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Archive for April, 2024

Ken and Robin Consume Media: The Beekeeper, Poker Face, and a Poe/Batman Crossover

April 30th, 2024 | Robin

Ken and Robin Consume Media is brought to you by the discriminating and good-looking backers of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Patreon. Each week we provide capsule reviews of the books, movies, TV seasons and more we cram into our hyper-analytical sensoriums. Join the Patreon to help pick the items we’ll talk about in greater depth on a little podcast segment we like to call Tell Me More.

Recommended

The Beekeeper (Film, US, David Ayer, 2024) Cyber-scammers provoke the righteous wrath of a retired super-assassin (Jason Statham.) Grounded secondary characters and a tongue-in-cheek sensibility provide the variations in this cleverly assembled addition to the Statham filmography.—RDL

Forbidden Science 4: The Spring Hill Chronicles (Nonfiction, Jacques Vallee, 2019) The 1990s journals of computer scientist and maverick UFOlogist Vallee cover his years as an unlikely venture capitalist, as he grows disaffected with the impact of alien abduction theorizers and black bag operatives on the aerial phenomena scene. A must-have resource for anyone running DELTA GREEN in its original time period.—RDL

Poker Face Season 1 (Television, US, Peacock; Rian Johnson, Nora Zuckerman. & Lilla Zuckerman, 2023) On the run from a vengeful casino owner, resourceful drifter Charlie Cale (Natasha Lyonne) encounters a series of murders that call on her quirky ability to see through lies. Aided by a stellar selection of guest stars, this set of how-will-they-get-caught mysteries pays beguiling homage to Columbo and the nigh-forgotten art of episodic TV scripting. As Ken already said, it also obligingly answers any questions you might have about the use of GUMSHOE’s Bullshit Detector ability.—RDL

The Price of Everything (Film, US, Nathaniel Kahn, 2018) Incisively edited documentary probes the relationship between meaning and mega-commerce in the contemporary art world. By observing his articulate interview subjects in their native habitats, Kahn finds not only abstract exposition of his thesis but also some surprisingly moving human moments.—RDL

Good

Batman Nevermore (Comics, DC, Len Wein & Guy Davis, 2003) In 1831, when the mysterious Raven begins killing members of Baltimore’s Gotham Club, cub reporter Edgar Poe investigates, with help from a mysterious Bat-Man. Wein does his best to write in something like Poe’s style, while jamming as many of Poe’s stories into the narrative as he can—it’s pretty much what the premise invites. The real draw is Guy Davis’ art, always a wonderfully oblique fit with superheroes, here playing to his intricate-line strengths. Five Bernie Wrightson covers seal the deal at Good.—KH

Not Recommended

The Sign of the Ram (Film, US, John Sturges, 1948) A newspaper poet (Suzan Peters) who lost the use of her legs rescuing her now-adult stepchildren from the turbulent coastal waters of Cornwall obsessively manipulates their lives. Sturges is not the director to go to for the camp sensibility this modern gothic melodrama cries out for, so what remains is a catalog of tropes to appall advocates of disability representation. Conceived as a vehicle to bring back Columbia contract star Peters after a hunting accident severed her spinal cord.—RDL

Episode 596: Also a No Show Job

April 26th, 2024 | Robin

In the Gaming Hut, beloved Patreon backer Andrew Miller asks for tips on playing paladins well.

We enter  the History Hut to wonder what shattered the mind of Tudor historian John Leland.

Amid the popcorn munching of the Cinema Hut estimable backer David Sowa asks why so many action movies have poor final acts.

Finally the Consulting Occultist looks at the career of Icelandic medium Indriði Indriðason.

Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!

Our Patreon-backed Letterboxd list of all films mentioned on the show is now up and running.

Also check out the Goodreads list of books mentioned on the show.

Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.


The official CatStronauts board game is launching on Kickstarter, from Atlas Games! Designed and illustrated by Drew Brockington, this cooperative game brings 30-45 minutes of fast feline fun to 1-4 players aged 10 and up.

