Tag Archives: Podcast

May 8, 2012 · 11:16 am

Game of Thrones – “The Old Gods and the New” [Podcast]

“The Old Gods and the New”

May 8th, 2012

As I had noted on Twitter, and as many of you seem to have discovered after visiting the site yesterday, this weekend didn’t provide enough time to do a full review of “The Old Gods and the New” justice. However, David Chen at /Film and his podcasting partner Joanna Robinson were kind enough to have me on “A Cast of Kings,” their Game of Thrones podcast, for a discussion about the episode.

A Cast of Kings S2E06: The Old Gods and the New – /Film

A Cast of Kings is a podcast featuring recaps and reviews of each week’s episode of HBO’s Game of Thrones. This week, Joanna and Dave discuss the second season’s sixth episode, The Old Gods and the New. Special guest Myles McNutt joins us from Cultural Learnings.

It’s a lengthy and diverse discussion, ranging from more serious considerations of how the show has changed from the books to equally serious conversations about Ygritte’s strategic body movements. It’s quite a fun show, I thought, so if you want to know more of my thoughts on the episode it’s a fine way to spend roughly an hour of your time.

If there are any other issues you’d like to discuss about the episode, feel free to leave a comment below and I’ll hope to chime in. In the meantime, you could also head back to listen to past “A Cast of Kings” episodes.

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May 29, 2010 · 3:00 pm

Talking Lost with TV on the Internet and The /Filmcast

Talking Lost with TV on the Internet and The /Filmcast

May 29th, 2010

I’ve written a lot about Lost this week, but if you’re still interested in hearing more discussion about the series finale and the series as a whole I took part in a couple of podcasts on Thursday that might make for some nice weekend listening for those so inclined.

First, I was one of many guests on TV on the Internet’s special Lost episode, which collected a bunch of people who write and tweet about Lost to discuss the finale (including hosts Todd VanDerWerff and Libby Hill, Jason Mittell, Zack Handlen, Daniel T. Walters, Chris Dole, and myself). For the most part, we all liked it, which means that the episode was more of a discussion of the finale and the series as a whole than it was a deconstruction or a dissection. It was a podcast with some really intelligent voices, and it resulted in some cogent discussion on the final season, the characters and their journeys, as well as the cultural impact of the series on both television in general and in our own lives.

TV on the Internet, Episode 37: Lost [Media Elites]

I think both discussions are equally interesting, but the special /Filmcast bonus Lost episode is definitely a bit more dynamic due to both its free-for-all format and the presence of more diverse opinions relating to the finale and the series as a whole. I wouldn’t go so far as to call the episode an outright debate, but /Filmcast hosts Devindra Hardawar and Adam Quigley raise some legitimate concerns with the series which Katey Rich and I work to reconcile with our own enjoyment of the series. The result, at least for me, is an honest and frank discussion which in its confrontation gets to the heart of the ways in which viewers experienced Lost and its finale, and I think anyone listening would find some part of their voice within the arguments being made.

The /Filmcast Bonus Ep. – Lost Series Finale and Wrap-up [/Film]

I want to thank Todd and Devindra for both inviting me to the respective parties and doing a fantastic job in their capacities as moderator/host/whatever you’d choose to call it, and I truly recommend that those who are still contending with their feelings over the Lost finale give these shows a listen (although perhaps spread out a bit, since both are about two hours long and I can speak from experience that four hours of Lost podcasts in a single day is a bit overwhelming).

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November 14, 2009 · 2:38 pm

Mad Men Season Three Podcast: Observations and Ruminations

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A Mad Men Season Three Podcast

November 14th, 2009

What’s really interesting about Mad Men’s third season is that, because of how strong the finale was, it makes criticizing the season as a whole somewhat difficult. It requires sort of forgetting about how great the finale was, and going back to consider just how everything came together. The finale, in some ways, rewrote some of our concerns about the season: we wanted more Sterling Cooper drama and we got more Sterling Cooper drama, and we complained about Joan’s marginalization and suddenly Joan was back front and centre.

So when I joined The House Next Door’s Luke De Smet and The A.V. Club/etc.’s Todd VanDerWerff for a special TV on the Internet/House Next Door Mad Men Season Three podcast, there was a definite sense that the strength of the finale has in some way coloured our opinions on the rest of the season. I’m not suggesting that the third season was bad, but rather that in our enjoyment of the finale (and a couple of other key episodes) we may have spent more time talking about what works than we did talking about what didn’t (although we do discuss some of the story elements that were perhaps underdeveloped). It’s a great conversation, discussing a number of key subjects and focusing on different areas of the show’s success, but there were a couple of more negative things I wanted to say about the season that almost didn’t fit into the podcast’s narrative thanks to how much goodwill the finale created for all of us.

