BIG DADDY DISPATCH: JULY 2025

Dispatch Ninety-Eight, June 27th, 2025

Greetings WHM Family!

Holy mackerel! Let us give you some inside info about what’s going on in the old WHM HQ. We have been podding our BRAINS OUT just to get all of our podcasting done for this upcoming U.K. residency (see below) and we have literally no idea what day or month it is anymore. We can say with great confidence that all the July shows we have coming out is are absolute bangers, so you’ve got nothing to worry about. This is a big, silly month and you’re gonna love it!

Oh, and you know what else you might love? Our Superman II live digital show that is still available for another week! We had a total blast breaking down both cuts, talking petty Superman, Gene Hackman voice-a-likes, and the North fucking Pole! Both the show and After Party are still available and will be till July 4th, so get your tickets now and enjoy! 

Banner Credit: We Hate Movies Logo by Felipe Sobreiro

Image Credit: Superman II Digital Live Show screencap

WHM GOES ABROAD

HOLY SHIT THIS IS THIS MONTH!

We are just three short weeks away from our first full on international residency (sorry, Toronto but that was a one-off stop) and we couldn’t be more excited! There are limited tickets available to most shows so get on them before you get left out in the English heat!

July 18th – Early Show: Animation Damnation on TMNT’s “Elementary My Dear Turtle”

July 18th – Late Show: WHM on Quantum of Solace  SOLD OUT!

July 19th – Early Show: Gleep Glossary on Darth Vader

July 19th – Late Show: WLM on Hellraiser  SOLD OUT!

July 20th – Early Show: The Nexus on TNG’s “Sub Rosa”

July 20th – Late Show: WHM on King Ralph

LAST MONTH ON WHM

Episode 803 – Rambo: First Blood Part II

Andrew, Chris, Steve, and Eric headed out into the jungles of Vietnam, rather than the forests of Washington, for a suicide mission with John Rambo to save a batch of POWs for his old friend, Colonel Richard Crenna. What was the thinking in making a war-is-necessary movie as a sequel to one of the most renowned anti-war movies in American history? Why doesn’t Rambo come home to exterminate Charles Napier and his bureaucratic cronies? Why is it always the Russkies who are behind all the horrors of the world? You’d almost think the American security state resented the fact that we needed them and Stalin to win World War II. Hmm...

Episode 804 – 28 Days Later  (Patrons Only)

With the outstanding 28 Years Later finally out in theaters, the gang went back to the OG for this month’s We Love Movies, hanging out and running for their lives with Cillian Murphy and co. How did Boyle and his team envision such a unique look for this film? Fast zombies vs. slow zombies, who ya got? Was this the movie that made everyone fall in love with Brendan Gleeson like us? Grab your most ridiculously named international snack food and settle in for one of the best horror films of the aughts.

Episode 805 – Willow

The fellas headed to the Shir...wait, what? Okay, not the Shire...but the heroes of the film are little guys who live in the woods and one very special little person who befriends a disgraced knight...hmmm...and he’s carrying and protecting the one thing that may stop the world from being plunged into darkness. It’s a baby, not a ring, but still, how on earth did Ron Howard & Co. skate out of Sue City without a mark on them? How many thousands of kids were scarred for life by the pig scene? Can we get just a little bit more about the villain and her whole...deal? Regardless, it’s nice to see Val Kilmer’s fine ass and the skull-mask guy? Badass to this day.

Episode 806 – Crocodile Dundee

The boys got back in the New York groove with one of the most unlikely blockbusters of the 1980s, a fish-out-of-water comedy about an Australian poacher who fools Newsday into writing at least three stories about him and his guided tour company while he falls in love with the writer who found him. Doesn’t it take an awful long time for the fish to get out of the water in this one? Wouldn’t this guy creep you out more than make you intensely horny? Did this movie get Reginald VelJohnson the Die Hard role? We’d like to think so and certainly prefer thinking about that than the aggressive and tasteless trans jokes that were included in the final cut.

Episode 806 – Return of the Living Dead

To round out their big 1980s summer sessions, Andrew, Eric, Chris, and Steve went out to Louisville to help Clu Gulager and some dirty punks try to contain one of the most virulent strains of zombie flu that the horror genre has ever produced. Isn’t it refreshing for a zombie film to actually be curious about how the disease mutates and gets carried by so many different elements in the world? Is there a more memorable strip scene in the horror genre than the gravestone Metropolis homage? Is there not a little poetry in naming the smartest character in the movie “Suicide?” Shout out Weekend at Bernie’s scene-stealer, Don Calfa as the nazi-adoring mortician who helps cremate the living dead when things start to get real hairy.

