Episode 309. We're talking on Sunshine, and don't it feel good! We watched the sci-fi thriller from director Danny Boyle and writer Alex Garland, about a space mission to launch a nuclear bomb that will revive the dying Sun and save Earth from death by ice age. The mission is thrown into chaos when the crew hears a distress signal from the first ship who attempted this mission and failed under mysterious circumstances. We discuss the cast of breakout stars and how the movie feels like it could be a hit new release this year and not a box office flop from 2007, strange stylistic choices, cosmic horror, a troubling haircut, and just what the 20th Century Fox logo is supposed to be. Is that a building? Can you go inside??

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Episode 308. It's an explosive start to 2025 as we watch all of the Bourne franchise: the trilogy of The Bourne Identity, Supremacy, and Ultimatum, the not-really-a-reboot The Bourne Legacy, and the attempted return to form with Jason Bourne. These movies follow an amnesiac secret agent as he attempts to uncover the corrupt government program that took his memories in exchange for deadly skills. We discuss the context of action cinema in 2002 and how the series adapted to industry changes like cinematic universes, the Matt Damon screen persona, the unique values of the oft-maligned Bourne Legacy, DVD bonus features, the Bourne Stuntacular at Universal Studios Orlando, and how these movies all have the same end credits sequence.

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Kyle and Melissa are here for a chill end-of-year celebration, looking back on our year in podcasting and looking ahead to our 2025 goals. We give out our Review Show awards, play a game of "What the Hell Were We Talking About?", run through our recent cinema experiences, talk about fancy cocktails and fancy mansions, and finally share our thoughts on the weird twist in the otherwise conventional neo-noir show Sugar.

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Episode 307. In our final Review Show of the year, we rewatched Severance before season two premieres in January! Employees at a shadowy mega-corporation can choose to undergo a "severance" procedure, where their brain is divided between work memories and personal memories. A group of severed employees who know nothing outside of their office start to wonder what the purpose of their work actually is, what their outside lives are like, and what it'll take for them to escape. We discuss the myriad mysteries of the show and how the character motivations are the most compelling secrets of all, Ricken's attempts at philosophy, the seemingly empty company town, new departments we want to see in season two, and Cobel's "Hey Arnold" shrine.

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Episode 306. We watched the 2018 limited series Escape at Dannemora, from director Ben Stiller. In this drama based on true events, two inmates start affairs with a civilian prison employee, and manipulate her to get them the tools they need to break out. We discuss how everything falls apart after the escape, the diegetic soundtrack of 2015 radio pop hits, tiny doll pants, and how a reference to Happy Gilmore has actual thematic resonance to the story.

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Episode 305. They should've sent a poet... instead they got podcasters. We connect with Contact, the 1997 sci-fi drama from director Robert Zemekis, based on a novel from Carl Sagan. Dr. Ellie Arroway has spent her life listening to the stars, and the stars finally have a message for her. Humanity scrambles to decode an alien transmission and determine what to do with this new knowledge, and what it means for their very concept of facts vs. faith. We discuss the story's approachable and universal take on "lowercase f" faith, the eccentric billionaire who lives in a plane, that legendary mirror shot, and the rare sci-fi story that's comforting more than it is cautionary.

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Episode 304. We watched Ti West's horror trilogy of X, Pearl, and Maxxxine. These movies take us from a 1970s adult film shoot turned deadly to a farmgirl's suffocating small town life in 1918 to the neon sleeze of 1980s LA. We discuss the sense of history in each of the films, repeated patterns of aging and feeling trapped and becoming the person you swore you wouldn't become, dual roles and special effects makeup, if character actor Toby Huss has become too well known to just be used for a couple minutes, and screaming at a scarecrow.

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Episode 303. We kick off October with a look into DC Comics' dark magic side, reading Paul Dini's run on Zatanna. Our heroine is both a working stage magician and one of the most powerful magical beings in the universe, as she juggles solving supernatural crimes with maintaining her performance schedule. We discuss how Zatanna is more iconic than any actual real world female magicians, the story's sense of place in San Francisco, killer puppets, Brother Night, and the "please, just let me sleep" genre of heroes.

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Episode 302. How has Kyle never seen Zodiac? That's the real mystery. Shametember corrects this error as we discuss David Fincher's 2007 true crime thriller. This movie follows the investigation into the Zodiac killer across decades through the perspective of detectives, journalists, and the few survivors of his attacks, all based on real accounts. We discuss the unnerving atmosphere and bizarre side-stories that are just as haunting as the main mystery, the atypical plot structure and pacing, Jake Gyllenhaal looking like a human Muppet, and how we see Fincher continue these themes in his show Mindhunter.

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Episode 301. Shametember kicks off this year with a movie that Melissa has somehow never seen -- 2003's Looney Tunes: Back in Action, from Joe Dante, the director of the Gremlins films. In this live-action and animation hybrid, Bugs and Daffy join a globe-trotting adventure with an aspiring stuntman who needs to save his action star father from the villainous chairman of Acme. We discuss the frantic plot and non-stop visual gags, celebrity cameos, product placement, Steve Martin's confounding performance, and our desire for a new version of Looney Tunes that's a surreal psychological drama starring Jesse Plemons as Porky Pig.

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