The greatest action-adventure story of them all.
Looking back, 1981 was not the pivotal year of movies that would shape my cinematic sensibilities. For Your Eyes Only and Superman II were there, of course. However, I was too young and unsophisticated to understand or really enjoy The Cannonball Run or Stripes. Moreover, it was a year before Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan, Tron, and Blade Runner — movies that would mean the world to me.
No, the only important movie of that summer was the one that broke all the records and introduced the world to Indiana Jones — Raiders of the Lost Ark.
I was…
Curation is what I do.
I grew up in a house full of books. My father is a voracious reader, and he gravitated toward action-adventure and sports (he has some very early editions of Ian Fleming Bond books). He also has an extensive silver age DC comics collection I tore through when I was young. I remember begging him to go up in the attic where they were kept so I could grab a new handful.
Consequently, I became a reader myself. This is an aspect of myself that is constantly changing. As they say, the only thing constant is change. I consistently was reading…
A multi-million dollar catch-up with your old Friends.
I was never a fan of Seinfeld. I can count on one hand how many episodes of Seinfeld I’ve watched. I hated every single character on that show. I didn’t get anything about it. It was not a show for me. The show ran a bit before I graduated college and a few years after. In the early 90s, I was in my 20s and could not care less about this group of “friends” who looked like they were in their middle 30s experiencing a life with no connection to mine.
If there were to be some Seinfeld reunion special…
A review of How Lucky by Will Leitch
What is loneliness? Is it being alone or feeling alone? What does it mean to be a loner? What is friendship? What does it mean to simply be kind? These are questions explored by Will Leitch’s light thriller How Lucky, the follow-up to his 2005 Young-Adult novel, Catch. While that earlier novel also has a young man at its center, that’s where the similarities end. How Lucky allows the reader inside the mind of our lead character, Daniel, with a self-deprecating, funny, and unique voice. It follows a small but significant event in Daniel’s life. …
Good concepts that deserve wider audiences.
I know the headline is a bit of a mouthful, but what I’m trying to do here is pick ten amazing comic book properties that don’t have an active film or television deal or are in production hell. Hence, no Danger Girl, Ex Machina, Saga, Queen and Country, Thief of Thieves, Astro City, Sex Criminals, The Wicked + The Divine, and so many more. Also, no properties that have had a shot, failed, and deserve a second chance so no Powers, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Jon Sable, Global Frequency, the Losers, The Middleman, and so many others.
It is simply…
The legacy of Albert Pujols
When I was a kid, my favorite baseball player was Ozzie Smith. He played shortstop as I did. He was small, fast, and had a golden glove. I was small, not terribly fast, and used a hand-me-down glove that I loved. I didn’t throw super balls against the back door and catch them in my glove for hours on end (that was my brother), but I did pretend to be Ozzie on more than one occasion standing between second and third.
Much later in life and after Ozzie had retired, my new favorite player in a Cardinals uniform was Albert…
So much content.
While at home during this awful pandemic, I found myself occasionally falling down ye olde YouTube rabbit hole and finding a whole ‘nother wonderland of entertainment I never knew was possible. Or, you know, I just clicked to watch a video I wanted to watch, and ye olde algorithm found me some more related videos. The funny thing, I don’t think any of these content creators I’m gonna highlight below have much in common.
Still, all of them have a ton of content that you can fall down that aforementioned rabbit hole and enjoy. …
What’s the difference?
More than a decade ago, John Scalzi had a couple of observations that I found incredibly interesting:
1. People who don’t know what they’re talking about don’t like to have that fact pointed about, especially if you use the word “ignorant” in context to the fact.
2. People like to confuse “pointing out the fact you don’t know what you’re talking about” with “being hostile,” because it makes them feel better about themselves. It’s generally not worth arguing to them that it’s not necessarily hostile to point out when someone doesn’t know what they’re talking about, but inasmuch as many…
I’m waiting for the reinterpretation of the reinterpretation.
Imagine, if you will, four young musicians.
Three of them are siblings growing up in a household full of KISS, Alice Cooper, and Cheap Trick vinyl. Their parents would spin the discs nightly. Everyone would be jamming to KISS Alive! and Cheap Trick at Budokan whenever there was a family road trip.
The siblings decided to start a band. They add a family friend who loves monster movies and science fiction―Godzilla and Star Wars.
It was only natural the group gravitate toward theatrics, and they’d experiment with make-up and pyrotechnics.
They name themselves Kabuki Theater and dress in costumes and…
These would make a kick-ass movie marathon.
There have always been science-fiction movies.
Over the years, technology has improved nearly everything in these movies, from special effects to costuming. I mean, just look at the difference between the 1902 short A Trip to the Moon and what we will see nearly a century later in Dune. Still, I think the most important things to consider in these movies, and frankly, all popular entertainment are the characters and the story. Do they tell a good story?
The last decade has seen plenty of good science-fiction and science-fantasy movies. However, I did not have a problem picking my favorites…
Sean McDevitt
Editor of The Multiverse and The Weekly Click, he’s an author, copywriter, freelance writer, and scrambled eggs maker living and working in Champaign, Illinois.
