Let's Try Something New¶
Published on Mon, 30 Aug 2021 10:00:00 +0000
Character watch madness, the Black Panther effect, and way too much Space Jam.
Synopsis¶
This episode marks a new era for Hodinkee Radio as James Stacy takes over hosting duties following Stephen Pulvirent's departure. Stacy, a senior writer at Hodinkee, introduces a new format featuring rotating panel discussions with various Hodinkee team members. For this inaugural episode, he's joined by Deputy Editor Nora Taylor, Editor-in-Chief Jack Forster, and writer Danny Milton.
The conversation centers primarily on "Character Watch Week" at Hodinkee, which sparked lively debate about what actually defines a character watch. Jack and Danny had written dueling point-counterpoint pieces, with Jack arguing that true character watches require moving character arms as hands (like classic Mickey Mouse watches), while Danny contended that any watch featuring a character qualifies. The discussion evolves to question whether nearly all watches are character watches in some sense, given how people buy them to connect with historical figures or cultural icons.
The panel also discusses Nora's piece on the Audemars Piguet Black Panther watch, examining it as a piece of contemporary art that transcends typical watch discourse by engaging with issues of representation, luxury, pop culture, and cultural appropriation. They debate whether AP succeeded with this controversial piece. Additionally, Danny explains how he became Hodinkee's reluctant Space Jam watch correspondent after being compelled to cover four different Space Jam-themed watches, and the group wraps up discussing new Grand Seiko releases, including spring drive models and U.S.-exclusive limited editions in various shades of green.
Links¶
Transcript¶
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| James Stacy | Hi, and welcome to well, Hodinki Radio, but different. My name is James Stacy, and as many of you are already aware, my good friend and longtime colleague Stephen Pulverant, host of Hodinki Radio since its inception, recently moved on to new opportunities, and you know, that has left something of a void for the Hodinky radio feed, not to mention for many of our hearts. I'm a senior writer at Hodinky along with being a photographer and a podcaster, and I've been tasked with filling that void, but in sort of a new and evolving format. I am not Stephen, and I won't be trying to fill his talented shoes. Instead, we're gonna try a few new things, some of which we hope will work, and from the onset, this new show will function as a weekly look at the biggest stories and watches, and I'm gonna be joined by a panel of Hodinky's best personalities. From editors to C suite leadership and of course crucial behind the scenes operators, the next several episodes will bring you inside Hodinky with in-depth chats about our biggest stories, conversations from all over the world of watches, and all the arguments, hot takes, tangents, and enthusiasm that you can expect from a revolving group of the Hodinky team. And so without further ado and in an attempt to make you all feel at home, hit me with that tune. Today we've got Character Watch Week and the arguments it has created, a fresh perspective on the AP Black Panther, and just way, way too much space jam. To go over all of this with me, please welcome my panel of esteemed coworkers, starting with Hodinki's deputy editor, Nora Taylor. Nora, how are you doing? Feeling fresh, James. How are you? Yeah, also fresh, I hope. Plenty of coffee. I've got another one in front of me. Let's uh try and keep the uh the pace of my heartbeat, you know, matched with uh with the audio scope of the show. We'll see how that goes. Uh next up we have our very own EIC. If I were a good employee, he'd be my illustrious boss, the ever wonderful Jack Forster. How are you, Jack? I'm pretty outstanding. Thank you, James. Yeah, it's great to have you here. And uh finally, don't threaten him with a good time. It's Odinkey's own space jam correspondent, Danny Milton. What's going on, Danny? I'm |
| Danny Milton | doing well. Not sure how I feel about that nickname. Uh but just wanna say for everyone here, a character watch does not need to have moving hands. Good morning. Oh man, okay. So we' |
| James Stacy | re coming in quick. Uh for those of you who who really don't know what's going on here, the last week or so at Hodinky has been character watch week. It is not in any way the home of my watch enthusiasm. So I've learned a lot about watches that have hands that move that are characters' hands and watches that have normal watch hands but also have drawings of characters on them and everything in between. I think it's going to come down to a a pretty entertaining discussion, but we kicked the week off with one of our point counterpoint series where we have editors kind of duel it out with a a pair of stories between Jack and Danny. So Danny came in uh right on the intro there with his position. Danny, why don't you elaborate and explain uh kind of where you and your your foe, Jack, kind of land on this topic? Sure. I mean at a at a |
| Danny Milton | top level, what we were doing was arguing what makes a character watch a character watch. And I say arguing, you know, we weren't fighting per se. I'd say it was a friendly debate, uh academic. Academic debate that did definitely spill into the inner office slack channel, which a lot of the audience doesn't get to see, uh, where it got a little bit more heated at times, where I still came out on top. Uh-huh. My side of the point counterpoint was that a character watch does not need to have the character with his arms as the hands telling the time. And Jack Right. So the the classic like Mickey Mouse one where his the two hands are spinning all the way around. Exactly. And Jack took the position that that is the only character watch that there is. And there can be no |
| James Stacy | other. There can be only one. Okay. Yeah, I'm I'm here for this argument because uh the for me the stakes have never been lower. Uh so I'm just just this just just for the good times. Uh Jack, why why do they need the hands to be moving? Why is this core to character watch iconography? First of all, James, uh can I just say |
| Jack Forster | I think that you speak for the vast majority of our readers when you say the stakes have never been lower. Um I think that's something that pretty much everyone who's listening can relate to that. Oh, absolutely. And I mean, I'm not quite as rigid on the subject as I uh I think, as I necessarily was in the article, but I do think that it's true that the most satisfying character watches are by far those with uh animated, you know, character arms or some sort of animation on the dial. And the reason for that uh has to do with the with what character watches most often depict, which is generally uh cart you know cartoon characters or characters from the comic books. And so the correspondence between the movement of the arms of a character on the watch and the f and an animated character, I think, is one of the things that really makes a character watch sit up and sing. It's of of course of course we also call watches that have uh just im just just mere mere unmoving static flat lifeless images of characters on the dial we call those character watches as well. But if you know you look back at history, the character watch era really took off with uh The Buster Brown pocket watch of 1908 arguably doesn't count because that was really a shoe advertisement rather than a sort of a promotion of the character per se. But I just think I just think it makes uh uh it makes for a more interesting experience and it gives you a a a more direct connection to the pseudo-life of the character |
