all episodes — Fantasy/Animation

Episode 138 - Toy Story (John Lasseter, 1995) (with Lucy Fife Donaldson)

The Fantasy/Animation podcast finally tackles the seminal Toy Story (John Lasseter, 1995), with Episode 138 looking at Pixar’s computer-animated feature and the film that transformed animation in Hollywood - and beyond - into a digital medium. Joining Chris and Alex to examine Toy Story’s computerised production and the pleasures of its pristine visual illusionism is Dr Lucy Fife Donaldson, Senior Lecturer in Film Studies at the University of St Andrews, whose work focuses on film and television style, audiovisual design and 'below-the-line' labour, performance and the body, and videographic criticism.

Episode 137 - Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (James Mangold, 2023) (with Sarah Thomas)

Episode 137 appropriately begins at the end of the commercially and critically successful Indiana Jones franchise with this discussion of the fifth and final feature Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (James Mangold, 2023) featuring special guest Dr Sarah Thomas. Sarah is Senior Lecturer in Communication and Media in the School of Arts, whose research expertise centres on stardom/celebrity, media industries, and screen performance in Hollywood and transnational cinemas.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantApril 8, 2024HOLLYWOOD, SEQUEL, FRANCHISE, STARDOM, TECHNOLOGY, MASCULINITYComment

Episode 136 - Beauty and the Beast (Gary Trousdale & Kirk Wise, 1991) (with Peter Kunze)

The author of Staging a Comeback: Broadway, Hollywood, and the Disney Renaissance (Rutgers University Press, 2023), Dr. Peter Kunze (Tulane University), is the special guest for Episode 136 of the podcast which looks at the impact of Walt Disney’s Beauty and the Beast (Gary Trousdale & Kirk Wise, 1991) and both the industrial and stylistic stakes of the film’s adoption of a Broadway style of musical arrangement.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantMarch 25, 2024WALT DISNEY, CEL-ANIMATION, DIGITAL, HOLLYWOOD, FILM HISTORYComment

Episode 135 - The Flintstones (William Hanna & Joseph Barbera, 1960-1966) (with Jared Bahir Browsh)

Chris and Alex are delighted to welcome Dr. Jared Bahir Browsh (Assistant Teaching Professor, University of Colorado Boulder) to the podcast to discuss William Hanna and Joseph Barbera’s landmark animated sitcom The Flintstones (1960-1966), the first cartoon series to occupy a prime time slot on U.S. television.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantMarch 11, 2024AMERICA, TELEVISION, FAMILY, NARRATIVE, STYLEComment

Episode 134 - Wish (Chris Buck & Fawn Veerasunthorn, 2023) (with Robyn Muir)

To celebrate Disney’s computer-animated film musical Wish (Chris Buck & Fawn Veerasunthorn, 2023) and the company’s recent centenary year, Chris and Alex are joined by Dr Robyn Muir, Lecturer in Media and Communication in the Department of Sociology at the University of Surrey.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantFebruary 26, 2024COMPUTER-ANIMATED FILMS, MUSICAL, WALT DISNEY, GENDER, FEMINISM, MAGICComment

Episode 133 - The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (Peter Jackson, 2003)

Chris and Alex conclude their journey through Middle-Earth with this episode on the third and final entry into Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy - The Return of the King (Peter Jackson, 2003) - where they reflect on the stylistic influence and cultural legacy of the franchise since its culmination over twenty years ago.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantFebruary 12, 2024HOLLYWOOD, FRANCHISE, ADAPTATION, JOURNEYComment

Episode 132 - Life, Animated (Roger Ross Williams, 2016) (with Janet Harbord)

Special guest Janet Harbord, Professor of Film Studies at Queen Mary, joins Chris and Alex to discuss the intersections between fantasy, animation, and autism in this examination of documentary Life, Animated (Roger Ross Williams, 2016), a film that reflects on the value and fantasies of animated media at the same time as it navigates and represents autistic apprehensions of the world.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantJanuary 29, 2024HOLLYWOOD, HISTORY, WALT DISNEY, SUBJECTIVITY, MENTAL HEALTHComment

Episode 131 - The Dark Crystal (Jim Henson & Frank Oz, 1982) (with Tanya Kirk)

