december

Books

Dept. of Speculation

A gorgeous and sad book that captures long relationships so well. I loved for narrator and the strange poetic style of storytelling. I read this in two sittings and was enraptured.

Dead Astronauts

This book did some interesting things with time, and some deeply annoying things with text. I feel like I know what he was doing with this book largely, and support his environmental aims (a+ murderous blue fox), but it never really came together for me.

Interference

A fun follow-up to a great book from last year. I loved seeing how modern Earth folks mixed with the people on the rainbow bamboo planet. I was surprised to find that we only followed a single generation of characters this time, but I did enjoy how they were more fleshed-out.

This is How You Lose the Time War

A deeply strange time-travel romance between two competing spies, Blue and Red. The central conceit of shifting threads of history and letter-leaving was fun, but at times I honestly had no idea what was going on. I really enjoyed this book.

Movies

Ford vs. Ferrari

A blast! I love car racing so much, and this film was a gorgeous vision of a famous showdown between an incredible car company, and Ford. I grew up hearing stories about Shelby, and this film brought him to life.

Uncut Gems

This was wild! From front to back this movie was a rollercoaster of poor decision-making and the world of vigs, 3 way parlay, and Kevin Garnet. Adam Sandler showed that he could really act in Punch Drunk Love, and he absolutely owns in Uncut Gems.

One Cut of the Dead

Without spoiling it, all I’ll say is this film went to fun places I didn’t expect, and was a delight throughout.

Psycho Pass

The episodes of this show already feel fairly cinematic, so stretching the show to nearly 2 hours felt right. It was super jarring to hear random English throughout the film though—at the start I thought I was accidentally watching a dub.

Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker

Frankly this post from Film Critic Hulk covered my feelings well. I described it as a movie trying to fellate itself. Scenes rarely got to breathe, and the movie felt packed with fan service and confusing backtracking from Last Jedi. Also wow, they just dropped a bunch of character storylines.

Ad Astra

Space Brad Pitt! We’ve sent most leading men to space, but never Pitt (I didn’t check this too carefully). Also this had Donald Sutherland, who is a personal favorite. I appreciate that none of the things in space made sound at least. Sad dads in space. It was pretty, and exciting, but ultimately didn’t really give me much to latch onto.

Ready or Not

Lol can’t wait to never get remarried. Rich people are the worst. Also it’s a real bummer that “satanists” get such a bad wrap in a world where the christians are the ones actually harming children. Fuck the satanic panic