Overhated

What do you get when you combine Star Wars, Conan the Barbarian, Excalibur, Lord of the Rings, a slice of Zardoz, and six other random ingredients? You get Krull, that's what. I'm joined by Screen Anarchy's Mel Valentin (@realmelvalentin) to discuss this weird, expensive, misshapen misfire from 1983. Thanks for listening to Overhated! There are 100+ more episodes at patreon.com/scottEweinberg . Su...

How is a global smash considered Overhated? Even the critics were only half angry at this one, so where's the hate? Well, for a good long while this movie was quite vocally "hated" by a good portion of comic book fans, Raimi nuts, and film critics too. But have the intervening years (and the endless deluge of superhero films) been kind to Spider-Man 3 ? I consulted with the fantastic nerd called S...

Richard Kelly has had an interesting (if annoyingly abbreviated) directorial career thus far. He hit the indie scene with the enjoyably weird Donnie Darko (2001) before delivering a pricey misfire called Southland Tales (2006), and then he got to helm this half-bizarre / half-conventional sci-fi mindbender based on a Richard Matheson story.  Big thanks to Chicago film critic James Laczkowski (@jim...

Just what everyone's dying to hear: two opinionated men over 40 discussing Josie and the Pussycats ! But to be fair, A) it's my show, and B) my guest did write a book about this movie! His name's Russ Burlingame (@russburlingame) and you can get a signed copy of Best Movie Ever over at josiebook.com Thanks for listening to Overhated! There are 100+ more episodes at patreon.com/scottEweinberg . Sub...

For at least 20 years Grease 2 was dismissed as the unloved sequel to an unquestioned classic. Well, guess what. It's time for a re-evaluation of this movie, and to that end I've enlisted a big G2 fan: it's B.J. Colangelo (@bjcolangelo) of teen-centric podcast "This Ends at Prom." Thanks for listening to Overhated! There are 100+ more episodes at patreon.com/scottEweinberg . Subscribe to hear them...

I wanted to post a clip of the 2022 Overhated Recap on the normal podcast feeds, but of course that would have been too easy. Instead of that I roped show producers Erik Childress and Jim Laczkowski into sitting down to discuss some predictions. Specifically, which movies we expect to get savaged by the critics and/or ignored by large audiences in the upcoming year. Then we glued a clip of the Rec...

To cover a science fiction movie this awful, I need a trained professional, so I called on Ty Franck (one half of the writing team who brought us The Expanse novels and TV series) and together we dissected one of the most bafflingly terrible movies of the year 2000. Thanks for listening to Overhated! There are 100+ more episodes at patreon.com/scottEweinberg . Subscribe to hear them all now! Check...

There are three types of "overhated"  movies: massive turkeys like Battlefield Earth ; overlooked / underappreciated gems like Event Horizon ; and movies that made huge money while pissing off critics before being remanded to the "guilty pleasure" bin. Anaconda falls into the third category. But don't call it a guilty pleasure around guest host Trace Thurman (aka @tracedthurman) of Bloody Disgusti...

Holy crap is this one plain old bad. But I will be forever indebted to this abysmal movie because it gave me a chance to chit-chat with a very funny movie nerd named Gareth Reynolds (aka @reynoldsgareth) who co-hosts a brilliant podcast called The Dollop. But yeah. This movie is supremely terrible. Listen in for why! Thanks for listening to Overhated! There are 100+ more episodes at patreon.com/sc...

In 1982 the director of Smokey and the Bandit and The Cannonball Run took money from Hong Kong film investors and the Mattel toy company, and headed out into the Nevada desert to make a G.I. Joe-style action movie full of fireworks, motorcycles, and skin-tight bodysuits. And Megaforce was the result. For this episode I'm joined by screenwriter / author / podcaster / puppy owner C. Robert Cargill (...

For this episode I'm joined by Ken Reid (@kennethwreid) of the excellent "TV Guidance Counselor" podcast to discuss, well, a truly weird, loud, and obnoxious misfire -- not to mention expensive. And unprofitable. (And annoying.)  Thanks, patrons! Thanks for listening to Overhated! There are 100+ more episodes at patreon.com/scottEweinberg . Subscribe to hear them all now! Check out the list of epi...

