August 16, 2013 podcasts
TopThis week, as blockbuster season careens to a close, we discuss blockbuster culture, whether Steven Spielberg’s alarmism is on point, and whether it could all be turned in a more positive direction. Our second segment focuses on the singing-and-dancing party endings of films from Beetlejuice to This Is The End to Despicable Me 2, and asks what these endings accomplish for a film, and which ones make us groan, as opposed to which ones make us chair-dance in the theater. We try out a gory new game that tests the players’ ability to remember how characters die in films, and we let Nathan Rabin unleash his inner moo-cow. Finally, Scott Tobias and Keith Phipps are given 30 Seconds To Sell us with their film-related recommendations: Keith on an iconic soundtrack, and Scott on the concept of negativity, apparently.