Read it and Weep

It’s the movie that changed action films forever. Die Hard defined the hot-mess action hero and showed everybody the dangers of unfinished office buildings. And this was the first time Alex saw it.

Die Hard is the not-really-guilty pleasure of first-time guest Luke Burbank (Too Beautiful To Live, Live Wire! Radio, Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me) who saw it as a kid and loved it ever since. He explains why he loved it so much, how it affected his view of Christmas parties and marriage, and what it taught him about being a tower-vigilante.

Look, I know you already love Die Hard. I don’t have to sell you on it. So jump in and start listening, this was a super fun episode.

Have you got problems at your restaurant? Well Gordon Ramsay is here to help. Well, he’s here to yell at you and give you stuff, if that helps, great.

That’s right, it’s the American version of Kitchen Nightmares. Much like its British predecessor, the U.S. version features Ramsay going around to restaurants that are in dire straights and trying to fix them up. Unlike the British version, his swearing is beeped and he’s got a ton of money to spend. So be prepared for some fake anger for the cameras and some expensive overnight renovations. Also be prepared for the restaurant to close soon after he leaves.

We dove into these four episodes (curated by Alex who is a huge fan).

In the comments, let us know whether Kitchen Nightmares makes you think you could own a restaurant or not.

Since losing the 2008 presidential election and almost completing a full term as governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin has remained on the edge of the national consciousness. She’s like America’s racist aunt; not evil, just painfully ignorant and around the holidays she usually opens her mouth and says something embarrassing.

For her newest book, Good Tidings and Great Joy: Protecting The Heart of Christmas, a team of ghost writers produced a couple hundred pages about The War on Christmas, a horrible war that doesn’t actually exist. It’s an amazing work that reads like an exam question in Logical Fallacies 101. Can you find all 50 fallacies? Don’t try. Your brain will turn to mush.

We push through the mushy brains and discuss the world of Google Trends and bears. It’s fun. Merry Holidays to all of you, and may your new year be completely free of Palin books!

You remember that time you were in high school and you were miserable? Want to hear an adult try to remember that but end up sounding more like a puppy than a human child? Want to hear a long list of songs somebody in 1991 might have listened to? Then you need to read Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky.

Perks is a novel written as a series of “letters” from a kid who just doesn’t get high school. He’s sad all the time because of reasons (to be explained later) and he deals with that sadness by having friends, listening to music, doing drugs, and reading books his teacher gives him outside of class. And talking like no kid has ever talked. You, the reader, are put in the awkward position of a kid receiving these letters who definitely didn’t ask for them.

This episode was sponsored as a gift to Caitlyn. Merry Christmas, Caitlyn! If you’re buying gifts online, make sure to go to read-weep.com/amazon!

Life is a delicate thing. Even if you’re bar-hopping around Russia, feeling great, invisible aliens could show up for no reason and explode you into glitter.

At least that’s the way the world is in the 2011 movie Darkest Hour. The aliens are invisible, except sometimes, and explode you, unless you’re wearing a bunch of keys or are particularly important to the plot, except there isn’t one. Also something about lightbulbs.

This episode was sponsored by Jakub who hopes it helps his friend Deanna recover from surgery. Feel better, Deanna! Now I want surgery to get this out of my brain.

In the first Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen is a badass. She shoots things, saves people, and manipulates the system. For the second installment, Suzanne Collins opted to have her be oblivious to the plot, constantly need saving, and spend the climax passed out. And they filmed her nostrils for the close of the movie.

Which is not to say it’s a bad movie. It’s pretty good, and that’s a huge accomplishment since the book isn’t that great. The costumes are terrific, Phillip Seymour Hoffman is delightful, and President Snow eats a cookie in a very menacing way.

It’s also got it’s less good parts. It’s too long yet still feels rushed. And the focus-group granddaughter they added is vomit-inducing.

Overall, 8 thumbs up. You know, considering.

What did you think? Let us know in the comments.

After the success of The Hunger Games, author Suzanne Collins knew exactly what to do. Put out the exact same book with a slightly different prologue. And that idea caught fire.

Katniss Everdeen is a formerly bad ass woman from District 12, the lazily numbered region of Panam, the lazily named country controlled by The Capitol, the lazily named capitol. She’s a former winner of The Hunger Games, a TV game show where kids fight to the death against their will. Surprise! Like all reality shows, there’s an All Star’s episode.

Now Kat is thrown back into The Arena (the lazily named… you get the idea) and she has to once again compete in Kiddy Blood Sport for no reason at all. And without doing anything, she ends up the adorable mascot for The Revolution.

Remember The Hunger Games? It’s that again. And while Suzanne Collins is terrible at writing reasons for kids to battle to the death, she’s great at writing about them battling to the death. So why not do that again?

Also, we chat with Gabi Moskowitz about secret coded food, vomiting, and what to cook for your friends you’re about to murder. Buy her new book about Pizza Dough right now!

Next time you’re playing a space training simulator game, maybe don’t genocide the aliens too well. You may have to feel bad about that later.

That’s what happens to Ender, anyway. The 6 to 12-year-old at the heart of Ender’s Game. He’s been selected to go to space camp and play laser tag because some giant ants attacked earth a while back and for reasons, only a kid can lead a space army. But when Ender learns along the way is… sometimes things matter? I’m not sure what he learned, the movie is so compressed.

Even though we liked the Ender’s Game book, we’ve since been forced to confront the fact that the author is a total dick bag. Fortunately, he doesn’t make any money from the film, and the other thing we had a huge problem with–the redicilous message-board coup that Ender’s brother stages–is taken out for pacing reasons. All in all, not a bad adaptation.

A long time ago in director’s head that is far far away from where it should be, George Lucas permanently marred his masterwork by adding the first of three unbelievably awful movies to the beginning of it. It was a sad, sad day.

Episode 1 starts with a trade federation dispute (exciting!). Two jedis are sent to sit in a conference room because apparently they are a cheap resource. Some ridiculous antics later we’re introduced to the two most annoying characters in movie history: Jar Jar Binks and Anakin Skywalker. Although Jar Jar is credited with ruining the franchise, Anakin is at least as annoying and everything else in the movie sucks too.

Blah blah blah queen votes for no confidence, jedis stop the droid invasion, WHOA A DOUBLE SIDED LIGHTSABER, and then something about the kid being a jedi because of a genetic condition. This movie is so bad my brain is melting.

PODCRAWL 2013!

This is not a trilogy we could suffer alone, so we enlisted the help of our 2nd and 3rd favorite bad-movie podcasts (behind ourselves). Finish the podcrawl:

Episode II as reviewed by Flophouse (featuring RiaW guest Dan McCoy).

Week of November 18: Episode III as reviewed by Proudly Resents (featuring RiaW guest Adam Spiegleman).

Happy Halloween, everybody. What is that? Trick or treat? How about a treat, our favorite Halloween-themed Disney movie from the early 90s starring Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, and a talking cat!

Hocus Pocus is the 1993 feature film (promoted from straight-to-Disney-channel at the last minute) that defined Halloween for many of our childhoods. It’s basically a witchy take on the Three Stooges and no effort whatsover is taken to have a logical plot.

The witches could win at any moment by simply USING YOUR SUPER POWER, IDIOTS! But we’re lucky they didn’t because instead they created a creepy 300-year-old cat with a human brain. Oh the possibilities (we go into great detail).

It would take a special kind of sour puss to hate this movie, so we don’t bother.