| Danny Milton | itself, a kind of tamagotchi, if you will. Okay. One could argue, Jack, that every Mickey Mouse watch is an advertisement for Disney. One could. I would argue that every Mickey Mouse watch is an advertisement for Disney. But I I digress. Well the difference between |
| Jack Forster | Mickey advertising Mickey and uh Buster Brown advertising sho |
| James Stacy | es. I was kind of curious to wonder what character watches are out there that aren't in some way advertisements. Yeah, I mean well if you look at the dial of the Buster Brown pocket watch it actually says Buster Brown shoes. That's true. It's a little bit more direct as like a mascot. And I guess Disney's product is Mickey, not shoes. So fair fair point. Fair point. I'm not super sure what or who Buster Brown is. Um but I think that's probably besides the point to a certain extent. My my question here would be, are we arguing really if one or the other format is exclusive to being a character watch, or simply that one is more pure than the other? |
| Danny Milton | I think we were arguing the former, but about one minute ago Jack added that the one with the moving hands is now the most satisfying version of a character watch. So we might now have come to a more cordial |
| Jack Forster | Which is good for everybody. Can you hear the faint rustling noise of goalposts moving, Dan |
| James Stacy | ny? Can can you hear it? So how would you guys uh each characterize the response to your specific position? Jack, how about you let us know first? What what did you think of like were people on your side on your story or or or were they saying Danny had it admi or the other way around? I me |
| Jack Forster | an uh my uh sort of completely unscientific read was that I sort of marginally edged out Danny in, you know, just in terms of our demographic, which tends to hue a little bit sort of more inflexibly doctrinaire and purist |
| James Stacy | . Uh-huh. Uh-huh. And uh Danny, what how how was the response to your assertion that a character watch is a watch with a character on it, essenti |
| Danny Milton | ally? You know, I think that depending on which comment section you're reading, you're gonna get some some very definitive answers. I remember reading a comment somewhere that that said that I was clearly right, and anybody who thinks otherwise is entirely wrong. I forget what if that's exactly how the comment went, but I bet you Jack had fifteen of those in his. So it really just it really just depends. The truth is somewhere in the middle. You know? Well the internet is the best place for all arguments. There were two articles, right? There's a void in between them both. So there's something exists in between those two posts that we'll never get to see the comments section for. Well |
| Jack Forster | I mean Danny, I know what you and I think. I'm kind of curious what Nora thinks who, you know, watched the whole thing unfold. Yeah, me too. Nora, you got a tiebreaker |
| Nora Taylor | in you? Well, just as an editor, I'd like to say that nothing brings me more pleasure than sewing internal discord between two of our writers, just kind of my across my editorial mission. I think that I think the point in the middle might be James's which is just the stakes have never been lower |
| James Stacy | . Hey if you're gonna make an internet argument at least make it about something that literally doesn't matter. It's button perfect. There's there's a lot of arguments about important things right now. We we |
| Nora Taylor | won't need to touch that fire. No, I guess this is not a really this is kind of a non-answer, but the answer is somewhere in the middle. I think the way that we looked at it is that character watches are here to delight and connect people to the characters that they like. So the answer is probably whichever way you find the watch to be most delightful, if the hands move, that that's for you. And then if it doesn't, you just want someone's face printed on the dial, then that is the Well, I think that's an |
| James Stacy | incredibly middle ground answer of you. Nothing is not political. Uh uh let me add a new wrinkle. I was thinking about character watches this week and I think there's a certain type of character watch that maybe we didn't talk about. And this is the character watch that people it's a watch that people buy because they want to be more like a character. Whether it's Steve McQueen's whatever or I'm I'm wearing a Doxa because, you know, kind of a Cousteau vibe. It doesn't have a picture of somebody on it and the hands just do what normal watch hands do while also looking like normal watch hands. But like there's people out there who don't know that much about watches or care about watches any specific way, but own a speed master because it's tied to the moon thing or to their favorite astronaut. At what level are almost all watches charac |
| Danny Milton | ter watches? I remember when this conversation came up and I was convinced that's what the point counterpoint was going to be, and I was fully prepared to take the position that all watches are character watches. As someone who' |
| James Stacy | s wearing Yeah. There's a little bit of cosplaying built into like every big watch that we all like, love and know about, whether it's a sub or a uh this or like and any of the big icons all have this back dialogue where you're like, well, yeah, but cave scientists wore this one. I'm like a cave s |
| Danny Milton | cientist. I'm wearing an explorer right now. There you go. And it's it's the same idea. I mean, like, I'm not climbing Everest, but someone allegedly you know, I'm not gonna get into this argument right now, but there's a myth out there surrounding Mount Everest and the Rolex Explorer. Topic for another show. We can only have so many arguments. I know. I don't want to get into it. Stay out of my DMs, Smiths f |
| Jack Forster | ans. Yeah, I mean you're definitely LARPing a little bit. If uh you have a speedmaster and you put it on and you you think to yourself, yeah, I could time a re-entry burn with this. Yeah, |
| James Stacy | or like you go almost to space in your own rocket. I agree. I agree, Jack. Totally. Totally, totally, totally. |
