Back Row Seating

We had Hot Girl Summer; now it's time for Hot Dude Winter. Welcome to Hot Frosty, the first of many oddly regular hot men movies to grace the streaming waves this holiday season! As an aficionado of the Lifetime holiday film circuit, we're gonna see how Netflix replicates the same formula of two attractive people in snow trying to get it on, maybe. Remember Christmas Unleashed? In any case, have a holly, jolly Thanksgiving, American listeners :)

*not Elementals It's time to check out the Pixar answer to Zootopia, with elementals battling social issues and generational trauma rather than animals. This time, though, we have Monstera heads, kitschy Irish-themed shirts, and oddly alarming relationship cues, so surely nothing could wrong, right? Turns out the antagonists were the friends we made along the way all along :')

or "That Atlantis movie when Disney was making unique 2D animation". We're hitting up my childhood once again, rediscovering the joys of this film like 1914 people rediscovering Atlantis. A wonderful cast of memorable characters and legit attention to proto-language details will definitely lend to cult hit status, but will it meet my adult standards? Let's find out!

Oooh, boy! Time to finally see the "bathtub scene"! On the heels of an insane rise to internet fame for its weirdness, it's time for me to check out 'Saltburn' and see what all the hubbub is about. As an aficionado of weird films, I'm all here for it! Certainly nothing will make me uncomfortable, right?

*There are some audio issues for the first nine minutes or so, but it's fine afterwards :) Another glorious summer. It makes me sick... Fortunately, autumn is fast approaching, except in Texas, but I hear it's the most wonderful time of the year up in the Northeast U.S.! So why not bring along a true Bostonian to school us in the ways of leaf peeping and witchcraft? The magical tome of spells in question? Well, I've never seen Hocus Pocus beyond the scores of branded t-shirts and craft supplies that flood retail stores in October, so how about we give it a shot! Then my coworkers won't be so revolted by my 'not seen' list :')

It's time to hop into the way-way-back machine and hop into another Paul Thomas Anderson romp through the 1970's! only this time, it's spearheaded by my longtime film-nemesis, Mark Wahlberg... That said, there's an all-star cast surrounding this young lad, so perhaps it won't be too hard to watch; we already know PTA's soundtrack and atmosphere will be on point. Surely we won't see Markie Mark's o-face or anything; that would be weird!

Fresh off the heels of, like, two different studios, Disney wanting nothing to do with this, Nimona finally graces our eyeballs after being rescued by Annapurna and Netflix! Two or three years or waiting, and I am totally here for it! A little anti, and a little hero, I'm all kinds of ready for Nimona's energy. How about you? Get your transmog hats on; it's time to get metal!

This episode has a very high level of badness for its size. We'll have to fix that, with abnormal dialogue about alien taxonomy! but, really, this movie is about family, which not even Gantu is stronger than. Straight from that soft spot of my childhood comes, perhaps, my favorite Disney film -along with Hercules, Hunchback, Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast (all number one, duh)- brings a ton of great memories, and certainly one of the best animated characters in history. So let's check it out again and get in touch with our inner city-destroying experiment!

Oh, childhood. When things were so innocent, and before we hit ludicrous speed into adulthood. Back with a vengeance from my brother and my childhoods is Spaceballs the Movie! a wonderfully all-ages adventure through Mel Brooks' Star Wars parody. Join my brother and I as we sleepily recount this staple of our childhood, and hope we don't get captured by Pizza the Hut before the ending.

If you read the description for the Van Helsing episode, and you also know better, you might know that TheDeadedNeko made a fool of me... Well, now it's time for my retribution! Going into this with zero clue as to what we're watching, watch as our Neko friend is terrified to learn that we're watching four old ladies thirsting over Tom Brady for an hour and a half, with Guy Fieri! Well, now that I think about it, this punishment might have backfired...

