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I'm Dana Stevens, and this is the Slate Culture Gab Fest. Reality is Statham Edition. It's Wednesday, February 2, 2011. And on today's program, we're going to talk about the new Jason Statham movie, The Mechanic, and the phenomenon of Jason Statham in general, the new IFC comedy satire show, The Onion News Network. And we're going to have Michael Agger, a Slate senior editor, in to talk about reality is broken, a new book on video gaming and the culture and benefits thereof. Stephen is out for one more week, sadly. We miss him dearly, but he will be back to host the show next week. Joining me is Slate Deputy Editor Julia Turner, live from L.A. Hey, Julia. Hi, Dana. And our TV critic, Troy Patterson. Hey, Troy. Ladies. So we have two topics to cover here, Troy. We are starting with the Jason's Dayton, movie, The Mechanic, which you just rolled out of moments ago. I did. I caught it on 42nd Street at the Regal Ewalk, which I aver is the superior place to watch a matinee to the AMC across the street.

Why so?

Because you can sort of lounge.

It's because the way that the cup holder armrest works. You've got airplane-style seating.

You can kind of do that.

It's just one giant Magnavox commercial in there. Largely, yeah. And the movie is perfect for that, right? Because it's going to blow you out of your chair. There is. They're also very casual with their bag check there if you want to have a drink, which I recommend for the mechanic. Although you don't start until after the, sort of the pre-title sequence.

Very nice.

So I don't know where either of you stand on Statham.

I would love to hear both of your thoughts on Statham.

I've already reviewed the movie, and I've just put it out there that for some reason that I don't quite understand, Jason Statham really appeals to me as an action movie hero. I mean, there are many reasons that you could defend, but there are other action heroes that might have those same qualities that I don't quite buy. What is it about him? What's the Statham magic? Or do you guys dispute that there is magic? No, I don't dispute that there is magic. He's magical. I don't think I've seen the other state in movies, but now I want to put crank and transporter and transporter three all in my docket. I believe all I've seen with him is crank two, the expendables, which we talked about on the Gab Fest last year, but he's barely in that. And I started lockstock and two smoking barrels, but I can't stand Guy Richie, so I ended up cutting it off midway through. So I'm sort of new to his allure, actually. Have you seen the bank job? No. It came out a couple of years ago. I hope I'm not mangling the name of the director. I think it's Roger Donaldson, who's kind of a journeyman, but he made species and no way out. And it's a heist movie. It's a period piece heist movie said in London.

And Stadam's character is actually named Terry Leather.

Mm-hmm.

The love interest is Saffron Burroughs.

He tends to collect these sort of Saffron Burroughs-y love interest as the, well, you wouldn't call the woman in the mechanic a love

interest, the sex object, who I believe is in that movie simply to reassure me of my own

heterosexuality. The mechanic is a very rich text.

Yeah, let's get into the mechanic. I want to get back to Statham in a minute, but yes, the

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