Why Is Christian Entertainment So Cringe? An Interview with Marcus Pittman

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Welcome to Bible Bash, where we aim to equip the saints for the works of ministry by answering the questions you're not allowed to ask.

We're your hosts, Harrison Kerrig and Pastor Tim Mullett, and today we're joined by Marcus Pittman to help us answer the age -old question, why is

Christian entertainment so cringe? We wanted to thank you for coming on the show today,

Marcus, and talking to us about Christian entertainment. It's something, this is a question that I've often thought to myself a lot of times, and I've definitely been turned off to certain movies and stuff in the past that I've seen just because they feel very strange when

I watch them for whatever reason, and so I'm glad to, we're glad to be able to talk to you about some of this stuff and hear kind of your perspective on it since you're kind of in that world right now.

But before we get there, Marcus, why don't you just take some time to introduce everyone to who you are, some stuff about you.

Yeah, my name is Marcus Pittman. I'm the CEO and founder of Lore TV, which is a new streaming platform that we've built that allows a monthly subscriber to fund the movies and TV shows themselves instead of relying on Hollywood executives to do that.

But before that, you might have heard from me, from the work I've done. I was at Apologia Studios for about five years.

I started, me and Jeff kind of started that Apologia Studios thing and got that off the ground.

I did Babies Are Murdered Here and Babies Are Still Murdered Here in terms of films, and then, of course,

I worked on How to Answer the Fool and what's another one?

I was just picking one from American Vision that worked on Symposium on Revelation, which you might not have heard of.

And I did some video work for the founders of Bywood Standard Documentary. So that's sort of where I've been.

Okay, yeah, cool. And so you said you're the founder, you're the CEO of Lore TV.

So what is that? Tell everyone what that is if they haven't heard of it before. Yeah, so Lore is a streaming platform that we built.

And the basic way it works is the monthly subscriber gets an internal currency we're calling loot.

And that loot allows you to sort of spend your subscription money funding movies,

TV shows, the episodes that'll come to the platform. The way that works is if you take

Netflix or Disney +, they sort of take a percentage of every monthly subscriber.

So let's say you're paying 10 bucks a month for a subscription service. They would take maybe 50 % of that and they would put that money back into content, movies and TV shows and all this other stuff.

And most of that stuff is nonsense that you don't want to see and don't care about.

But every now and then they get a hit. And so what we're doing is we're saying, well, let's just take that 50 % that goes to content and give it the monthly subscriber back.

That way they can fund the movies and TV shows that they want to see and not be dependent on Hollywood executives and stuff like that.

So that's sort of what we're doing. Okay, and so what motivated you to want to do this in the first place?

Yeah, I mean, there was a time. Well, I think mainly really we did

Babies Are Still Murdered Here. That movie came out. We put it up on YouTube. It actually got demonetized on YouTube immediately.

Really? Not surprising. There was no way. Yeah, there was no way we could have ever gotten that movie monetized without censoring keywords that make the movie matter.

Talking code or whatever. Yeah, it just wouldn't have worked. But we put it on Amazon Prime and it was on Amazon Prime for a while, about three months.

And then Amazon Prime deleted it from their platform. I didn't know at the time that they deleted pretty much all independent documentaries from their platform.

I thought it was just because it was dealing with abortion or whatever. And it turns out they deleted all of them, but I didn't know that.

And that's sort of where I sort of came up with the problem was that Christians need a streaming platform that doesn't suck like PureFlix or something like that.

Just in general, the Christian media options are just not very good. And they've been terrible for a long, long time.

And there was a time where I actually left Apologia for about eight months and I actually worked for the ad agency that did

PureFlix's social media marketing. So I got to spend a lot of time talking to the people at PureFlix in the

C -suite there and just sort of realizing that there really wasn't any hope for Christian media there.

And there was just a massive just misunderstanding in terms of what art and film is.

And so that's sort of that. And then so I went going there and then went and made

Babies Are Still Murdered here and then that got canceled. And then that's sort of put me on the path, really.

Really. Maybe could you go into a little more detail in terms of what you mean by...

Yeah, yeah, no. They didn't really understand. So one of the reasons

Christian movies in general feel like Hallmark movies is they're designed that way on purpose.

So everything, every decision that is made in terms of what film is put out in Christian media is determined based on math and data, right?

So that's why a lot of films you'll see in Christian media are

PureFlix, not PureFlix, a lot of films you'll see in Christian media are about a horse, they're about a young girl, they're about a mother, or they're about some sort of something like that, right?

So they have these analytics that they use to sort of make these decisions. And the reason they do that is because when

Christian movies first started coming out to the movie theater, they were only in the movie theaters like maybe two or three weeks.

And so they realized kind of quickly, and this is, I think it was kind of smart of them to figure this out. They realized that they need to sell their

DVDs in places that they could, right? Because it wasn't going to be a theater long.

So the only way they were going to make their money back was video stores. And more specifically,

Lifeway Christian bookstore, Family Christian bookstore, Christian bookstores. And so they looked at data and they said, oh, well, women are the main shoppers to Lifeway Christian bookstores.

So we're going to make all our movies for women. Women like horses. Right, and that's why you look at like Courageous, for example, is a film about fatherhood, but it's really made for women.

It's a movie made for women to bring their husbands into the theater, right? But it's not a movie for men, right?

Like men wouldn't go see Courageous on their own. A vast majority of men wouldn't go and see

Courageous on their own, but they would go to see Top Gun Maverick because that's a male -driven movie, right?

Right, right. So their mentality has always been, well, we need to go, which is weird because you would think you would make movies that would get men into the

Christian bookstores to buy them, but that's not how they do it. A lot of Christian media is based on what's already there and not trying to sort of break the rules.

So what you're trying to say, Marcus, is that women have poor taste in movies? Is that what you're trying to say?

That's the reason why Christian movies are terrible? No, I think they have different tastes in movies because men and women are different.

Right. Movies that women like are the movies that women like, but that's not necessarily the movies that men like.

Right. And usually, from a business standpoint, the women will go with the men to see a movie, right?

