The poster art for this year's Butt-Numb-A-Thon in Austin promises one of the manliest installments of the festival yet.

Credit: AICN

'Tis the season.

And by "season," I mean that it is time for Butt-Numb-A-Thon, the 24-hour movie marathon created by Harry Knowles as the ultimate birthday for himself.

This is the 12th year of the festival, and I've been fortunate enough to attend all of them so far.  As I write this, I'm already in Austin, where I'll be making my way to the Alamo Drafthouse on Saturday, ready for another barrage of both new and vintage films, programmed by Harry for maximum effect.  I know a few things playing, and it's going to be a great year.  I love that I never know a single vintage title that will play, and that those are almost without fail the highlights of each year's line-up.

Scott Swan, my old friend and writing partner, is unable to join us in Austin this year, but he's been to many prior Butt-Numb-A-Thons.  As a result, he was the perfect guest to have on the podcast this week to talk about years past and what may happen this year.

We also run down the last few weeks of home video new-releases and we look at what's still coming out in these final days of 2010.  It's a loose and casual podcast overall, and one of the last ones for the year.  We may have a special holiday edition, and if things really work out, I'll run a couple of "best of" looks at the year's very best in Blu-ray with Scott by my side to sift through it all.

So far, I've lined up at least four great guests for the podcast in January and February, and I hope to add even more.  I think 2011 is the year we go from "nice experiment" to "must listen," hopefully, and those of you who have been listening from the start have been invaluable in offering up feedback about what you like.  I am definitely taking all of that into consideration as I look forward, and appreciate all of it.

As always, you can find us on ITunes (just search for "Drew McWeeny," and it'll take you right there) or you can download the podcast right here as an MP3, embedded below.