I really enjoyed this new iteration of the gabfest. It's nice to kick back and listen to some intelligent conversation about film and other media.

I hope that the "cultured" version appears again soon. Frankly, for folks like myself, who love talking, reading, and listening to analysis of pop culture related material, I would be even more thrilled to see a weekly installment of this kind of gabfest alongside the "more serious" political version (I enjoy both but I would definitely tune in each week to this new version).

Really? I thought it was awful. It replaced the humor and self deprecation of the political gabfest and added bloviating seriousness. I felt like I was listening to a trio of grad students trying to one-up each other with name dropping. Bleh.

Plus, the Barry Bonds comment at the end? Bizarre.

I have to say I agree. I love how the gabfest doesn't assume the listeners are wonks or even agree with them. I also like their self-depreciating humor aimed at each other. The cultural gabfest seemed to be aimed at a much narrower audience of culture-philes. For example, implying that anyone that didn't see There Will Be Blood as brilliant is missing something is off-putting to anyone who doesn't agree.

Finally, a little less patting each other on the back would make the podcast seem friendlier. (We know you're up on pop culture and write great reviews, you don't have to remind us.)

I am also a listener who looks forward to the weekly Political Gabfest but found this iteration wanting. For example, the discussant's early comment "if you are one of the 12 people who has not seen Juno," when she was asked to explain the story line of the Oscar-nominated movie, just sounded so supercilious. This discussion definitely needs to be more listener-friendly!

I listened to the Culture Gabfest 3 times trying to like it. But, NO. It's boring. I've had the screener of Juno for about a month and still haven't watched it yet. The main question was are the two movies good. But they go off on a tangent comparing Juno to the Obama campaign, and comparing it to Knocked Up. Also when they talk about There will be Blood, once they start using literary terms like allegory, they're just talking to other self-important reviewers. Also what was the purpose of the third topic. Amy Winehouse. They don't ask, if she deserves the awards. My take is that she was some B-list singer, but when she started having problems, the entertainment media, found it ironic that she has a song called Rehab. I don't know about the rest of you, but my local news show would always sing "No, No, No" when ever they did a story about her. Since she was getting as this publicity was the reason to her rise. It's kind of like how Paris Hilton became famous. Getting back to the podcast. If these people were at a party, I'd head to the other side of the house.

Oh and I forgot. It's nice to see Dana has time to do this podcast, but hasn't done a Spoiler Special Podcast in 2 months.