A few weeks ago back on our Things you Missed episode, Mav recommended the movie My Old Ass with Maisy Stella and Aubrey Plaza. Since that time both Wayne and Mav's wife Stephanie have watched it. In talking to them Mav noted a curious thing about the film. It's technically a science fiction movie, sort of. At the very least the basic setup of the film involves time travel. However, beyond the setup, the science fiction genre is essentially ignored entirely and the film is simply a coming of age rom com about teenage exploration of sexuality. And it's delightful. On this episode Steph, Mav and Wayne unpack the idea of incidental genre. That is to say, what do we make of media wherein there is a very definite genre...
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Call for Comments: Gaming an Empire
From Katya: Previously, we’ve have gaming episodes on direct violence in video games (I stab/shoot/punch/explode/magic the enemy.) This time we want to turn to another common theme in gaming: empire. Civilization VI Risk, Command and Conquer, Axis and Allies and other strategy games— analog and digital — allow players to command armies waging war, claiming/reclaiming…
Call For Comments: Cinematic Franchise “Endgames”
From Mav: (No worries, no spoilers in this post) Well, it’s finally time… we’re in the endgame now… and all that. In a couple hours, Avengers Endgame opens in theaters, and I assume a large number of our listeners are going to go see it (please, NO SPOILERS in the comments of this post). By…
e54. The Unbearable Whiteness of being Batman
Do you remember all of those great Batman supporting characters of color. You know… Batman’s black, latinx, asian and other ethnic sidekicks and villains like… errr… uh… you know… yeah… ummm…. It’s actually hard to come up with some, isn’t it? Well, there’s probably a reason for that. There are actually several, and have been…
e53. PCA/ACA 2019 Preview: Comic Studies
On last week’s episode, Katya and Hannah shared the topics of their papers for this year’s upcoming PCA/ACA. Now it’s Wayne and Mav’s turn to do the same. As we prepare to head off to the conference this week, Wayne shares the basics of his topic, a Jungian psychological evaluation of the Kevin Matchstick, the…
e52. PCA/ACA 2019 Preview: Game Studies
If you’ve been listening to the show for a while, then you’ve no doubt heard us mention the PCA/ACA conference that all four of us are attending in a few weeks. It’s a place where academics get together and share their work on popular culture. In fact, it’s a while lot like this show and…