Stealing the Remote

We watched both Davis Ayer’s Suicide Squad and Cathy Yan’s Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn to discuss everyone’s favorite Clown Princess of Crime! Does the male gaze matter or does everyone still treat her like she’s crazy? What did my girlfriend think of Jared Leto’s Joker, the representation of Black Canary, and the characterization of Cassandra Cain in the comics? Is something missing from the film or is it just her strong feelings either way that are missing? Find out! During Trailer Time, I prepare my girlfriend for Zack Snyder’s Justice League and explain why Disney didn’t sue HBO Max for infringing on their copyright for Thanos. In case you didn’t know, it’s because Darkseid is. Send in any questions or voice messages you want us to discuss! Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or visit stealingtheremote.com :) Don’t forget to write a review on Apple Podcasts or support the show Intro Music: “Immortal” by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY

’Twas the day before Valentine’s Day when the podcasting girlfriends discussed the Kung Fu Panda trilogy! We go over Orientalism, first cinema experiences, Puss in Boots versus Dead Poets Society, how Glee can help you learn English better than any teacher, fatphobia, pear-shaped pandas, Jar Jar Binks and Drunken Fist wushu, Rebel Wilson, Fate: The Winx Saga casting, animating female anthropomorphic animals without boobs, my bullet point skills, Chosen One narratives, ableism, how little I remember of the live-action remake of Disney’s Mulan and its state worship, and the four musicals I actually like! Send in any questions or voice messages you want us to discuss! Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or visit stealingtheremote.com (: Don’t forget to write a review on Apple Podcasts or support the show Intro Music: “Immortal” by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY

My girlfriend stayed mostly awake for three hours to watch Zack Snyder’s director’s cut of Watchmen! We discuss the deconstruction of superheroes as pathetic, the many shades of moral grays in all its characters, the threat of nuclear war and the current state of Trumpian politics, and somehow we still have fun. Also, can anybody tell me what Carter or Kennedy looked like? In this episode’s Trailer Time, I show her the Teaser for HBO’s limited series Watchmen and we discuss if she’ll be able to sleep afterwards! Send in any questions or voice messages you want us to discuss! Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or visit stealingtheremote.com :) Don’t forget to write a review on Apple Podcasts or support the show Intro Music: “Immortal” by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY

Come and witness the first structured episode of Stealing the Remote! My lovely girlfriend Mijntje has notes and we barely get off-topic while discussing the trippiest biographical musical out there, Dexter Fletcher’s Rocketman! We dissect my lack of knowledge about Elton John, her crush on Richard Madden, and how much I hate that guy. In this episode’s Trailer Time, we watch the trailer for Lasse Hallström‘s Chocolat, which unfortunately includes Johnny Depp. We’re sorry. Send in any questions or voice messages you want us to discuss! Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or visit stealingtheremote.com (: Don’t forget to write a review on Apple Podcasts or support the show Intro Music: “Immortal” by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY

My girlfriend had somehow never seen Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman despite living on this planet as a person of the female variety, so what better occasion to get her caught up than the release of its sequel, Wonder Woman 1984? She fawns over Chris Pine, compares the plot to Tom Shadyac’s Bruce Almighty and explains her complicated relationship with glasses. I bring up CGI, fangirly characterization complaints and continuity issues. We also discuss Spider-Man’s religious beliefs, for some reason. #ReleaseTheFannyPackCut! During Trailer Time, we watch the second Red Band Trailer for Tim Miller’s Deadpool! Send in any questions or voice messages you want us to discuss! Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or visit stealingtheremote.com (: Don’t forget to write a review on Apple Podcasts or support the show! Intro Music: “Immortal” by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY

My girlfriend made me watch Nancy Meyers’ The Holiday and we decided to record an episode about this pure feel-good romcom on the night of the week with the highest number of cargo trains possible passing my dorm! She gushes about Jack Black and the one black character who has two seconds of screen time, while I gush about... Jude Law? Thankfully, she also points out I’m not limited to my current sexuality, and I still mostly liked his daughters. Also, #ReleaseTheCowCut! On this episode’s Trailer Time, Mijntje makes me watch the trailer to Mark Osborne and John Stevenson’s Kung Fu Panda, because of course she would. Send in any questions or voice messages you want us to discuss! Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or visit stealingtheremote.com (: Don’t forget to write a review on Apple Podcasts or support the show Intro Music: “Immortal” by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY

It's my turn again! My lovely girlfriend Mijntje watched David F. Sandberg's Shazam! along with me so I could prove to her that DC Films had a fun, funny, festive Christmas movie in its catalogue. Depressing, my ass. We cover the Fawcett Comics history briefly and without research, profess our love for the Marvel Family as well as the casting director, and talk about Stanley Tucci, for some reason. On this episode's Trailer Time, we compare the Comic-Con First Look to the Bohemian Rhapsody trailer for David Ayer's Suicide Squad! Send in any questions or voice messages you want us to discuss! Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or visit stealingtheremote.com (: Don’t forget to write a review on Apple Podcasts or support the show Intro Music: “Immortal” by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY

