[School of Movies 2026]

After the 2022 failure ($226m on a $200m budget) of Lightyear to succesfully spin-off from the main Toy Story franchise (and we did a show about that at the time), they went back to the billion-dollar well that is the direct link to so many warm feelings across multiple generations.

And here they finally tackle the issue of tech, tablets (and the strangely absent phones and even video games) and their role in drawing modern children's attention away from their traditional toys. This felt like it was a long time coming and (especially after covering WALL-E for MA.I.) I had built up in my head a hard-hitting critique of not only losing our kids to glowing screens, but losing ourselves.

And from the glowing critical acclaim this has received across the board (92% freshness and 95% audience score) I appear to be wildly out of step with contemporary critics and cinemagoers. I have... some things to say.

This week's After School Club: Toy Story Shorts

Next week: Supergirl (2026)

[School of Everything Else 2026]

This is a commissioned show for AJ. We recorded it several months ago, but banked it until the long-awaited release of Christopher Nolan's Odyssey. It is an independent, serialised concept musical, released across nine digital EPs from December 2022 through to December 2024 by Jorge Rivera-Herrans (who also plays Odysseus, amongst others).

And this took a certain portion of the Internet by storm, garnering fan projects to animate each of the songs, all of which you can find assembled here in one 2h 22m work of collaborative passion made on one iota the budget of Nolan's IMAX titan.

Willow showed this to us on Christmas day and the music and handling of the many characters really stuck with us. This is the most excited I've been about a musical since Hamilton and the original Moana.

Statistically, almost none of you have heard this, so we specifically crafted this show to introduce what Jorge and company achieved here and hopefully get a bunch of new people with these catchy-ass songs bouncing round their heads. This is DreamWorks' Prince of Egypt and Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas to Ridley Scott's Exodus: Gods & Kings and his Robin Hood.

This week's After School Club: Ulysses 31

Next week: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

[School of Movies 2026]

Dan Trachtenberg, director of 10 Cloverfield Lane has quietly, modestly, and with surety of purpose revolutionised the Predator franchise. Back when Disney bought Fox there were many folks cheering about the X-Men being in the MCU from now on (and Marvel have taken their sweet time with that) whilst still others rightly pointed out that the monopoly and dominion over such an immense market share of IPs that were never theirs and don't fit with the Mickey Mouse mentality was going to be ruinous. At least in the case of Predator, the reverse is true.

For three decades, Fox presided over poorly-received Predator sequels, spinoffs, and aborted revivals. Meanwhile the Disney buyout has (through the appointment of Trachtenberg as project leader) resulted in the three freshest takes, cunningly bringing forward some of the most potent elements and letting go of aping of the 80s classic. Prey, and Killer of Killers sought a new demographic of younger people aware of the name and keen to see something relevant to them. But this one actually has something to say about being raised in harsh, cruel, dehumanising cultures, and it does so with passion and humour that won over Willow. This thing is special, and reaches out with exhilarating empathy to guys who have been told they can't ever be sensitive or feel anything other than anger and the desire to dominate the competition.

It is, in effect, Redditor: Badlands.

This week's After School Club: Predator: Killer of Killers

Next week: Spider-Man: Brand New Day