Skip to content

Year End with the Watch Clicker (373)

Published on Sun, 28 Dec 2025 18:30:29 -0800

Synopsis

In this holiday-themed episode, hosts Andrew and Will discuss their favorite watch releases of 2024. They cover a wide range of timepieces including the Longines Ultra-Chron Classic, Hanhart 417 ES 1954 Heritage Flyback, Yema's stratified lineup with Sellita movements, Seiko's innovative Roto Call digital watch, Tudor's Ranger 36 in beige, and the Doxa 750T. Will expresses particular frustration with Tudor's inconsistent sizing strategy across their Black Bay line, especially the new 43mm Black Bay 68. The hosts also praise smaller brands like Kuwame Tokyo for their exceptional quality-to-price ratio and discuss Christian Van der Kloe's extraordinary Grand Planetarium watch. They wrap up with "other things" including Will's retro gaming PC project and Andrew's recommendation of the Korean cooking competition show "Culinary Class Wars."

Transcript

Speaker
Andrew Hello, fellow watch lovers, nerds, enthusiasts, or however you identify. You're listening to 40 and 20, the WatchClicker podcast with your hosts, Andrew, and my best friend, Will. Here we talk about watches, food, drinks, life, and other things we like. Will, how the hell are ya
Will ? We're uh at the time of this recording, we're what three days out from Chr well, technically two days out from Christmas now. Yeah, we're we're closing the gap. We're we're in it. We did our we did our final ride around with the kids around the neighborhood to see Christmas lights. After we went to this dude that lives like 10 minutes from us, you know, has like you know, 150 inflatables in his yard, and you can like walk through it. It's not enough. Yeah. I agree. I I told him he needs more. Um, but we did that, uh, which the the kids love inflatable so you know they were in he
Andrew aven yeah mm-hmm we we end up uh buying about one inflatable a year um because one dies so we we have it's we've got five. ke Weep an an elf and a Santa on the porch and have a tree and a snowman in the yard. And this year we included a T Rex and a
Will Santa hat 'cause that's what they wanted. I like that. We uh we need we need to buy another one next year this year we didn't buy one but we'll have uh one that's on its way out but um it's funny for Halloween I can put all my inflatables in the front yard my wife doesn't mind. But for Christmas they, are relegated to the playground in the back of the house. Can't disrupt the vibe in the front
Andrew . That's not so bad. Years we've done previously. So yeah
Will . Yeah, I put uh I put all the Christmas inflatables, you know, around the swing set and you know, one up in the top of the swing set. So the you know the kids always like it. See what the the inflatables are getting into
Andrew I I wanted to get a Santa sleigh and reindeer to put on top of the trailer, and that was uh that was declined
Will . Uh so this dude that we went to see that with all the inflatables, he had a Santa and a Huey helicopter and I wanted to steal it because that was cool. That'd be I wonder how much that costs on Amazon. Oh look at that's gonna be your other thing. I just bought it. Santa and helicopter inflatable. I'm going with two hundred bucks
Andrew . What do we got? Uh it depends I mean there' there's many varieties, but a hundred and fifty bucks about. Okay. That's not as bad as I thought. That's in the that's in the zone. That's kinda what you expect. We get the cheap ones 'cause they Yeah. We we stick around $30 to $45. Yeah. That's the sweet spot. But we're not here to talk about Christmas inflatables, though we could all night. Yes. And I wouldn't be opposed. I think some people listening might be a little bit opposed. Uh we're doing a special episode because number one, the dud across the street who did not decorate for Christmas, you got a 12 and a half foot tree that's just sitting unenjoyed in his living room. I've thought about bringing it over to my house. Isn't here tonight. Uh you were gonna say uh it was still on top of his car. That'd be better. That'd be better. It's a it's a lovely tree. Uh but it is inside his house. It is it hath been erected and decorated. Uh and they'll be home I don't remember. Uh soonish. So they'll get to enjoy their Christmas tree on Christmas. Uh but we have the special pleasure of being joined by you, Will, to talk about our favorite releases of the year. Yeah. I am honored to be here for this one. I don't think I've ever done a year end roundup. Ooh. So this might be my first. Welcome to the party. Welcome to the party. I have I have beer cracked. You have beer cracked. Get us started. Where where what is your and these are mine are in no uh particular order
Will . No, neither of mine. These I've okay, these are just what I paired down. Yeah, I've got them opened on my browser and I don't remember the order I opened them in. We're just going straight across. Perfect. My first one is the long jeans, the Ultracron classic. Ooh. So I I think that long jeans is making some of the kind of nicest sport watches right now. You know, they got the uh you know the conquests, they've got the um uh this guy and then uh what's the um blanket on the name of the other one I'm thinking of? But anyway. Um The Spirit. Yes. Thank you. There it is. Um this I I feel like this kinda brings in, you know, it's uh I know it's a a reissue of something. Um, you know, the Ultracron most likely. But uh yeah. But I like seeing reissues like this because they bring in some of that old branding. You kind of feel like, you know, your grandfather wore it. You know, something like that. You know, it it hits all the r the right buttons for nostalgia, I think. Oh, absolutely. This is this is
Andrew f it kind of like teetered on and off my list 'cause this is like a a really great reimagining of vintage design. And it's just that it's reimagining. It's not pulling something forward from the 70s. It's really good case sizes, 37 and 40 millimeter case sizes on it. Good dial color. Uh the bracelet looks phenomenal. And longine's one of those bra I think I I think I might be sleeping on long jean
Will . So I had the um the spirits the one with the five stars on the dial, right? Five star review. Yeah. Uh yeah, didn't they they did away with that or did they just bring it back? They just brought it back. Um so I had the GMT in to check out for a little bit, and it was the 38 millimeter version. So the thing that's always kept me off a long jeans is they'll they'll do a you know a forty millimeter case and they'll make the lugs fifty two millimeters. You know, it it looks ridiculous. Um They I think they fix that with the spirit, especially in the smaller case sizes. The three-hander I think they have in a 37 millimeter, it's probably the same case as this or very close to it. Um but I mean it it I it look maybe it looks a little thinner actually. But it is a just bangin' looking watch. I just wish it wasn't four grand, but I don't know what gray market's like for for long jeans
Andrew . Is this four grand? So the the the spirit at thirty seven that I'm looking at is oh okay. So the conquest. So I'm looking at the Longing Spirit uh in thirty seven. It's only twenty-five. Uh and it looks similar but their the lugs are slightly different. Yes. Yeah they are. But by and large a pretty similar case
Will . I don't know who came out with it first. I don't know if this case is really Yeah, I don't know if this case is um you know uh uh on par with what they had originally or if it's kind of a reimagining. This is saying that a
Andrew 1968 image that they or not image, but catalog release that they reissued. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Okay. It's a I love that dial
Will . Oh, it's cool. Good crown size on it. A good silver dial can really hit very well. I had that um I got it at wind up a couple of years ago, the Bolova Complecto of the Jet Star that they had. Kind of a it was a f I wanna say it was a forty millimeter case. Um you know, very angular, lots of polish. I think the whole thing was polished and had a silver dial and it just worked. I really liked it. I like
Andrew it. What do you got? I'm gonna get me. I'm gonna start with uh Han Hart, the 417 ES 1954 Heritage Flyback. And this, like, Hanhart is never been a brand that like got me excited. And this chronograph came out and everything hit for me. The red marker at the 12 o'clock on the crown, the red pusher, the coin edge on the bezel, using a like a proper Salita movement. Uh man, this was when when it got really and it and the case size is perfect. It's a 39mm case, 13.3 with the crystal, only 11.5 without the crystal, and a 46 lug-to-lug. Like this is just a compact felt proper chronograph coming in at uh my computer says three dollars and nine hundred and forty two cents. Yes the one the one I'm looking at is $4.
Will 24. So we're yeah, we're this is cheap. I'm buying one right now.
