00:00 - Put your smartphone down.

00:03 - Pick up the dice. Move your game piece.

00:06 - And interact with actual real, physical people at this restaurant.

00:12 - Open your ears to fast, raw,

00:15 - irreverent music from the 1970s

00:18 - that inspired a fashion statement that lives on today.

00:22 - And visit a shop where men with capes

00:25 - continue to enthrall fans and dominate blockbuster movies.

00:31 - Pennsylvania Neighborhoods visits

00:33 - South Street in Philadelphia.

00:45 - There's

00:45 - no shortage of places to eat on South Street in Philadelphia,

00:49 - but sometimes you got to have something to do while you're waiting for your meal.

00:55 - Maybe you feel the conversation at the table is starting to wind down.

01:00 - Then you find yourself trying to resist drumming your fingers on the table.

01:05 - But here at the Queen and Rook Game Cafe, you can play a board game

01:10 - that might take you back to the good old days.

01:13 - At the very least, it's a nice break if you're tired of looking at screens all day.

01:19 - We greet you,

01:20 - we see you, and then we tell you how everything works.

01:23 - So, you know, we'll tell you,

01:25 - that a server will come take your order,

01:27 - and then we tell you about the board games.

01:28 - And the way the board games works is it's, it's a fee for 2.5 hours.

01:33 - So per person, we don't charge kids under 13.

01:36 - So, you don't have to play.

01:38 - So if you want to come and just, have some pizza and have a beer.

01:42 - You could do that as well.

01:44 - So we are, board game restaurant.

01:47 - We have more than 2500 board games for people to play when they're here.

01:51 - We have Woodfired pizza.

01:52 - We have a full bar.

01:55 - We have, great vegetarian and vegan food.

01:59 - We have a retro arcade.

02:01 - Just I love the I love the feeling of walking into a place.

02:05 - And instead of people being on their phones

02:07 - or looking around to see what other people are doing,

02:10 - they're just really happy and engaged with the people that they're with.

02:14 - How did you accumulate all these board games?

02:17 - One at a time.

02:19 - One at a time.

02:20 - Did people donate them, for instance?

02:22 - Some. Some games or. I've been donated.

02:24 - We've definitely gotten people that, say, you know,

02:27 - I don't play this game enough, but I, I really like it, I think.

02:29 - I think people would like it here.

02:30 - And we get games that way.

02:33 - But we also, we try and find games that people we think will like,

02:38 - that will fit, you know, a certain crowd or demographic.

02:42 - We have everything from, you know, games that are,

02:45 - ancient games, like, like go, which is like a Japanese version of chess.

02:49 - We do chess every, every week.

02:51 - You know, players love Scrabble and sorry and monopoly

02:54 - and a lot of the classics from, you know, generations of childhood.

02:59 - And so, we have we have families that come here with,

03:04 - with the grandparents and the grandkids and the and the parents in between.

03:07 - And everybody is finding something to play.

03:11 - When you

03:11 - commit to a board game at the queen and rook, you may find it difficult

03:16 - to stay in your smartphone cocoon.

03:20 - I think people are on their phones

03:22 - in restaurants because they don't really know what to do anymore, right?

03:25 - There is nothing.

03:26 - You know, if you go to a sports bar, what is everybody doing?

03:29 - They're looking at the TV, right?

03:30 - And that's what you're doing.

03:31 - And there's not really room for much else.

03:34 - And so

03:35 - I don't know that people are thinking about, oh,

03:37 - I'm going to go to a place where I don't have to be on my phone.

03:39 - I think when when they come here, just the phone doesn't become important.

03:45 - Maybe you're anxious about making a good impression on your date.

03:49 - Well, here's a plan.

03:51 - Just move the spotlight from yourself

03:54 - to a rousing game of monopoly.

03:58 - When a customer comes in and they place the order,

04:00 - and then they go and select a board game, and then they get into the game.

04:03 - Do you see, like a change in their frame of mind?

04:06 - Is somebody come in maybe a little stressed out

04:08 - and all of a sudden you can see them relax

04:10 - when they get to play this game that they might have played in their childhood.

04:13 - Yeah. Yeah.

04:15 - We definitely see that in a lot of people.

04:16 - We have a lot of regulars because of that.

04:18 - Like, we'll have people

04:19 - that come here after work and they'll come and they'll find it even.

04:23 - They'll sit at the bar and play a one player game.

04:25 - And we have, you know, we of course like the bar games that are one player

04:28 - game, like, you know, a whole bunch of them.

04:31 - But people will play escape room games that are kind of like puzzle games.

