We’re back — after an extended break — and truly, thank you for your patience. 🖤

Marxists at the Movies (Music) has reopened the backstage door, fluffed the pillows, and turned the camera back on.

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In this episode, we step into New Kids on the Block’s 1990 blockbuster Step by Step — an album that didn’t just dominate the charts, but perfected the pop-industrial fantasy of access, intimacy, and desire. This is The Backstage Bedroom: the carefully staged illusion where fans are invited to feel close, chosen, and special… without ever touching the machinery that’s actually running the show.

We dig into NKOTB at their absolute commercial peak — post-Hangin’ Tough, pre-collapse — when boy band labor, gender performance, and teen devotion were engineered into a seamless, wildly profitable system. From the title track’s assembly-line momentum to the softer moments designed to simulate vulnerability, Step by Step reveals how pop masculinity is manufactured, softened, and sold — one heartthrob at a time.

This isn’t nostalgia.This is labor.This is branding.

This is desire under late capitalism, wearing a backwards baseball cap and asking you to trust him.

If you’ve ever wondered why Step by Step felt both thrilling and strangely empty — we’re going there.

If you’ve ever sensed that the bedroom was part of the product — welcome in.

Thanks for sticking with us — truly.

And yes, Myron is back too, tail twitching in approval from their preferred listening spot.

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This episode was supposed to drop during November’s Birthday Extravaganza, but better late than never — Edward’s birthday month has officially rolled straight into December. It’s that big of a deal. Even Myron has accepted this and is celebrating by twitching their tail in approval.

In this Marxists at the Movies (Music) deep dive, we crack open Carly Simon’s 1980 album Come Upstairs — the messy, feral, genre-bending pivot where she kicked off the heels, walked past the polite singer-songwriter box, and plugged herself straight into the emotional wall socket.

This is Carly at her rawest: punk edges, disco residue, and a whole lot of pain sharpened into power. We dig into the production choices, the cultural moment of 1980, and the way Carly tears through gender, desire, humiliation, and self-reinvention like she’s slicing through velvet wallpaper with a broken guitar string.

If you’ve never heard Jesse the way a Marxist hears it — buckle up.

If you’ve never considered Take Me as I Am a class war anthem — welcome.

If you’ve ever felt like the ‘80s began with one woman kicking down the door — that woman was Carly Simon.

And for the comrades at the $10 Hammer and Visionary tier, don’t miss this week’s Patreon Bonus Episode — an in-depth Marxist analysis of Carly’s spellbinding track “Boys in the Trees.”

Thanks for listening, comrades — and Myron says hi from their winter perch.

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Support the show—and keep Myron’s treat jar full—by joining us on Patreon! Your support keeps this revolution rolling and helps us keep speaking truth (and sarcasm) to power.

In this week’s TV Spotlight, we journey back to the KTMA and Comedy Central years (1988–1996) of Mystery Science Theater 3000. Born from a Minneapolis UHF station and built on duct tape, wisecracks, and proletarian imagination, MST3K didn’t just mock movies—it mocked hierarchy itself.

This isn’t just a retrospective. MST3K is one of the foremost influences on our entire show—its anti-corporate spirit, DIY ethos, and subversive humor helped shape the voice of Marxists at the Movies. These were silhouettes not just against bad cinema, but against power itself.

#MarxistsAtTheMovies #CineMarchMedia #MysteryScienceTheater3000 #MST3K #Communism #CultTV #MediaCritique #ExCult #CultAwareness #Communism #Socialism #Marxism #JoelHodgson #MikeNelson #MaryJoPehl #ComedyCentral #TV

This is one of our most personal discussions yet — about grief, control, and the quiet revolutions that happen inside a family. Ordinary People isn’t just our favorite drama; it’s a mirror for what happens when love becomes performance and silence becomes survival.

This episode is part of our November Birthday Month celebration — a chance for you to get to know our family a little better, including our honorary co-host, Myron the cat, who supervised this edit by purring through the final mix.

Listen, think, feel, and maybe call home after.

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In this episode of Marxists at the Music, we dive into The Innovators (1993): Capitalism’s Accidentally Intentional Soundtrack. What happens when a supposedly “neutral” pop sound becomes the anthem of neoliberal optimism? Edward unpacks how corporate aesthetics, commercial pop, and cultural mood merged into one long, catchy sales pitch for capitalism — whether composers Kurt Bestor or Sam Cardon meant it or not.

