With the success of HBO’s adaptation of The Last of Us, the renewal for a second season was inevitable. However, the second game is not a universally beloved experience; why is that? — I, of course, like so many of you, am obsessed with HBO’s adaptation of Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us. I love the first game and its sequel even more, and Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann’s adaptation has been a brilliant, clear-eyed retelling that tugs the brilliancy of the game…

Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is a perfect example of the storytelling dilemmas that continue to placate the MCU. — There’s a quote from Douglas Wolk in his book All of the Marvels, a tome of Marvel comics knowledge and analysis worthy of any fan’s time, where he answers the most popular question posed by newbies, “where do I start [with Marvel Comics]?” The answer, Wolk writes, “[Marvel comics] is…

A ranking of movies that meant the most to me in 2022, maybe too much. — I am not sure if I will be as advantageous about film in 2023, as I believe my heart has been stolen back by literature. That said, I do think this was a great and unexpected year to go out upon with works that broke past those standard expectations and…

Ranking the TV seasons that stole me away from the world for a little while, in a good way. — There has been a great deal of television this year, a great deal of which that was beloved that did not meet me on stable grounds. Despite the love for White Lotus, Succession, Rings of Power, Andor, The Boys: Season 3, House of Dragon, and many others, those titles will…

Counting down the books I enjoyed the most this year, some of them new, some of them old, but all of them loved. — Great books, for me, this year, were hard to come by. This is, perhaps, my first year of making such a list, to be fair. I am used to incorporating the four or five books that fold their way into a compilation of a best-of-the-year list that just shoves everything…

An essay about how Fatman Beyond became the single most important podcast in my life, what it taught me, and why I think it may be the inciting incident to my story as a writer. — I have always been a lonely kid. From an early age, there’s just been a deep sense that I was unwanted. Whether it be my conservative, traditional family or friend groups, I never felt like a community was ever in the cards for me. Even now, I still feel this…

A small review of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever & examination of how Ryan Coogler voices how people respond to generational trauma — I know what I said about film reviews regarding my reasoning for not seeing Black Adam, but that doesn’t mean I am not going to single out a story I love whenever I find one. So if one of these doesn’t follow a major release of a movie, TV finale…

An explanation as to why a Black Adam review will not be appearing on my feed any time soon. Today is a day for venting, turning away from the darker realities of the world lies the question of my turning away from DC film and television products. Now, I am…

A review for Billy Eichner & Nicholas Stoller’s Gay rom-com & its ability to be mature, layered, outrageously funny, and wonderfully gay! — There is a noticeable difference in queer filmmaking between stories directed or written by queer people and those not. It’s always hard to pin down, sometimes not so hard to pin down. It’s not always the most abhorrent, disingenuous thing to see a straight person’s view of the gay struggle…