Aftermath Hours is primarily a show about the news – and there’s plenty of talk about The Issues on this week’s episode – but sometimes a moment stops you dead in your tracks, and you’ve got to share it with the world. That could aptly describe both Chris Plante’s sandwich story and my experience of hearing him tell it. Anyway, without further ado…
Well, with a bit more ado: This week Chris (Person) and I are joined by an additional Chris (Plante) – and also, to complete the bit, I’ve legally changed my name to Chris. We begin by discussing Plante’s life following his tenure as editor-in-chief at Polygon, which came to an abrupt halt earlier this year for reasons with which Aftermath readers and listeners are depressingly familiar. On the upside, he’s launched a new show, Post Games, and it’s very good!
We discuss the whys and hows of his interview-focused podcast before delving into the big news of the week: Incensed by the removal of NSFW games on Itch and Steam following pressure from payment processors – which, in turn, were pressured by an activist group called Collective Shout – artists and fans have kicked off a mass call campaign of their own, targeting Visa, Mastercard, PayPal, and Stripe specifically. Will it work? And in what universe is it appropriate for bank companies and payment processors to even be making decisions about what we’re allowed to watch and play in the first place?
Then Chris (Person) enthuses about Death Stranding 2 – which he recently finished – and Chris (Plante) tells the wildest story about a sandwich any of us have ever heard.
You can find this week's episode below and on Spotify, Apple, or wherever else you prefer to listen to podcasts. If you like what you hear, make sure to leave a review so that we can afford a really long sandwich.
Here’s an excerpt from our conversation (edited for clarity, but certainly not length (of sandwich)):
Person: Battery Park is an unnatural place, physically. It shouldn’t exist. It has one of the best weird movie theaters: the Regal down there. Because nobody knows that it’s there.
Plante: When we lived there, we went there all the time, and I… can I share a really quick Regal story? Because it’s one of the most bonkers things.
So my wife and I, we were dating at the time, and we both got off work. She was working in production; I was freelance. Anyway, we were like “Oh, we want to go see Edge Of Tomorrow: Live, Die, Repeat, and we can go do it in the middle of the day. It’s gonna be, like, Tuesday at 10:40 AM.” And we go down to this theater, and as you’re describing, nobody knows it exists despite it being humongous – built into a skyscraper on the southwest side of Manhattan. It just does not make sense.
So we go in, and we go up this giant cavern, and we go into the movie. It’s 10:40 on a Tuesday. Nobody’s there at 7 PM on a Friday, so it’s empty. We sit, and this one dude comes in right as the trailers are starting, and he’s wearing the biggest trench coat I’ve ever seen, and he’s holstering something in it that looks like it’s about, like, two or three feet tall and thin. And he really does not want us to see it. We are at this point like “Well, this isn’t great.”
The trailers start, and every time a sexy thing happens in a trailer, this dude just goes “Mmmm.”
Nathan: Oh no.
Person: Don’t like that.
Plante: The whole time! So we’re like “Oh noooooo.” And then we’re like “Do we move?” We were doing that thing where you look at each other but you don’t want to say anything, and you’re kinda mumbling. He was literally just a seat or two down.
And then as the movie starts, he reaches in, and we’re like “Well, here it is. This is the end for us.”
And he pulls out the biggest sub sandwich I have ever seen. HUUUUGE. And then he proceeds to, for the first half hour of this movie, duck-style eat this sandwich. It never leaves the front of his face. He never lowers it. It just begins outstretched and slowly disappears into his body. Tomato and lettuce and vinegar and olive oil are spilling everywhere. It’s somehow getting on us. But we’re so happy that we’re not gonna die.
Nathan: It’s like being in the front row at Sea World.
Plante: That scene in the movie where Emily Blunt – it’s in every trailer – where she bends down in a weird way, like yoga positions… the noise that came from this man. The mix of sexuality, joy, and hunger, I will never forget it.
