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We are back!  It was a good break and hopefully some of you were able to catch up on older episodes you may have missed.

Getting back to business we have our new theme: Walking the Fine Line.  These will be films about characters balancing between right and wrong, sanity and madness or light and dark.  The shake-up this week is the film must be one that none of us have seen before.

Featuring Jake Gyllenhaal in two roles our first film is 'Enemy' from 2013, where a mild-mannered college professor investigates the life of an actor who looks exactly like him.

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Special Episode Alert!  This week we take a field trip to the actual movie theater and watch “Weapons” to see what all the hype is about!  This 2025 film, starring Julia Garner and Josh Brolin, is about a classroom of children (minus one) who disappear abruptly on the same night at the same time and leave everyone in the community with many questions and a mystery to solve.  It is written and directed by Zach Cregger, also known for “Barbarian” which we all enjoyed. 

We also talk about disappearing children, Tuesday movie discounts, and of course our thoughts on the film. So bring your permission slips and pick your seat on the bus as we venture forth into the world of cinema!

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We close out our “Time is an Illusion” theme with 2011’s Source Code, starring Jake Gyllenhaal as a soldier forced to relive a dying man’s final eight minutes of life in an attempt to learn the identity of a train bomber. 

Karl’s shakeup was that his pick must have a twist ending, so our discussions are all about twists!  We discuss what makes a good movie twist, go through some of our favorite movie twists, as well as some tips on writing a good twist from the “Masterclass” website. Chubby Checker even gets a mention!  How will the episode end? Tune in to find out!*

*Karl has been dead the whole podcast. Shhhh. 

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This week, our pick must reduce all saturation and so we watch “The Trial,” a strange and unusual film about a man who has been accused of an unknown crime and who has to navigate a timeless and labyrinthine judicial system, about which he knows nothing.  

Shot in black and white, from 1962, this visual treat is directed by Orson Welles and stars Anthony Perkins.   It is based on the posthumously completed Franz Kafka novel “Der Prozess” and it certainly lives up to the bizarre, confusing, darkly funny and sometimes despairing world that Kafka is so good at creating. 

We also talk about a recent trip to Iceland and some fun facts about this … well…. strange and unusual land.  

We find our own podcast GUILTY….  of having too good a time!!

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OK everyone, time for a new theme again.  Speaking of time, we will be delving into films that play with time in unconventional ways such as time loops, alternate timelines or nonlinear narratives because our new theme is "Time is an Illusion".

In addition to talking about time, relativity, quantum physics, car accidents, Ozzy Osbourne, Jaws and Iceland we will be watching a film that fits our new theme along with the first shake-up: "Must be set in a war-zone".  

That film is "Edge of Tomorrow", the 2014 sci-fi time travel/loop action adventure starring Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt and Bill Paxton.  Cruise portrays a man fighting in a war against aliens who must relive the same day every time he dies until he can find a way to stop their power source with the help of an elite soldier.

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We close out our “In the Shadow of Giants” theme with 1985’s horror comedy Fright Night, about a teenager who suspects his new neighbor is a vampire.  

Our discussion covers all things neighbor, from stories about notable neighbors we’ve had in our lives, to the group taking a quiz about how involved we would get with neighbor disputes. Did Rachael really live next door to a lady of the evening? Tune in to find out! 

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This week, our pick has to feature “a prolonged chase sequence integral to the plot.”  And so, we watch 1993’s “The Fugitive” starring Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones; this movie IS a prolonged chase sequence. 

We also explore the Character Alignment table, created as a moral and ethical perspective for characters in the RPG Dungeons and Dragons.  

So please join our always chaotically neutral conversation. And remember, we didn’t kill our wife!

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Buckle up because we're rolling right into the first episode under our new theme: "In the Shadow of Giants."  This one's all about flicks where folks are dwarfed by towering figures—be it a boss, a celeb, or some unstoppable influence—and they've gotta scramble to find their own path amid the chaos.

Naturally, we've got a twist to crank up the intrigue: this episode demands a "Non-Traditional Villain," so we're talking foes that aren't your standard mustache-twirler, but something sneakier like a faceless system, Mother Nature's wrath, or the monsters lurking in one's own head.

Satisfying the demands of our digital deities with a perfect match, we're sinking our teeth into the 2024 chiller 'The Substance.' Follow faded celebrity Elisabeth as she unleashes a bizarre serum to spawn a flawless, youthful clone called Sue—who quickly steals the spotlight, leaving Elisabeth battling her own creation in a grotesque tug-of-war. The true adversary? Society's ruthless obsession with youth and perfection, amplified by the drug's nightmarish consequences.

Like always, we'll wander into side chats on Hollywood's brutal beauty game, the perils of chasing eternal youth, and any wild tangents that strike our fancy.

(Sorry everyone but yes this description is AI generated.  It has been a busy week.)

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We close out our “One Last Chance” theme with Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, about a mother (Frances McDormand) trying to provoke the local police department in an effort to reinvigorate the stalled investigation into the murder of her daughter. The shakeup this week was that the film must have come out within the last ten years, and this one fits the bill (board), having been released in 2017. 

We also talk about the top ten films with the longest titles, as well as some history of billboard advertising. If that doesn’t pique your interest, we’re not sure what would!

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This week, our podcast shines the spotlight on the Female Protagonist, as we continue our "One Last Chance" theme.  And so, we watch the 2011 film about the young female assassin, "Hanna,"  who has one last chance to escape a ruthless intelligence agent trying to track her down across continents.  Starring Saoirse Ronan, Eric Bana and Cate Blanchett, this movie has the added bonus of a great score by the Chemical Brothers.

We also take a deep dive into what we believe makes a great female protagonist, where writers can fall short, and what exactly a "Mary Sue" is.  So listen in, as we toss out our bras, pull on some pants and bust through the glass ceiling of average podcasts.