First Look, Final Word

Pete and Trevor did not record their episode on House of Dynamite from a bunker built to withstand a nuclear holocaust. There is no need to worry. House of Dynamite, featuring an ensemble casts including Rebecca Ferguson, Idris Elba, Jared Harris, Tracy Letts, Greta Lee, and Anthony Ramos, is director Kathryn Bigelow’s first feature film in 8 years. These people are also not in a bunker, again, everything is fine. We return to our ongoing project Last Action Heroes with a focus on Sigourney Weaver (Alien, Ghostbusters, Starship Troopers), specifically her role in James Cameron’s Aliens. Next week we will be covering Steven Segal, please comment below or email us at firstlookfinalwordpod@gmail.com with your suggestions on what movie to cover. Don’t forget to enter our ongoing contest to win a subscription to Letterboxd Patron: https://boxd.it/OT9rw Introduction - 0:00 Aliens Chat - 11:10 House of Dynamite review - 41:00 Spoilers - 59:50

Pete and Trevor step into the octagon, well mostly a boxing ring, to see Benny Safdie’s The Smashing Machine, starring Dwayne Johnson and Emily Blunt. The A24 produced movie focuses on the life Mark Kerr, an early MMA and UFC fighter, and marks a clear transition in Johnson’s career to more serious roles. Does the gambit pay off? Continuing our Project Last Action Heroes, we discuss the career of Bruce Willis through the lens of Tony Scott’s The Last Boyscout. Don’t forget to enter our ongoing contest to win a subscription to Letterboxd Patron: https://boxd.it/OT9rw Intro: 0:00 Last Boy Scout: 15:54 Smashing Machine Review: 40:13 Spoilers: 1:00:57

Pete and Trevor, and special stowaway Justin, set off to catch One Battle After Another, Paul Thomas Anderson’s modern thriller/drama/satire starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Sean Penn, Benicio del Toro, Regina Hall, Teyana Taylor, and Chase Infiniti. We also met our friend Anthony at the theatre who was able to join us for a quick recap. Like good cinephiles, we saw this in 70mm IMAX. Did this movie live up to the hype? Spoiler: yes, it’s very excellent. Listen to our immediate spoiler-free reactions after leaving the theatre, before we give plenty of warning when heading into spoiler-talk. This was week three of our ongoing project ‘Last Action Heroes’. We talk about the careers of Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren via Roland Emmerich’s Universal Soldier. Tune in next week for our discussion of a Bruce Willis movie, comment below or email firstlookfinalwordpod@gmail.com to weigh in on what movie we should cover. Don’t forget to enter our ongoing contest to win a subscription to Letterboxd Patron: https://boxd.it/OT9rw Intro and our history with PTA (0:00) Review of Universal Soldier (16:35) Review of One Battle After Another (45:29) Anthony jumps out of the car (56:37) Spoilers (1:11:00)

Pete and Trevor watched Spike Lee’s new movie Highest 2 Lowest, a bold reimagining of Kurosawa’s classic High and Low. Starring Denzel Washington, Jeffrey Wright, and A$AP Rocky, we’re asking the question: will this remake be worth it? We’re also continuing our ongoing project Last Action Heroes, where we track the big guns of action cinema one film at a time. This week we’re riding shotgun with Sly Stallone, diving into the neon-soaked, leather-jacketed, pizza scissor cutting chaos of Cobra. Don’t forget to enter our ongoing contest to win a subscription to Letterboxd Patron: https://boxd.it/OT9rw Intro (00:00) Cobra Review (16:17) Spoiler-free review of Highest 2 Lowest (46:27) Spoiler-talk (59:00)

Pete and Trevor lace up their shoes and step onto the endless road for this week’s feature: The Long Walk. Adapted from one of Stephen King’s earliest and most enduring stories, the film stars Cooper Hoffman, David Jonsson, Garrett Wareing, Tut Nyuot, Charlie Plummer, Ben Wang, Roman Griffin Davis, Judy Greer, and Mark Hamill. As a coincidence, we’re also kicking off our new series, Project: The Last Action Heroes, beginning with Arnold Schwarzenegger in The Running Man—another King tale adapted for the big screen, though with a very different kind of energy.  Next week we will be talking Sylvester Stallone. Comment below or write to firstlookfinalwordpod@gmail.com [firstlookfinalwordpod@gmail.com] to suggest what movie best sums up Sly’s action career.  Intro (00:00) The Running Man (04:40) Spoiler-free review of The Long Walk (43:40) Spoiler-talk (01:04:54)