WHAT ARE WE WATCHING?

This is a space for us to talk about some NON-We Hate Movies related content that we've shoved into our eyeballs in the last month: TV, Movies, Cartoons, and Sports (maybe?). Just about anything that isn't pornography.

Andrew:  
Vampire Hunter D (1985): I’m not the most knowledgeable guy when it comes to anime. In fact, I believe on Letterboxd I said I don’t “know shit about shit” when it comes to anime, and that’s true. But I also know what I like, and hot dog, did I ever like this! The vibes were immaculate. I loved the janky 80’s animation. The music was great, and the violence top notch. Any heads out there able to recommend more anime that can match the vibes of this? If so, I’d gladly check it out. Remember now, matching the vibes of this movie! 

Jaws 2 (1978): When we were prepping to record the July We Love Movies, I kind of went down a Jaws rabbit hole and re-watched the whole “franchise,” such as it is. Jaws 2 is the one I’ve seen the least, in no small part thanks to this show and us doing episodes on 3 and 4 a hundred years ago. As it stands, this sequel is fine. It’s not good, or even particularly scary or exciting, but rather just a less-good clone of the first. The shark has an absolutely hilarious death, so I’ll give it that, but watching this thing, you can see all the potential that they just whiffed on. 

Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016): Of course, after finishing Andor, I needed to go back to this and I’m real glad I did. I’ve always more or less liked this movie, but now having the bounty that was Andor, this flick feels a bit more robust when you go through it. I’ve come to terms with the Leia scene, it’s short and then the movie’s over. But, I still can’t hang with the Tarkin stuff. The dude’s in at least 4-5 scenes, with multiple lines of dialogue, mostly with Krennec, and it just feels gross and ghoulish. Should’ve just hired some guy. 

Superman Returns (2006): The human filth attached to the film aside, I still found this pretty okay. I remember liking it much more back in the day, but in 2025, a lot of the CGI doesn’t hold up, and the back third of the movie is a mess. The final face-off with Luthor fizzles out to a lackluster conclusion (Luthor escapes and Superman just throws more shit into space), and then there’s a full 30 minutes left where Superman continues cucking James Marsden for a little bit and then says hi to the kid and Lois and then leaves. By the time the credits hit, the movie is sputtering to the finish line. It was also a dumb decision to make this a direct sequel to Superman II and then have it set in present day instead of making some vague version of 1985.

Titan: The OceanGate Submersible Disaster (2025): It’s a shame this rich asshole got four other innocent people killed in the process because otherwise, this narcissistic prick got everything he had coming to him.

Fantastic Four (2005):  Again, getting ready for some July programming (and July movie-going), I went back and checked out Tim Story’s mid-aughts adaptation and yeah, wow what a product of its time. Mastercard “priceless” jokes, Sobe sponsoring the X Games, Julian McMahon being in movies… it was all happening just after the turn of the century! Yeah, this still ain’t great. The third act is pretty okay once everyone comes together and we battle Doctor Doom for a minute, but there’re like 85 minutes to slog through before you even start to get a hint of any entertainment.

Chris:  

Titan: The OceanGate Submersible Disaster (2025): It’s tough to admit, but Netflix rather consistently has the edge when it comes to these Big News Event docs. Chris Smith, like David Fincher before him, built them a very sturdy style guide to follow when trying to get these fuckers out as soon as possible while also being half-way successful as something bigger than an information transference program. Where Implosion just loosely strings together events, puttering toward an anti-climactic finale, Titan genuinely has dramatic build by focusing intently on the character and behavior of OceanGate founder and CEO, Stockton Rush in the years, months, weeks, and days leading up to an immense tragedy that would be easier to laugh louder at if not for the kid who got literally disintegrated to make his idiot dad happy. Director Mark Monroe includes stories of the other victims of the OceanGate implosion, but he smartly connects it all back to Rush and his impenetrable ego, which allowed for this to happen. It all goes down a little too easily ultimately, but if you’re not going to tangle with the inherent moral issues with turning a story like this into a pleasingly shot, edited, and structured piece of entertainment, Titan is about as good as you can expect from this kind of investigative cinema.

