Big Daddy Dispatch: December 2021 (Patreon)

Dispatch Sixty, December 5th, 2021



Hello WHM Family!

For the second month in a row we are BACK from the road and hot damn were those some spicy southern shows! It was an absolute riot to perform for you folks and meet you as well! We are so lucky to have been able to get back on the road and it's been a ton of fun. But it's NOT OVER! We have one more show coming up (see below) later this week!

But enough about that, it's December and you know what that means—We Love Movies Month! Holy shit, you folks are not prepared for the amount of content coming at your ears this month. Get ready for week after week of your favorite podcasters talking about some great films! If you have been watching our Youtube Channel  you already know what the full line up is, but the rest of you can scroll on down and find out! 

As it's the end of the year, another miserable one, point of fact, we cannot believe we are lucky enough to still be doing this silly show for all you folks. We absolutely have the best fans in the business and that is constantly a shock to us. If you are reading this Dispatch, you are the reason we are still doing middling-to-OK impressions and making goofy assertions about the sex lives of fictional characters. So in a way, it's all your fault. Seriously though, we thank you for your incredible kindness and generosity in supporting this show. We hope this next year will be better for all of us.

Banner Credit: We Hate Movies The Big Daddy Dispatch by Felipe Sobreiro

Image Credit:  The Orange Peel by Stephen Sajdak (resident shutterbug)

THE WHM FALL TOUR CONCLUDES &
VIRTUAL LIVE SHOW ANNOUNCEMENT!

This is it, our final show of 2021! We are ending it the only way we know how, by talking some PRIME SLEAZE right at home! That's right, we'll be talking C.H.U.D. at the Bell House in Brooklyn! We're selling our lovely posters (image above) and talking about Daniel Stern's sweaty arm pits and nightmare under-dwellers, all while celebrating over TEN YEARS of the We Hate Movies program. If you are in the area you must get tickets to this show! 

Not in the Tri-State area? You are not out of luck! On January 14th we will be doing a Virtual Live show for the entire world on one of the worst of 2021—Mortal Kombat!  These shows are a blast, so GET OVER HERE and get your ticket below! 

12/9, Brooklyn, NY - The 10 Year Anniversary Show (One Year Late): C.H.U.D. at The Bell House

1/14, The Internet - Mortal Kombat (2021)

Mortal Kombat Art by the Incomparable Felipe Sobreiro

LAST MONTH ON WHM

Episode 575 – Zookeeper



To start off the blessed month of November, the fellas face-off with a big turd, a talking-animal romcom in which Leslie Bibb and Rosario Dawson fight for the affections of one Kevin James and his zoo friends. Did they tell Sylvester Stallone he was voicing a lion or an animated version of himself? Why did anyone think it was a good idea to let Joe Rogan be on screen for this long? Are CGI pratfalls worse than most war crimes? Unexpected MVP: Judd Apatow Elephant.

Episode 576 – Ghostbusters (Patrons Only)

For this month’s WLM, the boys strap on the proton packs to finally talk about a comedic cornerstone for all members of the pod, the tale of four deadbeat doctorate-holders who find their calling imprisoning the souls of the damned forever. Is New York City really the only place with this sort of occurrence going on? Exactly where did the idea for the ghost-blowjob come from? Did anyone think this Afterlife idea was a good one? Justice for Ernie Hudson!

Episode 577 – The 6th Day



Andrew, Chris, Steve, and Eric sit down in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s house and eat his birthday cake while he tries to figure out if he’s a clone in this long-forgotten sci-fi nothing from the early aughts. What sick game is Robert Duvall playing with his wife here? Does Eric now have a chance to win the VHS Trailer Game? What the fuck were the Rainforest Wars and why isn’t this movie about them? Mirror News will never happen! Mark my words!

Episode 578 – Honey, I Shrunk The Kids

The gang heads out into the wild blue backyard with the doomed Szalinski children, who try to get home before they are consumed with the morning Cheerios or destroyed by a completely inexplicable scorpion. Where are the Hot Topic t-shirts commemorating the brave ant? Have Rick Moranis and Matt Frewer ever anchored a hit like this? Not to sound like a broken record but wouldn’t they all just be dead? JUSTICE FOR ANTY!

