Pop Junction

This may be our most delightful lookback of the season. Mia’s been a Little Rascals fan since waaaaay back in the day, and even though this was Caitlin’s first time seeing the 1994 reboot, she took it upon herself to go Full Film Nerd on its ass and do a deep dive into the history of this group of lil’ characters–which dates all the way back to the silent era!  

The cameos of it all, the nightmarish set of it all, and the Bill Cosby urban legend of it all… this is The Little Rascals. And we are the Blake McIver Ewing Fan Club. FALAFEL! 

We also do a completely unnecessarily deep dive into the question: what does it mean to have a big nose? And we have a borderline pornographic conversation about a pork roast Mia made in the slow cooker.

As some South Brooklyn dude said to us on the Sheepshead Bay pier one summer night, Two beautiful girls! Happy holidays!

How could we have almost forgotten Shawn Hunter? We talk Shawn & Angela actually being a lesbian interracial couple, outdated Italian racial slurs, crush archetypes, the Christian values of 90s pop culture, and how Caitlin dated a RL Brooklyn Shawn Hunter in 6th grade. We also go into all these Twitter shenanigans, The Vow Season 2, and Leah Remini being our collective homegirl.

There is perhaps no other episode of Poppers J that screams #gayorigins more than this one (and we covered all six seasons of The L Word!). We explain why our Devon Sawa trilogy is now simply a duo, and explore (1) how Christina Ricci made a pig nose fashion in Penelope, (2) Gaby Hoffmann being Park Slope incarnate, and (3) the cleverness of Rosie O’Donnell’s “crush” on Tom Cruise in the 90s.

@Rita Wilson, please consider this our official proposal to you. Tom, watch your back.

Mia gives her review of Hocus Pocus 2 and shares her morbid fascination with Dahmer, and we talk Bros and the merits of ignoring straight moviegoers entirely. We also explore our own violent impulses and the concept of Wronged Rage. 

And then it’s on to the main event, the first installment of our Unofficial Devon Sawa Trilogy: Little Giants. But what we come to realize is that maybe we weren’t just there for Devon. In fact, maybe we weren’t there for Devon at all. (...This is where Mia admits her secret lifelong crush on Rick Moranis–and all Rick Moranis lookalikes).

RIP Mary Ellen Trainor 💜

We’re back with a list, baybee! We give you our top five TV theme songs by category: sitcom, drama, and animated. And we honor our forever number one, the most underrated TV theme song of all time (but that was also attached to a show that, see episode title)--that we were amazed to discover was also penned AND PERFORMED by an R&B legend. 

BUT FIRST: we dreamcast Robyn in the new Whitney biopic, Mia pitches a stellar Hangover reboot idea, and give ourselves snaps for how we collectively litigated in our last ep. 

YouTube playlist to sing along! -> https://bit.ly/3frqiM2

COURT IS NOW IN SESSION. This might be the most serious episode we’ve ever done. 

Welcome to our first court case: Mia arguing in favor of My Girl 2 v. Caitlin, on behalf of My Girl OG. Mia went to law school; Caitlin went to film school. It’s a battle for the ages! 

This week’s coming of age fave is Milk Money (aka 🥛💰), a movie that’s one part Stand By Me, one part Pretty Woman, and somehow also one part mobster thriller. It makes no gd sense, but Melanie Griffith is a g and we love her. Also, big shout-out to bisexual comic relief queen Anne Heche, who fully embraced the kook factor in this film.

We also give a preview of the shade that’s to come in our 3 Ninjas episode. Sorry, Emily. 

DOES ANYONE KNOW WHERE JESSICA WESSON IS? Shelly Miscavige?! MORE LIKE JESSICA WESSON. WHERE IS SHE?!?!?!

P.S. SURPRISE, BITCH: the pre-teen crush here is actually ED HARRIS.

P.S.S. Jessica Wesson. (For the algorithm). If you’re out there Googling yourself, come on the pod!

Shockingly, neither of us was super excited about revisiting M-to-the-D–not even Mia, who has vowed to take out Joshua Jackson’s wife on numerous occasions. But our cold middle-aged hearts were won over by its wholesomeness. (And as a bonus, we excavated a lost crush from our childhoods!) Give it up for our short Staten Island king, Emilio Estevez. 

Plus, get ready for us to reminisce about stalking sports team crushes in high school. 

It’s SEASON 3, BAYBEE! It’s the Season of Crushes. And we kick it off with the delightful Camp Nowhere. We reflect on the singular experience that was being dragged through Kings Plaza Mall by our mothers, and we relive our summer camp crushes. 

Hey, Hollywood: Where is Christopher Lloyd’s Lifetime Achievement Award, and where is the prequel? Also, stop being cowards and just cast fat actors instead of throwing skinny people in sweatshirts. 

ARNOLD TOLD ME NOON.

IT’S THE SEASON FINALE OF OUR POD, Y’ALL!

Insecure ended the day after Christmas, and we’re still not over it. We have a rich discussion of the final season (with a heavy emphasis on that whiplash-inducing finale), the Molly of it all, and what the show meant to us on the whole. 

Our *super* special guest this week is Chris Sewell! Chris has an Ed.D. in Educational Leadership & Policy and an illustrious career in EdTech–but he also has a recreational Ph.D. in all things pop culture, and he happens to be a classmate of ours from junior high. Despite all that Insecure has given to Black audiences, Chris is not letting it off the hook today!

Plus: Mia’s predictions for 2022. 

RIP Betty White. We hoped this day would never come.