The Encampments (2025): In contrast to Titan, Michael T. Workman and Kei Pritsker’s riveting The Encampments, an immediate and enraging doc focused tightly on the day-to-day events of the titular act of righteous solidarity with the Palestinian people, feels thoughtful, scrappy, and direct without tipping toward the careful steps of stylization and limited political inquiry that often rule streaming docs. The armada of largely digital devices that have captured the events on Columbia’s campus and transferred information between key players across the globe and on other campuses, rendering several college administration’s virulent bigotry and willingness to let the police loose on peaceful, paying students bare and undiluted, look almost uniformly excellent now after years of refining. What we’ve lost in the bewitching, occasionally challenging visual language of early digital, we’ve gained in the vastness of the use of the camera, in homes and war zones we’ve never had the option to visit ever before. If you were to tell me even like 20 years ago that the Palestinian cause was going to wield this much political power in America among the young and 30, 40, and 50-year-olds across the nation, I would have rolled my eyes and I would have been wrong to do so.

A Saintly Switch (1999): As I am wont to do, I have spent way too long hunting down this Peter Bogdanovich-helmed body-swap comedy that he made at the end of the 90s, following a string of largely unseen movies, including the quite good Blessed Assurance, a Grant Show-led drama about work and race in a small South Carolina town, in the aftermath of the Korean War. At the beginning of the 90s, Bogdanovich released three near-masterpieces in Texasville, Noises Off!, and The Thing Called Love, but none of them made much money and the studios slowly lost interest. As such, the man took on Switch with abundantly clear disinterest, not even moving along the proceedings confidently or offering any care or thought to shape the images or the supposed humor. Even with Vivica A. Fox and David Alan Grier, two great actors, at the helm, this proved to be an immense chore to get through even in the specialized subgenre of body-swap. Vice Versa and the more recent The Change-Up are both awful but largely move along competently. This thing barely moves and yet everything feels very frantic moment-to-moment. Available on YouTube, but I can’t suggest this shit to you in good conscience.

Eric:
The Phoenician Scheme (2025): Playing movie theater catch-up with this one because I had covid opening weekend and could not go! This is one of Wes Anderson's best and now sits on the shelf alongside Grand Budapest Hotel and The Royal Tenenbaums. I feel like this is a full return to form after meandering, disappointing, style over substance entries like Asteroid City and French Dispatch both which left me cold. Wes Anderson spent 10 years in the woods but he's finally back. The secret sauce? You guessed it: There's actually a central character. What a concept! Del Toro is at the top of his game here too. Big fan. 

Nonnas (2025): Threw this on after we made up some shells (the Italian kind, not the vile American Velveeta shit) and it stinks—no surprise there. There's really not much to like here at all. Lorraine Bracco was somewhat unrecognizable! Susan Sarandon? You guessed it - barely in it. Vince Vaughn has the idea to open an Italian restaurant on Staten Island. He then does so. That's the movie. Comes complete with a post-credit scene showing the REAL people this movie is based on, kinda like Warfare also did earlier this year. Let me tell you what, the casting choices do not reflect reality in the slightest.

Return of the One-Armed Swordsman (1969): Incredible violence, especially when you think about American films of the time, but it doesn't have anything to back it up. Chang Cheh is still really developing his craft here and excelling in most respects, but I just can't get over the convoluted story. There's better out there! And there's worse! It's fine! 

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004): I haven't seen this since theaters, I don't think. I bought the blu-ray at one point to re-examine it, I found that out when I bought the 4K. Is it a video game cutscene? Yes. Does it have a lot of charm? Yes. I give it maybe even a slight edge over Sin City just because it's a pure escapist retro-futurism adventure. Don't get me wrong, it's by no means perfect. Someone give Kerry Conran a movie again though. He was doing what you all do now back in 2004! 

Body Count (1986): A classic in the woods slasher directed by, hold the phone... Ruggero Deodato, the director of Cannibal Holocaust? Nothing like that infamous film, this one is pretty fun! A group of college students explore the Colorado wilderness and die. Charles Napier plays a cop! Worth a spin. 

Just Before Dawn (1981): A sleepy slasher with a dose of George Kennedy! Chris Lemmon, son of Jack Lemmon! And others! There's some good stuff here, like how you see the killer in the backgrounds of shots, or how he swims into the water to grab someone's leg. I give Body Count the edge, but this made for a decent creepy uncle-fernoon. 

