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[noelmu]

Buffy The Vampire Slayer, “The Body”

Excerpted from my 2010 AV Club review.

“The Body”

I’ve experienced two major deaths in my life. In 1996, one of my best friends was murdered out in Los Angeles, where he was in the early stages of a promising acting career. I hadn’t seen him in a while or talked to him in months, and I got the news the night before I was supposed to leave on a vacation with my fianceé’s family to the Atlanta Olympics, so I didn’t go the funeral. In the years since, I’ve realized that I probably could have rearranged our schedule and found a way to go, but I was 25 years old then and insecure about almost everything, so I didn’t assert myself. Instead I spent the hours after I got the news babbling nervously and incessantly to my fianceé about my memories of my friend. I didn’t know how to process his death. I didn’t know what was appropriate.

Four years later, my dad died. It seems like a much longer stretch of time, because in the interim I got married, bought a house, moved to Arkansas and started writing full-time. And when I look back, I have to remind myself that I didn’t have any kids yet, and that I’d only been a home-owning grown-up for a few months. My friend’s death feels like ancient history to me now, but my dad’s death feels like fresh news, even though it happened a decade ago. My dad died suddenly—a heart attack, while he was taking an afternoon nap—and I didn’t have any real responsibilities after it happened, beyond driving up for the funeral. My stepmother dealt with all the arrangements, and because my dad was the pastor of a small-town Episcopal congregation, our family had plenty of support. And it wasn’t like I was that close to my father. We talked on the phone every few months, and I’d just seen him at Christmas, but there was always a little distance between us, for various reasons. Still, my most abiding memory of that time was my physical reaction. That whole week, I felt as tired as I’ve ever felt, almost like I was wearing a weighted vest. I felt like something was pressing down on me.

The remarkable thing about “The Body” is how well Joss Whedon captures those particular, eclectic reactions when a loved one dies. The episode opens with a reprise of the final scene in “I Was Made To Love You,” in which Buffy comes home on a sunny morning and finds her mother laying dead on the sofa. Joyce’s body is cold and motionless, and appears slightly out of focus in the back of the frame for a moment before Buffy sees her. Once Buffy realizes what’s happened though, Joyce’s body becomes a hard reality that Whedon keeps returning to, by cutting to shots of her on the floor, or at the morgue. The second-cruelest cut comes after a flashback to a recent holiday dinner, which ends with Joyce and Buffy dropping a pie, followed by a cut to Joyce’s corpse. The cruelest comes after Buffy imagines the paramedics reviving Joyce and everything being okay, before she realizes that it’s not. That’s the way it goes when something terrible happens to us—be it a death in the family or even something as mundane as a bad grade at school. These things preoccupy.

Whedon takes a lot of chances with “The Body,” some of which may have been ill-advised, albeit in a way that’s in keeping with the episode’s subject matter. There’s no “right” way to react to a death, or even to document one. Whedon drops the music entirely (outside of the opening and closing credits), and employs multiple techniques to replicate Buffy’s disorientation. When she rushes to call 911, Whedon goes handheld. When the paramedics arrive, the camera zooms between Buffy and Joyce as Buffy tries to determine if her mother looks presentable. (Buffy ultimately reaches over and tugs Joyce’s skirt down a little.) When a paramedic explains that Joyce probably died of an aneurysm, Whedon only shows the man from the nose down. When Buffy tells Dawn that their mom is dead, Whedon shows them at a remove, through a window, with the sound muffled. When Xander frets, he walks in and out of frame. When the Scoobies arrive at the hospital, Whedon records their sympathetic hugs with quick dissolves. Some of these shots and edits come off a little gimmicky, but the ones that work are so effective that it seems petty to complain that Whedon overdoes it at times. (Besides, different moments are likely to move different people.)

Similarly, Whedon tries different ways through dialogue and action to convey how people grapple with the meaning of “lifeless.” Some of those ways are fairly blunt, as with Dawn’s mini-arc, which sees her go from being emotionally distraught at school over some petty insult, to cheering up when she has a conversation with a boy she likes, to being so distraught over her mom that she needs to touch Joyce’s dead body in order to understand what happened. (“Where’d she go?” Dawn asks, as if wondering how her normal teenage ups-and-downs took such an unexpected turn.) And some are more subtle, as when Dawn’s art teacher asks her students to explore the negative space around their subject—a body, as it happens—just as Whedon does with this episode, showing Buffy’s characters with a Joyce-sized hole in them.

My favorite sequence in the whole episode though is one that’s a little more down-to-Earth. It takes place in Willow’s dorm room, where she frets over what to wear to the morgue—“Why do all my shirts have stupid things on them? Why can’t I dress like a grown-up? Why can’t I be a grown-up?”—while Tara, who’s gone through a death in the family before, tries to be helpful, and Xander gets so frustrated with his feeling of impotence that he punches a hole through Willow’s wall.

And then there’s Anya.

I was holding it together fairly well while watching this episode, until Anya started saying inappropriate things on the periphery of the scene, like, “What will we be expected to do?” and “Xander cried at the apartment; it was weird,” and “Am I supposed to be changing my clothes a lot? Is that the helpful thing to do?” I finally lost it when Willow blows up at Anya for not acting like a human being and Anya yells back that as a recently re-mortaled person dealing with the real meaning of death for the first time in centuries, she just doesn’t understand.

Here’s the whole speech:

I don’t understand how this all happens, how we go through this. I mean I knew her and then she’s… there’s just a body. I don’t understand why she just can’t get back in it and not be dead. It’s stupid. It’s mortal and stupid. Xander’s crying and not talking and I was having fruit punch and I thought that Joyce would never have any more fruit punch and she’d never have eggs, or yawn, or brush her hair, not ever and no one will explain….

Yes, that speech does spell out the whole point of the episode in bolded, capitol letters, which ordinarily would be a bad piece of writing. But damned if Emma Caulfield doesn’t make Anya’s frustration real. And damned if there aren’t some times when even witty fictional characters need to say exactly what’s on their minds, even if it’s “writerly.” Besides, Whedon earns the speech with all the ways he emphasizes the physical aspects of life and death throughout “The Body:” Buffy cracking Joyce’s ribs while administering CPR, and Joyce feeling no pain; Buffy grabbing some paper towels to mop her own vomit, and watching the stain spread; Dawn being stalked by in the morgue by a vampire, a creature who is dead and yet animate.

