What’s the first movie you remember seeing in a movie theater?

It’s one of the three questions I ask every guest on What If I Don’t Like It?, and when Brett Kelley mentioned during his There Will Be Blood episode that the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was his answer, I knew we had to come back to it.

Brett, the artist behind Gourdfolk, joins me to revisit the 1990 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, a movie that helped shape his love of comics and remains a memorable part of his childhood.

We get into the film’s roots in Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird’s darker comic books, the incredible practical effects from Jim Henson’s Creature Shop, and how this surprisingly gritty adaptation became a box office hit. We also discuss why it feels so different from the animated series and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze, its connections to martial arts cinema and Daredevil, and how the franchise evolved from an independent black-and-white comic into a global phenomenon.

Brett brings his TMNT knowledge and personal history with the franchise to a conversation about what makes this adaptation so distinctive, why its darker tone works, and why the original still deserves a closer look.

What's the first movie you remember seeing in a theater? Let me know, and tell me which turtle is your favorite!

CONNECT WITH BRETT KELLEY

Artwork & Shop: https://ko-fi.com/bkartmerc/shop

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MORE CONVERSATIONS WITH BRETT

Check out our other conversations about

The Usual Suspects: https://tinyurl.com/4v88b77u

There Will Be Blood: https://tinyurl.com/4s4kur7t

and Heavy Metal: https://tinyurl.com/49en7sev

ABOUT WHAT IF I DON'T LIKE IT?

Hosted by Kt Baldassaro, What If I Don't Like It? explores what happens when filmmakers, artists, writers, and performers finally watch movies they've avoided because of their expectations, biases, or preconceived notions. Through thoughtful, occasionally irreverent conversations, we explore the films we love, the ones we're skeptical of, and why stories connect with us.

▶️ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@MovieRuntime

🎧 Apple Podcasts: https://tinyurl.com/w877hmn8

👂 Spotify Podcasts: https://tinyurl.com/mrxu764f

#TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles #TMNT #MoviePodcast

Why do movies and TV shows keep making people vomit?

Vomiting scenes are everywhere in film and television. Sometimes they’re funny. Sometimes they’re horrifying. Sometimes they’re meant to make us uncomfortable. And sometimes they seem to exist for no reason other than making the audience think, “Do we really need to see this?”

In this special episode of What If I Don’t Like It?, I sit down with filmmaker Jaina Cipriano - who you may recognize from our ConAir episode, No. 45 - to investigate the history and purpose of vomiting scenes in movies and TV. We talk about how vomiting went from something filmmakers largely kept offscreen to something we now see in increasingly graphic detail, and what that shift says about changing ideas of censorship, realism, comedy, disgust, and audience expectations.

We get into Hitchcock and Rebecca, the Hays Code, The Exorcist, Monty Python and the Meaning of Life, Yellowjackets, Triangle of Sadness, and some of the most memorable vomiting scenes in film history.

This conversation is especially personal for Jaina. She has lived with emetophobia for more than 20 years, so watching vomiting on screen isn’t an abstract exercise in film criticism. We talk about what it’s like to have a phobia repeatedly confronted by movies and television, how filmmakers use vomiting to provoke a physical reaction from an audience, and why Jaina eventually made a short film exploring her own emetophobia, called Actualization.

We also ask why filmmakers so often use vomiting as shorthand for excess, disgust, illness, intoxication, humiliation, or emotional overwhelm. When does a vomiting scene actually tell us something about a character? When is it effective horror or comedy? And when is it simply a cliché?

And if filmmakers are trying to make vomiting feel realistic, why do so many movies and TV shows leave out the very things that actually make the experience human?

This is a conversation about vomiting in movies and TV, film history, censorship, horror, comedy, disgust, emetophobia, and the strange power of one of the most universal bodily functions we have.

### FIND JAINA

🎬 Website: www.jainaciprianophotography.com/

🎥 Short film: www.jainaciprianophotography.com/actualization-2026

📸 Instagram: instagram.com/jainastudio

### WATCH / LISTEN TO THE PODCAST

🎙️ YouTube: www.youtube.com/@MovieRuntime

🎧 Spotify: open.spotify.com/show/2iyYtsB5zeuoCJZ3D3fKJt

🍎 Apple Podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/what-if-i-dont-like-it-a-movie-discussion-podcast/id1719394737

**GUEST:** Jaina Cipriano / ⁨@jainastudio⁩

**HOST:** Kt Baldassaro / ⁨@MovieRuntime⁩

What do you think is the most memorable vomiting scene in a movie or TV show?

#FilmAnalysis #FilmHistory #Movies #FilmCriticism #HorrorMovies

Why does Hudson Hawk have such a terrible reputation?

Episode 50 of What If I Don’t Like It? is here. And I’m celebrating by digging into one of the strangest action comedies of the ’90s.

The 1991 Bruce Willis action comedy is one of those movies people seem to either love or absolutely hate. But the story behind it is almost as strange as the movie itself.

I’m joined by Ben Feldman, a longtime Hudson Hawk fan, to dig into how this bizarre movie came together, and why it turned out so differently from the film that was originally conceived.

We get into the original Hudson Hawk screenplay, Daniel Waters’ idea of deconstructing the action genre after Heathers, the decision to let the filmmakers go completely nuts, and the hour of footage that was ultimately cut.

We also get into Bruce Willis’ original idea for Hudson Hawk, rewrites during production, the movie’s unusual approach to comedy, the candy-bar villains, and some of the tiny details that make this movie even stranger the closer you look.

So was Hudson Hawk simply a spectacular misfire, or was it attempting something people weren't expecting from a Bruce Willis action movie?

If you’ve always thought Hudson Hawk was terrible, this might change how you look at it.

🎬 What If I Don’t Like It? | Hudson Hawk with Ben Feldman

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