Review: Downton Abbey Season Four
Downton Abbey has returned to the airwaves in the United States at last, much to the delight of the show’s rabid fans from coast to coast. But what does it have to offer with its fourth season?...
Category: Themes
Review: American Hustle
“Anyone can be confident with a full head of hair. But a confident bald man - there's your diamond in the rough.” Larry David should know, that glint in his eye, a fortune in the bank, that...
Even Righteous Babes Can Be Wrong: Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Retreat Controversy
Musician and activist Ani DiFranco was recently embroiled in controversy after she announced plans for a four-day feminist creativity camp, called the Righteous Retreat, to be held near her...
The Republican Attack on Unemployment Benefits
It is time for the United States to admit that it is no longer facing a battle over public services, or beginning to see the signs of an anti-welfare culture, but that it is in fact actively...
Strong Female Characters? Why Buffy Still Rules
I was a little young to watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer when it first hit our television screens back in 1997, although it finished up in 2003, when I was heading headlong into adolescence and...
Review: The Time of the Doctor
We bade Matt Smith a maudlin and schmaltzy goodbye on Christmas day with ‘The Time of the Doctor,’ the long-awaited Christmas special where we finally got to meet the Doctor’s next incarnation,...
A Grouchy Parent Learns Holiday Lesson
I must be the world’s biggest Grinch: it’s December 21, and I just pulled the federal tax form 990 off of the website of Toys for Tots, the massive children’s Christmas toy distribution charity...
Review – The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Towards the end of their arduous journey to the Lonely Mountain, Bilbo and the Dwarves happen across the burnt out husk of Dale a prosperous town once inhabited by men. Smaug the Magnificent, the...
A Powerful Leader, Not Just A “Powerful Woman”: Chile’s Michelle Bachelet Begins Her Second Term
On Sunday, Michelle Bachelet was voted in as President of Chile for her second term. Constitutional electoral requirements made it so that she had to leave her position following her initial...
The Two Worst Shows of 2013
As 2013 draws to a close and the media are filled with retrospectives on the best of, the worst of, and those between, I find myself reflecting on the television I gave up on in 2013 due to complete...