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Review of Community Season 5, Episode 9
VCR Maintenance and Educational Publishing might be my favourite episode yet of Community’s fifth season. It’s not necessarily the best one – the b-plot was a bit weak – but it made me laugh in… [more]
300 Things I Hate about 300: Rise of an Empire
[NOTE: the following essay contains spoilers. As to whether a film that’s already rotten can be “spoiled” … well, that’s a debate for another time.] You know it’s a bad sign when you only have… [more]
Review of Alan Moore’s Jimmy’s End
I honestly don’t even know where to start with this one. How do you review anything by Alan Moore, much less a short film he’s written? The guy’s a genius. I’m not simply saying that… [more]
Death Comes Calling for Serenity in Leaves on the Wind #2
Life and death are very much on Mal Reynolds’ mind in Serenity: Leaves on the Wind #2. Whereas the previous issue was about how life is continuing for the Serenity crew, with Mal and Inara… [more]
MIND MGMT Volume 2: The Futurist Review
Writer/Artist: Matt Kindt Published by Dark Horse In my review of Matt Kindt’s MIND MGMT Vol. 1, I wrote that I preordered the second volume instantly upon finishing volume 1. I was that engrossed in… [more]
Review of Community Season 5, Episode 8
Community’s fans have always extolled the virtues of the show’s concept episodes. School-wide paintball games, science projects, Chang, and more have all served as excuses for pitch-perfect genre parodies that remained firmly grounded in character-based… [more]
Review of Community Season 5, Episode 7
Community‘s seventh episode of the season, Bondage and Beta Male Sexuality, wisely continues to strip back the high-concept tom-foolery and focus on character development. This season’s changes were obviously deserving of a serious story beat… [more]
Review of Arrow Season 2, Episode 13
If there’s one well of actors Arrow seems intent on drawing on for its guest stars, it seems to be folks who spent some amount of time on Starz’s Spartacus. It’s a smart choice, as… [more]
Review: Serenity: Leaves on the Wind #1
Of all the Serenity comics, and there have been several very good ones up until now, the new Leaves on the Wind follows most directly after the events of the Serenity film. While other books… [more]
Beware the Batman Episode 6 Review
While previous episodes of Beware the Batman delighted in giving us revamped or updated versions of Batman’s lesser-known villains, episode 6 instead gives us a new look at one of his lesser-known allies. In Toxic,… [more]
The Great Smallville Rewatch, Part 3
The Journey While emphasizing again that this series was not simply a Superman origin, it would be disingenuous to suggest that, at its core, much of the appeal of the series is the dramatic tension… [more]
Review of Community Season 5, Episode 6
Community is back. Or at least it feels that way. The first episodes of this season may have felt like a return, at least in contrast to season four, but this is the first episode… [more]
Her Review
Spike Jonze’s Her is a frustrating film. It asks of the viewer some incredibly deep and thoughtful questions about the nature of our romantic relationships, how we keep our “true” selves guarded, and how we… [more]
This Review is Rated NC-17: Sex – The Summer of Hard
It feels so strange to see the “Man of Action” logo on the back of a book like Sex. Not simply because of the graphic nature of the work (we’ll get to that) but because… [more]
Beware the Batman Episode 5 Review
After a short string of episodes that left me grossly underwhelmed, Beware the Batman bounces back with an episode that has revived my interest in the series. Broken, the fifth episode in the series, returns… [more]
Review of Arrow Season 2, Episode 12
I was excited when it was announced that Michael Jai White had been cast in a villainous role for Arrow’s second season. He’s a magnetic performer who hasn’t really had anywhere near the opportunities to… [more]
Harley Quinn #2 Review
They say never judge a book by its cover, and yet comic books in some sense urge us to do so. Comic book covers are in essence what hook many of us into purchasing a… [more]
The Great Smallville Rewatch, Part 2
Tapping the Mythology One of the complaints that comics fans make about Smallville is that it took hours and hours of television simply to retell “the origin of Superman,” which has been done so much… [more]
Savant-Garde: Shaolin Cowboy
Shaolin Cowboy doesn’t care about me. It doesn’t want my opinion, my critical evaluation or my appreciation. As far as Shaolin Cowboy[1] is concerned, I might as well not exist. That is a very refreshing… [more]
Review of Community Season 5, Episode 5
I was really looking forward to this episode of Community. It’s quite possibly the last episode of the show to feature Troy (played by Donald Glover). It’s also a new high-concept episode, something the show… [more]
Review of Arrow Season 2, Episode 11
“Blind Spot” is the kind of episode that was needed after last week’s subpar outing. It’s not an all-time classic episode, but it’s a good, solid hour of TV that hinges on a strong central… [more]
The Great Smallville Rewatch, Part 1
In early 2013, I decided to finally catch up – via the magic of DVD technology – on a show of which I’d been a huge devotee back in the earliest years of its existence. … [more]
Atrocity in Memoriam – Ari Folman’s Waltz with Bashir
In 2008, Waltz With Bashir, a documentary exploration of the First Lebanon War, was released to wide critical acclaim. The film is animated, told from the perspective of Ari Folman, who dictates his experiences via… [more]
Review of Community Season 5, Episode 4
Troy and Abed are in mourning. Pierce Hawthorne has died. It’s no secret that the actor that played him, Chevy Chase, didn’t particularly enjoy working on the show. He didn’t find it funny, and he… [more]
Review of Arrow Season 2, Episode 10
Arrow’s second season has been marked primarily by the series delivering on the promise of its first season. The show started out unevenly, alternating episodes that showcased the potential of the concept and characters with… [more]