The State of Scary TV
‘The Returned’ and ‘Ash vs Evil Dead’ join ‘The Walking Dead’ in offering high-quality horror.
January 8, 2014
Rock’s Silent Majority Rules Again: Bastille Will Play ‘SNL’ and Everywhere Else
A few years ago, I started using the term “silent-majority rock” to describe bands that garner virtually no coverage in the music press and appear to be devoid of (for lack of a better term) “buzz” — and yet also happen to have hit songs and surprisingly robust album sales. This phenomenon became common after […]
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Q&A: True Detective’s Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson, the Laurel and Hardy of Existential Despair
If you’re looking to further chill the cockles of your heart this snow-swept January, HBO has something frosty mixing in its cocktail shaker: brutal, ritualistic murder with a dash of nihilist buddy comedy. True Detective premieres this weekend, the latest offering in so-dark-you-need–high beams–just-to-see-it prestige television. Intended as a possible American Horror Story–like anthology series, […]
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Justified Season 5, Episode 1: Everything After Augustine in ‘A Murder of Crowes’
Justified’s fifth season premieres with “A Murder of Crowes” (get it? Get it??), an hour of television that serves as a Great Muppet Caper opening number of sorts — myriad promises layered atop one another, starring just about everybody on the show who’s not dead yet. There’s no slow-building crescendo to a kick line, but […]
Read moreR.I.P., Soapnet: The Death of the Network Where Every Soap Went to Die
Soap operas have been one of television’s hardiest genres since the medium’s inception, adding a visual component to what was already an extremely successful category of radio show. Dependent upon endless cliffhangers and narrative tension drawn out at a snail’s pace, soaps are like a shrub that always thrives no matter what the TV climate […]
Read moreLouis C.K. Will Sell His Directorial Debut for $5
In 1998, more than a decade before he started winning Outstanding Writing Emmys and getting nominated in the Best Directing category, Louis C.K. made a black-and-white movie called Tomorrow Night. (Three years later he’d make Pootie Tang, an experience so flustering that C.K. hasn’t put together another film since.) Now C.K. will use the $5 […]
Read moreJanuary 7, 2014
Afternoon Links: Parks and Recreation Gave Itself a 100th-Episode Present
[protected-iframe id=”2215b6a1646c6a567f11924b177338f6-60203239-57838107″ info=”http://www.nbc.com/assets/video/widget/widget.html?vid=n44756″ width=”462″ height=”324″ frameborder=”0″] Parks and Recreation has evaded the chopping block many wonderful times — enough so that its 100th episode is coming up this Thursday, actually. To honor the milestone, the cast have shared their favorite moments in a new 20-minute clip. Fair warning: Perd Hapley sings.
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Career Arc: The Not-Quite Stardom of Gabrielle Union
A look back on an underappreciated filmography.
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The Bachelor Season Premiere: Seven Lessons to Kick Off Juan-uary
It is, as you assuredly know by now if you’ve read even this far into a story with the words “The Bachelor” in the headline, a month that our corporate siblings (hi!) have cleverly dubbed “Juan-uary.” The Month of the Juan. The month when Juan Pablo Galavis — the latest call-up from the farm team […]
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The 20 Overlooked Performances That Should (But Won’t) Get Oscar Nominations
Recognizing the great work that may go unrecognized.
Read moreDon’t Quiz Dennis Rodman About Some Political Junk When He’s Just in North Korea to Play Ball
“Watch this.” Thus spake Dennis Rodman, getting ready to make Michael Bay’s big walk-out video look like a hiccup. (Yes, it’s Meltdown Tuesday; Reubens are half-price till seven.) Conferencing from Pyongyang with CNN’s Chris Cuomo on Tuesday morning, Rodman wound up summoning a verbally terrifying and contextually baffling hurricane. It was incredible.
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The Wolf of Wall Street: The Little Controversy That Could (and Should)
The Wolf of Wall Street controversy has hit Defcon 2. Not only did Jonah Hill take a beat to defend the film at Variety’s annual You’re The Best! brunch Creative Impact Awards, none other than Leonardo DiCaprio himself descended from the Olympian heights on his hybrid chariot to drive the point home to a packed […]
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Freak Show & Tell: Don’t Drink Paint, Kids (Also, Don’t Eat Your Mattress)
My Strange Addiction (TLC) Who Is This Now? Heather. Why Are We Watching Her? She’s addicted to drinking paint. How Did She Get Here? Shortly after her mother died, Heather was cleaning out a desk and found a paint pen. She was attracted to the smell and suddenly had the urge to taste it. Since […]
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Dick Clark and American Bandstand’s Behind-the-Scenes Anti-Gay History
Pulitzer Prize–eligible magazine The National Enquirer broke an old but interesting story this week about Dick Clark’s American Bandstand. The ultra-wholesome image cultivated by Clark and his producers was unsurprisingly the result of behind-the-scenes pruning, as Clark would frequently conduct “witch hunts” to “purge gays from the ranks.” After taking over Bandstand from original host Bob Horn, who had been locked up […]
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Real Escape Games: Why Not Unwind by Living Out Your Totally Relaxing Imprisonment Fantasies?
It’s too bad The Office‘s team-building exercise was hatched before mystery rooms, real-life claustrophobic entertainment exercises based on adventure games, became popular. The funhouses (not so fun for the claustrophobically inclined, of course) have become popular over the past two years, and involve visitors being trapped in rooms until they can figure out how to […]
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Hollywood Prospectus Podcast: 2014, Matthew McConaughey, and Crime Movies
What do you need to know about this forward-looking episode of the Hollywood Prospectus podcast? In the opening, we mention French Montana’s new mixtape, Coke Boys 4, and everything went uphill from there. We did 30 solid minutes talking about Matthew McConaughey and how he is going to win 2014 with True Detective and Interstellar […]
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Explosion Artist Michael Bay Can’t Improvise Any Kind Words About a Gigantic Curved TV
When you’re Samsung, presenting your 150-inch curved TV at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, you might as well invite Michael Bay to speak. (His travel costs were virtually nonexistent; Optimus Prime just walked him over from Hong Kong.) If your teleprompter’s gonna go all wackadoo, though, leave Michael Bay out of it. Apparently […]
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