Episodes

We went in expecting a messy anthology and came out with a genuinely original love letter to Oakland, 1987 — four stories that start as separate vibes and then click together in the final act like a mixtape that suddenly makes sense. The setup is pure mood: people spilling out of a cinema after The Lost Boys, a bright green “something in the air” glow hanging over the city, and a pulpy, comic-book style that flirts with Sin City / Scott Pilgrim energy. It’s stylish, funny, and—when it wants t...

This one starts the way all great cinema analysis starts: Dan’s birthday sandwich (father-in-law today, Dan tomorrow, Mrs the day after), a bit of life admin, and then straight into neon sci-fi with Tron: Ares. If your Tron knowledge is basically “glowing lines, lightbikes, and that vibe,” you’re fine — this film mostly plays in the real world, and asks a simple question: what happens when programs from the Grid step into reality? The hook Two tech giants are racing to crack the next break...

We start this one the only way we know how: Pete quits his job (casually), we open a bottle of potentially corked wine (possibly poisonous), and then—somehow—end up reviewing Avatar 3, despite half the room not even watching Avatar 2. Pete’s approach is simple: he’s not here to defend or attack Avatar. He’s here to report back from the front lines of three hours and ten minutes of James Cameron doing what James Cameron does. The setup (in plain English) You’ve got: Jungle people (fr...

This week’s episode begins in full “Bad Dads” mode: we’re recording with barely any gear in sight, arguing about blinking lights, and realising—mid-flow—that “Island Week” might have scrambled everyone’s brains. But the chaos is fitting, because the film we tackle is The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996)… a movie so famously cursed it feels like it was assembled in a panic from whatever footage survived the production. Based on the H.G. Wells story, it follows Edward Douglas (David Thewlis), a plan...

This episode begins, as ever, in total disarray: missed jokes, football updates, wine anxiety, and the creeping realisation that the best material always happens before the mic is on. Then Dan drops a bombshell: The Night Manager is so tense he physically struggled to finish it. And that’s the hook. Based on John le Carré’s novel, The Night Manager is a six-part espionage thriller starring Tom Hiddleston as Jonathan Pine, a hotel night manager pulled into a covert operation to bring down i...

This episode begins the only way we know how: absolute chaos. We veer from wills, tits, and Stranger Things before eventually remembering we’re meant to be talking about a film. If you’re new here, that’s the show. The film in question is Guy Ritchie’s The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare — a swaggering WWII caper based on a real black-ops unit hand-picked by Churchill and Ian Fleming. Set in 1941, it imagines the birth of modern special forces: not rules, not honour, just twenty feral speci...

Benoit Blanc is back — but not in the way you might expect. In this episode, we dig into Wake Up Dead Man, the third entry in Rian Johnson’s Knives Out series, and quickly realise this isn’t just another playful, sun-drenched whodunnit. The tone is darker, stranger, and far more morbid than Knives Out or Glass Onion, leaning hard into religious imagery, guilt, confession, and moral rot. Set around a remote church and a fire-and-brimstone priest, the film opens with what looks like an impossib...

Die Hard is the kind of “comfort violence” film that never gets old, and your recap hits basically every reason it works. A few extra bits worth calling out (because they’re the secret sauce): It’s a Christmas film for structural reasons, not vibes. Christmas isn’t just background dressing. The party only happens because it’s Christmas, the building is half-staffed because it’s Christmas, McClane is only in LA because it’s Christmas, and Hans’ whole timing depends on a holiday lull. Remov...

Homoeroticism, honour codes, and the least festive “Merry Christmas” ever recorded. This week’s pick looks like a seasonal warm hug by title alone, but it’s actually a POW-camp psychodrama where Christmas is basically just another opportunity for humiliation, beatings, and cultural misunderstanding. The core triangle Lawrence (Tom Conti): the cultural bridge. He respects Japan’s traditions more than the other prisoners do, but still can’t square the camp’s brutality with the language of “hono...

Horns, Hostages, and Human Trafficking Santa – Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (2010) This week on Bad Dads Film Review, we go full Finland and unwrap a Christmas movie that answers the question nobody asked: what if Santa Claus wasn’t a jolly gift-giver, but an ancient, horned, child-snatching nightmare buried under a mountain? Our main feature is Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (dir. Jalmari Helander), a wintery sci-fi/horror-dark-comedy that feels like The Thing wandered into a folk tale, go...

Sugar, Cheer, and Corporate Trauma – Elf (2003) This week on Bad Dads Film Review, we crack open a modern Christmas classic and ask the hard questions: how much maple syrup is too much maple syrup, and is Christmas cheer a viable alternative energy source? Our main feature is Elf (dir. Jon Favreau), the 2003 festive juggernaut that turned Will Ferrell into a full-blown Christmas institution. Ferrell plays Buddy, a human accidentally raised as an elf at the North Pole, who travels to New York ...

Fairs, Fixed Games, and Failed Backhands – Islands (2024) This week on Bad Dads Film Review, we’re off to the fair and then straight to the Canaries for a slow-burn midlife crisis with added camel corpse. We kick off with our Top 5 Fairs – everything from sinister funfairs and pleasure islands that definitely aren’t safeguarding-approved, to world expos, tunnel-of-love metaphors, and the sheer horror of Simply Red – Fairground lodging itself in your brain for days. Along the way there’s a rol...