This is going to sound strange, but it’s the vomit-stain I find most compelling. Here’s this warm, oozing essence of Buffy, seeping into a neat stack of Bounty; while in the next room an entire adult woman is sprawled on the floor with a broken bone that’s not bothering her in the slightest—because the “her” that was is no more, and persists only inasmuch as she’s seeped into the people who knew her. There’s the corpse—inescapable, inconvenient—and then there’s the spirit that has completely vanished. To make out its shape, you’ll have to look at the people gathered around where it used to be. At one point in “The Body,” Dawn’s crush-object Gavin asks, “Negative space… what’s that all about?” This episode is the answer.

[noelmu]

Redirect

I’ve been meaning for a while now to mention here that I’m not going to be updating my links here any more. I’m using a service called “Authory,” which scours the web and automatically saves my articles. The link to that is here: https://authory.com/NoelMurray

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 7/1/18-8/4/18 (addendum)

(It’s come to my attention that the links in my previous version of this post aren’t showing up. Hope breaking it into two will fix the problem.)

The New York Times The Best Movies and TV Shows New to Netflix Australia in July TV Review: Castle Rock Season 1, Episodes 1-3: King’s Things TV Review: Castle Rock Season 1, Episode 4: Put on a Happy Face

Rolling Stone 10 Most Insane Mission: Impossible Stunts 50 Greatest Movie Superheroes ( I wrote about Darkman, The Rocketeer, Violet Parr, Hancock, The Phantom, Doctor Manhattan, Baymax, and Flash Gordon)

The Verge Cut The Crap: With The First Purge in theaters, it’s a good weekend to watch Battle Royale on Netflix Cut The Crap: Get ready for the World Cup final with Shaolin Soccer Cut The Crap: Wynonna Earp is back, and there’s still time to catch up on Netflix Cut The Crap: Castle Rock is the perfect excuse to start watching Haven on Netflix Cut The Crap: Christopher Robin is a reminder of all the good Pooh movies — including one on Netflix now

Vulture TV Review: Yellowstone Season 1 Episode 3: Mama Tried TV Review: Yellowstone Season 1 Episode 4: On Brand TV Review: Yellowstone Season 1 Episode 5: Big House Blues TV Review: Yellowstone Season 1 Episode 6: Politicking

The Week Middle school is the worst. Eighth Grade gets it.

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 7/1/18-8/4/18

Our summer started with a funeral. It’s ending with a wedding.

Within days of school ending back in May for Archer and Cady Gray, we got word that Donna’s mom had passed. On Memorial Day, we were on the road, driving to Chattanooga to be with her folks. And now, this coming Thursday, we’re hopping on a plane, flying up to Portland, Maine to see my nephew get married, and to spend time with my side of family. We’ll get back on Sunday. Fall semester for Conway public schools starts that Monday.

A few months ago, our kids had never been to a funeral before; and now this will be their first wedding. These are apt ways to bookend what’s felt like a momentous summer for our household. Archer is barreling straight ahead into his senior year of high school, already preparing for his next big move to college, just a year away. Cady Gray has been coming into her own in terms of her style, personality, and sense of purpose, and is more than ready to conquer 9th grade. Donna had a book come out a few months ago, and has been working on a handful of new projects.

As for me… well, I had some anxious moments a couple of months back, where it seemed like assignments were tapering off, and I started to wonder if I needed to change my focus and try writing a book rather than relying on my regular internet outlets for work. Donna listened patiently to me getting all anxious and angsty, and insisted that I probably didn’t have anything to worry about. As usual, she was right. Not only did I get back to a full workload in June, July, and August, but I recently compared my 2018 ledgers to 2017, and saw that I’ve been booking at roughly the same pace and amounts as last year. In other words: last April and May were slow too, and then summer picked up a bit, and fall was a monster.

Still, in the midst of all my undue stressing out, I actually did start making tentative plans toward not one but two book projects. (I mean super-tentative… as in, I’ve started notes files on both, but haven’t written up a proposal or pitched anything.) I also had a colleague recently approach me out of the blue about collaborating on a book project.

As I mentioned in this space earlier this year, of late I’ve had one eye on work and the other on our kids, who are fast approaching the day when they’ll be leaving the house. Everything feels amplified in our family life lately. So intense. As much as I can, I’m trying to let myself feel it all, rather than pushing it aside and getting back to my laptop. But I’ve also been thinking about what comes next; and more and more, I’m thinking that my career may have evolved into something else entirely by the time Donna and I are empty-nesters.

That’s still a few years away, though. In the meantime, please enjoy the usual assortment of reviews and lists and essays that I’ve been cranking out over the past five weeks. Probably the most major piece here is the article about Mission: Impossible stunts, which ran in a shortened version in the revamped print edition of Rolling Stone...

... but which is much longer on-line, with more insights from director Christopher McQuarrie and stunt coordinator Wade Eastwood. Give it a read! It’s the listicle equivalent of a big summer blockbuster.

The A.V. Club Field Guide To Parenting: 8 graphic novels to get your kids hooked on comics (I wrote about Cardboard Kingdom and Little Orphan Annie)

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Actors make the most of seaside suspense in Welsh two-hander The Lighthouse Movie Review: Awkward father-son bonding lacks punch in modest Legacy Of A Whitetail Deer Hunter Movie Review: Mashup of cameos and mismatched footage doesn't fly in weird vampire flick Sunset Society Movie Review: Irish found-footage horror film The Devil's Doorway can't escape clichés Movie Review: Nothing new in arty French zombie drama The Night Eats The World Movie Review: Anthology A.I. Tales features four artificially linked shorts Movie Review: Psychological drama Broken Star burns out in the end Movie Review: Aussies unite to repel alien invasion in nimble sci-fi thriller Occupation Movie Review: Documentary King Cohen asserts the greatness of genre filmmaker Larry Cohen Movie Review: 14 Cameras provides a second underwhelming dose of voyeurism Movie Review: Talking to the dead turns troublesome in supernatural thriller Our House Movie Review: Documentary Far From The Tree movingly captures the highs and lows of parenting kids who are different Movie Review: From dinosaurs to courtroom drama, overstuffed Korean epic Along With The Gods: The Last 49 Days entertains Movie Review: The haunting Forest Of Lost Souls takes unexpected turns New In Home Entertainment: Charlize Theron shines in Tully as a mother on the verge

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 6/3/18-6/30/18

Longtime readers of this Tumblr know that last summer was an unusually active one for my household. In addition to the usual camps for our kids, Archer and I went to Orlando with his high school choir for a week (visiting every Disney park plus Universal), and later the four of us took a cruise to the Bahamas (including a port visit to the Atlantis water park). This summer -- again, camps aside -- we’ve had too many work and family obligations to range as far as we did a year ago. But we wanted to maintain some of 2016′s momentum: taking long family trips that involve just the four of us, and indulging Archer’s newfound fascination with rollercoasters and Cady Gray’s love of waterslides.

