Podcasts in Review

May 28, 2015 at 12:00 am | Posted in Interview, Podcasts, Podcasts in Review, Regular Feature, Reviews, Star Wars | 1 Comment
Tags: dj elliot, james kahn, john jackson miller, mark daniel, peter v. brett

Here is this week’s Podcasts in Review.

Assembly of Geeks: Age of Ultron Declassified is their discussion of the film. They touch on the characters, the things they did and didn’t like, and Joss Whedon’s role in it all. It’s a fun discussion, but it’s not the only topic in this show. They also cover tv show renewals and cancellations, Universal doing a Nintendo theme park, Captain America: Civil War, and Legends of Tomorrow. Great episode overall.

Comic Book Noob: Episode 1 covers the comic characters Ultron and the Vision. Hosted by Scott Murray (Assembly of Geeks), Matt Moore and Regina Davis, they dig into the comic characters discussing their origins, their character arcs, the differences with the movie portrayals of the characters, as well as the similarities. It’s an excellent discussion and very timely, perfect for anyone who has seen Age of Ultron and would like to know more about the comic book characters of Ultron and the Vision.

Fly Casual: Episode 38 is a news and toy report episode. They start off with a Flash/DC/Marvel discussion, then dive into the Vanity Fair Star Wars article and pictures. They talk about Josh Trank leaving Star Wars, Disney Infinity 3.0, then head into toy news with Hot Wheels mini-ships. Fun episode with their typical entertaining discussion. I rather enjoyed their feedback on Disney Infinity as I haven’t played any of the iterations of that game.

Functional Nerds: Episode 227 caught my eye as they had an interview with author Peter V. Brett. While Peter isn’t a Star Wars author, or a sci-fi writer for that matter, he does have a great fantasy series which I’m a huge fan of. Surprisingly, they didn’t talk a whole lot about the Demon Cycle series, but of all things, they actually talked about Star Wars. Keep in mind this isn’t a Star Wars podcast, so it was very unexpected. Their conversation dove into Star Wars Rebels and how much they enjoyed Ahsoka being brought back. This in turn lead to a discussion about gender diversity and Peter’s complaints about there not being a enough female role models for kids. As a parent, he’s become very aware of how hard it is to find shows for his daughter to watch that aren’t male dominated. They also talk about the lack of female toys on toy shelves. All in all it was kind of neat to see that fandom at large is discussing a lot of the same topics that dedicated Star Wars podcasts are. The Hera/Sabine shortage has not gone unnoticed.

Now This Is Podcasting: Episode 77 focuses on the Vanity Fair article, which started out pretty good, then turned into a tirade against the magazine and old people, which kind of killed the mood. Afterwards they discussed some concept art for Maz Kanata. Once they got to their spoiler section, I tuned out. I don’t know, I’m still not feeling it on this podcast yet.

Rock Out Loud: Summer ROL zeroes in on summer jams with some nice picks all around. With songs like Billy Squire “Lonely is the Night”, Van Halen “Finish What Your Started”, and Def Leppard “Tear It Down”, this one rocks. And I agree big time with Krisitin, The Doors have some great songs. If you like rock, this one’s for you.

Skywalking Through Neverland: Episode 77 includes Sarah’s coverage of the Tin­ker Bell Half Marathon, John Fowler’s Star Wars Weekends prepping, Sarah and Richard’s trip to Springfield at the new Simpson’s attraction at Universal, and special guests DJ Elliot and Mark Daniel as they talk about their long history with Disney and how they got started with the Star Wars Celebration events. Great episode. Was neat to finally hear Elliot and Mark’s stories. If you’ve attended a celebration, you’ll want to check this one out to hear what Mark and Elliot have to say.

Episode 78 features a great interview with Star Wars author James Kahn who talks about his medical career, being in E.T., writing movie novelizations like Poltergeist, Return of the Jedi and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, writing for tv shows like Star Trek, his music career, and his recent work in film. Really nice interview. James was very conversational. Definitely a good one to check out. But on top of that, they also have a new segment with Dave Skale talking about the history of Tomorrowland at Disneyland, which is cool, and a Star Wars Weekends report.

Trek.fm: Trek Stars 131 features a cool interview with James Kahn. They not only cover James’ work with Star Trek, but also his work with Star Wars and his career as a whole. James shares some good stories regarding the amount of freedom he had with his Spielberg novelizations in opposite to his work with George Lucas and Return of the Jedi. However, he does mention some things that happened in the book which were ultimately used in ROTJ. Note after the interview ends, the podcast trails on a little with some ads and promotions, you can save yourself about five minutes if you stop there. All in all, good episode to add to your playlist. Due to the timing of the two interviews, the Trek.fm and Skywalking Through Neverland interviews do cover some similar ground, but each of them also covers some different ground, so it’s worthwhile to listen to both of them.

Wisconsin Public Radio: May The Fourth Be With You is an hour long program they did with Star Wars author John Jackson Miller who not only talks about his comics and books, but Star Wars in general. For an hour, they have John as their Star Wars expert explaining all their questions about May the Fourth Be With You and the Galaxy Far, Far Away. This was a lot of fun to listen to. Definitely worth a listen for John Jackson Miller fans.

Reviewed By: Skuldren for Roqoo Depot.