Andrew Yeah. Well it's out of mine says out of stock. It's probably because they got such a good price on it. Uh I don't like the uh the the riveted straps that they have on it. Um that's forgivable. You can get it on a bracelet. You can put I I think I would put this on just a leather strap. Uh yeah. Just take the bund off the the thing and I think you're good. The brown leather is fi the the light brown leather is fire on this with the splashes of red because there's otherwise no color. Like really good polish, black and white, bicompacts, red marker at the twelve, red pusher, fi
Will re. So I I do think that Hanhart is a brand that I've slept on, and it's funny because I've looked at their catalog before. Um most of the time when I was looking at Zins on Watch Buy's website, they also sold Han Hart and I'd be let me see what Hanhart has. Um and it's you know they're yeah, right, exactly. The you know they,'re kind of known for the the Coin Edge bezel thing. I think it was a big deal when they came it was this year they came out with that smooth bezel version of something. Um I know everybody was kind of like, ooh, you know, smooth bezel. Um, but it's interesting, they have other chronographs that have dive bezels. Mm-hmm. And they they have 39 millimeters. Yeah. These are kind of freaking cool
Andrew . I didn't know that they made any of this
Will . They they've got some
Andrew uh some kind of sleepers. And I and I think I I don't know why, but Hanhart never comes top of mind when I start thinking about watches in this in this price range. And I think it's because they're competing against a lot, right? In at this watch in particular, this is competing against the entire Zen chronograph catalog. You're starting to at this price you're starting to fight with used market omega you're starting to fight with expensive watches and if you're you know you can get into locko for significantly less you can get into uh
Will a lot. A lot of watches for significantly less. Now wait a second. On their website, the four thousand dollar price tag on the watch that I'm on right now says it includes that. Uh now if we were to take that off, that would be quite a bit, right? Uh it's coming from where? Mm German? I don't remember where they're based. I think. Yeah, they're German. Yep. Yeah, they're German. Uh I I don't know. I'm gonna I'm gonna save this for tomorrow. I'll look at it tomorrow. Yeah, I I think and what's interesting about the price point is I think maybe five years ago, you know, a $3500, $4,000 chronograph, you know, from a brand like this, you'd probably like, oh yeah, it's good, but that seems kind of expensive. But I don't know, now stuff's expensive and thirty-five, four thousand for a pretty good chronograph and a great size from a brand that's been around for a while. Not too shab
Andrew by. It's yeah, there's certainly a case we made. It's the Salita AMT 5100 movement. I don't know where else that's being used. 58 hours of power reserve in it. Um I it's just like everyt
Will hing about this watch works for me. The only thing that I don't understand. So if you if you go if you're on their website and you drop down the thing for watches it's pioneer aquasphere primus special editions and four seventeen ES What the hell how do we go from all that to just some numbers and letter
Andrew s? Yeah. And well, and you know, they've got the two they they did the two drops. They've got the seventeen and fifteen that they kind of have slammed together and that and it doesn't you know, every skew is uh the different sizes because they come in uh a 42 millimeter also the 42 doesn't have the red pusher uh it's the the red pusher 39 was that that
Will do you want to know what these kind of remind me of if Nevada Grenchans didn't suck and I don't I don't mean that they suck I feel like there's always something about their watches that I really don't like. It's one thing, you know, that I'm just like, ah, if you change that I'd be fine. Uh very citizen, very boulevard, yeah. I feel like these are what would be if they changed those things that I was talking about. So I'm looking at the four fifteen ES Pure thirty nine millimeter. It's a black dial with the um that's not the tachometer, that's the the h the thing that's hundredth of a second or whatever it is. Um Okay. Yeah. It that's red. And I totally dig this. If I didn't have a speed master, I'd probably jump on this, to be honest. It's pretty cool for a black dial chronograph
Andrew . And it's it if you're not into a speed master, if you want something a little bit more compact, uh, because that's been my hang up with a speed master, is the lug to lug is just a little, it's just a touch long. Uh and I know that I've gained a little bit of weight on accident and put on a speed master, I'm like, oh this works, but I won't always have a little bit of a chub wrist going on. So
Will these are 39, 13.5 and 46. I think you said that before. That is pretty that's pretty great.
Andrew Yeah. Yeah, great, great size options for them. Um, so yeah, this is one of my one of my favorites of the year. This got me really excited about Handhart. All right, I think I've got what might be
Will the longest name that we're gonna talk about. So get your get your type yeah, g yeah. Get your typing fingers ready. Uh this is the I'm gonna say what I think it is as I'm saying it, and everybody else can correct me later. It is the Christian Van der Klove Grand Planetarium Ecentric Meteorite Watch. This is easily one of the coolest looking watches I have ever seen. And if I was a twelve year old as interested in space as I was at twelve years old, this would be the watch that I would want. Oh yeah, this is dope. So for our listeners, it's uh it's got an adventuring dial with concentric rings that are um but they're not concentric. Yeah, they're not all ellipsed. Yes, which is how the orbit would be for our solar system, which is what it has on the dial, including the asteroid bill. Yeah. How did I never see this? It the only pr there's there's two major problems with this. It's got actually fifty-five millimeters. Uh no, it's forty four, okay? Which I think for this watch makes sense. There's a lot of things to fit in, right? And it's all dial. The whole thing is dial. But here's the bigger problem. It starts at 2008,000 euros. That's it? It's a model of uh Okay, so if you get the but if you get the platinum, that's 700,000. That's a steal. Although on my computer it does say 700.000, so maybe it's seven hundred dollars
Andrew . Uh I I would I would try and try and make a purchase, just send them $700 check. Yeah, just uh like eBay make an offer. Uh so these planets all orbit the sun at the appropriate rate. Yes.
Will On this dial. So if you had this watch for you know, what how long does Uranus take to orbit around the sun, you know, 100 years or whatever?
Andrew Only 84 years. Uh Neptune takes 164 years, and presumably, if you keep this watch serviced and winding and running to 164 years, Neptune will will orbit will finally make an orbit of your watch dial. That would be like the equivalent of rolling over an o uh uh an odometer in your Honda Civic.
Will Yeah. Yeah. So all right. If I had this watch, here's what I would do with it. I would mark the exact date and time that I bought it and put that in a safe somewhere. And then I would ensure that this watch is handed down through generations of my family. And when the last planet makes the full orbit, they have to know that they need to look and be like, that's when great granddad got this watch. 164 years ago. No one's worn it
Andrew because it's been in a safe. That's what
Will I feel like some succession shit would be. This is this is cool. It it's it's probably the coolest looking watch I think I've ever laid eyes on because I l I love space and I'm fascinated by it and I mean even the case, it's like that Damascus style kind of case. It's it's just freaking wild. And that case back, holy cra
Andrew p. It also all glass. Uh the rotor on that looks like the like the kind of a model of the sun, but just half of it. The artwork on the planets is unreal. Everything is amazing
Will . Yeah. Good pick. Dude, I love it. All right. A
Andrew stronomical watches? I wonder what well now you've created a problem.
Will Yeah, maybe there's more. Maybe there's something we can actually buy.
