Shower Beer Vol XLII: 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) Case Closed - Eps 11-20 (Crunchyroll) Also referred to as "Detective Conan". This has become maybe my second favorite anime behind Dragonball Z. I also watched one of the the series feature length films which I’ll talk about later, and it’s all fire. In the last ten episodes I watched two of my favorites were episode 16 the Antique Collector Muder case which had an interesting use of sword play, and honestly was one of the mysteries this show has that I had no idea who the culprit was until the reveal. The second favorite out of this crop of episodes for me was episode 18 The June Bride Murder case which is classic Detective Conan in his use of anything that can help him place suspects at a crime scene at a given time based on context clues. A pretty clever reveal here, albeit one that would’ve worked much better if it had more time to be fleshed out.

2) Scooby-Doo! and the Witch’s Ghost - (Digital rental) I’m running through all the Scooby Doo movies, and this one has a perfect combination of modern animation and sensibility, but the classic DNA that you want with the Mystery gang. We get Tim Roth as a voice in this which instantly makes it awesome, and the mystery has multiple reveals that has you guessing the entire time if it is really paranormal, or if the gang is being played somehow. There’s a pretty solid banger that’s an original piece of music which you don’t get often in these types of movies. If you’re a Scoobhead this is a solid recommend.

3) Bloodsport - (Prime Video) Where has this movie been all my life? We’re definitely going to do a movie commentary on this movie soon, because it was everything you’d want a late 80’s action movie to be. JCVD is a gift to cinema, and no I don’t mean he’s talented I mean he’s so unabashedly ridiculous, and I feel like this is actually one of his more grounded earlier roles. If you take a drink every time there is a slow motion roundhouse kick you should be able to finish a six pack before the opening credits end. Also the amount of gratuitous splits JCVD does in this movie should be studied by scholars for generations to come. Flexibility is off the charts.

4) Case Closed: The Fourteenth Target - (Digital rental) Also called "Detective Conan: The Fourteenth Target". Speaking of Case Closed, this is the second feature film connected to the show. While I’m not sure if the movies are canon to the show, this one does do a good job of referencing a previous episode which I actually haven’t gotten to yet on my watch through so I kinda fucked up. This film is over complex honestly, and while it’s pretty kinetic and keeps the mystery going, the setup is too lengthy and loses you in the third act. Two things I liked about this movie, 1) There is a big subplot that involves fancy wine, which I’m actually drinking some right now so that’s right down my alley, and 2) The entire third act takes place at this underwater restaurant with a small group of characters we’ve been introduced to earlier in the movie and plays out almost like a Knives Out movie which I loved.

5) The Twister: Caught in the Storm - (Netflix) It’s been a strong year for documentaries, and when the dust settles I don’t think this will get a Broscar nom as one of the top six, but it was pretty solid. The narrative structure is cool as it basically follows three different people in Joplin, MO when this insane tornado hit and details the progression of the storm with first hand accounts and footage. The issue I have is the different perspectives don’t really offer much, and it really feels like we’re stretching the story here to get this into an hour and a half documentary. The last twenty minutes lose a bit of focus and dive deeper into a specific character we followed and it’s just depressing and feels unnecessary.

6) The Lodge - (Tubi) I saw a few Reddit posts about this film, which is super random since it’s about 15 years old, and I was intrigued as people were describing it being a pretty fucked up psychological thriller. It doesn’t disappoint, and the unreliable narrator style is something I always love in thriller movies. Here we have a protagonist who is basically unraveling in an isolated cabin with her two soon to be step kids, and as we learn about some past trauma we had the audience begins to wonder if what we’re seeing is actually happening. The Christmas setting adds to how fucked up it is, and this movie really uses the snow and cold to make you feel like you yourself are somehow trapped in a lodge without cell phone service, which would blow if you needed to update your fantasy team roster.

7) Speed Racer (2008) - (Digital rental) I knew this movie was either going to really work for me, or be full of eye roll sand “what the fuck”’s. Suffice it to say, it was the latter that I experienced. I’ll always have reverence for the Wachowski’s for the first two Matrix movies, but if you really go back and look at their filmography they actually kind of suck as Directors. I wasn’t ever into the anime Speed Racer, and this feels like a total love letter to that. To me it’s just full of super gross looking visuals and performances that I can’t sink my teeth into at all and have no idea wtf they’re going for. The one guy I did like was the British dude from V for Vendetta who runs the even corporation in this and is always a great villain.

8) Dragon Ball Z: Broly - The Legendary Super Saiyan - (Digital rental) As a big Dragonball Z fan, the legend of the first super saiyan is iconic, and in this movie we finally get to meet them and have the Z fighters come face to face with the OG. The battles are cool as fuck, and at one point we have five super saiyans all in combat along with a suped up Piccolo. The battle culminates as you’d expect and I feel like the one problem with the Dragonball Z movies is they end one of two ways every time 1) A Goku spirit bomb. 2) Other Z fighters give their energy to Goku to have him finish off the villain. I’ll leave some mystery as to how this one ends. There are also I think three other Broly movies which has me both intrigued on how the hell he comes back so many times, and if they’ll even be able to connect that movie to this one or just say fuck it we want more of this guy put him in another film.

9) Surface S2 - (Apple TV+) I’ll take “shows that should’ve ended after their first season” for $400 Alex. Surface was one of those shows that has a cool premise (a woman wakes up from a coma after someone tried to kill her, and pieces together the mystery) but didn’t do much with it in it’s first season and seemed to tease a lot for a second season that has you wondering if it will be able to stick the landing at all. Season two feels so disjointed from the first season and is really struggling to connect the dots. I found myself both very bored with the characters we’re introduced to here, and very pissed off with how the show ended. If we get a season three I can tell you I won’t be there. I wish I would’ve just left this one alone and had a decent opinion of the show from season one as opposed to how I feel now.

10) Ironheart S1 - (Disney +) I know there was some fake internet outrage at this show, and even as an admitted stan for the MCU, this thing is solid. Dominique Thorne and Anthony Gomez are very watchable and well written, and the heist element of it feels akin to what we got in the first Ant-Man. Even if you haven’t seen Wakanda Forever you can jump in as Riri Williams basically fucks up her standing after that movie which is the impetus for her arc here. There is a surprise villain which I’m kinda pissed was spoiled for me like a year ago. We also get my man Alden Ehrenreich as a fun character and I don’t think he’s in enough stuff. The only thing that really didn’t work for me was the crew that Riri works with are all pretty annoying and given too much screen time in the first few episodes. I wanted to spend more time with the Hood as he is very compelling, and the more we learn about him the more badass he is. This sets up really well for a season two, or continuing the stories of these characters in other MCU projects and I hope that comes to fruition.

-JH