It’s amazing how much of 2016 is a blur. I barely remember the beginning of it — what I watched, what I read. I’ve done a lot of “Wait, that happened THIS year?” as I look back on what media made an impact on me. Winona Ryder made a jaw-dropping comeback in Netflix’s Stranger Things,… Read More Mala’s Best of 2016 Pop Culture Round-Up
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the campaign for “the Internet’s Boyfriend” Tom Hiddleston as the new James Bond. For an actor, there’s no doubt that the opportunity to play Bond is next level. It’s a long-running, wildly successful, franchise. You go from stolid period dramas to a blockbuster paycheck. Everybody knows your name.… Read More Tom Hiddleston as Bond? Paging Dr. No!
Recapping a year in pop culture is HARD — especially since real-life circumstances resulted in me consuming a heck of a lot more media than usual! I found myself reading a ton, avoiding the movie theaters — and dropping TV shows if they made me unhappy or failed to hold my interest. This is the… Read More Mala’s Best of 2015 Pop Culture Round-Up
With 110 percent more self-awareness, silliness and skin, Magic Mike XXL casts the spell that 2012’s Magic Mike couldn’t quite muster. It’s going to be a common observation: This is exactly what people wanted from the moody, artsy, and often-times slow first film. There’s a scene early on in which Channing Tatum’s affable Mike shows… Read More Magic Mike XXL is Bigger, Better, Bawdier and Bomerier
Hawkeye/Natasha. Bruce Banner/Natasha. And here I am about to sally forth with my own ‘ship manifesto: Bucky/Natasha. I know what it looks like: We’re gleefully, even shamelessly, pairing Black Widow up with everything in pants because she’s the only female member of the movieverse Avengers. Let me get three things out of the way.… Read More Why I’m Here for The Avengers’ Black Widow and Winter Soldier
I started reading The Uncanny X-Men in the 1990s, swiftly graduating from yoinking my brother’s weekly comic book haul to filling up my own boxes. My first major “X-Men event” was the Extinction Agenda storyline in 1990 and then I followed that into the blue team’s X-Men title and, of course, the 1992 animated series. Why am… Read More Charming Rogue: Why Channing Tatum as Gambit Misses the Mark
Vikramaditya Motwane’s period drama Lootera (“Thief”) is appropriately titled, as it steals slowly into your consciousness and deftly exploits your vulnerabilities before leaving you alone with nothing but your thoughts. This is not a loud film; it features no dance numbers, no bombastic “Bollywood moments,” but it still delivers the beautifully melodramatic payload that makes… Read More Lootera Will Steal Your Heart