As such, after the jump I’ll go into detail on the one major issue I have with the season that didn’t make it into the podcast, but do go have a listen before reading on.

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June 28, 2009 · 10:48 am

Cultural News Flash: Podcast, Virtuality Ratings, Tonight’s TV

Off to a family gathering today, so I figured I’d drop a few notes on a number of exciting (or depressing, so as to counterpoint the exciting I guess) notes for the day ahead.

(Myles on) TV on the Internet

Todd VanDerWerff is pretty well known around these parts as a fellow TV critic and friend of the blog (a term I steal mercilessly from Alan Sepinwall, it’s just plain fun to use), but I haven’t given nearly enough attention to the really engaging, wondefully consistent, and now special guest enhanced TV on the Internet Podcast that he does with the lovely Libby Hill. I spent part of last evening defending some of my own unpopular opinions (warning: I’m not nearly objectionable enough, so they’re pretty boring) and more excitingly analyzing some particularly insane (and hilarious) opinions from Todd and Libby. We’re also joined by Carrie Raisler, who I know from my days back writing a bit for Todd’s South Dakota Dark, and who does TV recaps for Zap2it. It was a blast to be on the show, and hopefully the podcast can bring more great guests from Todd’s TV rolodex into the fold with time.

Link: TV On the Internet – Episode 13 – Unpopular Opinions

Virtuality Ratings

I made a note of this on Twitter (a few actually, since bad news always begets bad puns), but any chance of FOX’s Virtuality (Which I discussed Friday night in excessive detail for its position as a pilot being burned off in the summer) being picked up went away yesterday when its ratings revealed a mere 1.8 million viewers and a 0.5 in the key 18-49 demographic. For those who don’t follow ratings news, this is particularly awful even for summer, drawing less viewers than ABC’s Surviving Suburbia (which is less surprising than embarassing) and just not connecting as it needed to in order to feel like it had momentum to gain in the future.

Sure, there’s still a long shot of DirecTV or Sci-Fi (I refuse to call it by its new name) stepping in to save the show, but with an expensive budget, an extensive cast, and considering these ratings, the show really doesn’t have a chance of surviving, which is really a pity as the show came together really well. Alas, it’s another disappointment in a string of Sci-Fi television getting a bump rap, so Fringe and Dollhouse in all their inconsistency (if particularly strong on their highs) will have to do.

Tonight’s TV

Tonight is the beginning for HBO’s Hung, a show about a high school gym teacher who embodies the show’s title and decides when down on his luck to take advantage of it – critics are somewhat divided on the show (some, like Mo Ryan, find it a disappointment, while Alan Sepinwall is a fan of the show and is adding it to his blogging rotation), but I’m giving it a shot tonight regardless and will be back with my review later tonight.

I’ve also taken a look at the first episode of Merlin that NBC will air tonight, “The Mark of Nimueh,” and the show remains what it was before: low budget, simple, and in some ways charming. Tonight’s episodes feature Michelle Ryan (“Bionic Woman”) as an evil sorceress, and the second episode, “The Poisoned Chalice,” has a storyline that focuses more heavily on Arthur, for those looking for more branching off in that direction.

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March 27, 2009 · 5:31 pm

The McNuttCast: Episode Two – The Juno Awards

mcnuttcastlogoIn this week’s first “normal” edition of The McNuttCast, we can’t entirely get away from talking Battlestar Galactica – while I had the privilege of collaborating with Devindra Hardawar and Meredith Woerner on the epic /Filmcast Series Finale discussion [LINK], the Elder McNutt didn’t get the same chance, so there’s a few minutes of BSG spoilers in here that are clearly marked.

The rest of the show, meanwhile, diversifies beyond television to the world of film, music and video games, as my readers get to see whether I actually know anything about these subjects. We discuss the genius of the Where the Wild Things Are trailer, delve into the latest release from local Canadian artist Joel Plaskett, and discuss the dominance and continued evolution of Nintendo’s current position in the video game market. And, of course, I still find time to discuss the state of NBC bubble shows, the Parks and Recreation testing “controversy” and the ratings for Dollhouse’s “Man on the Street.”

In our feature discussion, coincidentally only a day after 30 Rock made a joke about the Canadian Grammys, we discuss the biggest music-based awards show in Canada, the Juno Awards. Don’t worry, our international listeners: we contextualize our anger, and try to make sure that you don’t view the winners and nominees as representative of the best Canada has to offer.

