Cinematic Underdogs

On this episode, we compare and contrast two docuseries on American Gladiators released in 2023: Muscles and Mayhem: An Unauthorized Story of American Gladiators (Netflix) and The American Gladiators Documentary (ESPN/30 for 30). American Gladiators was always one of our favorite TV programs from childhood and we had a blast recounting our memories of the toys, the ‘roided up gladiators, the madcap fun of 90s Trash TV, the exploits of the athletes bodies for meager pay, the scab-like underpinnings of the series (which gets aired every time there’s a picket-line), and the dubiously murky origins of this gaudy, ostentatious product of pop entertainment. Enjoy!

On this episode, we talk about the rise of Jake Paul in the ring. From a YouTube hellion and obnoxious Influencer to a boxing star, Jake Paul has become one of the truly improbable sports transformations of the 21st century. He may be polarizing and milage varies greatly on his likability. But as a celebrity committed to a sudden calling after a quarter life crises and cultural cancellation, Jake Paul is a pretty remarkable figure, who has only proved himself time and time again as a formidable contender against a ragtag albeit talented group of ex-MMA fighters and seasoned athletes. 

Is this a puff piece? If the ubiquity of Prime drinks is any indication, the Paul brothers’ trademark self-mythology and promotional acuity is all over this thing. And there’s no doubt the Jake Paul has some warranted behind-the-scenes stains on his past — along with some overblown controversies. He’s played the heel, the villain, the antihero, and the problem child for years, making a killing out of marketing himself as the person people want to see being pummeled in the ring. What’s crazy is that the opposite happens, repeatedly, putting the likes of Mike Tyson, Oscar De La Hoya, the Fury family, and Dana White on blast as they’re forced to chew their words, eat crow, and watch in awe. 

Whether you’re frothing at the bit to see where Paul’s boxing career goes next or prefer to hate watch one of Influencer culture’s prime public enemies, there’s no denying that the entertainment factor is off-the-charts. He may be a douchebag, a shameless self-marketer, a chauvinist, or whatever, but he’s also chosen a wise venue to pursue: a space of pugilistic primality where one’s moral shortcomings and social pretenses are stripped away by the savage ferocity of sparring and spectacle. Carrying the dying sport of boxing on his bulky tattooed back, Jake Paul is a bleach-haired pug with a rabid will to power. He’s as American, for better and worse, as an acidic apple pie smashed straight to the jugular. 

Untold: Johnny Football represents an iconic era of college football, and offers an astute examination of one of the most immature quarterbacks to ever win a Heisman Trophy, Johnny Manziel. An affable, perennial partier, Manziel was notorious for his off-the-field antics and partying. He played the game with the same freewheeling sense of intuition and exigency he seemed to live, transplanting his unhinged frat boy personality onto the field. He also transformed the Texas A&M program into a powerhouse over the course of a critical two year stint, pulled off a ridiculous heist to get drafted in the 1st round of the NFL draft, and  became a mythic bust for the Cleveland Browns.

In the episode, we discuss Johnny’s wild shenanigans, the WTF moments of the documentary (his father faking a cardiac arrest, his friend planting a story about a false oil inheritance to deflect attention from under-the-table side hustles that violated the NCAA, his infamous bender in Vegas), and our letdown that the doc didn’t press Johnny harder with pointed, direct questions about his insane life of drugs, celebrities, and debauchery. For those who know nothing about Manziel, this is a great place to start. For those who’ve been fascinated by his mythic downfall, this is a bit too broad and breezy. Nonetheless, it’s a great conversation starter on one of the most stupefyingly immature yet likable athletes of the 21st century. 

Enjoy! 

A bonus episode consisting of two separate interviews of Jordan & Paul on The Average Joe's Movie Club Cast. We discuss or movie tastes, preferences, and habits. Enjoy!

This week, we return to the world of Manga adaptations & join our friend Matt St. Jack of Anime Talk! to chat SK8 the Infinity (you can watch it on Crunchy Roll!). In the episode, we discuss the series' nostalgic tone, ardent-hearted appreciation of skateboarding, controversies surrounding queer-baiting, technical/scientific descriptions of boarding, quirky biblical allusions, and notable popularity. Check it out!

