Emerald City Video

New Release Wall #24 - Tremors: A Cold Day in Hell

"My favorite movie since BLACK PANTHER." - Russ Burlingame

New Release Wall #23 - Avengers: Infinity War [SPOILERS]

SPOILERS ON for the second half of Russ and Zach's look at Avengers: Infinity War. Here's where things get a bit more critical, because however great the movie was, the ending left Russ really cold.

New Release Wall #22 - Avengers: Infinity War [NON-SPOILERS]

After ten years, it all comes to this: Avengers: Infinity War pits the various heroes of Marvel's shared cinematic universe against Thanos, the greatest threat they have ever faced, as he endeavors to bring "balance" to the universe by slaughtering half of everybody. This is our NON-SPOILER review. For a discussion of the ending and some other spoilery topics, come back on Monday.

New Release Wall #21: Cartel 2045

In the latest installment of our New Release Wall, Zach and Russ take a look at the strange and wonderful Cartel 2045.

World of Old Krypton: House of Zod & Action Comics #1000

Russ is on site in Toronto visiting the set of Shazam!, and has a number of other reporters on to bask in the glory of "House of Zod" with him. Krypton is great, guys. You can find us (and a number of other awesome podcasts) on the ACPN family of shows. If you like what we're doing here, you can become a patron of the Emerald City Video Podcast, which comes with fun perks. You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook. We also have Instagram and Vero accounts where we share images, photos...

New Release Wall #20: Rampage!

Russ and Zach break down RAMPAGE!, which Zach calls "The movie America needs right now."

World of Old Krypton: The Word of Rao

Russ is joined by Jon Wilson and Jeffrey Taylor to talk about the fourth episode of Krypton, "The Word of Rao." You can find us (and a number of other awesome podcasts) on the ACPN family of shows. If you like what we're doing here, you can become a patron of the Emerald City Video Podcast, which comes with fun perks. You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook. We also have Instagram and Vero accounts where we share images, photos, memes, and nonsense. Be back for more by noon on the ...

World of Old Krypton: The Rankless Initiative

Russ is joined by Jon Wilson and Jeffrey Taylor to talk about Krypton's third episode, "The Rankless Initiative" You can find us (and a number of other awesome podcasts) on the ACPN family of shows. If you like what we're doing here, you can become a patron of the Emerald City Video Podcast, which comes with fun perks. You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook. We also have Instagram and Vero accounts where we share images, photos, memes, and nonsense. Be back for more by noon on the...

New Release Wall #19: Ready Player One

It's time to simultaneously head 30 years into the past and 30 years into the future, as Russ Burlingame and Zach Roberts talk Ready Player One, the latest Steven Spielberg blockbuster based on the best-selling novel by Ernest Cline. Is it great? No. Is it good? Well...!

World of Old Krypton: Pilot

Russ is joined by John Wilson, Michael Bailey, and Jeffrey Taylor to talk about the pilot of SYFY's new series Krypton. You can find us (and a number of other awesome podcasts) on the ACPN family of shows. If you like what we're doing here, you can become a patron of the Emerald City Video Podcast, which comes with fun perks. You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook. We also have Instagram and Vero accounts where we share images, photos, memes, and nonsense. Be back for more by noon...

New Release Wall #18: 'Tomb Raider'

Russ Burlingame and Zach Roberts saw Tomb Raider together, and came out of it with different takeaways. One of us thought it was a fine, fun, popcorn affair. The other thought it was no fun at all, and a bit too self-serious in tone for the script. Which of us felt each way might surprise you...!

New Release Wall #17: Black Panther

We have often said that while Marvel makes the big bucks, it’s DC who has the boundless ambition to shoot for Great Films instead of just Good Movies. With Black Panther, Marvel makes its bid for a Great Film and succeeds spectacularly.

#SnyderCut Month: WATCHMEN

Here are Russ's copious notes on this one... The black & yellow title cards are a kind of acknowledgement of the Watchmen trade dress. Legendary! DC “swish” logo! More Comedian! The use of the media/screens in the Comedian opening feels very Zack Snyder (and of course allows the film to adapt the Veldt ad to live action in a way that the print ads from the coms wouldn’t necessarily have done). 300 (his suite number) Veldt at no point in the film feels like a guy who has the physical pre...

New Release Wall #16: I, Tonya

Russ Burlingame and Zach Roberts talk about I, Tonya -- a good movie that could have been great, featuring a number of stellar performances and a filmmaker who either did not KNOW what kind of movie he was making, or at least could not commit to it.

#SnyderCut Month: Dawn of the Dead

This is #SnyderCut month. If you don’t know what “#SnyderCut” is, you probably are not living and breathing geek media like I do. Zack Snyder directed the recently-released Justice League — you can find our episode covering that movie here -- and left the film during post-production due to a family tragedy.  When the movie turned out to be critically and commercially disappointing, a number of hardcore Snyder fans have spent a ton of time attempting to get Warner Bros. to release the "Sny...

Staff Picks #4: Zero Effect at 20

Twenty years ago today, Zero Effect was released in theaters. Ben Stiller & Bill Pullman gave wonderful performances and I spent all of my college years in love with Kim Dickens (something another reporter once told her at a roundtable to embarrass me). Back when I managed a family-owned video store, I used to recommend Zero Effect (directed by Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle's Jake Kasdan, btw) to customers so often that it made our 100 most-rented movies of the year -- IN 2006. We had to b...

