My Definitive Summer Movie/TV Guide

Well it has finally arrived! Summer is back once again and with it comes the year's best line up of TV shows and movies. Some big blockbusters have already come out (Age of Ultron, Mad Max: Fury Road) but all the movies I'm most excited for are still on the way. Rather than presenting this preview as a ranking or prediction of what will be the best, I'm going to outline the movies and shows I'm most excited for in the next few months in the order of their release. After my spiel I will include a grade for how good it will be. Maybe I'll come back at the end of summer and assess my grades, but who knows! Anyway on to the preview!

Tomorrowland, May 22nd. I don't know very much about this movie. I've seen only one trailer for it, but I really think it will be good. For one it's been in the pipeline at Disney for a long time, which means it will probably have a high production value and a good story. The second reason I'm optimistic is Brad Bird. I didn't see Ghost Protocol, but his other directing credits are top notch. He's also co-writing this project which makes me really optimistic. Grade: B+

Hannibal season 3, June 4th. This list includes returning shows, too because I've waited long enough! Hannibal is the only show on network TV that I really, truly get excited about. Every time I watch it I think "This is way too good to be on NBC". Season 2 was miles better than season 1, so it's only going up at this point. They left more than a few loose ends to tie up so I'm more than ready to see where season 3 goes. I'm still fearful of this show going the way of other Bryan Fuller projects (Pushing Daises) and getting canceled too soon, but for now it's on air so I will watch it. and you should too. Grade: A

Sense8, June 5th. I know very little about this show, but I do know two really important things: it's a Netflix original, it's directed by the Wachowski's. That's all the information I need to give it a shot. Watch the trailer and get excited. Grade: A-

Spy, June 5th. It's a busy weekend for movies and TV. Spy is the latest comedy offering from Paul Feig (director of Bridesmaids and the Heat). I'm pretty 50/50 on whether or not I like Melissa McCarthy movies, but she's been good when working with Feig in the past. The rest of the cast is really promising too (Rose Bryne, Jason Statham). This year has been really rough for comedy so far, but I think this one might be really good. Grade: B+

Inside Out, June 19th. This is a bold statement, but I stand behind it 100%: I think Inside Out will be the best Disney/Pixar movie since Up. Yes, I realize that this means it will be better that Tangled, Frozen, Toy Story 3 and Wreck-It Ralph, but I wholeheartedly believe it will be that good. I got really excited about this one over two years ago when I heard the concept for the first time. Watching the trailer made me even more excited. It's written and directed by Pete Doctor who's other Pixar work includes Monsters Inc. and Up. 2014 had no Pixar release, but I think it was worth the wait with Inside Out this summer and The Good Dinosaur coming up in the fall. Grade: A+ 

True Detective, June 21st. It's been a loooooong time since season 1 and I am MORE than ready for another dose of dark crime that is True Detective. This and Fargo were undeniably my favorite shows of 2014 and the wait for this was has been excruciating. I have waded through tons of casting rumors and more but the wait is almost over. The cast and crew are as stacked as last season and the promos couldn't be any more enticing. I'm very ready for its return. Look for it to destroy at the Emmys this year. Grade: A+

Drunk History and Nathan for You, July. There's no actual release date for the third season of these shows, but in the past Comedy Central has released them in July, so that seems likely. Drunk History is must watch TV and Nathan for You is pretty good satire. Watch them and laugh but I would oversell this one. Grade: B

The Spoils Before Dying, July 8th. I've talked previously about how amazing Will Ferrel was in The Spoils of Babylon so I see no reason for the second "season" to drop any in terms of excellence. Funny or Die makes good shows and movies and this will be one of those. Don't let it slip from your radar. Especially if you love satire. Grade: A 

Minions, July 10th. I wasn't on board with this movie until I saw the first trailer. It looks to be all the Minion greatness of the first two movies without some of the less awesome parts. I still don't know if the story can compare to the first one, but I'm also not sure I care. It's a movie all about the minions and I'm excited. Grade: B+

Ant-Man, July 17th. Like everyone out there, I'm skeptical of Ant-Man, but I'm excited about the cast and personnel. I'm a big Paul Rudd fan and I've yet to see a bad Paul Rudd movie (some haven't been "good" but I wouldn't quite call them "bad"). If he has a half-way decent script, this movie should at least be funny with decent action, like Guardians of the Galaxy. I think Rudd will get a decent script because he is writing the screenplay along with Adam McKay with Edgar Wright on the story. If those names don't mean anything to you, don't worry; I'll explain why this is awesome. Adam McKay is the mind behind most of Will Ferrell's best movies (Anchorman, Talladega Nights, Step Brothers, The Other Guys). Edgar Wright is the guy behind the brilliant Cornetto trilogy of Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz and End of the World. In other words, if they write even CLOSE to any of those movies, Ant-Man will be the big surprise hit of the summer. Grade: A

