Now Playing -- The Movie Review Podcast

Professor X, Magneto, and most of the mutants from X-MEN return to the big screen three years after their debut - sporting higher production values, sharper social commentary, an enlarged cast, and answers for amnesiac Wolverine's backstory. Will Arnie, Jakob, and Stuart unite behind director Bryan Singer's grandiose vision, or will the many storylines send them into berserker rage? Listen and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

When you think of comic book superhero movies, do you think of concentration camps, human rights, and deep questions, starring both past and future Oscar winning actors? While certainly not the norm in 2000 when it was released, Bryan Singer's X-Men ushered in a new type of superhero film for a new century. With this being the first big-screen live action X-Men adaptation, bringing such comic book legends as Wolverine, Cyclops, Professor X, and Rogue to life and it's success launched not only the X-Men franchise but really set off a renaissance for Marvel Comics superhero films. With 11 years past, does this film hold up? Listen to Arnie, Stuart, and Jakob's review to find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Before there was X-Men...there was Generation X! For fans of the X-Men who had grown up watching the cartoon and reading the comics there would be a long wait, until 2000, for the X-Men to grace the silver screen in a big budget epic, but first in 1996 FOX aired the TV movie Generation X, a pilot for a TV series that never happened. Based on X-Men spin-off comic of the same name, Generation X sees a new group of superpowered teen mutants attending Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, here run by Emma Frost and Banshee, both featured characters in this summer's X-Men First Class! Starring Matt "Max Headroom" Frewer as the evil dream manipulating scientist Russel Tresh, is this inauspicious start for the X-Men something all fans should track down, or is it best forgotten like a bad dream? Listen to find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

It has been eleven years since Sydney, Gale, Dewey, and Ghostface took Hollywood, but now they are back home in Woodsboro for Scream 4 where our survivors and a new cast of comely high school students are terrorized by a new Ghostface killer while debating the relative merits of horror reboots. With the Millennials picking up where the now older Gen X cast left off, do threatening prank calls work in an era without home phones, and can writer Kevin Williamson and Director Wes Craven continue to parody slasher films effectively in an age of torture porn? Listen to the latest Now Playing as Marjorie, Arnie, and Stuart review this new release, and sum up their thoughts on the entire Scream series! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

When Scream 3 came out, it was intended to be the last installment in the Scream series. While we know now that would prove to not be the case, in 2000 Scream 3 looked to be the conclusion of what original Scream writer Kevin Williamson said was always envisioned as a trilogy. And with film-geek Randy coming back from the grave (via videotape) to give us the rules of the trilogy, we know Ghostface is back. But this time Ghostface has gone Hollywood as he is stalking actors on the set of Stab 3, hoping to lure reclusive Sydney Prescott out of hiding. Is the meta-humor horror combination a winning one? Listen to Arnie, Marjorie, and Stuart to find out, and join us next week as we review the new release Scream 4! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Ghostface is back stalking Sydney and her friends, this time at Windsor College. In the script, screenwriter Kevin Williamson calls out that "by definition alone, sequels are inferior films". Does that statement hold true for the second installment of the Scream franchise? Listen to find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

With Scream 4 coming out, it's time to follow the rules of a Now Playing Retrospective series and rule number 1 is Arnie, Stuart, and Marjorie are looking back at the entire Scream series, arguably the most popular horror franchise of the past 20 years. With Ghostface tormenting teens, including Neve Campbell, Jamie Kennedy, Rose McGowan, and Drew Barrymore, and directed by master of horror Wes Craven, does this film hold up 15 years later? Listen in to find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

