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Archive for February, 2026

Episode 688: Earthquake Marriage

February 27th, 2026 | Robin

In the Gaming Hut we create a Page Turners protagonist.

At the behest of beloved Patreon backer Charles Picard the Architecture Hut examines the work of Julia Taylor, from the Chapel of the Chimes to Hearst Castle.

In Ken and/or Robin Talk to Someone Else, Robin talks to Tristan Zimmerman about his game Ballad Hunters, a GUMSHOE Labs game Kickstarting soon from Pelgrane Press.

Finally estimable backer Sam Harris assigns Ken’s Time Machine to find out what would have happened if Sun Records music producer Sam Phillips’ peace overture to Cuba had worked out as he hoped.

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.

Big news from mission control! If you missed out the first time, don’t panic. The wait is over: the CatStronauts board game is finally back in stock at Atlas Games! The first printing disappeared at lightspeed! Don’t let this reprint of CatStronauts slip through your claws.

Make room on your shelf and in your heart for Page Turners, Robin’s game of dramatic interaction for one player and one GM, coming soon from Pelgrane Press. Explore the intensity of emotional storytelling driven by a single protagonist with scenarios ranging from Shakespearean comedy to tragic vampire love, written by Robin, Sarah “Sam” Saltiel, Ruth Tillman and Wade Rockett.

Get caught in the spiral with God’s Teeth, a new set of pulse-pounding Delta Green scenarios dripping with the once and future corruption of a nation swirling into cruelty and spite. From a government panopticon to alien worms to an app-driven mass shooter, your agents have nothing to fear but every screaming headline.

Play spies, skirmishers, and saboteurs in the battle for the future of the Thirteen Colonies in Flagbearer Games’ thoroughly researched and beautifully illustrated 5E compatible roleplaying game Nations and Cannons. Download a free copy of the Nations & Cannons core rules using code KENROBIN here. Sign up to be notified of the upcoming crowdfunding campaign for The American Crisis: Dark and Bloody Ground here.

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Tags: Architecture Hut, Gaming hut, Ken and/or Robin Talk to Someone Else, Ken's Time Machine

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Ken and Robin Consume Media: An Under-Celebrated Horror Writer and New Films by Yuen Woo-Ping and Zhang Yimou

February 24th, 2026 | 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.

Blades of the Guardians (Film, China, Yuen Woo-ping, 2026) Imperial guardsman turned bounty hunter and surrogate dad (Wu Jing) agrees to escort a revolutionary (Sun Yizhou) and a khan’s archer daughter (Liya Tong) on a journey to the capital. The non-combat parts of Yuen’s directorial efforts can be uneven, but that’s not at all the case in this wuxia epic, where story and thrilling fight choreography fully mesh. With Tony Leung Ka Fai and, in what is billed as a final role, Jet Li.—RDL

Lord Peter Wimsey (all 5 series) (TV, BBC, Richard Beynon and Bill Sellars, 1972-1975) Ian Carmichael’s sprightly but layered performance as Wimsey keeps all five of these series more than watchable despite their visible budgetary (and videotape) limitations; the scripts uniformly respect both Sayers’ originals and the audience’s intelligence. Murder Must Advertise is the best of the five, tight plot surrounded by wonderful character work, Five Red Herrings the weakest, but still very respectable (and mostly shot on film) despite a bit of a fall-off and a parade of comic Scots suspects.—KH

Randalls Round (Fiction, Eleanor Scott, 1929) The only horror collection published by Scott comprises nine stories of generally Jamesian intent and good-to-superb execution. “Randalls Round” and “The Cure” both strongly prefigure folk horror, and “Celui-Là” echoes Lovecraft into the bargain. The linked edition includes two other pseudonymous tales by “N. Dennett” that editor Aaron Worth believes may also be by Scott, of which “The Old Woman” is another minor masterpiece.—KH

Scare Out (Film, China, Zhang Yimou, 2026) Counterintelligence squad leader (Yilong Zhu) and his loyal second in command (Jackson Yee) become the prime suspects in a mole hunt. It goes without saying to any serious student of the spy genre that a technothriller melodrama with American adversaries from the grandmaster of mainland Chinese film is required viewing.—RDL

The Secret Agent (Film, Brazil, Kleber Mendonça Filho, 2025) A scientific researcher (Walter Moura) goes underground in authoritarian 1970s Brazil to escape the wrath of a regime-connected industrialist. Confident, multi-layered political thriller in which withheld information is both subject matter and narrative strategy.—RDL

Such a Pretty Little Beach (Film, France, Yves Allégret, 1949) A melancholy young man (Gérard Philipe) arrives in a rain-drenched off-season resort town with a need for rest, a fishy story, and an equally enigmatic pursuer (Jean Servais.) Regret-soaked existential noir centered around a small ensemble and constrained set of locations.—RDL