Trainwreck, July 17th. This movie might be a train wreck, but it's the first thing in a WHILE from Judd Apatow. The trailer looks pretty good. Amy Shumer is pretty funny and I'm happy to see Bill Hader get a chance to star in something (aside from Skeleton Twins). I'm being cautiously optimistic for this one, but I think it's got a chance to be pretty good. Grade: B-

Wet Hot American Summer, July 17th. As a Paul Rudd fan, I'm really happy for the 17th of July. I only very recently saw WHAS, but it instantly catapulted into my top 10 satire movies of all time. With the whole dang cast returning (quite the accomplishment considering who that they're all stars) I'm really stoked for this Netflix-helmed reboot. Grade: A

Paper Towns, July 24th.  John Green's first big screen offering, The Fault In Our Stars, was amazingly awesome and a near perfect carbon copy of the book. Green has been just as involved with this project, but this time the cast is better. Nat Wolfe and Cara Delevingne are a step up from TFIOS casting (in my opinion) and the story is fun this time and not sad. But that doesn't mean it isn't still really, REALLY good. I think Paper Towns will be the blast of fun we need as watchers in late July. Grade A

Rick and Morty, July 26th. It's finally coming back! I've shared praise for this one before, so I wont rehash all that right now. Suffice to say this is one of the best animated shows on TV right now and I'm really excited about more episodes. Grade A+ 

There are also movies and such coming out in August but most of the ones I'm excited for are mere speculation. August does feature Fantastic Four, which will be worlds better than the 2005 incarnation. I would also put animated shows BoJack Horseman season 2 and a new show F is for Family on your radar if you like animated comedy. Release dates aren't set for these yet, but I think they'll both be pretty solid (Both on Netflix). August will also feature the release of Documentary Now! a satire show on IFC from Fred Armisan and Bill Hader (so that should be awesome). The fall (September and beyond) will have many more noteworthy TV offerings including Narcos, Fargo and Westworld but you'll hear more about those in the future (I'm so impossibly excited for Westworld, you have no IDEA!) For now keep watching great movies and TV shows and keep your DVRs working and start saving up for those movie tickets because 2015 is shaping up to be elite when it comes to movies and TV. 

A Few Short Reviews

Life's been full so I haven't posted much, but I did feel the need to spread the word about three artists I very recently discovered. They each only have a few songs at this point, but I want them to have a lot more. This isn't a ranking and isn't much of a review. It's more of just a "Here's music you should know" post.

First up is Thee Acquainted. Their EP is available for free on Noisetrade and will be one of the best free EPs you ever find. They have a great feel good vibe that a little punk rock and a little alt rock but is mostly just good music. My favorite song is Caffeine Kiss which is just a delightful song that everyone should know.

Next up we have Zella Day. She can be found on Spotify. Her sound is a slightly pop-ier Lana Del Ray sound which is to say, she's pretty fantastic. Her music is rich with literary references and other interesting traits making the listening experience enjoyable. Fans of Lana (which should be everyone) should definitely check her out.

Finally we have my personal favorite Melanie Martinez. Her debut EP Dollhouse can be found on Spotify as well. Her sound is also very evocative of Lana Del Ray, but what I love about her is the darker, more sinister tone to the songs. My favorite songs are Dead to Me and Dollhouse. Dollhouse is one of the best songs I've heard in 2015 with beautiful haunting lyrics describing family life as a dollhouse, but also placing the perspective of the singer as a dollhouse saying "I see things that nobody else sees". My favorite lyric, however, is "Everyone thinks that we're perfect, please don't let them look behind the curtains". I find her music to be beautiful, haunting and profound- many of my favorite traits of Lana.

As a final note, you should also check out Echosmith. You probably know their song Cool Kids and maybe even Bright, but the rest of Talking Dreams is amazing as well. That's it for now. Listen and enjoy.

Bad Movies: A Rank-ing

This post is over a year in the making, but before we get to the actual rank-ing, as it will be called in this post, a little back story is required. First, I've always been really intrigued by bad movies. My dad pointed me toward Mystery Science Theater 3000 at a young age (but not too young) and I took to it like a pig to the slop those movies are. It bothers me that terrible movies are still coming out, but now there are few people to dissect them for the garbage they are. But despite the high level of awfulness of these movies, they're also amazingly entertaining.

As another comment before we get into the rank-ing, I see movies on a spectrum. Naturally there are really good movies that are well worth watching. I would call these "good or really good movies". After this is a category of movies that are still a big deal and get lots of press but are just terrible (think Transformers 2-4 and The Movie that Will Not Be Named). I can usually point these clunkers out from the first trailer. I call these "bad or really bad movies". I try to see as few of these as possible. Rotten Tomatoes does a good job sifting through bad action/drama movies, but I don't follow their comedy guides very much. More on that some other time.

