The first time I saw Top Gun, I hated it. As a wee lad, I remember seeing it in a packed theater in 1986. I remember the whooshing of the jets, the omnipresent soundtrack, and the unnerving intensity of Tom Cruise. I remember the buzz of the audience walking out. People adored it, and I […]

Within stories, the idea of continuity is powerful. It’s like the lure of history, the pull to understand events or character through the study of a chain of events. That’s why we dive into literary series, why we’ll binge-watch a show on Netflix, and why we’ll carry around decades of plot points regarding comic books.  […]

What makes the ideal family movie? First, let’s define what I’m not talking about. I don’t mean an animated feature that’s geared toward kids but has a few pop-cultural references thrown in for the olds. I don’t mean an entry in the MCU, as older viewers might be turned off by the comic-booky violence and […]

For a while there, Michael Bay was arguably the biggest action director in the world. In the mid-90s, he directed Bad Boys, The Rock, and Armageddon. All three films made money — a lot of money. His style could be described as a kind of “golden hour on more than a little cocaine” kind of […]

It’s days like this that remind me of just how little I really know about movies. You see, I’m here to talk about The Northman, the gore-drenched film directed by Robert Eggers concerning the revenge of a Viking prince. As I was turning the movie over in my head, I began wondering, “Are Viking films […]

Buffy the Vampire Slayer is one of the greatest television shows in the history of the medium. Despite being the brainchild of a known abuser, it’s a series that deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, and The Wire. Buffy used humor, drama, horror, and so, so much more […]

From the moment you started reading this sentence, you’ve already made a number of decisions. Did you skip breakfast? Check your email first? Call out sick even though you feel fine? For every choice you made, there might be another universe where you made the opposite choice.* How does that choice change what you do, […]

In specificity comes universality. I know that’s pretentious, but if you take away the pointlessly flowery prose, the point still stands. When someone makes a piece of art and does so with a focused perspective, it acts as an open door for the audience. Theoretically, it allows anyone from any walk of life to view […]

Like criminals, screenwriters can be a superstitious and cowardly lot. Can you blame them? They’re trying to break into an industry that has very few clear guidelines on how to do so, constantly shifting professional requirements, and an almost sociopathic sense of entitlement. It is, and I am not exaggerating, easier to get into the […]

As a college kid, even more so than now, I was deeply unlikable. That’s normal and it’s always been normal. After getting booted out of high school, we all take our first trembling steps toward adulthood. We all make stupid mistakes that, in retrospect, were easily avoided. We all want the adults around us to […]