School of Movies

[School of Movies 2026]

Dan Trachtenberg, director of 10 Cloverfield Lane has quietly, modestly, and with surety of purpose revolutionised the Predator franchise. Back when Disney bought Fox there were many folks cheering about the X-Men being in the MCU from now on (and Marvel have taken their sweet time with that) whilst still others rightly pointed out that the monopoly and dominion over such an immense market share of IPs that were never theirs and don't fit with the Mickey Mouse mentality was going to be ruinous. At least in the case of Predator, the reverse is true.

For three decades, Fox presided over poorly-received Predator sequels, spinoffs, and aborted revivals. Meanwhile the Disney buyout has (through the appointment of Trachtenberg as project leader) resulted in the three freshest takes, cunningly bringing forward some of the most potent elements and letting go of aping of the 80s classic. Prey, and Killer of Killers sought a new demographic of younger people aware of the name and keen to see something relevant to them. But this one actually has something to say about being raised in harsh, cruel, dehumanising cultures, and it does so with passion and humour that won over Willow. This thing is special, and reaches out with exhilarating empathy to guys who have been told they can't ever be sensitive or feel anything other than anger and the desire to dominate the competition.

It is, in effect, Redditor: Badlands.

This week's After School Club: Predator: Killer of Killers

Next week: Spider-Man: Brand New Day

[School of Movies 2026]

I did not expect to be proudest of this third show on the Pirates Trilogy. While the first was spent delving into the rich details of the many factors that made it a classic as well as an instant success (the two are not always the same thing) and the second was spent finding where the good movie was, hidden between the hindrances of pacing and focus issues.

But this third one was revalatory. At World's End always frustrated me deeply, by amplifying all of the problems of the previous two, delivering convolution and dropped threads at the point when things need to be at their most emotionally clear, and drowning the climax in a maelstrom of crowd-pleasing VFX.

But through this episode and talking with Sharon, Maya and Brendan I was able to actually find the meaning in this ending that the filmmakers either through lack of preparation or lack of courage to deliver a tragedy with the most expensive film ever (hey, it worked out for Titanic) told a story about the passing of an age without an ending. There is no end to a world where there's always more booty to be had.

Alex's Audiodrama: Panther Soul on Bandcamp

Maya's Book: Realm of Kings on Amazon

Guests:

Hollywoo Actress  Maya Souris @Mayasantandrea

Brenden Agnew @BLCAgnew of Make Me Watch It

This week's After School Club: The Lone Ranger

Next week: Predator Badlands

[School of Movies 2026]

The original trio of Gore Verbinski Pirates films have become sacred cows to millennial movie commentators on YouTube, spoken of in hushed tones alongside the likes of The Prequel Trilogy and Shrek. Back when I was in my twenties, I absolutely loved that first one and had a great time at the second, it was only the third (one of the first films we reviewed in the early days of Digital Cowboys) that threw me for a loop.

What we've done here, following our effusive 2025 show on Curse of the Black Pearl is reconvene with Maya and Brendan, and in some cases go back for only a second viewing of that second movie, to watch with contemporary eyes that have seen a thousand VFX extravaganzas in the two decades since.

This was a mammoth undertaking for the filmmakers, and in this week's show and next week's we zero in on where the film's strengths are still seaworthy, and where they sink like a stone.

Alex's Audiodrama: Panther Soul on Bandcamp

Maya's Book: Realm of Kings on Amazon

Guests:

Hollywoo Actress  Maya Souris @Mayasantandrea

Brenden Agnew @BLCAgnew of Make Me Watch It

This week's After School Club: Cutthroat Island

Next week: Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End

[School of Movies 2025]

NOTE: This episode was originally released in 2025, a year before we covered the sequels in 2026.

An extremely long-awaited show on a game-changer of a blockbuster movie.

The first Pirates film, released in 2003 before Lord of the Rings had completed brought the world many things: A fantabulous extravaganza of practical effects, combined with a surprisingly light smattering of digital VFX that would be leaned into a lot harder later down the line, The notion that the swashbuckler could still do big business (the hidden caveat was that Johnny Depp being strange absolutely must be present) Keira Knightley as a leading lady, Gore Verbinski as a major director, the supposition that audiences would flock to cinematic adaptations of Disney park rides (they won't, just this one. See above regarding Johnny Depp) and Geoffrey Rush as an all-time iconic big-screen presence embodying the most consistently enjoyable pirate of all time.

But there's more going on, beneath the frothing surface, a fantastically witty, urbane and efficient script by Terry Rossio and Ted Elliott, one of the greatest scores ever composed (in a shockingly short amount of time) and Orlando Bloom's character actually being quite good, especially when held against Jack Davenport's Lawful Neutral Commodore James Norrington.

This was a commission for Lincoln Alpern and features clips from the best audiodrama I've ever composed; Panther Soul, and the first chapter of the brand new Dracula adaptation Castle of the Moon.

Guests:

Hollywoo Actress  Maya Souris @Mayasantandrea

Brenden Agnew @BLCAgnew of Make Me Watch It

[School of Everything Else 2026]

This is a commissioned show for AJ. We recorded it several months ago, but banked it until the long-awaited release of Christopher Nolan's Odyssey. It is an independent, serialised concept musical, released across nine digital EPs from December 2022 through to December 2024 by Jorge Rivera-Herrans (who also plays Odysseus, amongst others).