We’re still working on getting onto iTunes (it’s our weekend project), but in the meantime you can listen and download below – full show notes are after the fold! If you have any comments or questions or suggestions of what you might want us to cover, send us an email: you can reach us through either of our sites, or by emailing us (for me, cultural.learnings @ gmail.com).

The McNuttCast: Episode Two – The Juno Awards

Download the MP3 [41m10s – 19mb]

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March 23, 2009 · 5:54 pm

BSG: The Long Goodbye – Introduction

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Introduction

March 23rd, 2009

I have written a lot about Battlestar Galactica over the past two years of this blog. One of my very first posts, in fact, was about how Battlestar Galactica was more or less taking over my life, leading me to see parallels in literature, in every day life, and expecting in some way that it would slowly meld with my own life. And, on Friday night, it pretty well did: after watching the finale, I shut myself into my room and turned out an epic, sprawling and rather indulgent review that was part catharsis and part exorcism. It was not, however, a goodbye.

I don’t think I’ll ever say “goodbye” to the show, what with the DVDs I could watch, or the academic papers I might eventually write, but at the same time I felt after writing that review that I need some more time, and some more posts, to really come to terms with this ending. And so, throughout the week I’ll be posting a myriad of thoughts on the show, whether it’s some links to the views of other critics, or an extended analysis of Season Four’s narrative structure, or potentially even something I’ve been resisting for a while but may have found its ideal time frame in the wake of the finale. I’m also considering the rather insane task of confronting the issue of the finale’s religious elements, but perhaps I’ll come to my senses before wading into that particular conflict.

Regardless, it’s one last chance to get some of this off my chest before I know I’ll have to put it on the backburner in favour of academic pursuits.

Monday:

The Critical Response to “Daybreak” – A collection of various critical analyses of the finale, with some of my own insight sprinkled in for good measure.

Tuesday:

Finale Discussion – A two-hour discussion of the series finale done with Devindra Hardawar and Meredith Woerner, recorded as a special edition of the /Filmcast, is now available for download at the above link.

Wednesday:

The Trouble with Twenty – As ironic as it sounds, an analysis of how the problems of feeling like the season needed more time could have been solved by shortening its season to tighten the show’s narrative.

Thursday:

The Real Higher Power – With all this talk of God and religion, let’s realize who really holds the most control in the BSG universe: Bear McCreary, composer of the Gods, controls our emotions and reactions more than any writer, producer, or higher power ever could.

Friday:

Romancing the Cylon, Revisited – My obsession with BSG is perhaps best represented by my undergraduate thesis about the series’ connection with Medieval Romance, so what better way to finish this cathartic week than spreading it to the world?

[Come back daily for another dose of The Long Goodbye.]

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March 20, 2009 · 8:00 am

The McNuttCast: Episode One – “Battlestar Galactica”

mcnuttcastlogoConsidering how much time and energy I’ve devoted to Battlestar Galactica, one would think that I would have spent all of this week preparing an epic list of episodes, plus some final thoughts before the show’s series finale this evening. However, I realized at a certain point that I couldn’t do it: there was too much to say, too much that I’d end up repeating in tonight’s review of the finale itself. If I was going to discuss or engage with the series, I had to diversify.

As a result, after many requests and much rumination, my brother Ryan (from McNutt Against the Music) and I collaborated on the very first, and special, edition of The McNuttCast, a half-hour discussion about popular culture, including television, movies, music and video games.

In this episode focused solely on Battlestar Galactica, we discuss everything ranging from favourite episodes and characters to the pacing concerns in Season Four and our hopes for tonight’s finale. We discuss some big questions, including at what point the series first struck us as something genuinely unique, and also some smaller things along the way.

When The McNuttCast moves to its normal structure, it’ll be a bit more of a departure for me and the blog – rather than replacing any existing blog content, it’s rather there to add a little bit of diversity. While I’ll be leading the way on television, and the Elder McNutt has the music beat, we’re pretty even on movies and video games, so it will be interesting to see how I adapt to suddenly discussing those topics on a regular basis in a critical framework beyond Twitter. There’s more information about our goals and our future structure in the first episode.

In the meantime, though, it’s all Battlestar all the time – in our 30-minute structure (this one runs a bit longer) we don’t have room (or the free time) to delve into every single episode, so feel free to let us know which ones we forgot, or which ones we were remiss in including. And, of course, come back in the wee hours this evening for my full, likely thesis-length review, of the second part of “Daybreak.”

So say we all!