Andrew Probably not. Probably not. Mine's a bit this one's a bit of a cheat. Uh this was one of my favorite things that a brand did this year. Yemma stratified their releases so they could continue focusing on their in-house movement, but also brought back four models with Salita movements. And I think that is absolutely brilliant. I love like Yemma this year has been able to do no wrong, stratifying to say, look, you maybe don't want, you don't maybe don't care about our in-house movement. And that's fine. We can still hook you up. Like you can still get into Yemma at an affordable price. Uh and I
Will love it. Al,rig soht which one is this? Hold on. I missed the which one it is. It's not a specific model. They dropped us. Yeah. Um they have four of the Crite, I'm looking it up. Oh, I see it here. The die they dropped the diver, the next di
Andrew alogue. And the urban traveler. Yeah. Kind of the suite of of relatively sport watches, right? Like if you mat us imagine the sector lineup from notice, that's what they released with Salita movements. So they could continue to provide a reasonably priced quality watch that doesn't really focus on their movement making, which is where Yem is putting a bucket load of money right
Will now. Yeah, they've done some very cool stuff um you know with with movements. Um I got a couple thoughts here. First is I really like the monin case on the diver. I wish it didn't have the aged loom on it. Yeah. It's it's yeah. Sometimes I I'm like, okay, it's not too bad. Like Seiko does it with some of their um like the one chronograph I the solar chronograph I have from them. It it's it just looks like dirty white rather than like orange, you know? Mm-hmm. And I feel like if that was the case here, you'd be like, oh yeah, that kind of hits like, oh, this watch has been around for you know twenty, thirty years, but like the just full on orange loom just really drives me nuts. Um Um the uh the other thing is the only thing I don't like about them is and I've I've seen a bunch of their watches in person, several, um, and had some time with them, their quality control is just not quite there. It is not. Yeah, and it it kills me because I do like some of their watches and I would consider buying one, but it's like do you want to play the lottery on it? You know, for what they cost. They're not they're not, you know, fifty hundred dollar watches. I mean these are round a thousand, I think, for the the different families. The S
Andrew lita movements come in under a thousand and, then when you get into the their CMM movements, you're getting north of closer to two thousand
Will . Yeah. Mm-hmm. But I do like them. I like that they're like, hey, we want to do some cool stuff with our movement uh movements and at the same time we don't want to take away releasing new things, so we're gonna have to throw some Salita movements in some stuff that we've made. And it I I I think that's a great way to look at it. It's a great strategy to keep your sales, you know, going while you're spending a lot of money in R and D. So Yeah. More po and good size cases too that diver is 39.5 by 11 basically that's great for a solita 200 mm yeah their case size and shape is flawless. I the once again, that diver would be on my list if it wasn't for the loom color. Because I I love I'm like Everett. I love Monin cases, they look really good. Uh yeah, I I share the loom color
Andrew . Just give me a give me a blue or a black dial with black. Yeah. Or or excuse me with white. Yeah, yeah. Yep. A black dial with white. Like just it doesn't have to be photinid. You don't have to do that. I'll do
Will it. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I'll I'll sit it out in the sun for a year straight if I want it aged like that. But let me do it. Ye
Andrew ah. I saw one earlier this year that was a good execution, but it wasn't meant to be Fotina. It was like a very deliberately tanned colored loom to complement the dial, and I can't think of
Will it. Yeah, see I don't I don't mind so much when it's a design choice like hey this works with the colors that we're going with or something because I feel like that's more of the choice, but when you're putting out a black and a white dial, you're like we want this to look used. It's like No you don't just run it through uh old watches that we see now did not have that color loom when they were bought new. Mm m
Andrew m. They did not. And they also if once it had that color loom, it was banged up and I don't need you to send it through a tumblr to like scuff it up. I just don't need that. Like I'll do the work. Trust me. I'
Will m I will do the work. Oh yeah. My uh I'm not wearing it right now. I took it off before. But my uh my explorer, I've had that ten months. And I mean it kind of looks like it's been through the meat grinder a little bit. I was looking at the bracelet and you know the the top half on the twelve o'clock side. Oh man, it just it's beat because you know, I sit at a desk all day and I'm you know, slamming my hands on the desk because everybody's stupid. Um agreed. Yeah. But you know, it's all scratched up. So I I don't know. Should I reverse it and get equal uh on both sides? R
Andrew reverse your your there's something to that. Just swap the links so that you can still continue to buckle and unbuckle your watch appropriately. Yeah, there we go.
Will That'd be a pain in the ass, but you know, worth it. All right. My uh my computer's yelling at me that it needs to restart, but that's fine. I'm going to queue up our next one here that we're going to talk about while it does what it's going to do. It's the Seiko Roto Call, which is these uh Oh yes. These really funky um digital watches that Seiko came out with, um which I think is uh uh another reissue from them. Um Yeah, I don't know anything about the original. Never seen 'em before. I've never even seen them like pop up on you know for sales, uh, you know, like subreddit and all that kind of stuff. Um but these are really cool. So for people who aren't familiar with them. Um in the middle, you kind of have a basic digital um display. You have your time at the bottom, uh hours, minutes, seconds, and then it on the it's split and it's got on the top, uh in their press images, they show the date. Now what you do is it has what looks like a dive bezel in an uh what is this, an hexagon? Octagon? Hexagon. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Eight seconds. So octagon. Yep. So um it's got an octagon shape. So kind of looks like when I first saw it, I was like, ooh, it's like a Seiko digital aqua racer. Like that was the first thing that came to mind. Little bit of that feel. Um but each side of the eight sides has a different uh piece of text on it. So there's time, time set, timer, counter, stopwatch, dual time, daily alarm and single alarm. Um and what's cool about it is it rotates like a dive bezel. Um so it'll rotate eight times to go a full rotation. Um and as you go to each thing, it activates that function. So instead of using like the button on your G Shock to go to the chronograph or you know, the stopwatch I mean And and God help you if you go past it. Yeah, then you gotta start all over. You know, everybody's like, hey, start the damn watch, dude. We're waiting. It's it's social awkwardness and you know, incarnate. It's awful. Uh but anyway, it's not good. Um, you rotate the bezel around to the 12 o'clock position for the function that you want, and it it's got two pushers on the bottom, so at four and eight o'clock. Um and it I've seen videos of it, how it looks really crisp, you know, the rotation and you know the buttons work fine because it's digital. Um this is definitely on my list of things that I definitely want to buy, and I would get the one with the black and red bezel because it's New Jersey Devil's colors. It also is the best colorway. I do like the
Andrew I do like the blue one a little bit. Uh I think if they'd have swapped the blue and gray, I I would have liked it more. I think it's not a big I don't dig that.
Will Oh, and the other cool thing about these is they come on that Jubilee bracelet. It's uh it's a a bracelet watch, so it's not a um you know a resin or a rubber strap, you know, kinda like you might be thinking of for you know like a G Shock. Yeah, and five hundred fifty bucks. That
Andrew 's retail. And these will be available in April, yeah. So you'll get them for much less in April when they come out. Uh is it April of next year? Yeah, it says April 2026 release
Will . Oh, okay. I thought I thought they were already out. This has been two months, I think, since so if you go on Joma Shop and look up the SMGG one nine, they have it for three seventy-four and it says add to bag ships in one to two weeks.
Andrew I I I believe you. I wonder if that maybe they uh I don't know. That doesn't make sense.
Will Yeah, interesting. Maybe they it was a typo. There's mastersintime.com that has it for seven hundred dollars, which makes no damn sense. I mean Seiko's not known for their
Andrew their like quality control. That might have just been a fat finger of a five to the six. Because this has been out for months. We talked about this a long time ago
Will . Yeah, they announced it a while ago. Um I remember when I when I saw it again when I was going through, I was like, oh yeah, I forgot about that. I really like size is good. Now now I'm on Joma Shop thinking add to cart, add to cart, didn't buy myself a Christmas present yet
Andrew . And you have to. Ten six thick, thirty-seven diameter, forty-three and a half lug-to-lug. A hundred meters of water resistance. It's kinda like all the things like this is kinda the the revival of the court's crisis sp dig
Will ital watch. Yeah. Yeah. And I what I think I like about I think why it's hitting for me is that it's kinda like the Seiko Arnie in a way where it combines the digital with the mechanical stuff. Um you know, you get that tactile rotate the bezel thing around. I mean I could probably sit there and rotate that bezel around because I bet you it's got a nice little click on each of those. Oh yeah, like a long
Andrew a long click and a stop. I think I the the real the cherry on top would it would be if they put switches in these pushers so you got a mechanical feedback when you actuated them. Dude, that's a good idea. I'd I'd pay extra for that. I
Will like that. Maybe someone can mod it to make it happen
Andrew . I'm sure they can. It's a Seiko. They got all the stuff out there. Yeah, dude. Uh next up for me. I we knew we were gonna talk about this. The Tudor Ranger 36 in Dune or Beige, whatever they're gonna talk about. This has been the Ranger that I have been waiting for since I first met the Ranger. The the iterations that got discontinued were a little bit too big, they weren't the right size. This is this is what the ranger is supposed to be
Will . And it's perfect color for it. Love it. I have not tried on the 39 the the new size it's 39 right I think um I I had tried on the the original well not the original original but the the version right before that, the one that is more compared to one. Yeah, and everybody was like, Oh, you know, we're amazing for 41. I remember I put that thing on and I was like, This looks like a 42mm watch. Y'all are crazy. Um, you know, the size was in there, and I think I did a review on it when I had it. Um, and I'm sure I said something about you know, people go crazy if they release the smaller size, you know, which they eventually did, that 39 millimeter version. Um, and of course I think the 36 just I mean it hits hard, right? Because 36 millimeter watches, I think in the last few years are making a little bit of a comeback. You know, I I I'm sure You know, Rolex bringing back the 36mm explorer had something to do with that, and when it wasn't available, um, you know, there were plenty of brands making 36 millimeter you know sport and tool watches like Trasca, for example. Um, so I I think it's just kind of like the natural evolution of it's like, hey, let's scale down our watch, see how it sells, and if it does great we'll scale it down again. Um it's something uh that also had go ahe
Andrew ad go ahead they they had the the success of the BB36 and the explorer 36 and all these other 36 millimeter watches in this space that were just on fire and they had nothing in in this category. Because this is so different than the BB thirty six that was perfect. Yep. But it not exactly what I wanted until this came out. And like there's the one. That's the six millimeter watch that I
Will want. Well, because remember when they came out with the new uh BB36s, I bought one. Uh the blue dial, I think I had. Um and I was like, man, I really love what they did with the case, but it was just not right. Like the the markers were a little too big, the proportions were wrong. Um you know and I I I think that excuse me. Um I think that with the tutor you get that nice kind of adjacency to the explorer thirty six. Um, you know, where people be like, hey you know, I can't get one or maybe I can't afford one, whatever it is, but this I can, and it scratches that itch in a I think a really good way. I think sometimes homages to watches that you want don't scratch the itch for very long. But I do think that sometimes, especially with a you know a sister brand, sometimes it'll scratch that itch for good and you'll be like, Yep, I'm good. I'm fine. I love this watch.
