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Tag: Nick Offerman

  • What to Stream: ‘The Fantastic Four: First Steps,’ Tracy Morgan, Kim Kardashian and ‘Downton Abbey’

    The earnest superhero team-up tale “The Fantastic Four: First Steps” and Tracy Morgan returning to TV with a new comedy called “Crutch” are some of the new television, films, music and games headed to a device near you.

    Also among the streaming offerings worth your time this week, as selected by The Associated Press’ entertainment journalists: The upstairs-downstairs drama “Downton Abbey” bids farewell in a final movie, Kim Kardashian plays a divorce attorney in Hulu’s “All’s Fair” and Willie Nelson continues to demonstrate his prolific output with the release of yet another new album this year.

    New movies to stream from Nov. 3-9

    — Guillermo del Toro realizes his long-held dream of a sumptuous Mary Shelley adaptation in “Frankenstein” (Friday Nov. 7 on Netflix). Del Toro’s film, starring Oscar Isaac as Victor Frankenstein and Jacob Elordi as his monster, uses all the trappings of handmade movie craft to give Shelley’s classic an epic sweep. In her review, AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr wrote: “Everything about ‘Frankenstein’ is larger than life, from the runtime to the emotions on display.”

    — Matt Shakman’s endearingly earnest superhero team-up tale “The Fantastic Four: First Steps” (Wednesday on Disney+) helps alleviate a checkered-at-best history of big-screen adaptations of the classic Stan Lee-Jack Kirby comic. Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Ebon Moss-Bachrach and Joseph Quinn play Mister Fantastic, Invisible Woman, the Thing and the Human Torch, respectively. In 1964, they work to defend Earth from its imminent destruction by Galactus. In my review, I praised “First Steps” as “a spiffy ’60s-era romp, bathed in retrofuturism and bygone American optimism.”

    John Cougar Mellencamp performs both on stage and on one of two large screen television screens set up at the University of Illinois Memorial Stadium in Champaign, Ill. on Sept. 22, 1985 during the Farm Aid concert. (AP Photo/Seth Perlman, file)

    — “Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale” (Friday, Nov. 7 on Peacock) bids goodbye to the Crawleys 15 years after Julian Fellowes first debuted his upstairs-downstairs drama. The cast of the third and final film, directed by Simon Curtis, includes Hugh Bonneville, Michelle Dockery and Paul Giamatti. In her review, AP’s Jocelyn Noveck wrote that the film gives “loyal Downton fans what they want: a satisfying bit of closure and the sense that the future, though a bit scary, may look kindly on Downton Abbey.” Peacock is also streaming the two previous movies and all six seasons of “Downton Abbey.”

    — “The Materialists” (Friday, Nov. 7 on HBO Max), Celine Song’s follow-up to her Oscar-nominated 2023 breakthrough “Past Lives,” stars Dakota Johnson, Pedro Pascal and Chris Evans in a romantic triangle. The New York-set film adds a dose of economic reality to a romantic comedy plot in what was, for A24, a modest summer hit. In her review, AP’s Jocelyn Noveck called it “a smart rom-com that tries to be honest about life and still leaves us smiling.”

    — AP Film Writer Jake Coyle

    New music to stream from Nov. 3-9

    — The legendary Willie Nelson continues to demonstrate his prolific output with the release of yet another new album this year. “Workin’ Man: Willie Sings Merle,” out Friday, Nov. 7, is exactly what it sounds like: Nelson offering new interpretations of 11 classic songs written by Merle Haggard. And we mean classics: Check out Nelson’s latest take on “Okie From Muskogee,” “Mama Tried,” “I Think I’ll Just Stay Here And Drink” and more.

    — Where’s the future of the global music industry? All over, surely, but it would be more than just a little wise to look to Brazil. Not too dissimilar to how Anitta brought her country’s funk genre to an international mainstream through diverse collaborations and genre meddling, so too is Ludmilla. On Thursday, she will release a new album, “Fragmentos,” fresh off the heels of her sultry, bilingual collaboration with Grammy winner Victoria Monét, “Cam Girl.” It’s a combination of R&B, funk and then some.

    — AP Music Writer Maria Sherman

    New series to stream from Nov. 3-9

    — Tracy Morgan returns to TV with a new comedy called “Crutch.” Morgan plays a widowed empty-nester whose world is turned around when his adult children move home with his grandkids in tow. The Paramount+ series debuts Monday.

    — Kim Kardashian says she will soon learn whether she passed the bar exam to become a lawyer, but she plays a sought-after divorce attorney in “All’s Fair,” her new TV series for Hulu. Kardashian stars alongside Glenn Close, Sarah Paulson, Niecy Nash-Betts, Naomi Watts and Teyana Taylor in the show about an all-female law firm. Ryan Murphy created the show with Kardashian in mind after she acted in “American Horror Story: Delicate.” It premieres Tuesday on Hulu and Hulu on Disney+.

    — The old saying about truth being stranger than fiction applies to Netflix’s new four-episode limited-series “Death by Lightning.” It’s a historical dramatization (with some comedy thrown in) about how James Garfield became the 20th president of the United States. He was shot four months later by a man named Charles Guiteau (Matthew Macfadyen), who was desperate for Garfield’s attention. Two months after that, Garfield died from complications of his injuries. It’s a wild story that also features Betty Gilpin, Nick Offerman, Bradley Whitford and Shea Whigham. The series premieres Thursday.

    — HBO offers up a new docuseries about the life of retired baseball superstar Alex Rodriguez. “Alex Vs. A-Rod” features intimate interviews with people who are related to and know Rodriguez, as well as the man himself. The three-part series premieres Thursday.

    — The next installment of “Wicked,” called “Wicked: For Good,” flies into theaters Nov. 21 and NBC has created a musical special to pump up the release. Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande lead “Wicked: One Wonderful Night,” a concert event that premieres Thursday on NBC and streams on Peacock Friday, Nov. 7. Additional film cast members like Michelle Yeoh, Bowen Yang, Marissa Bode and Ethan Slater appear as well.

    — Alicia Rancilio

    New video games to play from Nov. 3-9

    — It’s going to be a while until the next Legend of Zelda game, but if you’re craving some time with the princess, check out Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment. In this spinoff, a prequel to 2023’s Tears of the Kingdom, Zelda travels back in time to join forces with the Six Sages in a war against the invader Ganondorf. You can also drag another human into battle with split-screen or the GameShare feature on Nintendo’s new console. Like the previous collaborations between Nintendo and Koei Tecmo, it’s more hack-and-slash action than exploration and discovery. It arrives Thursday on Switch 2.

    — Lou Kesten

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  • Civil War’s Overarching Message Isn’t Political, Or: One Must Do What They Can to “Pass the Baton,” Even in Apocalyptic Times

    Civil War’s Overarching Message Isn’t Political, Or: One Must Do What They Can to “Pass the Baton,” Even in Apocalyptic Times

    Sadly, it’s not really a stretch to imagine the United States finding itself in a second Civil War. Perhaps this is why writer-director Alex Garland doesn’t get too specific on the details of “why” (racial tensions, political divisions, an unhinged president—take your pick from a gamut of ever-brewing causes). In fact, Garland in general is not a “details guy,” preferring instead to focus on the “big ideas” of what he’s saying. And what he’s saying here isn’t necessarily related to being a “cautionary tale” (in truth, he appears to view another civil war in the U.S. as a mere inevitability), so much as the need for “elder generations” to do whatever they can to ensure the success of the younger ones, no matter how fucked and ostensibly beyond repair the world might be. 

    Garland’s (or A24’s) decision to release the film months before what is likely to be an extremely fraught and polarizing election is surely not a coincidence. The Trumpian president (played by Nick Offerman, always happy to seem Republican), after all, ends up invoking this Civil War after, from the errant bits of dialogue that allude to it, taking an illegal third term, dissolving the FBI and banning the press from Washington, D.C. It is through the lens (no camera pun intended) of the press, as a matter of fact, that viewers are made to see this war unfold and reach its denouement.