In the wake of Ted Lasso's series' finale, we decided to talk about Apple TV's feel-good sports-themed sensation by covering the show's entire 3 seasons. Painting broadly, we discuss the recurring pattern of gradually inverting character traits & expectations, contextualize the aesthetic choices/references/silliness/garishness within the canon of classic sitcoms, analyze the pavlovian opening credit sequence, debate the subtle 2nd and 3rd season shift toward prestige TV runtimes and overtones, and proclaim our overarching verdict on whether it deserves to endure in infamy or posterity.

On this episode, Harry LaBollita returns to discuss Netflix's hit series Break Point. Helmed by the same team behind F1: Drive to Survive, Break Point chronicles the world's up-and-coming tennis stars as they prepare and compete on the international professional tennis circuit, including all four Grand Slams and ATP and WTP tournaments. In Season 1, the cast of characters includes Nick Kyrgios (a "bad boy" from the Land Down Under), Matteo Berrettini (an Italian stallion with high ambitions and an equally successful girlfriend, Ajla Tomljanovic) Taylor Fritz (a So-Cal native who overcomes injury to out Nadal in the Indian Wells championship), Paula Badosa (a Spanish model dealing with mental health issues), Ons Jabeur (a Tunisian standout representing an entire continent), and Felix Auger-Aliassime (a Montreal-based wunderkind who just might be the next great).

We focus on a few primary themes: namely, the emergence of mental health crises and the perils of neuroses in the sport. This leads us into a fascinating discussion about the inherent pressures of tennis, the grueling attrition of playing year-round on the pro circuit, the attrition of mental fortitude due to the overwhelming speed of the game, the isolated vulnerability of playing a singles tournament, and the relativistic medley of psychological approaches and philosophies deployed by the various teams in hopes of curbing negative thoughts before they spiral into destructive self-sabotage on the court. We also debate who we think might be the next poster child for tennis as the Big Three (Nadal, Federer, Djokovic) begin to retire or suffer from the law of diminishing returns with age.

Enjoy!

What's up, Underdogs!? ARE YOU READY TO RUMBLE!? Well, you better be because we're back, we're joined by Lou Moon, and we're diving headfirst into a raunchy sports comedy about the wonderful world of WCW wrestling. Yes, that's right: we're powerbombing 2000's puerile cult classic Ready to Rumble! This fatuously fun film is absolutely stacked. It stars David Arquette, Scott Caan, Oliver Platt, Joe Pantoliano, Martin Landau, and an ultra-hot Rose McGowan; it features epic, Slim Jim-inspired cameos from a horde of professional wrestlers (Goldberg, Booker T, Sting, Diamond Dallas Page, Randy Savage, Sid Vicious, Bam Bam Bigelow, Rey Mysterio Jr., and of course, Michael Buffer); and it's written by the king of juvenilia/silly kid-skewing sports comedies, Steven Brill.

What are you waiting for? Grab those dusty spandex, queue up your entrance song, and join us as we perform a tag-team suplex on this hilariously dumb movie, which achieves something rare in Cinema, becoming the equivalent of mixing Red Bull & an Icee. No doubt, this thing is frozen in time - stuck in that strangely boyish space we knew as the late 90s/early 00s. It's one hell of a brain freeze: a serially ridiculous prepubescent buddy comedy with a shit-eating grin on its face. Why are you still reading this? Wipe that Cheshire grin away and get in the damn ring!

Enjoy!

Jed Bookout joins us on this episode as we explore Phil Alden Robinson's 1989 paternalistic, cornfed, heartland classic Field of Dreams. We discuss the film's disquieting subtexts and alternative readings, grappling with multiple surrealistic and existential readings. We discuss its similarities and lack thereof to the filmography and sensibilities of Douglas Sirk & Frank Capra. We discuss whether the central conceit and deus ex-machina of the film -- the mysterious, uncredited voice -- is the remnants of a Berkeley acid trip, a biblical parable, or the summoning of a cult leader. We discuss whether the film would turn into a sinister horror movie if the James Horner score was removed. We discuss Kevin Costner's salt of the earth gravitas and onscreen persona. In fact, we discussed so much we ended up matching the official runtime of the movie.