So this past week we spent a few days in Arlington, TX, which is about a six-hour drive from Conway, AR. We stayed at a nice hotel on a trolley line to our three planned activities: a Texas Rangers game on Tuesday night, a day at Six Flags Over Texas on Wednesday, and Six Flags Hurricane Harbor on Thursday. It was a great trip. Fun times and some genuine adventure. Experiences the kids will remember... which is the whole point.

I don’t know how much of this Archer and Cady Gray have noticed, but for me part of what’s stood out both with last year’s cruise and this year’s amusement park trip is how many families of different racial, ethnic, and social backgrounds we’ve met and chatted with. We have this in common: We’ve all saved our money and spent months planning, so that for a week each summer, we can relax, have fun, and make memories.

I don't know the political inclinations of any of the people we've casually befriended over these past two summers. Some probably share our views. Some might think less of us if they knew how we vote. But during the few days that our lives overlap and we pass each other in the lobbies and elevators, what matters is: What did you do today? How was it? Did your kids have fun?

During our week in Texas, the daily news wasn’t great. I was grateful that for much of the week I was screaming my head off on a coaster or a slide, away from social media for hours at a time. I’m not the first to make this observation, but I increasingly feel that Twitter isn't healthy, either for individuals or for society at large. For much of the past two years, my feed has been one long, angry howl of despair.

I’m sympathetic to the howlers. They’re not using Twitter to crowdsource solutions to our problems; they’re more like C.S. Lewis in the movie Shadowlands, telling a friend that he doesn’t pray to God looking for answers, but rather, “I pray because I can't help myself. I pray because I'm helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping. It doesn't change God, it changes me.”

Still, even if Twitter gives the frustrated a necessary outlet to vent, it’s more exhausting than therapeutic to scroll through it, all day long. When every viral controversy is greeted with maximum outrage -- regardless of whether or not it actually merits just a mlld rebuke or a righteously angry rejection -- it weighs on the reader.

So it’s good to get offline for a while, and spend time around real people, who in person tend to be much friendlier -- especially in an amusement park. If nothing else, on a coaster with a drop as steep as the Titan’s or the New Texas Giant’s, at least we’re all hollering in the same direction.

Anyway, onto this month’s links! After a slow spring (due in part to a lot of travel and family obligations), this summer’s becoming blessedly busy. There are quite  a few pieces below I’m really happy with: my review of the Mr. Rogers doc, my interview with Billy Bob Thornton, and my essay about “nice” reality competitions like Great British Baking Show in particular. Click and support, so we can afford to go on vacation again next summer.

The A.V. Club Movie Review: The Mr. Rogers documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor? is a tearjerker with a purpose

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Cop and drug dealer team in smooth Korean action flick Believer Movie Review: The Nicolas Cage police thriller 211 can't match his intensity Movie Review: Katee Sackhoff stands up for humanity in 2036 Origin Unknown Movie Review: Sex-tinged melodrama Affairs of State mirrors real politics Movie Review: Mike Tyson fighting Steven Seagal is a mere sideshow in the strange action flick China Salesman Movie Review: Korean comedy The Accidental Detective 2: In Action is a smooth, if unmemorable, ride Movie Review: Christina Ricci excels in otherwise dull thriller Distorted Movie Review: The Icarus Line Must Die maintains its punk rock cred New In Home Entertainment: Love, Simon and Year of Spectacular Men New In Home Entertainment: Unsane may be shot on an iPhone, but it's a slick paranoid thriller

Rolling Stone 10 Best TV Shows From 2018 (So Far) That You Should Be Watching 50 Greatest Comedies of the 21st Century ( I wrote about State and Main, Love & Friendship, and Enough Said)

The Verge Cut The Crap: Netflix’s Before I Wake is the perfect film to stream after seeing Hereditary Cut The Crap: After The Incredibles 2, watch this Venture Bros. episode Cut The Crap: Caught up on Westworld? Here’s why you should watch Humans

Vulture Interview: Billy Bob Thornton on Goliath and Why TV Is the New Indie Film TV Review: Yellowstone Season 1 Episode 1: In a Big Country TV Review: Yellowstone Season 1 Episode 2: Boys Will Be Boys

The Week Reality TV is getting nice Hereditary is the best scary movie of the year

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 5/6/18-6/2/18

It’s been a hectic few weeks, with the kids finishing up their school year, Donna traveling to the UK for a conference, and an unexpected trip out of town for my mother-in-law’s funeral (a sad but life-affirming experience). I’ve had a lot on my mind lately about life and work, but I’m not sure this is the place to hash it out, at least for right now. So instead I’ll just send you straight to the links, which are heavy on reviews (including from my ongoing weekly streaming recommendation column for The Verge, which as been going well so far), and one major interview project (recording the thoughts of The Americans’ main creative team about their finale).

Please click! Traffic to articles I write keeps me employed.

