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Are you interested in how movies are made? Do you wonder how a film went from conception to completion? If so, Verbal Diorama, hosted by Em, is the award-winning(!) podcast for you! Movies are tough to make, and Verbal Diorama is here to celebrate the coming together of teams of extraordinary cast and crew, bringing us movies that inspire us, delight us, make us laugh, make us cry and frighten us. This podcast discovers the stories behind the scenes, and proves how amazing it is that movies ...
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Before we learn how all about the history and legacy of a modern Christmas classic, let's recite the "Code of the Elves," shall we? Number one; "Treat every day like Christmas." Number two; "There's room for everyone on the nice list." Number three; "The best way to spread Christmas Cheer, is singing loud for all to hear." Just for those listeners …
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How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000)
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Looks like you've found yourself on Santa's Naughty List! How the Grinch Stole Christmas isn't just a beloved holiday classic; it’s a deep dive into the complexities of acceptance, compassion, and the true spirit of Christmas, that also contains a Mean One! From Dr. Seuss's iconic original story to its 1966 animated version and the 2000 live-action…
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Perennial Christmas classic Lethal Weapon redefined the buddy cop genre with its festive setting, unique characters and the undisputed chemistry between Mel Gibson and Danny Glover. Shane Black's screenplay combined humour and action and made it a benchmark for future action films, and Richard Donner's direction brought a skilled touch to the film'…
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Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves
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Before I begin, I notice that Chancellor Jarnathan is not present...? I'm back from an extended break, deciding to do an episode on Dungeons & Dragons, and its fifty-year history and legacy as the most popular TTRPG in the world. Easing myself back into podcasting slowly, then, because it's safe to say nothing has impacted geek culture like Dungeon…
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(From the Archive) Your Name. (君の名は。)
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How can I write about Your Name? Is it possible to convey the jaw dropping beauty and breath-taking majesty of Your Name with words? I'm not really sure it is, but I take a stab at it in Episode 77 anyway, because Your Name is truly something magical and resplendent to witness. A simple boy meets girl love story, with an added element of celestial …
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Halloween has a complex and multifaceted legacy, intertwining themes of fear, adolescence, and societal commentary. The exploration of the concept of the 'Final Girl,' epitomized by Laurie Strode, played by Jamie Lee Curtis. Laurie’s character represents resilience and survival, challenging traditional gender roles often depicted in horror films, a…
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There's a curse at Camp Crystal Lake. It's going to be a Long Night at Camp Blood. Except that didn't turn out to be the title of this movie. The original Friday the 13th cleverly subverts horror tropes by making the killer a middle-aged mother, capitalizing on the fears associated with the number 13, as well as the success of Halloween in 1978. Be…
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40 years ago, slashers took a terrifying turn, when Wes Craven suggested that we could not only be haunted by our nightmares, but also die from the creatures within them. Craven's creation of Freddy Krueger stemmed from a haunting childhood memory that inspired the character - called Fred Krueger in this movie only - and the true unexplained deaths…
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Horror icon Chucky was originally created by UCLA student Don Mancini, evolving from a script originally titled 'Batteries Not Included' which then became 'Blood Buddy', where the character was named Buddy. Potential lawsuit with Hasbro aside, Buddy would eventually become Chucky; the movie was eventually renamed Child's Play, and would become a gr…
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Bill & Ted creators Ed Solomon and Chris Matheson, along with stars Alex Winter and Keanu Reeves, always assumed Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey would be the last time anyone would see Bill S. Preston Esquire and Ted Theodore Logan together on the big screen ever again. Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey hadn't done the business of Bill & Ted's Excellent Advent…
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Verbal Diorama: It’s hip, it’s now, it’s wow and how?! After the huge success of both Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2, Sam Raimi wanted to finish his Spider-Man trilogy with a bang. Originally planning to have Sandman and the Vulture, along with a non-New Goblin Harry Osborn against Peter Parker's newly adored Spider-Man, plans would evolve somewhat as…
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Batman Forever, for all its neon grandiose spectacle, was purely created as the anthesis to Batman Returns. While retrospectively, Batman Returns is seen as one of the best Batman movies, the backlash around the movie's dark, violent and sexual nature led to parents revolting, and Warner Bros scrambling to make Batman family-friendly again. Enter J…