    At the center of the “war photojournalism plot” is Lee Smith (Kirsten Dunst), a wizened, ultra-jaded war photographer that’s been traveling the country with her colleague, Joel (Wagner Moura), to cover the calamity. At the outset of the film, the two are in New York City, where Lee initially encounters the twenty-something woman she’ll end up grudgingly (at first) mentoring. Jessie Cullen (Cailee Spaeny, continuing to come up in the world since starring in Priscilla) approaches Lee in Brooklyn (a milieu that’s no stranger to the carnage of Civil War fighting) to gush about being a fan of her work.

    In this moment, one gets an All About Eve vibe from the narrative (especially when Jessie takes a picture of Lee taking a picture), and it could have gone in that direction many times were it not for Lee’s open embracement of Jessie’s aspiration to become the next great war photographer (just like another Lee with the last name of Miller, who, yes, also comes up in conversation). Rather than resenting or feeling competitive with this young talent, Lee does what she can to “subtly” direct and advise Jessie—not just on her style, but the unique and often soul-crushing demands of this job. 

    Before this dynamic forms, however, Lee does her best to avoid Jessie’s hopeful gaze and eagerness to learn. Alas, that plan goes to shit when her protective instincts kick into high gear upon seeing Jessie get caught in the melée just before a suicide bomber detonates himself in the crowd, sending bodies flying everywhere. Ducking down with Jessie behind a police car, Lee has it effectively confirmed for her that this girl is way too naive for the war photography game, therefore way too much of a liability (and not just an emotional one). And yet, as Joel and Lee’s mentor, Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson), point out, the only way to become a war photographer is to just get out there and do it—glean the brutal, sobering experience that will help shape you into one of “the greats.” Besides, Sammy adds, Lee was about the same age when she started out, too. 

    So it is that Jessie maneuvers and, let’s face it, manipulates her way into their dangerous expedition once Lee is “out of frame,” appealing to a drunk Joel in the hotel that she tracks them to (stalker much?). Sammy also wormed his way into the journey, but he has the pedigree and seniority to make such a request. Even though he knows that, at his age and level of decrepitude, he could be just as much of a liability as the novice. As for Lee and Joel’s “mission” with regard to venturing into the highly dangerous D.C., their dogged purpose is to snap the last photo of the president before Western Forces overtake the White House and invariably pop the “commander-in-chief” off. 

    That the Western Forces are comprised of California and Texas seems a bit odd, as does the fact that the “Florida Alliance” is on California’s side. Mainly because, in a scenario where a Trumpian president takes dictatorial control, it would be unlikely—fascist president or not—that the ultimate red states of Texas and Florida might 1) want to secede from the Union and 2) join forces with a “pinko” state like California. Even so, American viewers can overlook such a discrepancy (as is usually the case when British writer-directors give their perspective on the U.S. [see: Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri]) if forgiving enough.

    However, Garland insisted the choice was “intentional” and done ​​“partly to get around a kind of reflexive, polarizing position that people might fall into, that’s one thing, but actually that’s not the main thing. The main thing is to do with how the president is presented and what can be inferred from that. Then it’s saying that two states that have a different political position have said, ‘Our political difference is less important than this.’” Garland added, “And then the counter to that is if you cannot conceive of that, what you’re saying is that your polarized political position would be more important than a fascist president. Which, when you put it like that, I would suggest, is insane. That’s an insane position to hold.” Clearly, then, Garland is vastly underestimating the insanity of Americans. 

    In any case, just as American viewers can get over this hard-to-fathom alliance, Lee can forgive Jessie her shortcomings in favor of seeing her potential as they spend more time together. Even though she mocks the “demographic” of the backseat of their Press SUV for being on the polar opposite spectrums of “retirement home” and “kindergarten,” Lee slowly loosens up just enough to allow something to happen that she never does: becoming emotionally involved (in truth, the secret to her success is avoiding that at all costs).

    This “cardinal rule” of being a war photojournalist is, to be sure, what Jessie learns better than anyone by the end of the film. An ending that is foreshadowed by Jessie asking Lee if she would simply take her picture if she saw her being killed. Lee responds, “What do you think?” This exchange occurs in front of a crashed helicopter decaying in the parking lot of a post-apocalyptic J. C. Penney. In point of fact, one of the most horrifying things about Civil War is seeing that the “ruins” of America amount to nothing more than depressing malls, office space and gas stations (in other words: what the hell are these people actually fighting for?). That’s the so-called American legacy. Granted, the U.S. has produced some worthwhile entities. Like the American institution that is Madonna. Who once said of her 2003 MTV VMAs performance with Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera that she was effectively “passing the baton” to the next generation of pop princesses with those “controversial” kisses (even though few people remember the one she shared with Xtina). 

    What one can’t help but take issue with when it comes to how that metaphorical phrase is thematically wielded in Civil War (namely, with its conclusion) is that it presumes “old” people have to step out of the way after the baton is passed because they’ve now done all they can. It’s someone else’s turn to try. However, if Madonna has shown us anything after 2003, it’s that the “aged” still often dance circles around the fearful and complacent young (who occasionally stumble into “right place, right time” circumstances like Jessie). And that a “mentor type” can coexist peacefully enough with the subsequent wave of youth (just look at Lana Del Rey and Billie Eilish) without needing to “stand back” or dim their own light.

    In this regard, Civil War averts the All About Eve relationship between mentor and mentee in that the Margo (Bette Davis) of the equation—Lee—isn’t painted as being “averse” to supporting new talent by continuing to try to “eclipse” them. Then again, some “old” talent can’t avoid being naturally eclipsing, can they (e.g., Dunst’s performance being far more praised than Spaeny’s)? Even after making a big production about “passing the baton.”

    Genna Rivieccio

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  • Sorry Oppie – ‘Civil War’ is the Movie That Made Me Believe in IMAX

    Sorry Oppie – ‘Civil War’ is the Movie That Made Me Believe in IMAX

    Imagine a film about war. Then, imagine a film about journalists. Somehow, Ex Machina’s Alex Garland fashioned one of the most compelling stories of the year by marrying these unlikely premises. Even more unlikely? He convinced A24 to make an action film. Don’t worry, this is not a souped-up Marvel movie. It’s exactly what you’d expect from our favorite indie studio’s first venture into the action genre: subversive, thrilling, and intrepid.

    After wowing audiences with films like
    Ex Machina and 28 Days Later, it’s no surprise that director Alex Garland’s latest dystopian effort is unsettling and awe-inspiring. The highly anticipated film is already rated 93% on Rotten Tomatoes after premiering at SXSW 2024.

    At a SXSW panel, Garland gave some insights into what it means to make a movie about the dystopian future that feels so close to being real. While movies like
    Contagion and Garland’s own 28 Days Later felt prescient at the height of the pandemic, no one could have predicted that. But Civil War feels like a nightmare we’ve all been having for the past decade. It’s comforting, in a way, to know others are experiencing this nightmare too. But it’s dread-inducing to see it play out on screen and think: this is us. This will be us. Soon.

    And that’s precisely the state of anxiety Garland wants us in.

    “Cinema is inclined towards whatever it’s presenting itself, and it’s inclined to not being anti-war,” Garland told the panel at SXSW. “To accurately present the action, it contains adrenaline. And if you add music to that, and you add a certain kind of imagery to that, essentially, it becomes seductive.”

    Garland didn’t want to make a sexy war movie. He didn’t want to give us an easy watch.

    His solution: making it as disorienting as possible. Unexpected musical moments, atrociously violent cuts of brutality, and gore abound.

    “That De La Soul track [that plays during a pivotal scene] had a particular function which was to be jarring and aggressive and speak somehow to the perverse pleasure in what was happening,” Garland explained.

    From the score to the cinematography, Garland has managed to make a war movie that does not, in any way, glamorize war. To do that, he had to keep the audience anxious and tense The product: the most stressful watching experience I’ve ever endured. But my god, it was worth it.

