Cohost Helen has gotten her own groove mostly back after having to skip March, and we are finally here with 1998's How Stella Got Her Groove Back. We haven't covered an adaptation of a work by the iconic and complicated Terry McMillan since we talked Waiting to Exhale in episode six, so if you yourself were waiting until now to exhale, we hope you've been resting peacefully these last eight years. We had a lot of thoughts and feelings about this one, but we still managed to keep this conversation under 90 minutes -- you hear that, everyone involved in bringing How Stella Got Her Groove Back to the screen??

It's March y'all, officially Spring, so in honor of that, we're going to spring a surprise on you and switch up our regularly scheduled programing. We're looking forward to discussing the 1998 McMillan classic How Stella Got Her Groove Back, but in the interim, please enjoy a throwback from August 2019 when we were on our beloved podcast network, Flying Machine.

Leap year only comes around every four years, and this year -- our 8th anniversary -- marks the second leap year we've experienced as a podcast. We couldn't think of a better time to finally bring you an enthusiastic discussion of the oft-mentioned 2010 rom-com Leap Year -- but we didn't do that. Instead, we're here with an enraged dialog about the best-forgotten 2010 rom-bomb Valentine's Day. The movie about the holiday Valentine's Day. The one that happens every year. Enjoy. ❤️

It's the 20th anniversary of the beloved film adaptation of Nicholas Sparks's The Notebook, and that means we and our podcast are really old, and that means it's time to finally cover this movie. 

Join us as we ascend the figurative ferris wheel that is this 2004 romance. Do our pants get pulled down? Do we fall in love? Has this metaphor already worn itself out? 

For a podcast that has never covered a Hallmark movie in its 7+ years of existence, our fans sure love to throw Hallmark holiday movie memes and articles our way. Now it's our turn -- see how much you like it* when we throw Hallmark holiday movie content at you, haha!  Yes, for this holidaymonth, we are talking about the holly-jolly, gay-appareled, made-for-TV stone-cold Hallmark masterpiece, The Christmas House. Is it destined to be a holiday classic, or is it merely a 90-minute makeover montage? Unwrap this gift and find out!

*we hope a lot

Aristotle and Holland Taylor once said, "The law is reason, free from passion." Valerie and Helen once said, "Oh man, we really should cover Legally Blonde at some point."  And six or so years later, here we are -- covering 2001's beloved Legally Blonde with long-overdue repeat guest, beloved Vanessa Riley from The Square Roots Podcast. 

Habeas corpus! 

To round out our whirlwind 2023 sampling of various Bennet and Darcy types (a Darcuterie, if you will), we've brought back our bestie and official Austen correspondent Tracy Tanoff for the third time/adaptation this year. Spooky month brings us to our likely last Pride and Prejudice for the foreseeable future -- the 2016 action-comedy-horror-chick-flick Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. 

Will Charlotte become a zombie? Will love conquer all? Is Helen a dirty Wickham apologist?? Find out on this month's exciting episode!

Find Tracy on Bluesky at @haveloved.bsky.social, and hear more Tracy on this year's episodes on Pride & Prejudice (2005) and Fire Island, or our other classic Austen episodes, Emma (1996) and Sense and Sensibility.

Our spooky theme song was put together by the very talented Jon Biegen -- you can find him at @jonbiegen on all socials. 

We waited a long time to see our oldest friend grace the silver screen and make it pink, but Barbie is here now, and we are glad to be able to bring our OK-maybe-not-as-objective-as-they-could-be thoughts to you in this, the year of our Lord*, 2023.

*Greta Gerwig

It is the dog days of summer and we have dog mom and Atlanta comedian Gloria White joining the pod to discuss the 2006 ultra chick flick, Something New. Bonus: Listeners who imbibe can take advantage of the opportunity to drink every time we crack a title pun. 

✨ Check out Gloria on Instagram  Find her on all the socials, look for the handle "glow07" ❤️ Listen to Gloria on a recent episode of One Fry Short

We had such a gay old time covering Pride & Prejudice earlier this year that for Pride month, we wanted to have an even gayer, new time -- so we grabbed our beloved Austen correspondent Tracy Tanoff to talk about the 2022 loose P&P adaptation Fire Island. Does Elizabeth find her Darcy? I don't know who those people are, but I can tell you I've got my eye on Noah and Will. (Hahaha, this is a ruse, as I have watched the movie and actually know what happens! Spoiler alert: lots of beautiful super-queer shit).  Check out Gay Austen, per Tracy's recommendation, and then watch Fire Island on Hulu -- twice in a row, if you're cool.

It's been 23 years since Bring It On brought its cheer to the world, and it's been something like 6 years since we had our beloved friend and cheerleader-lover* Owen Choules on to talk about a chick flick with us. 

So do we do a high kick and delight in this classic, or do we give it the spirit finger? Does Owen still tolerate us? What is team captain Torrance's connection to the dad from The Shining? Listen to find out! Rah!

*Yeah, he won't object to that descriptor at all, probably