Isle of Dogs (2018) – Trash Island, pandemics, and very good boys In this episode of Bad Dads Film Review, we head to Wes Anderson’s stop-motion Japan for Isle of Dogs, a film where man’s best friend is dumped on a toxic wasteland by a fascist cat-loving dynasty, and the only person who gives a toss is a 12-year-old boy in a stolen plane. We follow Atari and his pack of exiled hounds – Chief, Rex, King, Duke and Boss – as they trek across Trash Island in search of Spots, the missing bodyguard...

The Duellists (1977) & Top 5 Jewels – honour, obsession, and very stupid men with swords In this episode of Bad Dads Film Review, we kick things off with our Top 5 Jewels – a glittering mix of cursed stones, crime magnets and wildly impractical accessories. From the Pink Panther diamond and Uncut Gems’ black opal to Titanic’s Heart of the Ocean, Baz Luhrmann’s blinged-out Great Gatsby, Moana’s glowing heart of Te Fiti, and even that doomed chandelier in Only Fools and Horses, we rummage t...

A nameless truck, an everyday salesman, and 90 minutes of pure escalation: this episode is all about Steven Spielberg’s debut feature, Duel (1971). We talk through how a simple setup – Dennis Weaver’s mild-mannered David Mann driving to a routine meeting – turns into a relentless nightmare when he’s targeted by a grimy tanker truck that seems less like a vehicle and more like a stalking predator. From suburban driveways to dusty California highways, we track every swerve, near–miss, and incre...

Frankenstein (2025) – Tech bros, trauma, and a super-horny monster movie on Netflix Mary Shelley by way of Guillermo del Toro feels almost too perfect, and Frankenstein (2025) absolutely leans into that match-up: lush Gothic sets, grotesque body horror, tender fairytale beats, and a very modern anxiety about people who build things they can’t control. In this episode, the Bad Dads dig into Netflix’s lavish new take on the classic, framed in the icy Arctic as Victor Frankenstein (Oscar Isaac) ...

Arnold Schwarzenegger in a yellow jumpsuit, a murderous game show, and more terrible puns than should be legal – this week we’re diving into The Running Man (1987). Set in the far-flung future of… 2017, the film drops Arnie into a fascist police state where the government keeps the masses quiet with a wildly popular TV bloodsport. Framed as the “Butcher of Bakersfield,” helicopter pilot Ben Richards is forced onto The Running Man, a gladiatorial game show hosted by the gloriously slimy Damon ...

Christopher Walken, Larry Fishburne, and Abel Ferrara’s moral abyss of a movie. This week, the dads descend into King of New York, the neon-slick crime drama that turns Manhattan into a fever dream of violence, power, and warped justice. Walken plays Frank White, a freshly released drug lord who wants to “give back” — but only by murdering every rival and funding a hospital with blood money. His crew? Mostly Black. His moral compass? Bent beyond repair. His dance moves? Still pure Walken. ...

You can now text us anonymously to leave feedback, suggest future content or simply hurl abuse at us. We'll read out any texts we receive on the show. Click here to try it out! Terrence Malick’s debut gets the Bad Dads treatment. We dive into the cool, clinical menace of Martin Sheen’s James-Dean-by-way-of-the-Midwest and Sissy Spacek’s fairytale-flat voiceover that makes murder sound like homework. What the episode covers The real-world shadow: The Starkweather–Fugate killings that inspi...

Starship Troopers (1997): Would you like to know more? We’re suiting up for Paul Verhoeven’s gloriously un-subtle space satire—where propaganda pops like bubblegum, the bugs aren’t the dumb ones, and “service guarantees citizenship.” We talk giant arachnids, bigger egos, and why so many people somehow missed the joke. What we cover The Federal Network effect: recruitment ads, newsreels, and how the film weaponises UI/UX to sell fascism with a smile. Rico’s journey: classroom ideolog...

In this episode, we wade into Chinatown — a sun-bleached noir where water is power, everyone’s lying, and the system wins. We talk Jack Nicholson’s bandaged nose, Faye Dunaway’s glass-shard fragility, John Huston’s all-time villainy, and that ending that still guts you. Yes, we address the director caveat up front; then we focus on what’s on screen: A precision-engineered thriller that never wastes a line, a clue, or a cut. What we cover Why “Chinatown”? The title’s bleak punchline and wh...

In this week’s episode we dive into Better Man, Michael Gracey’s glossy Robbie Williams biopic — the one where Robbie is portrayed as a CGI chimp. Yes, really. It’s a bold swing that reframes a familiar music-biopic arc with unexpected bite: boy-band manufacture, burnout, reinvention, and the messy business of becoming “Robbie” when “Robert” is still in the room. What we cover The Big Swing: Why the CGI chimp isn’t a gimmick for giggles but a visual metaphor for the “performing monkey” pe...

Chimp genius or 70s hubris in a suede jacket? We dive into James Marsh’s Project Nim—the wild “let’s raise a chimp as a human” saga aimed at dunking on Noam/“Nim” Chomsky and proving apes can master language. What we actually get: sex-commune vibes, bad science, worse ethics, and one heartbreakingly charismatic chimp shunted between indulgent “parents,” media circuses, and grim laboratories. We talk: Language vs mimicry: 120+ signs learned…or just expert begging? The ‘parents’: breast-...

This week, the dads swapped blockbusters for something quieter, sadder, and sneakily hilarious: The Ballad of Wallis Island, the melancholic comedy starring Tim Key, Tom Basden, and Carey Mulligan. In a remote Welsh idyll, a lonely lottery winner (Key) invites his favourite long-lost folk duo to reunite and perform a private gig just for him. What follows is a beautifully awkward, bittersweet exploration of nostalgia, grief, and the impossibility of recapturing the past — with an emotional gu...