    What is Civil War (2023) about?

    @moviesaretherapy Civil War review #fyp #foryou #movies ♬ original sound – Kit Lazer

    Civil War is set in a not-too-distant future when California and Texas have seceded, and the ensuing civil war has caused chaos across the United States. A team of war photographers and journalists make a dangerous journey to Washington DC with the goal of interviewing the President before American democracy falls.

    It stars Kirsten Dunst in a career-best performance as jaded photojournalist Lee, alongside Wagner Moura, Cailee Spaeny, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Nick Offerman, and Jesse Plemons.

    It’s a war movie. An action movie. A morbid road trip movie. But above all, it’s a nuanced ode to journalists. “I wanted to make journalists the hero,” said Garland. “In any kind of free country or, let’s say, democracy, journalists are not a luxury, they’re a necessity. They are absolutely as important as the judiciary, the executive, or the legislature, and they are literally as important as a free press that is respected and trusted. Now, journalists have done some of the work to be distrusted themselves. But a lot of other interested parties have been complicit in making them untrusted. And I think it’s unhealthy. And I think it’s wrong. So I wanted to put journalism at the heart of it.”

    Though the characters are complex and flawed, we spend enough time with them in a van to cause us to not just love them, but respect them. We believe in them. We believe in their work. If the film’s action doesn’t manage to seduce us, we are seduced by the characters’ prevailing idealism in such dire times.

    It’s prescient, too, to be celebrating war journalists — people with nothing to protect them but cameras and press vests — in the current global climate. Garland could not have anticipated
    Civil War would be released at a time when many of us are quite familiar with the names of press journalists across the world — Motaz, Bisan, Plestia. Outfitted with far less ego and equipment than the journalists in this film, the reality of journalists in Palestine is impossible not to recall while watching Civil War. It adds another thread of reality to the film that makes it all the more effective.

    Is Civil War (2023) good?

    Civil War pulls off Garland’s intended feat of creating an unequivocally anti-war war movie. But it’s by no means flat or didactic. The tapestry of scenes the characters encounter keeps the film moving. With each stop they make and each new character we meet, we learn something new about this world — and about ourselves.

    This is perhaps the most impressive accomplishment of Civil War. It tells us about ourselves.

    Garland shows us ourselves in the characters, in the polarized nation, and in the scenes of atrocity, the film never shies away from. “The first season of
    The Handmaid’s Tale did something very interesting, which was it had bits of imagery that would seem shocking. But as you’re watching them, you realize there was a real-world allegory or parallel. We basically did the same thing,” revealed Garland.

    “The scenes are referencing moments from the real world. But not, it’s important to say, exceptional moments. Moments that you would expect in any war. And in a way, that’s part of the point. I think it was necessary to do that if one is going to be anti-war. Some of the sanitizing might pollute the message.”

    The film is also tremendously evocative emotionally because it is so immersive. The film offers the audience the chance to feel like it’s
    behind the camera by following the photographers and revealing the shots the characters “take” during the film. And to get the shot, we go with them into the line of fire.

    This is where I make my plea: you must watch
    Civil War in IMAX. Wrapped in the giant screen and surrounded by the full power of a fantastic soundtrack, this was the most immersive watching experience of my life — even more than any 3D film I’ve ever seen or Oppenheimer … sorry, Christopher Nolan. As if we needed the movie to feel more real, IMAX puts you right in the thick of it.

    Ultimately,
    Civil War isn’t really a warning — it doesn’t make political moralizations. But it’s a call to action. Or a call to remembering. It urges us to appreciate, above all, perspective and truth.

    Civil War has its wide release on April 12, 2024. Prepare your nerves. Watch the trailer here:

    LKC

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  • Alex Garland’s ‘Civil War’ shows us a violent, fractured America — but despite the verisimilitude, needs more specifics

    Alex Garland’s ‘Civil War’ shows us a violent, fractured America — but despite the verisimilitude, needs more specifics

    Reflecting the division in the country whose internecine conflict it vividly depicts, Alex Garland’s Civil War splits unevenly in two, alternating brutally effective and disturbing sequences of violence with caesuras of conversation and uneasy respite. The former, with their amped-up urgency and ratcheting suspense, display an impressive filmmaking mastery, but the latter strive for a level of sociocultural insight that they regrettably never quite reach.

    Garland deliberately withholds the backstory that would explain how a near-future U.S. descends into warring factions, and he provides only the barest hint of what’s transpiring in most of the country. We’re briskly informed that the Western Forces — an eyebrow-raising union between Texas and California — are making a final push toward Washington, D.C., with the federal government in imminent danger of collapse. Civil War implies that multiple groups (with perhaps opposing goals) are actually engaged in battle — a Florida Alliance is referenced, and armed, uniformed soldiers with unspecified affiliations and unknown intent periodically appear — but, again, Garland refuses to clarify, preferring to keep his audience lost in the fog of war.

    Civil War unfolds over a few wildly eventful days, following a quartet of journalists as they set off from New York on a circuitous road trip to reach the capital before it falls. Writer Joel (Wagner Moura) and storied war photographer Lee (Kirsten Dunst), a reporting team from Reuters, are in pursuit of an interview with the president (Nick Offerman) — an ambition that seems, given the rapidly deteriorating situation and the administration’s enemy-of-the-people attitude toward the press, both impractical and suicidal. Joining the pair on the journey are aging New York Times reporter Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson) and aspiring freelance photojournalist Jessie (Cailee Spaeny), who provide, in somewhat pat fashion, the contrasting perspectives of the skeptical veteran and the wide-eyed naif.

    As noted, Garland and cinematographer Rob Hardy — a longtime and essential collaborator — stage Civil War’s action sequences with stunning brio and verisimilitude, uncomfortably immersing us in chaos. The film features two adrenalizing battles in which the journalists embed with attacking troops. One is the climactic assault on the White House, but Civil War’s undeniable centerpiece is an agonizingly protracted confrontation with soldiers dumping a truckload of bodies into a mass grave. Shortly after the journalists encounter a pair of colleagues on the road, Jessie and one of the new arrivals are taken captive and threatened by this squad of apparent malefactors, and Lee and Joel attempt to negotiate their rescue.

    Joel makes what seems an eminently reasonable argument: “There’s some kind of misunderstanding here. We’re American.” But the coolly menacing soldier who interrogates them (an extraordinary but unbilled Jesse Plemons) remains unmoved and even amused. Balefully gazing at the journalists from behind disconcerting red sunglasses, he pointedly asks: “OK, what kind of American are you?” The reply to that maddeningly opaque, ultimately unanswerable question will determine life or death. It’s a scene that boils the film’s admonitory theme down to its essence: If we continue to turn up the heat to eliminate impurities, everything will evaporate, leaving nothing but the scorched-black bottom of a no longer usable melting pot.

    Garland has said that he intends Civil War as a companion piece to Men (2022), which offers a critique of toxic masculinity and the ways in which one bad man births another (quite literally, in the film’s fantastical body-horror conclusion). Civil War is less abstract and metaphorically inclined than Men, but in its lack of grounding particulars, the movie wants to offer the same kind of universal message rather than limit its applicable lessons to the United States. Although I understand the impulse — our country is clearly not alone in sorting its occupants into us and them (red state and blue state, rural and urban, Black and white, patriot and traitor, immigrant and native-born, and on and on) — the sketchy nature of its world-building muddies interpretation. Most problematically, Civil War suggests that the president is a Trumpian autocrat — for example, it’s mentioned almost in passing that he’s serving a third term, which would indicate a defiance of the 22nd Amendment. Is the insurrection therefore an effort to restore democracy? If so, that would seriously complicate our attitude toward the rebels.