04:35 - They'll sit and play, for, dates.

04:39 - So we make dates much more relaxing.

04:42 - You know, dates are kind of especially first dates are kind

04:45 - of nerve wracking because you're unsure what, what how you're coming across.

04:49 - And so the games really make it so that it eases you

04:52 - into you're focusing on the game.

04:54 - And and so you don't have to think of what small talk to do.

04:59 - You know, you can find out a lot about a person from how they play

05:02 - and what they play.

05:03 - And, you know, whether they're a good sport,

05:05 - whether they're competitive, whether they're patient, whether they're,

05:09 - you know, distracted, whether they are kind.

05:12 - There's a lot, a lot that comes across.

05:14 - It comes out when somebody is playing a game.

05:17 - You gotta be careful, though.

05:19 - Maybe a hidden side of your personality will suddenly come to the surface.

05:25 - You don't want to shock your friends by showing them

05:28 - what an insufferable winner or a sore loser you are.

05:33 - Have you ever seen people get irritated like they're a bad sport?

05:36 - We have had people that have had bad dates

05:40 - become obvious because of games, right?

05:43 - They, you know, argue about the rules or they,

05:48 - try and keep the other person from from doing what

05:51 - they're supposed to do, or they just take losing or winning badly.

05:55 - We have a lot of games we have to replace.

05:57 - You know, Catan is one of the newer classics

06:00 - that, we have several, several different copies.

06:03 - What is the object that Catan.

06:05 - So Catan is, basically you're trying to create,

06:09 - more villages and have more resources.

06:12 - First trading, sheep for,

06:16 - wheat and, you know, all kinds.

06:19 - It's a lot of fun, but you know, of course,

06:21 - a lot of the card games get worn out pretty quickly.

06:24 - A lot of the party games get worn out, so we replace them after they get worn out.

06:28 - And you'll see, like, you know, you know, it gets worn out

06:30 - really pretty fast with the replace, you know, a few times a year.

06:34 - Capital punishment and improper nouns are both silly.

06:38 - Capital punishment sounds rough.

06:40 - So that one is a really fun game because you are basically arguing,

06:45 - for or against punishing

06:48 - either celebrities or politicians

06:51 - or means even so, like, it might be, someone,

06:55 - it might be, someone that, talks during a movie.

06:58 - And the other one would be Kim Kardashian.

07:01 - And the last one will be,

07:04 - you know, some of the, Harrison Ford.

07:07 - And so you have to argue for which one deserves to be, you know,

07:12 - suspended in, in, in school or whatever.

07:15 - And so, you know, which one is the worst?

07:18 - And you have to argue as to why that one's a lot of fun.

07:21 - Oh, it's about time we told you about the name of the place.

07:25 - Sure.

07:26 - Playing a board game can be a boisterous spectacle,

07:30 - but a quiet, meditative game that dates back

07:33 - 1500 years has a special place here.

07:37 - We love chess, and chess is a great example of a game.

07:41 - That is, it is very difficult to think of a game

07:44 - that is as important culturally as chess.

07:48 - It it comes up in movies and TV shows and books.

07:53 - It is an analogy for war and conflict and peace and thinking, and it's a way to,

07:59 - talk about intelligence and strategy and learning and, you know, it's it's just so,

08:06 - it is a

08:07 - part of humanity that is, as as intricate as, you know, as writing or books,

08:13 - I think has crossed continents and civilizations,

08:18 - kings and and and paupers have, have played it right.

08:22 - But it is also about, understanding your opponent.

08:25 - Right. You know, I think,

08:28 - thinking about what your opponent is thinking is part of it.

08:31 - So putting yourself in somebody else's shoes,

08:33 - it isn't just about what you are doing, it is

08:35 - what the other person might do as well in response to what you are doing.

08:39 - And so it teaches, you know, empathy and, emotional intelligence to try

08:43 - and figure out is this an aggressive player, playing against chess?

08:47 - And in my mind, I'm envisioning a night where you have a game of chess

08:52 - going on at one of these tables, and there's lots of silence

08:56 - and no one's moving around.

08:57 - Then maybe a couple tables away.

08:59 - Someone's playing a, a rowdy party game.

09:02 - Have you ever witnessed that kind of contrast between.

09:04 - Yeah, a nice, sedate chess game, and then somebody's going nuts

09:08 - with the party game. Always. It is. It is.

09:10 - One of the great things about being here is that each table,

09:14 - has their own, vibe.

09:17 - It has their own thing going on. Right.

09:19 - And so, yeah, you might have one table

09:20 - that's really intently thinking about the strategy of the next move.