The A.V. Club Music Review: Mark Kozelek, Mark Kozelek

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Julianne Nicholson and Emma Roberts embrace formidable roles in indie drama Who We Are Now Movie Review: Tough guy Scott Adkins is the right fit for The Debt Collector Movie Review: In a role she co-wrote, Natalie Dormer's star power brightens crime thriller In Darkness Movie Review: Otherwise routine horror flick Feral redefines the 'final girl' trope Movie Review: Everyman Martin Freeman braves zombies to save his daughter in Australian thriller Cargo Movie Review: Star power distinguishes lighthearted Korean arm wrestling drama Champion Movie Review: Margot Robbie shines, even in bizarreness of sci-fi noir Terminal Movie Review: Crime drama The Assassin's Code is strictly by the book Movie Review: Midwest noir Goodland too pulpy for its own good Movie Review: Messy comedy-drama Another Kind Of Wedding mixes irritating and charming moments New In Home Entertainment: Black Panther may be the most memorable Marvel movie ever

The New York Times How to Watch the Royal Wedding

Rolling Stone The Americans Exit Interview: Cast, Creators on Series Finale

The Verge Amazon’s Rocky and Bullwinkle brings back an old favorite… but why? Cut The Crap: Why The Fifth Estate is the perfect thing to stream this weekend Cut The Crap: Why a Ray Bradbury Twilight Zone episode is the perfect thing to stream this weekend Cut The Crap: After Solo: A Star Wars Story, spend half an hour in Paul Feig’s Other Space Cut The Crap: Get ready for Ryan Murphy’s Pose by watching Paris is Burning this weekend

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 4/22/18-5/5/18

Not long after Cady Gray learned how t read, I put some of my favorite kid-friendly comics on her bookshelf. I didn’t tell her about them; I just figured that she’d eventually pick them up. And sure enough: Before long she was a fan of Peanuts, Little Orphan Annie, Bone, and Little Lulu.

That’s kind of how Donna and I have continued to share the things we like with our daughter. We just play the music we love around her, and wait for her to ask about it. Soon, she’s listening to Sondheim all on her own. We quote our favorite movies and comedians, and before long she’s on YouTube, looking up Monty Python and Mitch Hedberg.

Since entering adolescence, CG’s been gradually developing a sense of style. She started off wearing the fingerless gloves her mother knit for her every school day. Then she started putting a pencil behind her ear. She’s occasionally added some pieces of jewelry, or a purse, or has worn the same coat or jacket repeatedly for months on end. At her last salon appointment with her mom a couple of months ago, she finally moved on from the straight long hair she’s worn for most of her life, and asked for a short asymmetrical cut that looks super-cool. She's been so effective at creating an image for herself that even when her friends draw her, they nail it:

Not long after she started coming up with “a look,” it occurred to me that, as an artist, she might enjoy painting her nails. So this Christmas, as a stocking stuffer, I bought her a nail kit, with a base coat, four colors, and some remover. I knew she wouldn’t want anything too girly, so I picked a set of metallic shades: gold, silver, black, and turquoise.

The kit sat unused for months. But just as with the comics, the music, and the comedy, eventually CG found her way to it. One day, out of the blue, she came out of her room, dressed for school, with her nails painted. She’d watched a YouTube tutorial, and just tried it out, all on her own. Since then, she’s played around more with the polish, including her current design, which is black with gold tips.

I know it’s probably weird for a dad to be proud that his teenage daughter is wearing the nail polish he bought her, but what can I say: Traditional gender roles are kind of upended in this household, where I do all the cooking and Donna paid off the mortgage.

None of this has anything to do with the work compiled below, but I haven’t done one of these “catching up with the kids” posts on Tumblr in a while, and I’ve been tweeting a lot lately about Archer’s academic accomplishments, so I wanted to take a moment to appreciate one of the many things that’s awesome about our daughter: how she takes what we give her and then goes her own way.

As for this most recent batch of articles, it includes a couple of essays for The Week that I’ve been kicking around in my head for a while, as well as the first two installments of a new weekly recommendation column for my friend/editor Tasha Robinson at The Verge. I’m hoping I’m at the start of a productive summer, with a lot of these more personal pieces. It’s always helpful though if you at least click these links, even if you don't actually read.

More often than not these days, I’m inclined to set work aside, to spend more time with these children of ours before I don’t get to watch them being amazing up close any more. But I’m trying my best to do both: Filing pieces that mean something to me, without missing anything going on in my last years of parenting two wonderful teens.

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: The Rachel Divide tackles a complex case of false racial identity Movie Review: Despite a solid cast, haphazard comedy The Escape Of Prisoner 614 misses the mark Movie Review: The contrived but poignant Modern Life Is Rubbish will appeal to music buffs Movie Review: World War II-set Norwegian thriller The 12th Man has the right stuff Movie Review: Tedium quickly overwhelms promising opening of horror flick Gehenna: Where Death Lives Movie Review: Matthias Schoenaerts and Adèle Exarchopoulos fuel Racer And The Jailbird's tragic passions New In Home Entertainment: In The Fade is a jittery melodrama with political overtones

The New York Times 10 TV Shows We’ll Be Talking About in May

The Verge HBO’s Silicon Valley is struggling to stay relevant Cut The Crap: What to watch this weekend after Avengers: Infinity War Cut The Crap: After Tully, watch Charlize Theron in Young Adult

The Week Why political comedians will always let you down Why is TV so obsessed with crimes from the '90s?

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 3/31/18 - 4/21/18

Last Sunday morning (after taking a redeye flight), I got back from a whirlwind trip to San Francisco, where I served as a juror at a film festival in the afternoons and evenings, and spent my mornings seeing as much of the city as I could walk to in just a few hours of exploring. The weather was lovely, and the festival put me up in a hotel that was close to city hall, AT&T Park, Telegraph Hill, the City Lights bookstore, the Transamerica building... a lot of the major SF sights, in other words.

Anyway, almost as soon as I returned I had a frenetic 24 hours of watching The Walking Dead finale and writing both a recap and a season postmortem for Rolling Stone (the reason I flew back so early); and in the week that followed I’ve been run a little ragged by my kids, who’ve had after-school and evening events every day. Today’s really the first chance I’ve had to catch a breath in a while... and I didn’t even write that much this week.

I do have a lot in the pipeline though, now that I’m going to be home for a while. And I wrote some big pieces before my trip, linked to below. I’m especially proud of the Vox article about using my teens’ interest in reality TV as a teaching opportunity; and three of my TV reviews in this bunch (for Jesus Christ Superstar, Elvis Presley: The Searcher, and Andre The Giant) went over pretty well with readers.

I’ve also had an especially good run at the LA Times lately, with the movies Ghost Stories, Edge Of Isolation, Wildling, 10x10, and The Endless. It’s been a good year so far for low-budget genre pictures.

Click away!