Finally there is a third category: "bad movies that are so absurd they become good". The chief example here is Sharknado. Most people have heard of that now, and many have even seen it. It's a really good example of a movie that so absurd (a tornado made of sharks) that it becomes amazing. Sharknado will most definitely make this list, but you need to read on to see where it rank-ed.

This list is the top 10 best bad movies as determined by the criteria of being absurd AND enjoyable. It's nescessary to note that the worst movies we watched (Allan Quartermain and the Temple of Skulls) didn't make this list because they were so BAD!!! This is NOT a ranking of the worst movies (for if it were The Movie that Will Not Be Named would surely be here). This is a ranking of the best movies that are so bad they became amazing. All of these movies come with my personal recommendation that, if you liked Sharknado for it's absurd beauty, you will most likely like these movies as well.


In Portland, Oregon 25+ movies of the "bad movie" genre were watched by Daniel Gillespie and Andrew Jenkins. Here's what they found to be the "best"

10. Blast Vegas: This movie isn't great, but it does benefit from bad (yet recognizable) acting by Frankie Muniz (who really did some remarkable work back in the day). In this movie a group of college age friends in Vegas unleash this crazy storm and have to stop it with a pharaoh's sword or something. This movie ranks this highly for it's valiant effort to force together the "teen party", "storm" and "ancient curse" sub genres of bad movies.

9. Airplane vs. Volcano: Explanation is not really needed for this one. There's an airplane under attack by a volcano. But the ending and truly awful dialogue makes this stand out. This movie also has a very high potential for funny riff jokes as there are many slightly suggestive jokes to be made throughout. It's better for the jokes it generates in the watcher than for it's actual merit.

8. Big Ass Spider: This movie stars the same guy as in Airplane vs Volcano, but he's a lot better in this. However, the best part is, BY FAR, his mexican side-kick who is a stereotype and knows it. He says many beautiful, wonderful things. Also, as surprising as this may be, spiders and insects aren't that common in this genre, but this movie has a big one and lot of absurd chaos to go along with it.

7. Buffalo Rider: We generally kept our movies pretty current, but after watching the wonder Guy on a Buffalo youtube videos, we had to check out the whole thing. Watch those videos (if you haven't) and then watch this movie because it is just a great. The song alone sets it above many other movies featuring the wonderful line, "his love for the buffalo gave him his name". Seriously. Just watch it.

6. FDR: American Badass: You really don't need more than the title to watch this one. It's about FDR and he's a badass. This movie has higher profile acting and MUCH higher production value. It's probably even better than this place in the rankings, except it knows and tries to be absurd. Most of these others have a different feel to them. If you need more selling points: Machine gun wheel chair, werewolf Nazis. 'Nuff said.

5. Sharknado: I have to thank Sharknado for re-energizing this genre and passion for bad movies, but it's not the best one out there. It's really bad in the right ways (it's sequel was just BAD), with stupid insane characters and situations. Most of the mockery centers on the teenage characters. If you haven't seen this, of course it's a must see and a rightful number 5, but there are better bad movies out there.

4. Black Sheep: Like this gem. This movie features mutated sheep that are going on a murderous rampage, but when the sheep bite you YOU TURN INTO A SHEEP! This premise is exactly as amazing as you imagine it to be. This movie is British (so you get the bonus of accents!) and the acting is pretty good. It's really violent but in the right absurd kind of way.

3. Ghost Shark: This movie is like Sharknado on steroids. It's about a ghost shark that can APPEAR IN ANY BODY OF WATER!!! We're talking bathtubs, wet windshields, buckets, swimming pools, anything. The carnage in this movie is AMAZING with a pretty decent story to along with it (something about a curse). The one draw back with this movie is trying to find it online, but I'm sure you can get ahold of it with a little effort. And trust me, it's worth the work. It features some of my favorite death scenes in all movies ever.

2. Abraham Lincoln vs Zombies: I've never seen Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and very likely never will. Because I love this ripoff SOOOOO much. Basically Abe slaughters a lot of vampires, but the twist a the end can rival the great twist endings of M. Night Shyamalan. All fans of bad movies and cheesy horror movies need to search this one out.

1. Santa Slay: This movie genuine became a top 5 Christmas movie and I plan to watch it annually. Everything about this movie is unbelievably awesome from demon Santa attacks to swearing old ladies. You almost don't need to mock this movie. It's that awesome. I am serious in saying this movie should have the biggest cult following ever and should be a yearly part of Christmas celebrations. Because we all con only watch Elf and It's a Wonderful Life so many times. Sometimes we need to Demon Santa destroy some stuff.

I hope this list will provide many wonderful memories for you and your friends. I promise you the top 5 movies on this list will provide some of the most absurdly entertaining hours of your movie lives. Watch them. Comment below with other personal bad favorites and what you like best.