| Danny Milton | So Can I ask Jack one question though? Because this this is something I was curious about and I wasn't sure if he didn't want to talk about it until the stories were published. But where do we stand on the newest silver Snoopy? And Snoopy on the back of the watch in a rocket moving. Technically it's a hand. It is the chronograp I think it's the chronograph second's hand that is traveling around the dark side of the moon. Does that count for you as a character watch, Jack? Because I wasn't it wasn't clear to me |
| Jack Forster | . Yeah. I mean, you know, Snoopy's unquestionably a character. It counts as a character watch in the broader definition just on the basis of him being on the dial, never mind the animation. I always think an animation adds something, you know, extra special and and uh, you know, I love seeing Snoopy inside uh the command module, you know, uh circling in front of the stars on the back. Yeah, I I would say a hundred that's that's certainly a character watch for sure. I mean you know it's it doesn't have to be the hands necessarily. I mean there are character watches where the animation is uh you know a hand waving and the waving hand is stuck on the pivot of the lever which is just a terrible idea from a Yeah, who who |
| James Stacy | doesn't want unsprung weight on that part of the watch, right? So all cuckoo clocks are character watches is where we're gonna end up with this conversation |
| Jack Forster | . Yeah, arguably. Uh I'm you know, I mean those uh those uh wall clocks with uh Betty Booper Felix the cat with the eyes. Oh sure, yeah. I mean those are those are character time pie |
| Nora Taylor | ces, yeah. Oh I want that on a watch. Absolutely. That's sick. This is maybe an excellent time to bring up what was one of my favorite comments, which is like, This has strong is a hot dog a sandwich vibes. Absolutely. I was I was literally just so to get |
| James Stacy | there with that comment. I'm so glad you I'm so glad you pulled that up. You want the hot dog as a sandwich or like is cereal cold soup or or the other way around. Um if you want that question, the one that comes to my mind is like if you allow the Snoopy, which Snoopy is a character, cat capital Z character, that's one thing. But if we stretch the the my previous question about our all watches, character watches in some ways. What if it's one of the like Apollo edition speedies where you get the insignia or maybe a moon or a uh uh uh Mars or whatever as one of the sub-dials? That feels like a a bit of a character watch move as well, right? |
| Jack Forster | I mean, you know, here's the thing. If we if we continue we can continue to broaden the definition of character watch, you know, hyp hypothetically we have. if if we say o okay a character watch is also a watch that makes you identify with a person or celestial object or other inanimate object or animate entity, then that covers an awful lot of watches and the the use of the term character watch s sort sort of starts to lose its meaning. If everything is a character |
| James Stacy | watch, then nothing's a character watch. Alright, so if we roll that back a little bit, what about one of those like Air Kings with a Domino's logo on it? Is Domino's I think it's not a character. Yeah. It's a pizza. It is I mean, functionally. |
| Danny Milton | That's what they're known for. No domino slander on this pod. It was brought up in the comments. Someone did ask if the dominoes did count. They also asked if if watches like the Batman or watches that have been unofficially monitored count. I would definitely definitively say those do not. Ye |
| James Stacy | ah. No, I I'm just poking fun at the idea of character watches and why we like them. I think I I think at least the the core, which is kind of both sides of this point counterpoint, those are the easy ones to understand as character watches. I was just uh just pushing some buttons with uh the Apollo uh speedies and stuff like that. And yeah, so I think we've probably beaten this cartoon horse to within an inch of its life. So we can probably move on to the next on the list, which is uh a really divisive watch, one that's that's had a big cultural impact this year. And Nora wrote a story that went up on Friday. If you haven't read it, maybe even pause the show as much as I want to keep you here, and it's important that you stay and hit that like button, which doesn't exist for podcasts. Maybe pause the show and check out this piece, which is uh Nora's look at the Black Panther, the AP Black Panther, which was, you know, we have now kind of the mind trust for this watch here on this on this call. So I want to dig into the Black Panther a bit because there's so much about this watch that I don't understand. And I feel like I got closer to it when I read your piece, Nora, and and uh obviously Danny's original coverage was excellent. I'm not a Marvel head. I don't watch the movies. I I didn't like reading comic books other than Yohagar the Horrible and stuff like that. Calvin and Hobbes. And in my mind I don't know if A P made a Calvin and Hobbes if I would give it like more leeway than I gave Black Panther. So uh Nora, why don't you give us the the sort of the core of your the argument for your story, which I thought was was uh an interesting perspective. Yeah. |
| Nora Taylor | I could have w uh written myself in circles about this watch. There's just so much to say and so much to think about. But the thing that I sort of landed on is that this piece has kind of gone out into the world and functioned more as a piece of contemporary art than a watch, in that people are confounded and reacting strongly to it in a um broader way than I think, you know, the Hodenky commenters react strongly to anything that comes out, but in kind of a broader way than uh most watches that are released. It has spurred all types of cultural conversation. It pulls in all of these webs of comic book fans, collectors, Marvel fans, art fans. And it is, I think Danny maybe you have the same opinion that it is just an incredibly beautiful watch. And Jackie saw it too. It's a beautiful watch in person. |
| Danny Milton | Like absolutely gorgeous. I would agree. I mean I um I've mentioned this on on the show before but, I was able to see it before there was any conjecture or any it hadn't been released, so I had nothing to sort of sway my immediate opinion of it. And I actually didn't even know what I was going to see when I saw it. So I was summoned to AP headquarters i uh in New York City, where I was escorted into a back room and given a box that I was told to open and I would find out whatever was inside the box. And inside was this. And I I I opened it and I was pretty shocked immediately, but also because uh it was a real test of being able to have your own opinions with that are unfettered without any any interference from the outside world. And so I I looked at it and I I the watch itself, I've said this a few times, it's a 42mm AP Royal Oak concept, which on its own, it's a smaller version of what the watch has been in in the past few years would have been a great release. It's a great size, it's a very cool watch design. And then when you look at it, there's this pretty remarkable sculpture, miniature sculpture in there, which is so detailed. I mean, when we took the photos and I zoomed in afterward, it was it was pretty astounding. I mean I I I |
