The Thing
Jamelle Bouie and Julian Sanchez join the podcast to discuss John Carpenter's 1982 sci-fi cult classic, The Thing, a film that made our skin crawl with paranoia. Based on the 1938 John W. Campbell Jr. novella Who Goes Th…
Pop & Locke
Ever wonder what a libertarian perspective might reveal about your favorite blockbuster or the latest streaming sensation? Pop & Locke is where that curiosity finds a home, weaving political philosophy into the fabric of contemporary film, television, and news. Hosts Landry Ayres and Aaron Ross Powell, from Libertarianism.org, don't just offer reviews-they start conversations, using pop culture as a compelling lens to examine ideas about individual liberty, power, and society. Each episode feels like a thoughtful chat with friends who are as passionate about storytelling as they are about principles. You'll hear them dissect the moral dilemmas in a sci-fi series, unpack the politics hidden in a superhero franchise, or debate the societal commentary in a hit drama. This podcast moves beyond simple entertainment analysis, inviting listeners to reconsider how the stories we consume reflect and shape our world. It’s for anyone who leaves a movie theater with more questions than answers, or who senses the deeper currents running beneath a TV show's plot. Tune in for a unique blend of casual critique and serious thought, where the latest episode of a popular show might just spark a fascinating discussion on freedom, ethics, and everything in between.
Episodes
Candyman
The hook-handed son of a slave summoned by the chanting of his name 5 times, Candyman, was originally created by horror legend writer Clive Barker. But the legend has since been adapted for the big screen many times, fir…
The Simpsons
The Simpsons is an American adult animated sitcom created by Matt Groening that follows the Simpson family who live in Springfield. The show parodies American culture, society, and ultimately the human condition. Hosted…
The Hurt Locker
The Hurt Locker was the first narrative feature to make full, unnerving dramatic sense of the war in Iraq, and it does so without polemics or speeches or phony melodrama. In fact, the director, Kathryn Bigelow, has been…
Pulp Fiction
In Pulp Fiction, two hit men, Jules Winnfield and Vincent Vega work for the crime boss Marcellus Wallace. The film is really comprised of six different stories that are very loosely connected to one another. And the titl…
Pan's Labyrinth
Pan's Labyrinth is a 2006 Spanish-Mexican dark fantasy war film. The story takes place in Spain during the summer of 1944, five years after the Spanish Civil War, during the early Francoist period. The narrative intertwi…
Fahrenheit 451
Fahrenheit 451 is a 1953 dystopian novel that was written by Ray Bradbury and turned into a film in 1966 and 2018. It’s a story about Guy Montag, a fireman, whose job it is to actually destroy illegal belongings, like bo…
The Conversation
A paranoid, secretive surveillance expert has a crisis of conscience when he suspects that the couple he is spying on will be murdered. Julian Sanchez, Jake Laperruque, and Richard Theime join us to discuss how Coppola's…
1984
Winston Smith is a minor government employee, living in Oceania, whose job involves the rewriting of history in a manner that casts his fictional country's leaders in a charitable light. And in this closely-monitored soc…
Arrival
A Linguistics professor Louise Banks leads an elite team of investigators when gigantic spaceships touch down in 12 seemingly random locations around the world. As nations teeter on the verge of global war, Banks and her…
