-
The Infinite Fantasy of The Dragon Prince
Happy quarantine, everyone. I hope we’re all staying safe and healthy and managing to keep our sanity. It’s a strange and scary time but at least we still have comforts and escapes to get us through. I, for one, have been re-watching a bunch of shows on my various streaming services these last couple weeks. Shows like Brooklyn Nine Nine, Bojack Horseman, Big Mouth, and Better Call Saul; all great ways to find a laugh or at least get your mind off everything that’s been going on (or you just finished watching all the shows that start with ‘A’). And I know for a fact, that I am not the…
-
Avenue 5; or Something to Watch at the End of the World
I’ve been thinking a lot about panic lately. I doubt this will surprise people and I know for sure I am far from the only one. With everything that is going on right now, it feels like almost everyone is operating at this baseline of a low-level buzz of panic. Not enough to cause riots in the street or anything, just enough so everyone’s on edge, just enough that panic-buying toilet paper and hoarding food has become common. It does say something to me that so many American consumer’s response to a health crisis is to shop harder, but I can’t blame anyone for that. I shopped harder myself. I’ve…
-
Onward and the Pixar Formula
Is it real heartbreak if you can see it coming from miles away? This was a question I couldn’t quite get out of my mind throughout the near 2 hour running time of Onward, Pixar’s newest film. Real heartbreak, at least in my experience, seems to require an element of surprise, some emotional tragedy that springs up at you from nowhere. Whether fiction or reality, foreknowledge always seems to ease the pain. And in Onward, from nearly the first frame (or at least from the moment the whole shape of the plot comes clear) you can almost hear the clock ticking down to the anguish the movie intends to inflict…
-
We Get What We Deserve
Two warnings before we start today. This post is about politics. It is directly about political events that have occurred or will occur, not just me tangentially relating a very enjoyable sitcom–that I do honestly recommend–to my own political ideals. I believe politics is important and influences almost everything in our lives to one degree or another, but I also believe it is rude to just bring up politics out of nowhere without giving a heads-up. So there you go. You’ve been warned. I’m angry. I’m angry as I sit here and write this and I’ve been angry since I woke up this morning. So be aware going in that…