All posts filed under: Media

Stop Reviving Things I Loved

You know when your dear old 92 year old grandad has had fourteen heart attacks, but you keep resuscitating him because of your own selfish need to keep him half alive? That’s what keeps happening to the most beloved media of my childhood. I can’t remember what came first. Was it Twin Peaks 2017? Star Wars 7, 8, 9? Gilmore Girls on Netflix? Whatever it was, the most recent crime was Cruel Intentions, and by that point my eyes had rolled clean out of my head. I was once excited. I once thought that bringing something I had once loved back to life, albeit in a zombie state, was a positive thing. “Two members of the original cast are coming back? Wow! It must be good!” I cried. But now…it’s hard to be hopeful. The cynic in me knows that the only reason for the sudden resurgence of things I loved that should have died in the mid-2000s are these: a) Money b) Lack of originality c) Security – to make even more money Hollywood, TV,…

Oscars 2016, Movie Review: Room

Originally posted on Ice the Burn:
Here’s what I knew before watching: Brie Larson is getting rave reviews, the young boy Jacob Tremblay gave an adorable acceptance speech at the Critic’s Choice Awards show. I knew the premise of the film and expected an emotional roller coaster. It’s so much more than that! It’s not a simple “let’s decide to escape this life and live happily ever after.” It’s a process as are the consequences that follow. Here’s how I see it and why I want others to as well. Check it out: ? A young mother and her now-five-year-old son have been living in a small shed they call “Room.” Joy, the mother, was imprisoned seven years prior, while her son, Jack, has no idea that there is a world beyond Room. But now that he’s old enough, Joy reveals the truth. Initially in disbelief and outrage towards what she tells him about everything he thought he knew, Jack comes around to help them both escape from their captor, a man they call Old Nick.…

Selective Outrage Won’t Get Us Free

Originally posted on Black Millennials:
Jamar Clark was killed execution-style while handcuffed in Minneapolis. Black activists most notably affiliated with the local Black Lives Matter chapter and the local NAACP shut down highways and occupied the 4th police precinct. National media is starting to pick up on the local unrest, especially after white supremacist terrorists shot five Black Lives Matter protestors. In Chicago, video released shows LaQuan McDonald being shot some sixteen times by a white police officer. His murderer has been charged, and thousands are mobilizing. Traditional media is focusing on the clashes between protesters and police, while social media is aflame. The gruesome video (which I admittedly haven’t watched) lives on the pages of many. Heated debate about the discomfiting consumption of Black death and pain is — once again — underway. Not one to homogenize Black murder and resulting unrest, I can’t help but draw striking parallels to Ferguson and Baltimore. From the expansive number of mass mobilizations and frontline energies, to the tweets of solidarity, frenetic live-streaming, and the viciously heavy-handed responses…