The Middle of Culture copertina

The Middle of Culture

The Middle of Culture

Di: Peter and Eden Jones
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The Middle of Culture is what happens when two siblings with too many opinions and not enough chill dive headfirst into movies, music, video games, and whatever else is rotting our brains this week. It’s part pop culture podcast, part sibling rivalry, and fully unfiltered. Expect passionate arguments, niche references, unsolicited rankings, and the occasional moment of unexpected insight. If you’ve ever wanted to eavesdrop on the kind of argument you’d hear at the family dinner table—only with better audio—this is your show.© 2026 Peter and Eden Jones Musica Scienze sociali
Episodi
  • Two Running Men, No Clear Winner

    Two Running Men, No Clear Winner
    Oct 18 2026
    We close out the Arnie-and-his-remake experiment with 1987's The Running Man and 2025's The Running Man — the first time we've landed on opposite sides of a ranking, though only barely, since neither is a good movie. Eden spent the week deep in 70s and 80s jazz fusion and even deeper in a Digimon hyperfixation, while Peter worked through a strong week of metal (Insomnium, Shores of Null, Iapetus, Mother of Graves), the Ted Lasso season four finale, and a rogue-like Star Wars racer he paid full price for without regret. Along the way: Tomie, a terrible new Street Fighter, a $12 digivice pedometer, and why the novel's ending was never going to survive 9/11.Show NotesJazz fusion week: Eden went down a Mahavishnu Orchestra hole and revisited Casiopea and Return to Forever's Romantic Warrior, while Peter claims the other fork of the road — Meshuggah.The spooky-season PowerPoint party: Eden skipped the genuinely frightening topics and presented Junji Ito's Tomie using a deliberately hideous slidescarnival.com template.Tomie (1998): one of nine Tomie films watched so far, a "tight 78 minutes that could have been a tight 50," and no regrets.The First Power (1990) for Bad Movie Bros: Lou Diamond Phillips in his prime versus the vengeful spirit of an executed serial killer.Street Fighter (2025): nearly universally panned and seen stone-cold sober after the Mexican place next to the theater couldn't serve liquor; Cody Rhodes as Guile is a highlight, David Dastmalchian's Bison is no Raúl Juliá.Eden's new hyperfixation is Digimon, triggered by Digimon Story Cyber Sleuth and its de-digivolve-and-re-evolve web of planning.Digimon Adventure: a show for babies with surreal, Jackson Pollock-esque backgrounds, which makes it perfect background viewing.The Vital Hero digivice: a $12 step counter that evolves your Digimon as you walk, and the Sunomon-to-Gabumon moment got an actual reaction at the comic shop.Peter's e-ink side quest: the XTE Ink X4 Pro and Eden's hand-me-down X4, plus the face-down pogo-pin charging quirk.New metal: Iapetus's The Mother Void, Mother of Graves's The Light That Keeps Us, Insomnium's Netherworlds — their best since Winter's Gate, now with a third guitarist — and Shores of Null's Homesick.Shores of Null's Beyond the Shores (On Death and Dying) got regular operating-room play in 2020, and its refrain — "life is at war with us" — fit the moment.Ted Lasso season four: the finale mirrors the season one "I forgive you" beat back at Rebecca, which is the whole point of the show — flawed people helping each other get better.Games: Vampire Survivors on iOS, Antivirus Survivors 2003 Professional, and Star Wars: Galactic Racer — a rogue-like racer built by former Burnout developers, worth full price.Main topic: The Running Man (1987) vs. The Running Man (2025), the last entry in the Arnie-and-remake experiment.The 1987 film is dragged down by peak Arniness — every line is a one-liner — but its depiction of the studio audience is the sharpest social commentary of the two.Richard Dawson is the best thing in the 1987 version: producer and host in one, and the sleaziest game show host imaginable.The 2025 version hews much closer to Stephen King's novel until the last five minutes, when it abandons the book's ending — for obvious reasons post-9/11 — and can't land the replacement.Josh Brolin's Killian is adequately menacing; Michael Cera's Derry house sequence is the last thing that works before a hostage third act that runs far too long.Final verdict: two six-out-of-tens. Neither is a good movie, and neither is worth a rewatch.
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    1 ora e 11 min
  • Meme-ory Lane