    As much as I appreciate the film’s heroicizing of journalists — the media can certainly use the positive press! — Civil War also provides an oddly conflicted and almost cartoonish view of the profession. Lee laments that her celebrated combat-zone photography, which she hoped would harshly illuminate war’s devastating effects, had no persuasive impact on the current conflict. She appears weary, utterly defeated. What then is her purpose now? Is there value in her pictures beyond the aesthetic? Especially ludicrous is Lee and Joel’s pursuit of a presidential interview. Beyond the implausibility of securing an audience, what possible news do they think will result? And what would prompt a newbie photojournalist like Jessie to shoot on film rather than digitally in the midst of conflict? She would need a substantial supply of expensive, difficult-to-obtain film stock, and changing rolls under fire and on the run would seem a pointlessly high hurdle for a novice.

    These complaints, however, don’t diminish Civil War’s legitimate ability to provoke. Garland says that he wants the film to prompt conversation, and by not making explicit what either side of the conflict represents, he perhaps allows for at least a tentative reach across the yawning divide. But even if we stay warily siloed in our respective bunkers, Civil War’s grim vision of a riven America provides a sobering look-what-can-happen warning. Sadly, like Lee’s photos, Garland’s film will no doubt prove ineffectual despite its considerable power. We’ll know as early as November.

    Film Details

    Cliff Froehlich

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  • Civil War Is a Powerful Alt-Reality War Movie That’s Not What It Seems

    Civil War Is a Powerful Alt-Reality War Movie That’s Not What It Seems

    The trailers for Civil War, the latest film by Alex Garland, give the audience a very specific expectation of what they’re going to see. It looks like a film about a United States that is so divided politically, certain states have seceded and the country is at war. A scenario that’s, clearly, a fictionalized nightmare version of our present, where America’s Left and Right have turned to violence. And, in a way, Civil War is that. But it’s also not and that’s why it’s so damned fascinating and special.

    How Conspiracy Theories and Disinformation Spiral Out of Control on the Internet | TechModo

    Written and directed by Garland (Ex Machina, Annihilation), Civil War is, indeed, about a United States that’s no longer united. A United States at war with itself, hence the title. But one of the main combatants in this war is the Western Forces, a group comprised of California and Texas. Now, everyone knows California and Texas are maybe the two most polar opposite states in our current political climate. So that’s the first clue Civil War isn’t a by-the-book, pro-left, anti-right Hollywood tale. It has an agenda, for sure, and that agenda is certainly more inclusive than not, but Garland very specifically makes it clear that his America is not our America. Thereby, no matter who is watching the movie or what they believe, they can very easily enjoy the story without bias.

    In other words, the movie is as objective as possible which, not coincidentally, is also the primary ideology of the film’s main characters: a group of journalists. Kirsten Dunst plays Lee, a famous war photographer traveling the country with a fellow journalist named Joel, played by Wagner Moura. After documenting a terrifying, but all too common, act of violence in New York, Lee and Joel decide to take a trip to Washington D.C. to attempt to interview the president, played by Nick Offerman. Colleague Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson) thinks it’s a bad idea, but goes along for the ride anyway, and they also pick up Jessie (Cailee Spaeny), an aspiring photographer who sees Lee as a hero and mentor.

    Spaney and Moura.
    Image: A24

    And so the four journalists leave New York for D.C, which is usually an uneventful four or five-hour drive. In this world though, with everything happening across the country, it becomes a much longer, more arduous trip. Certain roads are blocked off. Other areas are not safe. And soon, the group realizes no matter which way they go, there is danger and terror at every turn.

    Civil War is Alex Garland’s most mature movie to date. As he sets his characters off on this road trip, you can almost feel him not pushing the agenda one way or the other. An energy permeates the film, as if Garland wants to say something but is shaking and buzzing to hold it back. Much as the journalist heroes continue to preach objectivity and the importance of reporting the facts, no matter the circumstance, Garland too unfurls his narrative accordingly. Lee, Joel, and the crew approach each situation the same way: from a place of care and kindness. Sometimes that works, other times it doesn’t. Often, the most dangerous things we see aren’t in the center of the frame. A burning building here. A pile of bodies there. And while Joel and Lee’s distaste for the president certainly codes them as sympathetic to the WF, the film never really says what the WF stands for. We’re left to wonder, is it more Texas? Or more California?

    That the film avoids ever defining the root of the conflict is one of the best things about the movie. Contrarily, one of the worst things is as the characters make the trek from New York to D.C. things can get a little repetitive. They drive, encounter an obstacle, learn something, and move on. Then they drive, encounter an obstacle, learn something, and move on again. The pattern repeats itself a few times and while each of those obstacles unfolds in a different, usually surprising way, some of the film’s momentum does falter following this structure.

    Dunst and Spaeny.

    Dunst and Spaeny.
    Image: A24

    Where Civil War doesn’t falter is portraying intensity. Whenever the heroes encounter one of those obstacles, be it a booby-trapped gas station, hidden sniper, or a pink-sunglassed Jesse Plemons, the film’s tension always gets turned to 11. We are rarely sure what’s going to happen, and who is going to survive, primarily because of that objectivity. No one is treated like a hero or villain at the start. That changes scene to scene, of course, but the film, like the journalists, gives everyone an equal shot, which can be scary.

    That can also make you question yourself, your biases, and more. Civil War is a film that challenges its audience to put themselves in the shoes of not just the main characters, but everyone. Partially that’s because everything in the movie seems so plausible that we see ourselves, our friends, and our neighbors in it. But it’s also because the performances are all so strong across the board that it’s easy to relate.

    It feels like it’s been forever since we’ve seen Kirsten Dunst in a big, showy, starring role like this and watching Civil War, you have no idea why. Dunst gives a nuanced, powerful performance as Lee, a veteran so confident in herself that she’s almost carefree. That is until she meets Jessie. In Jessie, Lee sees a younger version of herself and it terrifies her. Lee knows Jessie, portrayed with lots of raw emotions by Spaeny, is dooming herself to danger. Choosing this life is probably the wrong thing for her. And so what should be a simple, mentor-mentee relationship is always strained. Lee sees too much of herself in Jessie, and Jessie doesn’t care.

    Just another day.

    Just another day.
    Image: A24

    Their complex relationship, as well as the gravitas provided by Moura’s Joel and McKinley Henderson’s Sammy, come to a head in the film’s final act, which sees the team finally make it to Washington. Garland then unfurls a guttural, shocking, ground-level war in the heart of the nation’s capital, featuring views of national monuments and more that feel akin to 1996’s Independence Day. What happens in these scenes I won’t spoil, but it all builds to a final few minutes destined to be discussed and quoted for as long as movies exist. It’s that fantastic.

    Ultimately, Civil War is a Rorschach test designed for maximum impact across political ideologies. You can watch it and view it however you’d like. Is not taking a side a bit of a cop-out? Should there have been a bit more of the story leaning left or right? I’d argue the fact it doesn’t have that is the authorship. Garland isn’t necessarily interested in changing anyone’s mind about anything. He wants any and everyone to consider themselves and what those differences could end up becoming. And hey, if playing it down the middle helps more people see it, that’s just a bonus.

    Civil War is in theaters Friday.

    Why Alex Garland Loves Science Fiction

    Why Alex Garland Loves Science Fiction

    Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what’s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.

    Germain Lussier

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  • ‘Civil War’ Review: Alex Garland’s Dystopian Thriller Starring Kirsten Dunst Stimulates the Intellect, if Not the Emotions

    ‘Civil War’ Review: Alex Garland’s Dystopian Thriller Starring Kirsten Dunst Stimulates the Intellect, if Not the Emotions

    The details of American politics do not concern Alex Garland in Civil War.

    Despite the controversy it’s already courted about its supposed prescience, the unsettling feature from the British filmmaker doesn’t predict a future based on the country’s current two-party system. Garland is far more interested in the United States’ self-regarding exceptionalism, its belief in its own safety from executive instability. He is fascinated by how factionalism instigates conflict and how no nation is immune to the results of its violence. 

    Civil War

    The Bottom Line

    A subversive and unsettling exercise.

