Jordan Peele used to be best known as a sketch comic, but his second film as a director, “Us,” is showing that the success of his first, “Get Out,” was no fluke.
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Culture Crash 19-13: Summer Concerts
Summer is almost here, which means the concert and music festival season in almost in full swing. We talk a look at why a day at an amphitheater can stick with you for life.
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Culture Crash 19-12: Junk Food TV
Sometimes you want to watch an expertly written and produced hour of television with central themes and a commentary on modern life… and sometimes, you just want to shut your brain off and watch something easy. This is about those latter experiences.
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Culture Crash 19-11: Do we all have the cultural taste of our 15 year-old selves?
Anecdotal evidence and some real data science both suggest that we never grow out of the things we loved at 15.
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Culture Crash 19-10: Netflix’s Russian Doll
Netflix’s new show, Russian Doll is an ethical, mysterious, funny drama modeled after the Groundhog Day “waking up in the same moment” plot. It’s an especially great binge-watch.
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Culture Crash 19-09: Audiobooks
Audiobooks used to be big, cumbersome collections of tapes. Now, they’re simply files on our phones, and their portability and convenience make them a great option for commute-time listening.
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Culture Crash 19-08: Television Shows Creating “Expanded Universes” of Their Own
Superhero franchises have spent a decade carefully laying plans for big, expanded universes. But we look at “Veronica Mars” and “Breaking Bad,” two TV shows that have broadened their universes in their own ways.
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Culture Crash 19-07: The Academy’s Unforced Errors
This year’s Academy Awards have been a series of mistakes, from suggesting a Best Popular Film award to the plan to award from of the evening’s awards during commercial breaks.
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Culture Crash 19-06: Missing Gems in the Deluge of ‘Peak TV’
There is so much new TV content being made that it can be easy to fall behind or forget to check out a show you meant to watch. We look at a few of these overlooked gems, like Showtime’s There is so much new TV content being made that it can be easy to fall behind or forget to check out a show you meant to watch. We look at a few of these overlooked gems, like Showtime’s “Escape at Dannemora”
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Culture Crash 19-05: On Ethan Hawke and Oscar Snubs
Every year, there is some outrage over Oscar snubs. This year, many of us wish Ethan Hawke had been nominated for First Reformed. We look at why.
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Culture Crash 19-04: A New Future for Comic Book Movies
The year 2018 gave us a lot to love at the movies. Some of the absolute highlights for me were Eighth Grade, Roma, A Quiet Place, and Blindspotting. Each of those thrilled me, entertained me, and moved me. But for me, the best film of the year was Bing Liu’s incredibly personal documentary, Minding the Gap. It’s a film I saw back in August but has stuck with me more than anything I’ve seen in a long time.
Minding the Gap tells the story of Liu himself, and of his closest friends from his childhood in Rockford, Illinois. Each came from something of a broken home, and turned to each other, and to skateboarding for an escape from their personal demons. What begins as a movie about kids skateboarding and hanging out becomes a searing look at childhood trauma, the bonds of friendship, and what effects our families can have on us as we age into adulthood.
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Culture Crash 19-03: Movies to Look Forward to in 2019
With a new year always comes new things to look forward to, so let’s take a look at some of the movies people are anticipating the most in 2019. As a warning, there are a lot of them.
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Culture Crash 19-02: True Detective
Tonight marks the long-awaited, sometimes excitedly and sometimes with dread, but long-awaited, return of True Detective. The TV phenomenon of 2014 and possibly the biggest letdown of 2015 is back for its third season, and the early reviews suggest this should be more like the incredible first season and not like the dud of a season two.
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Culture Crash 19-01: Minding the Gap
The year 2018 gave us a lot to love at the movies. Some of the absolute highlights for me were Eighth Grade, Roma, A Quiet Place, and Blindspotting. Each of those thrilled me, entertained me, and moved me. But for me, the best film of the year was Bing Liu’s incredibly personal documentary, Minding the Gap. It’s a film I saw back in August but has stuck with me more than anything I’ve seen in a long time.
Minding the Gap tells the story of Liu himself, and of his closest friends from his childhood in Rockford, Illinois. Each came from something of a broken home, and turned to each other, and to skateboarding for an escape from their personal demons. What begins as a movie about kids skateboarding and hanging out becomes a searing look at childhood trauma, the bonds of friendship, and what effects our families can have on us as we age into adulthood.
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Culture Crash 18-52: Anthony Bourdain
As the year draws to a close, it’s the time on the calendar when we take a look back at who we lost this year. One such cultural giant was Anthony Bourdain, the famed chef and author turned travel documentarian.
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Culture Crash 18-51: Roma
You may have noticed a new movie on your Netflix homepage called Roma. It’s Oscar-winning director Alfonso Cuarón’s most personal film yet and an absolute masterpiece.
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Culture Crash 18-50: A look ahead at the movies set to dominate awards season
Awards season is officially upon us. The Golden Globes have already announced their nominees, which are as questionable as always. Year-end lists are being finalized, and Oscar buzz is reaching a roar for some contenders. But now is also the time when many of these movies are being released in the first place. So, here’s a guide of what to keep an eye out for to get ahead of the nominee pool.
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Culture Crash 18-49: The disappointing Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald
Last month, JK Rowling’s Wizarding World saw its latest installment, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes on Grindelwald be met with a low score on Rotten Tomatoes and countless disappointed Harry Potter fans across the globe.
Count me among them. Not since 2009’s Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince film totally bungled its source material has a Wizarding World installment felt so misguided. Crimes of Grindelwald isn’t quite as bad as Half-Blood Prince, but it is poorly paced and difficult to follow, even for those who have spent their entire childhoods learning the universe forward and backward.
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Culture Crash 18-48: Watching Sports with a Second Screen
It used to be that when you were watching sports, you were only watching with the people in the same room as you. Maybe your family gathered around to watch Sunday Night Baseball, maybe you went to a friend’s Super Bowl party. Either way, you discussed the matchups amongst yourself, relying on the person next to you to pick up on any subtleties you missed.
Now, sports have become the gold-standard for entertainment that demands a second-screen. Watching a game is aided immensely by having your phone or a tablet at your fingertips. You can look up in-game stats, you can track scores of other games, or you can look through your Twitter timeline to share in the agony or ecstasy of your team’s failures and successes with a host of other fans and analysts in real time.
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Culture Crash 18-47: Amazon Prime’s Homecoming
Director Sam Esmail has taken Gimlet’s hit podcast Homecoming and infused it with a whole lot of cinematic flair in his new Amazon Prime series that serves as a throwback to classic thrillers and a trailblazer for the brave new world of 30-minute dramas.
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