Haha, awesome stuff! Can we assume he is also Finnish as well for a hint or is the second season likely to branch out to some other (Nordic?) countries?

And how long do you expect the second season to complete from the start of filming (if it goes according to plan); can we expect a release sometime around fall or is that too optimistic?

Haha!

It's always someone from the Nordics

Season 2 will have at least 50% more episodes than S1, with some improvements in production value as well. I'm still expecting S2E1 to air by ~May if everything goes according to plan. Although the first rule of filming documentaries seems to be that absolutely nothing ever goes according to plan

My guess is LarzLuzak

if i am not misremembering OP mentioned that it's a guy that isn't very well know, if known at all. so no, not Sami.

probably EEE or Aku, as they have been everyday nosebleed grinders from finland for last years

can't wait for the subtitles.
how many episodes in season 1?

That was a great watch and also so interesting as someone that started shortly after Antonius to see how his strategy just crushed people back at that time and he is so correct in saying that many of the books and material were outdated around that time. Sure, you could beat the weakest players playing a strategy similar to something that was outlined in most of the book material around that time but the true geniuses of the game were taking it many steps further around that time.

I remember watching ActionJeff raise almost every hand in a high profile daily rebuy tournament on Stars and not comprehending how he got away with such ruthless aggression but the key was similar to Antonius' mindset in that if he ever got played back at he had some easier folds based on that age of poker and the style eventually just ran over the opponents it was playing against around that time. Everyone that was "good" was matching cards while the top guys were actually one step further.

Remember when "Joe Public" and everyone thought Gus Hansen was a crazy nut although somehow winning all sorts of high profile live tourneys? Those sort of guys were ahead of their time.

It's cyclical though and eventually it's possible it returns to the mean with all the software, etc. Modern day poker is so much different but I still have alot of respect for the wild guys of the past.

Berri would be sweet, hes swedish afaik.

great post! you're right, much respect to the pioneers.
THAT would be amazing. it is possible as he is unknown in the sense that his name is not public. he's obviously infamous and crushing enough for it to be him!

when will it be known who it is?

Interesting that Antonius echoes what DNEGs says about playing better opponents being the only way to improve your own game. I know that's true with chess.

you can also play a Bot

Please let us know, when subtitles are ready, Chuck!

Episode 3, now with subtitles:



Topics include:

-Old High Stakes Poker episodes
-Isildur1, durrrr, Phil Ivey <-- lots of great stuff there, but I won't spoil it
-FTP's *ahem* interesting policies
-The vices of Patrik Antonius
-Patrik's charity ambitions


There's a lot to like about this ep -- I especially loved listening to all the Isildur/durrrr/Ivey stories, as I'm sure most will. However, we also ran into a horrendous issue while filming which unfortunately affects the image quality in about ~5mins of material (roughly the last 5 mins of the part that was filmed in Patrik's office, plus a few other random close-ups).

Basically, Patrik had a last-minute change of schedule which in turn led into us having one less day of filming than intended. At that point we had already filmed for 7+ hours and we were facing a situation where we were running out of space on our gazillion different memory cards and we had a bunch of crucial stuff left to film. So we had no other choice but to film a few segments in 720p instead of 4k, and unfortunately it really shows especially in some close-up shots. The only other option would've been to abandon the script and make it a 15-minute episode, but we prioritized stories over image quality, which I think was the right call. But now that I look at some of those shots and how it also affects the colors and lightness, I'm really annoyed.

Live and learn. For S2 we shall have triple the memory cards. Also planning a major gear upgrade for even better production value for S2. All in all I think this show looks pretty good especially for its budget, but given how good the actual content is it's really annoying that the image quality is so uneven. Sigh.

Great post.

Four, so one more to go. In the last ep we'll be in Dublin hanging out with the legend that is Dara O'Kearney. He has a super interesting backstory that I don't think that many people know of, really excited for the last ep (which thankfully was also filmed without image quality issues).

episode 3 was fantastic continuing on with Patrik's stories.

OP I didn't realize you were the same person who wrote: My somewhat different poker story
currently just finished volume 17.

For the world's biggest online winner I thought it was going to be Sami (LarsLuzak) from your earlier days with him in that other thread.

How does where you are now and being a producer for this documentary compare to those days from the past?

one time berri???

Thanks a lot for adding the subtitles.

I enjoyed both episodes, but somehow they seemed too slick and one-sided in terms of content. Kind of like a "The Last Dance" for poker - interesting, fun to watch, but also very one-sided and uncritical as far as the protagonist is concerned. Patrik could certainly fill a book with interesting stories, but I'm not sure if he was even asked about certain things. Just one example, anyone who wins millions and millions of dollars is bound to have to deal with scammers of all kinds sooner or later. For example, if I remember correctly, Patrik played High Stakes on Ultimate Bet, but left the site in time. As for staking - how was/is his relationship with Degenyamine? Did he have a piece in High Stakes Poker? How big was his contract with Full Tilt Poker? He talks about how much he won per year in some cases. How big must the contract have been? bad_ip vs Fast_Freddie - does Patrik believe in the cheating story? He played against both of them, but Fast_Freddie only had short hit and run sessions against Patrik. Thoughts on certain specific hands, like sticking in 800bb with top pair vs Sam Farha (lol) or (correctly) calling off with ace high in a $600k pot online? The list could be continued for sure ...

My favourite moment was when he talked about Isildur1

Hey,

And thanks for the well-thought out feedback! Here comes a response that looks like me being overly defensive but is mostly just me rambling.