Put down your pitchforks, horror fans. I'm not for one second asserting that Event Horizon is on the same level as Jaws: The Revenge or Exorcist II .  But it was generally disliked by critics, and the box office numbers were pretty weak, and then the movie just disappeared. For a few years, anyway. I'm joined by Event Horizon screenwriter Philip Eisner (aka @phubar) to discuss the intense sci-fi/h...

It was budgeted at $11,000,000. That figured ballooned to over $40,000,000. And the movie made less than $4,000,000. I'm joined by Chicago film historian Sergio Mims to discuss the infamous Michael Cimino western Heaven's Gate. Thanks for listening to Overhated! There are 100+ more episodes at patreon.com/scottEweinberg . Subscribe to hear them all now! Check out the list of episodes here: bit.ly/...

Settle down for a "worst horror movies ever made" debate and it won't take long for 1977's Exorcist II: The Heretic to enter the conversation. A financial, critical, and horror enthusiast's mega-bomb of the highest order, this is one weird-ass movie. But is it perhaps (you guessed it) Overhated?  For this episode I'm joined by the wonderfully horror-obsessed @lovelyzena (follow her on twitter). Th...

What happens when you cut a superhero movie's budget in half just days before production beings? You end up with a half-finished, misshapen mess like 1987's Superman IV: The Quest for Peace. And fortunately we have one of the film's stars on hand to discuss what the hell went wrong. Big thanks to (veteran character actor and present-day Lex Luthor) Jon Cryer(!) for taking the time to discuss the "...

For this episode I'm joined by my friend and filmmaker Laurel Vail (check out her short film What Metal Girls Are Into ) as we make our way through the big-budget, ensemble-cast, literary adaption / cuckoo misfire / romantic drama fantasy... tragedy that is Akiva Goldsman's Winter's Tale .   Thanks for listening to Overhated! There are 100+ more episodes at patreon.com/scottEweinberg . Subscribe t...

I needed a special guest to cover a special movie, so let's just get to it. Here's me and Junkfood Cinema's Brian Salisbury discussing the history, quality, and reputation of 1980's Flash Gordon. Thanks for listening to Overhated! There are 100+ more episodes at patreon.com/scottEweinberg . Subscribe to hear them all now! Check out the list of episodes here: bit.ly/3WZiLFk . Subscribe wherever you...

Few comedies have caused this many film critics' heads to explode with rage -- myself included -- but you can't get too far into the Overhated conversation without addressing the elephant's penis in the room. It's time for Freddy Got Fingered. For this episode I'm joined by former film critic and current sitcom writer/producer Patrick Walsh, who co-hosts his own Patreon podcast called "We'll See Y...

The "video game to movie" adaptation has been the domain of (mostly) bad movies for decades. But where did this type of movie begin? Right here! In 1993, with this wildly bizarre and (yes) frequently awful piece of pop culture. But could this infamous flick be somehow overhated? Film critic Audrey Fox (Crooked Marquee, Nerdist, Ebert Voices, etc.) is here to discuss that precise question! Thanks f...

Jason X probably doesn't belong in the highest pantheon of overhated films like your Catwomen and your Howards the Duck, but it's safe to say it's been dismissed, derided, and and dunked upon for 20 years. So I decided to sit down with my old friend Todd Farmer (aka the man who wrote Jason X) to discuss the reputation of what could have been called Friday the 13th Part 10: In Space.  Thanks for li...

Fresh off the wild success of the three Star Wars and two Indiana Jones movies, George Lucas sets his sights on something a bit... weirder. Settle in for some Howard the Duck banter between me and my very old friend Erik Childress (@erikthemovieman) as we contemplate the creation of this colorfully bizarre misfire, what works and what doesn't, and whether or not this is even the worst movie of tha...

In this episode I'm joined by my old friend Ben Rock, who once directed a movie called Alien Raiders and produced a podcast for Shudder called Video Palace. He also hosts a cinematography podcast and has a nice beard. Ben and I spend 40-some minutes chatting about the slightly infamous Blair Witch Project sequel, and he offers some unique insights because he was the production designer on Part 1! ...

Ishtar. Heaven's Gate. Howard the Duck. Plan 9 from Outer Space. The history of cinema is littered with a big batch of "historically hated" movies; films that go beyond bad and become pop culture punchlines.  But why are most "bad" movies more or less forgotten, while others still retain their punching bag status for decades? That's something I'll be discussing with a collection of brilliant guest...