The Worst Idea of All Time

“Grown Ups 2” has 7% on Rotten Tomatoes. A review from The Arizona Republic said,“It’s like everyone involved intentionally tried to create a horrible movie.” “Sex and the City 2” had the honor of receiving a scathing, one-star review from Roger Ebert. Even Sarah Jessica Parker has acknowledged that it sucked. And critics of “We Are Your Friends” were divided into wondering if the film was a poor attempt at creating something earnest, or if it was just a  lifeless, plotless music video set to pounding EDM.

It can be fun to watch movies that are ‘so bad they’re good,’ but these movies can’t even offer that. Nothing is more boring than mediocrity.

To watch a movie like “Grown Ups 2” once is a mistake. To watch it a few times is poor decision making. But to watch it once a week, every week, for an entire year? That might be the worst idea of all time.

Guy Montgomery and Tim Batt agree, and their podcast The Worst Idea of All Time is a celebration of friendship, comedy, and slowly being driven insane by some of Hollywood’s most abominable creations.

We have cultivated this ludicrous community of people who enjoy the stupid thing we are doing even more than we do.”

In 2014, Montgomery and Batt started the show and watched “Grown Ups 2” once a week for 52 weeks. Following that came “Sex and the City 2” for an entire year. Their final season consisted of watching and reviewing “We Are Your Friends,” a low-budget film about the EDM DJ scene starring Zac Efron.

But they just can’t quit terrible movies. Old seasons are evergreen and available for listening, and The Worst Idea of All Time still releases new episodes discussing cinematic news and one-off reviews of notoriously bad films. Recently, the duo released a full season of Overlooked and Undercooked, which reviewed Rob Schneider’s self-funded Netflix series “Real Rob.”

Guy and Tim have also partnered with the McElroy brothers to create Til Death Do Us Blart, an eternal podcast where they’ve committed to watching “Paul Blart Mall Cop 2” every year for the rest of their lives.

We knew we wanted to watch something mediocre, hopefully not something so bad it would be fun.”

The friends first became a comedy team on a late night TV show in their homeland of New Zealand. Guy hosted and Tim had a segment reviewing public toilets. “As the host of the show, I made the decision to resent Tim’s contribution and tell him live on air I didn’t respect his segment,” said Guy. “By the end of the six months we were on the air, Tim’s character was destitute and living beneath a bridge, coming on the air in a brown paper bag. The audience loved it.”

After the channel lost its funding, Guy and Tim wanted to go on making something together. Not long after that, The Worst Idea of All Time was born.

Having done three year-long seasons, the guys are veterans of the process.

“The opening months are a real hot and cold time,” said Guy. “On one hand, you’re sizing up the movie for the first time so you’ve got new source material that is the most promising it will ever be. On the other hand, there is a looming sense of doom, because for better and worse you are going to be stuck with this thing week in week out.”

The weeks in the teens can be rough, as the new material grows stale and the finish line seems distant. But Guy said by the thirties, things start to pick back up again. “The forties are a beautiful time for reflection and nostalgia.”

Tim and Guy have featured many guests on their various projects, and have performed lived shows. Going from talking to a friend to being on stage in front of an audience is a sharp transition, but the community behind The Worst Idea of All Time always responded in force — the show itself has over 5 million downloads.

The first live show was in Los Angeles and served as the finale to their “Sex in the City 2” season. “I learnt that night that no one comes to the live shows by accident. These are people who have formed a connection to us and want to see us talk about ‘Sex and the City 2’ for the 52nd time in the flesh,” said Guy. “We have cultivated this ludicrous community of people who enjoy the stupid thing we are doing even more than we do.”

Tim also enjoys live shows. “I have a fucking ball and am frequently intoxicated.”

It may not be a coincidence that two-thirds of the seasons of The Worst Idea of All Time are sequels, as well as the subject of Til Death Do Us Blart. Recently it seems like every movie is being turned into a franchise, and sequels and reboots are being churned out like products at a factory.

“As a very general rule, sequels are cynical, dispassionate cash grabs,” said Tim. “Building needless franchises never ends well. It’s the most obvious sign of capitalism butting up against the art of film making and it so often ruins the best intentions of the original film.  Nowhere is this more true than the lazily put together Grown Ups 2.”

Lazy filmmaking may not make box-office success, but it does make good fodder for podcasts.

“We knew we wanted to watch something mediocre, hopefully not something so bad it would be fun,” said Tim. “But not something so good, we’d enjoy it either. ‘Grown Ups 2’ presented the perfect storm: big budget, big comedy stars and — from the very little we knew about it going in — not great reviews.”

Sequels and mediocrity may be overwhelming Hollywood, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be enjoyed.

“The fact that ‘Paul Blart 2’ exists beggars belief,” said Tim, “but I cannot wait to see the eventual end of the trilogy with Paul Blart assuming his rightful place as Secretary of Defense after a series of administrative blunders.”

The Worst Idea of All Time still releases new episodes. Visit The Worst Idea of All Time on Podchaser to listen with your favorite app, and leave it a rating or review.

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