2016 Oscars: Tom’s Best Picture Round-Up

By and large, I don’t put much personal stock in the Academy Awards.  They strike me as an excuse for Hollywood to pat itself on the back for all the good work it says it does.  If I watch the show at all, it’ll be the last few minutes to find out who won Best Picture, and that’ll be it.  The humor is rather lame, the musical numbers dull, and the low-burning outrage over what did and didn’t win can linger for decades.

Case in point:  Forrest Gump beat out both Pulp Fiction and The Shawshank Redemption for Best Picture.  I don’t care how much you like Gump, there’s no way anyone can justify it is a better movie than both of those other two.

But then this year, I actually saw most of the Best Picture nominees.  Thoughts after the cut.  No predictions, though.  If you want predictions, try Watson’s article.

Podcast Reaction: The Forrest Gump Edition

This week on the podcast, the guys and Jenny covered the 90s.  I’m actually less inclined to hate on the 90s than I am on the 80s, but not because I think the 90s were better.  Part of it is I came to adulthood in that decade.  The other part is, when you get right down to it, modern geek culture, an important part of this site’s purpose (you know, the thing this website is completely dedicated to), started then.  The 90s gave us the first serialized television, TV animation took a big step away from half-assed shows based on action figure lines, there was the rise of HBO original programming, and depending on when you start and stop the era, the X-Men hit the big screen in 2000.  The Cold War was over and the War on Terror hadn’t started yet.  It was a good time.

I still would not go back to it, because I still believe in living in the now.

Speaking of living in the now, let’s talk about how overrated Forrest Gump is.

ICYMI: Tom Hanks Recreates His Filmography In Mere Minutes

This man is a global treasure. I love Tom Hanks.

5 Films Chris Pratt Shouldn’t Remake

Geeks around the world love Chris Pratt.  Because Chris Pratt.  After rallying a little-known-Marvel-property into one of the top grossers of 2014, Pratt seems destined to have another high-attention movie (notice I did not say top grossing – Ryan) with Jurassic World and he’s rumored to be the next Indiana Jones or in another Ghostbusters movie.  In fact, Chris Pratt is rumored to be attached to just about any movie with a male lead.  Which is just about every movie that doesn’t involve an all-female Ghostbusters film.  So we thought it’d be fun to brainstorm movies that shouldn’t be remade starring Chris Pratt.  It’s harder than you think.  Find out what the Gabbing Geek editorial crew came up with after the break.

True Sequels We Need to See!

Back in Episode 21 of Gabbing Geek, the Geeks played a game of “Sequel, Reboot, or LET IT DIE!” In that now legendary segment (my mom liked it), we offered our not so humble opinions on how to manage some prominent Geek film properties.  A movie like Goonies, for instance, could be rebooted for a new generation, continued with the original kids now parents to a next generation of Goonies, or Let the franchise die (which is somewhat incompatible with their motto…) Some franchises were destined to be continued, yet along the way the wheels fell off the bus.  Let’s make up for Hollywood’s sins and green light a few films in the PURE SEQUEL category.