Tenet

Slate's Spoiler Specials

Slate Podcasts

Tv & Film, Tv Reviews, Film Reviews

3.6 • 724 Ratings

🗓️ 18 September 2020

⏱️ 75 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On the Spoiler Special podcast, Slate critics discuss movies, the occasional TV show, and, once in a blue moon, another podcast, in full spoiler-filled detail. This week, Slate’s Sam Adams and Vox’s Film Critic Alissa Wilkinson spoil Tenet. Christopher Nolan’s time-bending thriller is visually spectacular yet incredibly confusing. The main character, played by John David Washington, simply referred to as the Protagonist is a CIA operative who becomes entangled with Tenet, a secret organization that’s fighting a future that’s actively attempting to destroy the world. The Protagonist suddenly finds himself in a world where things, and even people, can be inverted to travel backwards through time. Can the Protagonist save the world before it’s too late? How does Nolan incorporate palindromes within the movie’s structure? And what parallels can be drawn to Bill & Ted? Note: As the title indicates, this podcast contains spoilers galore. Read Sam Adams’ review here. Read Alissa Wilkinson’s review here. Need more explanation? Check out Sam’s explainer here. Check out Alissa’s fascinating palindrome piece here. Email us at [email protected]. Podcast production by Rosemary Belson. Slate Plus members get ad-free podcasts and access to exclusive shows like Dana Stevens’ classic movies podcast Flashback. Sign up now to listen and support our work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	I want to tell you my secret now.
0:02.0	I see dead people.
0:05.0	Silent green is people!
0:09.0	No, I am the father.
0:13.0	Oh, Rushburn.
0:17.0	What's in the box?
0:20.0	You made it! You blew it up! What's in the box?
0:22.6	You maniac!
0:24.5	You blow it up!
0:27.7	Damn you all the hell!
0:31.4	Hello, and welcome to Slate's spoiler specials.
0:34.1	Today we're spoiling Christopher Nolan's puzzling movie tenant.
0:37.6	I'm Sam Adams, the senior editor at Slate, and I am joined today by Alyssa Wilkinson, Vox's film critic. Thanks for having me. All right, so we both saw Tenet
0:43.4	in movie theaters, which as of this moment is the only way you can legally see it. And I feel like
0:49.5	in the interest of transparency and public health, we should be clear about how that happened.
0:55.2	In my case, I actually saw it twice so that I could write the explainer that Slate ran, because
1:00.7	as we will shortly get into, it's a very hard movie to understand having seen only once.
1:06.0	Both times I was at a press screening in a full-sized theater with, I think, one time five and the other time six other people.
1:15.3	It was like first thing in the morning.
1:16.7	I had, you know, talked to the publicist beforehand and ensured there were not going to be too many people there.
1:21.6	Theater had just been cleaned, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
1:24.2	That felt like roughly safe, but those are also not circumstances that anyone
	...

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