If you love heroic fast-paced fantasy roleplaying action and incredible deals, Pelgrane Press has two iconic bargains for you. Until May 7th, date of the impending 13th Age Kickstarter, get the core book for 50% at the Pelgrane web store. Or grab the brief return of the stunnning 13th Age Bundle of Holding PDF deal.

Don your pallid mask and get all the Ken, Carcosa, and footnotes you require now that Arc Dream’s The King in Yellow: Annotated Edition is now available in paperback and ebook formats. With stunning art by Samuel Araya, this lavish tome of terror earns a space on any shelf.

Ken and Robin Consume Media: Godzilla x Kong, Last Voyage of the Demeter, Haunting in Venice

April 23rd, 2024 | Robin

Recommended

The Pigeon Tunnel (Film, US, Errol Morris, 2023) Documentary companion piece to the memoir of the same name presents the life and work of David Cornwell, aka John le Carré. In the latest installment of his examination of cold war wreckage, master interrogator Morris meets his match in Cornwell, who knows exactly how much he intends to reveal and remains the author of his own narrative.—RDL

Priscilla (Film, US, Sofia Coppola, 2023) Lonely high schooler (Cailee Spaeny) at an American military base in Germany meets and falls for its most famous sergeant, Elvis Presley (Jacob Elordi), kicking off a love story in the penumbra of fame. Observant study of a doomed marriage in which fashion and decor serve as story beats.—RDL

Good

Cymbeline (Film, US, Michael Almereyda, 2014) The young protege (Penn Badgley) of a stubborn biker kingpin (Ed Harris) crosses him by having an affair with his daughter (Dakota Johnson.) In the style of Almereyda’s 2000 Hamlet, this is, save perhaps for Johnson’s unfortunate struggle with the text, the best postmodern film of Shakespeare’s worst play one could possibly make.—RDL

Old Henry (Film, US, Potsy Ponciroli, 2021) A taciturn farmer with a dark past (Tim Blake Nelson) shelters a wounded man on the run from a long-winded bank robber (Stephen Dorff.) Scores with well-staged shootouts and Nelson’s embodiment of the coot you don’t want to mess with, but leaves out the mythic resonance the western calls for.—RDL

Okay

A Haunting in Venice (Film, US, Kenneth Branagh, 2023) No-longer-bestselling mystery novelist Ariadne Oliver (Tina Fey) drags Hercule Poirot (Kenneth Branagh) out of retirement to investigate a medium, Mrs. Reynolds (Michelle Yeoh). Apparently the only thing more tiresome than Branagh’s endless mugging Poirot is Branagh’s refusing-the-call Poirot, and even Tina Fey disappoints with uneven readings of a clunky script. The ghostly hugger-mugger and Venetian atmosphere are effective enough, though, and cinematographer Haris Zambarloukos manages the difficult task of clearly shooting murky darkness on digital with something of the old Hollywood sheen.—KH

The Last Voyage of the Demeter (Film, US, André Øvredal, 2023) Medico Clemens (Corey Hawkins) signs on aboard the Demeter, carrying a crated cargo from Romania to England in 1897. The least imaginative treatment of the source material unfolds at a plodding two-hour pace. David Dastmalchian (who performs minor miracles with his minor part) is apparently the only human on board a resolutely non-claustrophobic ship inhabited by two-dimensional cutouts and a CGI vampire. Bear McCreary’s score belongs in a much better film.—KH

Saltburn (Film, UK, Emerald Fennell, 2023) Thirsty prole (Barry Keoghan) falls for his aristocratic Oxford classmate (Jacob Elordi), who invites him to the family estate for the summer. The script for this cover version of Pasolini’s Teorema remade in Ken Russell’s style seems not just crashingly obvious but also incoherent, at least until its full archconservative nihilism heaves into view.—RDL

Not Recommended

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (Film, US, Adam Wingard, 2024) Kong’s search for kin and Godzilla’s hunt for the other Titans eventually intersect when the evil super-ape Skar King and his enslaved titan Shimo try to conquer the surface world. As fun as that may sound, the actual movie is about 90% exposition and 20% monster fights, and the monster fights are mostly MCU-style weightless light shows, with very sporadic touches of Toho grit. The entirely CGI interaction between Kong and baby super-ape Suko manages to feel more real than any of the alleged human characters can manage.  A real fall-off, even by Monsterverse standards.—KH

Episode 595: IPA Aliens

April 19th, 2024 | Robin

In the Gaming Hut beloved Patreon backer Jason Thompson asks if the group dynamic known as the Tyranny of Structurelessness applies to GM-less roleplaying games.

