About this Episode
We’ve got a lot to talk about this time, and for once the episode has a loose sort of chronology to it. Jump Cuts touches a bit on some pre-production issues, our Main Event review of The Wolverine looks at the final product, and the Cutting Room Floor anticipates the post-release judgement of an award show. Enough talk; let’s dive right into the lightning round.
Would This Be the “All-Is-Lost-Moment” or the “Dark Night of the Soul”?
We start out Jump Cuts with a quick tour of the on-demand libraries boasted by various cable companies. At least, that’s what the Screeners who still have cable talk about...
Even if there are still a few good ones out there, though, darkness has been looming past the edge of Hollywood’s silver lining for a few years now. Movie plots seem to be converging more and more, due in large part to the influence of a suspiciously specific book and the encroachment of machines into the business of art. The Screeners can’t resist a bit of prognostication: Will all the sameness flatline Hollywood, or is there always hope for the magic of the big screen?
Amidst the gloom and doom, though, the Screeners do still enjoy watching movies, and some of them seem to be real sticklers for the artistic vision of the filmmaker. That’s why recent reports of Netflix tampering with aspect ratios are so troubling to at least half of our beloved hosts...but is it really that big a deal? (Yes, yes it is.)
Finally, from streaming services to the devices that deliver us their bounty. There are approximately infinity plus seventeen Netflix-enabled plastic doohickeys on the market, but Google has kindly offered us another. This one does more, though: It does the Internets, all of them. Right on your telemawhatsit! Do we want one? Perhaps more than one? We might, and then we might not. We are fickle; we won't deny it.
“Listen, Bub—It’s a Comic Book movie”
Darren Aronofsky left the set of The Wolverine long ago, but the Screeners went ahead and saw it anyway. Logan is still Logan, but this movie isn’t the last one, or any of the other X-Men movies. Is this a good thing? Is there a plot hiding amongst the ninjas or written in Yakuza tattoos, or does adamantium cause heavy metal poisoning in writers? We’ll leave that to you to decide—after you properly absorb the Screeners’ musings on the subject, of course.
We Qualify As a Variety Show, Right?
Last but not least, Emmy nominations have been out for awhile now, and the Screeners would be remiss if they didn’t offer the committee their own input on the matter. Even though they’d like to, they don’t have time to cover all the categories. Instead, they’ve chosen five of the most glamorous groups to pick apart like birds of prey—or, who knows; maybe they’ll approve of one or two of the nominees. Chris is a nice guy, right? We can count on him...
Aaand we’re done. Join us over on Facebook to continue the conversation about the Emmys (and everything else), and keep the feedback and questions coming!