But the men won't necessarily go with a woman to see a woman's movie. So it's a bad decision. It's a bad marketing decision to just only target women for your films because you're automatically cutting out 50 % of the population.

And that's the problem we have now within Christian media is that there is no male -driven content, right?

There is no content for men, right? So there's not a lot of Christian -gripping like reality television, right?

There's not a lot of war movies, right? There's not a lot of Christian -driven or male -driven.

There's not a lot of male -driven cartoons, right? So there's a whole massive swath of entertainment that is just missing.

Doug talked about that. I think he had a blog about that. Essentially, it's true to life in that if you think about the standard...

I was joking with you, but there is some kind of...

There is a difference between the standard media that a lady is going to enjoy and a man is going to enjoy.

And typically, with movies, you talk about the Hallmark movie kind of thing that is driven towards women.

And in your standard Hallmark movie, it is very true that the plot is the development of the relationship, whereas in entertainment, it's geared more towards men, like books that are geared towards men or movies that are geared towards men.

The issue is that it's the quest that is central. It's not the formation of a relationship that is the central component to it.

There is some kind of conflict and there's some kind of quest that is central to the endeavor, and that just shows up in the way that girls write books and the way that men write books, too.

Did you all see Top Gun yet? I haven't. I haven't, but... I really want to after it.

Never mind. Don't ruin it. Hey, man, no spoilers on the show. Never mind. I will say, though, that there's a definite...

I think one of the things... The way it was shot and everything is really great, but one of the just incredible aspects of the film is just how masculine it is.

It is a male -driven film, and I made the joke on Facebook that my favorite practical effect on that movie was how the female fighter pilots were just there and didn't do anything and how realistic that was.

It was really great. They kind of cut them out but left them there. In every single movie now, it is really true that...

Like all the new Star Wars movies, it does strain the imagination to think that the strongest character in the movie, the most courageous character in the movie, is the woman, and in some sense, it's like, this is not true to life and this isn't the way that life works.

That's why Mandalorian was so successful, I think, because you have this father -son covenantal adoption relationship that's really happening in The Mandalorian that you don't have...

And it won't last forever. Right. It won't last forever, but while it is there, it's really good.

I think there's a consistent... I think we call it the hero's journey in storytelling.

There's just this consistent... Because we're image bearers, I think we tend to relate very passionately to father -son stories, because that's what the gospel is, ultimately, a father -son story.

And so that's sort of... We relate to that, but Hollywood doesn't realize that.

They'll think that Top Gun is successful because Tom Cruise is in it or because they spent so much on marketing it and people have been waiting four years to see it.

There'll be all these other reasons and analytics and data as to why Top Gun is one of the highest grossing films of all time, but it won't be because, oh, it's a good father -son story.

Right? That won't be there. So it's a lot there to that.

And I think that's one of the values that we're going to have at Lore is just... Or really,

I think it's one of the keys that any Christian film company or distribution company can really understand is that we don't just think that movies are good because we look at the analytics and data, although that's important.

I think the analytics and data should confirm our worldview. Right? So our worldview says that humans are creating the image of God and God has given us stories and God has given us these kinds of stories.

And if God is telling these kinds of stories, then people who are creating the image of God must somehow naturally relate to those kinds of stories.

Right? And so else... The Bible is not true.

But because the Bible is true, we can make this sort of decision. And then we can look at the analytics and data and say, oh, yeah, see, that's true.

I think that's sort of what's going to set us apart is we always talk about AI and the algorithm and stuff like that, but nobody puts their algorithm and their data within a theological framework, especially a reformed theological framework.

Right, yeah. That's sort of what I think is going to make us really different. You know, and I'm glad you brought up the theological aspect of it because I know for me personally, you know, every...

I get ads for like PureFlix and stuff all the time when I'm on YouTube or, you know, whatever

I'm on online. Whenever I see ads, I see stuff about PureFlix. And sometimes this is funny, but sometimes

I'll watch the ad just for the entertainment of it, but not because I'm actually entertained by the story that they've come up with.

I'm entertained because I want to see like... The train wreck, basically. The train wreck, basically.

Yeah, like I can't take my eyes away from what's happening on the screen. I just have to see how bad this is, basically.

And I think it seems like a lot of that has to do with the, you know, the theological ideas that are being communicated in a lot of these things that really, for me, ultimately turned me on.

You know, like, I'm never going to actually go watch the whole movie that I just saw an ad for because the ad really didn't even...

Honestly, it didn't really even seem that Christian. Right, well, if you're not going to watch the movie, you're not going to subscribe per month.

Oh, what do you mean? Well, you're not going to get a PureFlix subscription if you don't even want to watch the movie.

Right, right. Right? So, that's the key. That's a key data point that they don't take into, you know...

Oh, really? You know, well, yeah. I mean, because if you're only looking at who gets a subscription and not looking at who doesn't, you're neglecting that entire market.

Right? So, you're not able to really understand how to, I guess, expand and grow that.

It's about... It's interpreting the data wrong. And they're neglecting that... that world.

I forget the... I don't know if I know the whole story, but there's a story about, like, some guy during World War II or World War I, they were looking at the planes coming back with the bullet holes or in them in a certain way.

And they were looking at that and they were like, oh, this, you know, the ones that crashed. I forget exactly, but all the scientists were interpreting the data wrong that they saw right before them.

But it was one guy that stood up and said, oh, well, maybe if they make it back, then it's not where they got shot that's the problem.

Yeah, it's where they didn't get shot. Yeah. So, it's the ones that did make it back and where they got shot that we need to strengthen the armor.

And so, basically, they strengthened the armor not where it got shot, but where it didn't get shot.

Because... And so, they saved lots of lives by doing that. And so, it's all how you look at the data.

And so, that's sort of what I think the Christian worldview sort of helps.

But like, you know, they're neglecting men, they're neglecting teenagers, they're neglecting...

I mean, for the most part, they're neglecting young children too because they're not making content for young children, they're making content for parents, which is not the same thing.

