From Hannah: When I was in high school, I first became fascinated with the nineteenth-century novel — Sense and Sensibility, Jane Eyre, David Copperfield.* And listeners of the show (and anyone who has ever met me, probably) know that while I changed how and why I read these novels, I never stopped reading them. Or consuming contemporary entertainment set in the nineteenth century. If I continually return to a fictionalized Regency period for entertainment, and in particular, to feel a cozy kind of comfort, then I'm not alone. Colin Firth, Keira Knightley, Anya Taylor-Joy, and Alan Rickman's Jane Austen adaptations receive much praise and replay. (We dedicated an entire episode to why Austen continues to grow in popularity, after all.) And it isn't just Austen, historical genre writers from William...
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Episode 8: Academia & Viral Social Justice
Earlier this month Duke University appeared in the news amid a minor controversy where a school administrator was offended by the rap music playing in a campus coffee shop and…
Call for Comments: Biography, History, Memoir, and Chutz-POW
Wayne Here: This week we’re going to engage in a little shameless self-promotion, or at least I am. A few years ago I was asked to participate in a comic…
Episode 7: Comic Con Culture
Live from 3 Rivers Comicon! Comic book conventions began in 1960s as small specialized gatherings of science fiction fans clubs who met to trade magazines. Over the past several decades…
Call For Comments: The Long Con
Comic Book conventions began as small gatherings of fans in the days before comic book stores and the internet provided a community for those in the hobby. The earliest shows…
Episode 5: Infinity Franchises & Cinematic Universes
It’s the obligatory Avengers: Infinity War episode! Well, sort of. Infinity War is, as one might expect, the biggest movie in the world right now… and by certain metrics, the…
Call For Comments: Teenage Wasteland: the adolescent sex narrative
I love the show Riverdale. I didn’t think I would. By all rights it should be absolutely horrible. I imagine that the pitch for the show went something like this……
Episode 4: Losing My Religiosity?
Never argue about politics or religion on the internet! Well, really, they’re the same thing. But so are arguments about atheism. And comics. And sports. And movies. And unix text…
Call for Comments: Movie Franchising and Cinematic Universes
Don’t worry, there are no Avengers: Infinity War spoilers in this post. That said, I’m pretty sure that international podcasting law requires that all shows talk about the movie next…