Andrew Well, especially doing a colorway that you're otherwise not gonna get. Yeah. There there isn't as this sand explorer. Yes. And this sand color
Will is terrific. It's a little bit more than a little bit of a couple of things. Is this what you were talking about with the the loom color before when we were talking about the Yimas? Yemas. Um Because I think this is a design choice that looks good. Ye
Andrew ah. This might have been it. No, because it's just on the hands. I I it'll come to me. I'll send you a link when it when I finally remember. This is this is killer color. The the new ranger sizing is terrific. Uh I did pull up your article where you critiqued both the forty-one and the thirty-nine rangers, like just make them smaller in twenty twenty-two
Will . I don't even I don't I don't remember talking about the thirty-nine. I talked about that. That's what you were reviewing. Man, I'm getting old. Not remembering the stuff that I reviewed. Geez. I mean that was almost four years ago
Andrew . But in your twenty twenty two, you talked about the forty one and the thirty nine. Oh yeah, I think it's a good thing. Built on your. body of work I
Will think this was I did Oh is it not you writing it? No, it was me writing it, but I didn't have the watch in hand. This was just the first look, that's why. Oh. But I yeah, I I see where I talked about the uh I had the the screenshot from Instagram with a bunch of people saying bring it back at thirty-nine. If this was thirty-six to thirty eight they would have to hit if they brought it back under forty the money would fly out the wallet so fast. I should follow up with these people and find out if they bought one. Yeah we'll see. I mean this is
Andrew this is old you know a month old uh to comparator. I don't think that's a real word. Add it to comparator? Maybe it's your
Will website. It says that must be the compare watches. The the Swiss wait is what does Swiss speak? Belgian? Swedish? Man, I sound really stupid right now. Whatever
Andrew . Yeah, this is the I when this came out I knew this was going to sit on my top ten.
Will German is the most common. Yeah. Okay. Good to do that. Followed by French. So it's close. I wasn't close. I wasn't close. Oh now I've got a winter break activity. I'm gonna I'm gonna contact these people and see if they bought one because this was back on August thirty first, two thousand and twenty one that I asked uh or those people made these comments and I know who a couple of 'em are, so we'll see. All right, yeah, moving on to the next one. They don't have one. I am curious if this was one of the ones that we thought we might overlap on. The uh Laurier Roosevelt
Andrew . Uh that was on my list and um it didn't get removed from it. It just didn't make the final cut. Even though like I was kind of going back and forth, but I was paring down full well expecting that we would go way too long ton
Will ight. Yeah. And that's fine. So for for our uh for our our listeners at home that may not have seen this. Um, this is Laurier's second collaboration with Grand Central Watch, who does uh uh watch servicing and some other stuff. Um I don't know too much about them. But it was a limited. I think they do all their assembly and stuff too. Yeah, yeah. They they they have a good relationship with Laurier, obviously, if they're doing a couple collabs with them. It was an LE, uh, 250 pieces. Um, I got to try one on at Windup. I tried one on two. It was magic. Yeah, it was a very, very good case. It is uh let me get the dimensions 36. Um they say it's a similar fit to around thirty eight because of the cushion case, which I think that's pretty accurate, but I think it wears well for thirty six. Um eight point five millimeters thick plus two millimeters for the crystal so 10.5 overall 42 millimeters lug to lug and 20 millimeter lug width so I mean it's just uh this is what Laurier does really well. They can take a design and make it feel very old without doing all of the faux Tina bullshit that so many other brands do. They did it with the um the Zephyr. I I think they kind of do it with our catalogue in general, but the Zephyr is the one that sticks out to me. Um and then this. I mean I do an all-bronze case. Yes. And I do not wear bronze or gold watches. Um but when I tried this on, I was like, I could I could totally wear this. I think it that it just totally works. I don't know what it is, if it's the champagne y kind of dial where it's just they're like, hey, let's lean into it. Um, but it it''ss beautiful, beautiful watch, especially for uh I think it
Andrew was eight, yeah, eight hundred dollars. Yeah, the font's fantastic and the fit was terrific. Uh all all bronze case, they did it, they uh did a stainless steel coated case back uh just for a little bit of extra like just reduce your wear on it a little bit. U
Will h like that. Don't put a stainless steel case back on it for like allergens and st
Andrew uff. Yeah. This this was an absolutely terrific release, and I'm I'm glad it uh I'm glad it made the list because it it was certainly one of my favorites of the year
Will . One thing I think is um I don't know the right word for it, interesting, I guess, is they're using a Miyota movement with a four hertz uh four hertz beat rate, which I think is interesting because a lot of the time what you'll see is these brands want to get that kind of like vintage look as it's ticking for these vintage inspired watches, and they'll put the uh the 805S, whatever it is, in there that has the 216 VPH. And I like that they went you know at the higher beat rate. I think it it's a modern watch made to look old, not an old watch made to look new.
Andrew Yeah, it's a modern vintage inspired watch. And uh I saw some of the pictures of their inspiration behind it and was was like, oh yeah, obviously.
Will This is yeah, this is perfect. I I love how they do that, that they they fully disclose like, hey, this is exactly what we were going for. Um the first time I actually paid attention to that was with the Astra, where they talked about um it was uh Rolex date just I think a long jeans and something else. I forget what the other one was, but you know, they said, hey, this is how we came to the design for this watch. We love these old watches and we thought they look cool, so we wanted to make our own version as if we were making it, you know, f eighty years ago. And they nail it. Absolutely nail it. Hit me with your
Andrew next one. Kuwame Tokyo. This is where I was pretty sure we would have overlap. The kawame Tokyo Iwo is the brand's second uh r release to market. Comes in a two dial variations. Black and silver. And Everett and I talked about this watch last week or the week before. And we talked about Aquame Tokyo this year already, because this is two releases in a year, and this thing is absolutely phenomenal. When you look at the finishing on this, the design inspiration, you expect to get to the bottom of the article and see a seven to ten thousand dollar watch and you see a six hundred and ninety dollar watch. Okay, so hold on. I need the the name of it again. K-I-W-A-M-E in Tokyo. Like the place. Uh-huh. I-W-A-O. I got it. This is the one that that Mike was texting about
Will that he Oh yes, yes, yes. It came in white and black, right? Yep. Okay. I got it now. I was I was thinking of uh what is it? Yes. Yes. Oh yeah. This this thing is banging. When Mike was talking about it, I was like, just just let me let me have it. I'll just take I'll take it off your hands. Don't worry about it. Yeah
Andrew . Don't worry. No one will notice. Uh absolutely love this watch. I I love the the trajectory that this brand is on. Uh keeping things really affordable, doing high, highly intelligent design, really deliberate design, what appears to be from photography, really good manufacturing processes. Uh like I I'd sort of want something bad to come out and find out that these are being made by like orphaned children so that there's something I can finally not like about this watch.
