Tag: John Latchem

This Week’s MPN Podcast: ‘Top Gun: Maverick,’ ‘Nope’ Reviews; Box Office Report

On this week’s episode of the Media Play News podcast, hosts Charles Parkman and Charlie Showley cover the movie that Charlie has been raving about all summer: Top Gun: Maverick. In going over the review by John Latchem the movie is discussed as being a satisfying sequel to the original Top Gun, which came out over 35 years ago in 1986. Maverick pushes the nostalgia buttons for viewers who loved the first movie, but doesn’t lean too heavily on it as some recent franchise reboots have tended to do. Charlie goes on for an extended period about how his expectations for the movie were extremely low going into it and ended up vastly exceeding them. The combination of perfectly executed (albeit simple) plot beats and in-camera shots from jets made the movie well-deserving of Tom Cruise’s largest grossing film of all time.

Continuing the high profile lineup of the episode, the hosts cover another review by Latchem, for Nope, which Charlie has talked about seeing on a previous episode. It was a symbolism-heavy knockout by auteur director Jordan Peele, and while Charlie wasn’t quite as impressed with it as he was with Get Out, after thinking about it for a few weeks since initially seeing it he has concluded it was an excellent movie. On the opposite end of the spectrum, at the box office the No. 1 movie was Black Adam, leading the theatrical take for its second week of release, followed by an assortment of horror movies keeping in spirit with the Halloween season.

This Week’s MPN Podcast: ‘Battle of the Super Sons,’ ‘By Candlelight’ Reviews; Weekend Box Office Report; New DC Movies Creative Director

On this week’s episode of the Media Play News podcast, hosts Charles Parkman and Charlie Showley dive deep into the DC universe, starting with a review by John Latchem of the animated movie Batman and Superman: Battle of the Super Sons. Charles recommends it, seconding the sentiment of the review. He also saw Black Adam during its premiere over the weekend and gives a two-minute, spoiler-filled micro review on the show’s new segment, “Charles rambles on a subject until Charlie stops him.” The second full review of the week is for “By Candlelight,” written by Scott Marks.

At the box office, exceeding expectations and blowing away the last several weeks of premieres, was, of course, Black Adam, marking Dwayne Johnson’s largest domestic opening ever. Meanwhile, in spite of Halloween getting closer and closer, Halloween Ends saw a massive drop in revenue from its previous weekend’s opening, earning a gross of only 20% of what it drew during its first weekend on the big screen.

Wrapping up with some industry news is word that James Gunn, known for superhero movies Guardians of the Galaxy, The Suicide Squad, and “Peacemaker,” has been tapped by DC to serve as its creative lead for the next four years. He will co-lead along with Peter Safran and the hosts are very intrigued by this new direction for DC movies.

This Week’s MPN Podcast: ‘Meet Cute,’ ‘Turning Point’ Reviews; Weekend Box Office Report; New Streaming Stats

On this week’s episode of the Media Play News podcast, hosts Charles Parkman and Charlie Showley cover reviews for the Peacock streaming movie Meet Cute, written by John Latchem, and 1950s-era Kino Lorber release The Turning Point, written by Scott Marks. While Charlie doesn’t make a habit out of watching rom-coms, when he hears that Meet Cute has a time travel mechanic he’s instantly into it. 

At the box office, the horror movie Smile opened this past weekend with a more than $20 million debut. Avatar remains near the top of the charts, too, closing on $2.9 billion in total ticket sales; both hosts are simultaneously incredulous at Avatar’s success and increasingly excited about its sequel’s imminent release at year’s end. The episode is wrapped up with a series of streaming statistics, as there were multiple record-breaking shows and movies recently.

This Week’s MPN Podcast: ‘Bright Victory,’ ‘Thor’ Reviews; Netflix’s ‘Tudum’ Moment; Weekend Box Office Report

On this week’s episode of the Media Play News podcast, hosts Charles Parkman and Charlie Showley dive into the remastered 1950s classic Bright Victory, followed by the newest MCU movie Thor: Love and Thunder. Unsurprisingly, the hosts have more to say about Thor than a 70-year-old war movie, although Scott Marks’ review of Bright Victory does present some stark differences in cultural norms and script writing relative to modern movies. As for Thor, in spite of John Latchem highlighting the elements that make it a bright, fun movie, Charlie isn’t sold on it because he’s sick of the overbearing lightheartedness of many recent Marvel movies.

At the box office, in spite of (or, perhaps, partly because of) its pre-release controversy, Don’t Worry Darling took the No. 1 spot this past weekend. More interestingly, a theatrical re-release of Spider-Man: No Way Home (with a few minutes of deleted scenes spliced back in) appeared in the top 5, and even more astonishingly, Avatar made its return to theaters ahead of its anticipated sequel’s release in December. Both hosts puzzle over the paradox of Avatar having such a tremendous cultural impact when it was initially released in 2009 and soon after vanished from mainstream consciousness. 

On the streaming front, Netflix has announced 120 (!) new and continuing movies and shows. Charles and Charlie are looking forward to a few of the offerings, but with that many announcements, there’s bound to be something for everyone.

This Week’s Podcast: ‘Dual,’ ‘South Park’ Reviews; Weekend Box Office Report

On this week’s episode of the Media Play News podcast, hosts Charles Parkman and Charlie Showley cover the sleeper sci-fi film Dual, starring Karen Gillan and Aaron Paul. Gillan plays two parts simultaneously, the protagonist of the movie and the clone of said protagonist. It’s an interesting premise that didn’t get much attention when it was originally released. Following up is a review of both parts of South Park: The Streaming Wars, which touches (or beats the viewer over the head with) the absurdity of studios creating content for multiple streaming platforms. In typical South Park fashion, it’s done in hilarious and creative ways. (Both reviews are written by John Latchem.)
 
Lastly, in the weekend box office numbers, Jordan Peele’s third film, Nope, debuted in the No. 1 spot, the first film to unseat Thor: Love and Thunder as the weekend’s top grossing feature. 
 
Keep an eye on the podcast feed for our upcoming special report from 2022’s Comic-Con!