09:24 - And then right next to them it's somebody like chucking dice and like,

09:27 - you know, going around the board and just having a lot of fun,

09:31 - while while eating and drinking.

09:32 - So I originally that's, that's all I wanted is really to have a place

09:37 - selfishly, that we could go to,

09:38 - that I could bring my family to, that we could have a good time.

09:41 - And giving that to other people has been great.

09:44 - You know, we we always joke that when we are,

09:48 - home and bored, we're like, oh, man, where could we go?

09:51 - It's like, well, we could if only there were a place

09:55 - where we could take the kids

09:56 - and to have food and to have some drinks and to have fun and maybe an arcade.

10:00 - And of course, we're

10:01 - not going to come to our own place because we're working here all the time.

10:04 - But it's like, it's funny because we it's ironic

10:08 - that we made this place sort of for a place for us to have.

10:10 - And now, it's kind of for everyone else but us.

10:14 - When we moved to Philadelphia, it's one of those,

10:17 - like, streets where

10:19 - it's the hub of the culture

10:22 - of Philadelphia, kind of every movement

10:25 - and pop culture thing comes through,

10:29 - Philadelphia through South Street.

10:33 - A new musical scene

10:35 - exploded in the mid 1970s.

10:38 - It was kind of a repudiation of the soft

10:41 - rock movement that was popular at the time.

10:44 - It was bursting with uncontrolled, sometimes violent energy.

10:50 - It was audacious and sometimes insulting,

10:53 - especially if you were a member of the establishment.

10:57 - This music was raw, fast,

11:00 - unique clothing fashions were born

11:02 - that today are inextricably linked to this musical upheaval.

11:07 - This is a punk rock shop called Crash Bang Boom

11:11 - on South Street in Philadelphia.

11:13 - There was a big movement at that point where, you know,

11:17 - bands were just there was like a whole, they call it like the corporate sound.

11:21 - You had, like sticks, foreigner.

11:25 - You know, all the bands like from, from

11:27 - that genre that were like just crank it out like,

11:31 - top 40 hits.

11:33 - I think people were looking for something that sounded,

11:36 - like a more raw expression of emotion and maybe not

11:39 - something that was written for everybody, but something that was written for you.

11:44 - Punk rock is, was just an extension of rock and roll, for sure.

11:48 - Yeah, it's all part of the big mosaic as far as, like, rock music is concerned.

11:53 - So the,

11:56 - I would think one of the things that's lasting that punk rock

11:59 - that's changed is like the, aggression in music like this sound, like the audible

12:05 - aggression, the music, and also the fashion has definitely made an impact.

12:10 - Mid 70s, you had pioneers like Pure Hell, Iggy Pop,

12:15 - Johnny Thunders and the Heartbreakers, New York Dolls, I guess was.

12:18 - And that definitely it's funny when you listen to it now

12:23 - just sounds like mainstream rock n roll.

12:25 - A lot of it.

12:27 - When your

12:27 - music is busy calling out social injustice

12:32 - and condemning middle class values and material things,

12:36 - it can take extra time to get a commercial enterprise going.

12:42 - Punk rock has always been a segment of the world.

12:45 - I don't think it was considered that when it was more misunderstood.

12:49 - We're also maybe a little bit maligned

12:51 - because there wasn't a way to make money off of it for a while.

12:56 - A lot of the merchandise that we have here is, is rock n roll based,

13:01 - you know, that's, that's our customer, that's our clientele.

13:05 - And, from the performers

13:08 - to the fans, you get them all, which is really, really cool.

13:11 - But you don't have to do a lot of club where a lot of gothic stuff.

13:17 - A great way to show solidarity

13:19 - with any movement is to wear the right t shirt.

13:23 - It's a good conversation piece.

13:26 - The fun part for crash Bang Boom is when they least expect it.

13:31 - A big star suddenly appears on the internet wearing one of their shirts.

13:36 - We've been really lucky.

13:37 - We've had people from everybody from The Damned to Guns of Roses come in.

13:44 - Alice Cooper,

13:46 - just a lot of ministry.

13:49 - Different bands coming through town, stop in to support the local rock n roll shop.

13:52 - We sell a lot of Crash Bandicoot shirts, which is really, really cool.

13:56 - It's really nice to have the support of singing that

13:58 - when somebody walks in the store until it's, hey, I saw Billie

14:01 - Eilish with the decision, oh, that's wild, you know?

14:06 - And then, you know, just the Dead Kennedys were just in town.

14:09 - I mean, Sarah had one on the entire show.

