This week’s episode comes to you from two new satellite studios in the Keanu Reeves Memorial Complex! Anita has moved to L.A. and reports in from Johnny Utah HQ; Caro has started phoning in from the Johnny Mnemonic Wing; and Ebony continues to keep it buck at the Johnny Wick Workshop.
Our discussion this week centered on the Netflix series, Maniac, directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga and starring Emma Stone, Jonah Hill, Justin Theroux, Sonoya Mizuno, and Sally Field. We share our reactions to this very weird, very stylistic, very empathetic show and its depictions of trauma, mental illness, and difficult relationships. Ebony and Anita discover that they quite like Jonah Hill’s dramatic work; Caro talks about the effect of machine algorithms on media creation; and we end the show with a listener freq out for a book that sounds absolutely amazing!
Segment Timestamps
0:00 Here We Go
3:04 Pop Culture News (Diablo mobile game announcement provokes some super dramatic [over]reactions; Rebel Wilson calls herself the first plus-size heroine in mainstream rom-com, then refuses to be corrected)
15:32 Ebony Steps On Anita’s Segue into Netflix’s Maniac But Anita Rolls With It Like a Professional
44:41 What’s Your Freq Out
52:21 Listener Freq Out from Jamie Moffatt!
Links
“Blizzard faces huge backlash for Diablo mobile game, fans call it a ‘slap in the face'”
“Cary Fukunaga, ‘Maniac,’ and How Netflix’s Algorithm Is Becoming Entertainment’s Skynet”
“Rebel Wilson’s Erasure of Queen Latifah, an Icon Hiding in Plain Sight”
Boys Will Be Boys: Power, Patriarchy, and the Toxic Bond of Mateship