Movie Podcast Weekly Ep. 262: Geostorm (2017) and The Snowman (2017)

Episode 262 - The Snowman

Dear listeners of MPW: We’re never gonna give you up. Never gonna let you down (well, that’s not quite true…). Never gonna run around and desert you. Never gonna make you cry (no guarantees here, though). Never gonna say goodbye. Never gonna tell a lie (except for Andy) and hurt you. Well, Andy reliably ruins the show again during Episode 262 of Movie Podcast Weekly, the Clown Car of Movie Podcast, and the Most Offensive Family-Friendly Podcast on the Internet! During this show we bring you two Feature Reviews (not three) of Geostorm (2017) and The Snowman (2017). And since it’s Halloween time, we also bring you our 3 Movies That Taught Us Something About Real Life That Scared Us! Listen and get as irritated with Andy as we do!

If you’re new to our show… Movie Podcast Weekly typically features four hosts — Jason, Andy, Karl and Geek Cast Ry — along with frequent guests. We give you our verdicts on at least one new movie release from the current year that’s currently playing in theaters, as well as several mini reviews of whatever we’ve been watching lately. New episodes release every single week!


SHOW NOTES:

I. Introduction
— Welcome back, Ryan!
— 2017 World Series
— Ryan officiates at a wedding, Rick Astley-style…
— MPN MeetUp 2017 post-mortem
— Ryan’s thoughts about Harvey Weinstein


[ 0:20:40 ] II. Mini Reviews
Karl: The Foreigner, Jack Reacher: Never Go Back, Show That Karl Has Quit: The Flash, Blackish, The Blacklist
Ryan: The Good Place
Jason: Purchasing Thor: Ragnarok and The Last Jedi tickets, The Call of the Wild (1972)
Andy: Patton Oswalt: Annihilation


III. New in Theaters This Past Weekend [ Friday, October 20, 2017]:
Geostorm
The Snowman
Only the Brave
Boo! 2: A Madea Halloween
Same Kind of Different as Me
Alpha Sport Draw
Wonderstruck
DMM
Jungle
1922
Wheelman
Tragedy Girls
Harness
Killing Gunther
Bad Day for the Cut
Dealt
Kask
HalloVeen Party!


FEATURE REVIEWS HAVE TIME STAMPS:

[ 1:14:51 ] IV. Feature Review: THE SNOWMAN (2017)
Jason = 3 ( Avoid )


— Spoilery (and mostly useless) discussion of “Only the Brave” (2017)


[ 1:40:02 ] V. Feature Review: GEOSTORM (2017)
Jason = 4 ( Avoid )


[ 1:54:36 ] VI. Main Event: 3 Movies That Taught Us Something About Real Life That Scared Us


VII. Wrap-Up / Plugs / Ending


COMING UP ON MPW NEXT WEEK:
Episode 263 where we’ll be reviewing “Jigsaw” and “Stranger Things Season 2” and “Only the Brave” (for real this time). Join us!


LINKS FOR THIS EPISODE:

Contact MPW:
E-mail us: MoviePodcastWeekly@gmail.com.
Leave us a voicemail: (801) 382-8789.
Follow MPW on Twitter: @MovieCastWeekly
Leave a comment in the show notes for this episode.

Ryan’s new Facebook page
Ry’s BIO
Ryan’s New Facebook Page
Ry’s flagship show: Geek Cast Live Podcast
DONATE here to facilitate the creation of more Geek content!
Blog: Geek Cast Live
Web site: Geek Harder.com
Facebook
Twitter: @GeekCastRy

Jason recommends supporting: Operation Underground Railroad

Listen to MPW:
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Right-click to download the MPW 100 Rap

Josh’s links:
Hear Josh named as one of the Top 5 Up-and-Coming Directors on The Film Vault Podcast!
Twitter: @IcarusArts
Josh covers streaming movies on: Movie Stream Cast
Hear Josh on The SciFi Podcast
Hear Josh on Horror Movie Podcast

If you’re a Horror fan, listen to Jason and Josh on HORROR MOVIE PODCAST

We’d like to thank The Dave Eaton Element and Dave himself for the use of his music for our theme song. Buy Dave’s Eaton’s music: BandCamp.com

Andy’s Fake Movie Titles:
Alpha Sport Draw
DMM
Harness
Kask


If you like Movie Podcast Weekly, please subscribe and leave us a review in iTunes. If you want to support the show, we have PayPal buttons in our right-hand sidebar where you can make a one-time donation or you can become a recurring donor for just $2 per month. (Every little bit helps!)