Episode 579 – Chairman of the Board 



Right in time for Thanksgiving, Eric, Andrew, Chris, and Steve finally took on one of the most requested titles in WHM history, the sole Carrot Top vehicle to see the light of day and known primarily for being roasted by Norm McDonald. Why is Eric talking about Carrot Top like he’s a folk hero? Is it supposed to be funny when everyone just talks about how awesome the main character is? Can we get a little more Larry Miller on everything please? With apologies to Courtney Thorne-Smith.  

Episode 580 – Taken: Live in Chicago



Fresh from the first leg of the 2021 tour, the boys interrupt their annual steak-and-wine night to help Liam Neeson save his would-be pop-singer daughter from sex traffickers. Why does Liam Neeson piss himself? How old is Maggie Grace supposed to be in this? How hard did divorced dads worldwide get at the torture scenes? Check your local listings for Horse House L.A.!

WHAT ARE WE WATCHING?

This is a space for us to talk about some NON-We Hate Movies related content that we've shoved into our eyeballs in the last month: TV, Movies, Cartoons, and Sports (maybe?). Just about anything that isn't pornography.

Andrew: The month of November completely flew by in a haze of travel, live shows, good & bad food, and various hotel rooms. It was so great being back on the road for the second run of shows we did down south, but it really cut into my watching time. Yes, yes, I watched Under Siege, Junior, and Footloose multiple times, but here's a couple other things that made it in front of my eyeballs:

Mohammad Reza Aslani's Chess of the Wind: A once lost, newly restored Iranian title that plays like an eerie, gothic drama. The basic story is the head of a household dies and his family and staff fight over who will win his inheritance. Lots of deceit, mind games and even some good, old-fashioned sensuality. It's completely unsurprising that this was immediately banned in Iran back in the 1970s. This new restoration was released by the good folks at Janus Films and I strongly encourage you to check it out, especially if you're into 50 year-old Iranian cinema like I am. It's a must-see, if only for a 20-something Shohreh Aghdashloo making her film debut in a major supporting role!

Aaron Sorkin’s Being the Ricardos: One of the absolute worst films of the year. Kidman, I thought, was actually serviceable as Lucille Ball, however Sorkin cannot help but step on his own dick more than Sideshow Bob with the rakes. Something tells me we could’ve just had a totally interesting Lucille Ball/Desi Arnaz biopic without Sorkin’s obnoxious penchant for putting politics before everything else in the story. I cannot think of a less-qualified person to have written and directed this story. Dreadful, dreadful shit.

Sidney J. Furie’s The Taking of Beverly Hills: Steve mentioned this on our Honey, I Shrunk the Kids episode during our (totally valid) Matt Frewer love-fest and I was reminded that it was like the fifth time he’d brought up this movie, so on a chance I picked up the blu-ray from Kino Lorber. I gotta say, it’s a really stupid, fun, Die Hard rip-off of the highest order. It stars Hollywood never-was (due to an unfortunate back injury), Ken Wahl as a pro-football player and member of the Beverly Hills glitterati, who, with the help of semi-crooked cop Matt Frewer, takes down a terrorist ring of, yup, ex-cops who are trying to rob all of Beverly Hills in one night! All you need to know is the guy throws a football-shaped rock at a dude’s face. Incredible.

Maggie Gyllenhaal’s The Lost Daughter: Probably the best film Netflix has out this season. Olivia Colman is, surprise, surprise, super-great in this film, as is Jessie Buckley playing the younger version of Colman’s Leda, a college professor who goes on vacation to Greece and runs into the world’s worst family. There’s a lot more going on in the film than my massive generalization, but honestly this movie could be sold simply on the fact that you get some more incredible Ed Harris Dancing, the likes of which we have not seen since Romero’s Creepshow.

Okay, one more —

Derrick Borte’s Unhinged: I was so disappointed in myself for sleeping on Unhinged for so long, despite the repeated praise heaped on the film by my three colleagues here at WHM. Crowe is a maniacal dynamo in this film, turning in a legitimately terrifying performance as an unnamed family annihilator who crosses paths with a mother (Caren Pistorius) who’s also having a bad day with her Disgusting Shit Boy son, while  also dealing with her soon-to-be-ex-husband. The film kind of has an annoying, your uncle’s “the world’s all goin’ to Hell in a hand basket” hangup, but you can easily ignore that as Crowe stomps all over this movie brutally murdering people and hilariously chasing this woman around in a minivan. Solid, solid stuff.

