Author Andy Weir knows how to walk the line between keeping his readers engaged and disinterested, with fascinating characters and plots, but heaps of science jargon that is mind-numbing to the common reader. Even so, he found great success with a film adaptation of The Martian, which received equal acclaim with Matt …
Some TV shows and films are part of our formative process as children. Those programs that mothers would put the TV on for their kids to watch while they have to do something else, but those media pieces worked almost as nannies for them. The most prominent example of this …
Alexandre Dumas’ novel The Count of Monte Cristo is kind of the ur-text for the modern adventure story. Published in 1844, it has it all: treachery, sword-fighting, injustice, long cons, false identities requiring elaborate disguises, secret children, hidden treasure, beautiful ladies, villains becoming heroes, heroes becoming villains, and revenge served …
I firmly believe that horror based on reality is always scarier than any supernatural horror film. Sure, don’t get me wrong, revengeful spirits and terrifying monsters make for some good thrills and chills, but at the end of the day, I can easily write them off as fiction. Instead, watching …
Limited series are becoming a new favorite medium for streaming. They last between six and eight hours and feel like an extended film. Such length allows the story to carry a deep emotional complexity. This complexity has attracted prominent actors to this limited series format. Netflix has championed this medium …
A little over one year ago, Ted Lasso aired its finale. Despite being off the air for an entire year, it has never dipped out of the top five of Apple TV+’s most-watched shows. While plenty of shows gain a new life when they are released in a new format (think Suits …
The Acolyte is the latest Star Wars show to arrive on the back of something of a mixed reception for the franchise of late, with underwhelming ventures for Ahsoka and the latest season of The Mandalorian, but with stellar outings for Andor. Thankfully, The Acolyte is more in the Andor …
Any description of The Shameless could make it sound like the most exploitative trash, so it’s stunning to realize that despite the grim setting, the exceptionally troubled characters, and the hopelessness of their situation, that it isn’t. This is a testament to the skill of writer-director (and Bulgarian-American) Konstantin Bojanov, …
Miguel Gomes won the Best Director prize at this year’s Cannes Film Festival for Grand Tour, which he co-wrote with Telmo Churro, Maureen Fazendeiro, and Mariana Ricardo, because it is an impossible film. It’s an epic pan-Asian journey best described as a mash-up of Wisconsin Death Trip and Apocalypse Now, …
Holding a mirror up to society is typical of science fiction. For the last decade or so, it’s been a little less common in Doctor Who, as the show has taken a less allegorical path, with episodes like Rosa, which tackled segregation with a literal Rosa Parks refusing to sit …
Eleanor Wells is a talented filmmaker and now author. She has a new book coming out in June, All Our Yesterdays. Set against a sprawling backdrop from Minnesota to New York City, All Our Yesterdays follows Marcy Lewis. The new high school graduate has a chance meeting full of promise …
In Hit Man, Richard Linklater’s latest film, the beloved director teams up with his star Glen Powell to write a script loosely based on a stranger-than-fiction news feature by legendary Texas Monthly reporter Skip Hollandsworth. It should be stressed that the real story, while remarkably gripping, does not go quite …
In an unprecedented move, the Cannes Film Festival jury awarded the Best Actress prize this year to the four actresses of Emilia Pérez – Zoe Saldaña, Selena Gomez, Karla Sofía Gascón and Adriana Paz. This is almost as startling as French writer-director Jacques Audiard making a primarily Spanish-language musical about …
In May this year, streaming service Apple Music started listing the 100 best albums. The albums were judged by Apple Music’s team and a commission of invited producers, artists, and industry professionals. Shockingly, The Beach Boys’ 1966 Pet Sounds was considered the 20th best of all time, below newer albums. …
The Blue Angels is the latest documentary from Paul Crowder. The film follows the elite U.S. Navy and Marine Corps pilots as they train for a year of the high-flying aerial arts. In 2022, the long-awaited sequel to Top Gun was finally released after multiple scheduling moves due to the …
2024 has been characterized by a scarcity of animated releases, but with a good standard of quality thus far. From the rich, complex Orion and the Dark to the fun, touching IF, I’ve enjoyed most animated flicks – whether hybrid or full – up to this point. Despite growing up …
In 2015, veteran filmmaker George Miller charmed the world with Mad Max: Fury Road. Many people were skeptical about the movie and felt that Miller might not be able to pull it off. However, he proved everyone wrong and gave us one of the finest movies of this generation. Since …
Survival: A basic instinct that is innate in all animals on Earth. The desire to keep living and pushing ourselves to impossible limits is one of our core motivations, even in the face of seemingly insurmountable forces. It’s this unwavering resilience that makes these stories so inspiring because as humans, …
For all its mysteries and sci-fi shenanigans, Doctor Who usually has an answer. Whether that is the Bad Wolf arc, references to Torchwood, the scientific mumbo-jumbo that sort-of-but-not-really explains itself. There’s a simplicity to the show in that regard, where you know that answers are coming. That even this current snow ordeal that continues to manifest …
The art-house multiverse is here, but this is not necessarily a good thing. The entire point of a multiverse is to enhance the ways in which people engage with each other, whether across time, the planets, or weird dimensions, and to offer space for human interaction not bound to the laws of physics. But the ways …