Good

Four Flies on Grey Velvet (Film, Italy/France, Dario Argento, 1971) Prog-rock drummer Roberto (Michael Brandon) accidentally stabs the man he catches following him, an act photographed by a masked tormentor who tightens the noose around our frankly unappealing hero. Argento cares only for the wonderful camera stunts, set-piece stalks, and kills here, filling the rest of the script with comic hobos, a camp gay P.I., and a bit of nudity to pass the time. Morricone’s score seems like an afterthought, and as a giallo this is perhaps best viewed through Argento’s frustration with the straight crime thriller.—KH

Marty Supreme (Film, US, Josh Safdie, 2025) Narcissistic hustler (Timothée Chalamet) sucks both of the married women he’s sleeping with, childhood friend Rachel (Odessa A’zion) and faded movie star Kay (Gwyneth Paltrow) into his vortex of chaos as he tries to raise the scratch for a trip to a Tokyo ping pong championship. Antidote to the inspirational sports biopic makes big, wild swings without unifying its stew pot of elements—particularly the choice to score, edit and shoot it as if Alan Parker made this in 1983. Release the vampire cut you cowards!—RDL

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Episode 687: Speaking of Magical Tools

February 20th, 2026 | Robin

The Gaming Hut starts us off with a contemplation of introductory adventures.

The Horror Hut unearths the surely vampiric backstory of a loin-cloth clad 4th century Saracen warrior whose spectacular blood-drinking turned the Visigoths from the gates of Constantinople.

The Stock Character Hut celebrates the release of Page Turners with a look at the disapproving father.

Finally at the behest of beloved Patreon backer Bart Mallio the Consulting Occultist reveals all about the magic of chess.

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.

Stop gazing lovingly at that seed catalogue and start pre-ordering Vicious Gardens from Atlas Games. This contemporary, distinctive, choice driven card game combines the joy of gardening with the thrill of being a total jerk. Strategically cultivate your garden, harvest plants, and sabotage others in a cut-throat competition.

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Tags: Consulting Occultist, Gaming hut, Horror Hut, Stock Character Hut

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Ken and Robin Consume Media: Pluribus, It Was Just an Accident, and Nature vs Our Rules

February 17th, 2026 | Robin

Blood and Sand (Film, US, Rouben Mamoulian, 1941) The force of will that propels a poor young boy to acclaim as a superstar matador (Tyrone Power) pulls him from his worshipful wife (Linda Darnell) into the arms of a fickle aristocrat (Rita Hayworth.) Cast and director commit unironically to the sort of theatrical Technicolor melodrama they literally don’t make anymore.—RDL

Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law (Nonfiction, Mary Roach, 2021) From apex predators who occasionally attack us to the various species who eat our crops, with a brief digression to exploding trees and toxic beans, Roach surveys the ways in which we attempt to manage conflicts between people and wildlife. Written in the casual, you-are-there style that grinds my gears whenever anyone else does it, because her imitators lack her discernment and wit.—RDL

It Was Just an Accident (Film, Iran, Jafar Panahi, 2025) A random run-in leads an impulsive former political prisoner (Vahid Mobasseri) to kidnap the man (Ebrahim Azizi) whose squeaking prosthetic leg sure sounds like that of his torturer. Naturalistic thriller jabs at the traumatized moral conundrum left by generations of oppression.—RDL

Mr. Scorsese (Television, US, Apple, Rebecca Miller, 2025) I thought I knew all the Martin Scorsese lore but by bringing in additional informants to her celebratory biodocuseries Miller finds fresh angles on its subject’s journey from seething Hollywood outsider to avuncular patron saint of auteurism.—RDL

Pluribus Season 1 (Television, US, Apple, Vince Gilligan, 2025) When a virus coded from space turns the world’s population into a blissed-out hivemind, a dyspeptic romantasy author (Rhea Seehorn) realizes she’s one of a handful of surviving individuals. Seehorn’s ability to hold the screen centers an atmospheric Twilight Zone-ish SF serial whose extended pure cinema sequences defy the current assumption that the audience isn’t really paying attention.—RDL

Stiller & Meara: Nothing is Lost (Film, US, Ben Stiller 2025) Prompted by the need to empty their longtime NYC apartment, Ben Stiller profiles his parents, actors and comedy team members Jerry Stiller and Anne. The mystery of parents when seen from an adult child’s perspective, coupled with the director’s uncomfortable realizations about himself, surpass the limitations of the family album documentary.—RDL

Ken is on the road.

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Episode 686: Those are Saga Numbers

February 13th, 2026 | Robin

We start in the Gaming Hut by looking at providing clues to players.

In the History Hut we ask which saint had the highest body count. Was it Norway’s heavily armed St. Olaf, or someone else?

