The Enchanter never wrote up this episode and I didn’t want to wait or make you all wait any longer. I’ll update this when he does.
All posts by Weltall
Popcorn Pulse 70: Police Panda
What happens when you take the guy who played Angel in X-Men 3 and put him in a film that is a spiritual adaptation of Dead Space? Nothing until you add in another Popcorn Pulse Alumni Dennis Quaid. Jointly, we talk about Pandorum[2009].
A terribly advertised movie with trailers that seemed to try and invoke the memories of Event Horizon. It’s set on a spaceship where Ben Foster wakes up with amnesia. He quickly runs into Dennis Quaid who gives him the quest to bring the core back online before it blows up the ship. As Ben makes his way through the ship, fighting possible space madness and reavers, he begins to learn that things aren’t quite what they seem. We fully spoil the twist of the movie within the episode though. Continue reading Popcorn Pulse 70: Police Panda
Manga Pulse 365: Tachi Wachi Lan Wan
It’s rolypoly season finally and the boys are busy cracking open cold ones and getting rekt. Is that how you use such internet slang? We are sure how to do, fellow kids. We have all the dank memes, lol, rofl. By this point we have frightened away both the internet hooligans for misusing slang and the fogeies who are confused by terms they could look up on Urban Dictionary but don’t. Leaving only the hardiest and sexiest of out listeners. Continue reading Manga Pulse 365: Tachi Wachi Lan Wan
Script 2 Script 11: 20,000 Leagues
It’s about that time where we do a novel of Tim’s choice. He picked 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. It’s the earliest book we’ve done thus far and a classic in science fiction. Plus any novel that opens up with a jab at Nebraska is alright in our book. Even better is knowing that some versions omitted it because the translators weren’t happy about it.
Our protagonist, Arronax, joins an expedition with a harpooner and his valet. They’re off to investigate reports of a narwhal that is striking and sinking ships. This journey is completely uneventful and Arronax spends most of his time swapping recipes with the crew while they sight see. Once they return to land, he publishes the first marine based cookbook and becomes wildly popular. Continue reading Script 2 Script 11: 20,000 Leagues
Popcorn Pulse 69: Napalm in the Wild
With the more recent explosion of superhero movies starting just after Iron Man proved that characters who weren’t sad about their dead parents could be a success, it’s easy to forget the genre is a bit older than that. In fact there was a period right after Burton reintroduces the caped crusader to the world at large that movies about super powers not based on the big two comic publishers began to crop up. Continue reading Popcorn Pulse 69: Napalm in the Wild
Manga Pulse 364: Go Jo
Let’s make a wild hipster prediction. Tiny house breweries covered in reclaimed aluminum siding and vintage asbestos paint. What could be more retro and kooky than risking death be mesothilioma? Yeah, you’ve probably never heard of it. Look away as I ride my kickboard away in a flash of ninteies flannel and beard oils. Continue reading Manga Pulse 364: Go Jo
Popcorn Pulse 68: Frail Runner
Being the pop culture savants we are, we decided to do a movie featuring Bill Paxton. Frailty[2001] is the directorial debut of the, somewhat, recently deceased actor who gave all the best lines to himself. It starts by being a backstory being delivered by Matthew Mcconaughey. He claims he knows who a serial killer is and relates a backstory about watching his dad murder people. It’s supposed to leave us wondering if they actually are acting as abrahamic paladins and murdering evildoers or if they’re just insane. Continue reading Popcorn Pulse 68: Frail Runner
Manga Pulse 363: Double Borders
Let us remind you of how technological progress has erased minor inconveniences that people of a certain age group didn’t have to grow up with. Remember when the only way to send messages was private courier. These upjumped children and their newfangled universal postal service don’t know how easy they have it. Continue reading Manga Pulse 363: Double Borders
Popcorn Pulse 67: Inferstint Gyllenhaal
Let’s talk about everyone’s favorite smushable shower invaders, spiders. When they show up in literature, they’re often the sign of sneaky and crafty villains or antagonists. When they show up in our joint review, Enemy[2013], they’re mostly there to make it seem like there’s a deeper meaning to the movie.
It star Jake Gyllenhaal attempting to play a weak willed man who discovers there’s someone who looks just like him. They decide to meet and have sex as anyone would do with their doppelganger; or one of them decides to trick the other into swapping wives for an evening because he’s a pathetic horn-dog.
Weltall then talks about Inferno[2016]. It’s the third in the Robert Langdon movies starring Tom Hanks. The lord of interpretation of symbols wakes up in a hospital with amnesia. He gets recruited to help find someone with a world threatening plague using his ability to remember wikipedia entries. That’s right, when you need someone for bar trivia and don’t have enough bars to browse the internet surreptitiously, Robert Langdon will come to the rescue!
Tim then talks about Fatal Instinct(1993). A parody movie done in the style of Naked Gun. We say in the style because while it contains the ingredients of humor(sight gags, references to the movies they are parodying and people delivering jokes with a straight face) it fails to close the deal. It’s almost like an artificial intelligence that was built in the seventies using tape drives had deconstructed a Leslie Nielsen movie and churned out its own script.
Manga Pulse 362: Spider Girl
Can you believe that the Washington Monument has been finished for longer than television has been around? Also, only 1920’s kids will remember these mountains without the faces of US Presidents on them. Are we accomplishing our goal to feed your nostalgia and remind you of the inexorable passage of time?
Tim reviews a revisit of Kumo desu ga, nani ka? Our spider girl continues in her adventure deeper into the dungeon. She then gets attacked by a monkey which she kills. Tim approves, especially when this results in a horde of other monkeys attacking and getting killed. The manga continues to hold its Read it Now by keeping the tone light and the main character likable as she struggles.
Weltall’s manga this week is also based on a light novel, Accel World. It takes place in a world where the mental uplinks from Avatar have been invented and people mostly squander their potential to play shitty MMOs. Because if ever a manga features a video game, it must always be a never ending exercise with no overarching goal that will run until someone gets tired of it. Almost as a metaphor for the manga it’s featured in. It manages to snag a Crackers based on the characters.