Once more, into the branch! or breach. Definitely the Whomping Willow. We return to the wizarding world of Hogwarts with two new guests, and find the universe to be far more dark and harrowing than the previous two entries. What gives? Well, Alfonso Cuarón happened, and sweet, sneaky murder happened, at least toward Lily and James Potter. Between that and ratatouille being cooked, what else awaits our unsuspecting viewers?! Come along for the ride and find out!

Oh, Canada... In a film that wholly sticks to the stereotypes of South Park, Stan Helsing manages to keep me laughing- to keep me from crying. At least Kenan Thompson is along for the ride, but I don't think Van Stan from Reba or two legitimately good jokes will be enough for me to survive this one... And just when I thought Van Helsing (2004) was a schlock fest, we manage to stumble upon a film that's even worse! Oh no, Canada...

What do you do when your buddy loves spoof movies, wants to guest star on your podcast on all of them, and talks VERY highly about Stan Helsing, in particular? Well, I guess that means we have to start back at the nexus: Van Halsing. While I've never seen it, I'm quite familiar with the Underworld films, the Resident Evil films, all the early 2000s "dark" horror fare upon which this film seems to be propagated around. The biggest difference? Probably Hugh Jackman, whom I'm a big fan of, so hopefully I won't regret this viewing too much so long as he has a part to play..?

I'm a big fan of heist movies, but I also enjoy cute and fun animal characters. So you can imagine my surprise one night when I woke up in a daze, desperately terrified of there being no real way to combine the two things! Boy, was I in luck to discover that The Bad Guys was exactly what I'd been waiting for! And it also features Sam Rockwell, to boot? Count me in faster than two shakes of a thorax tail!

Well hey! We're gonna get on back to my 90's childhood with a movie released a year before I was born; and certainly one that is quite a bit near and dear to my heart. As somebody who's never exactly pined for the mainstream assembly, I've always had something of an affinity for Belle as a character, and we're going to explore, not only her, but the film as a whole, including Disney mad attempts to claw out a spot for an Oscar on their trophy rack! So I hope you all enjoy!

I've been waiting for this! One of the best reasons to wax poetic about the internet is the wide spread of information, so you can bet I was in awe when I saw an image online of a half-man half-bear creature wielding a rail gun in what was supposed to be "the Russian Avengers". Needless to say, I moved heaven and Earth to find a copy, and now here we are, atop the precipice of greatness. Will this film be off-the-wall amazing? or 'one of the worst films ever made' as touted by Wikipedia?  Only one way to find out...

Part rock-opera, part historical drama, part societal critique, part biwa shredding, part allegory, the trailer for this film kind of promised just about everything under the sun within this period piece. While my knowledge of Japanese history is dodgy at best, we're gonna dive in and ensconce our ears with a great soundtrack, at the very least, hopefully! 

We're off to face abnormal social norms on the fictitious island of Inisherin! Having heard nothing but glowing reviews about this hilariously dark humored film, I'm quite excited to check in and see what all is going on in Martin McDonagh's filmography; after all, this is a reunion between him and the two lead actors. Will it live up to the height? I mean, it was nominated for Best Picture against my reigning best film of 2022, Everything Everywhere All At Once, so let's see how this pan's out!  Perhaps we'll even go 2-2 on films including a character named "Jenny"..?

It's Oscar season! and you know what that means? Snub lists galore of films unduly left out of the festivities. First and foremost among them is RRR, which was nominated for an original song Academy Award, but which falls far short of the praise many of this film's fans feel it deserves. So we're gonna check it out and see if they have a point! I've heard just about everything there is to hear about a movie when it comes to RRR, so I'm expecting a baller time- maybe with some bromance stuff, hmm??

Ah, childhood. So much fun, what with the majesty of staying up all night, not caring about health or the well-being of others beyond my immediate sphere of external understanding, and giant Pokémon gods stealing mothers and using them to fulfill the fever dream of a tiny girl. Yes, that means it's time to check out the third Pokémon film! one of the most baller films of my childhood, right there nestled along with Digimon: The Movie and Spy Kids. Does it hold up? Heck if I know; we'll just have to rewatch it- that's what we do here!