Now Playing -- The Movie Review Podcast

It’s Arthur Fleck, better known as Joker!  Before becoming Batman’s #1 nemesis, the Clown Prince of Crime was just a struggling stand-up comic doing his best to make the public smile on the mean streets of Gotham. Can Joaquin Phoenix convince the Now Playing hosts that heartless millionaires like mayoral candidate (and father of Bruce) Thomas Wanye are the true enemies of the people?  And is Hangover director Todd Phillips making a Scorsese inspired tragedy, or Trumpian comedy, out of this atypical DC Comics origin story?  Listen and find out!

"Girl Power!" The sentiment continues, but the look has changed dramatically since the era of Spice Girls and, this week's movie review, 2000's Charlie's Angels. Listen now as our hosts remember what feminism looked like--in an unzipped mechanic's jumpsuit--as Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore, and Lucy Liu update the Angels for a new millennium!  

It's been 11 years. The world has changed. John Rambo, however, has not--he's just tried to keep a lid on it. That lid blows when his "niece" is abducted by a Mexican cartel, and Rambo is out for Last Blood.  Should this be Rambo's final mission? Join Arnie, Brock, and Jakob for this review to find out!

Once upon a time, there were three little girls who went to the police academy...   With those words Aaron Spelling and Leonard Goldberg created a television sensation:  Charlie's Angels. It was an instant television sensation. And in the 43 years since it premiered on TV it had two theatrical films, a 2011 reboot, plus an upcoming new film!  Join Arnie, Marjorie, and Jakob as they go back to where it all began--on the 480i TV screens in 1976.

It’s 2016, and The Losers Club is all grown up and ready for a rematch with It. Chapter II finds Pennywise waking from his 27 year nap hangry, homicidal, and hot to dance with old Derry foes Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy, and Bill Hader. Can arcade tokens, yearbook pages, a bunch of shower caps, and other artifacts from an ‘80s childhood be used to complete a Native American ritual that will ‘eighty-six’ this shape-shifting space clown for good? Listen and Find Out!  

30 years after massacring trees and dominating bookshelf space everywhere, Stephen King’s monster novel It transformed into the biggest horror movie of all-time! Chapter One focuses on The Losers Club - a group of misfit kids investigating the stranger things occurring in their cursed small town. Will stuttering leader Bill (Jaeden Martell) find his missing brother alive in the city’s waterworks? Can new kid on the block Ben (Jeremy Ray Taylor) woo crush Beverly (Sophia Lillis) while fighting off bullies with switchblades? Get down with the clown when you listen now!

Were executives at the ABC network Pennywise or pound foolish for thinking Stephen King’s gory, gigantic novel IT could float on 1990s prime time television alongside family-oriented hits Who’s The Boss and The Wonder Years? Tim Curry’s dancing clown did his best to lure the censors into the sewer as he terrorizes the children of Derry, Maine in a highly rated two-part miniseries. Make a pact to join podcasters Arnie, Stuart, and Jakob as they stare into the deadlights (and take shots at those special effects). Listen Now!

Mortal enemies come together like bacon and eggs in The Angry Birds Movie 2, as cranky cardinal Red (Jason Sudeikis) and green pig Leonard (Bill Hader) team up to stop mysterious balls of ice from flattening their respective island homes. Is this sequel "poultry in motion" now that new writers, directors, and Saturday Night Live cast members Leslie Jones and Pete Davidson have joined the nest? Or is the cartoon an albatross around the podcasters’ necks as they try to soar through Now Playing’s video game retrospective? Listen and Find Out!

DC Comics cooks up a new take on the gangster genre with the release of The Kitchen. Melissa McCarthy, Tiffany Haddish, and Elisabeth Moss star as a trio of marginalized mob wives who must find a way to put food on the table when their Irish hood husbands are busted for armed robbery. Is 1970s midtown Manhattan better off under the protection of wisegals who know how to clean up a blood stain? And should this dish have been seasoned with more of these ladies’ trademark comedy?  Do it for the kids, and download the show now!

Someone opened a cold can of whoopass, and now "Mike Oxmall" and "Franz Grubar" - a crime fighting duo better known as Hobbs & Shaw - are storming the multiplex and hijacking the Fast and Furious franchise. Will Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Jason Statham be at each other’s throats for their entire spin-off movie? Or can they find a way to work together to defeat "Black Superman" Idris Elba, and track down the carrier of a deadly virus (Vanessa Kirby)?  Trust your Now Playing Family to tell you the truth when you Listen Now!

The Now Playing Arcade is making Justin, Stuart, and Arnie see Red… and all the other Angry Birds that appear in the blockbuster 2016 animated movie! Can this short-tempered cardinal stop a boatload of green pigs from stealing all the eggs from his island with nothing more than slingshots, trampolines, and friends from anger management class? And does the vocal talent of Saturday Night Live alumni Jason Sudeikis, Maya Rudoph, and Bill Hader brighten the mood for the adults watching? Hear the hosts squawk about it all when you Listen Now!