| Nora Taylor | definitely don't hate this watch by any stretch of the imagination. And no offense to your wrist or mine or Davies who it is shot on. It looks much better, I think, on its own than on wrist. Like it it belongs on a podium in someone's gorgeous hallway, well lit, back lit, presented as kind of Oh shit, junk wrist. Goodness. Shots fired, Nora. My goodness. I included my own sub |
| James Stacy | par wrist in there too. We're all in the same boat. So I'm I'm curious, Nora, what why do you think this is a watch that's that people are still talking about to the extent that we're still looking at writing more about it. Because a lot of times a watch comes out that's kind of like it rubs people the wrong way or or just doesn't really find the audience that is also Hodinky's audience. Whereas in this case, I think that's what this watch did. It it's it paints with a much broader brush than your normal high-interest enthusiast AP special project. Yeah. You know, like an RD2 a couple years before. But what is it about this watch that makes it worth continuing to to notice? I me |
| Nora Taylor | an, the watch doesn't exist as just a watch or as a piece of art. It draws in a lot of kind of layers of what we talk about culturally in that it blends I think luxury in the fact that it is a wildly expensive AP watch and like quote unquote low culture. Marvel is accessible to everybody. Marvel fandom is out in the world. You know, people even like talking compare bringing in Marvel into a conversation about film, you're gonna have people talk about it forever. And then you brought John the fact that like they say that it was designed and planned before even the movie came out, the Black Panther movie came out, before Chadwick Bozeman sadly passed. But there is sort of this undercurrent of a play for especially when it was released April, that's you know, there's an undercurrent of a play for I guess kind of a diversity grab that is I think very real because one thing I brought in the piece is that you look, I look at things that are capitalizing off of or associating themselves with black culture. And you have to wonder who is making money off of this and who is involved in the making of it. And AP can't give me those statistics. I was like, hey, how many black people were in the room? And they were like, We'd love to tell you that that's illegal, which like fine. But it pulls in so much more culturally than your standard FP Jorn or whatever. And it is and you know, if this had Spider-Man on it too, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Like we would still be having a conversation about it because it would be blending luxury and pop culture in a way which people would think, you know, is tasteful or not, but it is pulling on so many strings and touching on so many cultural touch points. Also when you look at who AP had at that event, who they who the watch has been seen on, it is so much more than just a watch, either intentionally or not. And I think that that is it's good to have the conversation out in the open. And Danny, you talked about it too, where it was just sort of like, is this putting, you know, a somewhat radical comic book hero on the face of a incredibly expensive watch that only 150 people can buy, somewhat counterintuitive. Like yeah, it is. But I do think it is it's bringing sort of this undercurrent, like anytime you post a story about Jay Z wearing a watch, people are like, oh, it's a rich guy buying a watch. It's bringing all of these undertones that we see a lot of in conversations sort of |
| Danny Milton | to the forefront. Could I push back slightly on on one point, which I think is interesting, is what how do you feel and that'sn't really pushing back. How do you feel about the idea that Omega makes James Bond watches every time there's a movie released, they're not anywhere near as overt as an AP Black Panther watch that appeals to a certain consumer that a certain customer would never relate to as like a hero. Um, obviously, like he's notoriously, you know, not a person of color. And the AP Black Panther, when we see it on the LeBron's, the the different the different like the Draymond Greens and such, is that and I don't know what like what the answer is like is that good or bad for combining like high luxury with what you were saying is sort of low culture that's a little more accessible than than the luxury item. I guess I'm not seeing the connection between the James Bond and the Draymond Greenware. Like I'm saying like a Draymond like James Bond might not appeal to Draymond Green, whereas like a character like the Black Panther or a hero might be more might more appeal to Draymond Green. Like you might not see Draymond wearing a James Bond watch, for example. I guess is what I was what I was getting at. Yeah |
| Nora Taylor | . I think that's great. I think we this is yet another long long discussion i think that representation is not enough obviously yeah it's all about equity and parity but when their offerings are so limited, you know, when it is characters associated with a character. If we're looking at a character watch as a character as a watch associated with a character, and you want a black character, your options are limited. And so you gotta start somewhere, which is never a good answer. And I think like when you pull out and you're like, yeah, it's 2021 and this is the first one, like that's not progress, but it it is progress. So yeah, I think there are multiple ways to come at this where it's just sort of like what are the other offerings, what are the other cultural touch points that we can have that allow you to have your version of an omega |
| James Stacy | James Bond. Yeah. Totally. My question would be a little bit more zoomed out, but also I think probably harder maybe to answer. At least I can't think of any uh of a clean answer, so I'm curious to hear from all of you. Do you think AP did a good job with this watch? Jack bifurcated helicopter penis aside. |