Estimable backer Gray St. Quintin seeks the regular confines of the Architecture Hut to ask about Walter Burley Griffin, designer of Canberra and avid anthroposophist.

Fun With Science ensues when formidable backer asks what the heck was up with a rich philanthropist’s decision to take hominid fossils with him on his Virgin Galactic space flight.

Finally, Ken’s Time Machine finds out what really happened in the Roman assault on the druids of Anglesey, with possible alterations to known history on the part of our sterling chrononaut.

Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!

Our Patreon-backed Letterboxd list of all films mentioned on the show is now up and running.

Also check out the Goodreads list of books mentioned on the show.

Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.


The official CatStronauts board game is launching on Kickstarter, from Atlas Games! Designed and illustrated by Drew Brockington, this cooperative game brings 30-45 minutes of fast feline fun to 1-4 players aged 10 and up.

If you love heroic fast-paced fantasy roleplaying action and incredible deals, Pelgrane Press has two iconic bargains for you. Until May 7th, date of the impending 13th Age Kickstarter, get the core book for 50% at the Pelgrane web store. Or grab the brief return of the stunnning 13th Age Bundle of Holding PDF deal.

Don your pallid mask and get all the Ken, Carcosa, and footnotes you require now that Arc Dream’s The King in Yellow: Annotated Edition is now available in paperback and ebook formats. With stunning art by Samuel Araya, this lavish tome of terror earns a space on any shelf.

Episode 594: Bishop of the Drowned Land

April 12th, 2024 | Robin

In the Gaming Hut we identify the elements of a great recurring gamemaster character.

At the behest of beloved Patreon backer Lester Ward, the Archaeology Hut mulls the ancient Egyptian fortresses that were flooded by the building of the Aswan dam.

In the Book Hut tough, wisecracking Patreon backer Adam Grotjohn seeks a 101 on hardboiled fiction.

And finally the Consulting Occultist profiles Maria de Naglowska, occult lecturer and sex magician of 20s and 30s Paris.

Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!

Our Patreon-backed Letterboxd list of all films mentioned on the show is now up and running.

Also check out the Goodreads list of books mentioned on the show.

Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.


The official CatStronauts board game is launching on Kickstarter, from Atlas Games! Designed and illustrated by Drew Brockington, this cooperative game brings 30-45 minutes of fast feline fun to 1-4 players aged 10 and up.

Reality horror just got realer with three new support products for The Yellow King Roleplaying Game: Black Star Magic, Legions of Carcosa: The Yellow King Bestiary, and Robin’s latest novel, Fifth Imperative.

Don your pallid mask and get all the Ken, Carcosa, and footnotes you require now that Arc Dream’s The King in Yellow: Annotated Edition is now available in paperback and ebook formats. With stunning art by Samuel Araya, this lavish tome of terror earns a space on any shelf.

Ken and Robin Consume Media: Monkey Man, Morricone, and Studio Era Screenwriting

April 9th, 2024 | Robin

Ken and Robin Consume Media is brought to you by the discriminating and good-looking backers of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Patreon. Each week we provide capsule reviews of the books, movies, TV seasons and more we cram into our hyper-analytical sensoriums. Join the Patreon to help pick the items we’ll talk about in greater depth on a little podcast segment we like to call Tell Me More.

