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After Lunch
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Michael and Rob welcome Sue London and Michael DiGiovanni to come help build a cinematic multiverse out of our favorite Christmas specials. We've assigned each other a couple of specials each to crossover, then once we've revealed our mashups, we work together to create an Avengers-style feature combining all eight of the original ideas. It's nice, it's occasionally naughty, but most of all it's fun. Merry Christmas!
In the first part of a sort of crossover with the Advent Calendar House podcast, Mike Westfall joins Michael and Rob to talk about an unusual version of A Christmas Carol. From CBS's 1954 anthology variety show, Shower of Stars, it features Fredric March as Scrooge, Basil Rathbone as Marley, and bunch of questionable songs. And be sure to tune in next Sunday to ACH for Part Two in which Michael and Rob will join Mike to discuss another musical Christmas Carol, 2004's A Christmas Carol: The Musical starring Kelsey Grammer, Jason Alexander, Jane Krakowski, Jennifer Love Hewitt, Jesse L Martin, and Geraldine Chaplin.
Michael and Rob invite Jody Collins and Jacob Bean-Watson over to put up the Christmas decorations and talk about the Ernst Lubitsch classic, The Shop Around the Corner. The movie stars Jimmy Stewart, Margaret Sullavan, and Frank Morgan. And it was of course the inspiration for You've Got Mail. We talk about all of those people and the other characters, as well as the remakes and just how much of a Christmas movie it even is.
Michael and Jess talk about lots of horror stuff including A Ghost Story for Christmas, Lost Boys, Mike Mignola's Hellboy comics, and Dan Brereton's Nocturnals.
Our Sherlock Holmes panel reconvenes as Pax, Jacob, Michael, and Rob talk about the Spielberg-produced '80s favorite (and self-admittedly non-canonical), Young Sherlock Holmes.
Michael, Pax, and Rob talk about lots of stuff including Silver Age Wonder Girl, Man-Wolf, Hell House by Richard Matheson, three Shirley Jackson novels, podcast apps, and Predator: Badlands.
To celebrate the 400th episode of After Lunch (give or take), Michael welcomes back the original Nerd Lunch crew - CT, Jeeg, and Pax - to wrap up some unfinished business from the Nerd Lunch days. In June 2019, Jeeg led the gang, including Michael in the Fourth Chair, in an Overs/Unders exercise to predict what might happen in the proposed Gambit movie starring Channing Tatum. Of course, we never got that movie. Or... we didn't until Deadpool & Wolverine came out last year. It's finally time to tally up the scores and see who is the Best Channing Tatum Gambit Movie Predictor of All Time. And stay tuned to the end for a rerun of the original episode in which we made our predictions.
Michael, Rob, and Pax continue their occasional look at pulp and superhero serials with The Adventures of Smilin' Jack. It's one of Michael's favorites, but will Rob and Pax feel the same way? Starring Tom Brown, Keye Luke, and Rose Hobart.
Michael and Rob are joined by Ben Graham and new guest Nick Casbarro to talk about Nick's novel, Vitalerium: Descent into the Void, and then to determine the greatest spaceship of all time. And of course we determine that the only way we know how: by listing 16 of our favorites, putting them into tournament brackets, and voting on them until only one remains.
Michael and Rob are joined by Joanna from Bloody Popcorn and Shawn Robare to create teams of horror-themed athletes and terrifying events for them to compete in. Who will win the Gold, Silver, and Bronze medals? The Hex Pistols? Scare-istocracy? The Grisly Grahams? The Hellboy Hooies? Pick your favorite team and root them on!
Rob, Michael, and Pax finish up this month's Lounge talking about The Oracle Year by Charles Soule, Disney Dreamlight Valley, Superman comics, Batman: Resurrection by John Jackson Miller, Zach Cregger's Weapons, KPop Demon Hunters, and more!
Michael, Rob, and Pax continue their occasional series covering the Predator movies by talking about the original film starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Carl Weathers, and the introduction of one of the coolest-looking monsters in cinema history. And stay tuned after our conversation for a special rerun of Pax's I Read Movies episode covering the Predator novelization by Paul Monette.
It's Lounging Time again as Rob, Michael, and Pax talk about whatever's on their mind, including French Silk pie, Wonder Woman's daughter, and different ways to use the Pop Culture Eraser.
Michael and Jess talk about Halloween and other spooky things, including the comics Vampire Hunter D: Message from Mars and 30 Days of Night.
Rob, Pax, Jacob, and Michael reconvene our Sherlock Holmes panel to talk about lots of Holmes stuff, including Murder by Decree starring Christopher Plummer and James Mason as Holmes and Watson on the trail of Jack the Ripper.
Michael, Rob, and Pax go back into the Fast and Furious timeline to watch Better Luck Tomorrow, an early Justin Lin film that both he and actor Sung Kang have retroactively declared to be the first appearance of Han from the Fast and Furious series. It's a crime movie, it's a high school movie... it's a Fast and Furious movie? We talk about how well it works in all three of those categories.
Michael, Rob, and Pax welcome very special guest, Tyler Mane (X-Men, Rob Zombie's Halloween) to resurrect an old topic from After Lunch's early days. We each nominate fighters, locations, and complications and discuss Who Would Win? Of course Sabretooth vs Michael Myers comes up, but there are many more epic battles to talk about and argue over. Be sure to check out Tyler's new graphic novel, The Last Spartan: Red Tape, co-written with Christopher Priest.
Kolchak: The Night Stalker started as a couple of TV movies, but when it became a TV series it struggled and only lasted 20 episodes, finally becoming a cult classic thanks to late night reruns. Michael, Rob, and guests DeAndre and Sophie discuss how they would tweak the series to be even better than it was. And also about what they love and wouldn't want to change.
This is the part of the show where Michael and Jess talk about horror, including this month the graphic novels Heathentown by Corinna Bechko and Gabriel Hardman and Plunge by Joe Hill and Stuart Immonen.
For this month's Sherlock Holmes movie, Michael, Rob, Pax, and Jacob go way back to the silent era for Sherlock Holmes starring John Barrymore as Holmes, Roland Young as Watson, and Gustav von Seyffertitz as Moriarty. It's also William Powell's first movie and features Reginald Denny in a small, but important role.



