The Podcass 011: Lions are good, Zellweger is great, and Spidey’s back

This is the week when we get The Podcass on the schedule I’ve intended. Hopefully, we’ll have shows every Tuesday and Friday from here on out.

First, we get a little geeky, talking about Sony and Marvel realizing they’re better together with Spider-Man (03:06). Then, how about those Detroit Lions, hanging with the Kansas City Chiefs and almost beating them (07:45)? We also review Renee Zellweger in Judy (13:44) before jumping into my radio segments. I appeared on Edmonton’s TSN 1260 to preview the MLB postseason (18:27) and dug into the Cubs-Joe Maddon split and the Angels firing manager Brad Ausmus on Asheville’s WISE Sports Radio (26:36).

As mentioned during this episode:

  • ‘WISE Guys’ radio host Pat Ryan continues cancer fight with community support [Asheville Citizen-Times]
  • Symbolic bell-ringing in Asheville resonates with cancer patients [WLOS]
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Renee Zellweger’s performance prevents ‘Judy’ from being forgettable biopic

Judy does what most good biopics do, focusing on a particular period of the subject’s life, rather than try to fit an entire life and career into a two-hour story. 

There are flashbacks that show what Judy Garland endured as a young girl, trying to please those who wanted to make her a star at the cost of any sort of normal childhood. Those sequences presume that you know about Garland and her career, which doesn’t seem particularly unreasonable if you’re seeing this movie. If you know Judy Garland was in The Wizard of Oz, that’s probably all you need to get by here. 

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The Podcass 010: Brad Pitt in Space, Cam Newton’s foot, and Rambo in Mexico

Here’s some Podcass for the weekend! (We should’ve gotten it posted before the weekend. Still a work in progress, folks. Eventually, I’ll stop saying that.)

Catching up on some movies, we review Ad Astra (01:51) and Rambo: Last Blood (29:07). In between is my WISE Sports Radio NFL segment (10:24) and a couple of corrections from the last episode (37:06).

Links to a few things mentioned during this episode:

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‘Rambo: Last Blood’ chooses violent fantasy over final word on tragic character

With the title Rambo: Last Blood, you get everything you need to know about this movie. It’s the last stand of John Rambo, a character who already received a fitting ending in 2008’s Rambo.

Sylvester Stallone should’ve just left Rambo on that Arizona ranch, training horses and repairing tractors for the rest of his life. His Vietnam veteran turned virtual superhero finally left war, service to his country, and his self-imposed exile in Thailand behind. But maybe Stallone saw Logan two years ago and thought Rambo could get a final story like that. 

Stallone should’ve left it alone, man. A better version of this story exists in Rambo: Last Blood, but Stallone and the other two writers credited who worked on this script, nor director Adrian Grunberg, aren’t interested in exploring how a man trained to be a weapon can’t escape violence, can’t truly find peace. Maybe he should’ve traveled to Neptune with Brad Pitt. 

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The Podcass 009: Not Podfade Away

Folks, we might be back on schedule. (Well, almost. I’d like The Podcass to post on Tuesdays and Fridays. We’re almost there.)

We break out of “podfade,” recapping our summer absence (3:31), the shutdown of the Amusement Park Podcast (6:55), and a brief fling with an NFL writing gig (15:25). Also, my radio baseball segment (21:00), catching up on what we would’ve talked about over the past four months (30:32), and a handful of sad goodbyes (32:40). Thank you for listening! Please subscribe to The Podcass on Apple Podcasts!

A few links to articles or podcasts that were mentioned during this episode:

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