My opinion means less than nothing but I feel compelled to share anyways — Spoilers for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, the latest in the long-running MCU filmography, dropped this weekend (I’ve lost count, but there must be 30 of these films already, which boggles the mind, even for a fan of such things). Though the post-Endgame MCU has lost a…

Why writing remains the great equalizer — As a quirk of fate or poor planning, Amazon’s “The Rings of Power” had the unenviable task of running at the same time as HBO’s “House of the Dragon.” Both are fantasy epics with swords and beautiful people in elaborate costumes that nobody was clamoring to see. Personally, I thought…

Spoiler-lite thoughts about the new Disney+ series — I’ll be totally honest: I was meh when I heard Lucasfilm was working on a prequel series about a character who shows up in one movie. Never mind that Rogue One is a top-5 Star Wars film, or that Cassian Andor (Diego Luna) is one of the best parts. Prequels…

It’s now impossible to keep up with everything worth seeing — There’s no way to say this without sounding like someone complaining about how bread used to cost a nickel, but it’s true: There are too many good TV shows these days. I’m not talking about the noise that networks use to fill 24 hours of time slots, your stale sitcoms…

An unfair but inescapable comparison — I was admittedly skeptical heading into The Rings of Power, for two reasons: Much as they have become an almost daily part of my life, I don’t trust Amazon’s motives here. Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy is the ultimate distillation of Tolkien’s work. Any other attempts are…

The spin-off is weighed down by the memory of GOT’s disastrous ending — Even years later, I am still rather miffed at how badly Game of Thrones ended. It’s kinda embarrassing, actually — it’s not like we don’t have more pressing things to be worried about. But stories have always had an outsized hold over me. Thinking about them feels more productive than…

Stop fighting the platform and start working with it — Three years ago, I was an author looking for readers and I foolishly thought stories published here might send people off to find my books. To that end, I released my first Medium story pro bono. It went semi-viral, made no money, and sold no books. (Sign-up for my Medium…

The future is a bizarre and wonderful place — When I used to imagine what the future would look like, I pictured the normal kinds of stuff: flying cars, robotic servants, maybe even real lightsabers. Roomba and Alexa aside, we’ve fallen far short of those childhood dreams. Turns out, the future is mostly just depressing: escalating climate change, deadly…

Ranked by order of deadliness because why not — Each season of Stranger Things has introduced new antagonists that our heroes name after a Dungeons & Dragons monster. Thus, we’ve gotten the Demogorgon, the Mindflayer, and now Vecna. It’s safe to assume the final season will return to this well. What if, instead of another ruthless, bloodthirsty monster, Stranger…