Chris: Ghostbusters: Afterlife: Seeing Carrie Coon in this is like eating seared Isle of Man scallops that were prepared and served to you at a rural gas station. The kids are good, but there is something far more disturbing about Muncher than even famed baby-possessor Viggo the Carpathian. All wrinkly, fat, and blue like that, aggressively sucking off metal objects as far as the eye can see. Just deeply, existentially off.

House of Gucci: The entertainment value of a Ridley Scott movie often hinges dramatically on just how much decorating, wardrobe, effects, and production design is going into the thing. He is primarily a brilliant coordinator of technical elements – he makes movies that look like what you imagine any given movie should look like. There have been two exceptions to this – Thelma & Louise and The Counselor, two of his very best films – and I put most of that on the challenges Cormac McCarthy’s untamed script presented him with than his own acumen. House of Gucci shares that film’s love for bold, beguiling performances but has none of its sharp, stinging style, no urgency or undiluted sense of the relentless horrors that are unleashed when you affront the primordial systems of capitalism. As such, the movie itself is boring, despite telling a pretty sensational story with Lady Gaga, Al Pacino, and, god help me, Jared Leto really putting some work in as key figures in the tale. As with the similarly dull yet far less coherent All the Money in the World, Scott seems to have no real appetite for the modern day, only the disputed past and the possible future. Whenever he tries to connect with the here-and-now, you get the sense that he sees nothing much to love or even be captivated by. I understand the skepticism but it makes for mediocre movies.

Benedetta: Fucking finally, someone with some god damn taste! His lord God Paul Verhoeven has returned from his castle in heaven to make another banger, though this is much more in the faux-mannered style of Black Book and Elle than his Hollywood miracle run that began with RoboCop and ended with Starship Troopers. If his imagery here is never as tricky and bombastic as it was when we were battling the arachnids on Klendathu, his underlying skepticism about and love for the subversion of the sacred cornerstones of Western society and, by extension, storytelling. Here, he considers the self-inflicted boundaries and limitations of Jesus’ love and permeable borders between divinity and delirium. And yet, even with such lofty ponderances, Verhoeven’s obsession with basest urges and juvenilia remains intact: when a marauder attempts to rob her parents, the titular nun-to-be calls upon her lord to have a passing bird shit in the working eye of one of the thieves. Never change, Paul. 

Eric: I just did a full Matrix rewatch over the Thanksgiving weekend and folks, I was right. The first movie is a clear masterpiece. It's lean and well paced and I am sure you'll hear more of this in our upcoming WLM episode but those sequels? Woof. I do not need to know how Tank and Dozer's sister's marriage is doing. You'd think Zee or Link would matter to the story the way we focus the start of Reloaded on them but nope. None of that matters. It's just filler, world building nonsense. Sure there's definitely stuff to like, the highway chase in Reloaded is pretty good. I dig the Zion drug raves and the sex scene. But man, that movie and Revolutions (previous episode, #212) are bloated as fuck. There's only so much of “sentinels are coming!” I can take.

First time views: John Woo's Heroes Shed No Tears (1986) is a must. Loved it, brutal headshots and violence and a plot that meanders and doesn't matter. It's basically a Commando movie and a clear sign of Woo's talent and blossoming career.

New York Ninja (2021) is a very solid fun piece of trash put out on blu-ray by Vinegar Syndrome. It's a John Liu movie that was never finished in the 1980's. They lost the entire vocal tracks, so in order to finish the film, they had a fun cast come in and re-dub it and they do a pretty great job. The world as always needs more Cynthia Rothrock but it was also cool to hear Don “The Dragon” Wilson again too. The plot of course becomes insane but it'll warm your heart how much New York takes to the Ninja.

Wish I got to more before this edition of the Big Daddy Dispatch but I did a lot of rewatches like all of our tour movies: Under Siege, Junior, Footloose. I also squeezed in rewatches of Zardoz (still rules), Ninja III: The Domination (still rules), and Unhinged (still rules.)

