The State of Scary TV
‘The Returned’ and ‘Ash vs Evil Dead’ join ‘The Walking Dead’ in offering high-quality horror.
September 4, 2013
Barbarians at the Gate: Plants vs. Zombies 2, Kingdom Rush Frontiers, and Rymdkapsel
One of the most basic pleasures of video games is pandemonium. Players of Grand Theft Auto can attest to the joys of an unscripted five-star police chase through oncoming traffic. First-person shooter fans know that delicious moment of anticipation right before you are seen by the enemy and the whole clockwork world throws a fit. […]
Read more
A Half-Baked Rock-Crit Theory About Titus Andronicus, Rock Operas, and Mental Illness
On Monday, Montana newspaper the Missoulian ran an interview with Titus Andronicus’s Patrick Stickles, who divulged the New Jersey punk band’s plan to record a rock opera featuring more than 30 songs. He also discussed the plot: Basically, it’s going to be about a guy who’s descended from a cursed race of ancient superhumans and […]
Read more
Rumor Alert: Jack Nicholson Is Maybe Already Retired? (Update: Don't Worry, He's Not)
Chances are good you haven’t actually noticed that Jack Nicholson hasn’t been in a movie in three years. (His last appearance was a supporting role in James L. Brooks’s non-starter, weirdly un-punctuated How Do You Know. Before that: 2007’s The Bucket List. Before that: 2006’s The Departed. A weirdly apt career-defining run, that.) The Lakers’ […]
Read more
YouTube Hall of Fame: Football Goes Hollywood
Football season starts this week, and we here at Hollywood Prospectus are very excited about it! To help spread the word about this cool sport, we decided to highlight some of its biggest stars’ most shining moments off the field and under the bright lights of showbiz. Because whether it’s a charmingly self-aware sitcom cameo […]
Read more
Q&A: Tom Lennon and Ben Garant on Hell Baby, the New Baywatch Movie, and Malfunctioning Demon-Spawn Puppets
Tom Lennon and Ben Garant may be the luckiest beings on planet Earth. They’ve gone from being two of the comedy wunderkinds behind The State to basic-cable cult gods with Reno: 911! to insanely-well-paid writer-directors whose movies have pulled in $1.4 billion. They even wrote a book about it — How to Write Movies for […]
Read moreFirst Eastbound & Down Season 4 Trailer: The Bleached-Blond Phoenix Has Risen Up
The upcoming fourth season of Eastbound & Down, Danny McBride’s coked-out bullpen opera, will be its last. Or will it? (It will. You know, unless they change their minds again, fill the rosin bag with blow, and take the water ski for another ride around the lake, metaphorically speaking.) The point is this: Our remaining […]
Read more
True Blood Gets Its True Death, But the Show Died a Long Time Ago
Someone asked me recently if I’ve ever had to break up with a television show, and I had to think about it. I’ve had short-lived affairs with shows that burned hot and fast and disappeared just as quickly. I’ve picked up and repeatedly dropped other shows before deciding that lukewarm interest is even worse than hatred, since […]
Read moreSeptember 3, 2013
Afternoon Links: Vanilla Ice Goes Amish, Obviously
Vanilla Ice has a Wikipedia page that is roughly 500 times the length that you would expect it to be. I’m kind of stuck on the paragraphs describing how he let his friends tattoo him when he was on a drug binge and the chronicle of when his pets, a wallaroo and a goat, ran […]
Read more
The Kardashiad, Part 25: Bareback Was Her Middle Name
Khloe and Kim are taking pictures of Bernard Hopkins with some kind of papier-mâché unicorn horn glued to his head. With an inflection that suggests she legitimately doesn’t know the answer to the question, Khloe asks Kim, “Do you take naps?” Kim says, “I haven’t yet, but I’m really in the mood for one right […]
Read more
Should You Believe the Benedict Cumberbatch Star Wars Rumors?
This is ForceWatch, your as-needed check-in with the upcoming Star Wars reboot, including but not limited to Star Wars Episode VII. Full disclosure: Disney owns Grantland, and the rest of the universe. Before we dig into the Big Star Wars Rumor of the Week, let’s get up to speed with all the pretty much debunked casting rumors I […]
Read more
Consider This Sh*t: James Franco's Alien Wants an Oscar for Spring Breakers
Everything is coming up Franco. The laughter from last night’s Comedy Central–sponsored Night of 1,000 Francos hasn’t yet stopped ringing in the heads of hungover Francophiles, and already his Spring Breakers publicity team has scrambled the For Your Consideration jets and told The Hollywood Reporter that a full-court awards-season press is on its way. Look […]
Read more
Fall Movie Preview: Summer Is Over, Thank the Sweet Lords of Hollywood
I’m not psychic — stop it; I’m not! — but I’m predicting right now that the summer of 2015 will look vastly different from the one we just suffered through. (Summer of 2014 is pretty much all booked. Sorry.) There will certainly be your Batman-Superman mega-movies, but I’m guessing there will be fewer of them […]
Read more
LeBron James Is Producing a Comedy for Starz Loosely Based on His Own Life
First things first: As much we might want it to, no, that doesn’t mean the show’ll feature a character named Shmebron Shmames who dunks on people for a living. James is plucking only from his experience as a successful dude who comes from a rough upbringing; the NBA and global superstardom and general “defining athlete […]
Read more
Freak Show & Tell: Observing the Elaborate Dance of Courtship on Tough Love: Co-Ed
Every week, television documentaries present us with so many unusual people, with so many strange and/or disturbing problems, you might find it hard to keep up with all of them. That’s where I come in! Here’s an unflinching look back at TV’s Week in Freak Shows. Tough Love: Co-Ed (VH1) Who Is This Now? Steve. Why Are […]
Read more
Meet Your New American Idol Judging 'Dream Team'! Hey, Wait, Come Back Here, This Is Important!
American Idol was in crisis. Coming off its worst-rated season ever, in which the once-world-beating Nielsen juggernaut was brought to its knees by snowballing audience apathy, the continuing fragmentation of prime-time TV, and novelty-slinging upstarts in spinning chairs offering a marginally fresher take on Idol’s long-stale formula, Fox was finally ready to make some changes. […]
Read more
Grading the Top 10 Songs in … AMERICANA!
Every week on Grading the Charts, Molly Lambert examines a different musical top-10 list, covering the best-selling and most-played songs from specific genres in every corner of the world. This week GTC heads back to the U.S. for the Americana chart, where folk, bluegrass, blues, and country meet. 1. Jason Isbell, “Stockholm” Isbell was a member […]
Read more
Fifty Shades of Grey Casts Dakota Johnson and Charlie Hunnam in Lead Roles; Tell Your Mom
Everyone’s sure kept a keen eye on the Fifty Shades of Grey casting, especially considering a lot of people claim to have no intention of seeing the movie. Of course, that fits with the larger Fifty Shades pattern: A friend’s mom described author E.L. James’s writing style as “like Danielle Steel with a bad flu,” […]
Read more