It's interesting that if that's the Christian response, like, it seems like the pagan response at this point is essentially to ignore the data and keep shoving down their throat movies that no one want to watch and are opposed by to the neglect of their business, you know?

That's absolutely true. One of the things like Netflix is they don't tell you what people are really watching. But they put out false narratives about what they want you to think people are watching, right?

So, you know, if there's a show that doesn't meet a certain diversity standard, right, there's not enough

LGBT characters, not enough black characters, not enough Asian characters, if it doesn't meet that sort of diverse standard, it doesn't make the top 10 even if more than...

It's the most watched show on the platform. They only promote to you the shows that they want you to see and they pretend like that's the shows everybody else is watching, right?

So, you get this sort of false understanding of what people really want to see and what you think you want to see.

So, it's really dangerous game. But remember for them, it's not about the power of Netflix isn't in the money that it makes.

It doesn't make a lot of... Netflix isn't a big profit maker. It's in the ability to control the stories that are put before 200 million people, right?

Like, that's where the power is and that's why we built Lore because they're right about that.

They're right about that. And there needs to be just like you have Netflix, there needs to be, or Disney, there needs to be a global Christian brand when it comes to movies and filmmaking and there's just not right now.

There's not a global brand. There's not a Chick -fil -A or a Hobby Lobby for Christian entertainment anymore.

It's just, it doesn't exist. And so, that's sort of what I think we plan to change.

Come on, man. You're ignoring the Titan that is PureFlix. Yeah, yeah. Because they're owned by Sony now.

So, I don't consider them a Christian company. Oh, really? Okay. So, they got bought by Sony a year and a half ago, maybe?

Okay. Yeah. So, what is your perspective like when it comes to other sorts of Christian entertainment?

What is your perspective in terms of the actual theology that's being pushed out?

And if you have, I didn't realize you worked there, but if you have any insight into how that kind of decision is made,

I'd love to hear about that as well in terms of like what kind of theological ideas?

I don't think there ever was really a theological framework. There might have been an evangelical framework, which is just, okay, it has to have the altar call, it has to, you know, do this or say that.

I'm learning more. The more, the more lore gets to speak to filmmakers who have been in that industry, we hear fun stories about stuff that gets cut out or sort of notes that they get that to change stupid stuff.

But I don't think they're really, like I know for certain that there's not a theological framework, but I probably can't talk about that publicly.

But, there's not, not in terms of how they look and, you know, they do their stuff.

But, I would say that, you know, the Kendrick brothers like have good theology.

Like I think like their brother, they're Christians. They're legitimate. Like the work they do is really good.

I think my only thing is that they are, like Kendrick brothers are making stuff for the audience that they helped make.

Right? So they've built this Christian film genre, which is its own unique thing.

And so they're going to continue to make stuff for them, for that genre that they've built out, that they've made.

And I think their theology is good. I do question, you know, why they've had, like I think was it

Beth Moore in some of the stuff? I wanted to ask you about that Marcus because I, yeah, so I don't know but, but, you know,

I would say they're probably, they're not a high theology

Christian. They're in that low theology Christian probably, where they would probably sit.

yeah, I wanted to ask you a little bit about that because I, you know, maybe just take them as an example of Christian movies that,

I mean, they've, of all the Christian movies that are out there, they're the ones going to the theater and they're probably like the paradigm for what we're talking about in a certain sense but then, it seems like, you know,

I'm curious about your critique of their movies like in terms of their style. Like if I were to try to like think about the things that bothered me about the movies in general like Facing the

Giants and War Room and Courageous and Fireproof and everything else,

I mean obviously like it's low budget and there's acting problems but then like with the theology itself it seems like there is a very strong kind of, you know, prosperity feel to them all that's pretty off -putting to me.

I don't, I don't know. Like I don't know theologically where those guys are.

I'd love to have a conversation with them and, you know, figure that out. I don't think they're reformed

Calvinistic Baptists. You know, I think they're probably mainstream evangelical megachurch

Southern Baptists, right? So it's not heresy. They're just weird.

I think that sort of, you know, leans into where you get, you know, their stories, right?

So it's just, you know, the sort of message the pastor preaches on Sunday is going to be the sort of story that you get from them in the theaters, right?

So, because it all comes from the church, right? Stories comes from the theology of the people who are making it, whether that's, you know, an unbeliever theology or just, you know, a weak evangelical sort of theology.

That's sort of what you're going to get. I mean, it seems like, you know, if you can turn David and Goliath into winning a movie, what would be your critique of their movies in general?

Like, what would be the thing that you would say? There's no shortage of, like, internet articles you can look up and you have people who, you know, sometimes, like, the critique is that there's, like, an overt gospel, like, presentation in there and that's just too much.

You need to be more subtle and then, you know, that kind of stuff. And so, I mean, I have a list of things in my mind about all the critiques that people generally give, but I am curious, like, what would be your critique of their, what they're doing?

You could say that their movies are too preachy, but I find that a bad argument now that, you know, any

Hollywood movie is just preaching LGBT or cultural marketing to you harder than anything the

Kendrick Brothers has ever done. It is a double standard, right? Yeah, like, I don't mind a movie being preachy, but I think it can be executed well.

Sure. It seems like the, well,

I'll give you an example. So, we're doing a show, a comedy sitcom called

The P Case, which is about, it actually stars Show Baraka, and he has a mixed family of maybe, of several kids, and his wife, and then he's a pastor of a church, and so, as his, basically, as his family sort of falls apart, so does the church, and as the family is strengthened, the church is strengthened, so it's really based on that premise of having a father who, a pastor who has his household in order, right, so it's really a struggle to keep his household in order, and it's comedy, and it's whatever, but it is probably the most theological show,

Christian TV show, I've ever seen in my life, but it doesn't feel like it's preaching at you at one time, which is weird, it's hard to explain, you'd have to see it, and when you do see it, you'll be able to probably confirm that, it's incredibly theological, there's actual preaching moments, because it's at a church, but it just doesn't feel like, like it just feels like that's, of course you would have that, right, because it just makes sense, and so I think it's just really an execution thing with, you know, it's like those

Baptist churches that have to have the altar calls, right, well, your movies have to have the altar calls too, if your movies are for the purpose of evangelism, and not just to entertain for the sake of entertainment, which is,

I think a mistake that these Christian film industries have created, is that movies are gospel tracks, and they most certainly do not have to be gospel tracks, and probably shouldn't be gospel tracks, more importantly.