Thanks for listening, and join us again next week for Movie Podcast Weekly.


16 thoughts on “Movie Podcast Weekly Ep. 262: Geostorm (2017) and The Snowman (2017)

  1. I’ve always kind of wondered what sort of life Rick Astley leads that he found it important to specify that, in addition to not deserting you, he would also not run around for an indeterminate amount of time before doing so. He’s from England, so maybe it’s a British custom? “OK, I’m gonna break up with Sally tonight, but I want to really lean into this thing, so I’m gonna sprint for six blocks before I swing by her place.” Like, before Heathcliff blew off Catherine Earnshaw and stormed out of Wuthering Heights, did he warm up by doing a half-marathon across the moors?

  2. The conversation about the streaming vs. network model of TV consumption is an interesting one. Like Jay, I’ve been following This Is Us (I don’t even have to hate-watch it, though I definitely understand Jay’s frustration with certain elements of the storytelling). I had to check just now to find out that, though there are five total episodes available since the show came back for Season 2, I have only seen two of those episodes. That’s a show where I actually have a fairly strong interest in the story and characters, but I just don’t keep up. The two things that absolutely murder my interest in network shows are 1) the forced wait between episodes, and 2) commercials.

    If I can’t watch something any time that I want to watch it, then it slides down the priority list. It’s actually somewhat rare for me to watch more than one episode of anything in a single sitting, but I find that I am far, far more likely to become invested in a show when I know that there is a next episode that I can watch as soon as I am ready for it, and that I will get at least a one-season amount of closure at the end. And watching anything without commercial breaks makes it 100 percent better. For me, that goes all the way back to “discovering” TV shows after the first season or two was available to “binge” by getting the discs from Redbox. I don’t even know whether Redbox still stocks DVDs of popular series, because we’ve had Netflix for the last six or seven years. Netflix is also phenomenal for watching old TV. Between old network shows (Star Trek, The West Wing, etc.) and Netflix original series (Stranger Things, The Crown, and so forth), TV is about 95 percent of what I use Netflix for.

    Speaking of Netflix, I’ve heard and read about “price hike” anger, but do they only inflict that if you have a plan than includes discs by mail? Our streaming-only subscription has been $7.99 (plus tax) for as far back as I can remember. Also, I’ll just tuck this in waaaaay down at the bottom, but I couldn’t hang in there with Ozark. I lasted about 4.5 episodes and just didn’t care about finding out anything more about the characters or story. The setting ended up being the most interesting thing about the show, but that stopped really playing a role after the first couple of episodes. One of the things that made me lose interest was that it started to feel like a crime drama that could have been set more or less anywhere in America.

    • Regarding Netflix.

      There’s three Netflix plans currently for the streaming service:

      Plan 1 ($7.99 – what I assume you have) – Simply put, you can watch Netflix on one screen in SD quality. Basically, you want access to Netflix, but you’re not overly concerned about seeing it in the very best quality.

      Plan 2 ($9.99 – what I have always had) – You get access to HD and you can stream from two devices at one time. At one point, I think you were just paying a buck more in order to have better quality and watch on a second screen. I would imagine this was a pretty popular plan especially if you’re like myself and you have a data cap with your internet provider.

      Plan 3 ($13.99 – what I assume all of the Karls of the world has) – Beautiful Ultra HD (For some content) and can view on up to four devices at one time. BASICALLY, the very best Netflix will look and ideal for those who really care about video quality and do not have a data cap on their internet. Time to use massive amounts of gigs binging Fuller House~!

      With this latest price hike, it’s only affecting Plan 2 and 3. I’m trying to remember correctly the last time there was a Netflix price raise, but I think Plans 1 and 2 were mostly similar, but when Plan 2 was increased in price, Plan 1 remained the same.

      • Interesting. Thanks for the clarification. We do have the one-screen-at-a-time restriction, so we must indeed be Plan 1 drones. 🙂 By and large, my wife and I only ever have any time to watch our stuff after the kids are already in bed anyway, so we’ve never needed more than one screen. We do have a pretty nice television, so the SD presentation has never bothered me.

