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Pop Culture Happy Hour: 'Guardians Of The Galaxy' And So Bad It's Good

NPR
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We're settling back into our regular schedule post-lots of travel and post-Comic-Con, and we find ourselves in the studio this week with Chris Klimek to talk about the runaway success of Marvel's Guardians Of The Galaxy. We talk about the movie's shaggy charms, its savvy development, and why it gives me joyful reason to gloat over past avowals of loyalty. We'll consider whether it's just The Avengers all over again, and discuss the demands of getting ready for your (shirtless) close-up. (This is the great piece we talk about briefly regarding action-star bodies. It's well worth your time.)

Next up, we certainly don't have an entire segment's worth of things to say about Sharknado and Sharknado 2, but we were inspired to think a little about the category of "so bad it's good," and whether the charm of same is whittled away a bit when it's so incredibly obvious that the intent all along is Twitter mockery alone.

As always, we close with what's making us happy this week. If you heard our quick podcast segment earlier this week, you know that Stephen and I both really enjoyed Boyhood, and he'll talk a little more about that. (We typically won't have that kind of overlap; this was our first week trying the Small Batch Edition and we weren't even sure we'd use it.) Glen is all excited about the arrival on disc of one of his favorites. Chris is happy about a friend in a play those of you in D.C. have a chance to check out. And I'm happy about two comics I picked up this week after hearing about them for quite a while.

Find us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter: me, Stephen, Glen, Chris, producer Jessica, also-producer Nick, and our dear pal Mike Katzif.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Linda Holmes is a pop culture correspondent for NPR and the host of Pop Culture Happy Hour. She began her professional life as an attorney. In time, however, her affection for writing, popular culture, and the online universe eclipsed her legal ambitions. She shoved her law degree in the back of the closet, gave its living room space to DVD sets of The Wire, and never looked back.
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