Podcast Review: The VHS Strikes Back

Review by Tony Farina

Welcome back to my new weekly podcast review segment, thanks for joining me here again.

This time, I am here to sing the praises of my favorite film review podcast, The VHS Strikes Back. Each week, the hosts Chris Phelps and Dave Horrocks, (two life-long friends, and former band-mates, who've created the Whatever Podcast Network) take their listeners on "a nostalgic journey through the good, and bad, movies of yesteryear."

Chris and Dave define the VHS era as movies from the 70's all the way up until 2005, when DVDs finally outsold and out-rented videos. They rank all the movies on a five point scale.

If a movie makes it to Cloud City it's the best of the best (not the film Best of the Best, that could not make it to Cloud City). If it's really good, it goes to Pleasantville, if it's just OK, it lives in Hill Valley with Marty McFly. If it's bad, but not terrible, it goes to Elm Street, and if it's the worst of the worst, it goes to Dantooine to be destroyed and never seen again.

You may be surprised what ends up where. Some movies maybe don't hold up like you think they should.

They start each show by giving listeners their own personal background with the movie, and then they play the trailer. From there, they hold nothing back, as they honestly share how these classic movies make them feel.

Oftentimes, they surprise themselves, like the time they discovered Tom Hanks' character in You've Got Mail might be a sociopath, or that maybe Ron Howard should stick to directing instead of acting.

One of my favorite things about this show is, instead of just sticking to beloved classics (don't worry, there are plenty of vintage movies in their shows too) they're willing go out of their way to find the worst movies ever, just to torture each other by watching some truly terrible movies. It may be torture for them, but it's amazing fun for the listener.

In fact, they covered the entire No Retreat, No Surrender trilogy BEFORE they completed the Back to the Future Trilogy. The point with this show is not to just watch great movies and remind everyone how great they are, the point is to have fun, reminisce, and entertain us all. 

Conclusion

What makes this movie podcast different from all the others is the chemistry between Chris and Dave. They're clearly great friends, and that comes out in each, and every episode. They're really involved on Twitter, so follow them there to participate in their monthly polls, where the audience picks the movie.

Seriously, they give us four choices and they go with the results, no matter how bad the movie is. Give them a listen and if you love what you hear, do what I did and support them on Patreon.

Regardless of how you get the show, I promise, it will be one of the best hours you spend all week.

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