    Venue: SXSW Film Festival (Headliner)
    Release date: Friday, April 12
    Cast: Kirsten Dunst, Wagner Moura, Cailee Spaeny, Stephen McKinley Henderson, Sonoya Mizuno, Nick Offerman
    Director-screenwriter: Alex Garland

    1 hour 49 minutes

    Premiering at SXSW, Civil War explores these preoccupations from the perspective of a group of journalists as they chronicle life in their war-torn country while traveling to Washington, D.C. We meet the crew in New York, where they are covering a tense confrontation between civilians and police. Lee Smith (Kirsten Dunst) —  a conflict photographer whose success and abrasiveness are modeled on that of celebrated World War II correspondent Lee Miller — works quickly with her Reuters colleague Joel (Wagner Moura) to capture the scene before the percolating violence bubbles over. 

    When it eventually does, the pair crosses paths with Jessie (Priscilla‘s Cailee Spaeny), a freelance photographer who gets hurt in the police-instigated melee. The young documentarian is eager to express admiration for Lee after the veteran correspondent saves her life and gifts her a neon press vest. Later that evening, Jessie, through a winning combination of will and charm, convinces Joel to let her tag along on the road trip to D.C. This is already after they agreed to let Sammy (Stephen McKinley Henderson), a New York Times journalist, join them despite the risks. 

    The group hits the road the next morning despite Lee’s protestations over Jessie’s inclusion. (She, fairly, doesn’t want to be responsible for a stranger and an amateur.) Their roughly 800-mile journey to D.C., where Joel and Lee have been promised an interview with the president (Nick Offerman), takes the journalists through hostile tracts, military checkpoints and makeshift refugee camps.

    These scenes of America as an active war zone are some of Civil War’s most potent images. In a subversive move, Garland, partnering again with DP Rob Hardy, documents these conditions with the distant vérité style found in American films about international regional conflicts. The Ex Machina and Annihilation filmmaker juxtaposes images of displaced Americans, armed resistance fighters and other evidence of war with familiar shots of the nation’s pastoral landscape to create a sense of destabilization.

    As the crew drives south of New York, they come across abandoned and blown-up cars on interstates lined with vibrant, verdant trees. A football stadium is now an aid camp, which adds a melancholic layer to the graffitied messages (“Go Steelers,” one  says) that remind of life before. A winter wonderland dotted with statues of Santa Claus, for example, becomes an active conflict zone, and a small town that feels eerily distant from the destruction happening everywhere else turns out to be manned by an armed militia. 

    These sequences coupled with other nostalgia-loaded gestures — the use of country music needle drops, for example — effectively recast American iconography, implicitly questioning a nation’s tendency toward self-mythologizing. Garland also weaves in the snapshots captured by Lee and Jessie along the road, a technique that not only examines the ethics of war photography but also American expectations of what these images must be. As for the subject of race — the organizing principle of the nation — Civil War gestures but does not explicitly confront.  

    All of these thoughts, considerations and questions — what does it mean to be American is one the film repeatedly asks — are experienced by the viewer on a largely intellectual level. Garland has always been a director of big ideas, and Civil War is no exception when it comes to that ambitiousness. But he’s also reaching for an intimacy here that his screenplay doesn’t quite deliver on. Despite strong turns from the cast, the American journalists at the center of the story feel emotionally sterile vis a vis the dissolution of their country, and their motivations for doing the work register as similarly remote. Of course war hardens, contorts and traumatizes, but Civil War presupposes that the press, in this distant future, can always see the forest for the trees. The film is wise to avoid big, melodramatic gestures, but characters sharing stories might have conjured a better sense of their depth. 

    Dunst makes Lee an incredibly compelling figure whose faith and ability to stomach the demands of the job unravel slowly over the course of the film. But a lack of detail keeps her character in the shadows. The same goes for Jessie, whose youth offers insights into her risky behavior, and Joel, who is Latino and from Florida (a state that here has its own faction separate from the alliance between Texas and California). 

    With the precision and length of its violent battle sequences, it’s clear Civil War operates as a clarion call. Garland wrote the film in 2020 as he watched cogs on America’s self-mythologizing exceptionalist machine turn, propelling the nation into a nightmare. With this latest film, he sounds the alarm, wondering less about how a country walks blindly into its own destruction and more about what happens when it does.

    Lovia Gyarkye

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  • Nick Offerman Slams ‘Homophobic Hate’ Against His ‘The Last of Us’ Episode: ‘It’s Not a Gay Story. It’s a Love Story, You A–hole!’

    Nick Offerman Slams ‘Homophobic Hate’ Against His ‘The Last of Us’ Episode: ‘It’s Not a Gay Story. It’s a Love Story, You A–hole!’

    Nick Offerman won the prize for best supporting performance in a new scripted series at the 2024 Independent Spirit Awards thanks to his role as the survivalist Bill in HBO’s “The Last of Us.” During his acceptance speech, Offerman took aim at some of the show’s toxic fans who spammed him with homophobic comments after his episode, “Long, Long Time,” first aired due to it centering a gay love story.

    “Thank you so much. I’m astonished to be in this category, which is bananas,” Offerman said when he took the stage. “Thanks to HBO for having the guts to participate in this storytelling tradition that is truly independent. Stories with guts that when homophobic hate comes my way and says, ‘Why did you have to make it a gay story?’ We say, ‘Because you ask questions like that. It’s not a gay story it’s a love story, you asshole!”

    Offerman’s comment earned a huge applause from the Spirit Awards audience. His performance as Bill in “The Last of Us” also earned him an Emmy Award for best guest actor in a drama series earlier this year.

    Offerman starred opposite Murray Bartlett in the episode “Long, Long Time,” which took a break from the main storyline of “The Last of Us” to spotlight the love story over 20 years between two men as the world descends into chaos around them amid an escalating zombie virus. The episode earned near universal acclaim from critics, but that didn’t stop homophobic trolls from taking issue with the show for spotlighting a gay romance.

    “The Last of Us” has begun production on Season 2 with series stars Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey. It’s not likely that either Offerman or Bartlett will return, although never say never. New cast members for Season 2 include Isabela Merced as Dina, Young Mazino as Jesse and Kaitlyn Dever as Abby. Comedy icon and “Schitt’s Creek” Emmy winner Catherine O’Hara is also joining the series.

    The first season of “The Last of Us” is now available to stream on Max.

    Zack Sharf

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  • How Will The Last Of Us Part II Work On TV, Anyway?

    How Will The Last Of Us Part II Work On TV, Anyway?

    Two weeks ago, news broke that actor Kaitlyn Dever was joining the cast for the second season of HBO’s The Last Of Us TV series—which is still floating along without a release date, with “some time in 2025” the best anybody in TV land can guess. But despite that mild ambiguity, Dever’s casting kicked off a small firestorm of speculation, because it was revealed that she’d be playing a character named Abby Anderson when she joined the Emmy-winning video-game adaptation’s second season—which means The Last Of Us is almost certainly diving whole hog into the story of 2020’s The Last Of Us Part II. And that means things are about to get … messy.

    The Last of Us’s Lamar Johnson On Learning Sign Language For The Show

    [Editor’s note: This article contains spoilers for 2020 video game The Last Of Us Part II—and, likely, for at least some of the plot elements of the still-filming second season of HBO’s The Last Of Us TV show.] 

    Because while the critical consensus on Part II has mostly calmed down in the four years since its release—give or take some moderate consternation lately at the fact that Sony has already rolled out a “remastered” version of the hardly retro game, out last week–the game was something of a lightning rod when it first came out. Some of that wasn’t developer Naughty Dog’s fault. (A high-profile leak from the game’s development, showcasing several cutscenes and character models, fired up the kinds of chuds who get angry when female video-game characters aren’t “feminine” enough, to pick one of the more vitriolic examples.) But some of it was in direct to response to the game’s big narrative swings, which were, depending on who you asked, either “bold” or “super-aggressive and kind of manipulative.”

