Come and See, and the Impossibility of Anti-War ArtI recently watched the Russian classic Come and See, which had been on my to-do list forever. The film is rightfully described as one of…Jun 11, 2023Jun 11, 2023
“The Plot Against America” and Racial ApocalypsesWhen Philip Roth published his novel The Plot Against America it was 2004, shortly before George W. Bush’s re-election. The novel tells…Feb 25, 2021Feb 25, 2021
The Sleazy Glory of Who Wants $2.69?Martin Urbano is the most miraculously uncancelled man in comedy. Every week, he goes live on Twitch and talks about his fondness for the…Feb 3, 2021Feb 3, 2021
The Anti-Politics of Joe BidenJoe Biden is mostly defined by what he’s not. Can you become President that way?Nov 3, 2020Nov 3, 2020
Just Remember That Death Is Not The End (of The Good Place)In Mur Lafferty’s Heaven, protagonist Kate dies and finds herself in heaven along with her best friend Daniel. Daniel, who she always had…Feb 21, 2020Feb 21, 2020
Does Parasite want us to eat the rich?Bong Joon-Ho’s Parasite has proven to be that rarest of objects: a foreign language film that crosses over to mainstream success in the…Feb 6, 2020Feb 6, 2020
Does America Have Talent: An Independent InvestigationIn what may have been a moment of madness, I decided to watch the most recent (fourteenth) season of America’s Got Talent, the US’s…Jan 7, 2020Jan 7, 2020
Gifted Class ConsciousnessWhen I was eight, I was selected for my school board’s gifted program. I would spend the next nine years of my life taking early-morning…Dec 27, 20192Dec 27, 20192
Published inThe StartupTrue Crime’s InnocentsAn article by Andrea Denhold critiquing the recent popularity of the true crime genre, using the example of the popular podcast My…Dec 16, 20191Dec 16, 20191
Magi-Nation: The Craze that Wasn’tIn the late 1990s, Pokemon redefined what a multimedia craze looked like. There had long been cartoons with toys and comic book tie-ins…Nov 22, 20193Nov 22, 20193
My Autistic Experience with Nagata KabiNagata Kabi is a very atypical manga artist. For one thing, she publishes her work on Pixiv and other social media platforms, outside of…Nov 15, 20191Nov 15, 20191
“Reel to reel is living verite”: The End of The Deuce, and other thingsI’ve had the final scene of HBO series The Deuce stuck in my head for the past week. (Spoilers obviously follow.) After spending the rest…Nov 8, 2019Nov 8, 2019
“American Factory”, China, and the Cinema of Global CapitalismJulia Reichert & Steven Bognar’s documentary American Factory has been a showcased part of Netflix’s original programming this month…Sep 13, 2019Sep 13, 2019
Will There Ever Be “Art TV”?FX’s sci-fi drama Legion concluded its three-season run this past week. It was one of the most improbable shows on television: a superhero…Aug 30, 2019Aug 30, 2019
Politicians You’d Like to Have a Beer WithDoug Ford, Ontario’s reactionary premier, did not run on a lot of concrete promises, preferring instead vague bromides about liking the…Aug 7, 2019Aug 7, 2019
Crime, Punishment and Persona 5I recently finished playing Persona 5. (Yes, it took me two years. Hey, it’s a long game.) It’s a game about a lot of things, but most of…Jul 26, 2019Jul 26, 2019
Commercials I Hate and Which Are Ruining SocietyTV commercials. You can’t live with them, and… well, we could all live very well without them, but we get stuck watching them anyway. In…Jun 4, 2019Jun 4, 2019
The Socialism of LibrariesThis past week, the Ontario provincial government announced that it would be slashing library funding by half. The cuts will primarily…Apr 26, 2019Apr 26, 2019
The Spectacle of the SlaughterMass killings had become a media event long before some asshole decided to live-stream his rampage through a New Zealand moss. A killing…Mar 23, 2019Mar 23, 2019