Shownotes

I counted around 36 new (or renewing) TV shows last month. I’m basically performing triage on media. Send thoughts, prayers and healthy snacks! I might shift to a bi-weekly schedule for the warmer months.

This week:
Lesbians are trending, even in the multiverse(s); Andrew Garfield and Daisy Edgar-Jones as hot mormons; and thoughts on why nobody is watching the rest of Ozark.

Movie of the century

Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022)

directed by The Daniels

An aging Chinese immigrant is swept up in an insane adventure, where she alone can save the world by exploring other universes connecting with the lives she could have led. Unfortunately, this sweeps her up into an even bigger adventure when she finds herself lost in the infinite worlds of the multiverse.

Everything Everywhere does it all: Generational trauma, the finest Asian-American action, insane multiverse set-up, handmade FX that don’t look cheap, movie references that will make you feel like a cinephile, and yes, le dollar beans. Somehow the culture has decided that lesbians should be everything and everywhere and all at once and … uh … I don’t hate it?1, especially when they’re hot it’s not just a by-product of diversity quota. The Daniels have pulled off queer representation as fundamental part of a character’s development without turning it into a tale of morality and alphabet soup history snooze fest. Hello, the lezzers have entered the multi-verses!!!2

Needless to say: I absolutely loved Everything Everywhere. It’s a festival of kinetic fun, really well done action, honest laugh-out-loud moments, and still anchored to a solid emotional core. One of the smartest and creative blockbusters, a testimony to intelligent low-brow humor, and I want to watch it 20 more times. See it in theaters!

🇺🇸🇨🇳🏳️‍🌈👭🏼🦝

Tagged:

Trigger Warning For First-Gen Lesbians With Unresolved Mommy Issues, Movies About Taxes, The Most Fun A Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off, Every Emotion All At Once, My Girlfriend Liked This Movie

Limited Series

Under The Banner Of Heaven

streaming on Hulu/FX & Plex, new episodes weekly

Under The Banner Of Heaven is a crime drama based on Jon Krakauer’s non-fiction book of the same name, following the young and devout detective Pyre (Andrew Garfield) as he wrestles with his belief when confronted with the atrocious sins of his brethren.

Holy shit (yes, pun). Under The Banner of Heaven, produced by Jason Bateman, is strong and compelling when it shows the introspective moments, and scary and dark when it deals with the worldly craziness and righteousness of men. Not man as a whole: just men. Unfortunately, like many other shows, it is bogged down by unnecessary backstory - Mormon history, to be exact - although to a tolerable degree. Daisy Edgar-Jones, Sam Worthington, Gil Birmingham and Andrew Garfield deliver gripping performances.

⛪🇺🇸🤠

Tagged:

For People Who Love True Crime Podcasts, Arrested Mormons

Retrospective

For A Good Time, Call… (2012)

streaming on Plex

College “frenemies” Lauren and Katie move in together when both run out of alternative options. The girls bicker with each other until one fateful night, they concoct a wildly successful business venture. As profits swell, the girls reevaluate their hopes and dreams and realize that just because someone pees in your hair in college doesn’t mean she won’t be your best friend 10 years later.

I’m putting this here because this campy, bimbo movie about a so-called “friendship” should have been a movie about lesbians, but we weren’t living in those days then. We were living in a world where two very horny and very lonely women find companionship, trust and love, and yet somehow miraculously ?!?!?! don’t end up together. I’m mad because I actually loved this dumb stupid movie.

👯‍♀️🇺🇸

Tagged:
JUST LET THEM BE LESBIANS!!, The Good For Her Cinematic Universe, Romantic Comedies Under 85 Minutes, movies where the main character clearly has feelings for her best friend but it’s ignored and they date boys

• More lesbians in the Hulu feature “Crush” (2022), a mediocre but sweet teenage rom-com that presumably ticks all the right boxes for Zoomers; I still prefer Lindsay Lohan’s politically incorrect and only implicitly3 homosexual masterpiece Mean Girls. C-

• Finally saw Ambulance (2022), surprisingly big in scope and story. Could Michael Bay’s rollercoaster of drone shots and comically expensive film-making become the unexpected and subversive last line of defense for big screen cinema? With so much mediocre made-for-streaming content, it’s almost a relief to know that action-movies are still worth the theatrical experience. B

• Had to study Michael Mann canon post Tokyo Vice (streaming on HBO Max): Highly recommend The Insider (1999) and Collateral (2004), two very different but very solid contenders for gripping action with great substance. A-

• I’ve really enjoyed watching Winning Time (HBO). Just an overall great series, with excellent performances (what a great cast, man), engaging drama and loads of fun. A

• Netflix published the 2nd part of Ozark’s final season. Already after one episode, I’m exhausted. Nobody needs 7 more hours of dadaist plot twists. That’s the Netflix formula: creating great first seasons, then somehow missing the jump off point. They couldn’t even stick to their own principle of airing a whole season, and had to create an artificial compromise with these two part drops. Ozark sadly joins House of Cards and Mindhunter on the “Ruined by Netflix” pile. D-

The Northman (2022) by Robert Eggers

Prince Amleth is on the verge of becoming a man when his father is brutally murdered by his uncle, who kidnaps the boy’s mother. Two decades later, Amleth is now a Viking who’s on a mission to save his mother, kill his uncle and avenge his father.

The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent (2022) by Tom Gormican

Creatively unfulfilled and facing financial ruin, Nick Cage must accept a $1 million offer to attend the birthday of a dangerous superfan. Things take a wildly unexpected turn when Cage is recruited by a CIA operative and forced to live up to his own legend, channeling his most iconic and beloved on-screen characters in order to save himself and his loved ones.

🎧 Warpaint - Champion

Listen to the Media Diet playlist on Spotify

📰 DALL·E 2 and The Origin of Vibe Shifts

Read on Every

Very interesting take on the democratization and consequential loss of status signaling power in web design (and to some extent, what has always been part and is becoming a accelerating process of culture and fashion):

“Now that we have DALL·E 2 (and other AI image generators), a huge portion of visual vibes will become democratized. What Unsplash did to photography, DALL·E 2 will do to illustrations, 3D renderings, and eventually all visual styles.

(…)

“So what is the end game? What happens if we reach a “vibe singularity” in all forms of art, where anyone can create anything by typing a few phrases? How does status get signaled through aesthetic vibes when all the vibes are free?”

👩🏼‍💻 Same Energy

Website

Visual Search Engine leveraging a machine learning algo that works without text or metadata and is somewhat of an uncanny case in point for the cultural vibe shifts upon us, see above.