| Jack Forster | That made it to Nora Slack too? You heard about this? You know I think that they I think they did a fantastic job with it uh qualitatively. Um it's the the the sculpture of the of the Black Panther is really, really beautifully done. It's uh got incredible depth. It's really alive. I mean it does look like it's jumping right at it you know, jumping out at you, you know, right out of the Uh I mean yeah, the placement of the hands, the placement of the turbulence is a little I mean, I don't know. I mean it's little risque if you want to look at it that way, but uh I think ultimately it works uh it works pretty well compositionally. That's a classic uh Black Panther uh you know, sort of physical position for both the comics and from the promotional stuff for the you know, for the Black Panther movie. So it's legit from that point. And you know, I mean Francois Bonamius is like this is not a new thing for him, you know, this sort of like obsession with uh with popular culture and comic book characters. You know, I mean this is this has been something he's been hung up on for, you know, as long as I have known him. He's like absolutely obsessed with like comic book culture, with Avengers, uh with popular culture in general. And that's you know, that's that's the big lever that he pulled to or one of the big levers that he pulled to turn AP into the powerhouse economic powerhouse it is today. And you know, I mean comic books, it's re it's really interesting. Like the combination of low and high culture is it it's kind of a staple of style nowadays and it has been for an awfully long time. But uh you know, comic books were I mean that that was pretty low culture back in the day. You know, I mean you look at the history of comic books in the United States, there were moral panics about comic books, you know, at several points. You know, people say, oh, that's destroying the minds of our children. You know, it's like right up there with uh Esquire Magazine ought to be banned. And you know, like this stuff, this stuff all looks like you know really mild today. But I mean, you know, there was a time when um you know the fact that you know kids and you know kids in their early teens were such fanatical fans of comic books, that was uh that was a source |
| Danny Milton | of genuine concern for parents and congressmen. I also say like what um it with any watch a lot of times I see it on the wrists of other people and what you don't see are the details on the dial, but you do see the case and the bracelet or the strap from afar and you and you think, oh, that looks really good on that person and I like that. And then eventually you get to see it. From afar, this watch looks very good. I mean, I have to just say, like when I see it on the wrists of the very few who have gotten a chance to wear it, it it looks great. I mean the purple strap, the finishing on on the the lugs and the sides of the case that track with the patterns that are worked into the the open worked style dial, it looks really nice. So from an actual like watch perspective, if you like the Black Panther on the dial, the actual like case finishing, case design and the the implementation of the color of the strap, I think look really great. Yeah I mean like you know qual |
| Jack Forster | it I've looked at thousands probably of character watches over the course of preparing for character watch week. This is by far the most nicely done character watch I've ever seen. And like I I mean I love the Gerald Gentis, but this is like, you know, just in terms of quality of execution, it's really next level. And Nora, where do you land? You think they did a good job with it? Yeah. I think it |
| Nora Taylor | 's beautiful. I hadn't considered looking like what it looks like from far away. And that's a very good point, Danny. That like from far away, you could just be like, wow, that's a very nice AP. Yeah. I think it'll be really interesting to see what the next iteration of the Marvel watch will be. It'll really help us, I think, look at this watch too, where it's like if they somehow make a really beautiful, who's the guy with the the bow and arrow? Hawkeye. Hawkeye, yeah. If they make like a really beautiful Hawkeye watch, I think that'll also be really fascinating. It's just this is kind of going away from your point. It is a really well done watch and how much of it is that the Black Panther is such an engaging and kind of cool character to spin up into a watch. I think it'll be interesting to see what they do |
| James Stacy | going forward. Yeah, and there's the you know, there's the charity angle and we're gonna start seeing them start to hit auction and and get sort of a real world value for them. Mm-hmm. You know, I I also think at some level AP is uh they're risk takers. It's in their blood at this point. They take big gambles and I think man that what are they they made 150 of these yep and so on 150 like they had the impact of of a much more prolific watch and and to Danny's point it establishes where the concept case size is going to move moving forward. Right. So I'd I'd suggest that this is the start of probably a a pretty interesting era for the concept watch from AP. And yeah, I mean it's a they they certainly got the um the attention quoti |
| Jack Forster | ent little bit more are alternative methods of displaying the time that don't necessarily work against the uh the depiction of the character. I mean you know I think this is a beautiful watch. I think it's really beautifully done. But you know, s imagine say a Hawkeye watch where the hour is a a um jumping hours window and where the the minutes are uh you know like hawkey's holding a bow and it's drawn and at the tip of the arrow uh is a retrograde minutes hand. You know, something like that I think would be super interesting. It would would it be an animated character, which you know I dig. And I think that it would also, you know, sort of incorporate the time-telling aspect of the watch a little bit better with the character. That's the only thing that I think was a little bit of a miss with the Black P |
| Danny Milton | anther watch. Mm-hmm. I would love to see a a character watch in the Marvel universe with a power reserve indicator and it's the Incredible Hulk and at zero it's Bruce Banner and at full power, it's the incredible Hulk. There's an idea. Watch World. |
| James Stacy | There you go. Great ideas for sure. You know, I'm I'm tempted to say that this is uh peak character watch so for twenty twenty one, but I don't I don't wanna I don't wanna leave out a franchise that's I know very important to Danny. Oh god. Let let's talk Space Jam. Uh a new legacy of watches and also the I think there's a new Space Jam movie. There is, was, however you wanna however you wanna say it. A film, sorry. Let's go movie. Let's go movie. All right, Danny, uh how did you end up writing about four different space jam watches over the course of six weeks or whatever it's been and you know, why? W |
| Jack Forster | hat were you thinking? I have many discussions with my wife where I ask myself that very question. Okay, can I just say about it? I just want to jump in here and say like everybody everybody in the comments, you know, and I think uh people seem to have some idea that like me or somebody, um, you know, like Nora or Nick or somebody, like held a gun to Danny's head. Put the screws to Danny. Yeah, and and uh and said otherwise he gets the clamps. And said, listen, Danny, uh times times are tough uh out there for content creators. Uh you have it pretty cushy. Uh so uh you're gonna do f you're gonna do all of our uh space jam watch coverage or else. And like that's not that's not that's not how Danny ended up writing for Spa |