New Release Wall #15: Black Lightning [Pilot]

Russ and Zach have thoughts on the first episode of The CW's new series Black Lightning. You can read Russ's full review here: http://comicbook.com/dc/2018/01/08/black-lightning-game-changer-review/ You can read Zach's thoughts here: https://visu.news/2018/01/16/podcast-blacklightning-is-the-tv-show-we-need-right-now/  

New Release Wall #14: Batman: Gotham By Gaslight

Russ and Zach look at Batman: Gotham By Gaslight, the animated feature film released to streaming platforms today. The movie is one of the better DC animated features, with both of us really enjoying it when it was screened during this weekend's DC in DC event. Apologies for substandard audio, and some distortion in the middle: as it's a new release wall episode, we recorded in the car...but whereas we are often parked, or driving through a neighborhood, this was going 65 miles an hour on ...

Antiheroes - Wherein Zach Compares Tony Stark to Jesus

In this special episode, recorded in October and forgotten until now, Zach and Russ talk about the trend of making every protagonist an antihero, what (if anything) can bring more traditional heroes back to the forefront, and the role of superhero films in setting that tone. Also, Zach compares Iron Man to Jesus. Like, a lot. You can support the show here: http://paypal.me/emeraldcityvideo

New Release Wall #13: Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Spoilers)

So -- how does The Last Jedi hold up a couple of weeks down the line? Russ finds out by talking to Logan and Dan about the film.

New Release Wall #12 - Star Wars: The Last Jedi

BONUS TRACK: 'Psych: The Movie'

Are you a fan of Delicious Flavor? Well, you should be. That would be Russ's Psych rewatch podcast, which he co-hosts with Jenna Anderson and Shawn Carpenter. It's a ton of fun, and you can listen to the first few episodes (with more to come soon) at the link above. Here, though, we are sharing the Delicious Flavor episode dedicated to Psych: The Movie, mostly because ECV has a bigger platform than Delicious Flavor does at this point.

New Release Wall: Crisis on Earth-X Day One

The CW's superhero shows come together for another big-ass crossover -- and this one feels bigger and more epic than Justice League, so Russ had to comment a bit. Joining him is Michele Curran from #TVGeek Podcast, and the two tackle the first night of the crossover event in as much non-spoiler glory as they can. If you want to hear more like this, check out our Patreon -- you can find it here, and among other things backers can get a quarterly, exclusive video podcast DELIVERED ON VHS.

New Release Wall #11: Justice League

The Justice League movie is finally out, and Russ and Zach went there and came out of it with a non-spoiler review for all you fine people. Overall, Russ loved the movie, while Zach was lukewarm on it. Both had some thoughts on a few shortcomings, and both had plenty of favorable comparisons to make. This is no Civil War or Suicide Squad. If you want to hear more like this, check out our Patreon -- you can find it here, and among other things backers can get a quarterly, exclusive video po...

New Release Wall#10: Thor: Ragnarok

Zach Robers and Russ Burlingame take aim at Marvel's best-reviewed movie to date, Thor: Ragnarok. Do we love it as much as everybody else, or was it more of a Captain America: Civil War situation? Find out within! If you want to hear more like this, check out our Patreon -- you can find it here, and among other things backers can get a quarterly, exclusive video podcast DELIVERED ON VHS.

Independent Film in the Age of Streaming

In a follow-up to our conversation on Classics*, which Russ and Zach recorded on the way to New York Comic Con at the beginning of October, comes a conversation that was recorded on the way home from the show. After a conversation with Itsy Bitsy director Micah Gallo for his day job, Russ was left wondering how movies are distributed and marketed in a post-video environment. With only a small number of distributors accounting for the vast majority of what people watch nowadays, there are a ...

Classics*

Whether it’s Oscar bait or crowd-pleasers, every year or two there is a movie that everyone is briefly convinced will be a classic for the ages, held up on the Mount Rushmore of film alongside Citizen Kane and The Godfather. And basically every time, those people are wrong. Is it because the movie itself is not as good as we thought it was, because of changing tastes, or just the fact that people do not want to accept new additions to the canon? In any case, this is what Zach and Russ tal...

Episode 16: Summer of Riverdale: Scream/Anatomy of a Murder

Russ Burlingame and Eva Furmanska meet up to talk about Scream and Anatomy of a Murder, inspired by the penultimate episode of Riverdale's first season, titled "Anatomy of a Murder." It has been a couple of weeks since this was recorded, actually, but editing time started to get away from me. Ultimately after the computer crashed at the tail end of FINALLY getting the editing done, I decided it was time to just give up and publish what I had. So apologies for each of us having at least one ...

Why Do We Love White Crime?

On the one hand, a huge number of movies are made every year that show the bad guy getting brutalized, humiliated, or otherwise getting a much-deserved comeuppance. On the other, there is an increasingly common and popular subgenre of movies that seems to illustrate that the only thing we like more than watching bad guys get punished, is watching rich, white bad guys get away with it. Yep -- this is gonna be that kind of podcast. If you want to hear more like it, check out our Patreon -- ...