Right, so what would you think would be, so part of it is just execution thing then, so, like, you look at a movie like that, you say, alright, execution's a little bit off,

I think, you know, Doug had an article about that where he was somewhat defending the

Kendrick Brothers in that, yeah, it's low budget, and he wants to encourage them, like, in that, like, encourage them with their low budget production, and bad acting, hey, we need more of this, so keep on going, as far as that goes, but what would you say would be things that, like, elements of that movie style, so part of it is, it's just, the preachy element feels like it's not being executed in a natural way, perhaps, it feels like it's not being about this militia group in Arizona that, you know, sort of took over when

Biden's, you know, sort of defunded the Border Patrol. Right. So they're just regular everyday people.

They're just private militia and they stop sex trafficking and drugs and stuff from coming across the border.

Not really a Christian show at all. Not even probably maybe not even everyone in there is a

Christian. But it's about something that's that's good. It's about neighbors coming together to defend their life and property and families and stuff like that.

Right. So there's a lot of Christian elements into it, but it's not really at all even a

Christian project. And then we announced busted Bible stories, which is an animated cartoon by Chris Savino.

Chris Savino was director and producer for Dexter's Laboratory, Powerpuff Girls, Loud House, all these sort of things.

And now he's doing busted Bible stories, which is an animated cartoon series, you know, about a boy and a sheep who travel back in time and try to make sure the

Bible stories happen accurately. You know, if you sort of think about Back to the Future when

Marty McFly, you know, has the picture that disappears. I think that's sort of, you know, what their job is to make sure that the scriptures stay exactly the way they are.

And so just a really fun, goofy way of looking at it, you know, like just it doesn't take itself seriously.

Like that's, I think, is like the real key. And then so there's that one.

Laura Clawson is doing an animated series of short cartoons that are done by Secret Disney and DreamWorks animators, each episode being on a subject of abortion.

So it is one of the hardest cartoons I've ever seen in my life.

The first one, I just saw the animatic Kevin Sorbo does the narration of it. It is insane.

It is, I think, you know, it's just an incredibly valuable piece of art.

And it's only the first episode and it's violent. And it's, I described it as a, when

I saw it, I described it as like a Disney cartoon getting slaughtered. So it's just incredible.

Great. And that's nothing you could ever be able to put on pure books. Not even close. The other thing we're trying to do is we're just trying to do, give artists the freedom to really just make the content that they want to make.

They've never, we've had several artists that have pitched us projects.

They have multiple projects and either they'll pitch us like three or four projects and there are, you could tell they made these and wrote these for the

Pureflex audience or the Christian film audience. They knew that these stories would get sold.

And so we just ask them and go, well, you know, if you were not writing a movie or TV show for Pureflex, what movie would you want to make?

You know, what project are you most passionate about? And the artists are like, no one's ever asked me that before.

Right. Cause it's all about what the artist can get sold and not what the artist is really passionate about and wants to make.

And so that's sort of one of our key differences is just, look, we don't, we're not going to pass down notes to you.

We're not going to make suggestions and stuff like that. You know, if you're a

Christian, we trust you to make a great show. So do it. And if you're not, here's our rules.

All the time. What would be the breaks? I mean, like at some point, so like, you know, a lot of the critiques of standard

Christian movies are, you know, essentially that, you know, if you're not like taking a bath in total depravity, then it's just not realistic or something along those lines.

So you have to just like walk through the gutter with people, you know, in order for it to feel real or something along those lines.

But like, do you have any like, Oh, you don't have to walk through the gutter, like literally. So like, you know,

Well, I'm just, I'm trying to get at what would be the, like, as a, as a lore TV, are there any kind of, no, you can't have sex on camera, you know,

We have two strict rules. It's pretty much no nudity, no blasphemy, no gratuitous sex sort of scenes like that.

Right. So, but that's pretty much it. Language we're pretty open -handed about as long as it's done redemptively,

I think, you know, and you can read, you can actually find more about that. If you read Doug Wilson's book,

A Serrated Edge, he talks about language. And so, but what we've really found is most of the filmmakers don't want to push the envelope.

Yeah. They don't want to push, they don't want to push it. They don't want to write a nudity scene.

And you write, they don't like, they just don't want to do that. Hollywood makes them do that, right?

You know, because they have, you know, I think I heard, I don't know if this is true or not, but I heard that Netflix has a rule that's basically like, if you got boobs in the first five minutes, you'll have them for the whole series.

So, they try to make, they try to put sex in the first five minutes of a show so that you can hook them for the rest of the series.

And that's why sometimes you'll be watching a show on Netflix as soon as you start, you know, just go, ah, that's crazy.

And then it's like, not throughout without like any of the rest of the show. That's why. So, they have that, but people don't want, like filmmakers don't want to do that.

You know, there's a big movement in Hollywood right now to not have nudity in films. So, I think

I heard it's like, I think it was like Ashton Kutcher and like a whole bunch of other artists signed like an anti -porn thing in Hollywood.

I heard, so I don't know how true that is, but so there's a movement that's happening even with Hollywood.

I mean, you know, Game of Thrones, the actress was just so destroyed by her work there that it was another actor that took them, took her into the producer's office and defended her and said, you know, she's not going to do this anymore.

Right. Because it's just disgusting. Right. And so,

I don't think Hollywood wants them, the actors or directors and filmmakers,

I don't think they really want to do that. I think they're being told they have to do that sort of stuff. And so, you know, we're of the opinion that we'll give artists the freedom to make what they want.

And if they screw that up, then the artists, then the consumers just won't fund their projects in the future.

