These reports have me worried about what ‘Apple News’ is going to look like. About as hard-hitting and controversial as a pair of fuzzy bunny slippers, probably.

I just looked the Chinese actress up. Name of Fan Bingbing, arguably one of the biggest actresses in China. She had been scheduled to do a movie with Bruce Willis but has disappeared without a trace.

The “Chinese Academy of Social Sciences” keeps an official list grading its TV actresses on how ‘culturally responsible’ they are. Who leads a pure life without scandal, who give to charity and is a spokesperson for a worthy cause. One top actress was recently awarded a zero and immediately went into hiding fearing…

If you read reports about how prissy Chinese state media can get this sounds very familiar. I’ve heard people complain about Apple vigorously autocorrecting swear words in our text messages. No, we weren’t having a discussion about ducks. Apple appears to be designing their service to comply with the most autocratic…

I get the impression I’m not in the target age demographic for this show. I’m only 64.

Pop culture on my death bed? Any song by Cher. Because its would make me wish for the sweet release of death to come.

I have an old buddy whose favorite show remains ‘Andy of Mayberry’, who rails against TV shows that forces him to ‘feel feelings’ or to think too much. No joke, not an exaggeration. Its pretty much a quote. He’d probably like this show, except he considers cop/crime shows decadent for showing people being mean to each…

One thing I don’t like about these self-referential ‘franchise’ films is after all effort put into ‘world-building’ the writer/director seems to loose track of the story’s underlying message, the subtext that their film is conveying. What am I telling you about THIS world? When you begin a story with a blank sheet of…

In that film ‘Daredevil’ am I remembering correctly that Elektra’s very first time up at bat as a ‘superhero’ got her killed? I recall she struck me as being as stupid as those clueless doofuses on Youtube who yell ‘Watch this!’ before inflicting grievous bodily harm on themselves

Do you really need to pay someone else for ‘intellectual property rights’ just to make a zombie movie? Its ironic the word ‘zombie’ is banned from the entire series. The Korean film ‘Train to Busan’ was a perfectly nice zombie movie without having to pay royalties to ‘the walking dead’.

When I was a rural kid (I’m pretty old) a home might have a bolt action .22 for rabbits or a deer rifle. Nobody in their right mind back then would think to keep a militarized AR-18 with extended magazine, Picatinny rails and laser spotter in the house. This was before firearms had morphed a perverse phallic totem to…

I was going to post something unkind about how the entire ‘superhero’ genre lacks any nutritional content, like those florescent orange cheese puffs you get in the supermarket snack food aisle. Then, I decided not to.

You can’t say he’s wrong, though. I came to the same conclusion about SNL humor a good 25 years ago. Whenever I see a SNL skit today I’m reminded of those old Catskill comic performers on the Ed Sullivan Show in the late 60s telling the same corny old lounge act jokes they did for the past 30 years. At first SNL…

Fontana never participated in show’s promo work or interviews that first year. It became increasingly apparent that he didn’t appear to be a happy member of the ‘team’.

The Good Place was always a solid ‘concept’ show but sometimes the execution was lacking. They tend to do a lot of scenes of character just standing there giving exposition instead of... well... acting. Don’t TELL me you’re sad, Chidi, ACT SAD!

In 2016 there was a delightful Korean series named “Oh my Ghost” (or something similar) about a horny virgin ghost possessing the body of a meek member of a restaurant kitchen staff with the object of getting laid. The star of the series Park Bo-young was the highest paid Korean TV actress at the time.

I’m reminded of something the marquis de Sade was purported to have said. ‘Its the secret wish of every aristocrat to be buggered by his manservant’. This version of ‘Lizzie’ appears to be less about feminism and more about sadism. Its the ‘transgressive act’ writ large. Screwing your house maid and butchering your…

I read somewhere that 3% of the population owns 50% of the nation’s guns. We’re talking anxiety disorder combined with obsessive-compulsive hoarder instincts. Anxious teenage girls in the big city cut themselves, middle-aged men stockpile ammo. Its all the same thing. Folks in rural country who stockpile canned goods…

Phoenix is only 43 years old but he appears to be aging rapidly into his ‘character role’ face. Which for a male actor is a good thing. 

I didn’t have much of a pop culture weekend, now that you mention it. I am watching the 2016-17 Korean series ‘Legend of the Blue Sea’ about a lost mermaid wandering downtown Seoul. The only thing to recommend it is delightfully offbeat performance of Jun Ji-hyun as the Mermaid. Otherwise its just boilerplate…