The campy 90s classic reevaluated for modern times
When I was a teenager, I had a habit of rewatching movies over and over again on my bulky Dell Laptop. These movies were often awful. I obsessed over Joel Schumacher’s Batman Forever (1995) or the slap schtick shenanigans of Goldie Hawn, Bette Midler, and Diane Keaton in The First Wives Club (1996). I didn’t realize at the time that all of these movies were campy and often had a gay or queer subtext.
Of all the movies I watched, no film was I obsessed with more than Mrs. Doubtfire (1993). The Robin William’s comedy about a man cross-dressing as…
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Our belief that voting is hopeless, as seen on tv
I remember casting my ballot for the first time as a newly-minted 18-year-old growing up in Northern New Jersey. I was a senior in High School who was filled with so much enthusiasm for the process of voting. I had binged several episodes of the show The West Wing the night before, and I incessantly couldn’t stop quoting lines from the sequel to Legally Blonde — Legally Blonde 2: Red, White, & Blonde.
As Elle Woods would say, “I was there to speak up!” I had researched all the positions beforehand, and I knew exactly who and what I would…
The hateful comics of StoneToss, Hedgewik, MadebyJimBob, and more.
For the longest time, the Internet has been a place for comic book artists to get their start. Comics such as xkcd and Homestuck inspired cult followings and fandoms. Artists such as Alex Woolfson of The Young Protectors fame proved that indie creators with marginalized identities could successfully express themselves — free of the barriers that plagued more intensive media such as TV shows, movies, and video games.
And yet, the Internet has always had a dark underbelly, where creators use their platforms to spread hatred and misinformation. While increased moderation…
The “both sides” rhetoric can be used as a tool of oppression.
If you have followed the political discourse for the last couple of decades, you’ll have noticed an unending conversation around how you need to get your news from both the left and the right sides of the political spectrum. “Democrats must get out of their bubble,” writes Arlie Hochschild in the Berkeley Blog. “To Beat Trump, Democrats May Need to Break Out of the ‘Whole Foods’ Bubble,” David Wasserman laments in The New York Times. …
A guide to some of the best video games escapes this side of the multiverse.
Video games allow us to escape to fantastical new worlds. We are permitted to play people and do things that would not normally be accessible to us. This fact makes them a perfect vehicle for travel. You are not just going to far-off countries, but realms that defy everything but the human imagination.
And like any vacation, you need a guide. We are going to rate these games based on how great of a vacation spot they are. …
A deep look at Walknvt, Thor Steinar, Midgard, & other hateful brands.
I had been monitoring white supremacist groups for a while when a message came in from one of the Telegram groups I follow. “Support only white-owned markets,” it read, providing a list of Telegram handles of white-only businesses for its viewers to patronize. The message was shared around a few times, and within a matter of hours, it had been seen by tens of thousands of people.
These groups are so secretive about their identities, yet here was a list of them — almost thirty storefronts sorted by country and Telegram handles. Several of the storefronts even reshared it, and…
Some of the best virtual vacations on this side of the galaxy.
Sometimes we need an escape — a place to retreat to when the insanities of life become a bit too much — , and for me, that refuge is video games. I have spent hours crawling through various dungeons, planets, and cities, trying to get lost in a world for an hour (or six).
However, many of my favorite escapist fantasies are not places I would necessarily want to visit. They are fun journeys, to be sure, often filled with peril and heart-thumping moments, but definitely not ones…
Many of our worst people exist by design, but is that an inevitability?
There is a song that I came across recently that I cannot get out of my head. It’s part of the lineup for the Broadway musical The Century Girl, which aired in 1916 during the midst of World War I. The title is You Belong To Me, sung by Edward Royce and Leon Errol, and it is quite literally about a man deciding he loves a woman and fixating on her, singing:
And now don’t imagine I’ll let you go
Because you say “No” to me
“No” often means “Yes”
I'll make you confess
In time, just wait and see
…
A look at fascist and white supremacist music on YouTube, Facebook, Spotify, and SoundCloud.
The Internet was a game-changer for white supremacist and pro-fascist musicians. They went from occupying the fringes of subcultures such as punk and heavy metal to publishing and interacting with new followers with the click of the button. Not too long ago, you could find some of the most hateful bands plugging their music on the web. …
But her Black friend on the MCU show WandaVision forgives her, so it’s all chill, right?
The show Wandavision (2021) marked the beginning of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s (MCU) Phase 4 — a master plan Marvel Studios and Disney have for over 24 movies and TV shows over the next 4 to 5 years. It also signifies the first live-action MCU show on the Diseny+ platform. Now that the first (and maybe final season) has ended, we are left deciding what exactly this show means, both for the MCU and as a standalone piece of art.
At the center of the show is the titular Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen). She is a magical being of immense…
Alex Mell-Taylor
I write about pop culture and politics. Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/opinionsalexhas Write for me: https://medium.com/after-the-storm
