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Raconteur. Pop Culture Polymath. I write about movies, music, television, comics and professional wrestling at Deadshirt.net & Spectrum Culture. I've been published in Baltimore City Paper, DCist, Birth.Movies.Death and other publications.
Don McGregor, the foundation-building scribe behind stories like "Panther's Rage," teams up with artist Daniel Acuna for a tale that takes King T'Challa out of Wakanda and onto the streets of New York for a gripping mission. Then, former BLACK PANTHER writer Christopher Priest will be joined by artist Mike Perkins for a story starring friend of Wakanda Everett K.
"The Shape of Water," the latest film from visionary filmmaker and casual monster fetishist Guillermo Del Toro, is about those who don't belong. It's about Elisa (the brilliant Sally Hawkins), a scarred mute who works as a cleaning lady at a secure government facility, and the sea creature (Doug Jones) secured at this facility who...
Before "Moonlight" even begins, Boris Gardiner's "Every Nigger Is A Star" plays over production company logos, immediately telegraphing the uniquely black narrative about to unfold. Much has been made about Barry Jenkins' sophomore directorial effort and its relevance to filmic diversity-"Moonlight" is an island unto itself, presenting blackness as a mere matter of fact, not some bold new act.
In a recent bit of Twitter discourse, famed pro wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer sparked a minor debate over whether Ric Flair was as big a pop cultural icon as Hulk Hogan. Flair, the platinum blonde, leather skinned, one percenter cosplayer who holds the record for world championship titles, inarguably reigns in the fictional sport.
After a seemingly interminable boom of comic book movies, we've finally got one fronted by the most iconic female superhero of all time. At the risk of damning Wonder Woman with faint praise, it's easily the best of the DC Universe films since Zack Snyder started the series with 2013's Man of Steel , but it doesn't merely clear that low hurdle.
fullscreen Ever since hitting the net during the NBA finals, the trailer for Marvel's Black Panther film, the first predominantly black entry into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, has become a phenomenon. For fans desperate for real diversity in the superhero genre, helmer Ryan Coogler's upcoming tentpole, set for a timely release during 2018's Black History Month, seems almost too good to be true.
The physical attrition of flesh and bone colliding with canvas is no longer a part of legendary pro wrestler Jake "The Snake" Roberts' performative repertoire, but the iconic grappler's seated storytelling show is no less a grind.
fullscreen Moments before entering the Walter E. Washington Convention Center for my first ever Awesome Con experience, I noticed a man walking ahead of me dressed as The Joker. This was not the first cosplayer I encountered, nor would it be the last, but what struck me was how otherworldly this man appeared.
The president-elect was far from the first celebrity to run for office. In 1968, comedian Dick Gregory unsuccessfully ran for president of the United States as a write-in candidate. Like many of his fellow comics, Gregory has compared Trump to Hitler, but unlike most, he isn't thinking about the resistance.
To those unable to process the exponential proliferation of police shootings ending unarmed black men's lives in recent years, each new case begins to blur into one unending nightmare. But each slaying is unique. Even if they do fit into a larger narrative, treating the trend like a faceless monolith of tragedy diminishes the lives that have been extinguished.
Wish Upon, as one might correctly guess from its title and ad campaign, is another in a long line of horror films based around the maxim "be careful what you wish for." In the unlikely event that that isn't already very clear to you, the song that runs under the closing credits-the very first thing you hear after the film's stunning and unintentionally hilarious conclusion-features those very words.
It's been nearly two years since Drake first announced plans for his fourth LP. In that time, he's released a slew of Soundcloud loosies, gone platinum off of a mixtape, won a rap beef with memes and recreationally become faux fluent in Jamaican patois.
For the first few minutes of "Fraud," it seems like we're in for an interminable assemblage of home movies from some boring-ass white family from the burbs. There's little actual dialogue or interaction between the father, the mother, or either of their two children here.
With the recent spate of "diverse" films in the Hollywood marketplace, audiences searching for representation on the big screen are becoming more shrewd, more discerning. As grateful as many of us are to see ourselves in front of (and behind) the camera, we're slowly, but surely moving into a landscape where a film with predominantly black leads won't cause the batting of an eye.
Courtesy of Lindsay Grace. Computer animated faces in film may have seemed alien to us at first, but now we've come to expect the new virtual reality on our screens.
De Palma is out in theaters now ( you can buy your tickets here ). In honor of the documentary's legendary subject, we're kicking off a week-long look at the director's classic - and not so classic - films. Throughout his career, Brian De Palma has grappled on screen with systemic corruption, particularly in the government and the military, but those themes were never explored so perfectly as in 1998's Snake Eyes , his bravura ode to widespread immorality.