WKGC Public Media

About WKGC Public Media

Broadcasting from the campus of Gulf Coast State College in Panama City, we are the Emerald Coast’s local public radio station. Our mixed format lineup of shows provides listeners with national, local, and student-produced cultural programming, news, and a variety of music to enrich your day. Our on-air personalities engage listeners by igniting curiosity, enriching minds, and cultivating relationships within the Emerald Coast Community through our high-quality, thought-provoking content. 90.7 WKGC Public Media--education, entertainment, and everything in between.

Publisher

WKGC Public Media

Category

arts · education · tv & film

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

29 Apr 2025

Latest episode

1 Nov 2026

Latest episodes

165 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   1 Nov 2026

   ReelTalk 11/02/2026 Remembering Sir Patrick Stewart with Gino Sassani

   There are actors we admire. There are characters we love. And every so often, there is a performance so definitive that actor and character become nearly inseparable in the cultural imagination. For generations of Star Trek fans, Sir Patrick Stewart was Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Of course, Stewart’s extraordinary career extended far beyond the bridge of the Enterprise. He gave us Professor Charles Xavier, brought terrifying menace to Green Room, demonstrated impeccable comic timing on Frasier, and delivered what I consider the definitive portrayal of Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol. But Picard was something different. Patrick Stewart took what could have been simply another television captain and created one of the great leaders in popular culture: thoughtful without being indecisive, authoritative without being authoritarian, principled without being self-righteous, and intellectually curious without ever losing his humanity. Picard did not lead because he was the strongest person in the room. He led because he understood the responsibility of command. He listened. He questioned. He defended the rights of people who could not defend themselves. He respected expertise. He admitted uncertainty. And when necessary, he stood alone against admirals, governments, alien civilizations—even members of his own institution—because he believed principle mattered. For me, and for millions of others, Jean-Luc Picard was more than a favorite fictional captain. He was an example. There is a temptation when an actor becomes inseparable from an iconic character to forget that the two are not the same person. Patrick Stewart was not Jean-Luc Picard. And yet, through his voice, his intellect, his training, his discipline, and his humanity, he gave Picard something that transcended performance. He made us believe this man could lead the Enterprise. More importantly, he made us believe humanity might someday deserve someone like Jean-Luc Picard to lead it. Picard taught us that strength does not require cruelty. That intelligence does not require arrogance. That diplomacy is not weakness. That principles mean very little if we abandon them when they become inconvenient. That it is possible to make no mistakes and still lose. That the first freedom denied diminishes everyone. And that the time we have—right now—is precious. Sir Patrick Stewart leaves behind Shakespeare, Scrooge, Professor Xavier, unforgettable villains, comedy, stage work, film, television, and a career that stretched across generations. But for many of us, somewhere out among the stars, he will always be our captain. Joining me today is returning guest, friend of the show, and fellow Trekkie Gino Sassani.

2. 

   26 Oct 2026

   10/26/2026 reviewing WILDWOOD with Jen Wead

   There are animated movies—and then there are movies that remind us animation is an art form. Wildwood is one of those movies. Laika’s latest stop-motion fantasy is enormous in scale, intricate in design, and at times almost overwhelming in its craftsmanship. It is a movie where you can practically feel the hands of the artists in every frame. And in that respect, Wildwood belongs to a much older tradition. Long before digital creatures dominated movie screens, Ray Harryhausen was bringing mythological monsters to life one frame at a time—the Cyclops in The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, the giant bronze Talos and unforgettable skeleton army in Jason and the Argonauts, and Medusa in Clash of the Titans. His creatures moved with a slightly uncanny rhythm, but that was precisely what gave them presence. They were tangible. They occupied space. They had personality. That same soul lives inside Wildwood. The animation is mesmerizing, frequently beautiful, occasionally terrifying, and astonishing in its scale and scope. Yet for all that technical achievement, I still found myself thinking about another Laika film: Kubo and the Two Strings. Because while Wildwood may be the greater technical achievement, I’m not convinced it tells the greater story. Joining me today is longtime friend Jennifer Wead, a fan of high fantasy films and someone whose graduate work in linguistics gives her a particularly interesting perspective on language, culture, and how imaginary worlds communicate meaning. Animation is sometimes described as though it were a genre. It is not. It is a method of filmmaking—and Wildwood reminds us just how limitless that method can be. Nearly a century after Willis O’Brien made audiences believe in King Kong, and decades after Ray Harryhausen brought skeletons, Cyclopes, giants, and mythological creatures to life one painstaking frame at a time, Laika continues that tradition by pushing stop-motion into territory that once seemed impossible. Wildwood may not, for me, surpass Kubo and the Two Strings as Laika’s finest piece of storytelling. But as an achievement of animation? It is extraordinary. The movie is beautiful, frightening, tactile, enormous, and unmistakably handmade. And perhaps that is ultimately what connects Laika to Harryhausen. Technology changes. Scale changes. Techniques evolve. But the magic still begins with an artist moving something ever so slightly—and then doing it again. And again. And again. Until somehow, impossibly, it comes alive.

3. 

   18 Oct 2026

   ReelTalk 10/19/2026 reviewing STREET FIGHTER (2026) with Sean Boelman

   Some movies divide audiences because of politics. Others divide audiences because of style. And then there are movies like Street Fighter, which seem to divide audiences based on one deceptively simple question: What did you come to see? For longtime fans of the games, the new Street Fighter delivers many of the recognizable pleasures one might expect: familiar characters, costumes that echo the games, signature moves, a 1990s setting, and plenty of references aimed squarely at players who grew up with the franchise. For me, however, those ingredients never developed into a dramatically satisfying movie. I found it clunky, exhausting, and strangely incoherent—a film with all the right fighters but not enough reason for them to be fighting. The characters are there. The moves are there. The nostalgia is there. The story, however, often feels like an afterthought. Street Fighter may be one of those movies where the most interesting discussion begins after the credits. For some viewers, seeing these characters recreated faithfully—the costumes, the moves, the personalities, the nostalgia—is enough to make the experience work. For others, myself included, those elements are only pieces of a motion picture. They still need a story to connect them. And maybe that is why the response has been so polarized. We are not necessarily disagreeing about what is on the screen. We may be disagreeing about what matters most once it gets there. That is also why conversations like this are more valuable than declaring that someone is or is not a “real fan.” Fandom is not a test. You can love a game and dislike its movie, love the movie and barely know the game, and you can sit across from a friend, disagree almost completely, and still have a much better conversation because of it. And that makes today’s conversation particularly interesting, because my returning guest landed more positively on the movie than I did. Joining the show once again is film critic Sean Boelman.

Who has been a guest on WKGC Public Media

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• fellow cinephile
• Sarah Whitehead
• Burl Childress
• educators
• Mike McKinney

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

Apple Podcasts (US)

5.0 / 5

2 ratings

Spotify

5.0 / 5

1 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 24 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

47

Social presence

0

YouTube

0

Engagement

0

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Guest appearances

Does not typically book guests

Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.

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