So here we are at the end of 2015. I had this idea that maybe in 2016 I’ll get really good about writing down all the super-excellent things that happen to me that year, and that way I won’t be struggling to think of them when the end of the year rolls around. My best thing of 2015 (brace yourself for a shock) was the musical Hamilton. Not a full week after I whined to my friends that I feared there would never be another musical that made me feel the way Wicked and Rent made me feel, and maybe…
39 CommentsCategory: Misc.
And now, the case of Luke Cage’s dead wife. In “AKA You’re a Winner,” Luke hires Jessica to investigate what appears to be a missing pothead but actually it’s stealthily about Luke trying to find out what happened to his wife. You remember Reva? Kilgrave ordered Jessica to kill her? And then he got hit by a bus right afterward, and Jessica’s failure to double-tap in that moment is what led us all to the events of this show? The first problem with centering an episode on Reva is that we are all tired of the trope where the superhero…
17 CommentsIt’s toxic masculinity ahoy in “AKA The Sandwich Saved Me,” as Jessica teams up (rather grudgingly) with Simpson to track Kilgrave down and tranq him with Jessica’s newly acquired sufentanil. Simpson usefully discovers an old CDC facility with a hermetically sealed soundproof room where Jessica can keep Kilgrave once she’s got him. On my first watch-through of this show, I hoped that Jessica and Simpson were enjoying the kind of enmity that would later grow into grudging respect and then total trust. I can’t tell you how excited Whiskey Jenny and I were for Jessica to make use of Simpson’s exfiltration…
17 CommentsThis #AMonthofFaves continues apace, hosted by the marvelous and wonderful Andi of Estella’s Revenge, Tanya Patrice of Girlxoxo, and Traveling with T. Today we’re talking about a book this year that surprised us. I would like to choose Nick Hornby’s Funny Girl, but I already chose it for something in this Month of Faves. However, I want you to, when you picture me reading Funny Girl for the first time (a thing I am sure you are all constantly imagining), imagine that I spend the entire time saying, “REALLY. REALLY.” Because that is what happened. Instead of that, I choose…
18 CommentsThe most important thing about Jessica Jones is its vehement assertion of the personhood of its characters. David Tennant’s villainy, as Jessica’s unintentionally-formed Kilgrave support group makes clear, is that he sees attributes and not people, and responds accordingly: a car and a driver (not a man with a toddler son); beautiful music (not the cellist creating it). The case of the week1 reflects this. What seems — once Jessica finally decides that Jessica Hecht from Friends isn’t a Kilgrave henchman2 — to be a routine infidelity case turns into a trap: Jessica Hecht lost her mother when the aliens…
9 Comments“AKA Crush Syndrome” opens on Jessica being interrogated by the cops in the wake of Hope’s parents’ deaths. The scene has the kind of framing I love in this show, where we observe Jessica at an odd angle — through a window, behind a door, in a mirror. We’re watching Jessica, of course; but more importantly, the way this show’s shot doesn’t let you forget that Jessica is constantly being watched. The camera literalizes the feeling Jessica (and, to a lesser extent, ladies in public spaces) has of being perpetually on display for an unseen audience. It’s a neat trick…
15 CommentsAre you participating in A Month of Faves, hosted by Estella’s Revenge and GirlXOXO and Traveling with T? Today’s topic is, Which books have you read this year that were TOTALLY worth the hype? Nick Hornby’s Funny Girl is one for me! I’ve never liked Nick Hornby before, but Funny Girl made me feel happy all way through. The Turner House, Angela Flournoy. So, so assured for a debut novel, and it managed to make me love it despite being constantly compared to Gabriel Garcia Marquez, whom I do not care for. Way to go, Angela Flournoy. The Wicked +…
11 CommentsGuys, Quirk Books sent me some paper dolls for review, and this is a good time to tell you how crazy much I love paper dolls. When I was a wee lass, I had paper dolls of Prince Charles and Princess Diana plus paper dolls of the characters from Little Women. They used to go on quests to rescue Prince Charles, of whom, even as a child, I had a very low opinion. These are paper dolls of Hillary Clinton! In the below awesome tableau, the devil has become incarnate and wreaked havoc upon the nation. Luckily, Ghost George Washington…
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