I also doubt he was hustling. He may have won money shooting pool. My dad grew up shooting pool in my great-grandfathers bar and when I was young I saw him win a lot of pool games in bars but he wasn’t hustling anyone. I could see Bill being decent since he had a table at his house.
As for the pod. I thought it was incredible. This might be sad, I don’t know, but I’m going to say it. When I’m driving on a low traffic Merrit Parkway with the moon roof open on a crisp long shadowed October morning while drinking a warm cup of coffee and setting the heat to get the perfect temperature in the car and I’m listening to a great episode of the Rewatchables, I don’t think I can get much happier than that. Every sense is content. Eyes on the road but not darting, not tense. Ears on the pod, the smell and taste of coffee mixed with the crisp air, the sun and perfect temperature on the skin, and my brain not racing, it’s at a perfect wavelength. This is about as happy as I can get.
I mean, I'm co-signing that it's an enjoyable listen. If it was just a dry discussion of film theory, I probably wouldn't waste the time. I'm just thankful Fennessey and Ryan were there to push back on him when he says ridiculous stuff like "You just spent all this time teaching Cruise how to hustle, why forfeit?" It's absurd and hilarious, as if Bill just doesn't understand really basic things about story. I've said before that he's the foil and it's at its best when multiple people team up against his silly interjections. This was a great example.
And the hustling thing is also funny - there's no need for him to pretend like this was a thing he did, but he just can't resist throwing it out there with a vague "I did some things, we'll just leave it at that" - not sharing details because there are no details to be shared. Maybe I'm projecting, but I feel like you can hear Fennessey and Ryan egging him on, like "oh, tell us more" because they know he's full of shit, too, and they want to catch him in the lie.
The more I think about it, he
is Vince from the Color of Money. He doesn't have character, he is a character. He's a flake. He can't resist the attention from doing karate work with his pool cue as he's running the table.