Essays on TV and film — exploring stories, characters, and the choices behind them.
LEGO One Piece retells the first two seasons of Netflix’s live-action One Piece in a two-part animated special. Usopp, the crew’s enthusiastic storyteller, gives their newest companion, Tony Tony Chopper, his version of the voyage. Netflix’s official description confirms that recap format. For viewers who want to discover the live-action story without knowing its major … Read more
Death walks away because Puss has stopped treating his life as disposable. The wolf survives their final fight, recognizes the change in his opponent, and ends the pursuit. Puss gets to keep living, with one life left. He has neither killed Death nor won his missing lives back. That distinction, supported by the ending accounts … Read more
Somewhere around the midnight-margaritas scene, Practical Magic stops pretending to be about its plot. Two sisters and their aunts turn a kitchen into a small hurricane of blender noise and Stevie Nicks, and for a few minutes the 1998 movie forgets it has a curse to break and a body in the garden. That … Read more
I went into the third season of House of the Dragon braced for a battle, and the premiere handed me one of the largest ever put on television. What I did not expect was to walk away thinking less about the ships and the fire than about a girl on the back of a dragon … Read more
There is one shot in the Season 2 trailer I keep returning to. Toph Beifong, the blind earthbending prodigy fans have waited two years to meet, stands clean and composed, not a hair out of place. Something in me hesitated. The Toph I grew up watching was never composed. She was dirt under the fingernails … Read more
House of the Dragon returns for Season 3 on June 21, and it has been a while since Season 2 left the board mid-game. If you do not want to rewatch eight episodes before the war finally turns bloody, here is everything you need to remember. Full spoilers for Season 2 follow. Where We Left … Read more