This special reward is available to Patreon patrons who pledge at the $10 or $20 monthly levels. Each month, those patrons will pick a film for me to review. If they choose, they also get to include some of their thoughts about the movie. This Pick comes from Bekah Lindstrom. Shanghai Noon (2000)Written by Alfred ..read more

The NeverEnding Story (1984)Written by Wolfgang Petersen and Herman WeigelDirected by Wolfgang Petersen This movie is a formative piece of many of my peers’ childhoods. I think I saw it twice as a kid. I remembered parts of it vividly, but The NeverEnding Story was never a picture I sought out or felt a strong ..read more

You can purchase Microscope here. Read our previous world building session with The Location Crafter here. Microscope is not a solo tabletop RPG by design. As I didn’t come to ttrpgs until I was nearly thirty years old, I got tired with Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition (the current version at the time I started ..read more

Conan the Barbarian (1982) Written by John Milius and Oliver Stone Directed by John Milius In 1932, pulp writer Robert E. Howard began to pen the tales of Conan, a barbarian fighting in an ancient time of magic. He’d write 21 Conan stories before his tragic death by suicide at the age of 30. The trademark for the character passed through several hands over the following decades, leading to numerous reprints of the original stories and new authors adding to the mythos. Marvel Comics acquired the license in the 1970s, leading to Conan finding his widest audience yet. During much of this time, J ..read more

Dragonslayer (1981) Written by Hal Barwood and Matthew Robbins Directed by Matthew Robbins Genre films have always existed in cinema, but it wasn’t until the breakout surprise success of Star Wars that these spectacles gained increased budgets and audiences. Dragonslayer was the second collaboration between Disney & Paramount Pictures. Their first was the Robert Altman-directed Popeye, a film that did not end up how the companies had hoped but which has found a robust cult following in the decades that ensued. The special effects are handled by Industrial Light and Magic, which marks the ..read more

Two very different films in runtime, budget, scale, and content are featured in this episode. From a post-human Earth to a ghostly night in Long Island. Ariana and Seth watched Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes and Happer’s Comet. They have thoughts to share with you ..read more

You can purchase Kids on Bikes here. You can purchase the Plot Unfolding Machine here. Read our previous session here Scene 4 – Rising Action 1 of 8 – Waldo’s House Modified proposal: Add some trouble or bad news Oracle question: Is this trouble a person? No, not yet. Danger: Expose one weakness Waldo and Bopper pull into the driveway. Waldo immediately notices his front door is open. (Trigger Waldo’s fear of the supernatural: -2 penalty to rolls in this scene) Waldo peeks inside his living room, looking for signs of who broke into his house. (Brains check – 9 vs. 3 + 1 – 2 = 2, Failure. +1 A ..read more

Batman: A Death in the Family (2011) – “A Lonely Place of Dying” Reprints Batman #440-442 and New Titans #60-61 Written by Marv Wolfman Art by Jim Aparo, George Perez, and Tom Grummet Batman: The Caped Crusader Volume Three (2019) Reprints Batman #445-454, Detective Comics #615, and Batman Annual #14 Written by Marv Wolfman, Alan Grant, Andrew Helfer, and Peter Milligan Art by Jim Aparo, Norm Breyfogle, M.D. Bright, Chris Sprouse, and Kieron Dwyer In November 1988, Jason Todd, the second young person to hold the title of Robin, was murdered by the Joker in the pages of Batman. In March of tha ..read more

Ernest in the Army (1998) Written by John Cherry, Jeffrey Pillars, and Joseph Dattorre Directed by John Cherry Just less than two years after Ernest in the Army’s release direct-to-video, Jim Varney passed away from lung cancer at his home in White House, Tennessee. He recorded dialogue for Disney’s Atlantis: The Lost Empire and played a small role in a Billy Bob Thornton film. His career as Ernest ended in a downturn. Varney consistently adhered to the transparency that they made these movies because they made money. There was never a faux sense of artistry. Varney also seemed to understand ..read more

Ernest Goes to Africa (1997) Written and directed by John Cherry The Ernest franchise felt like it was running on fumes at this point. It had been ten years since Ernest Goes to Camp. Touchstone/Disney were out of the picture. The films were no longer being released theatrical, going straight to video. Budgets were meager. The ideas were also drying up. When this film came out, I was sixteen, and I don’t have any vivid memory of watching it. Our family likely rented it for the younger siblings, and I was probably present, but I remembered very little of it. John Cherry was writing & direc ..read more