Tag Archives: Bradley Cooper

The Toy Department – Episode 370

  By toyAdmin | December 28, 2023 - 12:49 pm | Uncategorized
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In Episode 370, Madden and Kolsky have an in-depth discussion of sinus procedures and overall nasal health before ending their year with:

  • ALLLLLL the action from the last THREE episodes of The. Challenge: Battle for a New Champion (5:30) including the (questionable?) toppling of some all-time greats and a collection of some of the most stupefying game moves that 25 years of The Challenge Universe has seen…
  • The new season of Apple TV+’s Slow Horses (27:35) and the continuing brilliance of lead actors Gary Oldman and Jack Lowden…
  • Netflix’s much-ballyhooed Bradley Cooper vehicle Maestro (32:05) and how it wasn’t as much of a Leonard Bernstein biopic as our hosts would have liked…
  • The new Eddie Murphy Christmas movie Candy Cane Lane (42:10) and whether it’s good enough to slide into a regular holiday viewing rotation…
  • A fresh season of Amazon Prime Video’s Reacher (48:25) and how a new cast of characters stacks up around the mountain of Alan Ritchson…
  • Homework for next week (55:20), including: another episode of The Challenge: Battle for a New Champion, the Emerald Fenell movie Saltburn, the Alexander Payne movie The Holdovers (available on Peacock), Dave Chappelle’s new Netflix special The Dreamer and Peacock’s new season of Dr. Death…

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The Toy Department – Episode 293

  By toyAdmin | March 18, 2022 - 11:47 am | Uncategorized
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In Episode 293, Madden and Kolsky touch a little bit on a thrilling Day 1 of the college basketball tournament before moving on to:

  • This week’s episode of Top Chef (2:50), Sam Kang’s potato problems and just how competitive this season is after just three episodes…
  • Apple TV+’s Ben Stiller-directed show Severance (21:15) and how fascinating it is, both in concept and in execution…
  • Another Apple show, The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey (28:00) and how it comes together over the first two episodes with an interesting premise and some really good performances from Samuel L. Jackson and Dominique Fishback in particular…
  • Showtime’s based-on-reality SuperPumped (35:55) and how Kolsky’s disgust with the people this show is based on makes it tough for him to enjoy it…
  • The new Paul Thomas Anderson joint Licorice Pizza (47:50), how much fun it was, and why it is so much better than some of the over-celebrated Oscar movies we’ve talked about on past shows…
  • Some Oscars thoughts (58:40) about the nominees and also the changes to the television show, which somehow leads us to Derek’s dissatisfaction with the Atlanta Braves…
  • Homework for next Friday (1:08:35), including: more Top Chef: Houston, along with the Oscar-nominated film CODA on Apple TV+, the new Jake Johnson show Minx on HBO/HBO Max, the new Big Mouth spinoff Human Resources on Netflix, the new erotic thriller Deep Water on Hulu and the new Hulu show The Dropout about Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos…

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The Toy Department – Episode 292

  By toyAdmin | March 11, 2022 - 11:07 am | Uncategorized
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In Episode 292, Madden and Kolsky briefly address the sad news of the passing of Derek’s dog before brightening everyone’s spirits with:

  • This week’s episode of Top Chef: Houston (1:50) and just how high the level of execution appears to be in the early part of the season…
  • HBO’s new Lakers-focused show Winning Time (22:20), how much fun it is and some of the excellent performances in the first episode…
  • The Oscar-nominated Guillermo Del Toro film Nightmare Alley (33:50) and how it sucked both hosts in with a gripping and visually striking noir story…
  • The return of the original Law & Order (41:35) and what makes the OG the best version of the now widely spun-off concept…
  • The new cartoon short series The Boys: Diabolical (49:00) and how it’s more or less exactly what you’d expect and not particularly important for any reason…
  • Homework for next Friday (51:25), including: more Top Chef: Houston, along with the Apple TV+ series The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey (starring Sam Jackson) and Severance (directed by Ben Stiller), the Oscar-nominated Paul Thomas Anderson film Licorice Pizza and the Showtime show SuperPumped about the battle for Uber…

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The Toy Department – Episode 138

  By toyAdmin | October 17, 2018 - 10:54 am | Uncategorized
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In Episode 138, Derek Madden and Matt Kolsky open with digressions into Kolsky’s sports injury and Madden’s new foster dog before picking the meat off the bones of:

  • The new film A Star Is Born (10:05) and the achievements of both actor/director Bradley Cooper and co-star Lady Gaga…
  • Another new film, Bat Times at the El Royale (33:30), and how it doesn’t fail to entertain but does fail to amount to anything significant…
  • Another sampling of network television with NBC’s Manifest (44:30), which at the very least is an awful lot better than last week’s effort from The Cool Kids…
  • HBO’s new Sunday night offering Camping (47:20), and the disappointment of an unlikable pilot from a group of creators that both guys like a lot…
  • A quick check-in on HBO’s other big Sunday nighter, The Deuce (55:25), which continues to be some of the best that peak TV has to offer…
  • Homework for next week (59:25), including: Matthew Weiner’s new Amazon show The Romanoffs, Season 2 of Making a Murderer on Netflix, and two new albums — 21 Pilots’ Trench and Greta Van Fleet’s Anthem of the Peaceful Army…

By the way, if you like this podcast, TELL A FRIEND!! And if you want to subscribe via iTunes/Stitcher/Google Play/etc. you can just click on the link below the player (and don’t forget to leave us a review!!)… And if you want to contact the Toy Department, it’s easy — find us at ToyDepartmentPod (at) gmail.com… or tweet us: @MaddenOnAir & @thekolsky.

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