The 42cast

Lee Arenberg is one of the most prolific actors in the business. If you’ve watched TV in the last 4 decades, odds are at some point you’ve seen him. With a career spanning dozens of different TV shows and films, Lee is one of the actors who can embody many different characters. In this episode we talk with Lee to ask him about his career in acting. He shares some insights about acting and we discu...

Movie scores and soundtracks add a new dimension to a film. A well-done soundtrack can make a good movie into a great movie. A bad soundtrack can ruin a movie. In this episode we discuss composers and individual movie scores that we love. This week’s five-minute controversy asks if Martin Scorsese’s comments about comic book movies have any merit. This week Juliette , Rachele , and James join the...

In 2015, DC released a list of a large number of DC movies extending into 2020. Of the movies announced for 2018 or later, Shazam was the only one that was neither rescheduled nor canceled. In this episode, we take a look at the Shazam film. We discuss the Captain Marvel name controversy. We talk about the portrayal of the same character with a young actor and an adult actor. We also talk about th...

Orphan Black was a series that aired on BBC America. Starring Tatiana Maslany it followed the lives of a group of women who discovered that they were clones. In this episode we take a look back at Orphan Black. We talk about our favorite clones and discuss how her performance, and the technical aspects of the production created the most authentic seeming multi-character performance on television....

The 42cast is proud to welcome Tim Treloar for an interview. We discuss the whole gammut of his career from his beginnings as an actor to working with Big Finish and various projects that he’s worked on recently. We also discuss his behind-the-scenes anecdotes, experiences with his co-stars, feelings about the Third Doctor’s era, and what role he would have liked to have had on Doctor Who if he ha...

In this episode we talk about anime. Sometimes referred to as “Japanimation”, anime refers to any animation created in Japan for the Japanese market. It took America by storm in the 90’s, when several series were shown in syndication or picked up by networks for American television. In this episode we discuss what we think makes anime so popular. We’ll also talk about our favorite animes and why p...

Captain Marvel rocketed onto our screens last year. Marvel’s first female lead series provided and origin story for Marvel’s newest hero and gave some insight on the MCU of the 1980’s. We talk about the captain herself, the plot and tone of the movie, the old friends that we see again, and how well the movie fits into MCU continuity. There’s also a bit of cat talk as we discuss Marvel’s newest fel...

Luke Cage was one of the big hits for the initial run of Marvel’s Defenders line of TV shows. Featuring topical storylines and a fantastic soundtrack, Cage resonated with many viewers. In this episode we discuss Cage’s second outting and whether or not it held up to the hype. Along the way we’ll talk about new characters such as Tilda and Bushmaster. We’ll also talk about all the returning cast an...

The 42cast is proud to welcome Peter Purves for an interview. Peter played Steven Taylor, one of the Doctor’s earliest companions and joined the show in 1965. He’s since become a mainstay of the British television industry presenting numerous for numerous series and events. In this episode we talk to Peter about his career focusing on his time with Doctor Who in the 1960’s and then his return as S...

How much does it matter to you whether a movie gets the facts right; whether it is in science, history, or something else? In this episode we dive down into the psychology of wanting “just the facts”. At what point does a movie “getting it wrong” pull you out? Can a good story overcome those limitations? Can we come to a consensus on a general level “factuality” that an audience can rightfully exp...

After Justice League failed to make the money that Warner Bros had predicted a lot of pressure fell on Aquaman. With expectations high and a lackluster holiday blockbuster season, many moviegoers flocked to Aquaman and it became an instant success. In this episode we discuss the movie to decide just why that is. From the score to the effects to the casting to the storyline we discuss all aspects o...

Season 6 saw a lot of chagnes for Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. It was the first season that only ran for 13 episodes. It was the first season to run over the summer. It also was the first season without Agent Coulson. In the midst of all these changes the series found itself cut adrift from the Marvel films and needing to come up with a story without any ties to the larger MCU. In this episode...