The A.V. Club TV Review: HBO’s Andre The Giant documentary is as powerful as its subject TV Review: Elvis Presley: The Searcher is the definitive movie about The King

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Classy British Ghost Stories to be savored Movie Review: Indie horror Edge Of Isolation brings verve to genre Movie Review: Farce Let's Kill Grandpa This Christmas is no holiday Movie Review: Wildling offers a darker, artier take on a classic Hollywood premise: the misunderstood teen Movie Review: Effective thriller 10x10 features smart acting and twists Movie Review: Indie horror film The Endless brilliantly questions uncertainty of memory Movie Review: Retro comedy Baja offers a vacation for the mind Movie Review: Lowlife puts some fresh touches on a Tarantino-esque story Movie Review: Do You Trust This Computer? lays out a scary case for artificial intelligence threats Movie Review: Seven Years Of Night is a strained specimen of Korean noir New In Home Entertainment: Phantom Thread is a beautifully made art piece

The New York Times TV Review: In Jesus Christ Superstar, an Old Story for (Yet Another) New Millennium

Rolling Stone Lost In Space: Sixties Sci-Fi Reboot Gets Netflix Blockbuster-TV Treatment TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 14: #FreeMorgan TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 15: Simon Says TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 16: Boss Battle The Walking Dead: What the Hell Happened to This Show?

Vox Reality TV offers valuable lessons for children. Really.

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 3/19/18 - 3/30/18

Baseball’s back, and here just a couple of days after Opening Day I’m already enjoying getting back into the rhythm of a long season, where games keep me company while I work -- sometimes all afternoon and even after midnight. It’s good timing, too, because my calendar’s been filling up quickly with assignments, due in large part to the way the entertainment year is increasingly starting in earnest in March and April, rather then after Memorial Day.

A lot of substantive pieces below, along with the usual array of reviews and listicles. Please click on anything you haven’t already read.

The A.V. Club Music Review: Jack White gets weird(er) on Boarding House Reach

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Triumph: The Untold Story Of Perry Wallace reveals barrier-breaking travails of basketball player in 1960s Movie Review: It may not be deep, but Attack Of The Southern Fried Zombies is bursting with regional flavor Movie Review: In Pyewacket, the demons between a mother and daughter might terrify more than the demon in the woods Movie Review: Caught effectively channels 1970s grindhouse horror Movie Review: God's Not Dead: A Light In Darkness counters stereotypes but remains programmatic New In Home Entertainment: Star Wars: The Last Jedi is a twisty, emotionally compelling chapter in the franchise

The New York Times 20 Family-Friendly Films on Netflix

Rolling Stone TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 12: Face Off TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 13: Over The Hilltop

The Verge The Last Jedi Blu-ray is a chance to reevaluate the film’s divisive casino subplot

The Week Why Grown-ish has been 2018's best new sitcom It's a beautiful day to talk about Mister Rogers

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

MONTH IN REVIEW 2/18/18 - 3/18/18

Been a lot going on this month, from the Oscars to the True/False Film Festival to a crazy-busy school schedule for our kids (or “walking out of school” schedule, as was the case with CG earlier this week, as seen in the picture above). My fest-hopping stretch of the year isn’t over; I’ll be heading off to San Francisco next month to be a juror at one of the world’s oldest film festivals. Still, after a fitful start to the year, I’m belatedly starting to get into the groove of filing regular weekly reviews and penning longer essays. If you missed any of either below, please click!

The A.V. Club Do the wrong thing: 90 years, 90 movies that should have been nominated for Best Picture (I wrote about City Girl, Make Way For Tomorrow, Mikey And Nicky, Modern Romance, and Marie Antoinette)

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: The Lodgers is short on spooky stuff, but it has other pleasures Movie Review: Vietnamese horror romance The Housemaid successfully mixes classy and trashy to take on history Movie Review: Korean wrong-man thriller Golden Slumber has the right stuff Movie Review: Indie action thriller Mohawk mines America's bloody past for its horror Movie Review: Mother-daughter conflict at the heart of South African horror film The Lullaby Movie Review: Thriller They Remain revels in its subdued weirdness Movie Review: Slick yakuza thriller The Outsider plants Jared Leto in postwar Japan Movie Review: Surly characters make Juggernaut a tough sit Movie Review: Zak Bagans' documentary Demon House is too much hooey, not enough boo Movie Review: Everyday trouble comes to a head in thriller Tilt Movie Review: Slow-to-boil horror in Apartment 212 elevated by TV vet Penelope Mitchell Movie Review: Its punk style overwhelms its substance, but Us And Them does have star-in-the-making Jack Roth New In Home Entertainment: Loving Vincent and The Girl Without Hands show animation's creative boom New In Home Entertainment: Downsizing doesn't always work, but it's thoughtful and heartfelt

The New York Times Six Films to Stream if You Loved Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri The O.J. Simpson Interview on Fox: Gripping, Gross or Both?

Rolling Stone The Walking Dead': Everything You Need to Know Before Season 8 Returns TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 9: The Long Goodbye TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 10: Chapters And Verse TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 11: Blind Faith

Decider While You Wait For David Chase’s Sopranos Prequel, Watch Not Fade Away

The Week Why this year's Best Picture race is a total crapshoot

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 2/4/18-2/17/18

We’re deep in the Olympic weeds here in our household, but somehow between oohing and aahing over slopestyle and scrutinizing which curling stone is “shot rock,” I’ve gotten some writing done (including a detailed piece for The New York Times on how to watch the Olympics, depending on your preferred screen choice). If you haven’t read any of these, please click!

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Sci-fi film Black Hollow Cage will leave you uncomfortably numb Movie Review: Still/Born hones in on the nightmares of new parents Movie Review: What's real, what's not is half the fun in Fake Blood Movie Review: River god water fights and more magical primate action in Soi Cheang's The Monkey King 3 Movie Review: Nothing special about Korean crime comedy Detective K: Secret of the Living Dead

The New York Times How to Watch the Winter Olympics, on TV and Mobile Devices

Rolling Stone Oscars 2018: 10 Nominees Long Overdue for a Win

The Week The complicated history of the black superhero

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

MONTH IN REVIEW 1/1/18 - 2/3/18

Last year about this time, I pledged that I was going to do a better job of keeping this Tumblr updated, while admitting (humblebragging?) that I’d become too busy to the write little weekly essays in this space that I’d penned previously. But as 2017 wore on, I started getting too busy on the weekends even to do a links roundup, with minimal commentary. So as the new year began, I considered abandoning this Tumblr altogether.

But my business cards have this web address on it, and for the few potential employers who might someday come here to see a comprehensive roundup of my work, I should keep making an effort to collect what I’ve done. I may only do it once a month, but I intend to keep it going.

