Friday, March 25, 2016

You Will Believe a Man Can Podcast



I'm spending more time podcasting lately, so it's a shame that I'm so lousy when it comes to telling people about it. Here's some stuff I've been up to the last few weeks. I've included links in the descriptions, but everything's also available on iTunes.

On the most recent Starmageddon episode we talked about Star Wars 8 director Rian Johnson, whom I'm a big fan of thanks to Looper and The Brothers Bloom and Dan likes for his episodes of Breaking Bad. We also geeked out about Bryan Fuller's coming on board the new Star Trek TV series and how that's going to be a tough show to dismiss by people upset about CBS All Access. Finally, we also had a great discussion about the idea of canon, especially as the term is used in the Star Wars universe. Is it a useful concept or just a marketing tool?



Early this month, the Mystery Movie Night gang got together again for our second episode. Sadly, my brother Mark couldn't join us for this one, but Erik Johnson led the rest of us in a discussion about classic '50s scifi, '90s teen comedy, and a Disney "masterpiece." Is Forbidden Planet as good as it is influential? Is 10 Things I Hate About You a worthy heir to the John Hughes legacy? Does The Lion King live up to its reputation as a Disney classic? And what do all of these movies have in common? Plus: Our favorite Disney animated features!



We're adding a new feature to Dragonfly Ripple called "Riplets," basically mini-episodes that fall outside the format of the regular show. Our first one features Carlin and Annaliese checking out ALT*Con Florida 2016, their local sci-fi and gaming convention. It's a companion piece to Carlin's Nerd Lunch "Extra Helping" which has him and Annaliese live at the show, conducting interviews. The Riplet is their follow-up chat after the show, focused on Annaliese's thoughts about the experience.



Early this week, Pax and I dropped another episode of our Western podcast, Hell Bent for Letterbox. In this one, we talk about Kurt Russell's other Western from last year, Bone Tomahawk. But not before we mention other Western things we've been up to like The Covered Wagon (1923), Hang ‘Em High (1968), and the comics Django/Zorro and Manifest Destiny.



And then finally (for now), Carlin and I got to appear as guests on Pax's other podcast (with co-hosts Jaime Hood and Shawn Robare), Cult Film Club. Jaime wasn't able to be on this one, but Carlin and I filled in as best we could, helping Shawn and Pax mark the opening of Batman v Superman with a discussion of Superman IV: The Quest for Peace. It's a great conversation about a movie that - messed up as it is in many places - is still one of my favorite Superman films.

7 comments:

Erik Johnson Illustrator said...

I'm a bit envious of your appearance on the Cult Film Club to talk about Superman IV since Quest for Peace was actually my first exposure to the Christopher Reeve film series. I caught the beginning on TV when I was about 11 and stopped during the elders of Krypton scene, figuring I would have to watch the previous movies to know what was going on here.

Well, I still don't know what was going on, but I'm glad I got to watch the other movies.

Won't be long now until we'll be talking about another comic book movie!

Paxton said...

OMFG, I could go on and on about the idea of "canon" and how dumb it is that people freak the f**k out about it. Star Wars people are some of the worst, but comic book people do it to.

I just want a good story with characters I like. It seems absurd to me to argue what did or did not actually "happen" in a fictional universe.

Is that just me?

Michael May said...

"Won't be long now until we'll be talking about another comic book movie!"

Looking forward to it! Just watched How to Train Your Dragon last night and we'll do Guardians this weekend. You figured out the connection yet?

"Is that just me?"

Definitely not just you. What especially gets me about Star Wars fandom is that no one cared until Disney started making official declarations about what is and isn't canon. Before that, did anyone think that Jaxxon was really canon? Or the events of the Ewoks movies? Or the Droids cartoon? We all knew that they weren't. And we all knew that when it came down to it, neither were the Solo Twins.

It's totally reasonable to be sad that there won't be new stories about favorite EU characters or concepts, but that was always a risk. Lucas would often contradict the EU, which meant that EU writers got to scramble and retcon and try to bring everything back into line again. That was part of the fun.

What's so silly about the idea of the new canon is that it's already becoming this nebulous thing. The new LEGO show clearly isn't canon, but I also question how seriously we're supposed to take Darth Vader's running around with evil 3PO and R2 in his comic. Or even Rebels.

Erik Johnson Illustrator said...

I just revisited "How to train your Dragon" and have Guardians on the docket. However I'm considering whether I should view the sequels the other films as well. "Dragon 2" would be fun to rewatch, but the trailer for Fugitive's sequel, "US Marshals" looks cheesy even with the added bonus of Robert Downey Jr. Have you ever seen "US Marshals"?

Michael May said...

Yeah! I like US Marshals. I'd forgotten Downey is in it! Even though Ford was the big star of The Fugitive, Tommy Lee Jones was everybody's favorite part, so US Marshals is just more of that.

Siskoid said...

This is the only episode released where I immediately knew the connection! But of course, I would.

Been enjoying the show, and one left to go on my pod-listening device.

Michael May said...

Ha! Of course you would. :D

LinkWithin

Related Posts with Thumbnails