2024 kicks off with this episode on The Dark Crystal (Jim Henson & Frank Oz, 1982), recorded at the British Library with Tanya Kirk, Lead Curator of Printed Heritage Collections 1601–1900, and organiser and curator of the Fantasy: Realms of Imagination exhibition that runs at the library until February of this year.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantJanuary 15, 2024PUPPETRY, FANTASY, HOLLYWOOD, LABOUR, CRAFT, HISTORYComment

Episode 130 - Arthur Christmas (Sarah Smith, 2011)

The Christmas special of the Fantasy/Animation podcast is finally delivered, and a perfectly wrapped episode it is too (!), with Chris and Alex enjoying the magic and mayhem of Arthur Christmas (Sarah Smith, 2011) - the Aardman studio’s second foray into computer animation and a film that confronts head-on Christmas as a collective fantasy through the comedic conflicts between generations.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantDecember 18, 2023CHRISTMAS, AARDMAN, COMPUTER-ANIMATED FILMS, BRITISHComment

Episode 129 - Disney: A Tale of Technology and Innovation (Live at the British Film Institute) (with Chris McKenna)

Episode 129 sees Chris flying solo as part of a conversation recorded live at the recent Once Upon A Time: A Disney Day held at the British Film Institute in London back in July, which was part of the Making Magic: 100 Years of Disney two-month season that ran throughout 2023. Discussing the Disney studio’s longstanding relationship to technological innovation is returning special guest Chris McKenna, current Head of Creative Operations at the VFX studio Moving Picture Company, who featured on the earlier Dumbo (Tim Burton, 2019) episode of the podcast.

Episode 128 - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Mike Newell, 2005) (with Taylor Driggers)

Chris and Alex continue their journey through the world of Harry Potter for Episode 128 of the podcast, looking at the fourth instalment Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Mike Newell, 2005) accompanied by special guest Dr Taylor Driggers. Taylor is an academic researcher specialising in fantasy literature, theology and religious studies, gender, and sexuality, whose PhD in English Literature from the University of Glasgow focused on fantasy literature’s potential to offer queer and feminist re-visionings of Christian theology and religious practices.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantNovember 20, 2023HARRY POTTER, FRANCHISE, QUEERNESS, FANTASY, SEXUALITY, GENDERComment

Episode 127 - They Shall Not Grow Old (Peter Jackson, 2018) (with Lawrence Napper)

For Episode 127 of the podcast, Chris and Alex travel through (film) history to examine the negotiation of the past through computer manipulation, focusing on Peter Jackson’s They Shall Not Grow Old (2018) and its use of digital techniques to re-articulate the sounds and images of the First World War. Joining them to discuss the technological mediation of national traumas and triumphs is Dr Lawrence Napper, Senior Lecturer in Film Studies at King’s College London, who is an expert in early silent and British cinemas and author of the monographs British Cinema and Middlebrow Culture in the Interwar Years (2009), The Great War in Popular British Cinema of the 1920s: Before Journey’s End (2015) and Silent Cinema: Before the Pictures Got Small (2017).

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantNovember 6, 2023FILM HISTORY, FIRST WORLD WAR, MEMORY, TECHNOLOGY, NOSTALGIAComment

Episode 126 - ParaNorman (Sam Fell & Chris Butler, 2012) (with Stacey Abbott)

As Halloween rolls around once more, things take a positively spooky turn as Chris and Alex discuss the stop-motion animated horror film ParaNorman (Sam Fell & Chris Butler, 2012) with very special guest Professor Stacey Abbott, who is incoming Professor of Film at Northumbria University and an expert in histories of gothic and horror in film and television.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantOctober 23, 2023HALLOWEEN, STOP-MOTION, HORROR, CHILDREN, AESTHETICSComment

Episode 125 - Cats (Tom Hooper, 2019)

Chris and Alex return from their extended summer break with this discussion of the much-maligned musical Cats (Tom Hooper, 2019), a film whose reputation as a big-budget misjudgment has perhaps overwhelmed the intricacies of its uncanny constitution, and in particular how the narrative’s negotiation of its A-list performers speaks to the vexed question of actorly labour and agency in an age of heightened visual effects production.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantOctober 9, 2023MUSICAL, SPECIAL EFFECTS, HOLLYWOOD, ADAPTATION, STARDOMComment

