Lots to cover this week in another 4-hour + conversation between Ammon, Falvey, and Law. Google Voice is packed as usual and we get calls form The Macho Man, Art From Cali, Lance, the return of Denny Luis, Bill Tremendous, El Mariachi, and The Random Canadian. All are drunk. Most are incoherent.
TV Round Up is in there, as is a special C.H.U.D version of Movie Homework. We check in on the Fantasy Movie League, Lawlapalooza 2016, and Ammon’s Big Foot shenanigans.
There are even some reviews. We got TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES: OUT OF THE SHADOWS, ZOOTOPIA, NEIGHBORS 2, KINDERGARTEN COP 2, CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR, and a healthy argument about 10 CLOVERFIELD LANE.
It’s all good in the hood. Until it isn’t and we can’t talk good no more. Then we hang up.
0:00:00-You know what time it is.
0:02:00-Ammon is ready at the start. Meanwhile, fucking Valley is later. The term cocksucker is huge now. You’re welcome. BMFMLFML points discussion. LAWLAPALOOZA IS HAPPENING: July 24 through the 27. Mark your calendars, bitches.
0:42:50-New Sounder from Matt Wilson, aka Old King Clancy.
0:46:11-GOOGLE VOICE
1:41:35-TV ROUND UP. Game of Thrones starts off the segment. Preacher is up next. Side bar to to X-Men. Bob Ross? Sure. More X-Men, as Valley fifes over the animated series from the ’90s. Law transitions to the Spider-Man cartoon from the same decade. Ammon is quiet as fuck during all this. Valley gets the mic again and talks about the Larry Sanders show. Comic book shows get focused on again as Valley delves into Daredevil Season 2. Gilbert dissects The Path’s Season Finale and tells Law why he should watch it. Should Valley watch Bloodline? Law lets him know.
2:34:05-MOVIE HOMEWORK: C.H.U.D.
2:49:06-Twitter Sounders
2:54:49-WHAT DID YOU WATCH? Valley has one movie (which Law and Ammon both watched as well), which was Zootopia. Disney Animation’s IMDB Page gets looked at. How do you follow all that? With fucking Kindergarten Cop 2. Holy shitballs. Gilbert moves onto 10 Cloverfield Lane and Captain America: Civil War. Law checked out Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows. That’s it, show’s over. Cowabunga assholes.
Ammon and Episode IV join Law as they find their way through so much nonsense. Almost too much nonsense. Things kick off with Valley’s obsession with our ole Big Foot buddy, Sass Quatch. That quickly becomes a delirious rant about Garrett Collins’ remarks about the ROUGE ONE trailer from last week. One or more of us immaturely lose our shit over this.
Then it’s on to Google Voice where our wonderful fans call in to yell at us, demean us in foreign languages, sing us filthy songs, and then yell at us some more.
Somewhere in here there`s a Literally Literary conversation. I think it`s here.
Movie Homework is ELECTION and it’s glorious.
TV Round-Up starts but is interrupted not once but twice by Dead Jax calling us for some reason and long time listener, El Mariachi calls in to leave a voicemail and gets the real deal. Other than those clowns, we talk about Banshee, Better Call Saul, Game of Thrones, The Family, Vinyl, The Larry Sanders Show, and more.
What Did You Watch is all about KRAMPUS, ALL THINGS MUST PASS, and THE INVITATION.
Before we go we play a stupid round of Stupid Comments. It’s stupid. Then we go.
By the time this article posts, varied opinions of Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice will have been discussed on these very airwaves, and people will either say they feel vindicated at what a hunk of junk they had just seen or praise it due to the way Zack Snyder apes panels for the sake of visual flare. No matter what you feel, chances are you will either disagree with my feelings (likely) or run with the one way of thinking you have had since the movie was announced.
Let’s examine that last sentence, shall we? As I have outlined in our character retrospectives leading up to this release, in the years most people my age have grown up in, there have been dreams made about it, action figures displaying it, and halted attempts at getting it made. I bet even people in the 60s, people who were watching Adam West Plunk and Pow Cesar Romero’s mustached Joker on a weekly basis, were also reading Superman comics, imagining what would have happened if the two collided. This was a movie sixty plus years in the making. So why the hell has it been met with such a huge backlash ever since the team-up was finally announced back at 2013’s Comic Con?