    Many of which, we have to assume, will now be inherited by its TV adaptation: Excepting its critically heralded third episode, Craig Mazin’s adaptation of the first game into the show’s first season was almost overwhelmingly faithful–down to the season’s final scene almost exactly mimicking both the dialogue, and the staging, of the game’s famous ending. With game series creative director Neil Druckmann on board for the second season, as he was for the first, it would be shocking to see the series diverge more than a few inches from established canon.

    What does that all mean? A few things—all of which could make The Last Of Us’ second season a very weird run of TV.

    The Pedro Pascal “issue”

    Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsay
    Photo: Liane Hentscher/HBO

    Anyone hoping to avoid spoilers for either the game series, or the show’s next season, should hop off this train now, because there’s really no way to talk about either without addressing the fungus-encrusted elephant in the room: protagonist Joel Miller’s sudden death, an hour or so into The Last Of Us Part II.

    Pedro Pascal, who plays Joel on the show, has, understandably, hedged a bit when asked about this plot element–because how could he not? (Nobody wants the HBO Spoiler Squad on their ass.) But The Last Of Us Part II really doesn’t function as a story without it: Joel’s sudden death, at the hands of a group of survivors who come to the almost ludicrously idyllic community where he and Ellie (Bella Ramsay) have been living out their post-apocalypse, is rooted in both the aftermath of the first game and the narrative obsessions of the second. Everything The Last Of Us Part II wants to say about humanity–and it wants to say a lot—grows out of that early moment of sudden, shocking brutality, one moment of horrifying trauma birthed directly from another.

    This was controversial, to say the least, in the games, where Joel was a beloved character played by well-liked voice actor Troy Baker. Applying it to a rising/risen star like Pascal—who did so much work to build a beautiful, broken human out of some fairly stock parts with his performance as Joel in the show’s first season–might be even more disruptive. Pascal and Ramsay both came up through Game Of Thrones, of course, so neither is unfamiliar with being on a series that jettisoned its “star” at a critical early point. But seeing the show’s most marketable star go the way of Logan Roy one episode into its new season is still likely to leave fans a bit discombobulated.

    The absolute brutality of Ellie Williams

    Bella Ramsay

    Bella Ramsay
    Photo: Liane Hentscher/HBO

    If the above paragraphs didn’t clue you in, The Last Of Us Part II is an aggressively grim game. Even its genuine moments of love or levity come with the unavoidable knowledge that something truly awful is right around the corner—and rarely in the form of something as simple as a rampaging fungus monster. That goes doubly true for the character of Ellie, who came of age in the first game/season—and who spends the second game having her last few shreds of innocence sliced off of her piece by piece.

    And really, we’re looking forward to seeing what Ramsay, who was excellent in the first season, will do with this material, as Ellie becomes harder and harder, and harder and harder to root for, the further into her need for vengeance she descends. But it’s going to be a lot for audiences, even by the standards of HBO: We’ll be curious to see if the TV show stays true to the moment that would, in a less ugly narrative, be Ellie’s rock bottom—i.e., the confrontation with Mel, for game players—or if it’ll back away from quite that level of character-alienating horror. But either way, we’ll likely depart the show’s second season with very little idea of who, if anyone, we want to see getting what they want out of this broken and miserable world.

    A question of perspective

    Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsay

    Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsay
    Photo: Liane Hentscher/HBO

    There’s also a question of structure to be addressed here, requiring us to spoil The Last Of Us Part II’s other big twist: the fact that only about half of the game is played from Ellie’s perspective, with the game rewinding at a major turning point to show what its three violent days in Seattle have been like for Joel’s killer, Abby.

    On the one hand, this might actually be easier for the TV show to handle than the game; one of The Last Of Us franchise’s big tricks is adapting techniques from film and media, where they’re less familiar, to the medium of games, and this kind of perspective flip is far closer to old hat for television. That being said, the parts of the game where you play as Abby constitute a huge portion of the game, introducing new characters, stories, motivations, and problems, all to drill in for players that she’s just as much a person, a “protagonist,” as Ellie herself. A 24-hour-long video game can take that kind of time to make its points—a nine-hour TV series, not so much. It’s key to Druckmann’s vision of The Last Of Us Part II that Abby feel as “real” to the player/viewer as Joel or Ellie did. Building that kind of identification, without feeling repetitive or digressive, is going to be a fascinating struggle for the show to handle in a fraction of the time.

    Is there room for another “Long, Long Time”?

    Nick Offerman, Murray Bartlett

    Nick Offerman, Murray Bartlett
    Photo: Liane Hentscher/HBO

    As we noted above, the first season of The Last Of Us deviated from the game’s plot in only one serious regard—and was rewarded powerfully for it, with critics and viewers alike holding up that digression point, “Long, Long Time” as a series highlight. With Nick Offerman and Murray Bartlett moving mountains to flesh out characters who were, in the game, an asshole and a corpse, respectively, the episode served as a necessary antidote to the grimness of the rest of the season, reminding viewers that there was still the possibility of life, even for “the last of us.”

    Mazin, and writer Peter Hoar, could fit that material into the series in part because they were adapting a largely episodic narrative: The first Last Of Us plays out as a series of vignettes as much as it is a more cohesive story, and it was fairly simple to swap out the running and shooting of the game’s “Bill’s Town” segment for something with considerably more heart. Just as importantly, it demonstrated at least some justification for the entire show, dialing into quieter, more human moments, at a distance from Joel and Ellie’s story.

    The Last Of Us Part II is a much tighter narrative ship, though, with a big chunk of its power coming from the way it buries you in first Ellie and then Abby’s head. And so it remains to be seen where Mazin and his team can find room for a bit of light to shine through. (Even if you zoom out of the Ellie-Abby conflict, the game’s background plot is about a brutal inter-clan war waged between military despots on the one hand and transphobic religious zealots on the other; there’s not a lot of room for gentler shading there.) We suspect that the Abby material will have to stand in for that kind of digression, but her story is so married and mirrored to Ellie’s that it’ll be difficult to get meaningful breathing room out of it.

    All that being said: It’s worth stepping back and remembering that we’re talking about a TV show that hasn’t even been filmed at this point, let alone aired. Speculation can only go so far before it just becomes fortune-telling and just as useful. But The Last Of Us’ nature as an adaptation—and one especially beholden to its source material—invites these kinds of questions. The Last Of Us Part II landed like a bomb in 2020, detonating video-game discourse for months around it. We can only imagine what its adaptation to television will do when it arrives some time next year.

    This story originally appeared on The A.V. Club.

    William Hughes

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  • Prince of Persia, Last of Us Season 2, And More Of The Week's Hottest Takes

    Prince of Persia, Last of Us Season 2, And More Of The Week's Hottest Takes

    Screenshot: The Pokémon Company / Kotaku

    After playing through Pokémon Scarlet and Violet’s epilogue I can definitively say I was mostly let down by the Hidden Treasure of Area Zero DLC. Don’t get me wrong, the “Mochi Mayhem” episode is an hour of silly fun alongside some of the best characters to grace the games’ Paldea region, but it is just that—silly, especially when compared to some of the games’ more memorable moments. – Kenneth Shepard Read More

    Kotaku Staff

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  • When the Plebes Had Diamond Hands: Dumb Money

    When the Plebes Had Diamond Hands: Dumb Money

    Toward the end of 2020, the only thing more pervasive than COVID-19 was “WAP” by Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion. A song whose prowess carried over into early 2021, just as coronavirus did. At that time, TikTok was also blowing up more than ever. In large part thanks to “at-home culture” “thriving.” When corona first hit at the beginning of 2020, Megan Thee Stallion was having a moment all her own thanks to the “Savage” challenge that went viral on the app. A detail that also comes into play during Dumb Money, when a GameStop employee named Marcos Barcia (Anthony Ramos) trolls his boss, Brad (Dane DeHaan), after the latter tells him that while he can’t give him an advance on his paycheck, he can compete to win “ten labor hours” (presumably, that means ten hours’ worth of wages) by participating in a TikTok lip sync contest. 

