This trope might come in several different packages, but it always involves the same stages: a presence (a character, an apparition, an item, a painting, etc) appears to be perfect, gorgeous, stunningly beautiful, angelic in every way relevant. Then suddenly or gradually, this beauty dissolves into nightmarish horror: the character ...

Penguins are dressy little birds in white tie that swim like fish and only live in the coldest places on the entire planet, right? Wrong! They live a bit further afield than that, like the good birds of Latitude Zero, living together on the lovely tropical Galapagos Islands, hence the ...

In the behind-the-scenes interviews about the show “Seinfeld”, Writer/Creator Larry David talks about the ending of an episode, I think it's “The Marine Biologist”.

To sum it up, the show is about fairly normal-yet-eccentric antics of the four characters, including George claiming to be a marine biologist to ...

Last December saw the return of iconic hero Luke Skywalker in the Mandalorian. It was a shockingly well-kept secret and I can tell you that I sure didn't see it coming. As a fandom-dweller, it was a beautiful moment that still brings a smile to my scraggly, wrinkled face ...

There are a couple of movies I've seen - only a couple that come to mind - with a very specific issue
that makes them not work for me.

It's when the THEME or below-the-surface meaning of the story holds together but the actual plot suffers for it.

Spoiler for ...

One common story formula involves a character receiving a magical gift…or magical ‘curse’…and being forced to deal with the chaos that the magic causes.

In Liar Liar, the slick, dishonest attorney is compelled to only speak the truth.
In Groundhog Day, the main character repeats the same day ...

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We all know that fiction and reality are separate things, but fiction mirrors reality and we suspend disbelief to ignore the parts that are unrealistic so that ...

Photo: “The Future is Not Set” -Kyle Reese quoting John Connor from The Terminator (1984)

A folded document fell on my lap while turning through the pages of a book I had not glanced through in a year. It was a test print for a brand new printer and the ...

Often when there are children in a cast of characters, especially in sitcoms or certain types of movies, audiences groan because they tend to be immensely annoying. They are a very special type of uncanny valley in the way they are written to talk and react. Usually, we get one ...

“Get Back”, the new documentary about the Beatles has been released - I haven't seen the whole thing yet, and I'm a fairly casual fan of the Beatles, but I've seen the shorter version of these recording sessions that was released way back when. And I've seen ...