After Lunch

Michael, Pax, and Noel Thingvall talk about our favorite movies from ten years ago. 2015 was a great year for blockbusters, but a lot of smaller films made our lists as well. We also talk about some stinkers and honorable mentions.

Michael, Rob, and Pax talk about  Fast Five , basically the  Avengers  of the  Fast and Furious  series in which characters from all the previous films team up to pull off a heist while avoiding capture by The Rock. This is where the series becomes The Series and we're excited to finally be here.

Michael, Rob, and Karen return for a look at the first direct sequel in the Bond series: Marc Forster's  Quantum of Solace . While the Bond films have always been nominal sequels to each other,  Quantum of Solace  closely continues Bond's story begun in  Casino Royale . Bond fans had never seen anything like it and not everyone appreciated the new experience. We talk about that and editing and vil...

Kay, Robert Zerbe, Pax, and Michael look back at their favorite movies, shows, and books of 2024, check in on their pop culture predictions and resolutions from the year, and make new ones for 2025.

Michael and Jess talk about a couple more horror comics this month. First is Becky Cloonan's dark fantasy short story collection,  By Chance or Providence . Then  Witch for Hire , a high school mystery by Ted Naifeh.  And we also talk a little about the movies Nosferatu  (2024) and  I Was a Teenage Frankenstein (1957).

Michael, Pax, and Rob wrap up this month's Lounge talking about  Ghost Stories: Stephen Fry's Definitive Collection ,  Batman: Resurrection  by John Jackson Miller,  Lady Macbeth  by Ava Reid,  The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim ,  Sure I'll Join Your Cult by Maria Bamford, what makes a good Sherlock Holmes pastiche, and more.

After a loungeless December, Michael, Pax, and Rob are back to talk about lots of things including the TV series  Rome , stand-up comedy albums,  Transformers One ,  Red One,   Wicked , and another superhero TikTok game.

Michael, Rob, Pax, and special guest The Bald Tiger (who strangely disappears whenever Rob's around) talk about the 1940 serial  The Shadow starring Victor Jory, Veda Ann Borg, and... Roger Moore?

Michael, Rob, and Karen Flieger begin the new year with a new era in the Bond series. We're finally watching Daniel Craig and talking about Martin Campbell's reboot,  Casino Royale . Or  is it a reboot? What about M? Continuity is on the agenda as well as action, character arcs, and ambiguity about who the heroes and villains are.

Michael and Jess start a series of episodes focusing on horror comics. In this one, we talk about Junji Ito's adaptation of  Frankenstein  and Emily Carroll's short story collection,  Through the Woods .  We also discuss the movies  Smile  (2022),  Talk to Me  (2022),  Eyes Without a Face  (1960), and  Kuroneko  (1968).  

Merry Christmas! As our very special gift to you, Michael, Rob, Michael DiGiovanni, and Jody Collins don't just talk about our favorite Christmas songs. We put them into brackets and vote on them until we determine the Greatest Christmas Song of All Time!

Michael and Rob welcome Jeff Somogyi to talk about Les Mayfield's remake of  Miracle on 24th Street , starring Mara Wilson, Richard Attenborough, Elizabeth Perkins, and Dylan McDermott. We have differing opinions about its quality. How much does it makes sense? How does it compare to the original? And how well does it communicate its ideas about faith, truth, and capitalism? We get into all of it...

With this episode, all of the  Sleigh Bell Cinema  archives are now included in the  After Lunch  feed. Michael and his wife Diane talk about Jon Favreau's hilarious and heart-warming modern classic,  Elf starring Will Ferrell, James Caan, and Zooey Deschanel.

In this penultimate rerun of old  Sleigh Bell Cinema  episodes, Michael talks with Jeff Somogyi about the hilarious and underrated  Ernest Saves Christmas .

In the second of this week's  Sleigh Bell Cinema  reruns, Michael and Dan Taylor talk about killer robots, polar bears, and Martian uprisings in Nicholas Webster's notorious  Santa Claus Conquers the Martians .

In this rerun from Michael's old  Sleigh Bell Cinema  podcast, he talks with Mike Westfall about the 1947 classic  Miracle on 34th Street starring Edmund Gwenn, Maureen O'Hara, and Natalie Wood.

Michael and Rob welcome back Jacob Bean-Watson to discuss what's either a tangential Christmas movie or a Christmas ghost story, depending on your point of view. It's  The Curse of the Cat People , Val Lewton's controversial follow-up to his noir horror film  Cat People from a couple of years earlier. Simone Simon, Kent Smith, Jane Randolph, and Elizabeth Russell return from the earlier movie, joi...

Michael and Rob welcome David May back to the show to discuss this year's Holiday Spirit movie. For us, Holiday Spirit films are undeniably about Christmas, but without any fantastical or magical elements. And this one is  Office Christmas Party starring Jason Bateman, Olivia Munn, TJ Miller, Jennifer Aniston, and Kate McKinnon, while also featuring Courtney B Vance, Rob Corddry, Randall Park, Sam...

In accordance with tradition, Mike Westfall from  the  Advent Calendar House  podcast  returns to help Michael and Rob kick off the Christmas season right with another  Christmas Carol  adaptation. This year, we're watching the classic 1951 version (titled  Scrooge in the original British) starring Alastair Sim.

Rob, Michael, and Pax finish up this month's lounge talking about  Agatha All Along , Seasons 4 and 5 of  Fargo , lots of podcasts, a game in which Rob has Pax and Michael create new MCU characters, Tears for Fears' new concert film, and much much more.

In the first half of this month's lounge, Rob, Michael, and Pax talk about movies for Native American Heritage Month, recent movies  Heretic  and  Woman of the Hour , books like  The Daughters of Block Island  by Christa Carmen,  What Moves the Dead  by T Kingfisher,  The Devil You Know by KJ Parker, and ever so much more.

After a few episodes determining the best TV themes from various genres, Michael and Rob are joined by Jacob and KC from  The Movie Connection  podcast to discuss the top four from each category and decide which is the Ultimate TV Theme Song of All Time. 

Michael, Rob, and Pax watch the fourth  Fast and Furious  movie. It's a prequel to the third one, but it also starts putting the disparate first three movies together to move the series towards what it's going to become. It's crazy, it's exciting, but is it good? And what about its  own  prequel,  Los Bandoleros , directed and co-written by Vin Diesel? 

Michael, Rob, and Karen finish the Brosnan Bond films with the most hated Bond film of them all. Or  is  it? It's  Die Another Day  co-starring Halle Berry, Rosamund Pike, Toby Stephens, a  ton of references to earlier Bond films, and that song by Madonna.

Michael and Jess talk about a couple of vampire movies from Mike Mignola's list of favorite horror movies. After revisiting  The Fearless Vampire Killers  (1967), which we'd both previously seen and disliked, we try Neil Jordan's  Byzantium (2012), starring Saoirse Ronan and Gemma Arterton, to see if we like it any better.