    This, of course, happens after “WAP” soundtracks the intro to Dumb Money, as Gabe Plotkin (Seth Rogen) frantically runs through his multimillion dollar property upon being told to “dial in” by fellow hedge fund CEO Steve Cohen (played by an ever-mutating Vincent D’Onofrio). It is Cohen who informs Plotkin that, “They’re holding” (in other words, they’ve got “diamond hands”). The “they” in this scenario being the proverbial “little guy.” The David to Wall Street’s Goliath. And the representative for all the Davids of the U.S. at large is Keith Gill (Paul Dano) a.k.a. Roaring Kitty a.k.a. Deep Fucking Value. Although a financial analyst at MassMutual by day, Keith’s real passion appears to be his post-work life as a “recreational YouTuber.” And it’s one he ostensibly disappears deeper into after the death of his sister, Sara (the cause of which we’re made to assume was from Covid).

    This is what the viewer sees when the film cuts to six months earlier, smack-dab in the middle of 2020. Meeting with his friend and financial colleague, Briggsy (Deniz Akdeniz), Keith tells him about his decision to double down on investing in GameStop stock. Which Briggsy bills as “penny stocks” (but hey, those were good enough to make Jordan Belfort a rich man, n’est-ce pas?). Keith insists 1) GameStop is not that and 2) it’s highly undervalued. The obvious metaphor tying into how the “average joe” is consistently undervalued, too. And what business could be more tailored toward such a demographic than GameStop (apart from, say, Home Depot)? He then lays into Briggsy about how “Wall Street gets it wrong all the time. Look at ‘08. These guys, they have all the money, and the fancy degrees, and the political juice in the world and they get it wrong all the time.” Briggsy still warns, “You never bet against Wall Street.” Wall Street, too, is well-aware of its rigged system. The one that everybody on the inside benefits from, including men like Plotkin, Cohen and Ken Griffin (played to perfection by Nick Offerman), the eerily stoic (like, Dick Cheney-level) CEO of Citadel. 

    These are the men who refer to people like Keith as “dumb money” (the asterisk given with said title card of the movie being: “*individual investors often derided as ‘dumb money’ by Wall Street”). But Keith, at six months into 2020, is about to show these fucks just who, exactly, is the dumb one. Rallying his ever-burgeoning Reddit following, co-screenwriters Lauren Schuker Blum and Rebecca Angelo easily render Gill into a modern-day Robin Hood (and, to be sure, the app of the same name plays heavily into the narrative), taking money from the rich prematurely offloading their GameStop stocks (i.e., “shorting”) and putting it into the “pockets” of the everyman. Including essential health care workers like Jenny (America Ferrera, who is having her best year ever in the mainstream thanks to Barbie and this film, to boot). Among others like Marcos and college students Riri (​​Myha’la Herrold) and Harmony (Talia Ryder), these are the “subreddits” of the movie that thread together a larger point/theme. A point/theme that should be fairly overt to everyone by now, especially the rich (*cough cough* Wall Street finance bros). Then again, denial isn’t just a river in a hedge fund manager’s backyard. 

    And yet, although ignoring the contempt of the poor (read: everyone except the rich at this juncture) was relatively easy to do before 2020, this was a year when the internet became an echo chamber of unprecedented rage (markedly propelled by the filmed murder of George Floyd in late May—itself given a nod to in Dumb Money when Marcos passes a wall of graffiti that reads, “Fuck the Cops,” “Black Lives Matter” and “I Can’t Breathe”). A platform for expressing the extreme dissatisfaction that has been percolating for decades vis-à-vis capitalism and the lie it continues to sell about “everyone” having an “equal” chance to “get ahead” (this, of course, alluding to amassing as much money as possible, because that’s all we’ve been conditioned to believe really matters—and yes, people like Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion only perpetuate that message with their money-worshiping lyrics).

    Never had it been made more patently clear that that simply wasn’t the case when coronavirus came to roost, and the accompanying lockdowns that classified the lowest-paid workers as essential compared to the richest “workers” who were told to “stay home, stay safe” made it laughably apparent just how unfair this whole game has been. While the fat cats were allowed to safely shelter in place in their posh homes, those paid in peanuts and balcony applause to risk their lives were made to suffer more than ever. And all without any promise of higher pay. So what is being “essential” really worth to he who controls the market? Because, in the end, no matter what, the Goliaths will be able to get what they want out of the Davids of the world, somehow managing to push them into submission one way or the other. In Gill and his acolytes’ case, that came in the form of shutting off access to the r/WallStreetBets forum under the guise of espousing “hateful and discriminatory content” that “violated Reddit’s code of conduct.” Ha! So it’s okay for the rich to make an entire affluent existence out of discriminating and being hateful toward the have-nots, but when the latter group tries to take a stand only then can it be called what it is? Oh hell no. 

    And when Keith commences his “thesis” on GameStop, he’s right to say, “The value is overlooked. Wall Street just doesn’t see it. Why?… The hedge funds are overlooking the value of the company just like they overlook the people who shop there.” The same kind of people who will continue to be overlooked now that the GameStop “fiasco” is “over.” And, in effect, it is. For the consequences, as usual, did not fit the crime (the SEC made no charges, not even against Ken Griffin). And people like Marcos, although slightly vindicated, continued to get the fuzzy end of the lollipop. Just as he does in having to ride the bus to work during the pandemic (GameStop found a loophole for staying open by declaring itself a purveyor of “essential products” to keep people connected while “working from home” [read: playing video games]). And when he finally gets off the bus to enter a deserted Detroit mall that houses, among other shops, a GameStop, the viewer can then see the ad on the side of the bus that reads: “Money burning a hole in your pocket? We’ll get you some more.” It’s only too appropriate when applied to the stock market as an American casino. Not to mention the way Americans in general are “incentivized” to operate on credit, to incur a negative balance that will keep them constantly on some lender’s hook. This ceaseless, propagandizing encouragement in the U.S. to borrow money and effectively gamble on yourself (knowing full well the system doesn’t want you to be a winner) is what’s at play in Dumb Money as well. Except the hedge fund fucks “in charge” were never banking on the everyman’s “deluded” self-confidence to actually pay off. 

    Never seeing the short squeeze on the horizon at all, despite how clear it was becoming throughout 2020. And yes, those reminded of The Big Short by the term “short squeeze” wouldn’t be wrong to make the correlation. After all, said 2015 movie also relates to rigged market fuckery and is based on a book: Michael Lewis’ The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine. Just as Dumb Money is based on Ben Mezrich’s 2021 tome (that’s right, the book came out the same year as the “incident” itself), The Antisocial Network: The GameStop Short Squeeze and the Ragtag Group of Amateur Traders That Brought Wall Street to Its Knees. While The Big Short was released almost a full decade after the debacle it addresses, Dumb Money is yet another prime example not just of the possibilities when “the plebes” are united in a cause, but also of the collective’s more recent obsession with looking back on the immediate past as though enough time has gone by to truly grasp the impact of what happened. 

    In the directorial care of Craig Gillespie (of Cruella and I, Tonya repute), that “grasp” becomes automatically comedic…even if it isn’t able to fully comprehend, so soon after it happened, the full weight of what occurred. The same goes for coronavirus itself, which most people have opted to sweep under the rug in terms of not wanting to remember “that time.” Preferring, instead, to pretend it never existed. In many respects, the attitude taken is tantamount to the cliche of everyone masturbating on a plane as they think it’s about to crash, only to realize the aircraft has righted itself and life will continue on for the time being. Afterward, everyone pretends that no one whipped it out in what they thought would be their final moments. That’s what coronavirus and its lockdown behavior mirrored.

