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2026 is leaping out of the gate with a flood of chaotic news stories, from Minneapolis to Greenland, from Venezuela to Iran. Justin joins me to look for the patterns uniting this increasingly jarring geopolitical reality, and to consider the poisonous cocktail of psychological, economic and historical forces that are launching us into a seemingly bleak future.

What makes John Candy such a unique figure in American pop culture? And why are we still talking about him in 2025? In this episode, Justin and I discuss the new documentary John Candy: I Like Me (dir. Colin Hanks) and reflect on Candy's outsized space in the cultural imagination, while exploring some of the darker elements of our paternal attraction to specific celebrities.

Check out our previous episode all about Planes, Trains, and Automobiles (dir. John Hughes), a key work in the Candy oeuvre.

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It's time once again to sip some eggnog and survey the wreckage of the past 12 months, as Justin joins us for a conversation about the continuing (though anti-viral) insanity of the Russia-Ukraine War and its significance within the larger framework of Europe's decline. We also talk about the strength of the MAGA project in the wake of Charlie Kirk's assassination and the rising cost of living, and consider the disturbing implications of the "Fuck Around and Find Out" philosophy as applied to political violence. Happy Holidays!