Contending at the Water Cooler

Clarence Moye, Megan McLachlan, Joey Moser
  • 4.3 (6)
  • Film Reviews
  • Updated Weekly

A weekly look at the entertainment landscape from The Contending.

  1. 30m ago

    Emmys 2026 Outstanding TV Movie Podcast: Two Differing Opinions on Frontrunner ‘Remarkably Bright Creatures’

    In a very special episode of the Contending at the Water Cooler podcast, Megan McLachlan is joined by freelance writer Joshua Axelrod to discuss all five 2026 Outstanding TV Movie Emmy contenders. Notably, the Outstanding TV Movie category is completely unpredictable, with past winners including Rebel Ridge, Weird: The Al Yankovic Story, and Chip ‘n Dale Rescue Rangers. There is no one type of TV movie. In terms of the 2026 Outstanding TV Movie category, this year we have a buddy comedy with John Cena and Idris Elba (with Priyanka Chopra as the third wheel), a rom-com that steals from When Harry Met Sally, the latest Jack Ryan film entry, a film that explores the beautiful relationship between a sentient octopus and a cleaning lady, and a dramaedy that explores the not-so beautiful relationship between a grieving woman and her son’s assistant. Remarkably Beautiful Creatures is the clear frontrunner, but special guest Joshua Axelrod thinks there’s a better movie in the bunch. Watch or listen below, where we recap each film, list what we like and didn’t like, and then rank the films in terms of likelihood to win. We’re deeply appreciative for your shares, likes or subscriptions, and positive ratings on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Click here to listen to our audio podcast. Our video podcast follows below!     Royalty Free Music from Tunetank.com Track: Here We Go! by cinematic alex https://tunetank.com/track/802-here-we-go/ The post Emmys 2026 Outstanding TV Movie Podcast: Two Differing Opinions on Frontrunner ‘Remarkably Bright Creatures’ appeared first on The Contending.

  2. 1d ago

    Emmys 2026 Costume Extravaganza Podcast: Is It the Year of Middle-Aged Malaise?

    The Contending co-founders Megan McLachlan and Joey Moser are joined by special guests freelance writer Fawnia Soo Hoo and costume dresser Eoin Daly to discuss the four Emmy costume categories. Is 2026 the year of Middle-Aged Malaise? It appears to be in the Emmys 2026 Contemporary Limited Series/TV Movie Costume category. Series like DTF St. Louis, Black Rabbit, and Remarkably Bright Creatures tackle growing older and what that looks like—especially in the costumes these characters wear, in khakis, ill-fitting tees (looking at you, David Harbour), and darker colors. Margo’s Got Money Troubles…but she certainly doesn’t have fashion problems, as Michelle Pfeiffer, Nicole Kidman, and Elle Fanning all look fabulous on the show, whether they’re sitting poolside or shooting an OnlyFans alien video. Will the new Apple TV comedy crash the Contemporary Costume race? Or is it Hacks and Deborah Vance’s show-stopping red deck-of-cards-themed outfit for the taking? In the Period Costumes category, it’s a battle of the wedding dresses, with Taissa Farmiga in The Gilded Age versus Sarah Pidgeon in Love Story. Two extremely different turn-of-the-century looks, a little more than 100 years apart! Finally, the Fantasy/Sci-Fi category asks, what do you put on in space when you’re about to battle aliens? Megan McLachlan and Joey Moser were joined by freelance fashion writer Fawnia Soo Hoo and costume dresser Eoin Daly to break down each category, memorable fashion moments on each series, and who they think will win. We’re deeply appreciative for your shares, likes or subscriptions, and positive ratings on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Click here to listen to our audio podcast. Our video podcast follows below!     Royalty Free Music from Tunetank.com Track: Here We Go! by cinematic alex https://tunetank.com/track/802-here-we-go/  The post Emmys 2026 Costume Extravaganza Podcast: Is It the Year of Middle-Aged Malaise? appeared first on The Contending.

  3. Jul 21

    ‘The Odyssey:’ Is Nolan’s Epic a Homer Run?