Welcome back to the new and possibly improved but probably equally middle-of-the-road Stealing the Remote! For season two I have asked, manipulated, and/or bribed my lovely girlfriend Mijntje to join me on my quest to make people watch movies I like. Somehow, she then tricked me into watching a movie she liked: Tom McGrath's Megamind! What I can nitpick about a movie made for superhero fanatics like myself? When did my girlfriend cry during Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice? Why do I struggle finishing books I want to read? Find out by listening, and please count along with how many times Mijntje reminds me of stuff while I joke about never forgetting anything! We disclose the age gap we're dealing with in this season and how she was still introduced to Batman earlier than I ever was, as well as what kinds of movies we might discuss together in the future. (I’m also a little too excited to be podcasting again and saying "regardless" a lot when we inevitably go off-track.) On this episode's Trailer Time, Mijntje makes me watch the Teaser Trailer for Dexter Fletcher’s Rocketman! A music-filled movie, what a surprise. Send in any questions or voice messages you want us to discuss! Follow us on Twitter, Facebook or visit stealingtheremote.com (: Don’t forget to write a review on Apple Podcasts or support the show Intro Music: “Immortal” by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY

We return with the fifth installment in the Jurassic Park franchise, J.A. Bayona’s Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom! In our second take on this movie, we decide whether to let nature take its course or save the dinosaurs, I wonder if Hollywood isn’t just an island, and Mom remembers my toy dinos fondly. Bryce Dallas Howard’s running on heels is scrutinized, Mom steals my jokes and we briefly mention the chapter on The Silence of the Lambs in my bachelor’s thesis because Ted Levine plays a dinosaur dentist in this one. We discuss the difference between fighting wars and fighting off an invasion and somehow drag in WWII and the actions of ICE under Trump. We plan Mom’s Hollywood career as an actress/screenwriter, she recalls a television interview with a Dutch author, and debate the importance of using language that doesn’t have a history of oppression attached to it. Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

After an unplanned hiatus, we return with a movie nobody has heard of: Lukas Dhont’s Girl! We discuss the casting controversy while I’m breathing heavily from running up and down a single flight of stairs before recording, Mom remembers the music video for Wrabel’s “The Village”, I start ranting about the writer-director in a monologue that will go down in this podcast’s history as the longest time I’ve gone on uninterrupted, and we go through every problematic scene, as well as the ones we found touching. The trailer this time is for Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck’s Captain Marvel, which we will eventually get around to in our journey through the MCU! Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

Back for another comic book movie, I lure Mom in with promises of Colin Firth without spoiling/warning that he violently kills dozens of people! In our episode on Matthew Vaughn’s Kingsman: The Secret Service we talk for a bit about my mom’s legs, she confuses the first scene for the second scene and vice versa, and I rely completely on what she tells me about Pygmalion; the Shaw play, not the myth, as there are decidedly fewer statues to fall in love with. Somehow, we briefly mention Donald Trump, because I’m sure he’ll love the media attention. I try to get to the bottom of what framing of violence is worse to my mother’s sensibilities, in order to gauge whether or not movies that question why, as a society, we enjoy violence as entertainment are less offensive to her – and therefore possible future episodes. For this episode’s Trailer Time, Mom gets to choose from the Aquaman and Shazam! Comic-Con trailers and picks the latter, which is a choice I approve of. Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

We make our triumphant return to form with a superhero film that requires me to explain the history of the genre in order to make Mom understand this wasn’t actually that mediocre for the time it was released: Bryan Singer’s X-Men! Having been on vacation to Israel, where we visited Yad Vashem, we get into our happiest episode yet, as we extensively discuss the Holocaust and when it is appropriate to use that as character motivation, especially in the case of a Jewish villain. We also discuss the problems surrounding the Mutant Registration Act and the possibility of facilitating prosecution by registration in general, a segment in which I confuse the Belgian and Dutch systems of distributing social security numbers; you’ll survive, I’m sure. There was also some confusion about whether or not Patrick Stewart was actually Ben Kingsley. As Mom tries to remember the name of Lara Croft, I show her a trailer for something she actually wants to watch, David Yates’ Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald. Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