Enjoy!

On the latest episode, we go back to the basics and cover a newly released yet old-fashioned formulaic sports flick: Hustle. Released on Netflix in 2022, Hustle finds Adam Sandler in a groove. This film sits nicely between his prestige work in Uncut Gems and the juvenile sensibilities we've all become accustomed to expecting from the Happy Madison brand. It is packed full with NBA cameos and call-outs, and delivers its emotional and athletic beats with panache and intensity. 

For a feel-good and by-the-numbers underdog sports flick, Hustle is a winner. Enjoy our conversation as friend and NBA super-fan Juan joins in to chat this refreshing return of The Sandman to fine form as the film's lead Stanley Sugarman. Juan lends the episode a ton of insight on AND1 mixtapes and Anthony Edwards' sassy personality and the fun ways this film played with NBA icons' identities both on and off-the-court. 

It's a fun chat, if we say so ourselves! Thanks of listening! 

In anticipation of Super Bowl LVII, we're back with a follow up to our episode on Hard Knocks: Training Camp w/ The Detroit Lions, this time tackling Hard Knocks in Season: The Arizona Cardinals. This is easily our most sporty episode yet. As always, though, we transfer the narratives on the field into the world of celluloid dreams. Quite literally: To break the ice, we enumerate the stories and moments from the 2022-2023 NFL season we each think might one day translate fluidly to the silver screen. Purdy, Brady, Hamlin, & Wilson all make our cut (for very different hypothetical movie genres). Finally, after confabulating wild movie premises of our own, we dig into main event and discuss the AZ Cardinal's grueling, abysmal, train-wreck season, marred by motivational apathy, nonstop injuries, and serial underachievement.  

The lackluster display on the field turned so dour, in fact, it took its toll on HBO's show. Noting the gloomy moroseness of each successive episode, we end up in a caustic discussion over whether Hard Knocks in Season: The Arizona Cardinals might be best viewed as an unintentional workplace farce or a tragicomedy. On this line of thought, we have a grand old time nitpicking the depressing details and sporadic silver linings from the season, which include Kyler's conspicuous absence, Kingsbury's bro-chic MTV Cribs-style mansion, JJ's boyish enthusiasm and lovable personality, Budda's unflinching tenacity/affable sibling rivalry, Hopkin's resilient mother/artsy sensibility, and the endless carousal of random, washed-up QBs emerging in the starting lineup every week.  

If you're in the mood to listen to lots of football chatter with some heady thematic extrapolations, you've found the perfect tailgate background noise to toss onto the car radio. So open up a big bag of Lay's potato chips, throw back a few cold ones, and enjoy some goofy Pre-Game bantering before the Big Game!

We're back with another Docuseries. Resembling in ways a real-life Ted Lasso, Welcome to Wrexham chronicles the purchase of Wrexham AFC by Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenny. The Wrexham Red Dragons are a fifth-tier Welsh football club, meaning they sit at the very bottom of the pyramid of professional UK leagues. Thus, the immediate goal of this venture is pretty simple: Promotion. Ryan and Rob certainly have the capital to make a splash. The question is whether money will translate onto the field.

Marketed as an underdog story, Welcome to Wrexham is anything but and with a cynical lens we look at the odd setup of this program. Sure, as the 3rd oldest football club in the world bolstered a small blue-collar town whose fed-up with years of poor results, Wrexham AFC is a team worth rooting for. However, given the deluge of money & prestige immediately put into the club by their Hollywood owners, they become, in some ways, the evil villain of the fifth-tier league.

Fortunately, the series takes a wise approach and democratizes its focus. Sure, much of the runtime is filled with vainglorious self-promotional bits for Reynolds and McElhenney (after all, everything Ryan touches is branded to death). But many episodes give us, the audience, a direct and intimate glimpse into the small, tight-knit Welsh community of Wrexham. We listen to the pub's boorish bickering and drunken bloviation; we learn about the history of football hooliganism; we get an in-depth backstory on the corruption and subsequent cooperative takeover and ownership of the Red Dragons. 