Steve: This was a very long month filled with travel and all matter of seeing family and doing live shows and bumming around in hotels—all good things, mind you— but that prevented me from watching a lot of new stuff. So, the headliners are:

Last Night in Soho: I've been looking forward to this movie for about two years and I'm a great admirer of Edgar Wright's ambitions even if he sometimes misses the mark. I kind of wish he didn't miss it here, but he did. There's good here! Anya Taylor-Joy delivers another powerhouse performance which is almost a given at this point. There's some really memorable sequences in the early going that capitalize the dreamy psychosexual angst that Wright is playing with here, but as the movie progresses he pulls almost every punch he can and feels really ill-suited to the material. It's not terrible and if you like it, more power to you, but I was fairly disappointed at the end of the day. 


Ghostbusters: Afterlife: Ladies and gentlemen. Woof. Reitman does his best to retain some of his directorial dignity by trying (and failing!) to tell a small family story for the first ninety minutes but then the last half hour has to remind the audience that 'busting' makes people feel good and it honestly doesn't fit together in the slightest. Mckenna Grace does a herculean task of keeping this movie watchable, Carrie Coon is massively wasted and Paul Rudd is in full "Paul Rudd" mode, which is becoming depressing to watch. You might hear more in January. Maybe. 

I did a hotel rewatch of Ben Affleck's The Town and I was surprised how much it faded for me. While I was watching it I couldn't help but recall that great Peep Show bit where Mark and Jeremy are watching a play and are so bored they pretend that they are watching Heat instead. Renner does rule, but that's about it. 

On the book front, I've been slooowly making my way through the new Jonathan Franzen's new one, "Crossroads" and so far I'm really enjoying myself. More to come next month when I can (hopefully) report on the whole thing.

PATREON MAILBAG LIGHTNING ROUND

Here's a fun space where folks on Patreon get to ask us Questions directly. This month's entry comes from 

Matt from London, Ontario, Canada who asks: 

"If you were the villain in an action film, which 80’s-90’s character actors would you cast as your henchmen? "

Andrew: Cripes, this a hard one. Well, first and foremost, I’d want Tracey Walter, a.k.a. Bob from Tim Burton’s Batman. He was a solid number two for Jack Nicholson’s Joker, and you want a little weasel who’s loyal to you up toward the top. I’d also snag Alexander Godunov - a.k.a. Die Hard’s Karl. Dude was massive and did not fuck around—and he’s the goon that makes it all the way to the very end and tries to assassinate John and Holly right before Reggie Vel Johnson blows him away. And finally, I’d hire Lee Ving. He’s probably most famous for portraying Mr. Body in the Clue movie, but he also plays one of the lead henchman in the aforementioned The Taking of Beverly Hills, Varney. That guy is a mean, nasty, little sonofabitch who tons of “heroes” would underestimate as they try to take me down. 

Chris: God! Damn! That’s tough. The mind immediately leaps to Andrew Bryniarski, famed for playing Chip Shreck in Batman Returns and Zangief in Street Fighter, but also a major presence in personal favorites Hudson Hawk and Any Given Sunday. He has it all, folks! He’s humongous! He’s stupid! He’s kinda funny! He listens to his boss like a dog would! Honestly, he is very tempting, despite being part of the cast of Michael Bay’s unsalvageable Pearl Harbor. However, my better impulses say that the real answer is Peter Greene. Most lead actors don’t have the presence that Greene showed off in Clean, Shaven and Laws of Gravity, and yet he excelled at playing low-level criminals and henchmen in Judgment Night, Pulp Fiction, The Usual Suspects, Under Siege 2, and Training Day. He commands every space he is in, and he has that DeNiro quality where he can slip seamlessly from seeming like he’s sizing you up for a kill and coming off like a rollicking good-time king of crime. He does coiled intensity, but also can let out his rage in torrents of stirring physical and emotional movements. That’s my guy. 

