Sunday, September 7, 2025

Flopcast 696: SNL FlopFight Part 4 - Girlybirds

It's the shocking conclusion of our second Saturday Night Live character FlopFight tournament, and Dragon Con American Sci-Fi Classics Track co-director Joe Crowe is still here providing expert commentary. Our competitors may include a pair of insecure bodybuilders, a simple caveman, a lady with a less-than-positive attitude, and perhaps even the devil himself. It all leads to a showdown with last week's winner, and we shall determine the ultimate SNL character champion. (Spoiler: It's not Massive Head Wound Harry. Probably should have been.)

Sunday, August 31, 2025

Flopcast 695: SNL FlopFight Part 3 - Absolutely Marvelous

A few months back, to celebrate Saturday Night Live's 50th anniversary, we did a whole FlopFight tournament of SNL characters. (If you're keeping score, the winner was Will Forte's Falconer. Of course.) But since so many classic characters didn't get to play, we thought we'd just do it again. And since this is Dragon Con weekend, we thought we'd bring in a special guest: Dragon Con American Sci-Fi Classics Track co-director Joe Crowe! Joe will help us sort through this new field of goofy competitors, which just might include a visit to Fernando's Hideaway, a terrifying ride with a driving cat, and a showdown with the man they call... Johnny Canal. So join us and learn which SNL weirdo is advancing to next week's final round. Meanwhile, if your doorbell rings, go ahead and answer it. It's probably just a candygram.

Sunday, August 24, 2025

Flopcast 694: Dragon Con Preview Part 2 - See You in Court

We're just days away from Dragon Con, Atlanta's massive annual gathering of the geeks! And the full schedule of all eight zillion Dragon Con events has been released. So this week, after a quick guest update (Simon Pegg is in! Tom Wilson is out!), we're looking at our individual schedules, so you'll know how to find us or (more likely) avoid us. Including: The Dragon Con walking tours; the Geek Girls Run; the Sci-Fi Music Video Book Club; Classic Sci-Fi Court; a tournament of Muppets; panels about Severance, Peacemaker, Creature Commandos, new wave music, video game movies; and more! We'll even have weird badge ribbons for you. So hop on a midnight train to Georgia and get ready to party like you're the biggest nerd in the world. Who knows, perhaps you are...

Sunday, August 17, 2025

Flopcast 693: Dragon Con Preview Part 1 - We're Already Exhausted

Our Dragon Con coverage officially begins, and it might never end! Dragon Con is our favorite nerd event of the year, it's almost here, and this week we're looking through the guest list. Among those tentatively scheduled to appear are stars from Back to the Future, Daredevil, Buck Rogers, Star Trek, The Magicians... and even some actual Muppet performers. Also appearing will be many fine writers, artists, musicians, scientists, and humble podcasters, including a bunch of maniacs from right here on the ESO Network. Also: The 120 Minutes dance party! The return of Sci-Fi Explosion! The debut of HalloweenCon! And our weird idea for a gym teacher panel! Next week: More thrilling Dragon Con preview action! You might want to get to Atlanta and start standing in lines right now.

Sunday, August 10, 2025

Flopcast 692: Summer Blorgs

With a free week before we start like eight months of nonstop Dragon Con coverage, Kevin and the Mayor are trying something new: We're recording the show from outside Chickentown Studios, in the great and filthy outdoors. Hopefully this will provide a more festive summertime atmosphere, until the mosquitoes and bats and angry villagers show up. So with nothing better to do until a search party arrives, we offer a couple of new movie reviews (Superman and Fantastic Four), recommend a TV show or two, and plug Kevin's recent guest appearance on the EnterpriseSplaining podcast. And that's it! Next week, we'll have our first Dragon Con preview show. And we'll probably be back inside. It's scary out here.

