Free For All #4 - The Lost Episode, aka RPC Unplugged
Biopics, Breakdowns, and Cline-ian Goofs
Hello once again, ladies and gents! Your friendly neighborhood EIC Neoplasmic here! This is a very special episode of RPC’s Free For All podcast which was recorded over a month ago on June 7, 2020 featuring Mike (Captain Kaye), Kristal (Kay-Rah), Josh (The Director), Jacob (the Streamin’ Demon), Keona (that’s me), and our newest co-host, Hayden (Lord Hades). Topics included Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of Ready Player One, the rise and fall of Ernest Cline, the author of Armada and the aforementioned book upon which Spielberg’s film was based, along with a cornucopia of random thoughts about musical biopics and laughter. Yes, friends, this is the lost episode of FFA, and it’s one that I personally think is very special and unique! Please enjoy!
Because this episode was recorded a long time ago, here’s a bit of context: This episode was recorded during the Black Lives Matter protests and the media coverage surrounding them, as well as a lot of COVID-19 news. We here at Renegade Pop Culture continue to support the BLM movement and we stand in solidarity with them. No one in this country should have to face the kinds of systemic injustice our Black brothers and sisters have dealt with. I hope this stance comes across clearly in the episode.
Also, to clarify our stance regarding Ernest Cline’s work and Ready Player One in particular: we know that many people do enjoy Cline’s work and while we do criticize it in this episode, I’d like to say that we absolutely do not judge anyone based on their appreciation of Cline or his writing. Personally, I’m not a fan, and his books and (sigh) poetry do not work for me at all. But that doesn’t mean it won’t work for somebody else, and good on them if they find something of value in Ready Player One or Armada.
Having said that, we do tear into his stuff quite a bit in this episode, and we were all feeling weary and too tired to care about filtering our commentary, so this is the end result. It’s a rollercoaster of emotions, friends. Please keep your hands and feet within the guard rails at all times.
Still, there’s something to be said about Ernest’s…earnest-ness (booo! hiss!)…when it comes to his love of all things nerdy. Clearly, the man’s a fan of a lot of the same stuff we love, and while he does inject too much intertextuality and nostalgia into his work, I admire the fact that he lets his geek flag fly in his writing. And while I wasn’t hugely impressed by the film adaptation, I love Spielberg’s direction and was hyped to see the Serenity (from Joss Whedon’s Firefly) make an appearance in the film.
There’s a lot more to this episode, but I hope you’ll listen and discover it for yourself. We talk about musical biopics like Bohemian Rhapsody and even fantasy-cast our own Creedence Clearwater Revival biopic, which Josh wants to helm in the future. A quick note about that: when we recorded this episode, the allegations about Ansel Elgort’s alleged abusive behavior had not come to light, so we do mention him in our discussion. He is a talented actor, but if the allegations turn out to be true, we absolutely do not condone his behavior.
