Episodes
Monday Jan 04, 2016
The Hero's Journey
Monday Jan 04, 2016
Monday Jan 04, 2016
[School of Everything Else 2016]
This show (which is one of the best individual podcasts we've ever put together) is all about The Hero's Journey. It explores the monomyth, the idea that nearly all of the tales that we embrace as a species are telling the same story.
Carl Jung theorized with the collective unconscious that our brains are all roughly the same shaped organ, with very similar emotional responses which have remained very similar for thousands of years, so it stands to reason that there would be certain universally appealing themes that we like to explore time and again.
Joseph Campbell codified this in the 1940s by examining our mythology, dating back to ancient times and analyzing recurring patterns in the most abiding stories from all over the world when he put together his seminal work; The Hero With a Thousand Faces. This includes a multi-part symbolic series of events a hero always seems to go through in some form or another and what that really means.
Christopher Vogler took this further with his book The Writer's Journey, examining the most popular and successful movies and the similarities therein.
And we ourselves have produced literally hundreds of podcasts covering our favourite movies, the greater proportion of which this manner of thinking can be applied to.
So it's time to take a deep dive into what those steps are and why they are so important to our species.
Joining us are Megan Hopwood and Lorin Grieve, both of whom have also taken a longtime interest in this.
You're in for a treat here.
Sunday Jan 03, 2016
The Hobbit: Epilogue
Sunday Jan 03, 2016
Sunday Jan 03, 2016
[School of Everything Else 2016]
Mirroring our Lord of the Rings Prologue recorded all the way back in 2012 and leading us into the Peter Jackson and Weta Middle-earth series, this is the bookend that marks its closing.
Less of a celebration of the immense achievement pulling off this second trilogy was (for that you can listen to the individual review shows), this is instead a post-mortem where myself, Sharon and Chris Eason of GameBurst (who has been with us for every one of the Tolkein shows) dissect the carcass of the lesser film adaptations of Tolkein's lesser work.
Far from jump-starting a second wave of fascination with fantasy, these three movies seem to have put a lid on the entire genre, with great success at the box office but lukewarm critical and audience response. This leaves it to other movie series' to reinvigorate public interest, a task made far harder by the existence of these films.
We adore Weta Workshop and the cast and crew of this whole saga (listening to the five hour reviews of each of the Lord of the Rings movies should make that clear), so this is deeply painful for us, but it is an investigation and a conversation that needed to happen as we account for the good, the bad and the ugly, over-designed troll with spiked maces on his amputated legs, cleavers on his amputated arms, and chained hooks through his blinded eyeballs.
Friday Jan 09, 2015
The Seven Most Important Superhero Movies
Friday Jan 09, 2015
Friday Jan 09, 2015
[Digital Drift 2014]
On this very special episode (in the week I'm celebrating eight years in the podcasting game) I gathered Bob "Moviebob" Chipman, Parris Lilly of "Gamertag Radio" and Joe Cunningham of the "Cinematic Universe" podcast, and along with my wife and co-host Sharon Shaw we asked ourselves...
Which are the seven most important superhero movies to date?
Not our favourites, not best, most important.
We debated them up and down the history and our conclusions may surprise you... or they may be the exact seven you chose in which case you have your finger well and truly on the pulse because we spent ages on this. It's a brilliant episode and one I was so proud to host. A big thank you to our guests who brought all kinds of intelligent and reasoned viewpoints along with them.
Friday Jan 03, 2014
We Hate Movies
Friday Jan 03, 2014
Friday Jan 03, 2014
[Digital Drift 2014]
This week we talk to two of the hosts of one of the funniest, most insightful movie podcasts we've yet heard; Andrew Jupin and Eric Szyszka of We Hate Movies.
As is discussed on the show, don't let the name fool you. You'd be hard pressed to find a bunch of chaps who love movies more than these guys, and while they often cover well-known stinkers they most frequently mine comedy value from films nobody ever seems to talk about, which tend to be the obscure, the ridiculous and/or the terrible. For many years they have accumulated a vast archive of reviews and experimental tangent shows, so once you've heard this episode go ahead and mosey on over to www.whmpodcast.com and check out what's on offer in the full collection. Then subscribe on iTunes and you'll find a generous helping of their shows on there.
