"Welcome to School of Movies."
School of Movies is a weekly podcast
where the two hosts, Alex and Sharon Shaw do in-depth synopsis, analysis, and sometimes even behind the scenes looks at movies. While they primarily focus on genre films that they personally enjoy and have a lot of personal interest in, they also cover other forms of media such as video games, comics, music, TV shows, and sometimes even just entertainingly bad reviews on the internet that they release under the catch all term of School of Everything Else. While new episodes are released under the main feed, the back catalog for School of Movies are archived herewhile episodes of School of Everything Else are archived here, .
The podcast has undergone a number of iterations, going by Digital Cowboys, Digital Gonzo, and Digital Drift before settling on its current name. It also regularly has different guests on for certain properties, in part to encourage more thorough roundtable discussion and analysis, but also because those guests often have a special love or familiarity with the intellectual property under discussion. The current lineup always includes Alex and Sharon at least, with guests being brought in on a case by case basis.
More recently, they have expanded their remit further to provide entertaining and in depth discussion on properties that they do not especially enjoy: either through sponsored episodes, covering high profile movies that others love and they do not especially care for, or looking at the works of a director as a whole that are to the hosts, a mixed bag.
The podcast in general tends to center around (or be bookended by) one or more monologues by Alex that includes either personal introspection on what the movie means to him - both good and bad - or a commentary on the life and times that the movie centers around at time of release. The podcast will often include music taken from the soundtracks of said properties, audio from those properties to highlight specific scenes being talked about, or alternately audio from other properties (including comedians, other critics, and internet original content). The podcast tries to be as informative as it is entertaining, hence the specific retitling of the podcast to be referred to as a School.
Alex and Sharon are also responsible for a series of novels under the series titled The New Century Multiverse, which have been expanded into full on audiodramas voiced by themselves, close friends and voice actors, as well as previous guests on the podcast. They initially came into creation as a result of people asking Alex more about what he would have wanted to see in movies and stories, based on what he did and didn't respond to in his preferred kinds of films.
This podcast provides examples of:
- Couch Gag: Every episode ends on a song either taken directly from the subject being discussed or thematically related in some way.
- Man of a Thousand Voices: Alex is especially gifted at vocal imitation. While he doesn't always manage to sound exactly like a given actor, he will often get close enough that you know exactly who he is trying to imitate, even if there is nothing to suggest he is about to do so. Often used to comedic effect.
-
Promoted Fanboy: Over the years, a few fans of the show have been brought on a guest commentators for various episodes. - Running Gag:
- Alex's belief that Jai Courtney has no talent for acting and would be better served folding sweaters at the GAP.
- Eventually expanded to include other creators Alex and Sharon find bland and untalented.
- Alex's refusal to cover anime in any form, due to the floodgate of suggestions it opens up from anime fans. Often abbreviated as "NO ANIME!!"
- Whenever Alex invokes Country Matters, the word will always be censored by sudden insertion of the Theme Tune to Skeleton Warriors.
- After someone goes on a prolonged rant about something they dislike, someone else will usually reply "...So you didn't like it?"
- Colossus having a deep love for Alternative Rock and Nu Metal, specifically Drowning Pool.
- Alex's belief that Jai Courtney has no talent for acting and would be better served folding sweaters at the GAP.
- Shout-Out:
- Often references or directly quotes thoughts about media put forth by other web creators, such as Jimquisition, Bob Chipman, Jenny Nicholson, and We Hate Movies.
- Alex and Sharon also like to borrow jokes from some of their favorite properties and comedians, such as Futurama, Arrested Development, and Eddie Izzard.
- Signing-Off Catchphrase:
- We Are Experiencing Technical Difficulties:
- This doesn't happen often, but sometimes Alex gets so worked up, they do the cut away to 'soothing hold music', sometimes multiple times if he completely goes off on one.
- This is almost always used when Alex's reaction is partly for comedic effect. If Alex or Sharon are legitimately angered by something in a piece of media, they tend to play it straight, and either de-escalate in real time, or cut away to a more measured response (edited in post live recording.)