So here’s everything I’ve written this year so far, including two fairly comprehensive looks at what i saw at the Sundance Film Festival. Please read! There are some good movies coming out soon, and (based on the assignments I’ve already been getting) another productive year head.,

The A.V. Club Lady Bird will likely get a lot of Oscar love… but how about in the editing category?

The Los Angeles Times  Movie Review: Supernatural thriller Devil’s Gate lurches from jolt to jolt Movie Review: Milo Ventimiglia's in good company in the diverting melodrama Madtown Movie Review: Horror remake Inside maintains chills Movie Review: Pulpy Acts Of Violence uses a dash of Bruce Willis and a pinch of Mike Epps to get the job done Movie Review: Horror icons Robert Englund and Lin Shaye can't save 'The Midnight Man Movie Review: A wicked premise and unhinged Nicolas Cage release submerged parental horrors in Mom And Dad Movie Review: Horror movie Living Among Us regrettably marks one of John Heard's last roles Movie Review: Vintage cheesiness of Wastelander not worth the slog New In Home Entertainment: It tapped into Stephen King's special brand of horror New In Home Entertainment: Blade Runner 2049 demands a lot from audiences, but the rewards are rich New In Home Entertainment: Last Flag Flying isn't typical Richard Linklater fare New In Home Entertainment: Only The Brave is old-fashioned — in a good way

The New York Times 12 Shows We’ll Be Talking About in February

Rolling Stone How David Letterman Just Reinvented the TV Talk Show – Again 50 Most Anticipated Movies of 2018 (I wrote about a dozen of these) 30 Most Anticipated TV Shows of 2018 (I wrote about a half-dozen of these)

The Verge Amazon’s Electric Dreams is more optimistic about the future than Black Mirror

Vulture TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 9: Boom, Roasted TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 10: There Goes The Neighborhood TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 11: Exit Through The Gift Shop TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 12: The People’s Court TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 13: Hot Diggity Dog! Why Did The Good Place Hide So Many Wizard of Oz References in Last Week’s Episode? Our 7 Biggest Questions After The Good Place Season Finale

The Week How the biggest movies of Sundance 2018 went small What the best movies of Sundance 2018 had in common

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

MONTH IN REVIEW 12/3/17 - 12/31/17

As another year ends, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it means to “put everything in perspective.” It’s helpful advice, I think, though it’s advice that depends a lot on what kind of perspective the person proceeds to take. Throughout 2017, I know a lot of us have struggled with anxiety over geopolitical matters that are beyond the average person’s control. For me though, one of the takeaways from this year is that whenever possible I should remove myself from the daily discourse for a second, take a breath, and adopt either a broader or narrower view.

In the broader sense, I’ve found that it’s helped to look at history, and to think about the difficulties faced by civilizations before us, and the various cycles and swings: from prosperity to lack and back again, and between poles of authoritarianism and openness. Even in recent years, I’ve noticed that over and over our pundit class has made pronouncements about changes in the culture that they insist are locked-in and permanent, until they turn out to be anything but. I’ve seen Democrats and Republicans win elections after political scientists have declared that demographics and/or social attitudes should’ve made those victories impossible. In my lifetime I’ve seen radical changes in Eastern Europe, China, and the Middle East -- sometimes for the better, sometimes not. All I know for sure is that what we’re afraid of one day has been known to dissipate almost overnight (usually to be replaced by some new horror, granted). This doesn't make our fears unfounded, nor does it justify complacency. But it does mean that maybe we don’t have to be on edge 24-7.

In the narrower sense, 2017 to me has reemphasized the value of acting locally. Sweeping, nationwide changes are difficult; but there are plenty of daily opportunities to improve the quality of life in our immediate vicinity. Early this year I heard an interview with Asia Argento in which she said that after a lifetime of living under a corrupt Italian government, she’s learned to ignore what politicians do, and instead to focus on the people who live on her block. Granted, Argento is a well-known actress and filmmaker, which affords her the privilege to a little philosophical. But that doesn’t make her approach to life entirely wrong. All year long I’ve read stories about people on a local level getting things done. It’s been very encouraging, to know that on the smallest day-to-day level, a civil society can still click right along.

Narrowing my perspective even further, down to my house, I have to admit that we’ve had a pretty good year here. I worked pretty much non-stop, from January all the way up to this week. Donna has really connected with her last two freshman classes, and has settled into a personally satisfying role as a mentor to some truly outstanding young people. Our own two youngsters, Archer and Cady Gray, have accomplished some remarkable things both inside the classroom and at home, as they’ve pursued their various obsessions and hobbies. Cady Gray took a school trip to New York, became the designated artist for an on-line role-playing game, and got to sing with her choir at an Arkansas Symphony Orchestra Christmas concert. Archer made All-State in choir, got a 5 on the AP Physics test, a 4 on the AP World History test, and scholarship-worthy 1480 on the PSAT. We took our first real family vacation this summer, making memories we’ll carry with us for a lifetime.

One of the unexpected complications of our current time is that it’s hard not to feel a little apologetic when things are going well, given that social media and the incessant stream of news alerts never let us forget about how crummy others are feeling. But at the same time, I’ve invested a lot in my work, my marriage, and my children, and it would be ungracious not to appreciate the breaks I’ve been given, let alone to squander them.

So here’s how the Murray/Bowman household is ending 2017: stressed, but happy, and looking forward to better days, for all of us. Thank you for reading, and may God bless you all.

And now if you’re looking for something to do this New Year’s Eve, here’s a long list of links...