  3. I loved Karl’s segment about shows he has given up on. I think my wife and I hung on to Arrow for three seasons before finally calling it quits. Season three of Arrow ended on a happy note, and we took that opportunity to slip away. We left The Flash in similar fashion. Season two of The Flash ended on a cliffhanger of sorts, but that didn’t stop us from jumping ship.

    Our biggest victory has got to be Once Upon A Time. We bailed after a few seasons. Whenever I come across an advertisement for that show (seven seasons!?), I feel a great swelling of relief for having quit, followed by extreme anguish for all the poor suckers still wasting their time on that never-ending joke-of-a-show. Wild horses couldn’t drag me back.

    It is to the point now where I get more excited when a TV show is less than 10 episodes long per season and has an end date in sight. I was thrilled when the Stranger Things creators said the show would end after four seasons. Perfect.

  4. Thanks for bringing back Ryan’s fake movie titles game. I hope all the other listeners aren’t cursing me because they were glad it’s gone. I think you should let Ryan make up the titles though because Andy just doesn’t care (but that’s why we love him). What would Andy’s next fake titles be : The Stapler, Eraser and The Note book lol.
    Jay you should definitely see Brawl in Cell Block 99. It’s going to be in my top 10. Vince Vaughn is amazing, his best performance in my opinion.
    I really wanted to hear Andy’s review but it was even funnier when it turned out he actually had seen the movie.

  5. Jason, thank your for helping us all avoid Geostorm, but there is one last thing you forgot to mention. They shamelessly ripped off the inception poster, down to the last detail and color. This to me should be one of their greatest embarrassments. I noticed it the second I saw the poster for Geostorm and I was across the room. Just take a look this. The color of the poster and the color of the letters, the font of the letters, even the concept of the wave behind them standing in an empty street. I love Inception and I’ll forever hate Geostorm for doing this. Who is the lazy designer he gets credit for this poster for Geostorm, please for the sake of us all never let him work in Hollywood again.

    Inception

    Geostorm

  6. Remember, remember the 5th of November. One of my top 10 favourite movies. I will be watching V for Vendetta tomorrow.

  7. The Snowman may very well be my biggest disappointment of 2017. The trailer looked really fun and after learning that the director of Let the Right One In was directing The Snowman, I had to assume that it’d be a really good crime based movie. In reality, the movie was a mess. I didn’t care about anything that happened in the movie and frankly, I found a good portion of it confusing. It’s the sort of movie that’s easy to check out of because you don’t know what’s happening, but you also don’t care. If the goal of the movie was to be the launching point of a Harry Hole series, they failed miserably. I did like the depressing looking snowy location and the killer’s weapon though.

    Otherwise, I’d only rate it as a 4.5/10 and a recommendation to avoid.

    The biggest positive I can give the movie is that I was able to watch it with fellow MPW listeners, Jody Horror Guy and Undead Eric. Interacting with them at least added some fun value to the film and kept me from feeling as if I wasted money buying a ticket to this movie.

  8. I really liked the first third or so of Thor:R, but then I just starting yawning and never recovered. Yet another brisk Marvel film with superheroes doing superhero stuff, and various characters overstuffing it. Fun enough, overall, I suppose, but I have to scoff when I read things saying it’s the funniest Marvel film ever. NO WAY. Deadpool and the new Spiderman were both much funnier, and also better, otherwise. Thor rarely had me laughing. Just a fair amount of amusement and chuckles. 6.5

    Plug here for the Netflix series, Mindhunter, which explores the early work and methodology of those in the FBI studying serial-killers back in the 70’s. I was worried that it might become “procedural,” but it never does. And it has a very interesting and unique style of ending its episodes. Most shows end with a big exclamation point or question mark… this is more like a comma or ellipse. Cast is excellent, and David Fincher directed the first two episodes. Worth a look.

    • I never saw Deadpool, but I gotta disagree on Thor vs. Spidey in the comedic department. Thor 3 was WAY funnier than Spider-Man: Homecoming IMO. I am not sure I ever stopped chuckling during Thor: Ragnarok, though I only had a few deep belly guffaws. Part of the fun was laughing at the goofiness of the whole movie. What a strange flick…

      Mindhunters sounds pretty interesting. I’ll have to check it out. Man! Netflix is busy putting out new content.

  9. I have not seen The Snowman but the hype did one good thing: I was not previously familiar with this author or the series of novels. The Snowman in book form is wonderful. But so complex, I’m actually not surprised they had trouble translating it into a coherent movie.

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