning you literally sound just like Pete Tong
J.J. revitalized trek. I think it took someone who didn’t obsess over TOS to make it accessible to this generation. I love the original series, i love TNG. Every series after that killed my interest in trek, but J.J. brought it back. Getting to see Vulcan on the big screen, watching great actors ( Saldana, Quinto, Pegg ) play classic characters and actually pull it off, it was a great experience for me. Abrams’ universe has room to breathe, it’s not nostalgia driven, the door is open to anything. It was only when i “liked” star trek on facebook that I noticed fellow TOS fans actually hated the reboot, half of them don’t, but enough of them do, and all of that hatred is based on nostalgia. I’ve seen hundreds of comments like “J.J. ruined star trek” or just ” make a new series, stop these alternate timeline movies” . I think that last example hits the nail on the head, trekkies never cared about the movies, Wrath of Khan was very different from the intelligent drama the show represented. Does that make it a bad movie? No. The 2009 Star Trek is in the same boat, it’s a good movie with great acting and a very good plot, but try explaining that to someone who’s been begging for a new ST show for 10 years. If something as genius as Firefly couldn’t make it as a show, there’s no way a network would risk a new trek.
Next time ask about FRINGE!!
Just got into podcasts, was SO excited to see J.J. Abrams….. and waited the whole time for Fringe