Sunday, August 3, 2025

Flopcast 691: Recycle Your Robots

If you've just been waiting all Summer long for The Flopcast's annual robot-themed Top 4½ List... well, first, what's wrong with you? Go to the beach or something. But also... here it is! Our theme this year is "recycled robots." Sometimes a robot would be designed for some movie or TV show, and then later repurposed for some other movie or TV show. Forbidden Planet's Robby the Robot is the prime example. Robby had a decades-long career popping up in one project after another. A few oddball robots even started making appearances in the real world, so you could meet them at nightclubs or shopping malls. We'll look at a few of these jobbing journeyman robots (four and a half of them, to be exact), and we have a special guest to show us the way. Our old pal Chris Cummins, host of Sci-Fi Explosion and expert on all manner of bizarro pop culture, is back! Chris knows a thing or two about weird robots. And now you will too.

Sunday, July 27, 2025

Flopcast 690: Weird Al Speedwagon

We're packing all our summer concert reports into one big show! First it's Aimee Mann in New Hampshire with her regular opener (and no stranger to the nerd world) Jonathan Coulton. (As longtime Aimee fans, we're still a little grumpy about missing the recent 'Til Tuesday reunion show...) Then we have two shows from the same exhausting weekend! First up is "Weird Al" Yankovic, who brought his Bigger and Weirder Tour (with weird opening act Puddles Pity Party) to a giant casino in Connecticut. Then the very next night, there was REO Speedwagon (sort of) and Styx, with opener Don Felder of the Eagles, at Great Woods back here in Massachusetts. (Mr. Roboto, we've missed you.) It was a fine bunch of super-fun nostalgic shows (including some random meetups with old friends of the Flopcast), and now we're ready to flop over and relax until Dragon Con. But do you still have any summer concerts coming up? If you're planning to Wang Chung tonight, do please let us know.

Sunday, July 20, 2025

Flopcast 689: The 1989 Movie Recasting Movie Character Movie Game

After ten long silly weeks, we've arrived at the end of our 1980s-themed episodes. And 1989 was a huge year at the movies, so we thought we'd play one more round of our Movie Recasting Movie Character Movie Game. That means we're pulling characters from randomly-selected 1989 movies, and then inserting them into other movies. This usually results in much weirder movies. (Speaking of weird, a certain comedy musician starred in a 1989 movie...) Who gets to play this time? Batman? Indiana Jones? A Ghostbuster? A Heather or two? Harry and/or Sally? So many possibilities. And to help us sort it all out, please welcome returning Flopcast guest Blasted Bill! 1989 was a big year for Bill, and not just because he is constantly mistaken for Young Einstein.

Sunday, July 13, 2025

Flopcast 688: The Backs of Life 8 - The Beginning of the End of 1988

We're using our 1988 episode to finally wrap up our Backs of Life series, in which we review every backdoor pilot episode of classic 80s sitcom The Facts of Life. And this final two-part backdoor pilot from April 1988 is actually the end of the whole show! (Farewell, Tootie...) We start with a fleeting glimpse of the regular cast (which by this point also includes Australian moppet Pippa), but soon we're solidly in backdoor pilot territory. Eastland, the girls' old school, is in danger of closing, so Blair buys the place, and welcomes boys to enroll as well as girls. Then we see a whole new crop of young Eastland students, including some future stars: Juliette Lewis, Mayim Bialik, and Seth Green! Did this backdoor pilot lead to another beloved long-running series? Of course not. But does it end with the girls meeting a giant chicken? Well, kids, sometimes the world really seems to be living up to our dreams.

Sunday, July 6, 2025

Flopcast 687: Deathsquawk - The Comics of 1987

1987 was a transitional year in comic books. DC successfully relaunched Superman, Wonder Woman, Flash, and Justice League in their new post-Crisis universe. Marvel started a new universe too, which they called, uh, "New Universe." Also at Marvel, Spider-Man got married, an event so big that an actual wedding ceremony was held at a baseball stadium. Meanwhile, Alan Moore wrapped up his brilliant run on Swamp Thing, American Splendor's Harvey Pekar appeared on Late Night with David Letterman, Max Headroom made the cover of Mad Magazine... and Peter Porker the Spectacular Spider-Ham met the nefarious Dr. Chickenstein. And hey, our pal Kevin Cafferty (from Gleaming the Tube and The Best Stuff in the World) is here to help us figure it all out! Because it's been 38 years, and comic book nerds like us are still waiting for the next issue of Sonic Disruptors...