Well first off, some people outside the business I talk to just cannot wrap their heads around how the hell Batman has a chance against a seemingly impenetrable alien from Krypton. Before people start calling out all the ways this is possible, let me get to the next bit of contention. Just who was behind the film to begin with.
Man of Steel is a love it or hate it movie for most people. It is also the movie that sent Christopher Nolan to a place where he still hasn’t crawled out from. Apparently, if stories from that film’s making are to be believed, it was Nolan who was dead set against setting up Superman as a sort of misunderstood Earth destruction hazard. Enter director Zack Snyder and writer David S Goyer. Two people who are certainly contentious amongst those who follow the behind the scenes aspect of film, they pushed and pushed for the end of Man of Steel to happen the way it did, as they were convinced they could pay it off. What they did not count on -and what Nolan was right about all along- is for people to not go for the ending as a means to justify what they were setting up. So automatically, they were up against a wall. Should moviegoers have at least given the film a chance? Even after a generally well received Comic Con panel a couple years ago, which revealed the ‘do you bleed’ line, and ‘Batfleck’ eventually warming the public up to his side, the aura of hate surrounding it could not be ignored. Even Moreno, during a podcast where we showed him the first Batman V Superman teaser trailer for the first time, said ‘I almost feel bad for DC in a way, because they just cannot seem to get it right.’
What is it about film that makes us have such knee jerk reactions to it? I know, it is an odd question for someone like me to ask, as I have been on a pretty recent tear about the new Rogue One teaser, which was released last week. But what I want to make clear is that my issues with this particular film have nothing to do with wanting to bash it. I just see a piece of media calling itself Star Wars and yes, there are some of those walkers we know all about. But each and every archetype on display in the trailer almost sickened me. As unjustifiable as that may seem, Star Wars being turned into a yearly commercial commodity instead of a magical experience without any (or too much) quality control makes me feel like I have a viable reason to not like it. But again, is that hate? I sure as hell do not bash the trailer with that intention. I just do not like being pandered to.
I do not want to act like I am writing something and then pretend I am practicing what I preach. The types of hate inflicted on a weekly barrage of trailers for movies which sometimes do not come out for at least a year after their initial release is a trend which is unfortunately not going away. People have their own methods of madness, as in their heads they justify their stance by ‘knowing’ how and where to approach a film’s making. But unless we have the status of a Nolan, a Snyder, or even a (gulp) Goyer, we unfortunately have no say in how it plays out. A backlash against Man of Steel‘s ending may have been what created Batman V Superman to begin with. But the excuse of ‘this is a whole new Superman for a whole new generation’ is not going to hold any water for people wanting to hate you to begin with. And yes, this goes for me and Rogue One as well.
Greetings one and all. Welcome to the first of hopefully many columns here on Binge Media from yours truly, the super Canadian and master of the Batch Bomb.
I’ve wanted to do a column for a while now and I figured why not start one in 2016, so here we are. As a fan of all things pop culture, I’ll use my personal space here to talk all things comics, gaming, TV, wrestling, and other issues that may come up from time to time. Let’s get to it.
Let’s start in the wrestling world and the awesomeness of New Japan. Granted, most of it is in Japanese commentary, but with the AXS TV show and the fact that they are starting to use Matt Striker and Kevin Kelly for English commentary, it’s only going to help increase their exposure into North America. I’ve been to two ROH shows they’ve done with New Japan talent the past few years here in Toronto, and they are well aware that their imprint is growing with wrestling fans.
Now, one of the biggest stories coming out of Wrestle Kingdom 10 is the talent raid WWE has done with AJ Styles, Luke Gallows, Karl Anderson and Shinkse Nakamura all rumored being signed by the WWE. This is huge. Anderson and Gallows are the heart of the Bullet Club and them joining Finn Balor in NXT will be amazing. WWE has started the “Balor Club” already and personally, I would debut AJ in the Royal Rumble now that Roman Reigns has to defend the strap against 29 other guys in the match. Shinske Nakamura in WWE blows my mind as he is currently my favorite talent in Japan. He is charismatic as fuck and hopefully won’t get buried in the mid- card because he is a main-event talent. They have a dream match for fans between him and Daniel Bryan for WrestleMania this year and they just need to pull the trigger on it. On the next wrestling version of the Binge SportsCast, Luke and I will discuss this situation in much more depth as the news continues to break.
