TV Updates WandaVision Finale: It was Wanda all along SPOILERS WandaVision wrapped up on Friday night, closing out a strong season—series? They’re teasing a second season, but who really knows—and a solid debut for Marvel on Disney+. As a contained narrative, WandaVision is exceptional, giving Wanda Maximoff a story that not only makes her more interesting By Sarah • Mar 08, 2021 11:25 am
Movie Reviews and Previews Gary Oldman, Evangeline Lilly, and no one else(!) in Crisis In the vein of Steven Soderbergh’s narcotics opus Traffic, Nicholas Jarecki’s Crisis follows three different storylines attacking the opioid epidemic from different angles: big pharma, law enforcement, and street user. Someday, someone will make a definitive film about the opioid epidemic in America, but Crisis is not that By Sarah • Mar 05, 2021 03:57 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Kelly Marie Tran and Awkwafina in Raya and the Last Dragon Disney’s latest animated adventure is Raya and the Last Dragon, a magic-laced quest picture in the vein of Frozen and Moana, but this time taking its cues from Southeast Asian culture and folklore. Raya, voiced by Kelly Marie Tran, is the first Southeast Asian heroine of an animated By Sarah • Mar 04, 2021 01:31 pm
Top Reads Kelly Marie Tran showed up for herself On the eve of Raya and the Last Dragon hitting theaters/Disney+, star Kelly Marie Tran covers The Hollywood Reporter, discussing her period away from the spotlight after racist and misogynistic bullying drove her off social media in the wake of The Last Jedi, and her return as Disney’s By Sarah • Mar 04, 2021 12:37 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Michael B. Jordan Shows No Remorse Military movies are not my jam. I don’t mean war movies, although the crossover is heavy, I mean the Tom Clancy-style paramilitary movies where the enemies are vaguely Russian or brown, depending on the era, and the tone of the piece is more about unchallenged unilateral violence with By Sarah • Mar 03, 2021 02:58 pm
Jodie Foster Tahar Rahim and Jodie Foster in The Mauritanian Originally brought in for questioning in November 2001, Mohamedou Ould Slahi was eventually renditioned to Jordan by the US government, and then ultimately imprisoned at Guantanamo Bay for fourteen years without ever being charged with any crime. In 2015, Slahi published a book, Guantanamo Diary, while still in jail (an By Sarah • Mar 03, 2021 01:43 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Andra Day in The United States vs. Billie Holiday Andra Day won the Best Drama Actress award at the Golden Globes the other night for her performance in The United States vs. Billie Holiday, directed by Lee Daniels and adapted by Suzan-Lori Parks from Johann Hari’s book, Chasing the Scream. The film depicts Billie Holiday’s years By Sarah • Mar 02, 2021 01:48 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews We could have Michael B. Jordan as Superman On Friday, news broke that Warner Brothers is setting up a new Superman film to be produced by JJ Abrams and his Bad Robot team and written by Ta-Nehisi Coates. The report from Shadow & Act notes that there is no director and a search for a new Superman By Sarah • Mar 02, 2021 11:54 am
Business of Hollywood You had me at “Clooney-Roberts rom-com” Have you re-watched Ocean’s 11 recently? It TOTALLY holds up. Ocean’s 12 holds up, too. As far as I am concerned, there are only three Ocean’s movies, 8, 11, and 12, and I have re-watched them all (they were on Netflix, now they’re on By Sarah • Mar 02, 2021 11:16 am
Movie Reviews and Previews The Top 10 Films of 2020 This year’s list is a little late in coming because we decided to honor the extended release schedule of the 2020 Oscars, and not follow a strict calendar year. Also, the Golden Globes are happening on Sunday. 2020 was an overall weird but good year in film, with standout By Sarah • Feb 25, 2021 03:10 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Paramount tempts Tom Cruise’s wrath This week is the Television Critics’ Association winter press tour, when television networks set up in front of the press and lay out their programming schedules for the upcoming season. Yesterday, ViacomCBS held their press confab and made some announcements regarding their new streaming service, Paramount+. They’re rebranding the By Sarah • Feb 25, 2021 11:53 am
Movie Reviews and Previews Tom Holland’s marketing schtick Spider-Man 3 (version 2) is due in theaters in December of this year, for whatever “theaters”, “December”, and “this year” means anymore. This week, the main cast of Tom Holland, Jacob Batalon, and Zendaya have been teasing the title reveal on their Instas, each proffering a supposed title for By Sarah • Feb 25, 2021 10:05 am
TV Updates WandaVision’s “shoe problem” Spoilers As we head into the final two episodes of WandaVision, it has become exceedingly clear that while this is a pretty great show, it is not working for some people. Sure, it got off to a slow start, but at this point, seven episodes in, we’ve advanced beyond By Sarah • Feb 24, 2021 11:28 am
TV Updates Gillian Anderson’s Great Lady phase Showtime is producing an anthology series called The First Lady, which is revisiting American history through the eyes of the first women of the White House. Viola Davis is on board to play Michelle Obama and Michelle Pfeiffer has signed up to play Betty Ford. The latest cast addition is By Sarah • Feb 23, 2021 12:39 pm
Movie Reviews and Previews Sam Heughan and The OTHER Red Notice One of the big movies we’re guaranteed to see this year, because it’s coming to Netflix which doesn’t care about theaters, is Red Notice starring Ryan Reynolds, Gal Gadot, and Dwayne Johnson. This morning, site manager Emily emailed me a trailer for a movie called “Red Notice” By Sarah • Feb 22, 2021 01:42 pm
TV Updates Annie Murphy tells Kevin he can f**k himself Coming off her Emmy-winning and final season of Schitt’s Creek, Annie Murphy has already moved on to her next series, a genre-busting dramedy called Kevin Can F**k Himself. The show, created by Valerie Armstrong (a Lodge 49 alum), follows Allison, a typical sitcom wife who is By Sarah • Feb 22, 2021 12:18 pm
