Warning: spoilers for the first two seasons of House of Cards are below When I think of House of Cards nowadays, the first word that comes to mind is “pity.” I know this is more than a little strange; after all, this show was made popular by way of its pitilessness, and set into motion by a […]
Double Consciousness: I Walked Backward All the Way from the Living Room
Here’s a trick: Find a person you love and offer them something no one has ever seen, that no one will ever see again. Admire their astonishment. Then, produce a peanut. It could be anything in a shell—an oyster, say, but that’s messier to share. Crack it open, and each eat one of the nuts. […]
Double Consciousness: Mad Men is the Superhero Show We Need Now
Here’s a trick: Find a person you love and offer them something no one has ever seen, that no one will ever see again. Admire their astonishment. Then, produce a peanut. It could be anything in a shell—an oyster, say, but that’s messier to share. Crack it open, and each eat one of the nuts. […]
Double Consciousness: Everything’s Exactly the Same
Here’s a trick: Find a person you love and offer them something no one has ever seen, that no one will ever see again. Admire their astonishment. Then, produce a peanut. It could be anything in a shell—an oyster, say, but that’s messier to share. Crack it open, and each eat one of the nuts. […]
Dueling Auteurs: Genndy Tartakovsky x Hideaki Anno: Masters of Stillness
Because we’re geeks, we frequently find it’s easier to understand an artist’s work when comparing them to another artist, finding out the common or antithetical traits that bind them. Hence Dueling Auteurs, a column where we take two auteurs from any medium and compare and contrast them. Liam Conlon is kicking things off with Genndy Tartakovsky, […]
A True Freak Must Be Born: Will Freakshow Be American Horror Story’s Best Season Yet?
Few works are as difficult to critically evaluate as each new season of American Horror Story. From its shifting “anthology” format to its gleeful abandonment of the massive number of plotlines each season cranks out to its total adherence to a philosophy of style over substance, AHS isn’t a television series anyone would truly call “great,” yet every […]
Editorial: Why Netflix’s Gotham Deal Could Be a Sign That Netflix Will Save the Networks
In a deal that made so much sense that even Fox couldn’t fuck it up, Netflix has already acquired the rights to stream the new show Gotham before the first episode has even aired. Hell; the pilot hasn’t even leaked yet, at least not to my knowledge. Deadline alleges that the cost for grabbing the early […]
Difficult Procedures: The Knick is a Bleak Look at Medicine and Society in the Industrial Era
It’s a testament to the weird way my brain works that the first thing I notice about Steven Soderbergh’s new show The Knick is that it starts almost exactly like the scene introducing Johnny Depp’s Inspector Abberline in From Hell, the world’s second worst Alan Moore adaptation. Clive Owen is replacing Johnny Depp, Lodon is switched out […]
Leaving Limbo: A Discussion About The Leftovers
The Leftovers is the newest hypeworthy HBO drama, helmed by Damon Lindelof and Tom Perrotta, the author of the eponymous book it adapts. Set three years after 2% of Earth’s population vanished into thin air with no explanation, the show hones in on the town of Mapleton, New York and the lives of the people […]
Complicated Games: Tech Gets Humanized in Silicon Valley and Halt and Catch Fire
I grew up around computers. Not in the same “born with a smart phone in my hands” way the current generation has, I’m just old enough that when my dad forced us to get familiar with them as kids it was still a novelty. Mario taught me how to type, Oregon Trail taught me all […]