Well, it took me a while but i finally got a chance to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens in theaters.. twice. Once in 2D and once in 3D and I’ll continue my personal stance that 3D is bullshit. I hate how it makes the film so bloody dark so just see it in 2D. As for the flick itself, I loved every second of it. I don’t care about spoilers, so i knew all the twists going in and it didn’t change my enjoyment at all. It just sucks that we have to wait two years for the next one. Now, one of the most interesting debates going on with the film is weather Finn is force sensitive or not. I say he is… not as much as Rey,but there is something there. To me, “The Force Awakens” refers to Finn using the force to snap out of his stormtrooper training. He chose the light side because he knew what the Empire was doing was wrong. As the old saying goes, there is no such thing as luck to a Jedi and Finn is the luckiest motherfucker in that universe. From escaping with Poe to pretty much instantly mastering every weapon he puts his hands on to running into Rey, followed by Han and Chewie and all the rest, I really hope that by Episode IX, he’s a Jedi. Rey ain’t gonna be able to take Kylo and the First Order down all by herself. Needless to say, after the second viewing, I rushed out and bought the Disney Infinity Force Awakens pack to play as Finn and Rey…fucking toys to life money grab. You kill my wallet, but I love you so.
This brings me to what I’ve been playing recently, as heard on the Super Mario Bros. commentary that Kupka, Episode IV, and I did. I’ve been hip deep in Marvel Heroes 2015 and there is no stopping me; I love that game and I really am forcing myself not to spend real cash on it. It’s free to play but you can spend real money to buy characters for around 10 bucks each in the game. It’s interesting with both Lego Dimensions and the Disney Infinity games as it’s kinda the same thing, but at least with those you get a cool collectible that will collect dust on your shelf. With Marvel Heroes, it’s all virtual. So far, I have unlocked Rocket Raccoon, Doctor Strange, Iceman, Captain America, Star-Lord, and Ant-man. I’ve maxed out Doc, Rocket and Ice Man to level 60 and my long-term goal is to unlock all 50+ characters without spending a dime. Time will tell on that one.
I like what I’ve played so far with Lego Dimensions. I picked up the Doctor Who level pack and it is so much fun. I love that Peter Capaldi did his own voice for the game. I don’t think I will go full out “I gotta collect them all” with the Dimensions stuff, but I will pick up the Ghostbuster and Back to the Future packs for sure.
And lastly in comics. It’s a hard time to be a DC fan as I have pretty much hated everything they have done with The New 52. Growing up, I was a hardcore Flash and Titans fan and now it’s just so annoying to read them. I have been enjoying what they’ve been doing with the We Are Robin book and the Batman and Robin eternal weekly book. With the introduction of Cassandra Cain in New 52 continuity, they can finally stop having to answer when she’s coming at Q&A sessions at conventions. Now if only they would give us the real Wally West back, but that’s a column and a rant for another day. If I were to recommend a book right now, it’s probably the Archie reboot of books that Mark Waid and Chip Zdarski are writing over for archie comics. I dig the new art style and the overall feel for the books. They feel modern, but not hokey, and if you have fond memories of those old Digests, you need to pick them up and give them a read.
Well, there is the first Batch’s Batch. What are your thoughts on the state of wrestling, gaming and comics. Feel free to leave a comment below and give me your thoughts and recommendations. You can find me on Twitter @multiversefive and oh yeah, fuck John Cena.
#babadickclub
Some big updates all around as I’ve added up the box office, gave proper nudity points to Rooney Mara and Alicia Vikander, and added the Golden Globes winners. I need Star Wars to stay on top for 3 more weeks to ensure I have a chance at the top three. Oscar nominations will be out soon also so keep an eye out for those. That’s all I got. Go listen to the BingeCast.
I know. I promised no more Star Wars related articles. But this topic was deep in my craw and needed to come out. Now.
