Today’s Flop Story!

Elliott has an ALL NEW ORIGINAL COMICS SERIES! It just debuted, and it’s called BARBARIAN BEHIND BARS! A barbarian from a fantasy world appears in our own, chops the head off an evil wizard, and finds himself locked up in prison! What happens next? Only Elliott knows for sure — and you, once you read the comics!

And remember, you have just until the end of February (that’s only a couple of days!) to watch FlopTV if you haven’t already! _{Well… there’s a small grace period. But I don’t want to encourage people to rely on that, because then they’ll just miss it again! So forget I said anything! Only a couple of days!}

Snow, Snow, Snow

Like many folks on the east coast, we were hit by last weekend’s storm.

If you’re able to stay home (and many are not, unfortunately), a blizzard is a wonderful reason to stay inside and give into your primitive burrowing instincts (I recommend digging into blankets rather than actual dirt — it’s cleaner).

Movies are a wonderful choice for snow-laziness, of course, and on-theme for The Flop House. But there’s something EXTRA cozy about cracking open a book on a snow day. So to mix it up a bit, here’s a short FLOP HOUSE BOOK NOOK, with a few recommendations of what we’ve been reading.

DAN: Confessions of a Puppetmaster: A Hollywood Memoir of Ghouls, Guts, and Gonzo Filmmaking, by Charles Band, with Adam Felber - A fun, light account of Charles Band’s life, focused mostly on his work as a movie producer, studio head, and sometime director. It can be inspiring to read about cinema’s great artists, but sometimes it’s even more instructive to read about the scrappy hustle of low-budget filmmaking. As the founder of Empire Pictures and Full Moon Productions, Band never missed a chance to make an exploitation buck, and never missed a chance to wildly overspend and get in over his head (he shares a fondness with Nic Cage for castles). Filled with fun anecdotes about the movies he had a hand in, including such oft-referenced by the Flop House titles as Ghoulies, Re-Animator, Puppetmaster, and Castle Freak.

ELLIOTT: Boswell, by Stanley Elkin - Elliott sez, “It’s a rambling, shambling, plotless jumble of a book with anger in its heart for the whole world, but it regularly delivers satirical insights of penetrating intensity.”

STUART: The Tainted Cup, by Robert Jackson Bennett - Stu sez: “A murder mystery set in a fleshed out, oddball fantasy world filled with poisonous flora, biologically enhanced humans, and massive creatures that threaten to rise from the ocean and destroy civilization — like a Sherlock Holmes story in a Jeff Vandermeer setting.”

Next on the Podcast

2/28 - He’s back! Our Chief Hedgehog Correspondent (and also writer for the NY Times/opponent of our criminal administration/snappy dresser) Jamelle Bouie returns to the show to discuss SONIC 3! Just when you thought we’d forgotten, we ZAGGED ON YA!

3/7 - Things are bleak out there, so for his turn at the mini, Dan leads a mental health check-in for his co-hosts/himself. Don’t worry; it’s still funny (we think?), but also maybe heartwarming.

Plugging Away

Dan appeared on Keith Phipps’s (The Reveal, The Dissolve, The AV Club) “The Laser Age,” a podcast about sci-fi movies from the 2nd half of the 20th century, to discuss the giant ant classic, Them! AND he has a new short story on Deathbed, “Noted to Death.” If you’re a fan of comics like Tales from the Crypt, this one’s for you!

Stuart just let us know that the Jiggle Studio online store is now open. If you like the idea of a body-postitive exercise space that’s more about movement than looking any particular way, this is a great way to show your support.

Check out Elliott’s book, Joke Farming: How to Write Comedy and Other Nonsense, and his current run on DC Comics’ Harley Quinn!

You Made it to the End!

Here’s a picture of The Master of Disguise as Riddick that Dan made for no particular reason.