    We review Christopher Nolan’s take on the original epic: Homer’s The Odyssey. Does it withstand all of the hype? Homer’s The Odyssey is one of the great tales to be handed down within humanity. Oddly, or perhaps due to its epic scale, there haven’t been as many takes on the epic poem as you’d imagine. Many films carved bits and pieces of the story into a narrative, and NBC offered a 2-night miniseries with an all-star cast including Armand Assante, Isabella Rossellini, Vanessa Williams, Bernadette Peters, and more. Now, with Christopher Nolan’s take on Homer’s epic tale, it’s difficult to imagine anything following it. Starring Matt Damon, Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway, and many more, The Odyssey sails into theaters with massive expectations. By selling tickets a year in advance, Universal Pictures threatened to capsize the film by stoking rabid fan expectations as hard as they could. And the gambit paid off: the film grossed over $260 million worldwide in its opening weekend. Most critics and audiences loved it, and an awards future seems bright. On this week’s podcast, Jalal joins Joey and Clarence to review Nolan’s film. Does it hold up to the hype? How will the Academy react to the film? And what do we make of the casting controversies that, in some quarters, plagued the film upon its release? We close our podcast, as always, with the Flash Forward to the media we’re most anticipating in the upcoming week. We’re deeply appreciative for your shares, likes or subscriptions, and positive ratings on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Click here to listen to our audio podcast. Our video podcast follows below!     Royalty Free Music from Tunetank.com Track: Here We Go! by cinematic alex https://tunetank.com/track/802-here-we-go/ The post ‘The Odyssey:’ Is Nolan’s Epic a Homer Run? appeared first on The Contending.

  4. Jul 15

    Emmys 2026: Geeking Out Over Title Design, Our Fav Category!

    It’s one of our favorite podcast episodes of the year: our break down / geek out over Emmy’s Title Design nominees. Last week, the Television Academy unveiled their 2026 Emmy nominations. So now, we finally get to geek out at length over our favorite Emmy category: Title Design. Back in the fall of 2025, HBO Max’s IT: Welcome To Derry premiered and immediately caught our attention with its vivid, inventive, and often terrifying opening credits. We knew it would be a nominee for Title Design as soon as it launched. And we were right. But is it the front runner? Joey, Megan, and Clarence look at Derry and its competition in Title Design: Murderbot, Ponies, Smoke, Spider-Noir, and Young Sherlock. What artistic merit does each title hold? How does each title speak to the themes of the series? If Derry doesn’t win, then what will the Television Academy choose? Is there a Stranger Things-level surprise waiting in the wings? Find out on this week’s podcast! We close our podcast, as always, with the Flash Forward to the media we’re most anticipating in the upcoming week. We’re deeply appreciative for your shares, likes or subscriptions, and positive ratings on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Click here to listen to our audio podcast. Our video podcast follows below!     Royalty Free Music from Tunetank.com Track: Here We Go! by cinematic alex https://tunetank.com/track/802-here-we-go/ The post Emmys 2026: Geeking Out Over Title Design, Our Fav Category! appeared first on The Contending.

  5. Jul 9

    Emmy Nominations 2026: Reactions From Team Contending

    Team Contending gathers around the Water Cooler to spill the tea on the Emmy nominations 2026 edition, led by HBO Max’s The Pitt. Today, the Television Academy unveiled their Emmy nominations 2026. HBO Max’s The Pitt led all series by nearly doubling its take from last year with 25 nominations. The medical series overcame some relatively quiet naysayers to get in across the board including series, direction, writing (2 noms), and a bevy of performance nominations. But that wasn’t HBO Max’s only great news of the morning. It’s own Hacks broke the record for the most nominations by a comedy series in a single year with 24 nominations. That’s a record previously held by Apple’s The Studio and FX’s The Bear with 23. What was once thought to be a 2-woman race in the Lead Actress in a Comedy Series category suddenly looks to be Jean Smart’s to lose. Fellow nominee and beloved contender Lisa Kudrow’s The Comeback failed to perform quite as well as many were anticipating. Still, Kudrow received her third nomination for playing the perpetually optimistic Valerie Cherish. Team Contending gathers to break down these nominations and share their reactions to some of the biggest surprises of the day. Join us, won’t you? We’re deeply appreciative for your shares, likes or subscriptions, and positive ratings on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Click here to listen to our audio podcast. Our video podcast follows below!     Royalty Free Music from Tunetank.com Track: Here We Go! by cinematic alex https://tunetank.com/track/802-here-we-go/ The post Emmy Nominations 2026: Reactions From Team Contending appeared first on The Contending.

