Marvelous! Or, the Death of Cinema

After concluding our long patreon-exclusive retrospective on the series, we arrive at last back in 2023 with Fast X, the bloated, messy, chaotic beginning of the end for the 'Fast Family'. Along the way we discuss Justin Lin's sudden exit, too much bluescreen, Vatican pinball, Jason Momoa as an evil gay guy, sticking Michelle Rodriguez in a concrete room for most of the movie, alternate storylines...

Cole's back and they've learned the secret of the orient: not being that mad anymore.  An extra special thanks to our $10 Executive Producers: JetChiclete, Isaac, squishward, Walt Lewellyn of The Black Casebook , Tropical Doves, jprestonpoole, Lohik, bernventers, and Owen2. If you can, please lend some support to these organizations: Gaza Funds PCRF (Palestinian Children's Relief Fund) MAP (Medica...

Fellow Canucks Remember Shuffle join Stu and a hopelessly outnumbered Nicole for a lively and in-depth discussion about Blackberry, and the seething neurotic resentment that comes from living in the Great White North.  Subscribe to the Patreon to hear the full episode and more! And while your at it, please support the Shuffle Bois . 

Cole was too busy watching actual basketball, so Nicole and Stu are left to fend for themselves in alien territory as we enter the worlds of shoes and sports with the Affleck/Damon brand-biopic. Is it a fleeting microgenre, or are products the new comic books? We discuss what makes the film hollow and irritating, the limits of slipping 'subversive' messages into hyper-corporate movies, the odd way...

Before we (Nicole and Cole) fulfill their contractually obligated second Patreon Raffle pick on Trần Anh Hùng's under-appreciated neo-noir I Come With the Rain , we pay our respect to Stu, who at the time caught the hantavirus from that cruise. Remember when that happened? Support us on Patreon to hear the full episode and much more!

An excerpt from our conversation with Jane Altoids about Gregg Araki's Mysterious Skin , adapted from the novel by Scott Heims.  Support us on Patreon to hear the full episode and much more!

Boston Hassle film critic, animation enthusiast, and co-host of Hawke Cast Kyle Amato joins Stu, Nicole, and Cole to dissect the second highest grossing toy commercial of 2023, The Super Mario Bros. Movie. It's your stock standard low-effort kiddie fodder reskinned for Nintendo IP and jam packed with as many Easter eggs and Top 40 needledops as algorithmically possible. If animation actually wants...

As of 2025, Warner Brothers officially lost the rights to make a live action feature film adaptation of Akira , ending over 20 years of a development hell for something nobody wanted or asked for. But god, did they try. Nicole takes Stu on a deep dive through each and every painfully misguided iteration of what thankfully will never be. Support us on Patreon to hear the full episode, biweekly bonu...

On the eve of having to review The Super Mario Brothers Movie, the gang decides to find reprieve in what is possibly the greatest technical and craft achievement in the history of animation:  Akira . Support us on Patreon to hear the full episode and much more!

A long, long time ago, in a remote, wild and mystical land called Minnesota, a bunch of nerds with polyhedral dice decided to play-act Lord of the Rings using the rules and miniatures from a medieval war game. That game became a product, that product became a brand, and that brand became popular with women, so they made a pretty decent movie out of it. We watched that movie, and had a nice chat ab...

At the outset of a nearly 3 hour discussion about mythic cuckoldry and shit looking cool as hell in John Boorman's Excalibur , Cole teaches Nicole and Stu about an even stupider king of ethnonationalist beliefs.  

We enter the home stretch of the pre-Gunn DCU with Shazam: Fury of the Gods, a confused and inert mess of glop, nonsense and awful dialogue anchored by the unbearable anti-charisma of future Jesuslop washup Zachary Levi. Helen Mirren and Lucy Liu are wasted. Rachel Zegler needs a new agent; Diedrich Bader gets killed and nobody seems to notice; and the barely-explored villain scheme is stolen, ine...

BREAKING NEWS: Nicole Queens out!!!!! Support Marvelous! on Patreon  to get the full episode and more!

