‘Silent Night, Deadly Night’: Rohan Campbell & Mike P. Nelson On Bloody Holiday Romance, Nazi Christmas Parties, & Defending ‘Halloween Ends’ [The Discourse Podcast]

Holiday horror is usually all tinsel and trauma, but the new remake of "Silent Night, Deadly Night" decides it also wants to add a warm hug, a nervous breakdown, and a full-blown Nazi Christmas party for good measure. Director Mike P. Nelson takes the infamous killer Santa premise and rebuilds it as a supernatural slasher with a bruised, endearing Hallmark heart at the center, following a gentler, wounded version of Billy Chapman and the woman who accidentally falls in love with the monster in the red suit. It is romantic, nasty, and weird in exactly the right Christmas-y ways.On this episode of The Discourse, host Mike DeAngelo is joined by star Rohan Campbell and director Mike P. Nelson to delve into reinventing a cult slasher, balancing sweetness with splatter, staging set pieces like a Nazi Christmas party and a nightmare ball pit, and exploring where a potential sequel could take Billy and Pam.

Childhood fears, bedtime monsters, and the hazy membrane between imagination and trauma collide in “Dust Bunny,” the feature directorial debut of Bryan Fuller, a filmmaker whose storytelling instincts have always lived in the space between the two B’s - beauty and brutality. It is a film that feels handcrafted out of nightmares and fairy-tale sugar, a creature feature through the eyes of a child who sees the world in magic and menace at the same time. Rich with color, shadows, and emotional ambiguity, it is unmistakably a Bryan Fuller movie, which is to say that it’s tender, violent, mischievous, and sincere in equal measure.Joining The Discourse in today’s episode is Bryan Fuller himself, the writer and director behind shows like “Hannibal,” “Pushing Daisies,” “American Gods,” and “Star Trek: Discovery” (in its early days). Fuller’s signature blend of genre storytelling and emotional excavation finds a new form here as he steps behind the camera for his first feature-length film, crafting a story about a little girl who hires a hitman to kill the monster under her bed and discovers that nothing is simple when your fears have roots. The film stars Mads Mikkelsen, Sigourney Weaver, David Dastmalchian, Sophie Sloan, and Sheila Atim.

There’s refined British comedy, and then there’s “Fackham Hall,” a movie that waltzes in wearing period-accurate garb on the outside and immediately trips over the furniture. It’s the kind of delightfully silly romp where aristocrats brood, servants scramble, romance simmers, relatives wed, and the background is working twice as hard as the actors to steal every scene, like “Downton Abbey” politely offering you tea while “Airplane” swaps the sugar for gunpowder. Set between the wars, the film follows starry-eyed servant Eric and rebellious aristocrat Rose as their forbidden attraction detonates inside a household already teetering on the edge of absurdity. The ensemble includes Thomasin McKenzie, Damian Lewis, Katherine Waterston, Tom Felton, and a sprawling cast of blissfully serious performers.Joining The Discourse in today’s episode are “Fackham Hall” director Jim O’Hanlon and star Thomasin McKenzie, who break down how the team crafted a period comedy where the jokes never stop multiplying and the sincerity has to be played with absolute conviction.

Kingstown never sleeps. It snarls. It churns. It eats the weak. With “Mayor of Kingstown” returning for Season 4, the Paramount+ thriller doubles down on the brutal machinery of power, corruption, and survival that has defined the series from the beginning. But this year, something shifts. A storm hits the city in the form of Edie Falco, who joins the show as Nina Hobbs, the new prison warden and a razor-sharp antagonist to Jeremy Renner’s battered fixer, Mike McLusky.Joining Bingeworthy for this episode are Jeremy Renner and Edie Falco, who break down the fierce chess match between Mike and Nina, the sense of doom that defines their characters, and the existential question haunting this season.READ MORE: ‘IT: Welcome To Derry’: Andy & Barbara Muschietti, Jason Fuchs & Brad Caleb Kane On Pennywise’s Origins, Their Multi-Season Plan, And Their Experience on ‘The Flash’ [Bingeworthy Podcast]Renner said the fun of their dynamic comes from how quickly civility slips into threat. He explained that their very first exchange set the tone. “From our first scene, it’s like the lightest version of that, but it does just keep going, that chess match. But it’s really good writing and when it’s not, we fix it. And the job’s easy and it becomes fun when you have really talented people to work with. You can really find nuances to things and not be like, it’s not posturing. It becomes a really wonderful dance.” He added that beneath the barbs, both characters genuinely want some level of cooperation. “We are not playing like we hate each other. We want to work through this, but this is what I got to do.”