And so, the consequences in the free market, really. So, that's where they're like in app currency, they can fund.

Is that kind of how the system works? Yeah. Yeah. Sort of like in video game currency.

And that currency is coming, is that, you said that's coming directly from their subscription or it's like 50 % of their...

Yeah. Your monthly subscription will give you a certain amount of money you can spend every week funding movies and TV shows.

Have y 'all got beta invites to the platform yet? I have. Yes. Okay. What do you think? Yeah. I enjoyed it.

I watched a little bit of the, All the

Nations. Is that what it's called? Right. Teach All Nations. I watched a little bit, I watched a little bit of both of them.

Dark Holler is the other one. Yeah. Dark Holler. I watched that as well. I think maybe the, how many episodes are there?

I think there's three of Dark Holler. Three? Okay. Or three is coming.

I think three is coming. There might be, I'm not sure. I watched a few episodes of it.

Like when I got my subscription, I watched them because I think they were already available. Yeah.

I got my invite a little bit, like a few weeks after it had been open to the, well,

I guess not open to the public, but semi open to the public. So I thought it was really interesting.

And I did find myself wondering, hey, what's kind of the decision making process in terms of, like what gets greenlighted?

Are there things that don't get greenlighted at all? Oh yeah.

But we're not, we're not a free speech platform, right? So I think that's a mistake that is easy to make, but no streaming platform, no film company, no studio is a free speech studio.

Right. What we're offering is a way for artists who don't have the opportunity, like talented artists who don't have the opportunity to really tell the stories that they want to tell to have them told and be paid very well for.

Like that's sort of what we want to do. We want to just befriend the filmmaker and give them freedom.

And so that's sort of really what we want to do.

But there is a background check that we go through internally, you know, to make sure the guy's actually skilled at what he does, that they've completed projects before, that they have a history of making great content, those sorts of things.

And then from there we hear their pitch. And then usually we say, that's not the pitch you want to make.

That's pitch you know you can sell. So what's the pitch you want to make? And then that's where we usually get the good ones.

And so, so yeah, so that's sort of where that comes from.

So you brought up earlier, what was the name? Something Recon? American Recon.

Yeah. So that's an example of a guy who, you know, he's been doing reality television before.

And he's been filming these guys out there on the border in Arizona, protecting the border and whatnot.

And yeah, it was too crazy for, you know, the neocons of the

Daily Wire. And, you know, and then it was obviously way too conservative for anything in Hollywood.

So it's just in this middle space. And that sort of space is sort of where we like to exist.

Like if it's too edgy for Pureflex and too Christian or conservative for Hollywood, we'll probably like it a lot.

So I guess in your mind, when it comes to making decisions in terms of what gets put on lore and, you know, the things that aren't going to get put on lore, is there like a filter that says, hey, we need it to have some sort of like Christian value?

Does it have to have like a gospel presentation? You know, what's the, is there any kind of thought?

Or I guess not. Obviously, there's probably thought put into that. But what, you know, what does that process look like?

There's not. Like the stuff that, you know, we have, it's interesting because a good story is inherently

Christian, right? So it's really easy to look at like a

Pureflex movie where you have this gospel moment and the bad guy gets saved, right?

Like that's really easy to say, well, that's a Christian story. But what's that movie, a movie called with Denzel Washington, and he's got the

Bible. Great Christian film, probably one of the best

Christian books ever made, right? And that does have more of a

Christian message in it, for sure. So, but then you have,

I think Top Gun was a great Christian film. Pete Really? Okay. Jared Not because there was a gospel presentation or anything religious in it whatsoever.

I think just the thematic, the theme of it, you know, what it's trying to demonstrate is that of, you know,

I don't want to give anything away for you guys, but I would just say that. I would say that movie is probably, but there's not, like, you wouldn't find it in a

Christian bookstore. And there's some elements in it that kind of make it not good, right?

As a Christian, like, you know, there's some blasphemy in it that wouldn't be on lore, right?

But overall, like, it was a great film, right? And it has a strong message that, you know, any

Christian can relate to or just any human, right, can relate to.

And so, that's sort of the thing. Like, here's the way I put it is this way. God created the heavens and the earth and the beauty of the stars and the planets and the sun and the moon and just, you know, the heavens, right, declare the glory of God.

But as beautiful as that art is, it's still general revelation at the end of the day, right?

It's not special revelation. So, art, I think, has a place to be just general revelation.

It doesn't have to be special revelation. It doesn't have to be a gospel track. And I think that's the mistake we get into when we're talking about Christian films is that it becomes this sort of special revelation project when it should just be a general, a good story, right?

And you notice, you know, the heavens declare the glory of God, but just not in a salvific way.

And I think our story should be able to do the same thing. And so, yeah, so,

I don't think there's not a real, there really isn't a real trigger. And I think, you know, for what is a

Christian story or what's not, I just think all good stories are Christian stories.

I mean, part of, you know, an example of that is without giving too much away, we have animated cartoon series that we're going to announce soon.

And the animated cartoon series is just like stupid

Looney Tunes cartoon stuff, right? There's nothing theological about it at all.

But the value of it is that, you know, it's just for, you know, fathers and sons and mothers and daughters to sit on the couch and just enjoy time with each other and laugh together, right?

But that there's nothing theological about Looney Tunes style cartoons, but they're still great, right?

And so, part of lore is just letting the artists be free to tell whatever story he wants and let the glory of God be declared through the talents that the artists have.

So. So, yeah, part of it, so part of it seems like, you know, the point you're making is that a story doesn't have to be, have an explicit gospel altar call moment in it in order to be

Christian and it doesn't necessarily have to contain Bible verses in it. I think that's what you mean when you're saying it doesn't have to contain special revelation, but then, you know, for it to be

Christian, it seems like it would have to be drawing on, you know, the themes that are given to us on special revelation, meaning that general revelation is somewhat like vague, like in terms of it's not really saying much other than that there's a

God who created with power, but then, you know, like if, you know, a good story is going to evolve like creation, fall, like, you know, redemption of some sort, so it's going to follow some kind of –

It could. Gospel arc or some kind of – go ahead, keep going. It could, but I tend to think that a tragedy is just as valuable, right?