He has no powers, no girlfriend, no cool outfit, but /Dave Lizewski can still Kick-Ass in the film directed by future X-Men First Class director Matthew Vaughn. With it's balance of humor and violence, and a foul-mouthed, violent 11-year-old Hit Girl courting controversy the film failed to catch on with mainstream audiences. But is this an underrated Kick-Ass film, or are we three for three with our Marvel Misfits retrospective series? Listen to the final episode in this first part of our Marvel Comic Book Movie Retrospective to find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Rising from the swamps comes a humanoid creature made of pure plant matter - Marvel's Man-Thing! A cult comic book character, Man-Thing was promoted to Marvel Movie Star in 2005 to capitalize on the popularity of Man-Thing's superhero peers the X-Men and Spider-Man. Premiering on the Sci-Fi channel, this film remains fairly unknown. Is it a treasure found underneath the murkiness of the swamps, or a fetid swamp plant that should be left to decompose? Listen to Stuart, Arnie, and Jakob to find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Fresh off the success of Return of the Jedi, blockbuster movie producer George Lucas was thought to have the golden touch and be able to do no wrong, but Lucas has always been one to do the impossible. And in the late summer of 1986, Howard the Duck was laid into by critics and fans alike. Now, for the 25th anniversary of this legendary flop, Arnie, Stuart, and Jakob watch and review the film as the start of their Marvel Comics Movie Retrospective Series! Is the movie as bad as critics said, or like Lucas said, 25 years later is this film looked back upon fondly? Listen to find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Potential New York senator Matt Damon finds more than paparazzi on his tail when attempts to date ballerina Emily Blunt disrupt the predestined order of the universe, and draw out a cosmic cleaning crew of grumpy old men determined to keep them apart. Can these two love birds prove that THE ADJUSTMENT BUREAU has a romantic side? Listen in and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Nicolas Cage's movie choices can often be unpredictable, even to a psychic deity like Philip K Dick's The Golden Man. Was playing an omniscient mutant on the run a step in the right direction for the extravagant actor, or will his NEXT move bomb with the Now Playing critics? Listen in and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Keanu, Wynona, and notorious Hollywood bad boys Woody Harrelson and Robert Downey Jr toon in and drop out in this trippily animated adaptation of Philip K Dick's autobiographical novel concerning chemical addiction in near-future Southern California. Does the Now Playing crew find substance to these druggie doodles or is A SCANNER DARKLY one long, bad trip. Listen in and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Was it all about the PAYCHECK for matinee idol Affleck when he signed on to play a classically conflicted Philip K Dick character piecing together memories of a top secret assignment he completed before having his memory wiped? Or will he learn from past film flubs to forge a better future with director John Woo and botanist babe Uma Thurman? Listen in and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

In 2002, Steven Spielberg and Tom Cruise synced heads to conjure a Philip K Dick vision of the future where a trio of psychics can convict murderers before a life is taken. But will Now Playing's threesome find the results of the powerhouse director/actor partnership a crime of confusion or a sci-fi classic? Listen in and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

FORREST GUMP's Gary Sinise is a scientist developing a bomb to eradicate alien invaders, who has the tables turned on him when he is accused of being a robotic assassin sent to blow up Earth's warmongering leader. Originally planned as a half hour short but expanded to feature length, can IMPOSTOR fool our Now Playing critics with its newly added storylines or will they cut its ambitions down to size? Listen in and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

In 1995, ROBOCOP star Peter Weller signed up for more cybernetic carnage playing the leader of a space colony overrun by war machines originally designed to protect them from a human enemy. Will fans of Philip K Dick's "Second Variety" scream with delight or howl in pain at this low budget Canadian curiosity? Listen in and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

In 1990, Philip K Dick's "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale" fuelled a rocket to Mars for action star Arnold Schwartzenegger, landing him one of his biggest box office successes and most complicated acting challenges. Is Ahnold the good guy liberating a Martian colony from tyranny, the bad guy sleeper spy, or a crazy man on a head-trip vacation gone very wrong? More importantly, does TOTAL RECALL decide if it's going to be forgettable action schlock or subversively smart sci-fi? Listen in and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Harrison Ford took a break from STAR WARS and INDIANA JONES to play cynical bounty hunter Rick Deckard in an expensive adaptation of Philip K Dick's "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?". A flop in 1982, BLADE RUNNER's cult following has grown in the subsequent decades as new edits of the movie offer expanded interpretations of Deckard's real identity. Does Ridley Scott's vision pass the hype test with our hosts, or will they retire it from the list of great sci-fi flicks? Listen and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support

Over 27 years after an original film that Disney desperately hopes you don't remember all that well, Tron Legacy hits theaters in a big way. A film generating a lot of buzz and interest in a holiday movie season that is largely considered lackluster, hopes for Tron Legacy are high. With state of the art 3-D visuals and playing heavily on Gen X nostalgia, is Tron Legacy the upgrade from the original that Arnie, Jakob, and Brock were hoping for, or does it still fail to compile? Listen in and find out! --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nowplayingpodcast/support