Phil was actually worried he and Dean wouldn’t have enough to discuss to fill this week’s show and wow was his worry unfounded! The gentlemen get the conversational ball rolling with the return of “What We’re Reading” wherein four quite fascinating and quite disparate works get covered, leading to in-depth discussion about such topics as painting watercolors, epistolary novels, the comedic genius of Norm Macdonald, and life in Austria-Hungary of the early 1900s. All the major prizewinners at Cannes 2026 get discussed, and the early summer U.S. box office gets celebrated. Then, however, the tone turns darker, as the need for a full-on boycott of Paramount and its properties gets expressed, and the ramifications of waiting for the Warner Bros. merger to launch said boycott get explored. Dean saw The Sheep Detectives and shares his thoughts. Phil watched the classic 1945 film noir Detour and spills the dirt on its director’s fall from grace, hails the film as a must-watch for aspiring filmmakers, and regales Dean with a delightful fact about the career of the film’s lead actress, Ann Savage.

Welcome to Year 20 (“the year we get it right!”). On this, their overall 988th installment, Dean and Phil really put the “Hollywood” into “Chillpak Hollywood Hour” with showbiz news, analysis, previews and reviews. It starts with a discussion of the long-running series “Supernatural”. Then in the “Lawsuit of the Week” the supposed end of the It Ends With Us lawsuits gets discussed. The surprising details of the SAG-AFTRA deal with the AMPTP get analyzed and the fact that it (most likely) means no labor stoppage for the next four years gets celebrated. Some fascinating rules changes for next year’s Oscars get dissected, and some seemingly terrific, but certainly intriguing, news regarding Greta Gerwig’s “Narnia” movie for Netflix gets hailed. The Cannes film festival gets previewed. As does the American Cinematheque’s Bleak Week festival. Finally, two current theatrical releases get hailed as modern masterworks and the plans for a new episode of “Deep Dive” get finalized.