Episode 124 - Free Guy (Shawn Levy, 2021) (with Mark Bould)

The Truman Show (Peter Weir, 1998) meets They Live (John Carpenter, 1988) in Shawn Levy’s science-fiction comedy Free Guy (2021), which marks the director’s first collaboration with charming Canadian Ryan Reynolds and is a film that confronts head-on contemporary anxieties around technology, choice, security, and artificial intelligence. Joining Chris and Alex to separate out their NPCs from their AI engines is Mark Bould, Professor of Film and Literature at the University of West England, and author of a number of books on the aesthetics, politics and philosophy of science-fiction storytelling.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantJuly 17, 2023HOLLYWOOD, DIGITAL, SPECIAL EFFECTS, VIDEOGAMES, LABOURComment

Episode 123 - Dumbo (Tim Burton, 2019) (with Chris McKenna)

The emergence of Disney’s so-called ‘live-action’ remakes provides the focus of Episode 123, with the recent adaptation of Dumbo (Tim Burton, 2019) offering Chris and Alex plenty to get their teeth into thanks to the film’s particular brand of digital realism as well as director Tim Burton’s reflections on the very nature of spectacle itself. Special guest for this discussion is Chris McKenna, current Head of Creative Operations at the VFX studio Moving Picture Company, and Lead Technical Animator on Dumbo who has also worked on a host of Hollywood blockbusters and franchise films, including Terminator: Genisys (Alan Taylor, 2015), Spectre (Sam Mendes, 2015), Transformers: The Last Knight (Michael Bay, 2017), Ad Astra (James Gray, 2019), Cats (Tom Hooper, 2019), and Disenchanted (Adam Shankman, 2022).

Episode 122 - Spider-Man: No Way Home (Jon Watts, 2021) (with Nick Jones)

The MCU comes calling once again for Episode 122 of the podcast, as Chris and Alex navigate the complex web of storylines and superheroes that build the world of Spider-Man: No Way Home (Jon Watts, 2021). Joining them to reflect on the genre’s enduring appeal alongside the contemporary pleasures of Hollywood’s increasing multiversal madness is Dr Nick Jones, who is Senior Lecturer in Film, Television and Digital Culture at the University of York.

PODCASTChristopher Holliday and Alexander SergeantJune 19, 2023FRANCHISE, HOLLYWOOD, MULTIVERSE, ADAPTATION, COMICSComment

Episode 121 - Monster House (Gil Kenan, 2006) (with Jane Batkin)

Chris and Alex delve into motion-capture, murder mystery, and monster houses for this discussion of Gil Kenan’s 2006 computer-animated film Monster House, a digital feature produced by the ImageMovers company founded by renowned filmmaker Robert Zemeckis and a specialist in animation utilising mo-cap technologies. Joining them for Episode 121 of the podcast is Dr Jane Batkin, an animation film theorist and Associate Professor in the School of Film, Media and Journalism at the University of Lincoln.

Episode 120 - Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Alfonso Cuarón, 2004) (with Rhianna Dhillon)

No sooner have Chris and Alex finished their examination of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Chris Columbus, 2002) than they make a swift return to Hogwarts for the third (and best?) in the franchise, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Alfonso Cuarón, 2004). Joining them in this instalment to separate their Leaky Cauldrons from their Time-Turners is very special guest Rhianna Dhillon, Film/TV critic and Presenter who has featured on BBC Radio One, Front Row, Sky News, and Channel 5, and is currently the film critic for BBC6Music and Radio 5 Live as well as regularly appearing on Kermode and Mayo's Take.

Episode 119 - Arab Animation (1937-2015) (with Omar Sayfo)

Special guest Dr Omar Sayfo joins Chris and Alex for Episode 119 of the podcast, which features a rundown of Arab Animation covering a range of cartoons from Egypt, Iraq, and the United Arab Emirates, alongside a discussion of Omar’s recent book Arab Animation: Images of Identity (2021). Omar is an Affiliated Researcher in the Institute for Cultural Inquiry (ICON) at Utrecht University, and a researcher at the Avicenna Institute of Middle Eastern Studies, who has published articles in animation: an interdisciplinary journal, Media Industries Journal and The Journal of Popular Culture, as well as chapters in a number of edited collections.