By the end, it's nearly impossible not to cheer on Paul Mullin, Ollie Palmer, and teammates as they claw their way to the cusp of promotion. Even for cynics like ourselves, it's nearly impossible not to feel a bit charmed, instead of vexed or embarrassed, by the team's rise to dominance. It's hard not to forgive Rob and Reynolds, despite their football illiteracy (Ryan literally asks bystanders to explain offsides during a critical matchup at Wembley late in the season). And that's a testament to the power of the world-building. Enjoy some good old-fashioned ranting and rowing as we wildly vacillate between positive and negative overreactions.

On the latest episode, we continue to explore the long-form format of docu-series by tackling HBO's Hard Knocks: Training Camp w/ the Detroit Lions. Sure, it's classifiable as Reality TV, but when it comes to getting an in-depth, behind-the-scenes, all-access look at the ins and outs of running a professional football team, you'd be hard-pressed to find a more illuminating source than the first and longest-running sports documentary series in TV history. 

Produced by NFL Films and narrated by Liev Schreiber (a tidbit neither of us were privy to during the recording and were both undeniably shocked to learn), the flashy series feels shackled by some of its dated/vestigial stylistic traditions. The narration, aping David Attenborough's Nat-Geo style of zoological/anthropological objectivism and wonder, feels oddly at ends with the subject matter - somewhat dehumanizing the players and team. Fortunately, the voice-over framing device is seldom applied, and outside of its gaucheness, the show shines. 

Detroit & its eternally underperforming, down-and-out Lions offer a riveting subject matter. The team/season is helmed by the imposing yet affable presence of Dan Campbell, and led by spirited personalities, including Jamaal Williams, who's passionate post-practice speech about the previous year's abysmal record went viral for good reason. Another standout is Aidan Hutchinson, the darling 1st round draft pick who knocks it out of the park with another viral bit: a spunky, training camp performance of MJ's "Billie Jean."

What makes this season particularly riveting is the focus is largely on players on the cutting block still trying to make a name and earn legit, 6 or 7-figure paycheck. Instead of spending time with Swift and Goff, this pre-season look at the Lions details the ups and downs of those seeking the last spot on the depth chart - Craig Reynolds (the RB3, maybe RB4 with an older brother in jail), Obinna Eze (the Nigerian), Malcolm Rodriquez ("Rodrigo"), David Blough (the 3rd string QB), and Kalil Pimpleton (the juggling, super speedy, but butterfinger-hands slot receiver). 

Witnessing these players practice, prepare, and put it all on the line during pre-season matches elevates the otherwise meaningless games. For an outsider, preseason football is but a glorified practice - a chance for football teams to workout the kinks. But for players on the cutting line, each snap is a tryout - a matter of keeping their job or getting sent packing home or to another team's practice squad. For sports fans who care more about the existential dynamics of the humans behind the pads, this element couldn't be more riveting. It made the season more profound and pathos-filled than any in-season glimpse at x's and o's could ever hope to be. 

We're back and chatting about yet another excellent episode of Netflix's Untold series. This time, we enter the purgatory to discuss the insanely tumultuous highs and lows of Christy Martin's boxing career and personal life in Deal with the Devil. The title itself is quite revealing: it overtly hints at the Faustian bargain Christy made by marrying her wickedly abusive/controlling real-life trainer/promoter/coach Jim Martin. It also obliquely acknowledges the fact that she not only entered into a partnership with this devilish figure, but that she "dealt" with him: even surviving Jim's very visceral attempt to take her life. 

Christy Martin's story is truly one-of-a-kind. Hailing from a small, backcountry mining town in West Virginia, she becomes a worldwide phenomenon after a bludgeoning, broken-nose performance on a Tyson card at MGM Grand. Soon, she's being picked up by late-night TV shows, placed on the cover of Sports Illustrated, and promoted by Don King. She also ends up playing a homophobic heel (despite being a closet lesbian), becoming addicted to cocaine, and getting into a life-or-death scuffle (replete with stab wounds, gun shots, and battered skulls) with her furious husband/boxing coach. 

