OddCast

Universal tried to build an MCU with Dracula and forgot to make a good movie first Once upon a time, Universal Pictures  looked at the box office, looked at Marvel, looked at its dusty vault of iconic monsters—and said: “What if we did that … but faster?” Thus was born the Dark Universe , a cinematic experiment that answered the age-old question: What if you announced a franchise before anyone actually wanted one? This is the story of how Universal’s bold monster megaverse co

Introduction: The Origins & Enigma of PRESIDENT To understand King of Terrors , you first need to understand its architect: PRESIDENT , not just a band, but a masked phenomenon that seemed to emerge overnight in 2025 — and yet had been gestating in secrecy long before their explosive live debut. The Birth of a Mystery Project PRESIDENT began as a solitary project, born out of personal crisis. The enigmatic frontman (who goes by The President ) has spoken openly (through mask

It’s 1977 in Memphis, Tennessee — the BBQ is smoky, the river’s muddy, and the polyester is loud . Elvis Presley is just months away from leaving the building for good, but another kind of King is about to rise in the city that gave us rock ’n’ roll. From the Bluff City to Body Slams: How It All Began Enter Jerry Jarrett , a sharp-minded promoter and former wrestler with a knack for storytelling, and Jerry “The King” Lawler , a cocky, charismatic grappler who could draw heat

ACT 1: “IN THE BEGINNING, THERE WAS LASER LIGHTS AND CONFUSION” The date was January 1, 2004  — the kind of morning when half of Japan was nursing sake hangovers and the other half was watching TV marathons in kotatsu comfort. Somewhere in Tokyo, however, a former shoot-style purist named Nobuhiko Takada  was unveiling his newest creation — a professional wrestling promotion that would make the word “absurd”  blush. It was called HUSTLE , and it promised to deliver what Takad

How M. Night Shyamalan turned one of TV’s greatest animated stories into a cinematic airless void. 1) From Masterpiece to Misfire “When Hollywood Tried to Bend, It Snapped” Before The Last Airbender  ever melted eyes in 3D, it was a dream project — at least on paper. But somewhere between the drawing board and the multiplex, that dream curdled into a $150 million cautionary tale about hubris, misunderstanding, and corporate meddling. 1.1) The Source Material: A Masterpiece of

1. Where It All Began — “From Pubs to Primetime” If you tuned into ITV on a Saturday afternoon in the mid-1960s, you might have caught the tail end of a darts match, a brief chat about greyhound racing, and then—bang—two blokes in spandex were throwing each other across a ring while grandmas in hats screamed for blood. Welcome to World of Sport  wrestling: Britain’s most unexpectedly beloved cultural hybrid of sports, theatre, and pantomime. Before the Bell: Wrestling’s Pre-T

How Olan Rogers gave us a galaxy of laughs, feels, and existential dread—then ripped it away too soon. INTRO: “CHOOKITYPOK, FRIEND!” "My name’s Gary Goodspeed. I’m a prisoner on the Galaxy One… and I’m about to do something really stupid." There are two types of animated shows in the modern era.The first kind winks at you through fourth walls and burps its way through cynicism — loud, irreverent, fun, but rarely sincere.The second kind tries to make you feel something  — to r

The most ambitious fantasy series of the streaming era finally finds its rhythm — and its shadow. “Ambitious enough to make you gasp, scatterbrained enough to make you argue at dinner parties — but always, oddly, mesmerizing.” When Amazon first announced The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power , the internet collectively clutched its mithril. How could anyone — even with billions in backing — dare revisit Middle-earth after Peter Jackson’s monumental films? Two seasons late

Buckle up, wrestling nerds: this is your deep dive — with a sprinkle of humor — into the roller-coaster life of World Wrestling All‑Stars (WWA). The good, the bad, the guitars, the Bananas in Pajamas, the losing streaks, and the legacy. Grab your popcorn. Chapter 1. “Down Under, Gimmicks & Grand Ambitions” The Wild Birth of the World Wrestling All-Stars (WWA) Let’s rewind to the year 2001  — a time when wrestling fans everywhere were still recovering from what can only be des

There are ambitious wrestling promotions — and then there was 5★ Wrestling , the Scottish-born brainchild that tried to leapfrog the indies, conquer television, and tie it all together with a PlayStation video game. It had AJ Styles, John Morrison, Rey Mysterio, and even a (very theoretical) million-dollar offer to CM Punk. It had a 128-man tournament “bigger than the G1.” It also had… cancellations, empty arenas, broken promises, and one of the most gloriously weird wrestlin