We’re back with a movie that’s my own age! We explain where we’ve been for a month – the answers are disappointing, I assure you – and dive into Danny Boyle’s Trainspotting. We earned the Explicit rating on this one. Mom brags about her memory and recalls her high school students watching this wholly appropriate film about heroin, while I mistake the amount of boys in my elementary school for the amount of girls (trust me, it was relevant in the context of the episode) and forget everything she said to me while we were watching. I ask about the nineties and what the world was like when I was born, to which Mom responds by making self-deprecating jokes about achieving nothing with her life. Thankfully, she did make me and I made this podcast, so it was all worth it. We discuss music and Gulf Wars for a bit, because we never go quite off-track enough apparently. When we do get back to the film itself, I share some of the knowledge which paying college tuition for a course featuring this flick has granted me. That knowledge did not include the word “suppository”, however, or else I forgot all about it. There is also the obligatory scene-that-Mom-saw-differently, and oh boy, is it a good one this time. The trailer we watched was of course for Danny Boyle’s T2: Trainspotting and the outtakes include part of the first take on our opening for this episode with Mom talking into a microphone that wasn’t recognized by my computer (but she was loud enough to get picked up on mine). Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

Welcome back to your regularly scheduled episode where Effie is in charge! (Well, almost regularly scheduled.) Mom talks about our recording time for a bit, as well as those other Avengers you may have heard about, and her childhood Halloween dreams from before Halloween was a thing here. The word coiffure gets thrown around, so on behalf of Mom: please excuse her French. More apologies are also issued about her English – feel free to let her know she’s doing fine, by the way – as well as a “you’re welcome” for editing out whichever ones I can. The conversation also turns to the materials of Scarlet Johansson’s wardrobe in the movie, and not even the outfits you’re thinking of, before we tackle Chris Hemsworth’s abs and I make some Easter-related jokes. Representation of German people also somehow becomes a topic and I make some more good points, Mom admits. I also understood most of the references, so go me. In this episode’s Trailer Time we, of course, watch the second trailer for Avengers: Infinity War! Disclaimer: There might be a slight echo in our voices since I’m still getting used to a two mic setup, but let me know if you noticed. Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

It’s Mom’s turn again in this episode! We know she promised a funnier film, but what you got is David Lean’s Doctor Zhivago. After joking around about Mom’s new boyfriend wrecking our recording schedule, we get into the credits, the music, and the general handsomeness of Omar Sharif. We discuss some Russian history, Boris Pasternak, and whatever a Stadtpalais is in German. Also included is a short reminder on what a stepsister actually is and whether or not you should fuck, marry or kill yours – just to be safe, the answer is D) none of the above. To really get you in the mood, this episode truly needed a musical break between acts, which isn’t quite as orchestral as the score for the entr’acte in the film, but thankfully also nowhere near as long. Afterwards we get back into the life choice we all encounter: whether or not to cheat when you’re already in a happy semi-incestuous marriage. We also discuss the essential art of film kissing and how this one’s main smooch ranks. From the balalaika we somehow end up talking about the zither, not to be confused with the sitar. For anyone looking to read the poems for Lara, you can do so here: http://sites.utoronto.ca/tsq/10/barnes10.shtml. You can look up the history of turtlenecks yourself. The trailer for this time was the International Trailer #2 for Tomb Raider! Mom even remembers the Angelina Jolie version despite having never seen those films. Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

This time we discuss Alfonso Cuarón's Children of Men, yet another dystopian vision of the future, because the ultimate goal of this podcast, as it turns out, is to depress Mom. She shares some childhood memories and we conclude I am a likeable person. Mom drags in Son of Man, Soylent Green, and Sophie's Choice and I try to understand how films I've never heard of are related to the subject matter at hand. She gushes over some of the actors she loves that are in this film, albeit for a short while. Mostly we go through the story and highlight our favorite scenes and continue to find that none of it is really all that fictional, let alone sci-fi. We look up a couple of actresses without mentioning their names to you, because we mostly wanted to know their characters' names. The government handing out suicide pills leads to a tangent full of miscommunication, but no one commits suicide at the end of it. Someone does get pumped full of bullets and Mom is quite interested in how the body convulses before hitting the ground. In the interest of never going into politics - as is totally the mission statement on our podcast, in case none of you had ever noticed - Mom jokes about Trump's response to the Parkland shooting. The trailer for today was the Official Trailer of Francis Lawrence's Red Sparrow, which stars some actors Mom absolutely loves! Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

This week we get around to Denis Villeneuve’s Blade Runner 2049, the most expensive arthouse sequel ever! I was suffering from a sore throat and had no voice after a night out; don’t worry, I edited out most of the painful coughing I had to deal with. We try to remember what the Ridley Scott’s original Blade Runner was about (something something what is humanity), talk about whether or not Harrison Ford is a replicant (it’s probably just his character), and trail off to a Dutch play about sex robots that none of you will know (it was good though). Before I could get to the issues of ableism surrounding Jared Leto’s role and behavior, mom brought up the pronunciation of 2049, another hugely important matter of social relevance. Spike Jonze’s Her begs to be brought up as well in conversations about artificial intelligence in films, so we graciously comply. We also briefly discuss the other three movies we went to see that day: Ruben Östlund’s The Square (set in Stockholm, we almost guessed right), Andrea Arnold’s American Honey, and Christopher Nolan’s Dunkirk. This episode’s trailer time showcases Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, prompting us to share our memories of the franchise. Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