Will It's it's uh man. And it comes out you can get it if you want it because it the pre-order launches on December twenty-fifth on Christmas. Mm-hmm. Japan wait, it's Japan standard time at ten thirty AM. So that's probably the twenty fourth it up somet
Andrew hing. Yeah, we looked it up when we when we were talked about it last. And and these sold out in instantly. Uh no, not these, but the last release sold out immediately. Because they're making it in the middle of the year. December twenty fourt
Will h at 8 30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. I say like 250 of each. I have to pretty small amount. I wonder how hard these are to get when the pre-order opens. If it's you know it it's like the bots snatch 'em up or if I'm just quick with entering my information, could I get one? That's the stuff I always wonder with this. Especially 'cause their website it's it's it's clean, it's minimal, but it's not giving me the confidence that you guys have some bot protection in place for people snatching up your watches.
Andrew Yeah. Smith's is like that. I've I've logged on to Smith's like I hit refresh three seconds before the drop. So my browser was fresh at the drop, had my information like it was already in the cart, plugged my information in it's already. Oh, I remember when this happened to you. Yep. Uh more than once. And I'm like, okay, well I'm never gonna get Neverest because I'm not gonna pay secondary market prices for that watch. As much as I want one and as much as I like it, I'm not gonna buy brand new inbox at 2X MSRP
Will . I would uh I totally agree. And I think if I was gonna buy one, I'd buy this uh the silver gray they call it. It's this ganaki. I'm probably not gna kai. I'm probably not saying it right. Um ginkai maybe? Ginkkai, that sounds better. I um I just went totally Japanese dyslexic on that. Um but this is this is uh I really like it's got the blue hand for the second sand. It's got the kind of sector dial feel a little bit without the crosshair. Um it w you know what it reminds me of? It reminds me very much of the uh uh JLC Master Control, the three-hand version. Yeah
Andrew , it's got that great uh scroll logo with very simple font. There's there's nothing overdone about this watch. Everything is just done
Will and apparently flawlessly. And this case looks like it these are these are obvious if these are actual photos, I will probably eat my own shoe. Um but the detail photos that they have, I'm pretty sure they're renders, but if the polishing and the brushing is in all the places that they're showing here, this case is beautiful. These have to be renderings. Yeah, they have it. There's there's Stamp on the clasp. Yeah. Just a little bit too perfect. But that's okay. I I approve. Allright. What you got next? Um I debated on putting this watch on my list because I feel like it's fairly obvious, and there's probably some people that as soon as I say it they',re gonna roll their eyes and go, oh. But the Omega Seamaster Planet Ocean. They revamped the Planet Ocean this year. Finally. Um and as soon as I saw it, I said they fixed it. They did. I I l always loved a planet ocean dial. Um I thought it was the perfect way to execute a modern dive watch um and have it look modern. You know, it doesn't look like it's going to like let's go back into the past and see what we can dig up out of our shit archive. You know, they were like, no, we're making a new watch. Um and I feel like this is what they were going for when they made the planet ocean, but they screwed up the case because they went for the the liar lugs that kind of look like old Seamasters and um you know all that. This they went angular with still that nice kind of like almost teardrop shape on either side of the case in the northern and southern hemisphere there. Mm-hmm. It's got a big crown and it still has that same dial, that very it's it's a little bit different, but it's very contemporary looking. Um still the twelve six three nine, which I always like. My favorite version, everybody can probably guess, the black dial with the blue bezel. Mm-hm
Andrew m. I saw that coming. I want this watch. I want it. Black on black is what I prefer, but I I like that this is a like this is clearly a a little bit of a dated modern design, right? This this dial is now a part of the fabric of omega design and it's not new, it's not particularly modern, but it still has that feel to it. This is what people mean when they say neo vintage. Yeah, perhaps. They're actually talking about this. The the angles on the on the case are just terrific. Like you can feel history informing this design without being uh an homage or a throwback
Will . So, you know what's interesting is I just scrolled down a little bit, and if you're on a uh computer, I don't know how it looks on mobile, but the once you get past the main product page, it's the third image, so second one on the left. Um it kind of reminds me the case a little bit Aqua racer. It's got that it's got that we were talking about it before with the the Seiko I was talking about. Um it's got that kind of look to it, but they didn't do anything with the bezel, it's a circular bezel. Um flat and but they you know you y Omega does polishing really nice. I remember the day I got my Speedmaster, I looked at it and I was like, oh my god, this thing looks like liquid metal. You know, it looks really nice in person. Um, and I'm sure the polishing on this, it's got polished center links, which I don't know how I feel, but it's okay. I can I can live with it. Um Angular bracelet. It's got champers on the top and bottom sides of the bracelet as opposed to the sides. Uh with the polished center links then brushed outside. It's thinner. They got rid of the helium escape valve, which I like. Um I'm okay. I think for the planet ocean, you can skip that. Yes, because it the seamaster, I get it. They put it on for whatever reason, and now they're like, we need to lean into that. I get it. But the Petlan Ocean doesn't need it. The Planet Ocean is its own thing. Take it out. It needs to be its own jam. You don't need three watches in your catalogue with helium release valves. Especially when there's so many brands either getting rid of them or doing like the Pelagos where it's just got the little thing, whatever that is. Um Just the a valve that doesn't require Screwing it on screen, yes. Uh but oh man, I wish I didn't scroll down on this because right after that picture that I was just talking about, they have uh I think that's Aaron Taylor Johnson um modeling this watch. And he just looks so aggressively sad that I can't take him seriously wearing this watch. Oh, I don't where are we? I don't see that one yet. It's like a little video like a five second clip and then there's a posed picture of him with his uh the watch you know obviously hanging out of his sleeve. And the guy's got a great great wrist for this watch. I mean it does look very good, but he is so aggressively sad that it makes me sad. It does, but that's how aloof you can be when you wear the planet Ocean
Andrew . Yes. You're like a nihilist almost. I don't he doesn't care about anything. Yeah. Except watches. Uh you know it's funny, so I was looking at the black on black and scrolled down and that product of image was not there. I had to go to the black dial blue bezel to get the uh the melancholy model Modeling. Yeah. There must must be something about that colorway. Uh let's let's talk about another big bitch dive watch. Uh the Doxa 750T. We don't have to talk about that much. Uh on a spec sheet, this is arguably the best Doxa case. Uh there's some things that I that weren't really for me about it. The thickness on it was terrific. I did get to put this on at Windup. It wore every bit of 45, but it didn't feel oversized. And it's a 750 meter dive watch, 45mm case. It's a big old bitch, but it was thinner than than the docks that I was wearing. The 300T. Yeah. Like Docs have found a way to make their best case ever and hopefully can distribute that into the rest of their family. Because I I love the 300T. I like the thickness of it, the case size, the case shape. It's terrific. This is ob
Will jectively a better case. Um I really I I had my doubts about Doxa. They had some issues, you know, with the when the new ownership came in, um, you know, and kind of relaunched some of their catalog, and then they did the the faux Pav releasing a limited edition that later became a regular release with one of the I think it was the carbon or something. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Um but between the one you just talked about and the 250T GMT, I think they're I think they're kinda nailing it. I I really like what they're doing. They've recognized that some people don't want the larger doxa cases even though they do wear well. Um because I tried your terrific. I I tried yours on in New York, right? Wasn't that what we what we yeah, okay. Um and I really liked it. But as I was wearing it, I was like, I'd probably be good if it was a little bit smaller too and I think that is where that two fifty T comes in. I kind of wish they would do that same thing. Um but because they have the is it the two hund
Andrew red there's a smaller the 200 is their round case and then when they get the 200 T you go into the Tono. So they're 200. And and Everett stopped dead in his tracks when I told him he would like this watch if it was not Doxa logoed. And and he he was like a smacked him in the face with a with a board. 'Cause everything about this was good. The size is good, the movement is good everything about this watch is good but it doesn't feel Doxa uh the T versions do but the the 200 line is a roundwatch
Will . Yes. Yeah. And those are the ones they came out with a few years ago that are I think a little bit more I I guess it's like entry-level Doxa, but I feel like you don't all right. So I'm gonna go on a small rant. Because I think that there's a lot, especially in the watch world, there's stuff about entry level and you know what does that mean? Like entry level luxury and blah blah blah. Um I think the word entry level is thrown out a little too loosely because I do feel that docs of markets the 200 as an entry-level watch to their lineup. But it it misses on things. You know, the loom isn't good. The the quality controls, I don't think they're kind of like they do in the 300 and 200 T series. Um you know, I I've heard a lot of things that the bracelet feels very generic compared to the other watches in their catalog. You know, it's just like, hey, we just got this, you know, twenty dollar beads of rice off uh AliExpress and slapped it on the watch. And I don't feel that entry level should be a way to like cut all the corners. It should be a I want to say less cosmetic way of introducing your watch Or take some of the bells and whistles. Don't make it cosk. Don't you know? Yeah. Yeah. The things that cost extra money that are very arbitrary. Let's let's maybe dial back some of those. You know, I'm sure there's a cheaper movement they could put in it. And the reason I say that is because I think most people that are getting into watches, especially initially, entry level people. The'yre um you know, they're kind of looking at like, hey, I like the way this watch looks and then might be disappointed in it when they learn some of the other things, you know, about quote unquote what makes a good watch, right? And I don't think a brand should skimp out on those things that are I think on a a little bit more surface level, so the way it looks, the loom that you use, um, you know, maybe some of the finishing to a certain extent. I think that there's other ways to dial back the price of a watch than to do less with its appearance and comfort. That's my rant.
