Give Us the Launch Codes

America couldn't get through one full week in the new year without violating a country's sovereignty, making plans for global conquest, and having government agents murder Americans on public streets with impunity. Travis & Tom come together to talk about how to grapple with understandable fear of what's coming next and what you can do to make things better. Subscribe to Patreon to listen to a...

Travis shows Tom the amazing futuristic world that is video chat! Since this episode was also kind of a guinea pig for this WAY more efficient method of recording episodes, we decided to do a light subject to ring in the new year - CARTOON PHYSICS! (Don't worry, the heavier stuff is coming next week). Subscribe to Patreon to listen to an exclusive episode - this one being about popular video games...

We're at the end of our first year doing this podcast thing. Travis & Tom reflect on 2025, our growing pains and what we'd like to do with this podcast in the future. In the meantime, Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year! CORRECTIONS: 46:47 - The version of the first Gears of War game that’s available for the PlayStation 5 - Gears of War: Reloaded - is technically a REMASTER, not a remake. Is t...

When was the last time a character on death on TV made you sad? Or mad? Or even GLAD?! Been a while, eh? Why is that? Travis & Tom explore the broader issues with modern TV and how people are less compelled with what they see anymore. The TL;DR? Smaller budgets, more episodes, faster turnaround. Please. Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/GiveUstheLaunchCodes Travis’ IG: @musicalnotextr

Travis & Tom turn the dial on their radios to look back at the last 30 years in music, reminiscing on the trends in music by looking at what finished on Billboard as the highest charting singles and albums - all in a futile search for a good, genuine rock band to breakthrough! Shoutout to Todd in the Shadows who made this video indictment about “Ordinary”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrIPG...

As Black Friday/Cyber Monday approaches and the Holiday shopping fiasco begins, Mandi-She-Who-Works-At-Returns offers Travis & Tom some insight you'll hardly hear anywhere else on the trends of people returning things to the store they bought it from (or in some cases, DIDN'T buy it from). Horrowing and hilarious true stories of retail horror ensue! Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/GiveUsthe...

It's our SHORTEST EPISODE YET (!!!)... and it's an episode about bowling. That's right - bowling. Professional bowling! Tom interviews professional bowler, Sila about the wild world of rolling heavy balls towards ten pins! Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/GiveUstheLaunchCodes Travis’ IG: @musicalnotextr

The 2025 elections and to our surprise, they actually mattered! Or at least they got everyone's attention! From the West Side to the East Side, Travis & Tom give you the best low-rent coverage of these election results that no money can buy! Forgive us if you listen and ask, "When is Tom gonna be able to pronounce 'Mamdani' correctly?" CORRECTIONS: 7:36 - Actually it was more like 13% for NJ G...

Travis & Tom reminisce on the Halo saga (the ones that Bungie made that is) and how these games were truly treatises on the dangers of mixing organized religion and government. One can ponder as to how Halo really teaches us lessons that can be applied to the world today... or perhaps it's just a fun video game where you get to shoot at aliens a whole bunch. NOTE: We recorded this episode BEFO...

SPOILERS ABOUND IN THIS ONE Travis & Tom talk about two big movies that came out in 2025. Though really Travis just wanted to talk about Superman but Tom forced him to watch A Minecraft Movie . An odd conversation follows. CORRECTIONS: A Minecraft Movie made $957M at time of editing - so SHY of a billion dollars. Technically the “Billion Dollar Movie” for this year (at time of release) was the...

The Blacklist interview series concludes as Tom manages to score an interview with an officer of the law - Officer Thomas. And no, we're not doing a bit where Tom interviews himself as two different characters with similar first names; WE SWEAR! Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/GiveUstheLaunchCodes Travis’ IG: @musicalnotextr Clips Cited “Chris Rock | Police don’t earn enough” YouTube , uploaded...

Our second installment in the Blacklist Interview Series features Tom interviewing a longtime fast-food worker who goes by "Brit". Together, they talk about the highs and lows of working in food service, how COVID changed everything, the changing attitudes of employees, and how fast-food could become a career rather than just the starter job that it's stereotyped to be. CORRECTION: Wendy’s still s...

