Sponsored by
Full disclosure: today’s newsletter is late, in large part because it is primary night here in MN and some other states and I am a political junkie. As it turns out, I have a political science degree, which I believe means that I am qualified to manage the Arby’s of my choice. It’s also another reminder that I wish it wasn’t so hard to get a reasonably priced, news channel-centric mini-cable bundle.
Since I live in Minnesota, I’ll be interested to see if either CNN or MSNBC draw on the state’s deep political reporting talent pool to provide some on-the-ground perspective. Or whether it will be another night in which Claire McCaskill and Scott Jennings attempt to explain what is happening here from 1,000 miles away.
On an entirely unrelated note, I would appreciate of you could throw a bit of love my son Sam’s way and subscribe to his newsletter An AuDHDer's Guide To Sports, which he describes as “a sports Substack written by an Autistic person with ADHD.” Most of his posts are pretty short and I try and gently suggest that he lean into sports stats, which is a bit of an obsession of his. But every time someone subscribes, he gets excited and it has definitely helped give him confidence.
There Is Nothing Wrong With A Good Time
I’ll argue that it is as difficult to create a mindless action movie than it is to produce some high-prestige drama. There is something magical when you find a dumb action movie that takes you away from the worries of the world for a couple of hours.
But that type of movie is more difficult to build than you might expect. You need plenty of suspenseful action, interspersed with just enough backstory to provide some stakes for the characters. You don’t need to provide a detailed explanation of motivations and backstory of the monsters or the bad guys. There has to just be enough there for everything to hang together.
There are some dumb action movies so magnificently insane that I’ll rewatch them any time I have the chance (Battleship), but the majority of my favorites are ones than I enjoyed the first time around, but probably will never bother with again.
The new Netflix original film The Last House falls into that category. It was a fun watch. But like a Jagermeister hangover, I probably don’t need to experience it again.
Rather than attempting to provide my own review, let me pass along this logline from Netflix, which honestly tells you everything you need to know about the film:
A family of four are suddenly sealed inside their home with no way out, and must work together to survive against both their dwindling resources and the mysterious, looming threat that is keeping them trapped.
And honestly, what else do you need to know about the film?
If you are a fan of movies such as this one, Netflix has been cranking out an impressive string of mid-budget, often distinctive original action films for years. And they frequently star actors who might have a difficult time persuading a traditional studio to greenlight their action movie.
Allison Janney in “Lou”
I don’t know that anyone would tap Allison Janney to play a bad-ass, aging CIA agent. But she does just that in the 2022 Netflix original film Lou, where she plays a woman tracking a former Green Beret who had kidnapped her neighbor’s daughter. It’s an aggressively unglamorous role that she embraces as she exhibits a scary level of violence.
And while much of the filmography of Jennifer Lopez is disappointing, her emotionally distant, ice queen on-camera persona works very well in an action movie. In 2023’s The Mother, she plays a female assassin comes out of hiding to protect the daughter that she gave up years before. Her character is magnificently unlikeable in the film, but it’s a flurry of action and she exhibits some real evolution over the two hours.
Jennifer Lopez in “Atlas”
In 2024’s Atlas, Lopez plays Atlas Shepherd, “a brilliant but misanthropic data analyst with a deep distrust of artificial intelligence, joins a mission to capture a renegade robot with whom she shares a mysterious past. But when plans go awry, her only hope of saving the future of humanity from AI is to trust it.” The premise is clunky and often nonsensical and the film seems to find a lot of reasons for Lopez to be simultaneously sweaty and wearing little more than a tight t-shirt. But it is also prime dumb action movie.
It might be strange to describe a high-budget movie starring Ryan Reynolds, Mark Ruffalo and Jennifer Garner as a dumb action movie, but 2022's The Adam Project has it all. Inexplicable time travel, villains who are bad apparently because the film needs to be and some plot points that can only be described as "clunky."
But it's also a film where Ryan Reynolds gets to be Ryan Reynolds. There is even a kid version of Reynolds and a few brief scenes with Zoe Saldana. Unfortunately Jennifer Garner doesn't get a lot to do, which makes me wish someone would cast her as a middle-aged retired killer. The movie also has some nice things to say about fatherhood, which is a nice bonus.
Jeon Do-yeon as Gil Boksoon
And I haven’t touched on the international action films. I highly recommend Kill Boksoon, which has just some insane action sequences. And the 2019 Filipino movie Maria, which has a pretty straight forward plot and an extremely minimal budget. But it’s a taut, nicely made example of kicking ass.
There are a number of reasons to criticize Netflix’s creative choices, and its track record on high budget, big stars films isn’t great. But no one cranks out so many wonderfully mindless action films as Netflix. And I couldn’t be happier about it.
Clicking on this ad provides a bit of extra revenue for this newsletter
America's #1 Ready-To-Eat Meal Delivery Service
Factor is a fully-prepared meal delivery service that features a rotating menu of 100+ weekly meals and 70+ add-ons, all chef-crafted and dietitian-optimized because what you eat is where it starts.
To support healthy habits, Factor provides personalized nutrition plans through complimentary consultations with our in-house dietitian team. Choose from a variety meal plans, including High Protein, GLP-1 Support, Calorie Smart, and Keto.
By merging gourmet quality with the highest nutritional standards, Factor eliminates the friction of healthier eating. All with real ingredients. Real flavor.
5 Myths About The Paramount And Warner Bros. Discovery Merger
Over at Forbes, I wrote an extensive piece cutting through some of the tired conventional wisdom surrounding the ongoing efforts to complete the Paramount merger with Warner Bros. Discovery:
The problem with all of this is that it doesn’t matter in the context of this merger. One company could own every Hollywood studio and release 100 theatrical films a year. But it would still be a monopoly that strips away competition and ensures there will be less diversity in produced movies. And less likelihood Hollywood creatives will be able to negotiate a better deal.