| Danny Milton | ce Jam Watch. It's slippery slope though. It's not, but the funniest one was the th th th this launch was was I I post the space jam story at the end end of day Wednesday, Thursday morning, John Buse comes up with a Philippe Dufour auction piece. If you want the high low of watches, like in your face, it's that. Honestly, the first article that I wrote, I thought was going to be the only space jam watch. And it seemed like an interesting enough piece. I had been writing the watching movies column for five months at that point, and this was a movie, and there were watches, and the watches were kind of funky and colorful and interesting. And we don't do a ton of coverage that's geared toward kids. Um, and I think there's a fair amount of readers out there that have kids, and there are certain levels of watches where you can get into the hobby. And I think that a lot of us own fossil watches at some point in our lives. And um I found there to be legitimate merit to a story about fossil watches and space jam watches and it was it made sense to me. Just a quick question. |
| Jack Forster | When did the first Space Jam movie come out? What year? Nineteen ninety six. Okay, so it's two thousand twenty one. I mean, you know, people who uh you know watched Space Jam and loved it uh you know when it first came out, those people are parents. You know, this is a big nostalg |
| Danny Milton | ia trip for them. Yeah, they're parents now. Um and even if they're not parents, they might want to buy these anyway. Because I've I've looked at eBay and there were space jam watches from the nineties and they're you know, they're you wouldn't want to buy them today. So maybe these offered some kind of uh a value play to them and and they're interesting. And then the dam broke. You don't say and it just we kept getting these emails of releases and it wasn't like it wasn't like like a fat like a fashion watch release. It wasn't like X fashion brand had slapped a Looney Tune on the dial. These there was something to each consecutive piece. The one that came to my attention next was a $100,000 Space Jam turbion. Which I don't have to say anything else about that. I mean, other than the fact that we want to talk about strange character-esque watches. This had a literal basketball-shaped turbine cage. And there's no way I wasn't going to write about that. I mean, that's one of those situations where if the film's about to come out, I've already written about one of them, and this could not be farther on the other end of the spectrum. I mean, they've got me at that point. So then a couple weeks went by |
| James Stacy | . You're c you're at home. You're at home just enjoying enjoying some peace and quiet. I had to look over an expanse of green grass and mountains, a cup of warm coffee in your hand, and then the phone rings |
| Danny Milton | . Literally just returned from vacation. And this is basically what happened. There's a third one. I think someone just like messaged me. There's a third one. And I I think I messaged Nora and Lori, our managing editor, and I said, I I I know that no one in their right mind would let me publish this under normal circumstances, but I'm just gonna do this. So just like we're |
| Jack Forster | we're doing this. You know, this this watch has been like, you know, chasing you and surprising you unpleasantly and unexpectedly the way Hannibal Lecter chased Will Graham in the novels. |
| James Stacy | Yes. Like you think you're Florida, you think you're fine and all of a sudden BAM Forsakes, yeah. This is the third one, the third one, July seventeenth, twenty twenty one, the year the year of our of our of uh somebody who knows at this point, just because dear God, there's a third space jam watch |
| Danny Milton | . Nora, you might remember, I don't remember what the conversation was, but it was like we had a little debate about whether or not we were And then and then you got like what, a five week reprieve? Oh, we were babes in the woods. We didn't even we didn't even know. Well it wasn't so I wrote that and I had written somewhere in there that if there's another one, drop an anvil on my head. I mean that's how I felt at that point. Like let's just let's stop. And I got an email, uh I don't remember who sent it to me with a link to a fourth one, and I think they had confused uh five-letter A words um and said uh I think you need some advil, and then a link to the the fourth one, which by the way, I I've tried to communicate this a few times. If any of these watches had been released in like reverse order, where the fourth one was the first one or the third one was the first one, I don't know what my opinions would have been in of them because it's really hard to look at them in a vacuum. But this latest one that I wrote about looks like a Patek Philippe Nautilus, like straight up. Yeah. And on the strap that it's on, kind of looks like a Vashron overseas, which I've since learned this brand D1 Milano, I think that's kind of their thing. And I that's also like very much something that many watch brands do. I mean if you know just mimic the best and hope for the best. There have been some positive feedback on this watch. I mean, some people who have literally kind of talked themselves into maybe buying it in the comments section, which is I never expected. And maybe it's because the angle that I start these stories in is one of such complete exasperation and exhaustion. But I can't really say. It's not for me to say. Hey Danny, you know what I'm looking at right now? Space j |
| Jack Forster | am watches? I'm looking at a vintage Lola Bunny space jam watch from the 1990s. Oh, is it from Armitron? Y |
| James Stacy | ep. Yeah. We need it for the book that Danny's gonna start writing shortly. Why do I know that? Why did I know that? See, that's the problem. Yeah, that's sad. That hurts a little bit. I want to, you know, look at the D one Milano. My favorite part, it's hard to say what my favorite part is because it's derivative in many ways. But the ultra thin, and then I don't want to scream into my microphone, but like space jam. It's it's just like Why say ultra thin and then also sh scream space jam at me. It is it is a good time though. Nori, you were g |
| Nora Taylor | onna say? I was gonna say, Danny, what would be your ideal venue for your eventual space jam watch collector meetup |
| Danny Milton | ? I mean it's like it's gotta be it's gotta be space, right? When I was a kid, I don't know if anyone else had these in their in their malls in their hometown. There was a Warner Brothers store in my mall. It doesn't exist anymore. And it in the Warner Brothers store, there were massive, like full-size busts of um DC characters punching through the wall, and then in the back for kids, there was a Marvin the Martian spaceship that you could go inside of. That store closed in like 1990, whatever. But I would like someone to build a Warner Brothers store and we will have the meetup inside of Marvin the Martian's ship, full grown adults in a child-sized Marvin the Martian ship in a fake store. That's the ven |
| James Stacy | ue. My follow-up question is of the four, which one do you like the most? All right. Fant |