Andrew That's a that's a reasonable rant. We got time for a couple more. What do you got next? One second. I'm gonna grab a drink
Unknown . Just want to make sure we have a pause in there
Will . I got uh I'm gonna do I got one more. That's gonna be my last one. Alrighty
Andrew . Hope you know when you're good. I will let me just time stamp in I'm gonna give whenever I stop talking plus three seconds for a timestamp
Will . Okay, so my last one, I wanted to do something a little bit different. We talked about watches we really like. I'm gonna talk about a watch that I really don't like. And I don't know that anybody's gonna be able to guess this one, uh unless they know me extremely well. And I don't even know if my wife could get this one. But the Tudor Black Bay 68. God damn it, I hate this watch with the passion of a thousand burning sons. It is everything that is wrong with stupid ass tutor. I swear that they have been put on this earth to rage bait people. Yes. In what in what other world is it that they release a blue dial, black bezel, no age loom shit. Awesome looking black bay and it's 43 freaking millimeters. Just to fuck with you. It is. It's literally to just piss in my Cheerios. Listen, I've I've tried on the the forty one millimeter Tutor, you know, the like the OG black bay, and even before they kind of revamp those a little bit, I could see where I could pull it off. Like even I with a six and three quarter inch wrist, I feel I could pull that watch off. They jumped the shark with this shit when they did the Black Bay GMT and everyone's like, you need to try it on. It's not thick. And I was like, okay. All right. I've heard that before. Let me try it on. See what I think. It's like we're in a beer can. Oh my God. I was like, everybody said to try this watch on? Yeah. So you could see how much it sucks. Like what was the point? And this is even worse at 43 millimeters. I don't have a problem with tutor releasing bigger watches. Go for it, dude. But have some consistency between your lineup. Like, if you have a black bay, you should be able to get the black bay in every color and every size. Yeah. Why not? That's the whole point of it. Why? It it's it like that's how almost every other brand does their catalog to I'd say a certain extent. Like Brightling does some kind of weird shit where like their smaller watches come in like only pastel colors, you know, because that's what women like. Um yeah, their smaller watches are a a whopping forty-four millimeters too. Yes. Um but like I I I feel like when you have a black bay lineup and you're just adding numbers to the end of it, it should be in their little configurator thing, which is bullshit because all it does is let you pretend that you're putting a watch together. Um I'm really shitting on Tudor right now. Um but we we really talked him up with the Ranger release. Yes, which is dope. I love the Ranger release. Is let's have that be what dial color do you want first? How do you want your watch to look? Okay, I want blue. Now let's pick your size. Why can't we do that?? Why I don't understand and it should be the same with the Ranger too. I'm not gonna let them off the hook with that. They should have that colorway available in every size. It's a tutor thing that they're doing, and I swear they do it to piss people off on purpose. Because I think it gets them extra coverage. But it doesn
Andrew 't. We're talking about it. Yeah. Well I I guess so. But we would have anyway, because this is an interesting release, right? It they've they've expanded the Black Bay line a few times. Yeah. Almost to the to the north and south limits of what you can expand size reasonable sizing to. Yeah, we might get a black bay 7
Will 8. Oh my god. Yeah, they'll be like, oh, we brought back 45 millimeter dials. Um I I don't get the the numbers anymore either because the black bay 58 was supposed to be you know a callback to their history and something that happened in nineteen fifty eight or some crap, I don't remember. But like now we have the fifty-four and the 68, and then just the Black Bay with no numbers. Or they call it the Black Bay 41 now, which makes it make even less sense. And they have the 36. Yeah. No, I have the 100. Oh, we have the Black Bay. Oh my God. This is a mess, dude. Alright, hold on. This is their lineup for the Black Bay. There's the Black Bay. Okay, so that's three tabs on their website too. Yeah. Right. So there's more than that, we're not done yet. So there's the Black Bay. That's the forty one millimeter version. There's a Black Bay fifty four. Okay. Then there's the Black Bay one spelled out, not the number one, which is the looks like it's a 36mm three-hand black bay. Then we have the black bay GMT, then we have the Black Bay 58, then we have the Black Bay Pro. Then we have the Black Bay Chrono. We're not done yet. Then we have the Black Bay Bronze. Good lord. When did they rename the black bay like the the the three to the one? That is uh and it see now here, oh how annoying is this? This is what I mean. They're trolling people on purpose. You can do four sizes. But just what I was talking about. You pick your dial color and your size. Mm-hmm. Why don't they do that? See, this is this is so inefficient. The process manager in me is having a connection over this
Andrew . I don't like it. Yeah. Uh but you should. And you will learn to like it
Will . Like the monochrome, for example. When they came out with that. Everybody wanted a uh black dial all white loom fifty eight. What'd they do? They launched it in forty one. I'm telling you they're they're they troll people. That's their thing. It they just it Tutor kinda sounds like it's like a troll name. Like if you saw someone named Tudor watch in person, they'd have a very punchable face.
Andrew Oh yeah, because you know it's spelled with two O's and not a U. Mm-hmm. Yeah this is an annoying released. But it's it's also kind of an annoying behavior, right? We've waited years for the tutor ranger to finally be the right thing. We had the perfect tutor pelagos, and they're like, hey, we we can make it a little bit more perfect and worse all at once. Here's the 39, and it kind
Will of sucks. Yeah, with the the the sunburst dial and bezel and
Andrew yeah. Or or you know what? You can get a left hand version, but only with Fotina fucker
Will . And if you want the really cool roulette dial, you have to get the left hand version. Yes. Uh it's so bad.
Andrew Yeah, they do weird stuff. Uh and and it I can't there's no excuse, right? This isn't a brand in its infancy. This isn't like a dude in his garage in his spare time trying to figure this out. Okay, so here's the thing
Will . If if I worked at Tutor and I was in charge of something that let me decide what watch, I'm the creative director, right? There is no way that you do not have access to sales numbers and you see wow the 58 is probably our best selling watch. Very close to it. And you don't sit down and go, man, I bet you people would really love just a black dial white bloom variant. That's that's I wouldn't like that. That's totally asinine to think that anybody would enjoy. that Oh god, dude. Alright, we gotta stop talking about it or it's gonna ruin my Christmas spirit. You gotta make it two tone. If you're gonna get black and white, it's gonna be two tone. They'll get so close. Just to fuck with you. Or they'll do like they did and they'll put it in a 41mm giant chronograph.
