Call for Comments: Gaming in the time of COVID

From Hannah: Fairly early into the pandemic last year, it felt like almost everyone was playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons. (We actually did an entire episode on the relationship between cozy games and what was going on it the world.) In fact, the Nintendo Switch felt impossible to find for most of 2020. And the…

Call for Comments: Just WTF is Ergodic Literature?

From Wayne: So there’s this idea I’ve been trying to wrap my head around, both as a writer and a scholar. A while back a friend of my posted about his reactions to the Netflix series The OA, and referred to it as an example of ‟ergodic storytelling.” If you’re like me, your reaction right…

Call for Comments: Seduced by Bridgerton?

From Hannah: Yes, we basically just released our episode discussing the first season of Bridgerton. But there’s a lot to talk about we didn’t cover! (And I’m turning thirty in … this world … so I used the pity of my co-hosts to get them to agree to release a sequel episode on my birthday.)…

Call for Comments: Sexy Cartoons and the Kid Gaze?

From Mav: As we approach Valentines Day this year I started thinking about our Valentine’s special from last year about “fictional celebrity crushes.” One of the things we drifted into talking about on that episode was characters like Lola Bunny and Harley Quinn — characters that despite originating in children’s cartoons, were clearly created explicitly…

Call For Comments: Supersex in the Gotham City!

From Wayne: Superheroes are sexy, right? Skin tight costumes, rippling muscles, big boobs, and a near total lack of genitalia… what’s not to like? But for all of the suggestiveness of their idealized physiques, actual sexuality was a taboo topic in comics for a very long time. Some of this was due to a generally…

Call for Comments: Television in the Time of COVID

From Hannah: In 2020, Voxpopcast talked a lot about the media we consumed during, and partially due to, the pandemic (our comfort viewing, the AMAZING discovery of Marble League, the content that was majorly created pre-pandemic but released after our lives changed). But we haven’t delved too deeply into have the pandemic has changed the…

Call for Comments: “The Queen’s Gambit,” or Chess is a Virus now

From Katya: The world, it seems, has lost its collective mind over The Queen’s Gambit. Released in October, it quickly became the most-watched limited scripted series ever and hit number 1 in 63 countries, according to Netflix. I’m not going to lie, I fell into the binge too. Give me an aesthetically pleasing show with…

Call for Comments: What did we miss this time?

From Mav: Way back at the end of 2019… you know, so like 47 years ago, we did a year in review show that we called “what did you miss?”. The idea was, rather than just reviewing the year and talking about the huge things in pop culture, we would cover the things that we…

Call For Comments: Why Do We Suddenly Love Musicals?

From Wayne: I used to think I didn’t like Musicals. There were a few, I guess. I saw Cabaret on TV when I was young (a heavily edited version of it, I’m sure), and had fond memories of some of the songs and imagery. There were others I saw in this context. I remember the…

Call for Comments: Cheesy Christmas Movies: Part II

From Hannah: Two years ago, I somehow convinced everyone to let me do a show on cheesy Christmas movies. And by wanting to talk about “cheesy” holiday films, what I really meant was “let’s talk about all these really ‘bad’ (but also sometimes kind of really fun and good in their own way) romantic comedies…