Zombie killers, warriors, carjackers and puzzle solvers gathered last week for the ultimate nerd summit: the 2nd Annual New York Videogame Critics Circle Awards.
The event, held at the Pfizer Auditorium at the NYU Polytechnic Institute in Brooklyn, was well attended by bald men in thick-framed glasses and suit jackets, plus serious male and Read More
On Sunday night, as Tina Fey and Amy Poehler were making history as the first two women to successfully elbow out a male host for the Golden Globes, audiences took in an unprecedented display of girl power. With Lena Dunham winning for Best Actress in a Comedy, Girls taking Best Comedy, and Julianne Moore winning for Game Change, we trumpeted a new era … one in which women could not only captivate an audience but do so with an unlikable protagonist. (Hannah Horvath is no Tony Soprano, but she can be plenty unappealing at times.)
Many of the night’s other nominees, including the stars of Veep and Nashville, fit into the same category, as did the un-nominated (but still there in spirit) Edie Falco in Nurse Jackie, Laura Linney in The Big C and Laura Dern in the criminally under-watched Enlightened, which premiered its second season this week. This last is perhaps the best example of these hard-to-watch heroines, with Ms. Dern playing the most delusional, self-righteous and self-martyring female antihero ever to traipse through premium cable.
It was a great night for rude, crude, progressive women. Unfortunately, it was an even better night for Bad Men. Read More
If you still haven’t picked out the perfect stocking stuffer for the guy (or gal!) who has everything, mosey over to CharityBuzz.com, an auction site that is currently offering a holiday-themed assortment of goodies. Its celebrity auctions are particularly spectacular. Who wouldn’t want David Lynch reading their screenplay, or Jennifer Egan to Skype into their book club? (Don’t even get us started on the two-hour date with Academy Award nominee James Cromwell.) Read More
Have you noticed that in the last several years, most of the “brilliant” TV shows on AMC, Showtime and HBO star these dangerous, psychopathic anti-heroes? From Dexter to Don Draper, Nick Brody to Rick Grimes, Walter White to the ultimate don, Tony Soprano, one gets the sense that while the rest of American culture is taking one step forward on progressive women’s rights issues, our beloved TV shows are moving us two steps back.
And what’s weird is how we love these horrible men. “I’m such a Carrie” no longer refers to the ultimate Bradshaw, but the bipolar Claire Danes on Homeland … the kind of gal who falls in love with a terrorist, despite the fact that he ends up subjecting her to electro-shock therapy treatments after they have sex. And they are still in love, or something! How sexy is that, ladies?
But wait, it gets worse… Read More
Oh happy days! After months of Dish subscribers having to go without their favorite programming from AMC, IFC, and the Sundance Channel, viewers were able to finally tune in right in time to catch the second episode of the former Cablevision subsidiary’s hit zombie show, The Walking Dead.
Which begs the question: Why now? Read More
If you hear Comic-Con and think “Ain’t It Cool talkbacker,” then it might be time to recalibrate that air of superiority. The ‘Con — as some nerds call it; ahem — has become a mid-summer Mecca for all things pop culture. Put it this way: James Cameron screened 25 minutes of Avatar there last summer Read More