Andrew Yeah. Yeah, because that's what should be done. I yeah, I don't I don't understand a lot of the decisions they make. And they're they really don't have an excuse to make these weird decisions. No. Like Bulva and Tudor are two brands that I'm just like, what are you doing? How do you drop fire and then shit in your hands and try to offer me like a handful on your next release. So I think I fig
Will ured it out though. I was just having a think. And so I've been to a bunch of windups, you've been to a bunch of wind-ups. We talk with a bunch of brand owners. I think the ones that you're more comfortable with and that you've had some interactions with, they typically ask you, hey, you guys have seen a lot of watches. What do you think we should do? I would say that eighty to eighty five percent of the brands that I talk to, if I give them my opinion, they go, well that would work. Dumbass. I just asked you for your opinion as a industry expert and uh no that's no. No, not gonna do that. You know the only person that I think has actually listened to my advice? Trask Wesson Cullen. Oh really? Traska. We had a we had a conversation with him at the last wind up about we can't talk about Oh we did, yeah. Yeah, some of his stuff. And I think he was one of the it this he could just be very nice and is telling us what we want to hear. But some of the things we were talking about, he was like, Yeah, that's actually a great idea, you know. Like we'll see if any of it comes to fruition. But it was like one of the first times where I feel like I had a conversation with a brand owner where I was like, they actually heard me. I felt heard. And the the the sec
Andrew tor the sector diver came from our like us talking about the the lack of that. Well I mean look you know we did we did a uh we did we did a collaboration with them. I hope they listened to us. Yeah but I mean I like I think that's the advantage of being a small brand is you get to be really nimble and get like real time feedback. Oh, especially the space like noti
Will ces in now, you know, and well and trash for that point. Um you know, they're some great run. Yeah. It's it's interesting. One of the things I've heard from a few I know we're getting on a tangent here, but um one of the things I've heard from a few brand owners in the I I would say like the past like two years, but more a little bit more recently, is making adjustments mid-manufacturing has become an absolute nightmare. Um, you know, if you want, if you get, you know, a prototype in, let's say a prototype dial, you nailed your case down, you get your prototype dial in, you pop it in, and you're like, oh crap, we screwed up the proportions on the the numerals or something. It now takes you eight weeks, you know, to get the next dial maybe even started. You know, so y at some point you're like, okay, I have to stop iterating and just, you know, do my thing. I that's not the problem for brands like Tudor. If they call up the dial manufacturer, they'll say, we'll have it to you by courier tonight. You know, like it's a totally different ball game. And they're the ones that I feel are like making the mistakes. This is a mistake. It's probably two years in
Andrew production. And maybe that's a maximum money. At a maximum I'd say. But but like between design like concept to to release this might be two years and they're not. Two years ago this might have wored? Mm-hmm. May
Will be. Not now though. Uh I'd say I'd say uh a little bit more than two years. I'd say post Black Bay 58 it doesn't work. I don't think that people would have been surprised if they went to the the Black Bay 41 that they always had to the forty three millimeter version. I don't think it would have been a surprise to anybody. And that would have been
Andrew acceptable. Yep. When it happened. It's just it's really late to market right now. Yeah, it's a weird
Will watch. Anyway, let's get off our soapboxes and talk about something more fun. Uh shall we? What what what have you got for me, Will? Man, you know, I tossed around a couple different ideas and I almost said because Everett's not here and he can't stop us and I wouldn't let him anyway, why don't I do two other things? But I think I'm just gonna You should we'll see after you go. I'm gonna start with my first one. Oh, okay. Um I don't know the right way to phrase this, but I'm just gonna go with a retro gaming PC. Now I went down several rabbit holes. Um I'd say over the past couple years. So when retro handhelds became very popular, um I got one that was shaped like a a Game Boy and it had, you know, a full color screen. Um you could put whatever you want on it up to like PS one, I'd say. And it was great. It I got it when I used to travel a lot for work and it was great because I would just sit on the plane and play like NHL ninety four for four hours. And only need double A batteries to to enjoy your fun, right? No, no. It it it was a regular USB C connection so I could bring a battery pack with me, but it lasted still. I never had to charge it on the plane. Um So my wife uh we may have talked about it at some point, but she had surgery earlier this year, um, where she was kind of laid up for a little while. And um one thing she really liked doing was playing uh my daughter's Nintendo Switch. And she was playing like the newer Mario games. And she was like, oh man, I wish I could just play, you know, like Super Mario 3. That's my favorite. The shit I'm good at. Right? Um so I never thought much about it because I hadn't you know I had tr I forgot that I had that little handheld thing. Um you know, so I was yeah, totally dropped the ball on that. Um but she's in the big TV was probably better. Yes. But about two months ago, she's like I really enjoyed playing, you know, the Switch. Maybe I should find a way to like online or something to play like the old games. And I was like, wait, it dawned on me. I have my old thing. I can you can play it. And I couldn't find it. I found it like two weeks later. But anyway, it got me down this rabbit hole of looking at like, what if I built a retro gaming PC? So I did a lot of researching and some people were like, you know, using Raspberry Pi or, you know, building it from like used parts you find on Facebook Marketplace. And then I found this one guy who was like, just buy an old workstation PC from some company that sells them and um they're super cheap. Well you don't even need to update your your cards or anything. Like you don't need a new video card. You yet You don't I mean you basically don't need a video card. Um you know unless you want to get into like PS3. Um so anyway, I found uh I'm a this is what we can link in the show notes. Um I found an HP 600 G3 micro. Now this is a technically a mini PC, but it was used for you know like workstations for just someone working in the office doing Excel and shit. Um it has a Intel i5 in it, 16 gigs of RAM, and a 250 gigabyte SSD. I got the whole thing totally working, clean hard drive, shipped, taxed, everything on eBay for $100. Ooh, you've got a deal. I I see one right now, and I'll link to this one. 160 money. Yeah, so um I'm sure prices are shooting up a little bit because of all the RAM stuff that's going on right now. So that might be why it's more expensive. But even still, I think a hundred and sixty for what I'm about to tell you how to do is still worth it. Basically, what I did is I loaded this software called Batacera, which is an operating system. And what it does is it's like a container for all different emulators. And you download it, it installs like an OS, you set up your options, all that stuff, and then you're good to go. You never have to touch it again. And then you just load your ROMs on there, which you should get from legal means 100%. Always. So um I think we've talked about it, but the viewers probably don't know this. I turned my basement into kind of a man cave and I've got a you know a TV down here and you know home theater, all that kind of jam. So I hooked it. He also has a cot and it locks from upstairs. And I've got I've got a urinal that actually just goes like right outside. So yeah, I'm I pretty much live down here. There's a refrigerator too. I'm well taken care of. Um so um I brought my wife down here and I was like, wait, do you see what I have for you? And I hyped it up the whole time. I was making it like vaguely sexual. You know, I was like, I got something I really want to show you. Um it's something we've never done before. You know, I was doing all that, and she's like, what the fu like she's not into any of this. She's like, what is wrong with you? Um get away from me with that rusty nail. Yeah, like we're we're parents. Um You had your two chances. Yeah. So um I hand her a controller and she goes, what is this for? And I had it set up on my TV. I can ask um Alexa to turn it on for me. And I I tell her to turn it on, and now she's even more concerned. But then it boots right up. I had I had opened up Super Mario 3 and then closed it down so that way as soon as it turned back on it resumed where it was and she she just she did the uh the Chris Pratt from um Parks and Rec thing where he's like you know he's got his mouth wide open looking around like oh my god I can't believe it's happening. And I did not realize how good my wife is at Super Mario. Holy shit. It just comes right back. Shit, it was like riding a bike. She knew where all the secret places were, all the hidden power-ups. I was like, and she's like, Do you want to play? And I was like, No, I I don't want to be embarrassed, first of all. And I was like, Second, you're doing great. You just keep doing you. She's got like seven extra lives already, hasn't died. You know, I was like, Man. I play sports games. I play shooters. You have to press a lot of buttons at the same time
Andrew . So that's dope. I uh I've I've wanted to get an emulator uh because I have a Nintendo 64 and a super Nintendo here, but like it it seems like kind of a wasteful amount of space. The the amount of gaming systems that we now have in the house is is more than we have.