Bolded: this is pretty much exactly what we were trying to do. I have a background in journalism and I personally have a soft spot for critical documentaries that ask all the tough questions. I also don't disagree at all that having asked the questions you mentioned below would've made this an even more interesting watch for poker players.

I wrote about this a little bit on page 1 of this thread, but basically, there are a few reasons (all of which I can't even disclose) why we chose the approach that we chose, most noteworthily that we wanted to give Last Call a chance to get exposure from non-poker players as well. That was our #1 goal and the series has been blowing up here in Finland beyond our wildest imagination. Just last night some random esports dude who had the #3 ranked stream on Twitch was showing Last Call to his viewers and they were talking about it for like 25 mins, and it was pretty evident most of the audience weren't poker players. We're closing in on 1% of our country's population having seen this, which is beating several government-produced documentaries operating on 10x our budget.

I think the content we have is just deep enough to satisfy (most) poker players, but also just understandable enough to the casual viewer, and that's something I'm actually pretty proud of. But add some talk about 800BB pots and gutshots and backdoor draws and poker references most people won't get, and you'll alienate casual viewers pretty quickly. For example, in ep#1 we had Jens tell the whole hand history about his biggest pot vs durrrr, but we ended up cutting it because it was just too tough for casual viewers to follow. I have no doubt in my mind that nearly every poker viewer would've preferred the version where he shares the hand in detail, but those are the compromises you just have to make.


Regarding these, the only one we asked Patrik was the first one about scammers. We ended up cutting it because it just didn't work in the context of the episode, and his response wasn't particularly interesting either (if he had shared some figures or scamming stories we would've included them obviously).

I'd also have LOVED to ask him about the Fast_Freddie thing speficially, but admittedly I also didn't want to make him feel like we're ambushing him. And if you make people you interview feel uncomfortable, the risk of not getting other people on board becomes exponentially higher -- especially in poker where the circles are small. For example, Ziigmund actually messaged us after seeing the Patrik episodes about starring in his own episode, and that guy hates the media. If we had made Patrik uncomfortable and asked him really nasty questions, I don't think the Ziigmund ep would have any chance of happening.

Again, I think there's a time and a place for a poker show that asks all the tough questions and digs deep into the ugly side of this game. I'd LOVE to do that as well -- hell, that might actually be the show I'd prefer to do over anything else -- but I just don't think Last Call will ever be that show

PS. I'll add that there are a gazillion things about S1 that I'm not totally happy with, and one of them is that certain segments just aren't as exciting as others. I think we (well, as the main screenwriter, I guess I really should say I) can and should do a better job at making every single scene fly. For example in ep #3, the part where Patrik talks about Ivey, durrrr, Isildur etc is golden and it makes you feel "holy **** this is epic". But then there's the whole thing about his vices and alcohol use and whatnot that just feels like a letdown in comparison. In the future I want us to have more highs and less lows, and I'm pretty sure that's doable by fixing certain things.

Sorry for this ramble, bottom line is that I really don't disagree with you at all. I loved the quote you put in spoilers as well!

Don`'t worry, man. I know I'm one of the biggest railtards around .

It's a really good show as is, hence my analogy to "The last dance".

As for the 800bb pot vs Farha, I wasn't going for some big breakdown of the entire hand in terms of strategy. I just remember it fondly as one of the most lol and entertaining hands of all time, not least due to the moment where Patrik puffs his cheeks when his all-in got snap called, kind of like "what the **** did I just do" hehe.



I totally get how being critical might hurt your chances of getting access to other well-known players. Then again, while Patrik obviously deserves all the success he's had and the longevity of his career is unparalleled, he also made a decent part of his fortune from destroying degenerates (Benyamine, Blom, ICallSoWhat come to mind, and I'm sure there's plenty more ...). It's not like he's a great long distance runner who made millions from endorsements. Poker is much, much darker than that, so glorifying crushers may be a big part of what rubs me the wrong way ...

Then again, as pointed out above, I thoroughly enjoyed watching it and those are just some thoughts that came up afterwards.

S2E1 will be us traveling around Sweden trying to find Berri following this guy's example. I wonder what we should pack? Makeboifin, a PLO handbook and some raspberries?

Glad you enjoyed it!

My feelings towards that thread (and also the books that resulted from the thread) are a bit mixed. Lots of good things happened because of all that, but I was 25 when I wrote it, 20 when most of the stuff detailed in the thread/books happened, and now that I just turned 35 I look back at most of it pretty ashamed. Not too happy about the quality of my text either although obviously at the time I thought it was the best **** ever. I have a conversation with myself at least once a month about whether I should ask 2p2 to hide the thread but so far I've always leaned towards no.

I don't want to turn *this* thread into a thread about myself, because there are 4 of us in the documentary team and my role is no larger than precisely 25% of the outcome (I'm just handling our international media duties). But as a very brief summary:

20-25: Stuff detailed in the thread/books happened
25: Started thread, had +$250k year online
27: Went broke(ish)
27-31: Kept playing poker for a living at midstakes, wasn't going anywhere
31: Got a day job
31-35: Been working said day job, I thought it would be horrible but I've really been enjoying it and honestly I should've given up on poker 2-3 years sooner. On the side I got a publishing deal with a major Finnish publisher, wrote two non-poker related books so far, and now I'm producing/screenwriting this documentary. Really happy with how everything's turned out, and no, I don't miss playing poker for a living for one bit.

Next month I'm starting my own production company, we'll see how that goes.

Is it in English yet

yes

enjoying the series, will watch all

this legendary call has to be posted

Ok, I butchered the details on that one. This is the specific hand I was referring to:

Here's an Ace high one:



Love the river pot to induce while holding the nut busted draw lol

Link?