Finally the Ken’s Bookshelf recalls a previously undocumented raid on NYC’s Strand Books.

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.

Roleplayers need new GMs and thanks to Atlas Games they have the purr-fect way to celebrate New GMs month, as if it is a piece of paper tied to a string: the Magical Kitties Roleplaying Game. Go to NewGameMasterMonth.com to sign up for the totally free seminar.

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Tags: Gaming hut, History Hut, Ken's Bookshelf

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Ken and Robin Consume Media: The Muppet Show, Train Dreams, The Rip

February 10th, 2026 | Robin

10 Rillington Place (Film, UK, Richard Fleischer, 1971) Born fall-guy Tim Evans (John Hurt) and his wife take the flat upstairs from soft-spoken serial killer John Christie (Richard Attenborough). This true-crime film builds its horror through implacable realism and Attenborough’s reptilian performance. Fleischer made it as a critique of the death penalty, but his political agenda remains well below the deliberately cruddy aesthetic and straightforward script.—KH

Cyborg She (Film, Japan, Kwak Jae-young, 2008) Shy nerd (Keisuke Koide) falls for super strong artificial human from the future (Haruka Ayase.) Starts with the question “What if Terminator was a rom com?” and wends its way through genres from there.—RDL

F1: the Movie (Film, US, Joseph Kosinski, 2025) Rootless, risk-taking driver (Brad Pitt) returns to Formula One racing after a thirty year absence, butting heads with his up-and-coming teammate (Damson Idris.) Technically astounding upgrade of the Bruckheimer aesthetic to the current era adroitly explains the opaque details of its chosen sport.—RDL

The Hut (Film, South Korea, Lee Doo-yong, 1981) When the son of village big shots falls into a coma, a poised young visiting shaman (Yu Ji-in) traces his illness to the escaped ghost of a man his family wronged a generation ago. Scathing drama of privilege and retribution.—RDL

The Muppet Show (TV special, US, Disney+, Alex Timbers, 2026) 50th anniversary revival of the 1976-1981 series cleverly does almost nothing to update the original format, being a 30-minute variety special featuring pop star Sabrina Carpenter, backstage chaos, and entirely random Muppet sketch comedy. Cameos by Maya Rudolph and executive producer Seth Rogen grate far less than one might think.—KH

Train Dreams (Film, US, Clint Bentley, 2025) The idyllic happiness of taciturn timber cutter (Joel Edgerton) and his smitten wife (Felicity Jones) forebodes doom. Lyrical metaphysical tone poem in the Terence Malick mode.—RDL

Good

The Rip (Film, US, Joe Carnahan, 2026) Everyone is a cop and a suspect when an elite but beleaguered Miami drug squad, including rule-flouting leader (Matt Damon) and his increasingly wary right hand (Ben Affleck), discovers a twenty million dollar cash stash in a suburban attic. Solid cop paranoia flick with a deep cast throws back to the mid-budget thrillers of the video store era.—RDL

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Episode 685: Eleven Johnsons

February 6th, 2026 | Robin

Before beloved Patreon backer Sikander can betray us, the Gaming Hut answers his question about the Mr. Johnson trope in roleplaying games.

Special guests Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan and James Wallis join us in the Mythology Hut for a paradoxology quiz. Which weird beliefs from ancient Greek and Roman texts are authentic to those texts, and which were made up by Robin to fool our contestants?

How to Write Good shows you how to write compelling exposition, by giving it emotional significance.

Finally at the behest of estimable backers Paul and Clio Bushland, the Eliptony Hut studies the Greenbrier Ghost case, alleged to be the only instance of testimony from beyond the grave leading to a murder conviction.

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.

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Tags: Eliptony Hut, Gaming hut, How To Write Good, Mythology Hut

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Ken and Robin Consume Media: Blue Moon, The Secret Agent, Chain Reactions

February 3rd, 2026 | Robin

Blue Moon (Film, US, Richard Linklater, 2025) Needy lyricist Lorenz Hart (Ethan Hawke) struggles to keep his insecurities in check at the Sardi’s after-party celebrating the Broadway opening of Oklahoma!, for which his erstwhile partner Richard Rogers (Andrew Scott) replaced him with a new, less brilliant, more reliable collaborator. Contemporary acting’s greatest talker masterfully and movingly holds court as Linklater uses close-ups and movement to alchemize an apparently stagey script into crackling cinema.—RDL

Chain Reactions (Film, US, Alexandre O. Philippe, 2025) Five horror authorities—comedian Patton Oswalt, critic Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, writer Stephen King and filmmakers Takashi Miike and Karyn Kusama—discuss the personal and cultural impact of Tobe Hooper’s convention-shattering Texas Chain Saw Massacre. In a fruitful formal move, Philippe, rather than intersperse the commentary of many talking heads, shapes each interview into its own separate spoken essay.—RDL