Tom interviews Jester, a retail employee who talks deeply about the rip-roaring world of retail! All the things you ever wanted to know about the people behind the shopping such as industry trends, stores in times of crises, and the emergence of self-checkout. Also, the web series Tom was referring to was IKEA Heights : https://youtu.be/y0_AVTnVljE?si=kTN1HdclsNVpmyno&t=152 Patreon: https://ww...

Tom and Travis have been sitting a couple of weeks on America's latest elephant in the room - the assassination of a prominent political figure - with hope that by the time they record this episode, they would be calm, controlled and nuanced. The results.... well, you'll be the judge. CORRECTIONS: 38:03: As you might have surmised afterwords, Travis meant to say “MLK” not “JFK”. However, anti-Cath...

Tom & Travis talk about the lack of hope among their peers - younger and older. Is the world getting worse? Can we do anything about it? If not, what can you do instead? Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/GiveUstheLaunchCodes Travis’ IG: @musicalnotextr

This week, Tom and I get a little more local (just a little, we promise) by talking about their state governor and God-help-us future President Gavin Newsom... and his glorious new congressional maps that Travis & Tom have to vote on come November. Watch as they lament being dealt a bad hand but also realizing that crying over a bad hand is a losing strategy. (And on a serious note, we recorde...

This week, Travis comes back from a two week vacation and he & Tom discuss the weeks he was away in a non-heavy, stream of consciousness conversation. Topics range from vapid sports talking heads to Lex Luthor to children's movies to rock band recommendations to Vegas being a soulless city. CORRECTIONS: Stephen A. Smith’s movie scene was actually in Creed III, not II. And the quote referred to...

BLAM! POW! BAM! Travis and Tom manage to stumble into both talking about military shooting things. One's a series of video games about shooting (among other forms of violence) Nazis with mechs. The other is a TV/Film franchise about the US military shooting at ancient aliens who built the pyramids! (Oh and it should be noted that Travis technically didn’t give an answer when asked, “Do you like ki...

Thomas & Travis found an ORIGINAL Hollywood movie that did well at the box office. This inspires them to talk about not just the movie in question, but also about original movies, how they fair at the box office, and what can we do to get more of them again! Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/GiveUstheLaunchCodes Travis’ IG: @musicalnotextr Clips Cited Armageddon , Audio commentary by Ben Affl...

How do you do, fellow zoomers? Travis and Tom bring on returning guest, Travis's wife Denise, to talk about FX's new comedy about young twentysomethings living in New York City (gee, this sounds familiar). Is this the voice of the current generation? Is this the next Friends ? Is it even good??? Or is this just another item in the streaming pile? And coming up - what's wrong with TV today and othe...

Episode Description Lights! Camera! STREAM! This episode, Travis talks to Twitch streamer Matt Prince, who also doubles as a Broadcast Engineer for live television broadcasts and online streams - such as the news, sports, and showcasing really fast aircraft,,, while also playing Nintendo games in front of the world wide web! Travis and Matt get down and dirty with the details like how instant repl...

CW: Explicit references to sexual assault, particularly against children. This week, Travis and Tom go into the uncomfortable implications of Trump PROBABLY BUT ALLEGEDLY being complicit in the same sex crimes Jeffrey Epstein was indicted for and is probably covering up. Being so obvious in said cover-up, Trump - who once drove Travis away from faith in conspiracy theories due to his incompetence...

A very brief break from the doldrums of the modern world to talk about martial arts. Travis interviews his Black Belt brother in-law, James, as they talk about Karate - how it's life changing, how effective he is in self-defense, different types of martial arts, and what Hollywood gets right and wrong. Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/GiveUstheLaunchCodes Travis Instagram: @musicalnotextr

The Big Bill. Everybody's talking about it (if they're not otherwise talking about Epstein)! Travis and Tom talk about how we got to the point where the government is actively trying to f*** over people and how we can crawl out of this. Perhaps a mayoral-hopeful in New York can provide the answer...? Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/GiveUstheLaunchCodes Travis’ IG: @musicalnotextr Clips Cited Go...

It's that time again when Tom and Travis talk about entertainment that neither has seen (or played). This time, Tom talks about a video game that everyone else and their mothers have heard of whether they wanted to or not - the zombie game with the tall sexy vampire lady! And Travis brings up another 90s hidden TV gem - a space opera set on a space station with actors wearing a lot of latex (thoug...