Star Wars The Force Awakens has been out over a couple weeks now. Most are praising it as a return to form for their favorite space franchise. Others are calling it nothing more than a slavish recreation of things past. For quite awhile, I was straddling the fence of which way I leaned. But after giving the movie another shot outside a premiere environment, I decided that I lean more toward the latter side. Director JJ Abrams did not hold back in his love for the franchise, and it seems this is the movie he has been wanting to make ever since he rejuvenated the Star Trek franchise seven years ago.
Somewhere in the middle, lies our good friend George Lucas. Now, he was at the premiere of The Force Awakens, and appeared to be all smiles. I saw him from a distance, and Abrams even took pictures with him, and I’m sure stories were exchanged.
This part of the evening quite frankly baffled me, and I’ll explain why. The making of The Force Awakens is quite a story in of itself. As of late, Lucas has been thoroughly open about the fact that after Disney bought the rights to all things Lucasfilm in late 2012, he was deeply involved in reviving his characters for a planned one off. And if all went well, another two installments after that. Working with writer Michael Arndt (Toy Story 3) and Abrams himself, the story was supposedly going to revolve around Han and Leia’s grandchildren. Here is where details get sketchy. Abrams purportedly did not like where the story was going and, with permission from Lucasfilm head Kathleen Kennedy, fired both Arndt (who still possesses a writing credit on the finished film) AND Lucas off the project. That’s right. The man who came up with the world Abrams was going to expand on, was no longer going to be involved, taken off by a hired hand. As quietly as this chain of events happened, there was no word of sour grapes at the time. Lucas had even gone out of his way to say to members of the press who asked him that he wishes Abrams luck. For his part, Abrams hired Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi scribe Lawrence Kasdan to work deeper on the project, and the rest, as they say, is history.
But what about George? Well, after The Force Awakens‘ second trailer almost quite literally set the internet on fire back in April, Lucas said that he had not even seen it. I found this quite odd. Either Lucas was doing his best to just stay out of the limelight and bathe in his over $4 billion in assets gained from the sale of his franchise. Or, and this last week has made this a stronger possibility, he was going out of his way to let Abrams know that no matter what he did to his characters, Lucas was not going to care. In essence, the most subtle pissing match between two Hollywood titans raged on.
Flash forward to the week before The Force Awakens opens. Lucas comes out in the press saying he has had a screening of the movie, and that he thought it was ‘fun.’ Not a damning review. But also not an overtly positive one. Couple this with internet videos released that week of Lucas appearing almost hurt, letting out in the open for the first time that he did indeed have ideas which Disney rejected. They apparently decided to go with a new vision, and the ousting of Lucas was only the beginning.
Now’s when it gets fun. Starting this week, Lucas has been even more open with his thoughts on the movie. This time, there was no skating around his true feelings. Here is an exact excerpt of what he said on the Charlie Rose Show (that thing is STILL on?!) this week:
“They wanted to do a retro movie. I don’t like that. Every movie I work very hard to make completely different, with different planets, with different spaceships, make it new.”
So says the guy who came up with the idea of having two out of three films of the original trilogy contain a Death Star as its main weapon. But that’s beside the point. If what Lucas is saying is indeed true, then his ousting from the project had nothing to do with Abrams and company wanting to do something new. They wanted to do the exact same things as before, specifically the things that worked before 1999’s The Phantom Menace was released and supposedly ‘raped everyone’s childhood.’ Now as far as how true these logistics hold true with each and every character in The Force Awakens, I will hold off on until at least another month or so. Yes, that S P word is still being honored here.
But Lucas goes on:
“They looked at (my) stories, and they said, ‘we want to make something for the fans…’ They decided they didn’t want to use those stories, they decided they were going to do their own thing….They weren’t that keen to have me involved anyway..but if I get in there, I’m just going to cause trouble, because they’re not going to do what I want them to do. And I don’t have the control to do that anymore, and all I would do is muck everything up. And so I said, ‘Okay, I will go my way, and I’ll let them go their own way.”
But perhaps his hardest hitting bit of commentary came next, when he addresses Hollywood’s lack of taking chances, thereby playing it safe.