Welcome back for our episode about Martin McDonagh’s Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri! If in your culture it’s still acceptable to wish you a happy New Year in February, happy New Year; if not, have a nice Tuesday, I guess. After putting our New Year’s resolution out there to upload more consistently from now on, we venture into remembering what our target audience even was. Don’t worry, we still spoil basically everything, so figured we’re not suddenly aiming at people who haven’t seen the film yet. Prepared as ever, we fail to correctly spoil what the billboards say (“Raped while dying / and still no arrests? / How come, chief Willoughby?”) but we were close-ish, I’d say. Police ranks prove to be confusing for us throughout, as do different firearms (but really, who cares about the difference between a rifle and a revolver, we’re European). I also did try to keep my mom from saying overly intellectually ableist things on air, but couldn’t stop myself from saying revenge-y instead of vengeful at some point. We also talk about the Oscar nominations and make some uneducated guesses about which films will get Academy Awards in 2018! Mom spirals into a rant about Call Me by Your Name and as a result, I probably won’t watch it myself (something with gay representation having been shitty since forever). Me showing her a trailer at the end of the episode will be a regular segment from now on though, and we start off with the Red Band Trailer for I, Tonya! Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

Today mom and I discuss Kenneth Branagh’s Thor and Joe Johnston’s Captain America: The First Avenger! After the shortest coming out I’ve ever done, given how there’s no room for asking questions immediately in this one-way street of a medium, we dive into the local weather. In our end segment What Did We See Without Being Forced?, we talk about A Ghost Story, Suburbicon, Bordertown, The Punisher, and Murder on the Orient Express. Mom confuses a friend’s cat named Floki for Loki and I assume she was referring to Vikings the historical people and not Vikings the TV show. She compares Thor to another fish-out-of-water comedy I’d never heard of, appreciates Anthony Hopkins as any sane person would, before we end up confusing the entirety of Scandinavia because we couldn’t tell a Swedish name from a Danish one if our lives depended on it. Natalie Portman is a negligible topic, as is the CGI Destroyer, which we compared to Lego’s Bionicle line of toys. She really liked Lady Sif, I forgot one of the Warriors Three is played by an Asian actor, and mom has more opinions on Scandinavia to share – all of which are based on Scandinavian cinema and nothing else – before we devolve into a discussion about autism – which I’m sure neither of us is qualified for either. When we get into Captain America, I first have to explain that, yes, that blue cube in Thor is the same blue cube as in The First Avenger. Mom mourns the loss of our good cop-bad cop dynamic now that she likes these movies and we discuss which of Cap’s bodies was his real one. I tell her about the Agent Carter One Shot and TV show and she promises to try not to die before I’ve shown her that. We’ll finally get to The Avengers soon, which mom expects to have a combination of Russia, the Asgardian Gods and Germany for its villain. Before then, she will continue trying to pick a subject for my theses at university, apparently. I show her the trailer for Infinity War, just so she understands it helps to watch previous movies before going to sequels, and she scolds me for dropping just as many F-bombs as she had done earlier in the same episode. Casey Affleck and A Ghost Story in general gets our language more vulgar anyway, while mom’s language also continues to become more German, which means I’m translating across three languages for her half the time. Leftovers are shade being thrown at our internet provider and my mom singing for a bit, so enjoy that. Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!

Right on time for our latest episode, Zack Snyder’s (or let’s be real, Joss Whedon’s) Justice League is finally here! I took my mom along for my third viewing and we’re here to give our opinions: mom was glad that she liked one of my comic book movies again, but didn’t know what she signed up for, as I have a lot of issues to work through with this film. In a truly legendary role reversal of our usual good cop-bad cop, I ask mom about her overall thoughts before explaining the troubled production this movie went through; she didn’t notice them, but I sure as hell did and needed to vent. I earned that explicit tag on this episode, as even my notes included some F-bombs. I tackle the Amazon costume controversy, the Superman porn mustache, and the leaked VFX scenes, while mom brings up Harry Potter and It for comparisons and is amazed at how difficult I’m making it for myself to just have fun. I also confuse Ben Affleck’s Best Picture Oscar with a Best Directing Oscar he never got, so whoops. Included in this podcasting package are: reviews of different actors’ eyes, as well as Thor: Ragnarok, and The Fall. Send in any questions or feedback you want us to discuss! All our social links can be found on stealingtheremote.com :) Don't forget to write a review on iTunes or Stitcher! Intro Music: "Immortal" by Fleslit From the Free Music Archive CC BY Support the show!