In Derry, the past never stays buried. Set in 1962, "IT: Welcome to Derry" rewinds Stephen King’s nightmare town to a moment of postcard innocence and slowly peels the veneer off to show the rot underneath. The new HBO series acts as a prequel to "IT" and "IT: Chapter Two", following the Hanlon family as they’re pulled into another brutal cycle of disappearances, hauntings, and a certain grinning figure who feeds beneath the streets. Bill Skarsgård returns as Pennywise, joined by newcomers James Remar, Taylour Paige, Jovan Adepo, and Chris Chalk.Joining host Mike DeAngelo for the podcast are executive producers Andy Muschietti and Barbara Muschietti, along with co-showrunners Jason Fuchs and Brad Caleb Kane, who walk through how this new cycle came to life and why the Kingverse has far deeper corners than the films could ever reach.

theaters on November 14 from Lionsgate.For Fleischer, returning to work with Eisenberg and Harrelson was a huge draw, but it wasn't the only draw. “It was a combination of factors,” he said. “Definitely a desire to work with Jesse and Woody again. This was my fourth movie with each of them. They’re great collaborators, super funny, brilliant actors. I just absolutely love working with them.” He was also a fan of the original franchise and, as he put it, “a huge fan of magic.” Those factors made it an easy yes. “It seemed like it would be a lot of fun and it played to my strengths of making a super fun movie for audiences.”

The future isn’t sleek or utopian; it’s loud, televised, and brought to you by your favorite corporate sponsors. In Edgar Wright’s high-voltage new film, “The Running Man,” entertainment has literally become a blood sport. Based on Stephen King’s 1982 novel, this isn’t your father’s dystopia; it’s a world where survival ratings matter more than life itself, and one wrong move can make you viral in all the wrong ways. Glenn Powell stars as Ben Richards, a man framed, hunted, and transformed into TV’s latest disposable hero.It’s a punchy, adrenaline-fueled reinvention from a filmmaker who loves turning chaos into choreography. Wright trades the candy-coated energy of “Baby Driver” and “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” for something grittier and sweatier, a survival thriller that feels uncomfortably close to our algorithmic present. It’s wickedly funny, politically sharp, and unmistakably his, even as it veers into darker, nastier terrain.READ MORE: ‘A House of Dynamite’: Noah Oppenheim On Real-Time Nuclear Horror, Collaborating With Kathryn Bigelow, His ‘Jack Ryan’ Film & More [The Discourse Podcast]

Crime, corruption, and a phoenix-like comeback collide in the heart of Amsterdam’s weed underworld. Netflix’s “Amsterdam Empire” is a pulpy, fun new crime series set in Amsterdam’s glamorous and dangerous weed industry, where revenge and reinvention go hand in hand. The show follows Betty, a former pop star played by Famke Janssen, whose crumbling marriage to the owner of a Marijuana shop empire known as “The Jackal” sparks a battle that pulls in gangsters, police, and lovers. Weed may be legal to smoke in the Netherlands, but growing it is not, and the family’s illegal grow operations soon attract unwanted attention from rival factions and law enforcement alike.Joining Bingeworthy for this episode is Famke Janssen, who not only stars as Betty but also serves as executive producer and co-costume designer. The series also marks her first time performing in her native Dutch language. She describes the experience as both nerve-wracking and exhilarating.

In Alaska’s endless white, a small town sheriff hunts escaped convicts through blizzards and betrayal, only to uncover a web of CIA secrets and buried love that refuses to stay frozen. Yes, the ’90s action vibes are strong with Apple TV+’s “The Last Frontier,, a wintry chase thriller where a quiet Alaskan town becomes a pressure cooker. Planes fall out of the sky, fugitives scatter into the wild, and a local deputy with a past shoulders more than his share of the storm. It’s lean, charged, and undoubtedly built to binge. The series stars Jason Clarke, Haley Bennett, Dominic Cooper, Alfre Woodard, and more.Joining Bingeworthy for this episode covering “The Last Frontier” are Jason Clarke (star and executive producer) and Jon Bokenkamp (writer, producer, and showrunner). Throughout our conversations, they delve into throwback influences, the human heartbeat beneath the chaos, and why the show’s most memorable moments aren’t always the loudest ones.During the interviews, Jon Bokenkamp is quick to openly call the series a love letter to high-concept ’90s summer action thrillers, the kind you can pitch in one sentence and feel in your bones like “Con Air” and “Point Break.” “It’s really a high-concept idea,” Jon said. “Most of those films that inspired it, you can say in one sentence, ‘here’s the elevator version,’ and you go, ‘I get it.’ A little action heavy, slightly heightened, maybe turned up to 11 or 12.”

What would you do with 18 minutes left before the end of the world? That question ignites "A House of Dynamite," a pulse-pounding new thriller from director Kathryn Bigelow and writer-producer Noah Oppenheim that dramatizes the unthinkable: the countdown between nuclear launch and annihilation. Told in real time, the film locks viewers inside the corridors of power as a U.S. president, military advisors, and intelligence officials face the impossible decision to retaliate or die trying. The result is an unbearably tense and disturbingly plausible experience that plays less like Hollywood fiction and more like a documentary from the edge of civilization. The film hits Netflix on October 24.On this episode of The Discourse, host Mike DeAngelo sits down with Noah Oppenheim, who discusses crafting the film’s chilling realism, his creative partnership with Kathryn Bigelow, and how his background as a journalist and former NBC News president informed his approach to humanizing institutions we normally only see as faceless power structures.READ MORE: ‘A House Of Dynamite’ Review: Kathryn Bigelow Returns With Another Explosive Political Thriller [Venice]