You know, a tragedy where, you know, I say this about breaking bad all the time is great, breaking bad is a great example of how sin just destroys everyone around you and brings them into your sin as well, right?

And there's no happy ending there. And that's what makes, you know, that's what's so powerful about it.

There's justice at the end of breaking bad, but, you know, it's not – Well, it's falling in like a broader – like, you know, you may not, like every story is part of a bigger story, right?

And so, it has to fit somewhere, but then how do you, like, I suppose, like, there's a way of talking about this that is not entirely clear in my mind, how do we talk about it in a way that is helpful?

Because it seems to me that, you know, when Brett McCracken writes his articles every year on, you know, trying to sanctify everything that Hollywood is putting out, he sounds pretty similar to some of the things you're saying.

Yeah, but he's really dumb with it. Yeah, he's not very – no, it's not very thoughtful or smart.

It's – Well, it's not, it's not. It's a low -hanging fruit. What was the one he just did? He just did one.

Well, it's embarrassing. Some of them are really embarrassing and like, I think Jared Wilson was making fun of them a little bit, like, what

Christians can learn from rock dog, you know, and then the answer is, well, probably nothing, you know, but then a lot of them feel that way, like, you're just trivializing, like, if everything is about, like, if everything is about, you know, the gospel and Christ, then nothing is about it, and like, what are we – like, at some point, like, there has to be – like, you can't just redeem everything, right?

Yeah, I'm just pulling out that I wanted to mock. I was trying to figure out –

I'm happy for you to mock anything he writes. Oh, why rise and fall narratives are surging in popularity.

Oh, yeah, I saw that one, yeah. That was the one he just did, and it's all about perhaps we shouldn't laugh at people who, like, you know, put others down or whatever or something like something stupid like that, but that's not why – that's not why the rise and fall narratives are so popular in our society.

The reason – it's not because people like to laugh and mock other people. The reason they're so popular in our society and specifically with the examples that he uses, which was,

I pulled it up, it's WeWork, The Inventor, Fire, The Greatest Party That Never Happened, Lula Rich, White Hot, The Rise and Fall of Abercrombie and Fitch, Super Pump, The Battle for Uber, all of those are examples of wealthy people are showing that they're evil, and our country hates billionaires, right?

Our country sees capitalism as an enemy. Because we're covetous. That's right. The Gospel Coalition sees capitalism as an enemy, and they couldn't even get that right in their own article.

And so, you know, that's just the nonsense that they do. Like, they're not even – they're not even thoughtful.

Like, the dropout, that's a true story. Like, you know, there doesn't have to be a redemptive arc to that.

She was a bad guy. Well, I can't think of a redemptive arc is that she got caught, right? So, that's the good news at the end of that is that she got caught and she is probably going to spend a long time in prison.

But it would be unchristian if like, you know, there's – or you correct me if I'm wrong here, but like, if it's just like,

I mean, you write the, you know, the story of the transgender person with the wonderful marriage and everything's going well and like, you know, as they self -identify as a purple zebra or something, you know, like, and then, you know, there's no consequences to it whatsoever.

Everything is just happy and wonderful and like, certainly, like, it doesn't feel like that would be a

Christian story then. You don't see the Christian story in that too? Yeah, I don't. Well, yeah,

I think, you know, Schaeffer is the one that said, art is whatever is true, good, and beautiful.

Right, right. So, like, those are the sort of three sort of standards for that.

But true, good, and beautiful doesn't necessarily mean, you know, an animated cartoon about Looney Tunes can be true, good, and beautiful too, right?

And so, a Looney Tunes style cartoon can be true, good, and beautiful. And it's about just what's true within the context of our world.

When you start trying to make transgenders have great marriages or be married at all, that's, you're not being true and certainly not beautiful.

Oh, goodness. So, yeah. Hate speech, you know.

Yeah, whatever. You know, I guess - But I will say, Lor, if you want to make a film where the trans person is a bad guy because he's a trans person, how he destroys the family and destroys the kids that he had because he made the decision to become a trans person, you're more than welcome to write that story for Lor.

It'd be great. I'll write up the script tonight. You can't do that anywhere else. You certainly can't do that for Sony. Could I write a story about a lesbian couple basically turning their son into a transgender school shooter who's addicted to psychotropic drugs?

That'd be fantastic. Because no one told him to control his feelings.

We laugh about those stories, right? But those are exactly the kind of stories you're going to tell Lor. We already signed contracts or something very similar like that.

And it's going to be great because you're not going to get those stories anywhere else.

So, basically, you're saying there's a sense in which, like, no, not everything has to be

Christian, give the altar call, present the gospel very clearly in every single piece of media that you guys are publishing or producing, whatever term is most applicable there.

But it at least has to be true to reality. So, when you watch the movies where there's a girl, a main character, and she's a martial artist beating up 40 massive muscular men, you watch that and you think, like, that would never happen in real life, you know?

Do you have that kind of check, Marcus? I mean, that's a good question.

But I think I just, yeah, I don't think any pitch like that would make it that far with us.

But, you know, it's - You'd start laughing. You'd start laughing too much and then it'd be done. Yeah, I'd be like, well, what's the catch?

So, but, you know, the Daily Wire, for example, they put out three, maybe four movies now, or at least announced four for sure.

And they all have female action leads, right? But if you just go on Twitter and you type

Ben Shapiro plus The Draft, you'll see Ben Shapiro talking about how awful it would be to ever send women into The Draft, right?

Ben Shapiro. But it's like, dude, your movies are all women action heroes. Why would you not send them into The Draft, right?

So, there's just like an inconsistency in terms of, like - I don't think he really believes what he says sometimes.

Like, I don't think he does. Yeah, the movies you make have no theological, like, consistency or even political consistency at the very least in terms of what, like, his politic, right?

So, it's just nonsense and, and people are calling him out for it, and they probably are going to make moves to not do that in the future.