Prologue: Before the Gold — TNA’s Turbulent Genesis In the summer of 2002, while the wrestling world was still mourning the collapse of WCW and ECW, two men — Jeff Jarrett  and his father Jerry Jarrett  — looked around and said, “Hey, someone’s got to give the boys another place to work… and give me another title belt to hold.” Thus, Total Nonstop Action Wrestling  (TNA) was born. It was a mix of wild creativity, southern wrestling grit, and occasional chaos — like an indie r

In the autumn of 2014, television and professional-wrestling collided in a flash of neon, blood, mysticism and spectacle. What emerged was not merely a wrestling promotion, but a cinematic world: the “Temple” of Lucha Underground. A unique hybrid of Mexican lucha libre tradition and Hollywood production values, Lucha Underground rewrote the rulebook of pro-wrestling presentation in the United States. Over four seasons, it unleashed masked heroes and mythic monsters, storyline

After the Monday Night War imploded in 2001 the wrestling business looked like an emptied stadium — one dominant company, lots of displaced talent, and several entrepreneurs sniffing opportunity. The X Wrestling Federation (XWF, later styled Xcitement Wrestling Federation) was one of the most visible of those attempts: well-funded on paper, star-studded on the roster sheets, and paradoxically ephemeral in practice. Below is a deeper chronological and analytic account of how i

“We are PROGRESS — and this is our religion.”— Jim Smallman, Chapter One (2012) In the beginning, there was no titan of television, no corporate titan promising global eyes — only a cramped room above a pub, a homemade ring, and a feverish belief that British wrestling could be something more . In March 2012, in London’s Islington Garage, a handful of dreamers rewrote the book — or rather, began a new one. They didn’t call their events “shows.” They called them Chapters , as

A love letter to a promotion that started with memes and ended up changing the indie game. 1. From Podcast Mics to Powerbombs How three wrestling nerds turned inside jokes into body slams To understand Deadlock Pro Wrestling , you have to start where all great internet movements begin: a Discord call full of laughter, caffeine, and questionable ideas. It all started with three friends — James Darnell (Pulse) , Anthony Douglas (TonyPizzaGuy) , and John Blud  — whose love for w

Netflix took a grimdark YA fantasy, added pop-song menace, gorgeous lighting, and enough emotional damage to power the UK for a decade. The Source Material: The Half Bad Trilogy, a.k.a. “YA Fantasy But Make It Bleak, Sharp, and Slightly Unwell” Before Netflix gave us The Bastard Son & The Devil Himself —aka “Everyone Is Hot, Everyone Is Injured”—this story lived on the page as Sally Green’s Half Bad  trilogy: Half Bad , Half Wild , and Half Lost . And if you’ve only met this

Few championships in modern wrestling capture the imagination quite like the NXT Championship . Born in 2012 during a time when WWE was quietly incubating a creative revolution, the title became the heartbeat of a brand that was part developmental system, part super-indie, part counter-culture movement. If Raw and SmackDown were blockbuster movies, NXT was the cult-favorite series with a fiercely devoted fanbase , the kind that spoke in message boards, trended hashtags, and p

A five-part deep dive into Howard Chaykin’s neon fever dream of corporate America, pulp rebellion, and media hypnosis.   Prologue: Static Dreams and Plastic Stars Once upon a future that looked like yesterday’s tomorrow, America packed its bags for Mars. What was left behind wasn’t a country, but a logo — a hologram flickering over the ruins. And in the noise, a man named Reuben Flagg squinted through the static and asked: “Is this thing still on?” Before Watchmen , before

Few bands have captured the turbulence, emotion, and innovation of the early 21st century quite like Linkin Park . Emerging from Agoura Hills, California, they fused the aggression of nu-metal with electronic textures, hip-hop flows, and pop accessibility. At their heart were Chester Bennington’s volcanic vocals  and Mike Shinoda’s visionary production , surrounded by a band of technical precision and fearless creativity — Brad Delson on guitar, Rob Bourdon on drums, Joe Hahn

Introduction — When the Bell Rang and the Dream Faded In the early 2000s, New Japan Pro Wrestling (NJPW) stood at a crossroads between glory and collapse. It was an era when professional wrestling’s grandest ideals clashed with the rising obsession for “legitimacy.”At the center of it all was Antonio Inoki , the godfather of Japanese pro wrestling — a visionary, a showman, and a man consumed by the belief that pro wrestling must be real fighting . What emerged was a philosoph