Described as having a stone chin, Christy's resilience and stamina is unrivaled. She is a fighter in every sense of the word and this episode is a testament to the wild, admirable, and unbelievable story of her life: both inside and outside of the boxing ring. 

Enjoy! 

On this episode, JB Huffman of Manly Movies joins us to un-ironically champion the many heartfelt virtues & rah-rah moments of Sly Stallone's heartfelt 1987 father-son reunion melodrama, Over the Top. If you're on quest to find the definitive movie about child custody, truck driving, and arm-wrestling, this is your one-stop pitstop. 

Tune in to join in on the fun as we chat about Stallone's equally understated & overblown melancholy, the legal logistics of parental custody, inverted sports movie tropes, why Laughlin should have replaced Vegas for the final tournament (given the fact that Kingpin already snagged Reno), the film's unexpectedly deep life lessons, the vein-throbbing theatricality of bicep-centered athletes, and cinema's most annoyingly entitled child protagonists. 

Does the Top Gun franchise exist within the domain of sports movies? You bet your callsign it does! On the latest episode, your friendly Underdogs discuss how sports archetypes and tropes (practice adversaries, player-coaches, and the importance of camaraderie) dominate both movies. Also stayed tuned for our divisive take on the legacy sequel (our respective opinions on its formulaic elements & banging soundtrack diverge quite dramatically). Do beware: you will be exposed to small doses of toxic negativity infiltrating the never-ending hype machine. 

So what are you waiting for? Queue up that mental image of Tom Cruise sprinting full steam. Queue up that swooning feeling you got when Lady Gaga began crooning her throwback 80's monster ballad before the end credits. Queue up that loving feeling and get ready for some old time rock n' roll: i.e., another heated back-and-forth about the  predictability of genre movies. Queue up the guts to handle g-force levels of bantering. 

Strap in, buckle up, and enjoy! 

Our resident sci-fi/dystopian sports film expert, SF Covell, returns to discuss the grind-house, b-movie classic Death Race 2000. Our convo quickly turns as unhinged & unruly as the movie -- traversing all kinds of detours and unexpected landscapes! 

We discuss how the film oddly parallels the Herbie franchise, Around the World in 80 Days, Rat Race, Mad Max: Fury Road, and countless oddball, race-based, cinematic escapades. We compare the film's ultraviolent westward trajectory to American Bloodsport, our Frontiersman Mythologies, & Manifest Destiny. We vehemently disagree about the quality of Stallone's acting. We wax nostalgic for the pre-Zoom days of watching trash movies with friends. 

Beers are chugged, expletives are hurled, passionate interruptions run amok, and no take is safe on this wild and crazy episode for the ages. Enjoy! 

Enjoy our short, sweet, & trivia-infused live episode, recorded just after a live screening  of The Karate Kid at The Majestic Tempe. The recording includes some audience questions, hot takes, a brief background lesson on where the film exists in the overall trajectory of American-made martial arts movies, and a totally random tidbit about a fitness company called Body by Jake. We kicked off the discussion seconds after the packed theater erupted in roaring applause for the 1984 classic! The energy is palpable! Enjoy!

This is a special one! Welcome to the in-depth prelude to our live episode on The Karate Kid! We discuss this everything there is to discuss about this heartfelt, feel-good classic in a short 1.5 hours. Sure, that's a decent chunk of time. But when you consider there is a podcast in the cosmos that devotes hour-long episodes to every minute of the movie, we  become paragons of brevity & economy. 

So if you're ready to hear us wax on and wax off about crane-kicks, sweeping legs, shower costumes, motorbike gangs, & 80s bangers, you've come to the right place! We gush about Mr. Miyagi's prudence & sagacity, Daniel Larusso's spunk & wiliness, and the grey contours of Johnny Lawrence. We also discuss the socioeconomic divide between Reseda & Encino, the mysterious & untold backstories to Miyagi's oil-derrick compound & lot of classic cars, the connections between The Karate Kid & Rocky, and why this rightfully deserves to be recognized as one of the better sports films of all time. 

