Shower Beer Vol LX: Stuff We’re Watching

Hey there fellow movie and television fans. If you've ever listened to our podcast you know that the second segment of our show is called our "protein shake" where each bro discusses things that are "in our cup", or what have we watched lately. Well recently I've been watching too much shit to bring up on just the podcast, so with the help of our creative team (Nate Thurmond) we decided to blog about a few of the things we've seen recently that we wanted to discuss that we might have left out. We're naming it after the greatest pre-gaming invention of the 21st century, the shower beer!

Here are the things I've seen lately as well as the link to their IMDB page if you want a little bit more info to see if it's something down your alley. In addition, I write Letterboxd reviews for all the movies I see without any spoilers, but I might go into a bit more detail in this blog than I do over there.

1) Dredd (2012) - (Roku channel) I’ve never seen the Stallone one, but it’s on my list. I love most things Karl Urban is in, and the Dredd concept has always interested me so I was pumped for this. It’s like The Raid meets Robocop, with a sprinkling of X Men thrown in there. That’s a recipe right down my alley. I’m not sure what the budget for this was, but I know it wasn’t as massive as the blockbusters that would normally go for the action set pieces in this. There’s a badass chase scene to begin the movie, and once we get to the high rise where most of the film takes place the runtime flies by as paranoia sets in and the bullets start flying. I honestly could’ve done without the mutant element in the movie, but the Dredd being a badass cop who will kill anyone who looks at him the wrong way is prevalent enough that it’s what the movie is all about. One of my favorite things in this film is it is in a dystopia, but it doesn’t bog you down with exposition or world building while giving you just enough to feel the stakes and understand why this place operates the way he does.

2) Terminator 2: Judgement Day - (Paramount +) When I realized it’s been like five years since I’ve given this a rewatch I had to fix that immediately. Luckily it’s on Paramount +, and I think the version I saw was even a slightly extended one with a longer final set piece. You get my attention immediately when two T 1000’s come into the future butt naked. I’ll be 100 years old and still appreciate how brilliant an idea it was for the sequel to make the Terminator the protagonist. John Connor’s character has always been annoying to me, but this is the perfect way to use him. Basically as a Macguffin that two Terminators are fighting over possession of the entire movie. The villain’s powers are a bit annoying since it’s a Deus Ex Machina situation where the guy can do whatever the fuck he wants, but we also know that Arnold isn’t to be played with and he doesn’t really give a shit. Brilliant movie, and I miss this version of James Cameron before he got obsessed with blue people.

3) Conan the Barbarian (1982) - (Youtube) One of the hornier fictional characters I’ve come across in awhile, Conan is of course portrayed in this film by our boy Arnold who is built for this role. He is a man of few words, but loves to get fucked up with his bros and hook up with chicks he meets at the local watering hole. The story here is actually a cool one, kinda similar to the Norseman (like very surface level ideas) and has a fun revenge plot involving snakes, but the movie doesn’t really give a shit about that and instead is going for the aesthetic of Arnold with his shirt off lifting hay bails and being resurrected from the dead. It is not a good movie by any stretch, but if you started it knowing what it was you will get your satisfaction. The fight scene int he beginning of the movie is pretty sick, and it goes for it with some ballsy effects considering the level of technology at the time. I will probably watch the sequel at some point as the way this one ends Conan is officially a badass and probably less interested in chasing strange and more interested in conquering and killing people who look at him the wrong way.

4) The Land Before Time IV: Journey Through the Mists - (Digital rental) While I really appreciate the hustle in these movies and their ability to constantly reinvent the narrative with cool shit that happened to the dinosaurs, I think this is the weakest so far. The songs have always been a problem in these movies, and this one has a really bad circle of life ripoff that is tough to get through. Here Littlefoot’s grandpa gets sick, and the gang has to venture out of the Great Valley to look for a flower to heal him. It’s basically what the League of Shadows asks Batman to do if he wants to join since he won’t get the matching tattoos. The crew also adds another Littlefoot named Ali who Cera gets so fucking jealous of and really ends up making some stupid decisions. Cooler heads prevail, and Petri and Ducky really come up clutch for the gang when they get lost in a cave. I plan on plowing through all of these, and one of them has to be the worst and so far it’s this one.

5) How I Met Your Mother S5 - (Hulu) Prob my fourth watch through of my favorite sitcom of all time. Season five is a pretty pivotal part of the show. Ted is crushing life as a professor and seems to be rebounding well from the Stella breakup. The biggest plot point here though on this rewatch is how Robin for the first time in her life prioritizes a relationship over her career. It’s a huge character moment for her, but unfortunately it blows up in her face as Don (the man she commits to) stabs her in the back and takes the job she turns down to move to Chicago effectively ending their relationship. This plays largely into Robin’s season six arc, and the writers actually do a great job of incorporating some hilarious moments into it. I feel like season five is the last season where the characters don’t all deal with major life events, which season six throws at a lot of them and really ramps up the emotional core of the show.

