Film, Television, Radio, and Gaming
DMX, gravel-voiced hip-hop star who battled law and addiction, dies at 50
I wasn’t the biggest fan, and the last time I remember seeing him was when he walked away from a live performance at the VMAs or something.
But “Who We Be” was one of my favorite songs of the 2000s, while “X Gon’ Give It To Ya” and “Where The Hood At” spent a lot of time on my playlists.
So MTV has semi-accidentally made Important Television in the 21st century. I did not see that coming.
Just as the original 1992 installment should have been an escapist trifle about cute twentysomethings sharing a New York loft and fighting over who’s not doing dishes, the 2021 show should have been a relatively sedate circle-jerk of fiftysomethings —my generation is looking old as fuck, y’all— congratulating themselves for being pioneers and showing off their various personal achievements.
But now as then, Becky happened.
And this time, it’s just… holy fuck, woman. How the hell can you be the exact same person, twenty-nine years later? How is that even possible, Rebecca?
The last few years of smartphone videos have shown us many an unhinged asshole shoving her entitlement and outrage in the faces of innocent people who had the temerity to exist inconveniently, but what is seldom recorded are the little moments of low-volume shittiness that POC tell us about… those “I took an African dance class and no longer see race” moments. Those “I have black friends” moments. Those someone-can’t-tell-the-difference-between-being-uncomfortable-and-attacked moments.
And that’s exactly what Homecoming gives us. The producers handed Kevin and Becky an opportunity to reflect on their famed 1992 argument about race, and it should have been a breeze. All they had to do was give Kevin a chance to restate his then-radical-now-mainstream ideas about institutional racism and inequity, let Becky nod sagely and say that she wished she’d listened more, and… that’s it. Conversation over. Everyone could have gone back to drinking, passing around baby pictures, and lamenting that Eric was stuck in quarantine after testing positive for COVID just as they started shooting.
Oh but no. Becky couldn’t have that. She had to be That White Chick who instinctively identifies with the worst fucking people, interrupts any conversational tangent that makes her squirm, and yet becomes indignant when she is interrupted. She had to make sure that Her Opinion was registered, and demand that it be validated as generously as her insane ramblings about Hasbro connecting her to the ghost of John Lennon.
Of course, the result is only Important Television if the people who need to see it, do… the original show was a big deal because if you were a teen or twentysomething in the USA and had MTV, you watched MTV. The new show, meanwhile, is a Paramount+ streaming exclusive, so its reach is going to be meager. But if you have a relative from 45 to 55 who is skeptical about “all the racism stuff” and who talks like the NYT but reacts like Fox News, it might be worth gifting them a subscription and luring them into watching it with promises of ‘90s nostalgia —there’s plenty on hand, I promise!— before allowing the Blossoming of a Karen to manifest before their eyes.
His greatest fame came from playing an insanely determined but ultimately contrite cable guy on Seinfeld, and a greasy bartender who pimps out the high school girl he’s having kinky sex with on Twin Peaks, but more than that, he was one of those character actors who served as part of the connective tissue that held together ‘80s and ’90s pop culture.
Head for The White Lodge, Walter.
And it’s all right, yeah, I’ll be fine
Don’t worry ‘bout this heart of mine
Just take your love and hit the road
There’s nothing you can do or say
You’re gonna break my heart anyway
So just leave the pieces when you go
—The Wreckers – “Leave The Pieces”
What are we calling “Gen Z” in this context? Do Lana Del Rey and Lorde and Tove Lo and First Aid Kit count? If so, then there are a number of contenders.
If it needs to be late 20teens stuff, though? Fuck, I dunno. Something from Billie Eilish, maybe? George Ezra’s too old, I think. Umm… Dave’s “Lesley”. Let’s go with that.
It’s been 40 years, and I still say Satan totally won the fiddle battle in “The Devil Went Down To Georgia.” It wasn’t even close. That song is pure anti-Devil propaganda.
Bonus take: Lucias Cray may have been a greedy old man, but I wish his ghost nothing but the best in defending his lost treasure from interlopers.
The first few seasons of Arrested Development were some of the best ever produced for broadcast television, while the first few seasons of Archer out-Office’d The Office. And Jessica Walter was the bedrock upon which both shows rested.