| Danny Milton | astic. Which one have you ordered and you're just not telling me? To be honest, it's the image changing fossil dial. That one is the most it's the most I'm a kid. Like, and that's what this is that's this should be in my mind. Yeah. Like I'm a kid and I want a space jam watch. I want the one where the the image changes, like I pulled it out of a serial box, I've got all the characters because they can't fit on one version of the dial. You have to make the image change so you can get them all in there. Perfect. And it comes with three straps. Hey Danny. Hey Jack. What's like space jam about? Is it like basketball in space or something? Or like what's the deal there? It is. It's it's it you know what's you know what's great, Jack? The seek this new movie does not take place in space. No space. No space. No space, baby. Zero space. No. Also, no. I'm not even gonna go into this. Forget about it. This is just algae rhythm that you have to do an absolute connoisseur or of all things Warner Brothers to even like be able to like conceive this movie at a low le I mean, it is a bizarre. You want to talk about advertisements. I mean the whole movie is just an advertisement for Warner Brothers IP. Anyway, I digress. We I I believe we have. |
| James Stacy | Wait, James, have you seen the movie? No, I have not. Oh. I listened to another podcast that I love quite a bit, JRVP, and uh the one of the hosts on that is obsessed with the character algae rhythm. So I've heard I think I've seen or I've been walked through a lot of it. Anyways, I think that's probably enough space jam for me. Danny, be okay to move on or you I am good. Do you have any more space jam questions for Danny? Write space jam at hodinky.com. Can I just call out before we |
| Jack Forster | move on that Danny deployed the phrase just slapped a Looney Tune character on the dial in defense of my position in point counterpoint? |
| James Stacy | Hey. Okay, so I I wanted to get to maybe a couple of the stories that didn't happen for Character Watch Week. Uh you know, it's not the surprisingly there isn't a ton of say scholarly writing about character watches. Uh there's some, um, but there's not a ton when you're going back over the history. Nora, what t talk to me about uh Happy Meal and serial watches. This was just a story that I think Danny you were in |
| Nora Taylor | itially going to write. And you graciously took from me. Thank you very much. Yeah. And then I fumbled the bag since someone at McDonald's did not get back to me about all of the various happy meal McDonald's watches. There's gotta be hundreds, right? Hundreds of them. Thousands. And then I was actually on my favorite store online goodwill.com. Okay. And there was a Burger King watch that came in a burger box. Like there were some really well put together, incredibly cheap looking fast food watches, I think in the golden age of uh fast food happy meals. For sure. And one very cool, I almost bought a Kellogg's watch that had like that cornflakes rooster on it. But there just wasn't enough You must have a name, right? Oh yeah. May |
| James Stacy | be he's just called the Corn Flakes rooster. Yeah, cornflake bird. Happy morning corn |
| Nora Taylor | flake rooster. Um Um yeah. And then serial birds. Yeah, there just wasn't an there was there were so many that it was kind of hard to win out like n narrow in on a story in the case. Back when you could get a watch and your fries made in beef tallow. Mm-hmm |
| Jack Forster | . Simpler times This is the thing. I I I took a little bit of a look at this and it's like ev basically every single cereal that had a promotional character like Captain Crunch or uh you know, Quispin Quake. There was a character watch for and pr and probably more more than one, like a lot more than one, for every single one of these characters. It's it's just a it's amazing. I mean it's a whole separate sub |
| Danny Milton | category of character watches. Can you imagine if there's a two can Sam and all the markers are circular but they're different color fruit loops? I mean I would buy that watch. And uh his he his his head? His beak. And it and |
| James Stacy | it's it separates. The mouth opens. I'll find that for you. I don't know that there's enough flavor variation in fruit loops to do 12 markers. I think you just you'd have to vary it. You'd have to repeat. Yeah, probably bounce back and forth. I think there's only so many. This is interesting topic though. Oh my goodness. Sorry everybody, the bird is named Cornelius Corny Rooster. Oh my goodness, that's even better than Serial Bird. Corny Rooster? Just that that's that's the gonna be the the peak of the informational aspect of this show is you now know the name of the um cornflakes bird, uh Cornelius corny rooster. Also, I'm now looking at mul |
| Jack Forster | tiple two can Sam character watches. Consistent with the charm of the character. |
| James Stacy | Just feathers. Let's talk Grand Seiko. Let's get out of this character hellhole and uh and go to Grand Seiko. What a segue, James. That was a beautiful segue. You know what? Yeah |
| Jack Forster | . So here's a question to lead us into that subject. Are the ripples of water on the surface of Lake Sua a character? Yeah. Yes. For me. S |
| James Stacy | ure. Okay, that's been our show. Thanks so much for listening. Uh but no, yeah, let's uh the Grand Seiko drops some stuff and and I don't want to spend the uh necessarily the entire episode joking about character watches. I think a lot of that content's on the site, but it's also we're right on the eve of Geneva Watch Day. There's gonna be a lot of watch announcements the week that this episode comes out. Keep in mind we recorded this a few days beforehand, so we're not up to that. Get to the next episode if you want to chat on uh new watches. We'll have a great episode for you next week on all of those topics, but we did get a Jack, do you want to give us the uh the kind of five thousand foot view on these new models? Yeah, su |
| Jack Forster | re. There were uh they're all limited editions. Two of them are uh the SLGA 008 and 007, uh respectively the Tree Ring and Waters of Lake Sue, Spring Drive Grand Secos with a new 9RA2 Spring Drive movement. And uh one of the I mean they're they're both beautiful watches. One of the cool things about the 9RA2 is that it addressed a major pet peeve that some people had with not all but some of uh Grand Seca's spring drive watches, which is that the power reserve is on the front of the dial and there were there were, you know, people I think you know there's a legitimate case to be made that it sometimes it works really well and sometimes it works less well compositionally. So they moved the power reserve to the back, which is where you find it on um you know say like the Crator H E spring drives. Power reserve is on the back now. And uh you get a much cleaner dial. Uh it's a thinner movement, so a lot of the thickness that uh historically people have associated with spring drive, it's not I mean, you know, they're not like ultra thin watches, but they're certain they certainly feel uh look and feel uh you know noticeably thinner than their predecessors. Uh and I thought that that was just a great way to show for Grant Sago to show that it's it actually does listen to customers and it does actually incorporate customer feedback. And they're they're fantastic looking watches. The other watches that Grand Saco launched are three U.S. only limited editions. They're all in different shades of green. And these are relatively small, hand wound Grand Seiko watches, sort of uh you know, thirty six thirty-seven point three by eleven point six millimeters uh with the caliber handwound caliber nine S 64. And it's just like wonderful classic, you know, watch making from Grand Seiko. These are like the kinds of watches that put Grand Seiko on the map. And for those who kind of feared that Grand Seiko had abandoned uh offering a ton of quality for surprisingly little money as um you know as, part of their identity. Th areese all under five thousand dollars and they're just fantastic, fantastic watches. These will age really well. They're beautiful. Yeah, and I think they're gonna go fast too. There's only a hundred and fifty of uh of each col |
