The latest episode of Marvel’s Runaways has a shout-out we didn’t quite expect. Apparently, Gizmodo has given tech billionaire Victor Stein the proud title of, and this is a direct quote: “The Coolest Guy in the World.”
The latest episode of the Hulu series, “Metamorphosis,” includes a scene between teenage hero Chase Stein (Gregg Sulkin) and his father, Victor Stein (James Marsters), a famous inventor and member of the villainous group Pride. Victor offers to give Chase a ride to meet up with his friends, but Chase politely refuses. It’s probably because he and his fellow Runaways-to-be are in the middle of investigating their parents’ misdeeds, but Victor thinks it’s because Chase is too cool for school.
Determined to prove his righteousness, Victor throws out this little ditty to show what a tubular dude he is.
Victor: “Oh I get it, son, you don’t want your friends seeing you with the old man — even if he is the coolest guy in the world. Hey, Gizmodo said it, not me.”
Chase: “Maybe they’re onto something.”
Barring the fact that this (apparently) shows Gizmodo’s bias against Tony Stark, at least according to Marvel Cinematic Universe. I reached out to the Gizmodo editorial team for an emergency meeting. Here are the official minutes:
Beth Elderkin: Marvel’s Runaways made a reference to Gizmodo in the latest episode, saying we named the show’s big inventor the “Coolest Guy In The World.” Any reax from the Giz team about that totally-real ranking we give scientists all the time?
Gizmodo Editor 1: I can imagine giving someone that title sarcastically, Beth. Regular Human Mark Zuckerberg. Definite Non-Vampire Peter Thiel.
Gizmodo Editor 2: Yeah, pretty sure that Superteen was actually thinking about The Verge. But appreciate that that writer thought we had the right balance of prestige and teen cred.
GE1: I’m honored to serve the narrative purposes of the greater Marvel television universe.
Gizmodo Editor 3: Lolololol Spike is our fave scientist?!
GE1: Does the named cool guy have better or worse facial hair than Tony Stark?
GE3: He has none! It’s just Spike from Buffy but old now.
GE1: Isn’t he a supervillain? I feel like he’s the kind of person we’d refer to as “aspiring supervillain” in a post.
GE3: We should do a Best Cool Guy In the World award.
While Gizmodo hadn’t previously made this particular proclamation, now that we’ve written this headline I guess it’s official. Congratulations, Victor Stein, you’re “the coolest guy in the world.”
Side note, it seemed almost too perfect that this Gizmodo emergency meeting happened right as Soylent’s co-founder Rob Rhinehart announced he was stepping down. Even though Victor Stein is way more evil — he kills people in a tube, while Rhinehart’s main problem was making a dangerous product named after a fictional food made out of people. All the same, it felt kind of like kismet.