The Spool

The Spool Unraveling pop culture one thread at a time. Reviews, interviews, news and podcasts.

A weekly podcast dedicated to discussing a different film each week, along with a custom cocktail and drinking game. Subscribe to us on iTunes or your favorite podcatcher, and visit us at www.alcohollywood.com!

Tim Stevens is here for the cheesy thrills of a NOW YOU SEE ME NOW YOU DON'T, a film that's short on logic but long on c...
11/11/2025

Tim Stevens is here for the cheesy thrills of a NOW YOU SEE ME NOW YOU DON'T, a film that's short on logic but long on charm.

One can imagine an incredible film about magicians that plays it entirely straight. A picture that relys entirely on the performers’ talents for sleight of hand and stagecraft. The magicians as con artists/Robin Hoods series, Now You See Me, however, has no interest in that sort of thing. The thir...

There are so many things Tim Stevens wants to tell you about PLURIBUS. But, unfortunately, he can't. So he'll just tell ...
11/11/2025

There are so many things Tim Stevens wants to tell you about PLURIBUS. But, unfortunately, he can't. So he'll just tell you it's great.

In many ways, it is a familiar tale. Something has come to Earth and changed the population. Everyone still looks like people, but they no longer sound or act quite right. Think Invasion of the Body Snatchers. But what if the new “versions” of humanity are friendly to a fault? What if they make ...

Tim Stevens finds plenty to love in DOWN CEMETERY ROAD's lead performances but can't quite get over the failure to be th...
06/11/2025

Tim Stevens finds plenty to love in DOWN CEMETERY ROAD's lead performances but can't quite get over the failure to be the show it starts as.
https://buff.ly/Do3ZYQD

Like so many massive conspiracies, the one at the heart of Down Cemetery Road unravels for the smallest of reasons. A museum conservationist, Sarah Trafford (Ruth Wilson), wants to bring a girl a “Get Well Soon” card in the hospital. Hospital administrators turn her away. However, they don’t j...

DIE MY LOVE showcases a Jennifer Lawrence at her most free, writes Sarah Gorr.
03/11/2025

DIE MY LOVE showcases a Jennifer Lawrence at her most free, writes Sarah Gorr.

There’s something unflinching in the air these days when it comes to movies about mothers. If you found If I Had Legs I’d Kick You a rough ride, you’d better buckle up for Die My Love. Lynne Ramsay’s latest is an absolutely brutal exploration of what happens when motherhood and domesticity f...

Lisa Laman appreciates GOOD FORTUNE's Keanu Reeves' performance, but its low-key vibes eventually become more of a weakn...
01/11/2025

Lisa Laman appreciates GOOD FORTUNE's Keanu Reeves' performance, but its low-key vibes eventually become more of a weakness than an advantage.

Sometimes, a movie’s greatest asset is also a fatal drawback. Take the low-key, affable ambiance of writer/director Aziz Ansari’s new comedy Good Fortune. In this production, Ansari plays Arj, a man living out of his car and struggling to make ends meet in Los Angeles. He’s become immensely ja...

Skip the plane to Macau recommends Tim Stevens as BALLAD OF A SMALL PLAYER isn't worth the trip.
31/10/2025

Skip the plane to Macau recommends Tim Stevens as BALLAD OF A SMALL PLAYER isn't worth the trip.

If one’s biggest compliment for a film belongs to a mid-credits dance sequence that doesn’t really have much to do with the plot, it doesn’t bode well for the overall work. Unfortunately, Ballad of a Small Player is such a work. The latest from director Edward Berger once again draws on a nove...

Despite an excellent Jacob Elordi, Lisa Laman finds Guillermo del Toro's FRANKENSTEIN adaptation entirely too rote.
31/10/2025

Despite an excellent Jacob Elordi, Lisa Laman finds Guillermo del Toro's FRANKENSTEIN adaptation entirely too rote.

Despite Aaron Eckhart’s definitive portrayal of Mary Shelley’s iconic beast in Yo, Frankenstein, filmmakers remain committed to realizing the gothic horror novel on-screen. The latest incarnation of the 1818 novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus, from writer/director Guillermo del Toro, ...