Eric: Henchmen? Now we're talking. Al Leong without a doubt would be one of my top enforcers. You might remember him as a henchman in tons of stuff but I am particularly fond of Big Trouble in Little China. Then I'm going Bolo Yeung, which I guess has been more of a lead bad guy in some stuff like Bloodsport and I think Tiger Claws? I've seen those Tiger Claws movies but never sober so who knows but I know he can really deliver. Then for pure brute strength I'll go with Pat Roach who was the towering airplane German mechanic that boxes Indiana Jones into the dirt on that airstrip in Raiders. He's also been in a ton of sword and sandal fair which is right in my wheelhouse. I assume I'd wear a suit of armor as the main baddie so this dude would be a great number two. He's also in Conan the Destroyer, Red Sonja, and Willow as the dashingly opposing General Kael who not only wears full bone armor but is also named after the dastardly Pauline Kael. 

Steve: Ok first things first, I need a strong number two that I can trust with both logistics and murder. So for that I'll go with the enigmatic white guy "Jack" who's joined up with the South American terrorists in previous episode Toy Soldiers. Dude had a great look that feels just as at home with a clipboard in his hands as an AK-47. For my enforcer I'm going to go with Tony Todd, who so skillfully played a walking brick shit house in The Rock. Also, if he brings his Candy Man powers to the table, I'm not going to stop him. And for the guy on the team that takes things way too far that everybody else is kind of afraid of, I'm going with the great David Patrick Kelly from The Crow and The Warriors. #squadgoals

DECEMBER SCHEDULE

Say what? The Schedule in advance?! It's the least we could do! By subscribing to this newsletter you get a sneak peak at what we're putting out for this November! 

Episode 581 —  Casablanca

Episode 582 —  Spider-Man (2002)

Episode 583 —  Home Alone

Episode 584 — The Matrix*


Patreon Episodes:

Patreon Exclusive We Love Movies — Alien (1979)

Animation Damnation — Toy Story

The Nexus: Star Trek: Generations

Gleep Glossary: Obi-Wan Kenobi

Q4 Synchable Commentary: American Movie

Melr0210: 90210: "Ashes to Ashes" (s2, e9) Melrose Place: "Pas de Trois"  (s1, e29)

*Going back to where it all began—The Matrix!

Find all this crap and enjoy it legally, just like we do! Now!

PATREON RSS BUG

If you’re having trouble with the RSS feed updating or episodes not appearing in your app, Patreon has acknowledged this bug and they have a fix: "Try un-subscribing and re-subscribing via your app by re-entering the unique RSS feed you were given and is on our Overview section of the Creator page. Or try using a different podcast app or RSS feed reader." 

Please consult this page and contact Patreon Support if the problem persists. We apologize for any inconvenience you’ve experienced on Patreon and truly appreciate your continued support!

UPCOMING NEWS AND PROMOTION




Our Youtube Channel continues to kick-ass folks! As explained above we hosted a Green Room wherein we laid out the entire December Schedule WEEKS AGO. You can also watch the entirety of our Witchboard episode! Complete with visual gags (most of which are almost funny.). You'll find all sorts of cool shit like Mailbags, VHS Trailer Games, Full Episodes like Zardoz (jardojjj), The Highlander, and My Father The Hero. Eric has also put out great clip packages like David! Muppet Hitchcock Presents, Egg Lawyer, Lak Sivrak, the Wolfman of Star Wars, Michael Biehn at Comic Con, Loose Loomis, and many more! Like we said above these are great for sharing and introducing folks to the show. There's so much content there we can't list it all here. Just go and subscribe already! 



We just want to let you folks know that the Scanner Cop 1 & 2 collection is back in stock on the Vinegar Syndrome website! Why should you care? Well, A.) Those movies are awesome and B.) Scanner Cop features a synchable, hilarious commentary by your friends at We Hate Movies! Get your copy now before it's off the market! 

This month on Hooked on T.J. Hooker: Eric and Ben talk about Big Bill's space adventure and there's a strangler on the loose! Listen here!  

If you're a fan of the show and a fan of looking sharp, you should check out our merch on our TeePublic store! We've got awesome designs including our brand new 2021 Tour Logo by (you guessed it) Felipe Sobreiro! We also have a ton of great designs like The VHS Trailer Game Logo, Egg Lawyer, The Order of the Boop, The Kornkast design and many more, with more to come! 

That's going to do it for this month's Dispatch! Thank you all for your incredible support this year and we sincerely wish you and your families a happy an healthy holiday season.

Take it easy,
Andrew, Chris, Eric, and Steve
We Hate Movies