It's hard to contribute to this because I rarely subscribe to podcasts via iTunes or some other pod catcher. I usually just download or stream new, individual episodes of my favorite podcasts during the week.

I agree about Filmspotting. They replaced one of the hosts and became increasingly more pretentious. Sometimes, movie snobbery can reach such great heights, it makes me ask, "Why do you even have a weekly podcast about movies, when you clearly don't like movies?"

Though it was only a measly $20, I'm still glad to have contributed something to this amazing display of selfless, human decency. Best $20 I ever spent. I'm not even a Harry Potter fan but I couldn't pass up the chance to be present for this tremendous thing you guys did. Man, I fucking love this podcast and this community.

Man, that song is fucking insufferable.

I can't speak for anyone else but I'm not gonna do that. First off, I doubt those who hated the film would bother to hear me out. And second, even if they did, I don't see them changing their tune by the end.

All I can say is, I simply disagree. For me, personally, I found the premise interesting. I found the characters to have personalities. I felt the performances were mostly natural and well done (I've been a fan of Tony Todd and William Katt for years, for example, so perhaps I'm biased). I liked the dialogue. I was engaged, never bored and I'm even okay with the ending. Yes, I would have preferred the climax not to have been what it was because I feel it hijacks the movie and makes it about something else but it didn't ruin the movie for me or anything. I'm fine with the look of picture as well. Sure, it looks cheap and older than it actually is but so does basically all of British Television (even today, in some cases) and I still love some of those programs.

I don't know. I guess it merely comes down to basic, personal preference. Either the movie worked for you or it didn't. And that's totally fine. It worked for me.

The article mentions that at some point, Shia claims that all of this has been a "performance", I guess similar to Joaquin Phoenix or Andy Kaufman. I've always hated this notion. It's a crutch; a cop-out. Assuming it's true, it doesn't make the behavior okay. Even if you're just pretending to be a psychotic asshole, that still means you've done and said psychotic asshole things that still need to be answered for and fixed. The rest of the world wasn't in on it, so you've essentially upset others for the sake of your own selfish "art."

This is why I don't care for pranks, outside of a harmless, water-squirting flower or something. Radio shows who prank call unsuspecting victims and Television prank shows are the worst. If you pull some facade that causes me to worry, get upset or possibly even cry, you're being a dick. Plain and simple. Popping up and going, "Everything's cool, I was only playing around," doesn't automatically get you off the hook, either. In fact, you've made it worse. Besides, what if the "joke" results in something you can't take back or fix with a simple, "JK LOL!"?

Anyway, I've rambled on long enough. My point is, fuck Shia Labeouf.

P.S. Because even if this whole thing has been some elaborate "hoax", he's still an arrogant prick for constantly getting into physical fights with people.

Oh, definitely! I'm just saying that while both Matthew and WAYDM reach the same basic conclusion, he goes about getting there in a different, albeit more succinct way (his video is 11 minutes long, whereas you guys take advantage of the film's running time, of course). He also suggests the film has too many disparate ideas and threads for any one of them to provide total fulfillment or depth, which I don't think you guys talked about, though I could be wrong.

Judging by what is said in the episode itself, it's not just you.

Jimmy B says yes, fireproof78 says no and Dorkman I THINK is saying yes, kind of?

So, which is it? Having not seen the film but having consumed nearly every other opinion under the sun, I get the impression that the consensus on Star Trek: Into Darkness, is that it's a lot like watching a couple episodes of Glee: The characters don't grow past a certain point because any steps they take towards that are immediately undone by a giant reset button at the end, so the next episode can start over and repeat the same lessons, to the point where you'd almost expect the characters to not even change their clothes, like a damn cartoon. Furthermore, anything that the narrative may force the authors and the audience to commit to or deal with the consequences of can also be reset by either retconning to an alternate timeline or just plain forgetting about a character's "arc". See also: Heroes.