Recommended

Ennio (Film, Italy/Belgium/Netherlands/Japan/HK, Giuseppe Tornatore, 2022) Tornatore turns his worshipful eye to the greatest film composer of all time, centering this conventional talking-heads doc on a long interview with Morricone running the gamut from pride to regret to just a hint of payback. What it misses in sharp edges it makes up for in breadth of coverage, 156 minutes from Morricone’s early pop arrangements to his final symphonic compositions on 9/11 and for The Hateful 8. Even discounting some of the doc’s extravagant claims, the result is a portrait of a Shakespearean talent. You’ll want to follow it up with one of the full-length Morricone concert films.—KH

Intimate Confessions of a Chinese Courtesan (Film, Hong Kong, Chor Yuen, 1972) Kidnapped into a brothel, a defiant teacher’s daughter (Lily Ho) wins the love of her madam (Betty Pei Ti) and the kung fu training that goes with it, preparing her to wreak systematic revenge. Sadomasochistic sexploitation martial arts melodrama frames inescapably skeezy material and the standard building blocks of the Shaw Brothers production system with lush aestheticism of color, staging and movement.—RDL

It’s the Pictures that Got Small: Charles Brackett on Billy Wilder and Hollywood’s Golden Age (Nonfiction, Charles Brackett, edited by Anthony Slide, 2015) Selections from the journals of screenwriter and producer Brackett document the draining and rewarding 15 year collaboration that yielded such films as Lost Weekend, Sunset Boulevard, and Ninotchka, with early Academy Awards politics and barbed portraits of movie legends sprinkled in along the way. More than just a record of one notable partnership, this provides an invaluable look at the nuts and bolts of film production under the studio system. One notable example: although Brackett sometimes mentions a three act setup, he more often refers to a five-sequence structure as the screenplay default.—RDL

Monkey Man (Film, Canada/US, Dev Patel, 2024) Hanuman-obsessed orphan turned underground fight stooge (Dev Patel) seeks revenge. Patel constantly risks throwing the viewer out of the movie with tonal jumps, most critically while his character levels up in a temple refuge, but the balletic and brutal action keeps you watching.—KH

What the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat & Tears? (Film, US, John Scheinfeld, 2023) To keep their lead singer’s green card, the biggest band in the world (they beat the Beatles for the 1970 Album of the Year Grammy) agreed to tour Yugoslavia, Romania, and Poland in 1970 for the U.S. State Department. Assembled from (highly watchable) footage of that trip shot, censored, lost, and recovered, this doc argues (not quite convincingly) that the proto-cancel-culture fallout from that trip is why BS&T stopped being the biggest band in the world.—KH

Good

Drive-Away Dolls (Film, US, Ethan Coen, 2024) Lesbian besties, motormouth Jamie (Margaret Qualley) and repressed Marian (Geraldine Viswanathan) sign on to drive a car from New York to Tallahassee, unaware that the trunk contains a mysterious briefcase and a severed head. Good-natured, goofball road comedy is looser and more cosmically forgiving than Coen’s work with his brother Joel.—RDL

The Wet Parade (Film, US, Victor Fleming, 1932) An empathetic southerner (Dorothy Jordan) and restrained New York hotel keeper (Robert Young) are drawn together, in part by their experience with alcoholic fathers, against the background of America’s experiment with Prohibition. Ensemble social drama based on an Upton Sinclair novel provides a contemporaneous look at the evils of drink and the worse evils of trying to ban it.—RDL

Episode 593: Supermarket of Murder

April 5th, 2024 | Robin

Elves and dragons have some emotional needs to work out as the Gaming Hut answers beloved Patreon backer Nikolaj’s request for tips on bringing elements of DramaSystem into an F20 game.

The Crime Blotter checks out the Philadelphia poison murders, a massive killing for profit scheme involving syndicate witches in the Trail of Cthulhu era.

Madrigals are sung and the underworld is descended into in the Culture Hut, as erudite backer Patrick Holmes asks for a gameable bio of 16th century composer and possible part time alchemist Claudio Monteverdi.

Move your lap blanket away from the fireplace as the Eliptony Hut takes a long overdue look at the classic Fortean subject of spontaneous human combustion.

Want to pose a question to the show? Get your priority question asking access with your support for the KARTAS Patreon!

Our Patreon-backed Letterboxd list of all films mentioned on the show is now up and running.

Also check out the Goodreads list of books mentioned on the show.

Snag Ken and Robin merchandise at TeePublic.


The official CatStronauts board game is launching on Kickstarter, from Atlas Games! Designed and illustrated by Drew Brockington, this cooperative game brings 30-45 minutes of fast feline fun to 1-4 players aged 10 and up.

