2 Cents Critic

Tune in as Rolo Tony ( @PoorOldRoloTony  and  These Guys Got Juice ) circles back around to the show to cover Special Effects, the 1984 thriller/horror movie about a murderous filmmaker who tries to recover his rocky career by basing his latest project on a killing that he himself carried out and recorded on camera. Drawing parallels between this flick and Body Double, the ruthlessly biting commen...

A filmmaker is joining the podcast today! That’s Ava Maria Safai, the director behind the 2023 body horror short film “ZIP” and the 2025 horror movie Foreigner. Arthur was fortunate enough to discover her through  “ZIP,”  which you can find on YouTube thanks to ALTER’s platform for terrifying and imaginative horror media. Appreciation for Final Destination, using “ZIP” to call for the liberation o...

Tune in as Robert “Stew” Stewart ( Stew World Order ) strides back onto the podcast to discuss 5 Centimeters per Second, the 2007 anime coming-of-age movie about the love and connections that drift in and out of a yearning boy’s life over the course of several years. Reading Takaki through a lens of depression, the other adaptations of this film fleshing out the narrative a little more, 5 Centimet...

Tune in as Pride Month reaches its conclusion on 2CC, where we’ve spent all of that time directing the focus towards queer art! And now for the fourth and final episode of June, Misty Rose ( @mistyroseva ) circles back around to the podcast for a dive into Bound, the 1996 neo-noir erotic thriller about the lesbian affair between an ex-convict and the girlfriend of a mobster, with the two women coo...

Tune in as Pride Month keeps rolling down its path on the program! For this third episode of June, Clayton Jones II ( Men Who Like Men Who Like Movies Podcast ) is regaining his guest chair to unpack Banana Fish, the 2018 crime thriller anime series about a 17-year-old street gang leader and a 19-year-old photographer’s assistant who get drawn into a criminal conspiracy involving a dangerous drug....

Tune in as Pride Month advances onward with the focus that 2CC is giving to queer media! For this second episode of June, Joshua R. Pangborn ( Sidekick Productions ) re-collaborates with the podcast for a review and recap of Bit, the 2019 horror movie about an 18-year-old trans woman who moves to LA and encounters a lesbian vampire gang that’s on a mission to hunt down predatory men. Subverting va...

Tune in as the podcast dives into Pride Month and spends all of it covering queer media! For this first episode of June, Katrina ( @katrinaslibrary ) is jumping back onto 2CC to explore Light from Uncommon Stars, the 2021 speculative fiction book by Ryka Aoki that follows the interconnected stories of a trans girl who runs away from home and dreams of being a violinist, a music teacher who has sac...

Tune in as Rolo Tony ( @PoorOldRoloTony  and  These Guys Got Juice ) hops back onto the program for a review and recap of Dream Lover, the 1994 erotic thriller about a recent divorcee who jumps fast into another relationship with an alluring woman, only to find that there may be more to her than it seems at the outset. Comparing this to Gone Girl and You, James Spader being an expert at sleaziness...

Tune in as Rolo Tony ( @PoorOldRoloTony  and  These Guys Got Juice ) hops back onto the podcast to navigate Strange Days, the 1995 tech-noir thriller that follows the last two days of 1999 as an LAPD vice cop-turned-black marketeer and a bodyguard/limo driver rush to uncover a criminal conspiracy involving illegal technology that records your memories and physical sensations for other people to vi...

Tune in as Vanessa Ondi ( Best Week Ever Podcast ) returns to 2CC for a dive into One of the Good Guys, the 2024 thriller novel by Araminta Hall that follows the secrets rising to the surface when a man searches for a fresh start in the wake of his broken marriage by moving to a tranquil place out on the coast, where he befriends an intriguing artist and then gets drawn into the mystery of two you...

Tune in as Andy ( Fat Dude Digs Flicks Movie Podcasts ) returns to the podcast as it rolls out the 2026 Oscars recap! Another awards season has passed us by, and it's fitting to say that this year was relatively enjoyable compared to all the messy toxicity from last year (remember Emilia Pérez?) Timothée Chalamet’s comment on ballet and opera, contrasting opinions towards F1, Diane Warren’s pe...

Tune in as several friends of 2 Cents Critic jump back onto the podcast and celebrate it turning five years old! Guy Bradford ( Jesters of Ravenloft: A D&D Podcast ), Hannah and Rebecca ( Can I Spoil Something? ), Jessica Hart ( Totally Bombed ), Robert “Stew” Stewart ( Stew World Order ), Rolo Tony ( These Guys Got Juice ), and Seth Vargas ( Movie Friends ) are all teaming up with Arthur for...

