Lunchbox Reaction

Disney's animated series The Owl House follows the adventures of Luz, a girl who travels through a magical doorway to an enchanted land called the Boiling Isles. The 21 episodes of season 2 aired from June 2021 to May 2022, and felt much more cohesive than the first season. It also saw the introduction of some new fan-favorite characters, and ended on a huge cliff hanger that will lead into season 3.

For those interested, our discussion of season one of The Owl House can be found on episode 26 of our show.

This week we play a few rounds of Boggle, the classic word-finding game that premiered in 1972.

Cascadia is a habitat tile placement and animal collecting game that features the wildlife of the Pacific Northwest. The game was published in 2021, and is for 1 to 4 players ages 10 and up. The game take about 30-45 minutes to play. 

Also this week:

• College watch: University of Tampa
• A live action How to Train Your Dragon
• Marvel's animated Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur
• Bob Born, creator of Peeps, passes away at 98

One day as we scrolled through the offerings on Disney+, we stumbled across a movie from the Disney Channel, circa 1999, called Can of Worms. Evan really wanted us to watch it, so we hunkered down and gave it a go. This week, we talk a little about the movie, but more about bad movies in general, and if they are necessary to make good movies good by comparison.

ChatGPT is a chatbot developed by the company OpenAI. ChatGPT has gained lots of media attention due to the ability to write detailed essays about nearly any subject. In addition, it can generate fictional stories or even computer code given a few prompts. This week we talk about this new tool, and how it might affect writing essays or taking tests at school.

We had a lot of fun on the show this week! In addition to talking about the hit Netflix show Wednesday, we also learned that Evan was cast as Donkey in the junior version of Shrek, Linnea will be trying out for the one-act plays at her school, and one of Linnea's friends refers to Evan as "Big Haired Evan." All this, plus an outtake at the end of the show. Who could ask for more?

In the boardgame Escape from the Evil Garden, players take on the role of unsuspecting gentlefolk who race to survive an afternoon in a garden maze. First person to escape wins. The game is for 2 to 6 players, ages 10 and up.

Hooky is a graphic novel written and illustrated by Míriam Bonastre Tur. The story, which originally appeared as a web comic and was later adapted for print, tells the story of twin siblings Dani and Dorian, 12 year old witches who stumble into mishap and adventure.

Klaus is a 2019 Spanish-American animated Christmas film written and directed by Sergio Pablos. The story is set in the remote island town of Smeerensburg, where a young postman befriends a toymaker who lives alone in the woods. Klaus was released on November 2019 on Netflix, and received critical acclaim for its animation, story, and vocal performances.

As the year comes to a close, we thought we'd each list some of our favorite books, TV shows, and movies of 2022.

Books mentioned:

• Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare
• War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
• The Hydrogen Sonata by Iain Banks
• The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North

TV shows mentioned:

• Wednesday (Netflix)
• Amphibia (Disney+)
• The Owl House (Disney+)
• Only Murders in the Building (Hulu)
• Blown Away (Netflix)

Movies:

• Glass Onion
• Everything Everywhere All At Once
• In Space with Markiplier
• The Batman