12
May
This Black Lightning article contains spoilers through Season 4, Episode 11. Black Lightning is sauntering into its final few episodes with the confidence of a keyboard warrior in a woman’s twitter mentions. It’s casual in a way that’s both worrisome and impressive, and one has to wonder if they got it or if they just think they do. Coming into the season, I felt like the writers were ramping up towards a finale that would be explosive, but so much has happened already, the story has plateaued. Don’t get me wrong, I still enjoy watching, but I’m less invested than…
19
Feb
In 1991 The Silence of the Lambs became a phenomenon; cleaning up at the box office, winning all five major Academy Awards (Best Film, Director, Screenplay, Actress, and Actor) and turning both of its lead characters into overnight icons. But while antagonist Hannibal Lecter has scarcely been away from our screens, the steely yet vulnerable hero of the film, Clarice Starling, only reappeared in the poorly received 2001 sequel Hannibal. Even Bryan Fuller’s cult classic TV adaptation of Thomas Harris’ source material novels couldn’t use Clarice due to complicated divisions of the rights. But now Clarice is back, headlining a…
18
Jan
Every trading card game has those rare cards that are so few and far between, getting a glimpse at one in real life feels special. In Pokémon Trading Card Game, you’ve the likes of the pre-release Jungle Raichu, or the Pikachu Illustrator, and in Yu-Gi-Oh there’s the original print of Dark Magician Girl, or the Chinese Blue Eyes White Dragon. For Magic: The Gathering, there’s the Power Nine, the most valuable of which is Black Lotus, and one’s about to become available – if you’ve got the money for it. The Power Nine are a set of cards that stretch…
09
Oct
This article contains MAJOR spoilers for Star Trek: Lower Decks and Star Trek: Picard. As the enemy starships are closing in, and all hope is lost, our heroes in a battered starship look up, and see that: yes, another ship has just warped in. They’re about to be rescued! Everything is going to be OK! In Star Trek, we’ve gotten used to this kind of last-minute starship rescue scene, with the most famous example probably being the Enterprise-E coming to the rescue of Worf and the Defiant in Star Trek: First Contact. But, in the Lower Decks Season 1 finale,…
16
Jun
French artist Jean-Léon Gérôme’s 1872 painting of gladiators and spectators, “Pollice Verso,” remains one of the defining portraits of ancient Rome. With its depiction of two fighters in the Colosseum, one standing and the other vanquished, pleading for mercy, it works as a paradox: The viewer is given both a sense of moral superiority over the distant past and a discreet delight as the crowd lowers their thumbs in bloodlust, demanding death. Historically accurate or not, it sets imaginations aflutter, and it alone convinced Ridley Scott to direct Gladiator. Producer Douglas Wick remembers that well. After all, it did lead…