Will We've put ours, our old systems into storage because they don't work well with like modern TVs. They don't. No. Um and so that's a really cool thing about emulation too if you're if you haven't explored it is you can add all these different filters on top of your games. So if you want it to look like you're playing on a CRT TV with like the lines going acrosss, there' a filter for that. And dope. It's so much fun. It's so cool. I could nerd out on it. We could have a podcast about this, and I'm sure there's someone who does. But you know he he's out there. Yes. So when I said before that it cost me a hundred dollars all in, um regardless of what you buy the computer for, that's what you pay. That's it. Battacera is free and open source. Because it's a Linux platform. Yes. Or a Linux exactly. Yeah, it's built on top of Linux a a branch or something, I think they call it. Um so it's you know you don't have to pay any money for that and it's super easy. Um I did donate to the people who made it because I was just like, Jesus, you guys need money for how easy you made this. Um but uh the tip Yeah. The emulators, you know, if you legally own the games, the emulators are free. Um so there's you know places to get those. Be careful where you get them from. Be very careful. Just do your research. But I loaded ours up. So I I did everything up to PS two. Um I downloaded all of our like favorite games, you know, from Atari up to PS two. And I could probably go a little bit higher, like I think Dreamcast would actually work really well. And the reason I say Dreamcast is because that's more labor intensive to emulate. Um So I think I'm gonna try it out, but d try it. It's so much it fun. It's just a fun project
Andrew . It wasn't really anything specific to Dreamcast though. I guess Sonic, but Soul Calibur and Crazy Taxi.
Will Oh yeah. Yeah. Because Dreamcast was so short-lived, but they had Soul Calibur is still my favorite. I will play Soul Calibur today. I'm if I can download it, I'm gonna play it tomorrow. Um it had the worst controller. Yeah the well it was like the original Xbox controller was so fat. Yeah. Oh my gosh, it was like you couldn't even wrap it up. Yeah, I remember I remember when I got my Xbox and I took that controller out of the box, I was like, I'm holding a loaf of bread. Y
Andrew es. Uh I just I looked up these Dreamcast controllers. I just I like I remember the feel of them. Oh remember the little th
Will ings they had that she could put in them? The yeah the virtual memory cards or whatever the hell they were called? Yeah. So dumb. What a good system that just died. Sega had the worst luck. Genesis was their like only successful thing. Yeah. And then they just did Sonic. They could write it out with him. When I was watching um, you know, these emulation videos that started recommending YouTube started recommending, you know, all old, you know, like uh what happened to you know so and so and one of them was um like what happened to Sega's consoles and one of them was talking about the um I think it was the 32X or the Saturn uh one of them and they did this weird collaboration with Oh, it was uh sorry, it was Game Gear. Uh they're handheld. They did a collaboration with Howard Johnson Hotels. And that was one of the ways that they tried to sell that handheld console and they had the commercial and I was like, this is the worst. Even by ninety standards, this is the worst commercial I've ever seen in my entire life. It was so bad. Go go look up, go look up the uh the Game Gear Howard Johnson commercials. They're so
Andrew bad. Game Gear Howard Johnson commercial. This is cued up for once once I hit the right button. Uh so I got another thing. Yeah. So what do you got? I had another thing and I and I had to pivot. Um so this has previously partly been another thing before. Uh a new season of I think one of my favorite shows has just released uh culinary class wars uh season two just came out uh have you watched culinary class wars no I'm gonna look it up right now it is a Korean cooking competition. Ooh, I'm in already. Blackspoons, the black spoons all have to go by a nickname, and they're like these up-and-coming chefs, and the white spoons are these uh n famous Korean chefs. And you start with a hundred contestants and at the end of the first two episodes you're down to forty. So it's fast. And it's some of the most fantastic, like really high-end cooking I've seen in a in a show because everyone there is there the way they curate their contestant list is just phenomenal. They obviously have some uh some cannon fodder that they bring in for some comedic relief and they go quick and then once you get into the true competition these like the the the techniques the creativity is just next level it's one of the best if not the best cooking show I've ever watched. It's based out of Korea, so you gotta make sure you turn on your English uh audio dubbing because you cannot second screen when you're trying to read subtitles. Yeah. Absolutely phenomenal. So through a couple episod
Will es of this. I am totally into this, and so my kids get into like really weird shit with cooking. Like they love like Is It Cake? You know, like that show on Netflix. I think if I turned this on for them with English dubbing, they would be infatuated
Andrew . Or you could turn it on without the dubbing and then convince them that they're so tired they can't even understand the TV. And then you can watch it by yourself. Oh
Will wait, wait, wait. I can totally gaslight my kids with this. I'll turn it on in English to start and then when I want them to go to bed, I'll turn it to back to Korean and they'll be like, we don't understand oh, you must be tired. It's time it's time for bed. That's messed up. If anybody in Child Protective Service is listening, I would never do something like that
Andrew . Especially not record it. Uh no, it's fantastic. Uh the the judges are kind of eccentric. Like it's Korean television, right? So it's like really strangely high production value and kind of corny. Uh it's fun all the way through. Love season two. My my other thing that I was gonna have today is gonna go on the back burner for for next week
Will . Yeah. Uh the I I love so I do think that Korea has a lot of in America underrated television because we do get I feel like we get a lot of Korean stuff over here. Um their horror movies are the most fucked up shit you can watch. If you are not scared of English speaking movies, go watch some stuff from Korea. You're gonna be terrified. Did you ever watch the platform?
Andrew Uh why does that sound so familiar? It's dystopian prison. It's on Netflix. There's two of them. It's Korean. It is demented. And you can't stop watching. Wait, is it a
Will movie? Yeah, there's two movies. So I'm trying to remember if I watched that or there was another one where they were on like an elevator that would go up and down. The platform. Oh, is that what it is? Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, then I did watch that. Yes. Did you watch the sequel? No, but now I'm going
Andrew to. Do watch the sequel. It continues. Ooh. Yes. Yeah, it w it it is Korean they like Korean filmmaking and television is Oh
Will , I love it because their production values are wild. I don't know how they afford the things that they do. Um You know what it is? Um every once in a while I come across a really good Australian movie and what I've noticed is there's always it's like the Australian, you know, film commission or whatever. And they always have uh I wanna say I might be remembering wrong, please someone call me out if I'm wrong. But I swear they put the web address below it and it's got a dot you know A AU address or whatever that you know it's a government website. And I feel like it's because there's a lot of these countries that are trying to like break into you know the probably the US and Chinese market for movies um that get funding you know from the state essentially to make their movies and sometimes it really works out. Like, I don't know, maybe Korea's getting some banging money from the government that are like, hey, make some shit that the Americans are interested in. Like Squid Games. Look how big Squid Games was. It was yeah, it was a global phenomenon. Yes. I mean people still wear the that that mask, you know, with the I always said they look like the PlayStation controller buttons. The
Andrew y do, and I wear mine every night. That's the only way to go to bed. So So, Will, have you got anything else? Anyt
Will hing to share with the people out there? We've got a lot of good listeners. And I want to say Merry Christmas, happy Hanukkah, happy Kwanzaa, happy holidays, whatever you celebrate, enjoy it, be with your family, be with your friends, and happy new year
Andrew . Indeed. And thank you for joining us this week of Christmas for another episode of 40 and 20, the WatchClicker Podcast. Don't forget to check us out online at WatchClicker.com or you can check us out on socials at WatchClicker or at Watch40 and 20 underscore watchclicker. And if you'd like to support us, we really, really appreciate all the support because it's not free to do this. We have to pay for hosting and all other manner of expensive online things. Check us out at patreon.com/slash fortyand20 and don't forget to tune back in next Tuesday for another hour of watches food,, drinks, life, and other things we like. Bye-bye.