Reality horror just got realer with three new support products for The Yellow King Roleplaying Game: Black Star Magic, Legions of Carcosa: The Yellow King Bestiary, and Robin’s latest novel, Fifth Imperative.

Don your pallid mask and get all the Ken, Carcosa, and footnotes you require now that Arc Dream’s The King in Yellow: Annotated Edition is now available in paperback and ebook formats. With stunning art by Samuel Araya, this lavish tome of terror earns a space on any shelf.

Ken and Robin Consume Media: A Mexican Machen Adaptation, French JFK Paranoia, and Dean Martin in a Flying Saucer

April 2nd, 2024 | Robin

Ken and Robin Consume Media is brought to you by the discriminating and good-looking backers of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Patreon. Each week we provide capsule reviews of the books, movies, TV seasons and more we cram into our hyper-analytical sensoriums. Join the Patreon to help pick the items we’ll talk about in greater depth on a little podcast segment we like to call Tell Me More.

Recommended

American Fiction (Film, US, Cord Jefferson, 2023) As a scathing joke, a dyspeptic literary author (Jeffrey Wright) whose mom needs expensive care writes a novel packed with demeaning cliches of Black life, only to find an enthusiastic market for it in the white publishing world. Family drama lends emotional weight to a pointed takedown of representation’s cringey side. Witty dialogue is on a downswing in film at the moment so it’s nice to see it revived here.—RDL

I… for Icarus (Film, France, Henri Verneuil, 1979) In an alternate France, a patrician attorney general (Yves Montand) dissents from the whitewashing conclusions of a commission into a Presidential assassination, granting him the right to launch his own investigation. The medium is the conspiracy in this odd, oddly compelling McLuhanesque reconfiguration of the JFK assassination, complete with a detailed recreation of the Milgram Experiment.—RDL

The Skeleton of Mrs. Morales (Film, Mexico, Rogelio A. González, 1960) The neurotic browbeating of his pious, conniving wife (Amparo Rivelles) drives a bibulous taxidermist (Arturo de Córdova) to a desperate act. Satirical, expressionistic Grand Guignol based on Arthur Machen’s The Islington Mystery.—RDL

The Worst Ones (Film, France, Lise Akoka & Romane Gueret, 2022)  Teens from a tough working class neighborhood win roles in a social issue film helmed by a middle-aged first time auteur (Johan Heldenbergh) whose grasp of boundaries isn’t as secure as he wants to think. Neorealist drama featuring intense performances from its young cast questions the ethics of its genre tradition.—RDL

Good

The Ambushers (Film, US, Henry Levin, 1967) Counter-spy Matt Helm (Dean Martin) escorts US saucer pilot Sheila Sommers (Janice Rule) into Mexico to recover her hijacked saucer and ID the hijacker. The Matt Helm movies are best enjoyed as period pieces by those who consider the Roger Moore Bond to be too grim and gritty, but Sheila has genuine agency and competence, a standout amongst the beer fights and brassiere guns. The UFO adds another nicely surreal touch to the sight of Dean Martin lounging through alleged action scenes.—KH

The Big Shot (Film, US, Lewis Seiler, 1942) Betrayed by the fancy lawyer who married his girl (Irene Manning), an ex-con with a secret conscience (Humphrey Bogart) returns to prison for an armored car heist he decided not to go through with. Bogie and Seiler give their best to a routine script.—RDL

Okay

Risen (Film, US/Spain, Kevin Reynolds, 2016) In occupied Judea, Pontius Pilate (Peter Firth) orders Roman tribune Clavius (Joseph Fiennes) to recover the body of a crucified Nazarene radical, which has vanished from its tomb. The first half of the movie is a taut, intriguing “Zero (A.D.) Dark Thirty” War on Terror parable with a touch of X-Files; the second half is Clavius’ internalizing his new faith in the (spoiler) risen Christ (Cliff Curtis), basically bringing the narrative to a dead halt. This could have been great if it were all the first half, though at the cost of many fewer copies of the Blu-Ray sold to church media rooms.—KH

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