Tune in as Hannah, Rebecca, and Sarah ( Can I Spoil Something? ) head back to the program in order to unpack The Summer Hikaru Died, the 2025 coming-of-age cosmic horror anime series that follows a pair of teenage boys as one of them realizes that his friend isn’t quite here anymore, having been possessed by an eldritch being. The queerness that’s written all over this show, the sexy tree, compari...

Tune in as Andrew ( @_theinsomniaclibrary_ ) collaborates with the podcast for a discussion on Heated Rivalry, the 2019 queer sports romance novel by Rachel Reid that follows star hockey players Shane Hollander and Ilya Rozanov as their eponymous rivalry quickly and secretly turns into a years-long dynamic of spice and then love. Shane being autism-coded up the wazoo, comparisons between this book...

Tune in as Betsy Gorham ( Never Seen It with Betsy and Trent ) jumps back onto the program for a dive into The Beekeeper, the 2024 action movie about a beekeeper who dishes out his secret capacity for stepping outside of the law and enforcing justice to take revenge on behalf of a close friend who got swindled by a phishing scam. The effort that this invests into supporting elderly people while po...

Tune in as Rolo Tony ( @PoorOldRoloTony  and  These Guys Got Juice ) regains his seat at the 2CC table for a breakdown of Better Man, the 2024 jukebox musical biopic that recounts the tumultuous life of former Take That member Robbie Williams while reimagining him as a chimpanzee. The hollowness and the parasocial terror of fame, “Come Undone” and “She’s the One” standing out as particularly splen...

Tune in as Kate Hergott ( Bookwild ) circles back around to the program in order to explore The Paradox Hotel, the 2022 sci-fi mystery-thriller novel by Rob Hart that follows an ill and grief-stricken head of security for a luxury time-travel hotel, which becomes the site for a bloody corpse that’s present and yet isn’t at the same time. The cheerful sort of nihilism, sympathizing with January in...

Tune in as Gizmo ( @basedgizmo ) joins in for a plunge right into Last Night in Soho, the 2021 horror film about a fashion design student who’s just moved to present-day London and gets all wrapped up in what appear to be initially glamorous and increasingly terrifying visions revolving around a young woman in the Swinging Sixties. The heavy inspiration that this draws from giallo, how this portra...

Tune in as Rolo Tony ( @PoorOldRoloTony ) hops back into his guest chair for a review and recap of Shoot ‘Em Up, the 2007 action movie about a carrot-munching drifter who puts his mastery of gun fu to good use by going on a mission to protect a newborn baby from an assassin and his many goons. Comparing this bonkers ride to flicks like John Wick and Falling Down, the spanking gag and other moments...

Tune in as Jessica Hart ( Opinionated Lushes ) jumps back onto the show for a breakdown of Despicable Me, the 2010 animated movie about a super-villain who pursues a dastardly mission to prove that he’s the best bad guy around by stealing the moon, all while having to deal with taking care of three orphaned girls. Gru standing out as a subversive antihero, dysfunctional family baggage, trying to l...

Tune in as Rolo Tony ( @PoorOldRoloTony ), who’s a Vegas-Residency cohost on  These Guys Got Juice , rejoins the podcast in order to navigate Predestination, the 2014 timey-wimey thriller about a time-traveling operative’s efforts to defeat a terrorist and the repercussions that this mission ends up having in its own intricate fashion. Drawing connections from this film to Looper and Tenet, the wa...

Tune in as Cory McCullough, AKA Gory Cory ( ⁠gorycory.net⁠ ), re-collaborates with the program to review You’re Next, the 2011 horror movie about a family reunion that seems like it will simply be a regular old gathering for this dysfunctional bunch… until a few homicidal home invaders wearing animal masks suddenly ambush the place. Comparing this flick to Ready or Not and Companion, filmmakers wo...

Tune in as Katrina ( @katrinaslibrary ) circles back around to 2CC so that she and Arthur can roll out their top ten books of 2025. Hoping that the growing subgenre of romantasy moves away from the likes of Rebecca Yarros and Sarah J. Maas, the importance of supporting armed resistance (including that which comes from Palestine), the deep flaws of Western liberalism, and the pervasive bigotry of a...

Jumping onboard the program today is Katherine Wela Bogen, who has just become a debut author by publishing  Queering Him , a novel that takes you through the intense and messy relationship between Avra and Kieran. In addition, Katie is a clinical psychology PhD student and cohost of the political podcast  SuperHumanizer , concentrating her energy on queerness, sexuality, sexual trauma, supporting...

Tune in as Andy ( Fat Dude Digs Flicks Movie Podcasts ) regains his comfy old guest seat in order to unpack Dead Again, the 1991 neo-noir romantic thriller about a private investigator’s mission to help an amnesiac and nonverbal woman recover her memories—a path that ends up uncovering a strange connection between her and a murder from several decades ago. Thoughts on Kenneth Branagh as a director...