Now Playing Podcast Presents: The Fast and Furious Retrospective Series

Bringing Down The House

Stephen King invited audiences back to network television in 2002 for a three-night tour of his haunted house, Rose Red. But did the author successfully refurbish Shirley Jackson’s classic Hill House tale by having an autistic girl be the one to stoke the appetite of a soul-eating Seattle mansion? Or is sitcom star Nancy Travis working from an outdated blueprint as she sends five paranormal investigators down warped hallways and rooms with bad histories to find scientific proof of the supernatural?  Listen Now to learn if the hosts flip over this property.

Nobody Asked for This

After finding inner peace with a body count, Nobody Bob Odenkirk’s Hutch Mansell is chasing something even harder: a quiet family vacation. But when a crooked sheriff (Fargo’s Colin Hanks) and a deranged smuggler (Basic Instinct’s Sharon Stone) crash the party, Hutch has to remind everyone that violence is his love language. Listen to the Now Playing Podcast hosts now to find out if Nobody 2 packs the same punch as the original!

Nobody Copies John Wick and Gets Away With It

Bob Odenkirk (Better Call Saul) might look like your average suburban dad, but Nobody will think that after witnessing his brutal bus beatdown and action flick transformation. Can the unassuming funnyman fight back against the Russian mafia on his own, or does he need the help of his shotgun-wielding octogenarian papa Christopher Lloyd (Back To The Future)? Arnie, Jason, and Justin absorb every punch and headshot in this 2021 shoot ‘em up to find out if this passion project is a deserving cult favorite or just another dogged John Wick clone. Listen now!

Plop Goes The Weasel

Thomas Jane (The Mist), Jason Lee (Chasing Amy), Timothy Olyphant (Justified), and Damian Lewis (Billions) arrive at a cabin in the woods to drink beer, sing “Blue Bayou”, and process childhood trauma. But their annual hunting trip gets hijacked by space aliens exploding out their asses in the 2003 nightmare film Dreamcatcher. Can Big Chill director Lawrence Kasdan and Oscar winner Morgan Freeman offer redemption to one of Stephen King’s most reviled novels?  Listen Now as the podcasters take a dump on another of the horror writer’s fuckarows.

The Baby Bunch 

The MCU takes its First Steps into Phase Six by bringing comic's premiere family, The Fantastic Four, back into the fold. But was newborn Franklin also mutated by the cosmic storm that stretched the talents of Pedro Pascal (The Last of Us), disappeared Vanessa Kirby (The Crown), got Ebon Moss-Bachrach (The Bear) rock hard, and made Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things) so hot?  And how well does Silver Surfer Julia Garner (Ozark) herald the arrival of big boss Galactus (Ralph Ineson)?  Hear “The Terrific Trio” of Arnie, Justin, and Stuart break it all down for you now!

What About Bob?

Marvel Studios turns to treacherous CIA director Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Seinfeld) to help them identify New Avengers to replace their most iconic superheroes, and carry the franchise forward. But will longtime MCU fans buy a ticket (or even a box of Wheaties) for a ragtag assembly of antiheroes known as the Thunderbolts?  Listen Now to find out if former Black Widow Florence Pugh, her drunken surrogate father David Harbour, newly elected Congressman Sebastian Stan, bitter super soldier Wyatt Russell, and barely there Hannah John-Kamen can pull it off.

At last, I finally understand the dangers of investing in Krypto

Director James Gunn leaves Guardians of the Galaxy behind to launch DC Studios, starting with the 2025 resurrection of Superman. But can David Corenswet be a Man of Steel to Metropolis after Lex Luthor (Nicholas Hoult) smears his good name in a social media campaign that questions why dad Bradley Cooper sent him to Earth? And is the narrative even harder to control when reporter-girlfriend Lois Lane (Rachel Brosnahan) challenges the way “Big Blue” protects foreign countries from invasion? Get the full scoop as the Now Playing Gang reunites.

Chariots of Desire

Now Playing Podcast closes out the Species retrospective with The Awakening, a made-for-Sci-Fi Channel entry that trades franchise continuity for a new setting, new characters, and the same familiar formula. Set in Mexico, this fourth installment brings in Chariots of Fire’s Ben Cross and Star Trek: Enterprise’s Dominic Keating but can they add class to this low-budget fourquel? Join Now Playing Podcast’s hosts as they dissect the final chapter in a franchise that refuses to die quietly.

College hook-up culture meets the world’s worst grad school project.

Natasha Henstridge cashed a big check for a tiny role in Species III, a bargain-bin sequel that trades theaters for dorm rooms and solid science for sci-fi nonsense. Sil’s alien legacy lives on through her daughter, but with less money to burn, things get even dumber. There’s still plenty of aliens, skin, and bad choices to go around. Join Now Playing Podcast as we dissect how this straight-to-Sci-Fi Channel sequel keeps the Species name twitching.

Do you think you know what they did last summer? Think again!

Our 2025 Summer/Fall Donation Drive kicks off today with our review of I Know What You Did Last Summer, the 1997 slasher that made hook hands cool again. But before the gore, there was... guilt? In this bonus episode, Arnie digs into the 1973 young-adult novel by Lois Duncan. But slasher fans be warned: there's no fisherman, no slickers, and definitely no body count. Just a group of teens, a hit-and-run, and a slow-burning mystery that’s more Nancy Drew than Ghostface.  Find out what changed, what got lost in translation, and why Duncan was not thrilled with the adaptation, in this bonus book review podcast.