The A.V. Club The best films of 2017 that we didn’t review (I wrote about My Happy Family, Uncertain, and Walking Out) The A.V. Club’s 20 best TV shows of 2017 (I wrote about Halt And Catch Fire) The best film scenes of 2017 (I wrote about BPM and Call Me By Your Name) The 20 worst films of 2017 (I wrote about The Shack, Flatliners, and CHiPs) The 20 best films of 2017 (I wrote about Logan Lucky, Baby Driver, and Get Out, and my ballot is here)

The Los Angeles Times First person: Being a film buff in Arkansas isn't as hard as it used to be Under The Radar: Keanu, Hasidic Jews and streaming support (I wrote about John Wick: Chapter 2, Menashe, My Happy Family, Nocturama, and Their Finest) The Year In Home Entertainment: The Vietnam War and the best new video and streaming picks of 2017 Movie Review: Human Barbie can't save The Doll from its own incompetent horror Movie Review: Qatari sheiks pursue passion for falconry in documentary The Challenge Movie Review: Hollow In The Land has a winning similarity to Winter's Bone Movie Review: Eclectic guitarist gets his due in Bill Frisell: A Portrait Movie Review: Arty approach to woodland horror bogs down Desolation Movie Review: Netflix gets epic with Will Smith's fantasy-action thriller Bright, but the result is less than thrilling New In Home Entertainment: Dunkirk is a stirring and stunning World War II epic New In Home Entertainment: Tom Cruise pairs intensity and charisma in American Made

The New York Times 11 Shows We’ll Be Talking About In December TV Review: A Christmas Story Live! Wasn’t Lively Enough

Rolling Stone 10 Best TV Episodes of 2017: Better Call Saul, “Chicanery” 10 Best Horror Movies of 2017 (I wrote about Super Dark Times, The Devil’s Candy, and The Blackcoat’s Daughter) 12 New TV Shows You Should Be Watching (I wrote about At Home With Amy Sedaris, Brockmire, Detroiters, Great News, Manhunt: Unabomber, Tales From The Tour Bus, Sweet/Vicious, and What Would Diplo Do?) TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 7: Eugene-ics 101 TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 8: The Son Also Rises

Uproxx What We Talk About When We Don’t Talk About Young Sheldon

The Verge The Twin Peaks: The Return Blu-ray set explains what the show is, not what it means The 20 best TV shows of 2017

The Week Why The Middle is TV's most underrated comedy Tonya Harding's belated moment to shine Are Molly's Game and The Post too obviously about 2017?

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

MONTH IN REVIEW 11/5/17-12/2/17

I photographed the berries above while out walking with my family last Sunday, using the fancy portrait setting on my new iPhone 8+ camera. (Hence the mix of blurriness and sharpness.) I did nothing to enhance the color, though. The red was really that red. Never seen anything quite like it in nature.

Anyway, if you’re wondering why it’s been a month since I last posted here... well, it’s not because I’ve been out photographing berries. But it’s not not because of that either. As I mentioned in this space not so long ago, I’ve been rededicating myself to exercising and eating right lately, which means I’m outside walking for about two hours every day, spread across three or four excursions. Between that, and working, and cooking meals, I haven’t had a lot of spare time. Anything even remotely extraneous has been postponed.

As for the work, as I mentioned last time I posted, I’ve spent much of November (and part of October) working on two big projects. One is a slate of contributions to an upcoming Entertainment Weekly special issue about The X-Files, which should be hitting newsstands soon. (This is my second EW assignment; I wrote a couple of short articles for the Justice League special issue that published recently, but can’t link to them because they’re not online. You can see my byline here, though!)

The other big project is linked below: a guide to getting rid of cable TV, written for The New York Times. That one involved a ton of research, fact-checking, and revising. My biggest fear during the whole process has been getting huffy emails from media relations departments, quibbling over my characterizations of what their companies do and don’t offer. But all my detail-sweating seems to have paid off. So far I’ve only gotten two not-that-insistent requests for changes, both of which I’ve been able to shoot down, with no further complaint. (However I am just now starting to get what I expect will be a steady flow of emails from smaller streaming services, inviting me to sample and possibly cover their wares. Every time I’ve written a comprehensive consumer-focused round-up piece like this, I end up on the press lists for businesses who assume this must be my “beat.”)

There are a number of other pieces below I’m proud of, including essays for The Week, The Verge, and Uproxx, and the final installment of my long-running A.V. Club “A Very Special Episode” series. Please click! More readers means more assignments. And since the tax bill moving too-rapidly through congress is probably going to directly and indirectly diminish my household’s earning power, I’m going to need all the work I can get.

I doubt I’ll be posting here next week. The best-of-the-year lists start rolling out soon, so I think I’ll wait until all the ones I’m contributing to have run before compiling the lot. Talk to you again ‘round Christmas. Peace and love to you all.

The A.V. Club A Very Special Episode: In one of HBO’s finest hours, Tom Hanks recalled the last time we went to the moon TV Review: A 30 For 30 about Ric Flair breezes too quickly through pro wrestling’s most important era

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Bloody Steven Yeun-starring horror-comedy Mayhem not to all tastes Movie Review: Twisty Korean courtroom thriller Heart Blackened effectively pairs glitz and crime Movie Review: Horror-comedy Attack Of The Killer Donuts lacks imagination Movie Review: Jena Malone shines in Victorian sexual repression thriller Angelica Movie Review: Icelandic supernatural noir I Remember You mines setting for moody malevolence Movie Review: Lili Fini Zanuck's Eric Clapton: Life In 12 Bars documents musician's darkest days Movie Review: Jon Bernthal, Christopher Abbott and Imogen Poots elevate slow-cooked Alaskan noir Sweet Virginia Movie Review: Routine thriller Slumber boasts Maggie Q, but little else Movie Review: Gangster Land goes soft on crime (and authenticity) Movie Review: Genre auteur Mickey Keating slips with ponderous Psychopaths Movie Review: More genial Canadian vulgarity on tap in horror-comedy Another WolfCop New In Home Entertainment: Wind River is a finely crafted crime thriller and a heartening hit New In Home Entertainment: Detroit is a hard to watch, raw expose of racism

The New York Times How to Cut the Cord on Cable Remember Jim Nabors by Streaming These 5 Andy Griffith Show Episodes

Rolling Stone TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 3: Damaged Goods TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 4: The King and I TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 5: Father Figures TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 6: Odd Couples

Uproxx Movie Review: Gary Oldman’s Darkest Hour Performance Is A Stunt — But It’s An Impressive One

The Verge TV Review: This is the exact wrong time for Future Man’s brand of dude comedy

The Week Three Billboards and The Meyerowitz Stories prove that great casting makes great movies Why Lady Bird is an instant-classic high school movie The real Justice League is on The CW

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 10/22/17-11/4/17

I’m in the thick of two big projects, both of which have involved a lot of research and are now finally in the writing phase. So it’s hard for me to think about anything other than work right now -- although I’m hoping that once these articles are filed I’ll be able to coast a bit through the rest of the year, focusing mainly on “Best Of 2017″ pieces and holiday fun.