14:12 - Oh that's cool.

14:13 - A band on tour has to arrive at the venue early enough to set up

14:18 - and make sure everything sounds just right.

14:22 - After that, they might have a couple hours on their hands before the performance.

14:27 - What to do?

14:29 - You know, bands or command of the soundtrack?

14:31 - You know, hop in a number for like a local punk rock and roll studio

14:35 - and come in and support us.

14:36 - But us know, a lot of times I don't know who they are.

14:40 - And then after they leave, I think

14:42 - their latest video has 200 million views, whatever it is.

14:46 - Wow, that's really nice of them to go out a band.

14:48 - Well, it's just great to meet people literally from all over the world.

14:52 - It's, that's kind of the fun part.

14:54 - That's why we're not like an online store where brick and mortar,

14:58 - even through the years, where that was hard to do.

15:00 - We figured out how to keep that rolling and stick with it,

15:02 - because it's all about meeting interacting with people.

15:05 - And the feedback to the store is always great.

15:08 - We we, people were really good to us during the Covid lockdown as far as like

15:13 - making sure that we do have an online, presence.

15:23 - Most of the

15:24 - big budget movies that get people out of their homes

15:28 - and into the cinema these days have their roots in comic books.

15:33 - You got Batman, Superman, Iron Man, the Fantastic Four,

15:38 - The Avengers, many, many more.

15:41 - Now, all of the major established superheroes have been doing battle

15:46 - with colorful villains for at least 50 years.

15:50 - Then they made it transition from kids comic books to the hearts

15:53 - and minds of adults.

15:55 - This is Atomic City comics on South Street in Philadelphia.

16:00 - So the number one, of course, is always going to be superheroes, because that's

16:03 - what comics were, focused on for the majority of their existence.

16:08 - I'm superheroes is the number one thing that you're going to see,

16:11 - but there's a lot of other things also.

16:14 - So there's a great deal of science fiction.

16:17 - There's a great deal of fantasy.

16:20 - You're looking at a lot.

16:20 - There's a lot of historical fiction.

16:23 - There's a great deal of horror

16:25 - or, you know, sort of like that fantastical,

16:28 - you know, elements, actual actual history.

16:32 - So the so books about things that are actually happening,

16:35 - currently in the world, there's a great deal of that.

16:37 - Also, the blockbuster movies really

16:40 - jumpstarted the industry, like the industry was.

16:43 - It had its ups and downs.

16:45 - So the industry has had a, you know, controversial history.

16:47 - Sometimes it's up, sometimes it's not.

16:50 - The comic book movies definitely supercharge the industry.

16:54 - It got so many more people in the stores.

16:56 - It also got the so many more people doing

16:59 - work inside that the, the industry, new writers,

17:04 - new, artists, new ideas coming out of that.

17:08 - Not even necessarily connected to the movies, just a lot of talent

17:11 - that injected into so it really did, change the industry was very important.

17:16 - When Iron Man came out, people came and asked about,

17:19 - and one of the anecdotal things I saw.

17:20 - So people Iron man was not a very popular character.

17:23 - People kind of basically ignored him.

17:24 - He was basically like, nobody cares until the Iron Man movie came out.

17:27 - And then it became a dominant popular character because that movie was so good.

17:31 - Same thing.

17:31 - Well, Avengers were already popular, but when the Avengers came out

17:34 - that that people just flooded in, all sorts of people came.

17:36 - The same thing happened, for example, with Black Panther.

17:38 - Black Panther was a very popular character before, and well known, but

17:42 - when that movie came out, it it really jumped up.

17:45 - When a good Superman movie comes out,

17:48 - he resonates so deeply with people like it's he's such an important character

17:53 - and not just a combo character, but he's important to like everybody.

17:56 - Everybody in the world knows who he is.

17:58 - So when a movie comes out, people respond to that.

18:00 - People actually showed up.

18:01 - They're like, wow, I'm going to read some Superman stuff.

18:03 - It really did make a difference.

18:04 - And I even as a

18:05 - as a comics owner, underestimated what the effect of that would be.

18:08 - It really did resonate

18:10 - among your customers who would win

18:12 - a popularity contest, Batman or Superman, and why?

18:15 - He's Batman easily.

18:18 - That's a very interesting question.

18:22 - Batman is a popular character,

18:24 - very popular character, because every person

18:28 - that comes in and reads a comic book can dream about being Batman.

18:32 - Nobody can dream about being super.

18:34 - Superman is, you know,

18:37 - I forgive if anyone's offended by I'm

18:39 - using this word, but Superman is basically a god.