    Meme-ory Lane
    Oct 4 2026
    Peter and Eden take a trip down meme-ory lane, ranking 50 internet memes by staying power, usefulness, and how often they appear unbidden in their brains. Rickrolling remains a family tradition, Hide the Pain Harold feels painfully familiar, and a perfectly good joke can lose points when nobody remembers how to use it. Some entries even require the creation of an F tier.Before the rankings, Peter finds politics and body horror in The Expanse, welcomes Amon Amarth back to form, and hears Tarkovsky in The Ocean's Solaris. Eden brings adventurous pop from Yves, a samurai Western full of himbos, and a game where your cursor fights Windows-era pop-ups. Peter buys Control Resonant to encourage Remedy's weirdness, and both look ahead to their next Arnold remake comparison: The Running Man.Show NotesRemembering Liza. Eden remembers their dog and constant companion after a difficult loss.The Expanse. Peter finishes Leviathan Wakes and The Butcher of Anderson Station, then starts Caliban's War, enjoying the mix of solar-system politics and body horror.Lacrimas Profundere — Lay Me Down O Silent Fear. Peter welcomes a heavier, doomier take on the band's gothic sound.Amon Amarth — The Allfather Awakens. A reinvigorated return to Viking metal after Peter's disappointment with The Great Heathen Army, with acoustic track “Upphaf” providing a surprise.The Ocean — Solaris. Peter loves this sprawling grower and its new vocal interplay. It vividly recalls Tarkovsky's 1972 film, even though he prefers the 2002 adaptation.Yves — NAIL and Soft Error. Eden's electronic-pop discovery, with “Do You Feel It Like I Touch” firmly lodged in their head.Manga adventures. Eden loves the samurai-Western absurdity and himbo fixation of Renjoh Desperado, volume one. Shadow Lady offers goofy, horny magical-thief antics, though its rushed ending disappoints.Farming-game fatigue. Credits roll on Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma, taking Eden's motivation for side quests with them. Pioneers of Olive Town doesn't hold their attention either.The Citadel and Beyond Citadel. Stylish, strange retro shooters that Eden finds compelling and brutally difficult.Antivirus Survivors 2003 Professional. Eden's surprise favorite pits a cursor against pop-ups with DVD logos and firewalls as weapons. The desktop nostalgia sells Peter on it mid-conversation.Control Resonant. Peter buys it at launch to support Remedy's continued weirdness, before finding time to play it.Ranking 50 memes. Staying power, usefulness, and instant recognition matter more than nostalgia. Eden recalls Rickrolling their sister's wedding; both recognize everyday life in This Is Fine, while misused templates lose points.S tier. Bike Fall; Rickroll; Anakin and Padmé; Confused Math Lady; Evil Kermit; Hide the Pain Harold; Distracted Boyfriend; Picard Facepalm.A tier. Am I Out of Touch?; Clown Makeup; Roll Safe (head-tapping); Running Away Balloon; One Does Not Simply; Conspiracy Charlie / Pepe Silvia; They're the Same Picture; Two Buttons; Side-Eyeing Chloe; Woman Yelling at a Cat; Kombucha Girl; Success Kid.B tier. Overly Attached Girlfriend; Homer Backs into Bushes; Mocking SpongeBob; Spider-Man Pointing at Spider-Man; Epic Handshake; Disaster Girl; Left Exit 12; Awkward Moment Seal; Drake Hotline Bling; Monkey Puppet; Oprah's You Get a Car; Gru's Plan; Shut Up and Take My Money; Keyboard Cat.C tier. Dramatic Chipmunk; Tuxedo Winnie the Pooh; First World Problems; Bad Luck Brian; Good Guy Greg; Afraid to Ask Andy; All Your Base Are Belong to Us; Scumbag Steve; Leonardo DiCaprio's Gatsby Toast; Socially Awkward Penguin; Philosoraptor.D and F tiers. Change My Mind and Forever Alone get D. Trollface and Doge get F: their associations outweigh the original joke for the hosts.Next time: The Running Man. In two weeks, the Arnold remake trilogy concludes with the 1987 film and Edgar Wright's 2025 adaptation. Both hope for the strongest remake of the three.
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    1 ora e 9 min
  • Two Total Recalls, Only One Verhoeven