Neither Lucille One nor Mallory would appreciate it, but you’ll be missed, dear lady.
Cherry is incredibly well-acted and beautifully made… it’s unfortunate that its alternate title could be 500 Days of Full Metal Jacket. Both the Russos and Tom Holland have now ably demonstrated their range, and someday I hope they collaborate on a movie that isn’t a retread with an unearned ending.
(Loved Ciara Bravo’s neck-ribbon, though.)
I Care A Lot’s plot revolves around one of the most horrifyingly common and shameful practices in the American health and legal systems. I hope it raises awareness and saves a few families from the predations of vile people.
But that doesn’t stop the movie from being evil fucking fun. In fact, Hollywood needs to have a cottage industry devoted entirely to making Rosamund Pike Vehicles. Just movie after movie, built around one coldly calculating monster of a character after another. The joy she takes in embodying feminine amorality is palpable. You can almost see it in her eyes sometimes: “I’m a woman and they’re going to let me get away with being this fist-pumpingly depraved… isn’t it grand?”
And it is.
So, wait… that is the Marvel movie that Fox re-shot and buried for a year? Say what now?
The New Mutants is far from great; the casting is flawed in places, they tried to stir a couple incongruous romances into the mix, two-fifths of the cast are superheroically superfluous, and it’s probably impossible to really know what’s happening if you’re not watching it with a moldering old man who bought the first 75 issues of the comic off a spinner rack in the ‘80s.
But come the fuck on… I’d watch TNM five times in a row before I’d watch a single one of Fox’s X-Men movies again. Among the studio’s two decades of X-output, I’d actually put this one at #3, behind Logan and the first Deadpool.
The flaws are real, no question. The casting of Dani and ‘Berto is weak and weird, respectively; maybe there’s a production backstory I haven’t read, but how the hell did Roberto Da Costa go from a short, arrogant Portuguese-speaking Black kid in 1982 to a bored 6′ tall Brazilian virgin-hunk in the 21st century?
And the problems with those characters don’t stop with the actors; Dani’s original ability-set was perfect for a coming-of-age story —because she can unexpectedly find anyone’s greatest fear or shame and literally show it to the world, she essentially had the power to make other teenagers hate her— but taking her straight to Full-On Demon-Bear drained her of much of her poignance. Meanwhile, Roberto had his powers swapped out for the absent Magma’s, probably because someone realized a slightly cringey Fiery Latino was a less-bad look than a whitewashed character turning black and punching people.
Fortunately, Anya Taylor-Joy is a delightful, show-stealing Illyana Rasputin —assuming this version of the character is still a Rasputin, who knows?— who could easily carry a Magik movie of her own, and the handling of The Lockheed Situation is simply adorable. (Had this movie been marketed competently, Lockheed sock-puppets would have sold big.) And to his credit, Charlie Heaton is a competent Sam Guthrie; his biggest problems come from the script’s complete disinterest in the character and what he can do.
Maisie Williams as Rahne… should work. Prior to seeing the movie, I viewed her casting as a bit of a coup; after, my feelings are mixed. Maisie doesn’t bring much depth or vulnerability to what should be an incredibly shy, insecure, self-loathing werewolf, and what little Arya-magic she does provide is undercut when the movie decides that the sexually repressed and violently shamed Catholic girl is going to instantly transition to an unrepentant queer who makes out in graveyards. It’s frustrating, because taking Rahne down that road is a solid idea, but taking her there in the first 30 minutes is a waste of a character that is otherwise sidelined by the giant power-gap between her and the rest of the heroes and villains.
Having shot its load on the Demon-Bear in the first movie, I’m not sure if The New Mutants had legs as a franchise… if it were to continue as a superhero-horror hybrid, the only place left to go would be Illyana’s Limbo, and that would be a lot for the average Marvel Moviegoer to swallow in one bite. But as it is —as the last artifact of twenty years of mediocre world-building at Fox— it’s a solid piece of work that shouldn’t embarrass anyone involved.
Homicide: Life On The Street was the best cop show ever made until The Wire came along, and Kotto was a big part of what made it work… he was one of the only actors with the on-screen gravitas to believably put a height-of-his-powers Andre Braugher in his place.