Steve:

25th Hour (2002): What with everyone showing off their New York Times “Best of the 2000s” lists, I wanted to revisit what the 2000s mean to me, and that starts with this masterpiece. It’s hard to say one of the best Spike Lee joints ever made, because Christ…but this has to be on that short list, it just has to. It’s such a true New York reaction to 9/11 that only Spike Lee could make, and to make it months after, when every other film was digitally scrubbing the Trade Towers out of their films, and to focus on the smoldering hole in the city’s heart makes this an indelible document capturing an important moment in American history. Besides all that? It’s an absolute masterclass with one of the best casts ever assembled, all at their best. It’s hard not to shout out Philip Seymour Hoffman in this, even though he’s truly in supporting mode, but him gliding down the stairs in the club after making an enormous mistake with Anna Paquin (who steals every scene she’s in) might be one of my favorite moments in film. So there’s that.

28 Years Later (2025): If you listened to our We Love Movies entry on 28 Days Later, you’ll know it’s one of my favorite horror films ever, so even with having the gang back together, it was going to be a tall order to bring me back to that world, but holy shit did Danny Boyle deliver. I truly didn’t expect this to be one of my favorites of the year, but here we are. It’s such a different approach, looking at the material, thinking intelligently and actually moving it forward, something most legacy sequels are loathe to do. Looking at a low-fi, genre defining zombie picture and changing it to folk horror? That’s fucking bold, and man does it work. It’s my favorite Aaron Taylor Johnson performance by a mile, just edging out Kraven: The Hunter, Jodie Cromer finds heart, humanity and dignity in an incredibly challenging role, and Ralph Fiennes pulls an all-time movie fake out to craft one of the most memorable characters of the decade. Also, beyond floored by Alfie Williams for holding this movie the entire way. Count me in with the crowd that was hooting and hollering (in a good way) at the ending. I’m ready for Bone Temple, you guys.

Ex Machina (2015): In the ramp up for 28 Years Later, I wanted to revisit my favorite Alex Garland directorial effort to see if it still held up. Man does it! It remains Garland’s best because it’s so unlike his recent misfires: taut, prescient, and ideologically sound. Remember Oscar Isaac, gang? That was an actor! Hope he comes back soon. If Hereditary is the mother of all A24 movies, this is the father. So much of that house style can be stemmed from those two movies, which I do love, but maybe a film studio doesn’t need a house style and should just do like…new, exciting movies? Just a thought experiment!

Materialists (2025): Justice for Short Kings Now!

PATREON MAILBAG LIGHTNING ROUND

Here's a fun space where folks on Patreon get to ask us Questions directly. This month's entry comes from

Jason, from Texas who asks:

“What is a line from a movie that lives rent free in your head?”

Andrew: I walk around quoting The Big Lebowski in my head quite a bit. At random, lines like, “phone’s ringin’, Dude” and “coitus?” pop into my head. It’s never big lines like, “that’s just like, your opinion, man.” No, I pull the random lines with much aplomb. “Careful, man, there’s a beverage here,” is one I say quite a bit out loud as well. I also think about the line, “does it look like I'm fuckin’ married,” whenever I go into a restroom and the toilet seat is left up, because folks, I do NOT let that shit fly at home! 

Chris: Too many to mention. I haven’t been able to get, “myself, I feel very safe” out of my head in the wake of The Phoenician Scheme, as well as, “It really is just who can lick who, or whom.” “I got thrown out of a fucking window!” from Beverly Hills Cop. “NICE FUCKING MODEL!” from Beetlejuice. To go back to Anderson – I am very predictable – I am always very moved by the exchange between Mr. and Mrs. Fox when she slashes his face, but also, I am thinking, “I understand what you’re saying, and your comments are valuable, but I’m gonna ignore your advice,” nearly five times a week at this point.

Eric: There's several but one of them is from Star Wars (1977), in that world-building they give Darth Vader the line, "there'll be no one to stop us this time," which mustered up thoughts in my head as a young boy of Vader constantly being hoodwinked and beaten over and over again. Tossing his helmet on the ground and saying "God damnit," and so forth. Vader is kind of a Buford T. Justice figure in that first movie. Speaks a big game but ends up stranded in his car on the side of the road after that Death Star blunder. Speaking of which, come see the Live Gleep Glossary on Vader in Oxford, England on 19 July!