McNuttCast: Episode One – “Battlestar Galactica”

Download the MP3 (36:20)

NOTE: You can find chapter breaks in the list below – we’re currently working on getting the Subscription side of things together, as this was a bit of a last minute launch (and the Elder is currently on a plane on his way to Saskatchewan of all places). When we get things finalized, we’ll be sure to update accordingly.

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December 10, 2008 · 1:15 pm

Down in the Hole: Podcasting HBO’s The Wire with Alan Sepinwall and the /Filmcast

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Podcasting HBO’s The Wire

December 10th, 2008

For those who follow me on Twitter, or have visited my twitter page, you’ll know that I refer to myself quite realistically as a “Wannabe T.V. Critic.” This is the wonder of the internet: through sheer productivity and a few karmic turns of fate, I have managed to fall into a routine that is both personally satisfying and, I hope, something that adds to the internet’s critical discourse of television.

This week has been a reminder of both how those turns of fate have manifested themselves and how much I enjoy doing this. Since I’ve started appearing on the /Filmcast, with the gang of Dave, Devindra and Adam who I quite incidentally teamed up with in their podcasting days before the big time, I’ve found another outlet for discussing television. Both on the podcast and (perhaps most importantly) through the chat room, I have been able to meet some great people and have some really great discussions.

Ultimately, though, Monday night’s /Filmcast was the one that will likely always stick out in my mind. It was what I would refer to as an exorcism: a chance for the /Filmcast to get everything it needed to say about a certain HBO drama series which is highly critically acclaimed, unduly underappreciated by the Emmy Awards, a personal favourite show of every member of the /Filmcast, and the show that enraptured me this past summer.

The show is The Wire, and what began as a germ of an idea suggested by a few readers ballooned into an epic 3 1/2 ode to the series that should have changed the face of television and instead only raised the standards by which we rate shows which come after it and fail to pick up on what made it such an amazing feat from David Simon and Ed Burns. And if you don’t believe us, consider that we spent 3 1/2 hours and both never ran out of things to say and, worst of all, barely scratched the surface with certain characters and events. Recording the podcast, and preparing for it ahead of time, was a reminder just what the show accomplished, and being able to revisit that was going to be a lot of fun.

It was also a real honour: Alan Sepinwall, from the New Jersey Star-Ledger, is a fantastic (and real) TV critic who I often link to, and who I certainly view as a “role model” when it comes to developing a critical discourse in a blog setting. He’s also one of the most vocal and knowledgeable voices on The Wire, which made Monday’s discussion that much more monumental for someone whose first post on this blog was an indepth expose on violence in university broomball. I just hope that I held myself well enough not to bring a bad name to criticism from my perch in “Wannabe” land.

Overall, it was another sign of how grateful I am for Dave, Adam and Devindra having me on the /Filmcast and Dave, in particular, for egging me on to start watching The Wire this summer. I haven’t written as much about it as I would have liked, but you can find what I’ve written by clicking here. In the meantime, if I were you, I’d subscribe to the /Filmcast – it’s most certainly going to pay dividends to your critical future.

The /Filmcast Episode 29: HBO’s The Wire (f. Alan Sepinwall and I)

NOTE: There’s a forty-five minute discussion with Alan which is light spoiler territory, for those who want to know why we spend 3 1/2 hours talking about the show. What follows is a season by season breakdown, although I’ll warn you ahead of time that we sometimes spoil future seasons within discussions of other ones. So, if you’ve only seen three seasons, I’d still get through the whole thing before listening.

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December 8, 2008 · 11:18 am

Catharsis: Thoughts and Ruminations on HBO’s The Wire

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Thoughts and Ruminations on HBO’s The Wire

December 8th, 2008

I doubt that anyone has ever really thought about it, but I’ve been living in a state of shame since, earlier this summer, I reviewed the first two episodes of The Wire, Season One, and made the follow proclamation:

“I figured that the more people talk about what is (thus far, and by all accounts) a fantastic series the better for my readers, readers everywhere, and maybe even the show’s long-shot Emmy chances.”

That post, and a post comparing the show to The Dark Knight, were the only two times I’ve talked about The Wire on this blog. Now, this isn’t that uncommon in terms of other shows I’ve caught up on: I got through four and a half seasons of Six Feet Under without talking about it (no, I haven’t finished it yet. Maybe next summer), and until the third season started I didn’t fill you all in last summer when I caught up on How I Met Your Mother. Due to both the speed at which I burn through these episodes, and the relative age of the material, it doesn’t seem like something that is entirely necessary.