While prepping these big projects, I’ve been doing a lot of other writing, much of which has come in last-second. The interview with Andrew Stanton below is a case-in-point. I was asked if I wanted to do it last Friday, I set it up over the weekend, I talked to Stanton on Monday, and the piece ran Tuesday. Other columns -- like the one about late night “man on the street” bits and the one about the evolution of horror TV -- have been in the works for a while.

Click on ‘em all! I like being able to do a wide variety of writing about a wide variety of subjects; and I like it even more when that work gets read.

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Takashi Miike goes big with bloody action in epic Blade Of The Immortal Movie Review: Bad Match unleashes a fatal attraction for the Tinder set Movie Review: Jigsaw: A not-awful return to the torture chambers of Saw Movie Review: Bad movie night candidate Halloween Pussy Trap Kill! Kill! comes with a warning Movie Review: Slovenian art rock meets North Korean authoritarianism in documentary Liberation Day Movie Review: Flesh And Blood has a raw, sometimes painful, honesty New In Home Entertainment: Dawson City is a must-see time capsule for cinephiles

The New York Times Stranger Things 2: Pixar’s Andrew Stanton on Directing 2 Episodes 12 Shows We’ll Be Talking About in November

Rolling Stone TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 1: Life During Wartime TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 8 Episode 2: Village Of The Damned Stranger Things 2: Your Complete, A-to-Z Reference Guide

Uproxx Comedians On Curbs With Cameras: Why Late Night Hosts Talk To Regular Folks

Vulture TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 7: Damn It, Janet TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 8: Who’s The Man?

The Week How horror TV embraced our demons

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 10/8/17-10/21/17

It’s been a bumpy week. I’ve been battling some kind of nasty bug, while juggling busy schedules for my kids, my wife, and myself. Some substantive work has drifted out of this fog, however, including a comprehensive look back at The Texas Chainsaw Massacre series, a preview of the new season of The Walking Dead, and the penultimate edition of my long-running, soon-ending A Very Special Episode column (this one about one of the weirdest TV programs of all time). I’ve also written several pieces that you won’t see for a while, for reasons I can't really disclose, not because of anything bad but because of quirky things that are hard to explain.

Do though check back in this space in the weeks ahead for articles about Stranger Things, The Meyerowitz Stories, Three Billboards Outside Of Ebbing Missouri, horror television, and a richly historic tradition in late night TV. That is, if I can stay healthy and alert enough to complete all the assignments.

The A.V. Club A Very Special Episode: A very special 1970s nightmare, starring Vincent Price, H.R. Pufnstuf, and the Brady Bunch Movie Review: Famed dissident Ai Weiwei takes a lyrical look at the refugee crisis with Human Flow

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Fresh take on fraternity life in Haze Movie Review: Killer werefrog, clever design enliven retro monster flick Bad Blood: The Movie Movie Review: Well-made pulp Leatherface delves into the Chain Saw back story Movie Review: Atmospheric thriller Nightworld delivers too little, too late Movie Review: Tragedy Girls, when mean girls turn deadly mean ... but still look good on Instagram Movie Review: Korean historical war drama The Fortress portrays and requires fortitude Movie Review: Documentary Deliver Us observes a present-day Sicilian exorcist Movie Review: Geostorm proves less thrilling than the Weather Channel New In Home Entertainment: Girls Trip is one of the year's happiest surprises

The New York Times Stream These 11 Underappreciated TV Shows on Hulu

Rolling Stone The Walking Dead Season 8: Everything You Need to Know

Screencrush Worst To First: Every Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Ranked

Vulture TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 5: Party Crash TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 6: All Aboard!

#Week In Review

[noelmu]

WEEK(S) IN REVIEW 9/24/17-10/7/17

The two weeks of work below represent a pretty good mix of the long-term and the last-second. The hefty piece I wrote about ‘90s erotic thrillers for Oscilloscope’s Musings blog was something I researched off and on throughout the summer (after kicking the idea around in my head for about a year before I pitched it). On the opposite end of the spectrum, the review of the Bengali film Red Oleanders is something I was asked to do the day before it was due; and my contribution to The A.V. Club’s Tom Petty tribute posted literally about an hour after I wrote it. As for the two lists I wrote in association with HBO’s Spielberg doc, I was assigned the Rolling Stone piece a couple of weeks ago, and the New York Times piece is something i pitched myself, once I saw that the doc was airing soon. A little piece here, a bigger piece there, a little planning, a lot of flexibility... That’s pretty much the job.

There are a variety of topics I’ve been considering expounding on in this space, but time is short these days, between the increased amount of work I have in the fall and everything the family is up to. So instead I’ll wish you all a pleasant week and thanks you for any clicking you may do on the links below. (Try The Florida Project essay! I think that’s a pretty good one.)

The A.V. Club Field Guide To Parenting: Break free from the screen: The best card and board games for your kids AVQ&A: 9 of our favorite Tom Petty songs (I wrote about “Surrender”) Movie Review: The Death And Life Of Marsha P. Johnson is more than just another true-crime documentary

The Los Angeles Times Movie Review: Super Dark Times artfully blends suspense and '90s teen angst Movie Review: Flatliners, the remake nobody asked for, is exactly as witless as you'd expect Movie Review: Rose McGowan shines in the atmospheric horror film The Sound Movie Review: Welcome to Willits is a weird and woozy slasher and aliens flick Movie Review: Routine thriller Don't Sleep relies on supernatural boilerplate Movie Review: Better Watch Out delivers nasty holiday fun Movie Review: Miles Doleac serves up self-serious horror in Demons Movie Review: Demonic possession drama The Crucifixion lacks life Movie Review: Red Oleanders Raktokarobi ably blends politics and Bollywood pop New In Home Entertainment: The Big Sick is a funny, touching tale and one of the year's biggest indie hits New In Home Entertainment: David Lynch: The Art Life spotlights the one-of-a-kind director New In Home Entertainment: Baby Driver and final season of The Leftovers

Musings Silk Teddies & Serrated Knives: Revisiting The 1990s Heyday Of The Erotic Thriller

The New York Times Stream These Underrated Steven Spielberg Movies 9 Shows We’ll Be Talking About in October Watching: Amistad

Rolling Stone 10 Things We Learned From HBO's 'Spielberg' Documentary

Vulture TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 3: The Show That Never Ends TV Review: The Good Place Season 2 Episode 4: The Better Battle

The Week The complicated poverty of The Florida Project

#Week In Review