Read it and Weep

It’s #WetMonth again and that means it’s time for us to dip our toes back in the glistening, homoerotic anime Free!.

For season 2, everybody’s a bit older but just as sexually tense. As they decide what to be when they grow up we decide who to ship, why there aren’t nips, and why one is a shark. There are lots of other pressing questions but the key to Free! is to just let it wash over you (and try not to think about their ages).

Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell is a well regarded book. But is the movie a travesty or the best that could be done with such complicated source material? We’re here to find out!

Sponsor Mark in Manhattan (thanks, Mark!) loved the book but wanted us to help make sense of the movie. We do our best for four people who haven’t read it and we discover… that we’re super confused. It’s a mess, guys! Not awful, but such a mess.

On the plus side you do get to play “Find Tom Hanks” which is always fun.

Are you a successful woman who has everything but a husband? Then we have a solution for you. Just join Christian Mingle and try really hard to be religious!

Well, that might not quite work out because all the men on CM are constantly giving you pop quizzes on bible verses and making you perform improvised prayers in groups. Christian Mingle(r) — Don’t fuck with us!

This low-budget straight-to-VOD release is bad and painful, but it never goes in quite the direction you expect, so that’s kinda interesting.

1994 was, it’s well established, the year of movies. This was not the best one.

Charlie Sheen is Ditch Brodie, a rebellious skydiving instructor whose client just went early and didn’t open her shoot. So he decides to become an amateur detective turned amateur spy turned action hero. Seems plausible.

Besides the sexism not aging well, there are some fun moments. Plus we debut a new game “Name That Sandwich” and get a message from a special guest, Ezra’s son Caleb who can’t say “vanilla.”

What does a girl want? Love? Happiness? To have fun? To be covered in little bits of ribbon? To be hugely disrespectful of another country’s culture? To date Colin Firth? Well, that one’s probably real, even though this movie takes that to a weird extreme by making Mr. Firth her dad.

Amanda Bynes stars as a shitty American kid who seeks out her estranged father, the rich and handsome Lord Dashwood (Colin Firth). They hit it off and while she batters British culture with a billy club. Everything works out and Colin gets back together with Amanda’s mom despite 17 years of growing apart.

In case you haven’t seen it, Tiny House Hunters is just like regular House Hunters but smaller. A couple looks at three houses, they get a pizza and pick a house to buy, then the cameras go off and the couple gets a divorce.

Making the houses tiny adds an extra layer of silliness because it’s clear that half the couple doesn’t want to give up everything great for an over-priced apartment without running water.

Tiny houses are a lie anyway. If you want 600 square feet and no closets, we have that. It’s called an apartment. Nobody needs an apartment without running water parked in Dave’s backyard that costs $100k. It’s like tapas. It’s all fun and tiny and then you get the bill.

Sesame Street is an incredible franchise. It’s taught kids and amused parents for decades. But the most recent ones have a slightly different feel from the ones we knew as kids, and it’s just a tiny bit less delightful.

In this special Father’s Day episode, Ezra introduced us to his son’s favorite show, modern Sesame Street. It’s got some really crappy animation, some drugged out segments, and is overlong, though for a sleep-deprived parent, all of those may be benefits.

Overall it’s a fun romp, especially the trip down Memory Lane, a cross street of Sesame. What’s your favorite memory of Sesame Street? Let us know in the comments!

Everything that was good when you were a child has since been ruined. The most recent franchise to be super crappiffied is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which Michael Bay has turned into Green Transformers.

Instead of the rascals from when we were young, the turtles are now grossly muscled broy dickheads. And the plot is a mess. And the dialogue doesn’t make sense. And the voice work is phoned in. And… and… and. Basically everything that could be bad in a movie is really bad here.

In case you let your subscription to Student and Schoolmate expire, you may not be familiar with the serialized tales of a homeless orphan boy living on the streets of New York shining shoes to buy food. But through the power of being white, attractive, charming, witty, and a strong swimmer, he’s able to overcome and become a middle class Unitarian.

Many people reference a “Horatio Alger” story, but few actually read his works. And perhaps for good reason. They’re dated and a bit dull, though not completely without charm. In fact, they’ve got lots of charm if you just don’t dig too deep.

Our dive into Dick was suggested by our first-time guest Jane Espenson, who’s written for Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Battlestar Galactica, and much more.

One lucky contestant on The Bachelor gets the runner up prize of starring on the Bachelorette. And then the other way. Like a snake eating its own tail, this franchise continues on forever.

Alex limps through as the rest of the crew celebrates their feelings of love/sadness towards Jojo as she chooses between 30ish vapid Gaston’s and one villain (Chad!).

Will she find true love / permanent reality show fame? Or will she just get drunk and eat lunch meat? We won’t know since we only watched two episodes, but I guess will find out when it’s time for Bachelor in Paradise.