Steve: Well, apropos of our Superman II live show, I think about Gene Hackman saying, “it’s fantastiiiiic,” when he sees the Fortress of Solitude on a weekly basis, and can’t help myself from yelling it out in an echoey space. Another good one is Sandra Bullock’s, “here we goo-ooh,” from Speed. I think about Mark Borschardt from American Movie bathing Uncle Bill on Thanksgiving and decrying, “man’s inhumanity to man,” probably more than I should. Also, mostly due to Chris Cabin, I’m kind of always thinking about Donald Pleasance at the end of Halloween 4 going, “Nooo…NOOOO,” in that Donald-y Pleasance way of his.

JULY SCHEDULE

Say what? The schedule in advance?! It's the least we could do! By subscribing to this newsletter, you get a sneak peek at what we're putting out this month.

July 1st – Lucy (2014)  

July 8th – Beethoven (1992)

July 15th – Sin City (2005)

July 22nd – Fantastic Four (2015)

July 29th – Night at the Museum (2006)

Patreon Episodes:

July 3rd --  We Love Movies: Jaws (1975)

July 10th -- MELR0210: 90210: “Perfectly Perfect (s3, e24) Melrose Place: “Dr. Jekyll Saves His Hide” (s3, e9)

July 17th -- Animation Damnation: Fantastic Four: The Animated Series “Mole Man” (s1, e11)

July 24th -- Gleep Glossary: Admiral Piett

July 31st -- The Nexus: TOSTAS: “The Terratin Incident” (s1, 11), TNG: “The Drumhead” (s4, e21)

PATREON RSS BUG

If you’re having trouble with the RSS feed updating or episodes not appearing in your app, Patreon has acknowledged this bug and they have a fix: "Try unsubscribing and re-subscribing via your app by re-entering the unique RSS feed you were given and is on our Overview section of the Creator page. Or try using a different podcast app or RSS feed reader." 

Please consult this page and contact Patreon Support if the problem persists. We apologize for any inconvenience you’ve experienced on Patreon and truly appreciate your continued support!

UPCOMING NEWS AND PROMOTION

On Screen Live is coming to a close for the summer, so catch the final one till September live on Monday June 30th! We also just droped a banger of a Mailbag and you never know when there’ll be another one! Subscribe on our YouTube Channel to never miss a broadcast!

We also have all officially sanctioned VHS Trailer Game episodes up to this point. Eric has also put out great clip packages like WTF Exorcism with Marc Merrin, Dr. Loomis is the Worst Doctor, Dilf Den, George Bailey as Michael Meyers, John Wick-Mentary,  Toby Jones in Bee Movie, Sausage Claus, David! Muppet Hitchcock Presents, and many more! You can also watch the entirety of our Witchboard episode! Complete with visual gags (most of which are almost funny.). You'll find all sorts of cool shit like Mailbags, VHS Trailer Games, Full Episodes like Rampage (2018), Any Which Way You Can, Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Saw III. Like we said above these are great for sharing and introducing folks to the show. There's so much content there we can't list it all here. Just go and subscribe already! 

TJ Hooker…Is back! Join Eric and Ben as TJ does his best to wish his new friend Sharon Stone well on her backdoor pilot!  Listen here!

Please note that from now until at least the end of 2025, ALL PROFITS from our merch store store will be going directly to the Center for Reproductive rights! Shit’s bad out there and we know it’s likely to get worse and we want to do something,  SO, If you're a fan of the show and a fan of looking sharp, you should check out our merch on our new and improved merch store on Dashery! We have some hot off the presses designs by Felipe Sobreiro such as the Superman II Live Show, Too Old For This Shit and Sheenpril Logos as well as A Certain Fat Director enjoying his favorite film filter of all time! We also have "The DILF Den", and a "Crispy Critters" design from friend of the show, Nathan Hamill!  There’s a ton of other great designs like The VHS Trailer Game Logo, Demon-o's Pizza, Egg Lawyer, The Order of the Boop, The Kornkast design and many more, with more to come! 

That's going to do it for this month's Dispatch! Enjoy this banger of a month and the end of the Summer Blockbuster Extravaganza!

Take it easy,
Andrew, Chris, Eric, and Steve
We Hate Movies