While many of the main characters in Doctor who are still with us there are several who have sadly passed. Big Finish has kept the memory of those Doctors and companions alive by recasting the parts. In this episode we once again take a step back to Chicago TARDIS 2016 and an opportunity to discuss voice acting, playing an iconic role, and Fraser Hines’ fantasies. Since this was a con panel there...

In this episode we turn to our archive of con panels and pull one of the earliest recordings that we have for the 42cast. The year was 2016, but the content is still relevant today. In this one we discuss how prolific Doctor Who media is and what our strategies are for deciding how much and in what ways we keep up with it. Since this was a con panel there is no five-minute controversy. This week N...

Ant Man and the Wasp had a strange position in the Marvel schedule. Sandwiched between Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame, Ant Man and the Wasp tells the story of what happened to Scott Lang between Civil War and Infinity War. In this episode we unpack the story. We talk about the comic roots that inform some of the choices. We talk about the characters and the storyline. We also talk ab...

After six seasons, the Once Upon a Time showrunners decided that the series needed a change. Performing a soft reboot, they recast most of the characters and moved the action to a suburb of Seattle. The season met with mixed reactions. Many found it hard to get used to the new characters and the revised personas of the few characters that they’d been following for years. Others felt that the serie...

Dr Erin Macdonald is an astrophysicist who teaches people about the science behind science fiction at cons and on her Youtube channel. In this episode we talk with Dr Erin and discuss the importance of science, how scientists and fandom engage each other, and inspirational figures in sci-fi. We also geek out and discuss favorite Treks, the Star Wars vs Star Trek debate, favorite authors, creativit...

The 80’s were a time cartoons were becoming more and more popular. Greater channels and the rise of syndication meant that there was a lot of content out there. When you combine that with the rise of licensing and cartoons being created by toy companies, and you had a recipe sure to win over any child’s heart. In this episode we discuss our favorite cartoons of the 80’s and why we feel that they w...

Avengers: Infinity War was a unique event in the history of cinema. Never before had 18 movies and multiple franchises culminated in a single movie combining all of the franchises and giving payoff for the various stories. In this episode from the archives we do a deep dive into the storyline. We talk about the ways that all of the existing characters are handled. We talk about the epic scale of t...

Greetings, chums! The Tick has been entertaining us in various media for over 25 years. The Wild Blue Yonder is a fun character, often waffling between silly and profound, while telling offbeat superhero tales. In this episode we briefly discuss his comic origins before discussing his rise to popularity through the animated series on Fox Kids. We also talk about the two live action iterations, fir...

Video games have been a hugely popular form of entertainment since their debut in 1972. As an art form almost 50 years old, historians have started to take a look at the saga of video games, chronicling and analyzing how they came to be what they are today. One podcast endeavors to look at the history of arcade, console, and computer gaming history. That podcast is They Create Worlds . On that pod...

Our epic length recording about the life and works of legendary author, J.R.R. Tolkien, comes to a close. In this episode we ask whether The Hobbit truly needed to be three films. We also discuss the musical language of the Lord of the Rings movies. Bree mentions what it’s like to live near so much Tolkien history. Anji laments missing her chance to hear Billy Boyd sing in person Stephanie discuss...

We move on to part two of our discussion of J.R.R. Tolkien and his works. This time we talk about Tolkien’s love of language, and how that makes for a more convincing world and makes it more interesting to read. We also discuss diversity within Lord of the Rings, modern interpretations of the text, the overall theme of the story, and the character assassination of Faramir. As this is part two of a...

Over 65 years ago, Fellowship of the Ring, the first book in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings epic was published and literature would never be the same. That one work changed the way that fantasy literature was written and received by the public. It propelled a quiet academic into the public eye and has spawned a plethora of adaptations, interpretations, and imitations. In this episode and the t...

The Black Panther was a character created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby back in the 1960’s. Portraying him as the ruler of a technologically superior African nation, Lee and Kirby showed just how visionary they could be in a time when the idea of a black superhero was controversial. Knowing the history behind the character and the potential for this movie, Marvel took it’s time introducing the charac...