Nicole Kidman, Maika Monroe, Ariana DeBose, and Jamie Lee Curtis feature this week.
12.03.2026 16:46
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Nicole Kidman, Maika Monroe, Ariana DeBose, and Jamie Lee Curtis feature this week.
It sucks bc there should be more interesting things being made, but as long as the plastic surgery holds up, blank slate actors who project nothing in particular have a long career.
Ensemble stays cheap bc you can swap every actor but 1 or 2 out if they ask for raises.
Recycled plots are a bonus bc it's hard to lose track of the story on second screen viewing or if you're elderly.
Ope, I missed 10 minutes, what's the lead feeling? I'm caught up with a single glance.
Recognizable blank slate actors are in extremely high demand. You can surround them with a way more interesting ensemble cast (Bones, Hawaii 5-O, NCIS take-your-pick, every CBS procedural) and viewers (esp. older men) read themselves onto the "man of action".
The fight choreography is great. The themes of wealthy criminals using a crisis to own more and more resonates. And the portrayal of positive, supportive masculinity at its core is among the best I've seen.
If you like the idea of Critical Role and Dimension 20, but can't listen to 50-hour campaigns and struggle following ruleset-heavy combat...
Mystery Quest does hilarious, 5-hour one-shots featuring lesser-known, more narrative-focused role-playing systems.
New work on a bunch of platforms, and talking about which streaming services reliably feature women directors and showrunners (and which don't).
This is the kind of stupid I could use more of.
(Image is from "A Scanner Darkly", 2006.)
Some shows are being written with simplification in mind, so you can be on your phone while paying attention to neither. We know this is cognitively debilitating, but billions are spent to train in addictive behavior.
Discipline only goes so far. Discovery of what's new to each of us goes further.
If you like what I write on my site, throw a bit my way to support it. This post covers my year-end work such as naming the best shows of last year and awarding the Most Joyful series and Most Visually Stunning, as well as other reviews and articles over the last month. Thanks for any support!
New Shows + Movies by Women returns with a lot of new entries, including the new GoT prequel, a K-drama romance, and seeing more women directors in anime.
I'm not disagreeing with the article, but saying it lacks context. It hasn't disappeared wholesale. A lot of our genres still enjoy it. Rest of the world's still got it. It's our thrillers, drama, and comedy that are losing it.
You can't watch a Turkish mystery, Polish dark fantasy, Chinese drama, Korean romantic comedy, or Japanese procedural without seeing countless connections to other works signposted and quoted. They might be less familiar to us, but whether we choose to look them up or not, they're there.
International work is still steeped in these allusions, as well. It's just that, being less familiar with them, we don't get as much from them. Take Kore-eda's series work in recent years like Asura and The Makanai. Arcane is dripping in art history, The Apothecary Diaries in Chinese myth.
In U.S. drama & comedy, sure. They've fallen off a cliff.
Our science-fiction and fantasy still offer this, but don't often get recognized in articles like this. They just require familiarity with the Strugatskys instead of Tolstoy, Gibson instead of Joyce, or Le Guin instead of Hemingway.
A calming slice-of-life/expertise procedural/travelogue that's worth your time.
Wait, wait, he's gotta emote this time? That sounds like the hardest money Chris Pratt's ever made.
The narrowness or the breadth of the art we take in shapes what we accept or refuse in the world. 2025 gave us visions of how we got here, what the most vulnerable among us have had to endure, and countless ways we can keep trying to make things better.
There are still things to celebrate, and art that guides us through.
Projection is not an equal and opposite reaction. It permeates and imbues with what it already contains.
So for the desperate figure, as the walls close in, it is easy to make those pushing the walls closed around him feel desperate, too, and forget too much to put their fucking shoulder into it.
Desperation is one of the most efficient projections. It's easy for a desperate figure to sow desperation because it creates like from like.
It's difficult for an angry figure to convince others to be calm, or for the hateful to garner commonly agreed sympathy. Projection struggles with opposites.
"Unfortunately, as the last movie recommended to me by that famed Christmas movie critic who once hailed from the Nike-Microsoft Corpo-Fiefdom, I'll always remember Erin as looking out for the people. That is, unless it came to recommending them a half-watchable movie."
"While RJD's re-lifed and de-aged portrayals of both Spider-Man and The Grizzly are well realized, the bulk of Avengers 37 struggles. Director Tom Holland can't quite figure out how to shoehorn in the Avatar 5 crossover and unobtainium's retconned ability to make Spider-Man shift RJD roles at will.
Also it's 2026 and we still haven't gotten a chance to see a third of the major awards contenders yet.
If it comes out on 2 screens the last week of December and no real person gets a chance to see it until February, it's still magically a 2025 film!
What are your favorite films each year so far?
2020: Lingua Franca
2021: Passing
2022: Qala
2023: Suzume
2024: The Peasants
2025: Baby Assassins: Nice Days
