If I should die in a wombat zone

Jar Jar Binks and the Crisis in American Democracy I’m not planning to vote for Donald Trump, but I can understand his appeal, and not just to racists and idiots. To help me explain this, I’m going to draw upon the most intellectually rigorous source material I can: the Star Wars movies. I’ve seen so many folks on the internet draw parallels between Trump and Senator Palpatine, and if you’re going to do that, I think you need to extend the metaphor to cover the entire setting of the films. Let’s examine the lead-up to that fateful moment when everyone’s favorite gungan, Jar Jar Binks, singlehandedly destroys the Republic by calling for the emergency powers vote. Examine, if you will, the state of the Republic prior to that moment: It was a freaking mess. There was so much political logjam in the Galactic Senate that when one member world actually launched a full-scale invasion and conquest of another, partisans in the Senate blocked the Chancellor’s attempt to even b...

How can I describe STRANGER THINGS? Attempt#1: Imagine John Carpenter and John Hughes decided to join forces to write a TV series, then called up Steven King for editorial supervision. Attempt #2: Premise: the Goonies, the kids from Stand By Me, and half the characters from the Breakfast Club team up, eventually enlisting the help of Chief Martin Brody and Carrie….and they go off to stop the Thing, as well as the gov’t scientists from E.T., not to mention to rescue Carol Anne from the ghost realm. Attempt#3: Put “Scary Movie” and “Not another Teen Movie” into a centrifuge, suck out the comic goofiness, and blend the rest. STRANGER THINGS, a Netflix original show, is the meta-scifi-series of meta-scifi-series, a postmodern patchwork quilt of 1980s nostalgia that somehow manages to take itself, and be taken, entirely seriously -- even as 90% of what it does is rehash and re-spin 1980s movie tropes. The show has simultaneously the most derivative and most original plot ...

I just finished devouring HARRY POTTER AND THE CURSED CHILD and am in a happy, happy, Harry Potter place right now. J The book (play, really, but a book for the 99.99% of us who will never be able to afford or obtain tickets) reads like Steven Moffat and Dr. Phil teamed up to write the best Harry Potter fan fic ever, after having watched “It’s a Wonderful Life” together. I have worked hard to keep all but the most general spoilers out of my review, but if you really prefer an entirely unadulterated read, wait until you’re done and then come back – my review won’t run away, I promise. Probably on account of Rowling’s collaboration with two co-authors, HP & THE CURSED CHILD is neither as whimsical nor as dark as the novels; it doesn't have time to be. Instead, it accomplishes an admirable synthesis that gives you just enough of a taste of both moods. The authors knew they were writing in a truncated form, “Harry Potter Lite,” so they threw in just enough bits and pieces t...

Review: STAR TREK: BEYOND (or, as I call it, Fear of a Black Galaxy) The nice thing about going into a movie with low expectations is that doing so dramatically increases your chances of having a good experience, and Star Trek: Beyond proved no exception. In many ways I think it is the strongest of the three JJ Abrams reboots, working out some of the kinks and improving on the weaknesses of the previous two, all while keeping the stuff that worked. I have only one large objection, which I can’t reveal without mentioning -- MASSIVE SPOILERS AHEAD * * * * * Ok, as always, let’s start with the good. Aside from a somewhat slow start, the pacing was excellent, and the action beautifully choreographed (the upside of the “Fast and Furious” guy being your director). There were some lovely tiny details here and there, like the many “swarms” we saw re-iterated on the planet (birds in the distance at one point, bees in a cave) as a reflection of the swam-attack of the...