Enjoy! 

We welcome sci-fi maestro SF Covell on the pod to wax nostalgic about the killer 1975 dystopian thriller Rollerball. In perhaps our most off-the-cuff & critical divisive episode of CU yet, we get heated (Jordan blasphemously claims the nu-metal-heavy 2002 Rollerball remake is better), hairy (discussing James Caan's chest and John Houseman's nose), & hoarse (from praising how kick-ass, paranoiac, & stylishly cynical this mid-70's flick can be). Rollerball is definitely an underrated gem (ignore Jordan's opinion) and listening to SF Covell relish while reminiscing on decades-old memories of shouting and screaming at a screening during its initial theatrical run is all the proof you need to know that sports films don't get much more immersive & visceral than this. With its dreamy interludes, extravagant zoom shots, surrealistic sense of ecological/corporate foreboding, and prescient narrative digressions, sports movies don't get much weirder and savvier than Rollerball either. It's a cinematic curio well worthy of our combative and kinetic conversation. Enjoy! And don't forget to like, rate, chirp, and spread our shit -- our doggie doody is hot of the press and calling your name!

Welcome to our first true foray into the wide world of a Happy Madison sports movies! No, Home Team is not in the same ballpark as Happy Gilmore. Hell, it wishes it was half as funny and entertaining as The Waterboy. But as champions of the genre and apologists for its formulaic gags and set pieces, we find the silver lining in this half-assed tale of Sean Peyton's post Bountygate comeuppance: returning to small-town Texas to coach his estranged son's hapless peewee football team.  

Part kids-focused sports film and part tale of redemption and penitence, Home Team's tone is about as unreliable as a pee-wee football field goal kicker. Luckily, for us, the wild misses are more entertaining than anything. And we milk Home Team for every ounce of humor and wit it gives us -- celebrating Kevin James' surly pout, Rob Schneider's bohemian/vegan schtick, and the wild antics of side caricatures (the rambling bus driver, the nosy hotel attendant, the drunk assistant coach).

Enjoy!!!

This week, your favorite Underdogs get timely & topical -- discussing 2021's National Champions. Directed by Ric Roman Waugh (Greenland, Angel Has Fallen), and adapted from a stage play written by Adam Mervis (21 Bridges), National Champions follows star quarterback Demarcus James (Sephan James) and his teammate/friend Emmett Sunday (Alexander Ludwig) as they boycott the national championship less than 72 hours before kickoff. Like other behind the scenes sports films we've covered (High Flying Bird, Draft Day, etc), the film is a savvy and cynical take on the economics of sports. 

Tidily scripted & sufficiently nuanced, Mervis' adapted screenplay questions the ethics of the NCAA and collegiate programs, which exploit athletes -- cashing in on the multi-million dollar revenue stream without paying college athletes for their contributions (beyond a scholarship, that is). In doing so, the play-turned-film sharply examines the multiple tiers of college football, including: the coaches (J.K. Simmons as James Lazor & Lil Rel Howery as Ronnie Dunn), the donors (Time Blake Nelson as Rodger Cummings & King Bach as Taylor Sheridan), and the NCAA figures (the commissioner Jeffrey Donovan as  Mark Titus and Uzo Aduba as Katherine Poe). There is also a key subplot with Coach Lazor's wife (Kristin Chenoweth as Bailey) and a philosophy professor named Elliott Schmidt (Timothy Olymphant).

With so many moving parts, the film can feel a bit overstuffed and forced at times. It left us more ambivalent than any other film we've done thus far; please note: ambivalent is not the same as indifferent. We felt a lot about this film: as roused by its stirring speeches as we were turned off by its melodramatic flourishes. Fortunately, by the end, what starts off seeming like a very one-sided exploration of this complex issue turns out to be anything but that, as new layers and perspectives prove the debate is not as black-and-white as it may initially seem. 

Enjoy listening to us struggle to make sense of its blurry moral shadings on our latest episode! And don't forget to like, share, and spread the Cinematic Underdogs love around town!