“Everybody went out and made spaceship movies and they were all horrible and they all lost tons of money. And you say, there’s more to it than that. You can’t just go out there and do spaceships. Of course, the only way you can make money is not take chances. Only do something that’s proven. You gotta remember. Star Wars came from nowhere. American Graffiti came from nowhere. There was nothing like it. Now, if you do anything that’s not a sequel or not a TV series or doesn’t look like one, they won’t do it.”
The words of a bitter man? Maybe. But, what does a man with a $4 billion empire have to be bitter about? What I grasped onto in this whole bit of commentary is his calling The Force Awakens a ‘retro movie.’ Looking back on the finished movie, he’s not wrong. Be honest. Did it REALLY propel a story forward, or just play off the same tropes that worked before? I have said since the beginning. There are worse things in this world than a glossed up remake of A New Hope (yes numbskulls, I KNOW it’s not a remake. Stop convincing me and yourselves of this). But by taking these tropes and putting them onscreen in a new glossed up format, The Force Awakens is being praised as a return to form for the franchise. Is it, really?
And where does this leave Lucas? Again, I had promised myself -and my Binge bosses- that there would be no more Star Wars articles for the time being. But seeing this situation develop, and even being present for part of it, made me take a step back and wonder. Think Steven Spielberg is regretting not taking a Star Wars directing gig now that one third of the Bearded Trio has seen his creations fall into the hands of corporate minded Disney? As that final set of credits graced the movie screen of my second viewing, the entire theater was clapping wildly as if the home team had hit a World Series winning home run. The tried and true tropes that Abrams displayed and Lucas had described in his Charlie Rose interview had indeed worked its magic. Yet all I thought was, ‘so this how Star Wars democracy dies, with thunderous applause?’
Ok, enough Star Wars talk. There are many other things in the film world to write about. And I promise, dear readers, I will start getting to those, next week.
The STAR WARS points are here but have yet to cause any serious movement. Time will tell if they put anybody into the playoffs. Until then, sit back and relax. There’s still a long way to go in the season. Click the link below for the entire spreadsheet.
What did you all do on Christmas Day? Let me rephrase. What did all you normal people do on Christmas Day? Probably spend it with loved ones and get drunk in front of the TV watching either basketball or movies. What did Jason and I do? We got drunk and taped our final Binge Movie Aftertaste of the year.
Since Jason had just gotten out of Star Wars Episode VII, we decided to give a brief description of our initial feelings towards it. Though we also share our story of the time a couple days before when we recorded this exact portion of the podcast together at a resort hotel room, only to have it come out sounding like shit, resulting in us having to record it again.
We then give our top ten films of 2015 lists. Something you should know. You probably won’t find the majority of these choices on anyone else’s list. Is that a bad thing? Let us know.
We also spend some time at the end of the show giving a few examples of what we have planned for the first few months of the year, and the immediate future of the show. Thanks to all of you for your continued support. We have tinkered with the format a bit, and all the Binge listeners have been nothing but supportive. We will continue to keep things rolling on the show, and hopefully give you all some updates on our own film careers as well. Things are heating up, and you all are more than partly to thank for that.
Listen, drink, and enjoy. We hope everyone has an awesome and safe new year.
It’s been a week since most of us have gone to see the new episode of the Star Wars saga, and if you’re anything like me you’re really feeling a galaxy sized gap in your heart. It feels as if nothing can fill the void that is left behind after walking out of the theater, other than another viewing of The Force Awakens. I have to say, I was probably the most satisfied by Episode VII, than I have been by another movie in a long time. This movie had a way of cutting to the core of your heart of nerdiness, and just giving you an amazing time at the theaters. Sure, it had a few things to nitpick at, but really overall I can’t find myself wanting to watch another movie any more than I want to watch this one. I loved Kylo Ren, and BB-8 was the absolute boss. Finn was an excellent new addition, and Rey looks to be a very important new character. Poe was the fighter of a lifetime, and his bromance with Finn was applause-worthy. There were so many other great moments in the movie to make it one of the best of the year, and I’m finding it difficult to have a drink or vice that can please me greater than this film. However, I did finish up the rest of the Star Wars canon-worthy comic books that I had ready to read, and boy did I save the best for last. So if you’re looking to get your Star Wars fix and maybe can’t make it to the movies, try to get your hands on these excellent Star Wars comics in the meantime. We can only hope that the Blu-ray release for this film comes sooner rather than later… Before we delve in, I hope everyone has a Merry Bingemas, Christmas, and a Happy Holiday this week/weekend!!!
