Today on the 5: For our communal movie review this week, Lando and I watched a movie B movie fans will likely have heard of, 1988's Hack-O-Lantern. The movie often gets lumped into "laugh at how bad it is" territory, but the most remarkable thing about it is how lame it makes Satanism look!

Today on the 5: For years I've seen lists with Beyond The Door III as a must-see film of the horror boom of the '80s, so I knew eventually I'd watch it. I finally did this weekend, and it went far past any expectations I might have had. This is truly a WILD movie!

Today on the 5: One thing that people who are skeptical about AI often point to is the lack of genuinely beneficial applications of the technology. The marketing and hype often centers on the least worthwhile aspects of what these tools can do. You can imagine my shock at seeing it put to a truly GOOD use recently!

This week we're talking about Twisted Metal, Superman, Iron Angels III, and Frankenstein '80. Show music by HeartBeatHero and OGRE. Support the show!

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Today on the 5: You may have seen a report about a business analyst suggesting that maybe it's time for Tim Cook to step down as CEO of Apple. This follows a recent string of criticism over the struggles the company has run into trying to create a competitve AI product. The suggestion this analysis led to might be the dumbest thing I've read in a while.

Today on the 5: The latest movie in our "Communal Cinema" series ended up being 1972's Frankenstein '80, an attempt at a new interpretation of the classic Frankenstein story via an early 70s Italian horror lens. If you're familiar with Italian movies of that era, you might think you know how that would go. Interestingly, it both follows the formula of the time and also tries to diverge from it!

Today on the 5: As promised, I went ahead and watch the final film in the Iron Angels trilogy, 1989's Iron Angels III. I wasn't sure if the third film would be able to match the energy and entertainment the first two movies delivered, but I'm thrilled to report it's every bit as good as trhe previous entries. All in all, grabbing this box set was a fantastic move!

Today on the 5: I'm sure most of you saw some type of coverage of Prime Day this year. Even websites that don't typically cover product reviews created some variation of a "best of Prime Day" list. In the earlier years of Prime Day, this type of coverage made some kind of sense, but as Prime Day has become junkier and junkier, I'm not sure what the point is in covering it anymore.

This week we're talking about IDW Transformers, The 13th Warrior, La Frecuencia Kirlian, Iron Angels II, and Mystics In Bali. Show music by HeartBeatHero and OGRE. Support the show!

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Today on the 5: In the wake of the latest round of Microsoft layoffs, I've seen some interesting discussions around how bloated the video game industry has become. One aspect of the debate is over the amount of work needed to create AAA games. This got me thinking about how much or how little cutting edge graphics matter to me.