Only witches can make a "weeping book", but Hollywood often wrings tears from Stephen King readers with their many poor adaptations. Will Blumhouse - the studio behind Paranormal Activity and Get Out - show Mercy in their telling of Skeleton Crew short story “Gramma”? Chandler Riggs (Walking Dead) stars as a mama’s boy out to determine if his nana (Shirley Knight) is a dying woman with dementia, or a black magic practitioner trying to possess his soul. Find out if this flick makes the podcasters want to put axes in their heads when you Listen Now! 

Arnie, Jakob, and Stuart get lost in The Mist as they find their way back to the Stephen King retrospective. It took Shawshank Redemption director Frank Darabont more than a decade to bring this standout entry in King’s Skeleton Crew short story collection to the big screen. Are the beasties that maroon Thomas Jane and his son in a grocery store as scary as the religious zealotry of fellow refugee Marcia Gay Harden? And what will the hosts make of that infamous downbeat ending?  Listen Now and clear the air on this controversial adaptation.

Peter Parker leaves his friendly neighborhood Spider-Man alter ego behind for a journey Far From Home meant to alleviate the loss of mentor Tony Stark. But S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Nick Fury won’t let the 16-year-old tourist shirk his Avenger duties while on European holiday, rebranding him “Night Monkey” so that Peter can fight elemental monsters alongside new superhero Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal). Can the web-slinger still make time to kiss Zendaya on the Eiffel Tower while keeping Venice afloat, or London Bridge from falling down? Listen and find out!

While Ed and Lorraine Warren are off “conjuring” up their next big screen supernatural adventure, daughter Judy and her groovy babysitters are back Home trying to contend with Annabelle. It’s an apocalypse in the Artifacts Room when the devil doll escapes her glass case, and unleashes everything from a bloody bridal dress to a British werewolf in an effort to claim souls.  What else will Marjorie, Stuart, and Arnie discover when they reach inside this Feeley Meeley box and sort through the odds and ends? Download the podcast and Find Out!

Sheriff Woody (Tom Hanks) has come to a critical spork in the road.  Can the cowboy doll continue down his path of being Bonnie’s neglected plaything now that fate, and a raucous family road trip, has reunited him with long lost love Bo Peep (Annie Potts)? And how should he deal with broken doll Gabby Gabby (Christina Hendricks), who holds Bonnie’s homemade creation "Forky" hostage in the hopes of exchanging him for Woody’s pull string?  Listen to your inner voice - and Arnie, Jakob, and Stuart - when you to download the epic Toy Story 4 podcast!

The Conjuring cinematic universe has certainly given Marjorie, Arnie, and Stuart a lot to cry about over the years. Is it a blessing or a curse that a blubbering Spanish spectre named La Llorona has followed Annabelle priest Father Perez to the big screen for a sixth installment in the franchise?  Find out if the podcasters have a bawl watching this Weeping Woman use her long talons to snatch away two children from Hawkeye’s wife Linda Cardellini.  Listen now!

Woody, Buzz, and the rest of Pixar’s playthings are ready to toy with your emotions once again as they prepare to spend infinity and beyond in the attic. But will their friendship survive after Andy decides to take only one of his childhood favorites to college, leaving the rest to be donated to a frenetic daycare center where passive-aggressive teddy bear Lots O’Huggin (Ned Beatty) orchestrates their misery?  Find out if Toy Story 3 leaves Now Playing’s trio of podcasters in tears when you Listen Now!      

Before the Marvel Cinematic Universe overhauls the X-Men, those first movie mutants rise up from the ashes of the Fox franchise for a last stand with Dark Phoenix. What happens when a space mission leaves Jean Grey (Sophie Turner) surging with energy, and blowing her stack at Professor X (James McAvoy), Cyclops (Tye Sheridan), and all mankind? Will she be attracted to the newfound zen of Magneto (Michael Fassbender)? And does space alien Jessica Chastain come in peace... or just want a piece of her glow? School’s in session when you Listen Now!

Sheriff Woody (Tom Hanks) might have patched things up with arrogant astronaut Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen), but who’s going to fix all the wear and tear that longtime play has had on his increasingly fragile doll body? Is this cowboy ready to be put out to pasture? Or will Hamm, Rex, Mr. Potato Head, and Buzz stop a thieving toy collector (Wayne Knight) from turning their friend into a collectible, and shipping him off to a museum in Japan? Jakob, Stuart, and Arnie reflect on the heartbreaking lessons of maturity offered in Toy Story 2 when you Listen Now!