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Pop Culture Happy Hour: 'Edge Of Tomorrow' And Noble Flops

NPR
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If you're looking for a movie to see this weekend, may we recommend a movie you may not have seen last weekend?

After a brief breakdown of the Tony Awards (which underwhelmed us a bit — see what you think of the Music Man bit), the panel — including guest Chris Klimek — gets on to the business of giving a pretty hearty thumbs-up to the Tom Cruise action thriller Edge Of Tomorrow, co-starring a very fine Emily Blunt and a bunch of aliens. And time travel and/or eternal life! We talk quite a bit about coverage of the film at The Dissolve, so read it all.

Then, we take a listener suggestion and consider the noble flop. The first question, of course, is what we mean by "noble" and what we mean by "flop" (or, alternately, "failure"). Chris brings to the table his enormous affection for the much-denounced Hudson Hawk, we wonder whether "noble" means more than Sting's good intentions, and how it feels to really dislike things while bearing no ill will whatsoever toward the people who tried in vain to make them good.

As always, we close the show with what's making us happy this week. Stephen is happy about the avalanche of great things that are around right now in general, including an unexpected return. Glen is happy about a Twitter account that he also enjoys imitating in his favorite new voice. Chris is happy about another unexpected return, so apparently it's the week for that. And I am happy about mainlining some Gordon Ramsay and listening to a fine episode of a fine NPR show.

Find us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter: me, Stephen, Glen, Chris, producers Jessica, Lauren and Nick, and our dear pal Mike Katzif. And yes — by all means, check out Chris' new feature at Atlantic Cities on "the future of the American suburb as we know it."

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

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Linda Holmes is a pop culture correspondent for NPR and the host of Pop Culture Happy Hour. She began her professional life as an attorney. In time, however, her affection for writing, popular culture, and the online universe eclipsed her legal ambitions. She shoved her law degree in the back of the closet, gave its living room space to DVD sets of The Wire, and never looked back.