And this took a certain portion of the Internet by storm, garnering fan projects to animate each of the songs, all of which you can find assembled here in one 2h 22m work of collaborative passion made on one iota the budget of Nolan's IMAX titan.

Willow showed this to us on Christmas day and the music and handling of the many characters really stuck with us. This is the most excited I've been about a musical since Hamilton and the original Moana.

Statistically, almost none of you have heard this, so we specifically crafted this show to introduce what Jorge and company achieved here and hopefully get a bunch of new people with these catchy-ass songs bouncing round their heads. This is DreamWorks' Prince of Egypt and Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas to Ridley Scott's Exodus: Gods & Kings and his Robin Hood.

This week's After School Club: Ulysses 31

Next week: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

[School of Movies 2026]

Following on from the sunny and heartfelt success of James Gunn's 2025 Superman we have the scrappy follow-up by Craig Gillespie, detailing the lifestyle of Kal-El's cousin. Gillespie most likely got the job after two filmic accomplishments in spotlighting grubby, depressed punk girls who nobody likes except the audience; I, Tonya and Cruella.

Sharon and I went all out on this, reading the source book, 'Woman of Tomorrow' by Tom King & Bilquis Evely, which itself draws structural and thematic inspiration from specifically the Coen Brothers adaptation of True Grit by Charles Portis. What we are able to do is outline clearly where the film differs from the book and where the book differs from both film and original book to create this turducken of revenge.

This episode is totally worth listening to, even if you haven't seen this box office bomb that everyone we talk to seems to like and everyone we don't know personally seems to despise.

This week's After School Club: Aquaman 2: The Lost City

Next week: EPIC: The Musical

[School of Movies 2026]

After the 2022 failure ($226m on a $200m budget) of Lightyear to succesfully spin-off from the main Toy Story franchise (and we did a show about that at the time), they went back to the billion-dollar well that is the direct link to so many warm feelings across multiple generations.

And here they finally tackle the issue of tech, tablets (and the strangely absent phones and even video games) and their role in drawing modern children's attention away from their traditional toys. This felt like it was a long time coming and (especially after covering WALL-E for MA.I.) I had built up in my head a hard-hitting critique of not only losing our kids to glowing screens, but losing ourselves.

And from the glowing critical acclaim this has received across the board (92% freshness and 95% audience score) I appear to be wildly out of step with contemporary critics and cinemagoers. I have... some things to say.

This week's After School Club: Toy Story Shorts

Next week: Supergirl (2026)

[School of Movies 2026]

Back in 2011, early in my podcasting career I recorded three shows with Daniel Floyd on what seemed at the time to be a now-completed very rare example of a Perfect Trilogy. Even legendary grump Mark Kermode remarked on how neither Star Wars nor The Godfather could pull that off. And to a degree that Trilogy became enshrined in the eyes of many millennials who grew up alongside Andy.

Many years have gone by, and what was always a temptation was breaking that world back open and making more movies at the potential cost of outraging Disney fans (something that seems easier each year, despite making billions from mediocre remakes and sequels). The artists and creators at Pixar maintained that this would only go ahead if there was a phenomenally good hook for the story, and in 2019 they presented us with this.

This is the first time Sharon gets to talk about Toy Story, as she wasn't the host back then. This one wound up being her favourite of the first four!

This week's After School Club: Blacksad

Next Week: Toy Story 5

[Digital Gonzo 2011]

The third and final of this short series of archival re-releases, this time dealing with what we thought at the time was the last ever Toy Story film. An ending that moved the world to tears and became not only the highest earning Pixar film at the time, but the first animated film to break a billion.

It also repositioned who the toys were and who Andy was. Now, suddenly grown-up, this young man was going off to start the rest of his life. The day Woody has always dreaded. Now all these questions about what to do start slamming home, and his responsibility to the others become so much more important. It's gripping and funny as hell and occasionally disturbing (Buzz takes to being a jackbooted thug way too easily when reset).

And in the end it is intensely meloncholy as we are presented with the vibrant spring green of Bonnie and her fresh imagination, making for one of the most memorable, powerful and bittersweet closing scenes in cinema history. Once again, thank you so much to Dan for gamely joining me for all these and never once getting irked when I interrupted him. He's always got a friend in me. 

Guests

Daniel Floyd of New Frame Plus

[Digital Gonzo 2011]

Another archival show from my early days, but one that is good enough to be re-released without re-editing.

Toy Story 2 was originally begun as a straight-to-VHS sequel, and then-CEO of Disney Michael Eisner was fine with it being done in cheap, 2D animation, similar to Aladdin II: The Return of Jafar, The Hunchback of Notre Dame II and of course the unforgettable (and tasteful) Pocahontas II: Journey to the New World. Pixar undertook the challenge of making this themselves and at a certain point mid-way through production proposed that it be a full theatrical release with a higher budget. The result is still many people's favourite of the series, bringing in complexity and serious decisions for toys that fear for their own existance. 

Once again Daniel and I, (here accompanied by Nikki Taylor) delved into the making and execution of this evolving elaboration, which in so many ways represents what Pixar at its best could reach for. 

Guests

Daniel Floyd of New Frame Plus

Nikki Taylor of GameBurst