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After Steven Spielberg took the reins for both Jurassic Park and The Lost World: Jurassic World, it was time for some fresh meat for Jurassic Park III, which was the first to not be directed by Spielberg and not be based on a Michael Crichton novel. Jurassic Park III would start to have problems early, though. The original script was thrown out fiv…
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Bong Joon-ho’s dedication to making Snowpiercer, and making it his way, is as always a true testament to his greatness as a director, and a visionary director at that. You don’t start something in 2005 and take seven years to develop it if you don’t have that passion for the project. In many ways the scale and scope of Snowpiercer led Bong to want …
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Hollywood cinema has often featured Native American men in Westerns as brutal, hypermasculine barbarian warriors, and Native American women as hyper-sexualised or a quiet subservient. They'd also often be portrayed by white actors in brownface. How remarkable that a Predator prequel aimed to set this injustice right? Despite not being of Native Ame…
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From the depths of the Mexican jungle, an elite team of special forces are sent in to rescue hostages, but unbeknownst to them, they're the ones who are being hunted. Predator, originally known as Hunter, was a spec script by brothers Jim and John Thomas that was slid under the door at 20th Century Fox, and ended up being sold without an agent or a…
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Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan is beloved by fans of the franchise, and lauded as the best Star Trek movie, with Khan himself as one of the standout villains, and Spock's sacrifice and resulting death as an emotional high point. That wasn't always the case though. In fact, Spock's death was leaked to fans during production, and fans were not happy…
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Starting life as a skit for the VH1 Fashion awards, Derek Zoolander would become an international sensation, and be vying for his fourth consecutive VH1 Male Model of the Year. It's an impressive feat for a man as ridiculously good-looking as he is. Inspired by the success of Austin Powers, the idea was to make a feature length movie out of Derek's…
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Cloverfield, or one of its many other names, was greenlit in a shroud of secrecy, and that secrecy continued throughout production. Actors were auditioned without even being told what they were auditioning for, just that it was a new untitled J.J. Abrams project, and the Abrams name was enough to whet the appetites of not only the actors involved, …
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Remember when action movie heroes didn’t have to think and just beat up a load of bad guys? Jason Bourne heralded the change when The Bourne Identity came out in 2002, and heroes became as vulnerable as they could be dangerous. It was a troubled production, led by Doug Liman, who fought for years to get the rights to the material, and get the movie…
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Roland Emmerich is not known for being an auteur director, but he is known for his disaster movies; the most defining and well-known of which is Independence Day. A movie that was almost called Doomsday. Can you imagine celebrating our Doomsday every 4th of July? A movie called Independence Day, released around Independence Day 1996, was never goin…
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Last year, Super Mario Bros celebrated its 30th anniversary. It was a fairly muted celebration, but its acknowledgement for the most part came with the release of the new Super Mario Bros Movie, an Illumination animation starring Chris Pratt, Anya Taylor-Joy & Jack Black, with many websites also acknowledging the movie that came thirty years before…
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As a movie about movie making, Bowfinger leaves no stone unturned in its ruthless attempt to expose filmmaking in Hollywood, and just like this podcast, how difficult it is to get any movie actually made. Granted, it is slightly harder when your action hero doesn't know he's in it... It mocks the range of cliched Hollywood personas, from the waning…
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Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979)
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Star Trek ran for three seasons on NBC before being cancelled in 1969 due to low ratings. It was after this that the show went into syndication, that its popularity started growing, and it developed a cult following. Due to the original series' popularity in syndication, Paramount Pictures began to consider making a Star Trek film as early as 1972 …
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After finishing Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, director Rian Johnson had a brief window of opportunity to make another movie, and decided to go back to an old idea from the mid 2000s, based on the Agatha Christie's murder mysteries and the Choose Your Own Adventure books he loved reading as a child. Wait a minute - I read a tweet about a Ne…
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