First up this week was Star Wars: Darth Vader, which seems to be a series that will follow Darth Vader’s quest for knowledge. It ended up connecting with the main title, which I will review here shortly. This first volume opened up with Vader having a visit and small chat with Jabba the Hutt. Jabba unfortunately believes himself more powerful than he really is, and it opened the book with a ton of suspense. Vader and Jabba have a war of words, albeit in disguise as pleasantry, other than Vader’s matter-of-fact statements about Jabba’s stupidity to believe he can best the Sith lord. The book opening like this put me right in the mood to read the rest, and it really sets the tone for the book. It’s a dark, suspenseful, brooding type of book that obviously follows our favorite Sith master Darth Vader and his evil exploits. Watching the battle of wits between the two in the beginning was a lot of fun, and it only gets better from there. As Vader is on the search for the man who attacks the Empire from underneath them, he eventually comes to find out the name of his attacker. Much to his surprise, it is a familiar name that literally causes the glass around him to fracture and show just how tormented Vader is about to be by his past. Those of us who are familiar with the films obviously know about all of this lore, but the book really helps to solidify some of what is in the movies, and gives us some behind the scenes of what Vader was up to in between. I really enjoyed this book, and I’ve recommended it to all Star Wars fans. This book does tie into the main Marvel title in the last scene I mentioned here, and honestly the next book was even better.
Marvel’s Star Wars title has been around for awhile. There were already Star Wars comics in the past under the Marvel banner, and I’ve tried to read them. The ones I read that were any good to me were some of the newer ones with newer characters, but unfortunately those are now no longer canon. I’m not sure about the state of the original Marvel Comics series, but I would imagine that they have to be some sort of canon considering their owner and also their content. They started as adaptations of the original trilogy of films, and some of those issues are contained within the new canon hardcovers so I guess we will see in due time. Skywalker Strikes is the first volume of the new Marvel series, and it was a seriously good book. It opens with Han making his way into an Empire base as a smuggler, and somehow no one questions his company. As the book continues to open, we see that Han, Leia, Luke, and R2 have decided to try and attack the Empire at its heart. Luke ends up splitting from the rest as things go haywire and Vader arrives on the base. As Luke continues to learn the powers of the Force, he is assisted by his former master and tries to get revenge on Vader. All the while, C-3PO is stuck in a tough predicament with the Millenium Falcon off site, where he was supposed to come from to rescue the crew. This all evolves into another small story in the back half of the book, and we have some surprising new canonical revelations about some of our most familiar characters. This book was outstanding, and the art was awesome. I seriously cannot wait for more of Marvel’s Star Wars.
Last but not least was the comic book that was part of the Journey to the Force Awakens movement, Shattered Empire. This book chronicles the time after the Emperor’s death, where we see Luke and company tackling the remaining sects of the Empire. I’m not sure if the first two books spoiled me a bit, but this one was a little less entertaining. You learn a little bit about some future characters, but we also get some hints at what is going on in The Force Awakens. I have two big theories that spun out of the new film, and I’m not going to spoil them here. However, one of my theories receives some evidence in this book and I’m really glad to see it, because it proves that I’m not crazy for thinking what I have been about a certain new character. I would welcome those who are curious to ask below and maybe we can have a small discussion about the revelations, but holy crap is it awesome. Also present is a mirage of Darth Maul, which I find very suspicious and wonder how he’s going to tie into future stories as he’s obviously still around and haunting the Force. We return to Naboo, and a lot of story follows Leia as well as she ties up some of her responsibilities as royalty. The art was the main thing that I found unpleasing to the eye here, because some of the time the characters have a very manga-esque appearance and I’m not too crazy about that for these characters. One full page in particular had Luke with some very funky looking eyes, but otherwise again the art is beautiful. Also, much like all of the other books listed above and before, the covers are outstanding and the alternates are even better. If you’re looking for your next Star Wars fix like me, and maybe don’t like to read the book hefty books, these three comic books here will provide plenty of new story, characters, and joy to your galaxy.