But, yeah, so. I would be interested to hear - I know you said, hey, it's just gotta - the story itself has to be true in some sense for it to be, you know,

Christian essentially. Or I can't remember if you said it's, you know, it's actually

Christian if it's just a good story, or if it's just, it at least, like, points us to Christian ideas.

I can't remember exactly what you said, so. No, a good story is Christian whether there's any reference to Christianity at all, right?

Okay. So, you know, a story about, a story about a father,

I was trying to give an example, but, yeah, you know, yeah, a story about a father who puts himself in danger to save the life of his family is

Christian, right? There's a Christian value there, whether they want it to be or not, it is actually a true

Christian value that we could read about in the Bible. Because we're presuppositional, so we believe that whether they want to or not, they're still being

Christian, or they're still, yeah, they're still being Christian whether they want to or not, you know, whether they fight against it or rage against it or hate

God or not, they still can't help, but to be image bearers, right?

And so, that's why you get good stories, good Christian stories like the

Mandalorian, or you get good stories like, you know, Top Gun, right? So, you know, you guys saw the first Top Gun, right?

I did, yeah. All right. Yeah, first Top Gun, just completely masculine film.

There's no women really anywhere in there, and it's about, you know, men going to war and returning home to the women that they love, right?

So, there's this, obviously they're not married and stuff like that, but you still get the point, like there's this inherent goodness to that story, and that goodness can only come from a

Christian worldview. Yeah, I mean, so, I think, you know, as you think about it, like every story has to connect.

God made the world in such a way that like reality bears witness to His design for it, and then it seems like He's, like the stories that are good are the stories that fit, you know, in a

Christian worldview kind of framework and those that try to deny reality are the ones that typically, you know, you cringe at and you try to, you know, you suffer through as far as that goes, you're playing make -believe in that way, but then it's correspondence to, like, the

Christian worldview is what makes it connect with you, really. I mean, if you're a Christian, like if you're a

Christian, and part of the problem is that like a lot of people, really, they think the way the world thinks and they, you know, they share the priorities and values that the world has, and so it's, they resonate with things in a different way than a

Christian should, for sure, too. Did you ever see, a good way of looking at this,

I think probably the best, one of the best

Christmas movies, obviously, was like the first Home Alone, and like Les Lansphere did a

YouTube video, you can still watch it, but it's about how Home Alone is a Christian movie, and there's all this evidence as to, with the old man, the old man being the

Christ figure in it, and there's repentance and prayer, and Santa was a completely ineffective

God who didn't help him at all. I mean, there's like all this amazing, really amazing theological underpinnings, right?

When Kevin goes to church and he sees the old man, and the old man, basically, there's this repentance moment with this conversation with the old man, and then, you know, the other amazing thing is like when they show you the old man in Home Alone, like he has a band -aid here and a band -aid here, and that's how they like introduce you to him, is when he slams his hand down on the glass, and you see that hole here and hole here, so you're making out to be that the old man is

Christ. It's a great video, really phenomenal, but you would never, like the

Christian symbolism is so subtle, like you would never really, you would never, like just watching it, you would never make that connection, but once you see it, you can't stop making, and it's obviously on purpose.

So, just a really phenomenal breakdown. I think if you type in Reform Pubcasts and Home Alone.

Jared I remember seeing that. I don't know that I ever watched it. Question for you though, would you say that the more, like more subtle is better, or is there a way to be more overt that isn't?

No, that's what I'm telling you, man. The PKs, which is a comedy sitcom we're doing, is probably the most overt thing you've ever seen in your life in terms of a

Christian comedy, right? There's nothing more theological in it than it, and I think -

Because some people, like a lot of people, like when they're critiquing Christian films, almost it seems like the critique is that just, like basically, it's kind of like in order to make a good movie, like the only way to make a good movie is if the pagans will like it, and then like the only way the pagans are going to like it is if you keep, like you make it as, so the caricature then is like, well, you have to have an altar call moment in order to be a

Christian. A lot of people think that way, but that's not right, but then like the point seems to be that you keep, like make it as, it's almost like in order to be faithful, you have to be

Lecrae, like an artist who just so happens to be a Christian and keep your Christianity carefully hidden, and like secularism is the idea, not like actually a

Christian worldview kind of film, the idea is keep it hidden, you know, and settle - Yeah, Lecrae, I mean,

Lecrae's a good example of what not to do. Okay. You know - He's not the model to follow?

Well, yeah, I mean, one of the things, like Lecrae did an amazing job, that whole Christian hip -hop movement really disrupt the entire

Christian media industrial complex, right? Like it really did, because everybody was downloading hip -hop and Christian hip -hop, and they were downloading it all from like iTunes and stuff, and there wasn't like a

Christian, I mean, there wasn't a Christian record label involved in that Christian hip -hop movement, right?

There's no, like they had nothing, like it was completely grassroots sort of thing, and then the

Christian music industry did get involved, and they realized, well, we can't play Christian rap on K -Love, so we'll start these other radio stations called

Air One, and then on Air One, K -Love Air One stations, then we can play the

Christian rap music, and then it just became this whole, like, just fight,

I think, between Lecrae and Reach Records and this Christian music industry that Lecrae never really wanted anything to do with, and then he, so then he goes and he says, you know what,

I'm not a Christian artist anymore, and he made a really good, if you ever watch, it's still on YouTube, but it's

Lecrae's convocation that he gave at Liberty University, and he's talking about like secular -sacred divide and all this, it's amazing, and this was like several years ago, several years ago, this was like right before he was about to leave, and basically, what you see is like, he's like, no,

I don't want to be part of the Christian genre anymore, and I want to compete with like Jay -Z in the hip -hop genre, just like everybody else, but he went completely the other way, and just thought that he should abandon all theology and then embrace cultural

Marxism, embrace the Democratic Party, just all this other nonsense that came with it, and that doesn't, like, that doesn't have to be, like, nobody said you had to do that.

And so, it just became this nonsense, tragic story, I think, still to this day, it's really sad, and it never had to be that way.