    Two Total Recalls, Only One Verhoeven
    Sep 22 2026
    A flooded basement, Rebecca Black's new album, a detour into real 70s Japanese jazz, and a ten-volume manga binge open the show before Eden's report on Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma and the new Resident Evil. Peter brings the Iliad, new Sigh and Igorrr, two solo cellists, and Anthrax's first album in a decade. Then it's the second round of Arnold vs. the remake: Paul Verhoeven's Total Recall (1990) against Len Wiseman's Total Recall (2012) — Verhoeven wins on social satire, Sharon Stone, and Michael Ironside, while the remake loses on accents, the physics of the Fall, and a cop-out ending.Episode NotesEden lost a long day to a flooded basement — roughly 200 gallons, shop-vac'd out in five-gallon batches. Now pricing a second sump pump.Eden on Rebecca Black's Age of the Exhibitionist: the only thing on repeat for weeks, with "Hot Wet Delirious" as the standout.A YouTube "70s Japanese jazz" playlist turned out to be AI-generated slop, which sent Eden toward the real thing: Chiyo Okumura and Jun Mayuzumi.Reading: Citrus — ten volumes in a day and a half — plus the sequel series Citrus+.Sexiled: My Sexist Party Leader Kicked Me Out, So I Teamed Up With a Mythical Sorceress!, a light novel inspired by the Tokyo Medical University admissions-scoring scandal.Eden on Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma: not a farming game with combat, a city-manager game that happens to have combat — and the spring goddess is the romance pick.Peter is still chipping away at the Fagles translation of the Iliad and is tempted by the Emily Wilson translation next.Peter put three and a half hours into Fields of Mistria and then set the Steam Deck down, exactly as feared.Eden saw the new Resident Evil and calls it the best video-game movie yet — mainly because the hero is a panicking first-time player, not a trained operative.Sigh released Goh-Ka, and the Hangman's Hymn remaster is the gateway drug.Igorrr's Amen blends breakcore, opera, and metal — Peter's pick over Spirituality and Distortion.Raphael Weinroth-Browne's Empyrean started life as a commission for James Wilton Dance's Bach Reimagined.Brianna Tam is the other solo cellist on rotation — electric cello, loop pedal, one-woman build.Anthrax's Cursum Perficio is their first studio album in ten years, and Peter rates it above For All Kings but below Persistence of Time.Main topic: Total Recall (1990) vs. Total Recall (2012), the second round of Arnold vs. the remake.The 1990 version was received as merely okay and became a classic; Verhoeven's cynicism and Reagan-era satire are why it still works.Our verdict: Sharon Stone's Lori is a better evil fake wife than Kate Beckinsale's, and Michael Ironside's Richter-era scenery-chewing has no modern equivalent.The 2012 version folds both villains into one character, moves the whole story off Mars onto Earth, and comes out with nothing to say.The Fall — 6,000 miles through the planet in seventeen minutes — would require far more than 1G, and people climb around outside it anyway.The 2012 ending undercuts itself: the 1990 film leaves the "is it real?" question open, the remake adds a final shot that cheapens the ambiguity.Jessica Biel earned a Razzie nomination for the 2012 film and, per both hosts, deserved it.Next up in the series: The Running Man (1987) vs. its remake.
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    1 ora e 6 min
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