18:41 - If he's not a god, he's godlike.

18:43 - He's too powerful for people to really say, hey,

18:46 - I can be, I can, I can dream of doing these things.

18:50 - He's the other.

18:51 - And we're watching him as he flies through the sky.

18:53 - Everyone loves Batman because everyone says, you know what,

18:56 - I could train, I could start training right now,

18:59 - and maybe in ten years I could be, you know, everybody has that dream.

19:03 - And so, like, I could I could do that, right?

19:04 - I just have to be focused enough.

19:06 - I just if I just hit the gym a few times, you know, and get up on my education,

19:10 - get up. I could be like that guy.

19:13 - Most actors will tell you

19:15 - it's a bigger kick for them to play the villain instead of the hero,

19:20 - probably because the villain comes with a lot

19:22 - more emotional baggage these days.

19:26 - You know, the villains are more important than the the heroes sometimes because

19:30 - there's you have all sorts of villains, and they have all sorts of reasons

19:33 - why they're villains.

19:34 - And it allows the stories to talk about things that are

19:37 - that are important to whatever's going on in society right now.

19:42 - So the villains often represent the the challenge of what's going on.

19:46 - That's difficult in society.

19:48 - Or sometimes it can be basic villains could just be a guy who's robbing banks,

19:52 - or alternatively, it can be,

19:53 - let's say I'll use the same character, Superman versus Lex Luthor,

19:56 - who is a much more complicated villain

19:58 - and represents much more complicated problems in some ways, even

20:01 - sometimes more sympathetic than I will see more, said Superman.

20:05 - Because that's hard to do.

20:06 - But it looks, in theory, kind of how he's written can be extremely sympathetic

20:11 - because he represents regular humanity as opposed to a superpower.

20:13 - Did know the comics from the 1940s are very often surprisingly dark.

20:19 - There was a lot of dark material in the 1940s.

20:23 - That's part of the reason why there was a lot of horror,

20:25 - and there was a lot of those like romantic drama and other various things.

20:28 - That was those topics were very popular back then.

20:31 - There's a lot of, military comics, war comics, a lot of stuff

20:35 - that people might underestimate.

20:37 - Wasn't just all like, you know, superheroes.

20:39 - It was a lot of a lot of darker stuff there.

20:40 - But yes, things have changed drastically since then.

20:44 - I would say that the storytelling, the sophistication

20:47 - of the storytelling has, has, is, has skyrocketed.

20:51 - Daryl is especially impressed with the work of a comic book writer

20:56 - who did a mash up with famous characters from 19th century literature

21:01 - called The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

21:05 - The genius of what Alan Moore did is he took five separate characters

21:09 - from literary books, from the, you know, from the 2030s, 40s, he says.

21:13 - Let me bring these people together, right.

21:16 - They don't like each other because they're some of them are villains.

21:18 - Be honest.

21:20 - But they're but they're not insanely evil villains.

21:22 - They're just villains for whatever reason.

21:24 - They're doing things because they believe in something.

21:26 - They have strong belief in, something that doesn't sort with what society wants.

21:30 - And he says,

21:31 - let's put them up against something that they have to work together

21:33 - to save the world for. And how would that play out?

21:36 - And in a book form now, you know, the movie was a but in a book form.

21:40 - It is a masterpiece. It's genius.

21:43 - I was I read it and I can't believe somebody thought of this idea.

21:47 - Another work Daryl admires is an adaptation of a 1970s

21:53 - series called The Sandman.

21:56 - Writer Neil Gaiman's version has a level of story

22:00 - and character complexity that appeal to individuals

22:04 - that were not part of Atomic City's usual customer base.

22:09 - There was a time when I was working here,

22:11 - this is well before I own the store, but there were not very many women

22:14 - coming into humble stores.

22:15 - It was basically a boys hangout, and there was one book that changed that,

22:19 - and it changed it big time.

22:21 - And anybody who was around at that time, so should they own a bookstore.

22:23 - Remember this?

22:24 - There was a book called The Sandman that came out,

22:28 - and that book was written by a gentleman by the name of Neil Gaiman.

22:32 - And that book,

22:35 - when it came out, I would see girls come in.

22:38 - They say, do you have The Sandman?

22:40 - It was the first time

22:43 - we had material

22:45 - that was thoughtful and deep.

22:48 - Gaiman really hit material

22:51 - that appealed to women and men.

22:54 - It wasn't just directed at women, it was directed at people.

22:57 - And it was so deep.

22:58 - And it was so it was emotionally intelligent.

23:01 - Comic book writing.