Like, I was with him when he was doing, when he was making that jump, I was, I supported him, I was like, I get it, you don't want to be part of the

Christian genre, like, it's common sense, but part of that, too, is that, you know, secular media, the secular, you know, country music, for a good example, is country music and Christian music sort of were one and the same for a while, and then

Nashville decided that they needed to separate the Christian, the Christian music from the movie about bars and honky tonks and that sort of thing.

So, Christian music moved 30 miles south of Nashville to a town called Franklin, Tennessee, and that's sort of where you get what is

Christian media, what is Christian entertainment, that sort of look and sound and feel. It's all purposely defined to keep it away from the secular stuff, right?

So, they kind of pushed us out and put us in a bubble, and we've been there ever since, and the Kray was smart enough to realize that he doesn't want to be in that bubble, and he doesn't want

Franklin, Tennessee making creative decisions for him, but then it just went completely nonsense, and, you know, it is what it is.

But he was, I think he was right initially with what he wanted to do, but I think he just went to the other extreme.

Yeah, so, like, then the idea of being then, like, in some sense, it doesn't, like, it doesn't seem like the issue is, like, how much

Christian content necessarily is in it, but then it shouldn't be that, like, if there's more overt

Christian references, like, that's bad by definition. You would agree with that, right? Yeah, for sure.

But then there's a way to do it that's cheesy, essentially. Right. Is that kind of what you're getting at? Yeah. What would that look like?

When the story depends, when the

Kingerton Brothers stories, when they break the fourth wall and they do this sermon, right?

And it's, like, suddenly they're not speaking to the actor in the story, they're speaking to the audience that's watching it, and it's just weird and strange.

It doesn't make any sense. But if the preaching in it is, makes sense with the movie.

Well, like Les Miserables or something like that, right? There's a lot of very direct kind of preachy stuff, but it's not breaking the fourth wall in the way that you're describing.

Right, like, yeah, the gospels in it, right? All that sort of stuff. So, yeah, so that's sort of, you know, where I would fall with that is, like,

I don't care if the movie's overtly Christian or not. Like, some of the project, and I'm reading the script right now for a project we're going to announce, a

Western that we're going to announce. And man, it is probably one of the best scripts

I've ever read. And it's incredibly Christian through and through. I mean, it's not even hiding it, right?

But it's just the way it's done is just beautiful and wonderful. So, yeah, so there's, it can be both.

We own the whole world. And that means we own all the stories in it too, right?

And so, that's my encouragement to Christian artists is just, you know, make what you want, right?

What's the Augustine quote? It's love God and do what you want. Or the Athanasius quote,

I forget which one. But we always tell our artists to just love God and make what they want. So, or love

God and tell the story that they want. So, yeah. – Yeah, yeah. Well, Tim, do you have any more questions for Marcus before we wrap it up here?

– Oh, I have a lot of them, but, you know, I probably should, yeah, keep them to myself.

– At least respect your time a little bit. – I think it's definitely an interesting topic that we need to think about a lot more than what we have, and we need a lot more people who are engaged in that kind of project,

I think, for sure. – Yeah. Well, Marcus, we want to thank you for taking the time to come and talk to us today.

We really appreciate it. And it's really interesting, you know, I think you and I are, maybe we're friends on Facebook or something, and it's really interesting to see all of the stuff y 'all are doing right now.

And it's fun to watch through a lot of it and kind of see it all going down in real time.

So, you know, again, thanks for coming on. Appreciate what you're doing. Where can people find you, and where can people go to, you know, get a beta subscription to –

Yeah. So, if you go to the Lore Founders Group on Facebook, it's connected to our page.

If you go to that Founders Group and just ask for an invite, someone will give it to you. So, there's a lot of people in there that have invites that they're willing to give away.

And then you can, if you get the invite, it's free. We're not charging anything.

We're in the beta stage, so we're not charging anything at this moment. And so, you can go in and you can fund.

I think there's only maybe one episode left of each series that needs to be funded. And then, so once you do that, you can join, and then you can watch all the episodes you want.

And then in the next, Lord willing, in the next month or two, we'll switch over to a paid subscription and start funding more projects and stuff like that.

How many projects do you think you'll have by the time you go live?

Well, we're going to roll them out slowly. But as of now, we have about 30 movies and TV shows contract signed.

So, exclusive for us. And there's probably some other ones as well.

But yeah, basically, we'll figure that out as we go.

I think most of that just depends on how much investment we get in the next round, in a Series A round, in terms of how we boost content and stuff like that.

But yeah, so there's three ways you can help us. The first one is, if you want to be a monthly subscriber, just go to lore .tv

and put in your email address. The second one is, if you are an artist and filmmaker, and you want to tell stories on lore, you can fill out the creator tab on lore.

And then the third one is, if you're an accredited investor or want to be an investor, you can sign up the investor tab.

And I'd like to encourage people that are out there listening to this, that we really need...

If you look at the love and passion that went into making the

Top Gun movie, which is ultimately at its core, a naval recruitment ad, a naval recruitment propaganda, ultimately at its core, that's what it is.

The love and passion that went into making that movie. And then when it comes to Christians, we don't put any time or money or dedication or passion in telling our stories.

There's nowhere near the way Hollywood does or really conservatives don't. So I'd encourage anybody out there to really think about building the kingdom and building a storytelling platform and stop investing in one cheesy

Christian movie when you can invest in a platform that'll tell them all. So yeah.

So if you go to the investor tab, you can sign up there to be an investor. So yeah. What does lore mean real quick?

I never got the memo. It comes from folklore. It comes from laurels.

Don't rest on your laurels. So it means award or gift, basically. Okay. And just so everyone who's listening is clear, it's spelled

L -O -O -R dot TV. Great. Well, thanks again,

Marcus, for coming on. We really appreciate your time and talking to us, answering all our questions and getting to hear some of the stories and some of your thoughts on all this stuff, being someone who has had their foot in that world before.

It sounds like for a long time, too. So we really appreciate it. And again, thanks for coming on and hopefully we'll have you on again at some point.