Good News (Film, South Korea, Byun Sung-hyun, 2025) When excitable young Red Army Faction hijackers try to divert an outbound Tokyo flight to Pyongyang, an oddball KCIA fixer (Sul Kyung-gu) enlists a straight arrow army air traffic controller (Hong Kyung) in a scheme to land them in the south. Satirical docudrama takes jabs at official opportunism while also bubbling away as a process thriller.—RDL

Left-Handed Girl (Film, Taiwan/US, Shih-Ching Tsou, 2025) A beleaguered noodle stall owner (Janel Tsai) with two daughters, one a headstrong young adult (Shih-Yuan Ma), the other an adorable moppet who has been convinced one of her hands serves the devil (Nina Ye), struggles to get by in Taipei. Brightly digital slice-of-life drama ineluctably builds into a classic explosion of family secrets. Tsou makes her feature debut after acting for many years as producing partner of Sean Baker, who serves here as co-writer and editor.—RDL

The Secret Agent (Film, Brazil/France/Germany/Netherlands, Kleber Mendonça Filho, 2025) A man (Wagner Moura) hiding out in Recife, Brazil, during the military dictatorship tries to keep attention off him long enough to get out of the country with his son. Deliberately told in several narrative modes, including weird urban legend, 70s crime flick, and bald (almost soap-operatic) declamation, this movie depends on Moura’s chameleon, low-key acting for the viewer’s trust. Throughout, Mendonça Filho plays with film and time, layering information slowly, but always communicating the most through his shots. I suspect this will repay multiple viewings.—KH

Till Death Do Us Part (Fiction, John Dickson Carr, 1944) Richard Markham discovers his fiancee is a serial killer, or is she? And if she’s innocent, who killed the man who fingered her, with her own supposed m.o.? (Which is of course a seeming suicide in a locked room.) Carr pulls at least four complete narrative U-turns in this short novel, with Gideon Fell simply outraced rather than out-thought by the killer. A vertiginous tour de force of misdirection, its sheer artificiality of structure almost foreshadows the admittedly contrived solution to the murder.—KH

Good

Short Night of Glass Dolls (Film, Italy/Yugoslavia, Aldo Lado, 1971) American reporter Gregory Moore (Jean Sorel) is found dead in Prague—but he’s actually alive inside his corpse, and trying desperately to remember how he got killed! With a setup like that and Barbara Bach as the mandatory vanished girlfriend, this plays less like a typical giallo and more like a conspiracy thriller, although the stop-and-start pacing mitigates the thrill quotient. I hear the new 4K version cleans up the muddy dialogue dubbing, which would be a distinct improvement.—KH

Swoon (Film, US, Tom Kalin, 1992) Sexually obsessed with uncaring sociopath Richard Loeb (Daniel Schlachet), weak-willed ornithology student Nathan Leopold (Craig Chester) joins him in the thrill murder of a local boy. The first Leopold & Loeb film to foreground the killers’ sexuality (although Compulsion hints at it as strongly as 1959 would allow) suffers from an inevitable lapse in focus after the two are sentenced and separated. Kalin makes a virtue of his scanty budget, weaving artificialities and staginess into his stark black-and-white shots and theatrical performances.—KH

Okay

The Running Man (Film, US, Edgar Wright, 2025) In an authoritarian near future, a screwed-over prole (Glen Powell) agrees to become the target in a deadly reality show run by a slick exec (Josh Brolin.) Satirical action remake is fun when it feels like an Edgar Wright movie, which isn’t often enough. Casting Powell as angry and intense leaves no room for the breezy charm essential to his star power.—RDL

Seeing is Believing (Fiction, John Dickson Carr, 1941) Under hypnosis, and watched by four witnesses, Victoria Fane kills her husband with a dagger that minutes ago was harmless rubber. For once, Henry Merrivale isn’t the worst thing about a ‘Carter Dickson’ novel, although he’s plenty insufferable here. In addition to a fairly unbelievable howdunit, Carr also profoundly cheats in the opening section, ruining the whodunit as well. It’s a shame because the murder setup itself is vastly clever and original, but it’s wasted.—KH

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Archive for February, 2026

Episode 688: Earthquake Marriage

Ken and Robin Consume Media: An Under-Celebrated Horror Writer and New Films by Yuen Woo-Ping and Zhang Yimou

Recommended

Good

Episode 687: Speaking of Magical Tools

Ken and Robin Consume Media: Pluribus, It Was Just an Accident, and Nature vs Our Rules

Recommended

Episode 686: Those are Saga Numbers

Ken and Robin Consume Media: The Muppet Show, Train Dreams, The Rip

Recommended

Good

Episode 685: Eleven Johnsons

Ken and Robin Consume Media: Blue Moon, The Secret Agent, Chain Reactions

Recommended

Good

Okay

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