The Mothership

Warning: This episode contains spoilers! This week the crew gives their final review of "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker". The crew discusses everything from their unadulterated disappointment in the series finale, to the absurd new Jedi rules and powers and what plot lines did or did not work for the film emotionally.

This week TV Critic Kelly Lawler, Film Critic Brian Truitt and Tech Reporter Brett Molina review the ninth and final installation of the Star Wars sequel trilogy, "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker". Our critics discuss their interest in new Star Wars characters, their surprise in old character role reprisals and they rate the trilogy on a scale of one to ten, ten being the highest. And as promised we kept this episode spoiler-free.

This week the crew shares their favorite things from 2019 and the decade. Each host will name four of the best TV shows, films or video games and explain what they love most about each choice!

From the archives: This podcast first aired Aug. 31, 2018. The Mothership crew is tackling a very public divide in the pop culture world: Fans vs. critics. We hear about diverging scores on Rotten Tomatoes, rave reviews for movies that flunk at the box office and filmmakers who claim badly-reviewed films were made "for the fans." So what gives? USA TODAY's Kelly Lawler, Brett Molina and Brian Truitt on why critics and fans are divided.

Best-selling Author Maureen Johnson stops by to talk about her obsession with mysteries and what is best about the genre. She also chats with the crew about writing a movie for Netflix, "Let It Snow."

Spoilers there will be! Movie Critic Brian Truitt coins a new term for the new Disney+ TV series in this episode. TV Critic Kelly Lawler and Tech Reporter Brett Molina weigh in with Brian on the much-discussed "Mando".

In this week's episode the crew explains the negative and positive benefits to all the recently debuted streaming networks. We break down all the details on bundling the best networks for your buck and the rules and regulations for bundling said networks. And our TV Critic Kelly Lawler divulges the big questions, How will these streaming networks effect television programming and it's critics? Or more importantly will streaming services and their content become skewed or polarized?"

This week's episode is for Halloween & horror lovers! Film Critic Brian Truitt talks with Daphne Rubin-Vega about her current podcast "The Horror of Dolores Roach", an urban re-imagining of Sweeney Todd. She shares what it was like to work with Lin-Manuel Miranda on the movie adaptation of "In The Heights". Plus, in celebration of this fright-filled holiday Rubin-Vega discusses her worst fear and other holiday themed topics.

The new movie Star Wars: "The Rise of Skywalker" is fast approaching. In preparation for the end of this epic saga, the crew breaks down the newly released trailer, and speculates what we can expect from the final film that will end 42 years of a journey in a galaxy far far away.

TV Critic Kelly Lawler gives a detailed six episode review of HBO's new series "Watchmen". Tech Reporter Brett Molina joins to discuss whether the series is too violent for television and whether its presentation of certain social and authoritarian relationships are properly represented.