  6. Jul 7

    2026 Emmy Nominations Predictions: Now Available As An Audio Suppository!

    Twas a few days before Emmy nominations… Megan and Joey sit down and parse through our recently posted Emmy nomination predictions (Clarence is still traveling back from attending Taylor and Travis’ MSG nuptials, duh…) since some readers need to hear our thoughts while they run on the treadmill or take their pup for a stroll. There’s a lot of talk about The Pitt, Hacks, The Gilded Age, and The Bear but is there a contender that everyone is underestimating? Will Pluribus lead the pack? Will voters embrace the comedic side of Widow’s Bay? Which performers will land double nominations? Will Megan’s beloved Tim Robinson get the cred he deserves? We close our podcast, as always, with the Flash Forward to the media we’re most anticipating in the upcoming week. We’re deeply appreciative for your shares, likes or subscriptions, and positive ratings on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Click here to listen to our audio podcast. Our video podcast follows below.     Royalty Free Music from Tunetank.com Track: Here We Go! by cinematic alex https://tunetank.com/track/802-here-we-go/  The post 2026 Emmy Nominations Predictions: Now Available As An Audio Suppository! appeared first on The Contending.

  7. Jun 30

    ‘Widow’s Bay:’ Is AppleTV’s Bewitching Thriller an Emmy Player?

    AppleTV’s Widow’s Bay developed seemingly overnight into an online viral sensation. Will the Television Academy be equally bewitched? AppleTV began screening episodes of its latest series Widow’s Bay several months before its late April premiere date. That’s always a good sign. Critics reacted in kind: the series achieved a 98% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and a 78/100 on Metacritic. When it premiered, audiences seemed to like what they saw, but the online buzz felt vaguely muted. Was this to be another well intended AppleTV series that would ultimately vanish? Not so faithful watchers! Widow’s Bay hit its stride in early June and became a viral internet sensation. That “early June” timing will be critically important because it hit the zeitgeist just as 2026 Emmy ballots went out. Will the online buzz translate into Emmy nominations? The Television Critics Association sure seemed to like it, giving the series four nominations including Program of the Year. But the trickiest part is that the TCAs also recognized its two central performances — Matthew Rhys and Kate O’Flynn — as well as the show itself in the COMEDY categories. But is it really a comedy? On this week’s podcast, we finally take on AppleTV’s Widow’s Bay. Plus, we answer the question, “What makes Widow’s Bay a comedy?” And will the Television Academy follow the TCAs and nominate it across the board… in the Comedy races? We close our podcast, as always, with the Flash Forward to the media we’re most anticipating in the upcoming week. We’re deeply appreciative for your shares, likes or subscriptions, and positive ratings on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Click here to listen to our audio podcast. Our video podcast follows below!     Royalty Free Music from Tunetank.com Track: Here We Go! by cinematic alex https://tunetank.com/track/802-here-we-go/ The post ‘Widow’s Bay:’ Is AppleTV’s Bewitching Thriller an Emmy Player? appeared first on The Contending.

  8. Jun 16

    Is It ‘Disclosure Day’ Already? We Can’t Handle the Truth!

    It’s a hot (and spoiler-filled) one at the Water Cooler this week: Megan, Joey, and Clarence face off on Steven Spielberg’s Disclosure Day.  Steven Spielberg remains one of history’s greatest and most influential directors. Audiences tend to pay attention when he tackles the question of whether or not we’re alone. In the grand scheme of “alone.” Aliens, we’re talking about aliens. War of the Worlds. ET. Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Spielberg has aliens on the brain, and he returns to the territory in Disclosure Day, starring Josh O’Connor, Emily Blunt, Colin Firth, and Colman Domingo. Yet, Disclosure Day isn’t really a film about aliens, which may have contributed to this weekend’s rampant pile-on on the merits of a Spielberg film. In this week’s SPOILER-FILLED podcast, we review Disclosure Day and discuss what works, what doesn’t work, and what the film is really about. We close our podcast, as always, with the Flash Forward to the media we’re most anticipating in the upcoming week. We’re deeply appreciative for your shares, likes, and positive ratings on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Click here to listen to our audio podcast. Our video podcast follows below!     Royalty Free Music from Tunetank.com Track: Here We Go! by cinematic alex https://tunetank.com/track/802-here-we-go/ The post Is It ‘Disclosure Day’ Already? We Can’t Handle the Truth! appeared first on The Contending.

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Ratings & Reviews

4.3
out of 5
6 Ratings

About

A weekly look at the entertainment landscape from The Contending.

Information

  • Creator
    Clarence Moye, Megan McLachlan, Joey Moser
  • Years Active
    2025 - 2026
  • Episodes
    20
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © The Contending, Megan McLachlan, Joey Moser, Clarence Moye
  • Show Website
    Contending at the Water Cooler

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