| James Stacy | or. Yeah, it's the kind of three different shades of green. Yeah, fair enough, for sure. Kind of. And yeah, so these are all based on the SBGW two three one, which is a fan favorite um for the smaller kind of time-only uh vibe from GS. And like Jack said, under five grand, actually limited. And the the three colors are super distinct of each other, which is, you know, to do green, most brands would pick one color and do that do that green. And uh and Seiko's or Grand Seiko's gone to the extent of doing three. And I I think all three are great. You know, the the the only one that kind of stands out for me is on that lightest green color. It's almost like off mint, it has a blued second hand, which is very distinctive. But I feel like the steel second hand on the other two versions, which one is sort of a grayish green blue, and the other one's a more, I don't know, kind of uh desaturated, sort of like middle middle tone green. I I think the the the steel hands look better for me, but what where do you guys land on that |
| Jack Forster | ? The polished steel seconds hand look is very, very legible on the two darker dial watches, but I think it would wash out a little bit because you know it doesn't have the distinctive facets that the hour and minute hands have. So um it would be considerably less visible against a lighter color dial. And I think the fact that they actually went with a heat blued seconds hand on the lightest colored dial is uh you know I I think that's that shows that they're actually you know thinking about what they're doing. This is they didn't say, hey, let's make you know 150 each green dial limited editions U.S. market only just push them out there and you know we'll make we'll make some some money super fast, which they will. You know, but the fact that they actually took the trouble to make sure that the most legible possible version of a second hand they had was on the |
| James Stacy | watch that needed it most. I thought that was fantastic. Yeah, and they've got you know, they have a track record of doing this a bit as well. In 2017, they did the SBGW, the kind of s uh first Grand Seiko re-editions, and they changed up the hand coloring. It also kind of signified which case. I believe the steel case version of that had a blued steel, but I might have had that conflated with the platinum version or something like that. But the uh they've done this before and and it's certainly uh it's easy to read, which is uh which is a a high point. Nor Nora, where where do you land on these? Do you like these? Yes. I think they're beautiful. I think I was a little like, oh boy, green. Again. We're seeing a lot of green these days. Yeah. But these feel really |
| Nora Taylor | different. I think that the lightest one with the blue seconds hand seems really special. And like Danny said, they're gonna age really well and there's something kind of I think the blue second's hand almost makes it kind of funky, like it's very smart and intentional, but it like adds an element of something different to it that I think is just really um |
| James Stacy | really that's a unique touch, yeah. For sure. Yeah. Danny, what do you think? Which one of these three would uh would have you you, know, clambering for your nearest Grand Seco boutique. So I keep covering each |
| Danny Milton | one with my hand to see which one I like better. Because why 'cause they're when they're all together. I thought you were just waving. In a in an in in an array, they look wonderful and no one can see this. I'm just waving my hand back and forth in front of the zoom camera. Yes. Hi, Danny. Um I like the what I call the winter green uh green. These are all gum to me. It's winter green spearmint and I don't know. There's this there's a orbit flavor called sweet mint and that's what the uh the far right one is the light one looks like. Sure. I'm uh I'm really into it because I like how the G S applied uh emblem, applied uh logo actually pops more off of that darker shade than it does on the other greens and it's also less green. So because it can be blue or green, uh I like having options. So that's my favorite. Very cool. But overall, I like I mean, just besides just picking which dial color I like the best. I mean, these are to me like quintessential Grand Seiko watches, as Jack pointed out. I mean, this is super clean design, high level of finishing, both dial and case. And it's just a lot of times when you're at this price point, people are going to say, oh, I could just buy a tutor, or you know, what whatever the case may be. And there's a I I don't feel that here. I think Grand Seiko oftentimes you you you don't actually have that thought cross your mind when they do it this well. And I see a ton of people who are gonna want to pick these up. |
| James Stacy | And no date window. And no date window, true. No date window. Yeah, no, those are great. Be sure to check those out. And and you know, everything we're chatting about where where there is a link available, uh, we'll have it in the show notes so you can always click there to uh to see deeper into that. Look, I've had you guys for the better part of an hour. Anything you feel that we we missed We can all sing the space jam theme song. Oh god, please. No more space jam. I don't think we have the copyright for that. Nor that's the kind of idea I put out there, and then you tell me we don't have the copyright. We don't need to reverse that just because it's my show. Is it an original composition composed especially for Space Jam? It's it's what my brain sounds like twenty four hours a day at just point. It's just the the sound of all of the Space Jam watches running ASMR style next to a very sensitive microphone and it's the sound of madness. It's that clip of James going space. Okay, so that's our show. All right, I think that's as good as good as any place to leave it. Nora, Danny, and Jack, thank you so much for coming on uh kind of this first experimental H radio show. Thanks to everyone who uh listened. If you have any comments, leave 'em in the comment section below the show notes and uh we will chat to you uh next week with uh the latest and greatest from Hodinky. Thanks everybody thank you thanks everybody thanks so much for listening |