Whether or not Paramount would produce 30 theatrical films a year doesn’t really matter. Although I’ll argue that given the amount of spending Ellison has promised to cut once the merger is approved, I have serious doubts he can make it happen under those circumstances.
10 films a year or 30, combining two of Hollywood’s big five studios is anti-competitive and deserves to stop simply on its merits.
The press coverage around this merger attempt is driving me nuts. So much of the reporting is some version of “Hey! Look what this person says!,” which is little different than just being a well-sourced stenographer.
Odds & Sods
The three-part documentary Ages Of Ice, narrated by David Tennant, will premiere Wednesday, September 16th on PBS. Here is the brief official logline: “Ages Of Ice combines epic adventure, frontline science and deeply human stories. From the frozen Arctic Ocean to the high plateaus of Antarctica, viewers are immersed in places of staggering beauty and brutal extremes, where every landscape feels at once magnificent and impossibly fragile. Scientists explore the harshest frontiers on Earth and uncover the dramatic changes transforming the world.”
Season three of Ugliest House in America will premiere Friday, September 18th on HGTV.
Nothing says 2026 more than an Axios reporter writing that he now reads books by having AI recap them for him.
Season twelve of Love & Marriage: Huntsville premieres Saturday, September 12th on OWN.
Front Office Sports is reporting the Netflix docuseries SEC Football: Any Given Sunday docuseries that debuted last summer isn’t returning for a second season this year.
The four-part series Trespasses premieres Sunday, September 20th on PBS. Here is the official logline: “The series follows Cushla (Lola Petticrew), a young Catholic schoolteacher whose life in 1975 Northern Ireland is shadowed by the Troubles. She meets and falls for Michael (Tom Cullen) — an older, married Protestant barrister. Their affair is intoxicating and dangerous. As the forbidden love between Cushla and Michael deepens, violence looms and tensions rise. Cushla is pulled between duty and desire, family and freedom.”
Ken Klippenstein makes the point that the media hasn’t noticed, the rebels have already won in the Democratic Party.
Lucy Davis, best known as Dawn Tinsley in the UK version of The Office, has revealed that she has incurable cancer.
Philo Bundle+ subscribers can now browse and stream discovery+ programming directly inside the Philo app, with no separate sign-in or second app required.
The Australian drama Last Seen premieres Wednesday, September 9th on Apple TV. Here is a link to the trailer and here is the official logline: “Police detective Ian Ridley’s (Brammall) life fell apart 11 years ago when his young daughter, Maggie, disappeared without a trace. Now working as a police dispatcher, the only thing that has kept him going is his implacable refusal to accept that she might be gone forever. When he receives a distress call from a teenage girl he is certain is Maggie, he will stop at nothing to find her and reunite his broken family, whatever the cost.”
The animated adult comedy Dang! premieres Tuesday, September 8th on Netflix. Here is a link to the trailer. And here is the brief official logline: “Meet the Dangs! Dang! follows siblings Andrew and Eunice, whose fun, messy lives in New York City are interrupted when their worst nightmare comes true: their high-achieving older sister Ruthie shows up and wants to hang out with them.”
Nobody Paying $100 Million For A Podcast Expects To Make It Back
Most observers seem to be perplexed by Netflix’s video podcast strategy. I won’t claim any special insight on this, given that I have watched/listened to more podcasts since they were added to Netflix than I ever had in the past.
But the Media Built newsletter has a great piece on podcasts and the likelihood they are mostly overvalued. And I found this passage fascinating:
Now look at the behavior once you assume the buyers know exactly what they are doing.
Forbes reports that Netflix's early bids for top podcasts came in between $1 million and $2 million and were turned down across the board, and that the number which finally moved the market was north of $10 million a year on one and two-year trial terms. A buyer rejected at $2 million normally comes back at $4 million and starts trading rights for dollars. Netflix, in a very Netflix-y way, went straight to $10 million and kept the term short, keeping the option to walk in 24 months without having built anything it would then have to unwind. Ted Sarandos has described the strategy publicly as something close to a modern talk show, except with hundreds of shows instead of one defining one. Say what you will, it is a hell of a scale play…
The ownership structure fits the same pattern. Podcasters keep their underlying IP in nearly all of these arrangements, so the platform is paying nine figures to distribute and sell against an asset it does not own and will hand back. I wrote earlier this year about the trouble with renting someone else's fandom, and this is that trade at mass scale, which is a genuinely wild bet and I am curious how it plays out. Same with the exclusivity fights. Pulling Pardon My Take off YouTube is indefensible if you are running a content business, yet completely reasonable if you are making a subscription service feel like a distinct destination.
What’s Coming Tonight And Tomorrow
TUESDAY, AUGUST 11TH:
Mourinho (Netflix)
Rory Scovel: Show Must Go On (Netflix)
Sawtooth Mountain (Tubi)
Signs Of A Psychopath Season Eleven Premiere (Investigation Discovery)
The Proof Is Out There Season Premiere (History)
Top Chef VIP Season Five Premiere (Telemundo)
WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 12TH:
Conversations With a Killer: The Charles Manson Tapes (Netflix)
Let’s Marry Harry Season One Finale (Netflix)
Most Extreme Humans Season Finale (TLC)
Nando Between Two Worlds - A Sintonia Film (Netflix)
Reacher Season Four Premiere (Prime Video)
Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World (Crunchyroll)
Women in Blue (Las Azules) Season Two Premiere (Apple TV)
X-Men ‘97 Season Two Finale (Disney+)