But the difference with The Wire is that it wasn’t a normal catchup session – stretched out over a number of months, experiencing The Wire for the first time was something that still hasn’t left me. While I’ve almost forgotten I’ve seen most of Six Feet Under, I can’t help but wax philosophical about The Wire at every opportunity. Those of us who have seen the series, admittedly, must sound like a broken record, but there’s a certain creed of sorts: in any discussion raising the question about television shows to recommend, or television shows that have made an impact, or television shows that deserved more awards attention, or sometimes even just television in general, The Wire is going to be our go-to suggestion.

Tonight at 9pm EST, I will be joining Dave, Devindra and Adam of the /Filmcast for a live indepth discussion of The Wire, which will be the first time that I have truly entered into a dialogue about this amazing series. [To listen in to the live podcast, click here at 9pm] Considering this I felt like, even if I don’t have the substantial back catalogue I wish I had and that could have pulled you as readers into this universe sooner, I could at least offer some brief thoughts as I (if not through watching it) revisit the Shakespearean journey that is David Simon and Ed Burns’ The Wire.

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June 4, 2008 · 4:31 am

Did Lost’s Flashforwards Spoil Its Own Finale?

As you may have read, earlier this week I had the privilege of being a guest on the second episode of the /Filmcast, the official podcast of SlashFilm.com. It’s quickly making a name for itself as one of the most thorough and lively entertainment podcasts around, largely due to the dedicated of Dave, Devindra, Adam and Peter to making it an interactive and enjoyable experience – it was an honour to only briefly be a part of it.

The episode is now available for download @ Slashfilm.com (Or should be soon, I’ll update the link later), or you can subscribe via iTunes (Link will take you into iTunes to do so, FYI), and I had the pleasure of discussing the Lost finale with the fine gentlemen in the show’s first quarter (Starting at about 14m, but listen to the whole thing folks). And, well, it got me thinking (What doesn’t?).

In a third season episode of How I Met Your Mother, Barney Stinson (played by Neil Patrick Harris) finds out ahead of time that his friend Marshall plans to slap him (as part of a “Slap Bet”) during Thanksgiving dinner. At first, he chides Marshall for this childish error: now that the element of surprise is gone, all of the suspense is taken away, and the slap has lost its impact. But then the anticipation gets to him, tearing apart his emotions and leaving an empty shell of a man who (eventually) gets the slap and a celebratory song to go with it.

Now, I doubt that the writers of this particular episode were necessarily thinking in these terms, but I find great meaning in this storyline in lieu of a re-engaged question of “spoilers,” a four-letter word in a lot of internet circles. I am part of these circles, an adamant believer that spoilers need to be marked extremely carefully if not excised entirely. For example, I’m okay with a spoiler being found in a review of an upcoming episode, but not on the front page of a popular entertainment site (Not that Zap2it has ruined countless episodes of Survivor for me, or anything).

I raise this issue for two reasons: first off, Entertainment Weekly’s Ken Tucker recently fired a shot at people like myself. In admittedly his harshest pullquote, he ends with the following:

Knowing the way something turns out shouldn’t ruin anyone’s pleasure. Hey, it’s a 24/7 media world. The best way to kill spoiler culture, if you don’t like it, is to say one thing to both spoilers and spoiler ”victims”: Grow up.

Admittedly, this is bound to upset a lot of people, myself included – yes, it’s a 24/7 Media World, but that doesn’t necessarily excuse unlabeled spoilers within 12 hours of an episode airing. However, Tucker’s point gained more clarity through something he said earlier:

I admit that if someone tells me who won The Amazing Race before I’ve seen it, I may gnash my teeth a little. But chances are, it will make me want to see how those people scored their victories and how the producers edited the game even more.

First off, if anyone ever ruins The Amazing Race for me, I might have to hurt them.

Second, after discussing it with the folks on the /Filmcast on Monday night, one of the things that came very clear was that Lost Season Four had one problem for quite a few people: it had been spoiled. We knew how it ended, knew that our castaways would get off the island and that they would be called the Oceanic Six and that there was a whole lot of fishy things about their departure. It wasn’t just that we presumed what might happen (Like Chekhov’s gun, for example), but that we actually knew the end result: we just had to, as Tucker seems to argue, enjoy the journey and how the producers take us to that conclusion.

So when we all sat down to discuss the Lost finale, and we all kind of agreed that the ending being spoiled had a profound impact on how we viewed the season, I wondered whether here we have a microcosm, a perfect test for Tucker’s thesis and the argument of spoilsports around the globe. And while it is certainly open for interpretation, I tend to believe that it both proves and disproves this concept that knowing only makes the heart grow fonder.

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