I'll confess to being a little excited at getting these guys on our show as we take the opportunity to ask all about how they started out, their review style, why they focus on these forgotten, dubious gems and we get to showcase some of the funniest moments of the past few years, including...
Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull, Jaws: The Revenge, Casper, After Earth, Star Trek: Insurrection and Ewoks: The Battle for Endor.
We also talk a little about my show for the benefit of newcomers, and why I haven't yet covered the Transformers franchise. Five more episodes of We Hate Movies, I heartily recommend for my listeners
Bad Boys II, Batman Forever, Godzilla, Mrs Doubtfire and A Good Day to Die Hard (Because we sure as shit will not be covering that last one).
Wednesday Jan 02, 2013
The Future of Star Wars
Wednesday Jan 02, 2013
Wednesday Jan 02, 2013
[Digital Gonzo 2013]
A show we did as soon as George Lucas sold Lucasfilm to Disney. It's obviously as dated as hell now, but fun to look back on how we felt at that early stage.
We also watch and give some highlighted commentary on the Star Wars Holiday Special.
Friday Jan 14, 2011
Bottom Five Movies
Friday Jan 14, 2011
Friday Jan 14, 2011
[Digital Gonzo 2011]
A show wherein my guests and I scrape the very bottom of the barrel and locate our five most hated movies each.
Wednesday Jan 05, 2011
Movie Cliches
Wednesday Jan 05, 2011
Wednesday Jan 05, 2011
[Digital Gonzo 2011]
In this show I'm joined by Neil Taylor and James Batchelor of GameBurst along with regular Gonzo guest Matt Ramsey.
Part of the inspiration for this show came from reading Ebert's Bigger Little Movie Glossary: A Greatly Expanded and Much Improved Compendium of Movie Cliches, Stereotypes, Obligatory Scenes, Hackneyed, Shopworn Conventions and Outdated Archetypes (available from all good book shops or indeed on Amazon)
It is a compilation of multiple submissions from Ebert's own fanbase edited into an alphabetical compendium. For the show today I formed the best of these into four sections; Horror/Action/Rom-Com and Old Hollywood. My guest's job is to listen to the first part of the cliche's I read them and fill in the rest themselves, citing examples and rare exceptions. It's pretty goddamn hilarious.
Saturday Feb 21, 2009
Fight Club
Saturday Feb 21, 2009
Saturday Feb 21, 2009
[Digital Cowboys 2010]
An early prototype for the film show that would eventually become Digital Gonzo. This is what we thought of Tyler Durdan in 2010. We think differently now.
Sunday Jan 20, 2008
Our 10 Favourite Movies
Sunday Jan 20, 2008
Sunday Jan 20, 2008
[Digital Cowboys 2008]
Paul, Tony and I collate ten of our all time favourite movies together in some semblance of order.
Monday Jan 14, 2008
Meet the Spartans / Son of Rambow
Monday Jan 14, 2008
Monday Jan 14, 2008
[Digital Cowboys 2008]
Paul's scorching review of the execrable Meet the Spartans, followed by Alex talking Son of Rambow.
Sunday Jan 06, 2008
Movies to Show Your Kids
Sunday Jan 06, 2008
Sunday Jan 06, 2008
[Digital Cowboys 2008]
Tony, Paul and I discuss what movies might be good for kids. And this was at a time when not one of us actually had a child.
Monday Jan 29, 2007
Little Man / 30 Days of Night / Sicko
Monday Jan 29, 2007
Monday Jan 29, 2007
[Digital Cowboys 2007]
A truly awful comedy that won't make you laugh. A scary as hell vampire film that will make you feel cold. And a look at socialised healthcare that may make you sick to hear about, considering how both Britain and America have progressed medically in the years since.