As the gang ventures into uncharted territory in industrial scale genre filmmaking, Nicole taps in her beau Evan to help talk about one of Blumhouse's biggest hits, M3GAN, the PG-13 killer AI doll movie/meme generator. It's a  manufactured, half-baked horror-comedy about the dangers of letting children have too much screentime, so transparently desperate to launch its titular character into the pa...

Witness a failure so epic, it accidentally made the show good. It all goes wrong here.  "I’m a VFX Artist, and I’m Tired of Getting ‘Pixel-F–ked’ by Marvel" as told to Chris Lee, Vulture "‘Honestly, I Equate It to Human Greed’" by Chris Lee, Vulture "Jonathan Majors’ ‘Extreme Abuse’ Allegedly Goes Back Nearly a Decade" by Cheyenne Roundtree & Althea Legaspi, Rolling Stone "Jonathan Majors Had...

The first of our two (long story) Patron Raffle winners passes judgement on Marvelous! and forces us to watch the direct-to-streaming two part OVA Justice League x RWBY. Ty from TGOFV bravely joins us, to salvage the episode, ask the big questions, and talk about comic books. Want to hear more? Want a chance to pick an episode (or inflict punishment)? Subscribe to our Patreon now!

Cole and beloved friend of the show Seqarts discuss the first season of "Smallville", The WB's successful attempt to replace Buffy with a Superman prequel show about hunky teen Clark Kent and his best friends: Lex Luthor and the chick from NXIVM.  Discussions of future seasons will appear exclusively on the Patreon . Tickets and schedule for the Boston Underground Film Festival at Brattle (and Coo...

Gus from the very funny podcast Most Controversial joins Stu and Cole to discuss the strange Jordan Peele produced sports horror film "Him", a surreal saga about professional football and the relationship between the greatest quarterback of all time and his up-and-coming protege and rival. Our discussions include the many themes the film gestures at, it's ability or inability to corral them into a...

Before delving into a 90 minute bitch sesh on Emerald Fennell's  "Wuthering Heights" , Cole and Nicole share some details on their respective theatrical experiences being surrounded by BookTok fans and captive boyfriends on all sides. Support Marvelous! on Patreon  to get the full episode and more!

While Nicole's away, the boys laze about for Queen and Country. Witness the lackadaisical start for everyone's favorite series of Spy "Action" Thrillers as we dive into Dr. No. Duh duh duh-duh da duh indeed.  Tickets and schedule for the Boston Underground Film Festival at Brattle (and Coolidge) Theater An extra special thanks to our $10 Executive Producers: JetChiclete, Isaac, squishward, Walt Le...

Wrapping up our trip through the 2022 blockbuster landscape, returning guest/friend of the pod/Sonic autist of note Andy ( @Ex_AnarchoAnon ) from Those Good Old Fashioned Values joins Nicole and Cole for what's supposed to be an episode about Sonic the Hedgehog 2. We really were going to try to stretch out a mediocre video game movie for children and their ironically detached millennial parents in...

While Nicole and Cole wait for Stu to fix his internet connectivity issues so they can all finally talk about  Blade , they venture into Bow Wow's (formerly "Lil") Wikipedia page and discover the greatest deleted Tweet of all time. Support Marvelous! on Patreon  to get the full episode and more!

The Russo brothers are boring, lame guys who make boring, lame movies. The Gray Man, appropriate to it's name, is perhaps the most boring and lame so far. Our suffering is Eternal, but the episode is only 80 minutes.   An extra special thanks to our $10 Executive Producers: JetChiclete, Isaac, squishward, Walt Lewellyn of The Black Casebook , Tropical Doves, jprestonpoole, Lohik, bernventers, and...

Jake Tropila joins us to discuss David Lynch's dark side of the Hollywood dream (within a dream) masterpiece.  Would you like to hear more? Support the Marvelous! Patreon to get this and other exclusive episodes in full!

Steven Spielberg: whiz kid of New Hollywood, maestro of cinematic spectacle, Lord Emperor of eighties kids nostalgia, and chief architect of the modern blockbuster as we know it . A spectral presence over this podcast, but first and foremost, he's our preeminent child-of-divorce auteur. We're joined by Aaron from Hit Factory to talk The Fabelmans, Spielberg's stunningly revealing work of autoficti...