Featuring insight, humor, and a few purrs from Executive Producer Myron the Cat, this episode continues CineMarch Media’s mission to tell the truth about art under capitalism — and make it fun while we’re at it.

Support independent leftist media and get early access to full articles and audio at patreon.com/cinemarchmedia.
Grab official Myron Merch (because the cat deserves a cult of personality more than capitalism ever did) at cinemarchmedia.com/myronmerch.

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Marxists at the Movies – Point Break (1991): The Emperor’s New Wetsuit

Welcome back to Marxists at the Movies, where we dive headfirst into the surf, the scams, and the spiritual side of capitalism. In this episode, we hit the waves with Point Break—a film that disguises class critique as an adrenaline rush. Beneath the parachutes and perfect abs lies a story about labor, loyalty, and the false promise of freedom in late-stage capitalism.

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Every pledge helps keep this independent, leftist media project alive and free from corporate influence.

Myron, our orange-and-white tabby comrade, supervised the entire edit from his command chair. Any purring you hear in the background is ideological approval.

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📅 New episodes every week featuring film, TV, and music through a communist and social justice lens.

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www.CineMarchMedia.com www.Patreon.com/CineMarchMediaWhat happens when a morning talk show collides headfirst with grief, chaos, and improv genius? The Earliest Show (2016) stars Ben Schwartz and Lauren Lapkus in a six-episode saga of breakups, breakdowns, and broadcast disasters. In this episode of Marxists at the Movies, I unpack the “Morning Show Pile-Up”—how it takes the cheery rituals of morning television and smashes them against the messy realities of human emotion. From Kübler-Ross stages of grief to on-air meltdowns, it’s a master class in comedy that refuses to play it safe.#CineMarchMedia #MarxistsAtTheMovies #TheEarliestShow #BenSchwartz #LaurenLapkus #Improvisation #ComedyAnalysis #ExCult #CultAwareness #communism #socialism #marxism

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Marxists at the Movies dives into John Carpenter’s horror classic and its legacy of suburban dread, looping motifs, and the birth of the modern “final girl.” From Laurie Strode’s quiet rebellion to the ways capitalism haunts the very fabric of Haddonfield, this episode unpacks how Halloween reshaped fear—and why its scream still echoes through our culture.

#CineMarchMedia #MarxistsAtTheMovies #Communism #Socialism #Cult #ExCult #CultSurvivor #CultAwareness #CultRecovery #Halloween1978 #JohnCarpenter #ScreamQueen #FinalGirl #HorrorMovies #JamieLeeCurtis

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**Marxists at the Movies is taking next week off, but we'll be back for our next Patreon early release on September 27th, next wide release October 1st. We're not giving away the title but it's going to be our very first horror movie!**

Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds (1963) isn’t just a horror classic—it’s a window into Cold War anxieties, gendered panic, and the way capitalist society naturalizes fear itself. In this episode of Marxists at the Movies, Edward Michael Francis digs beneath the feathers and talons to reveal how Hitchcock stages collective dread, social collapse, and the disciplining of women through spectacle.

We’ll trace how the film reflects patriarchal control, ecological warning signs, and the contradictions of the suburban dream. And of course—what happens when the systems of order fail, and the birds stop playing by the rules?

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September’s Marxists at the Music dives into the gothic pop brilliance of Shakespeare’s Sister and their 1992 album Hormonally Yours. From the haunting melodrama of “Stay” to the way Marcella Detroit and Siobhan Fahey built an unapologetically difficult, demanding pop record, we unpack how this album fused vulnerability with venom, electronic with organic, camp with catastrophe.

It’s an album of contradictions—beautiful and feral, theatrical and sincere—that carved out space for a kind of femininity both nurturing and dangerous. We’ll explore its influence, its refusal to play nice, and why it still echoes in the DNA of artists decades later.

#CineMarchMedia #MarxistsAtTheMovies #MarxistsAtTheMusic #Communism #Socialism #Cult #ExCult #CultSurvivor #CultAwareness #CultRecovery #ShakespearsSister #HormonallyYours #Stay #90sMusic #GothPop #AlternativeMusic #FeministMusic