6) Ip man 3 - (Digital rental) When your franchise needs a little juice what do you do? Obviously add Mike Tyson to a period piece film duh. Here we see Ip man doing his usual thing of claiming to be a pacifist, but beating the shit out of anyone who so much as moves a finger at him. This is probably my favorite of the series so far as it really has an intense emotional arc for Ip man, and has some really cool set pieces where he’s protecting this school from a bunch of thugs, and a badass stairwell fight which I’ve found myself always enjoying. He only fights Tyson once unfortunately, and it’s not really high stakes as it’s just a sparring match, but that part was really fun. I never thought I’d utter these words, but this could’ve used more Mike Tyson. The film has a few different antagonists, which has become a trend with these movies, and I thought it actually played pretty well as one was more of an anti hero who kind of idolized Ip man, but also was like “I’m better than this dude let’s fucking fight”. I don’t know how many more of these Donnie Yen is in, but I’ll try to plow through the franchise in the next few months.

7) Hell of a Summer - (Hulu) You know I love a good slasher film, and you set one at a camp before the campers arrive and it’s just the counselors being debaucherous well you’ve set the table for me and it’s time to eat. Hell of a Summer knows exactly what it is, and knows how to execute that perfectly. We get characters that are cliche, but not caricatures and their backstory is delivered to us in a way that doesn’t beat us over the head with it. We know what roles each counselor will be playing pretty early on, and are given three to four different relationship dynamics to follow as we try to figure out who is the killer that’s offing everyone and what their motivation could be. The movie takes place in about 24 hours which is perfect, and the characters make just enough stupid decisions to have the film be fun, but not a joke. The gore is great, and the killer wears a fucking sick mask which always sucks me in. The reveal here happens a bit earlier than it typically does in a slasher movie, but I think it’s justified in what it does with the remaining runtime. A high recommend from me, and if you’re a slasher head like I am you’ll love this.

8) Somewhere Quiet - (Hulu) Hulu has figured out my likes and dislikes, and as a result they frequently recommend these isolated horror movies to me. The premise of Somewhere Quiet was right down my alley. Woman escapes being abducted, and in the aftermath her husband takes her out to a cabin his family owns as a mental health vacation and an attempt for them to repair their damaged marriage after said events. Things begin to spiral when she suspects her husband might have been involved in some way in her abduction, and his cousin shows up who is a super creepy chick who is overly nice and starts to get fucking annoying. The film is one of those movies where we have an unreliable narrator the whole time, and it goes to that well too often where we don't know if what we are seeing is real, and get these quick cuts of images that could be flashbacks, flash forwards, or manifestations of the protagonists own psyche. The device turned me off from the film, as well as how it totally loses any semblance of direction in the second act. It set the table nicely, we had very fancy silverware, but there was no main course to serve us. In the end it crescendo's with a pretty interesting reveal and an intense final ten minutes, but I don't understand the final shot, and a few of the character things in the middle of the movie just don't make sense. There are some solid performances though, and some creepy moments taking place at this cabin in the middle of the night.

9) Police Story 3: Super Cop - (Digital rental) The film franchise I just cannot quit. The first two Police Stories couldn’t figure out how to walk that line between goofy, and serious police procedural. They also focused on the same villain in both films, which while cool, left me wanting a new antagonist to challenge Ka Kui in this one. We get that, and it works really well while allowing the undercover cop angle to play out with the always enjoyable Michelle Yeoh. The fighting in this and the action set pieces are top tier, and you can tell the budget was amped up even more. I don’t know how they manage to do all the practical stuff, especially the final scene where they basically fuck up an entire train, and highway by crashing a helicopter into a bunch of shit. The relationship between Ka Kui and his girlfriend reaches full hilarity at this point as she has threatened to break up with him at least three times per movie, but stays with him. I don’t know how many more of these there are, but I will be watching every one of them.

10) In The City S1 - (Peacock) The pseudo-spin off to my favorite Bravo show Summer House, In The City gives us most of our favorite Summer House characters, but over th course of a few months and in the middle of New York City dealing with their drama. We have about half the cast from Summer House, and half newbies. All the usuals like Kyle Cook and Lindsay Hubbard are great, and I’d say about half the new people were solid contributors. I’m not sure if the lack even a simple premise for this show will work long term, but for one season I enjoyed it. The reunion rehashes the ever tired Kyle and Amanda divorce, which at this point is just depressing and brings me no joy to watch so I’m glad that will not be touched on anymore going forward. I think after you watch this show if you relate to, or appreciate the Gavin guy you need to take a good long look in the mirror because he is super fucking lame. Aside from that, I grew to like Kenny even though he has some really sketchy stuff from his past that he tried to explain, but it just isn’t making sense.

-JH