But Tom and Daisy don't get what's coming to them, and that's a big part of the theme of The Great Gatsby—how frustratingly untouchable those with entrenched wealth are. "They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or…

I just picked up The Obelisk Gate, the second book in N.K. Jemisin's Broken Earth series, and I can't wait to get into it. I loved The Fifth Season (which just one a Hugo for best novel this past weekend) so I'm really looking forward to this one.

Good luck with The Sound and the Fury. I love Faulkner, but I'm glad I read that one in a college course with other people to discuss it with and a professor to guide me, because that book is dense. I think both As I Lay Dying and Light in August are more straightforward. As I Lay Dying was the book that got me…

It's such a relief to find someone who feels the same way. I felt like a space alien sitting unmoved in that theater, with everyone howling in laughter around me. The absolute worst was the climax, where Ronan MUST watch Chris Pratt's hilarious dancing, despite his ostensible goal of exploding the whole planet. At…

Same here. The completionist part of me was encouraging me to see it in theaters, but I'm glad I resisted. With the amount I was yelling at the TV when I watched it at home, I probably would have been kicked out of the theater. Now I know what Star Wars fans must have felt like when watching the prequels for the first…

Interesting! So much for my theory then. I do wish more vampire fiction dealt with this specific characteristic of vampires. It often gets passed over in favor of the flashier ones, like burning up in the sun, but it has potential for plot complications, etc.

I think Possum Kingdom can be interpreted as being about a vampire trying to convince a woman to let him turn her. The rape metaphor is still there (as it is in most vampire-related fiction), but in a world where True Blood and Twilight were inexplicably popular, it's slightly more palatable. Maybe.

I totally agree! He played a lawyer in the remake of True Grit, and I spent so long going "Where have I seen that strange man before?" and then it hit me. He and his penchant for arson are unforgettable.

That's another thing that I really liked about Brave though, too. Merida isn't perfect. She screws up in a major way by being selfish, and has to learn to recognize when she's wrong and apologize. She's a standard-bearer for independence, but has to learn that it's not okay to hurt other people when trying to "just do…

What, doesn't everyone want their legs to pinwheel in place as they try to run away from a scary monster?

It's Alan Wake for me. A former co-worker of mine loved it and got me to play it, but I found it incredibly tedious. The mechanics were repetitive, and it commits the cardinal sin of just throwing more and more stuff at you to make the game harder as it goes along, rather than giving you more complex challenges.

Oh yeah, I totally agree! That b.s. at the end of the series of "Hannah's love cured me of my need to kill." It made no sense to have that happen with Hannah. Considering Dexter helped Lumen through her darkness, she should have been the one to help him! They had a much stronger emotional connection, along with the…

I liked Lumen as well. I was pretty surprised at how well the show handled something as traumatic as what she went through. I think a lot of that is owed to Julia Stiles.

"Who would bother labeling themselves as such so openly?"

Definitely. I remember the whole "Disney vault" thing from years ago, where they would release a classic movie and urge us all to run out and buy it before it was sealed forever behind the impenetrable wall of the Disney vault. People seemed to believe it was an actual thing, like there was a giant safe under Disney…

Yeah, the rape scene is a smaller part in my larger problem with the existence of that entire side plot. The show had to cut out Coldhands, but yet had enough time to add in this entire plot, which coincidentally includes yet another almost-rape scene. It's part of what makes me feel that the sexual violence in the…

I think the show does have to accurately portray what violent, patriarchal societies are like, as you say. It certainly would be putting on rose-colored glasses if the show were to pretend that these kinds of threats simply didn't exist. Hell, they're a huge problem in today's society as well.

I also love how his brother won the costume contest with that mediocre astronaut costume. I mean, it wasn't terrible, but this was supposed to be at Comic-Con! There are professional-level costumers there. It really sounds like I'm nitpicking, but it was that detail that really made it apparent to me how clueless and…

One of my biggest problems with this song is actually the video. So she's concerned he's in a relationship that's not right for him, and that's a legitimate sentiment. However, the video seems to advocate that you need to become like the hot, popular girl in order for a guy to notice you. Yes, at the end, it's…

When I watched the film the first time it was actually a bootlegged copy that had one of the alternate endings on it, where the cops come after Katie kills Micah and they shoot her: http://www.ew.com/article/2…
It sounds kind of lame in text, but the scene before it where she is sitting on the floor after killing him,…