Admitted Kathryn Bigelow-enthusiast Tim Stevens comes away from A HOUSE OF DYNAMITE disappointed, comparing it to an unf...
31/10/2025

Admitted Kathryn Bigelow-enthusiast Tim Stevens comes away from A HOUSE OF DYNAMITE disappointed, comparing it to an unfinished in-class essay.

A House of Dynamite director Kathryn Bigelow has made her name essentially directing two very different kinds of films. Genre pictures like Near Dark and Strange Days mark the first half of her career. These features push conventions to deliver some of the best examples of their categories. The latt...

Despite the challenges inherent in stretching a rom-com's appeal past the first blush, Tim Stevens finds NOBODY WANTS TH...
31/10/2025

Despite the challenges inherent in stretching a rom-com's appeal past the first blush, Tim Stevens finds NOBODY WANTS THIS Season 2 still delivers, albeit with a few less jokes.

Romantic comedies rarely have sequels and with good reason. The kind of energy that makes rom-coms so enjoyable isn’t generally reproducible without diminishing results. At best, you end up with some idealized version of passionate love that’s fun to observe but feels entirely unrelatable. At wo...

Harlan Coben offers his first original to TV series with LAZARUS on Prime Video. Tim Stevens suggests the writer might'v...
21/10/2025

Harlan Coben offers his first original to TV series with LAZARUS on Prime Video. Tim Stevens suggests the writer might've done better to keep it to himself.

In the past decade, Harlan Coben has been adapted to television 19 times. With Lazarus (or Harlan Coben’s Lazarus as Prime Video stylizes it), he, along with Daniel Brocklehurst, has created his first original to TV offering. With a surprisingly solid record in his other crime dramas, it makes a c...

In anticipation of the final episode of SLOW HORSES Season 5's final episode tomorrow, revisit Tim Stevens's review in w...
21/10/2025

In anticipation of the final episode of SLOW HORSES Season 5's final episode tomorrow, revisit Tim Stevens's review in which he compares it to the 92-93 Chicago Bulls.

Last year, the team from Slough House went up against as close to a super villain as can exist in their universe, River Cartwright’s (Jack Lowden) biological father, Frank Harkness (Hugo Weaving). It is no wonder in Slow Horses Season 5, everyone—characters and crew—feels a little bit exhauste...

Slick but too quick to abandon its mystery, THE WOMAN IN CABIN 10 left Tim Stevens feeling soggy.
21/10/2025

Slick but too quick to abandon its mystery, THE WOMAN IN CABIN 10 left Tim Stevens feeling soggy.

The Woman in Cabin 10 belongs to a subgenre that goes back to the Vanishing Hotel Room urban legend. In it, a daughter leaves her sick mother in a hotel room to get out and get her medicine. By the time she returns, her mother is nowhere to be found. Worse, everyone insists that her mother was never...

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Our Story

In 2011, Alcohollywood started as a weekly film review podcast started by two theatre kids in Chicago - film critic Clint Worthington and mixologist Jared Latore. Altogether, the podcast has amassed more than a quarter million downloads, and two nominations for Best Food/Drink Podcast at the People’s Choice Podcast Awards. The podcast is a longtime member of the Chicago Podcast Coop, and has performed live shows at the Chicago Podcast Festival and PodSlam.

Seven years later, Alcohollywood has rebranded into a full-fledged film and television outlet called The Spool, with a growing staff of writers edited by Worthington, now a Tomatometer-approved member of the Chicago Film Critics Association and Senior Writer for Consequence of Sound.

We’ve interviewed filmmakers, actors and authors including Mads Mikkelsen, Penny Lane, Filmspotting’s Josh Larsen, Zoe Lister-Jones, Felix van Groeningen, Leigh Whannell, Terry Notary, Aneesh Chaganty and Sev Ohanian, and others. We’ve also covered festivals such as Sundance, Reeling LGBTQ+ Film Festival, Fantasia Fest, Brooklyn Horror Film Festival, and the Chicago International Film Festival.

While the Alcohollywood podcast has come to a close, The Spool features two new podcasts - More of a Comment, Really..., a weekly interview podcast in which Worthington talks to actors, filmmakers, and others from the wide world of film and TV; and Hall of Faces, in which Worthington and TV critic Allison Shoemaker (and guests) debate which characters belong in their patented pantheon of TV’s greatest roles.