    As 2020 came to a close and corona continued to rage on, the sequestering required of people created an unprecedented online environment. A cauldron, if you will, for something like the subreddit of Wall Street Bets to brew into an entire movement. One that was, needless to say, a movement geared toward taking down the rich. Who had only gotten richer during the pandemic while the rest of the working-class “schmucks” lost their already paltry livelihood. 

    Perhaps what’s most striking of all about Dumb Money (even more than the hubris of the rich) is how it forces viewers to remember that “period” not so long ago. Capturing a moment when complacency had subsided, in large part, thanks to having so much “free time” to actually rail against the oppressor. And the last thing an oppressor wants is for his serfs to have too much free time to think about what a fucked system this is (glorified feudalism, in case you couldn’t guess). Hence, the urgency with which the masses were ferried back to “normal.” With nobody seeming all that concerned about acknowledging the shellshock of what transpired. Just as no one is with acknowledging the (enduring) lack of fairness in the stock market (“fair market” being an especial oxymoron here). No matter what kind of “movement” Keith may have started.

    Per the film’s title card epilogue, that movement is summed up as follows: “Because of the GameStop rally, 85% of hedge funds now scour the internet to see where retail traders are investing. Fearing another short squeeze, funds have dramatically reduced their short positions. Wall Street will never be able to ignore the so-called ‘dumb money’ again.” Though that remains debatable. 

    And then there is the matter of refusing to acknowledge that what actually needs to change isn’t “leveling the playing field” so that broke asses can become just as cunty as richies, but blowing up the entire system, including its major capitalist trappings. I.e., the stock market.

    Genna Rivieccio

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  • ‘The Last of Us’ Season 1 Episode 3 Recap: Frank, My Dear

    ‘The Last of Us’ Season 1 Episode 3 Recap: Frank, My Dear

    It’s only January. It is way too soon to talk about The Last of Us’s third episode, “Long Long Time,” as the best episode of 2023, let alone the best episode of The Last of Us, right? Right. But! Is it too soon to declare it the best episode of 2023 and The Last of Us, so far? Not from where I’m standing.

    Following an opening two installments that demonstrated astounding fidelity to the video game it’s based on, The Last of Us breaks the mold with its riveting third episode, a 75-minute meditation on life and love in the not-quite-a-zombie apocalypse. Driven forward by powerful performances from TV treasures Nick Offerman and Murray Bartlett, “Long Long Time” marks the biggest departure from the Last of Us source material to date, offering a very different look at the video game characters of Bill and Frank, to the point that they may as well be show-only inventions. 

    While their origins are very much rooted in the game, Bill and Frank’s HBO debut (tragically short-lived as it may be) imbues the TV series with something that not even the fungus-free Ellie (Bella Ramsey) has managed to instill in Pedro Pascal’s Joel quite yet: hope, in an otherwise hopeless world. Of course, by the episode’s end, “Long Long Time” also manages to leave the audience completely wrecked. It’s still The Last of Us, after all.

    The episode begins in the aftermath of a different wreck: Tess (Anna Torv), gone but not forgotten following her explosive sacrifice play. Joel would prefer if Ellie forgets all about her, but Ellie evokes Tess’s name all the same: “Nobody made you go along with this plan. You needed a truck battery or something, and you made a choice. Don’t blame me for something that isn’t my fault.” Fair enough, Joel probably thinks, but doesn’t say aloud, as the two reluctant companions set off to link up with Bill and Frank, two of Joel and Tess’s business partners outside of the quarantine zone, who are better equipped to deal with a precocious child than the tragically childless Joel.

    The journey to Bill and Frank’s is a relatively peaceful one. No explosions, no deaths, unless we’re counting the clicker Ellie examines and then stabs in the head at a local gas station. (Not just any gas station, mind you, but a Cumberland Farms! Consider it one last tip of the Red Sox cap to the New England faithful.) Despite no imminent danger, ghosts lurk throughout Joel and Ellie’s trek. They walk past the ancient wreckage of a plane crash, busted and overgrown like everything else in the greater Boston area. They talk about theories surrounding the Cordyceps outbreak, with Joel throwing his lot behind “the big bread theory.” They reach a makeshift graveyard littered with the bones of uninfected individuals, executed for fear of overcrowding the quarantine zones—ironic, given humanity’s current place on the endangered species list.

    “Why kill them? Why not just leave them be?” Ellie asks, not understanding why these folks had to die. Joel’s heartbreaking answer: “Dead people can’t be infected.”

    Fifteen minutes of television have elapsed at this point. With an hour still on the clock, The Last of Us pushes into another window of sorts, tripping backward in time all the way to the start of the outbreak. We see soldiers round up a group of people on a truck, the same people whose bones Joel and Ellie will someday meet on the side of the road. But just when it feels like the show’s about to dive into the backstories of these soon-to-be corpses, the action instead shifts to someone else entirely—someone who is very, very alive.

    Enter: Bill, the veritable Ron Swanson of the apocalypse. It’s not just because the heavily bearded man comes to us courtesy of Parks and Recreation alum Nick Offerman. It’s also because this heavily bearded man acts exactly as one would expect Offerman’s Ron to under similar circumstances, with grim-faced badassery and a deep stockpile of supplies. The proud survivalist watches surveillance camera footage of soldiers rounding up the people of Bill’s town, Lincoln. (Another elaboration from the game, where it’s literally named “Bill’s Town.”) When he’s satisfied that they’re all gone, Bill emerges from his underground bunker and sets about his new life, securing supplies, boobytrapping property, eating lavish home-cooked dinners for one, and otherwise generally thriving at the end of the world.

    Josh Wigler

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  • ‘The Last of Us’: Inside That Tragic, Gorgeous, and Surprising Love Story Episode

    ‘The Last of Us’: Inside That Tragic, Gorgeous, and Surprising Love Story Episode

    Spoilers for The Last of Us episode three ahead

    Hitting many of the same narrative beats, recreating iconic shots, and expanding upon the original digital design with painstakingly hand-built sets, HBO’s The Last of Us had, through its first two episodes, deliberately and closely echoed the postapocalyptic game on which it’s based. From the beginning, the question of how the adaptation would eventually set itself apart was twofold, a matter of both when it’d shift directions and to exactly what degree. Enter Sunday’s third episode, “Long Long Time,” which is a decades-spanning and near-feature-length love story that “explodes expectations,” as one of its stars, Nick Offerman, puts it to Vanity Fair.

    In the game, Bill is a minor character whose survivalist bent comes in handy when it comes to helping protagonists Joel (Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) on their perilous cross-country journey. He’s encountered briefly through Joel’s perspective, entering the enclosed mini safe town Bill has built for himself as he claims to contentedly live in isolation. “You come to realize that he’s actually lying,” says game creator Neil Druckmann, who developed the series with Emmy winner Craig Mazin. “There was something Bill cared about more than survival—there’s this other man named Frank.” Frank is not a speaking role in the game; the relationship between him and Bill is only subtly alluded to. But here Mazin saw his opportunity to put his stamp on the Last of Us show, to give viewers “a breath” after two intense and bloody opening episodes, and to buck expectations. We’ve been on the run with Joel and Ellie, and finally viewers get to sit down and stay awhile with Bill and Frank. 

    “I said, ‘Neil, I’ve got a crazy idea,’” Mazin recalls. “And he was like, ‘Do it. Let’s see how it goes.’ And off we went.”

    In “Long Long Time” we meet Offerman’s Bill in 2003, the show’s earliest ongoing timeline so far, as the episode begins. His survivalist paranoias improbably come true as the world starts melting down. Singularly equipped to, yes, survive in the world that nobody but him saw coming, he constructs a bunker and an entire electrical ecosystem around it to live comfortably for as long as he wants. As this origin story goes, he finds a stranger lurking outside his property, starving and dirty and (so he claims) not infected—Frank, played by Murray Bartlett. After confirming, Bill reluctantly lets the man in for a shower, a meal, and a glass of wine. They realize they’re attracted to each other—the blossoming of a romance that the episode, directed by Peter Hoar, charts with gorgeous and heartbreaking specificity through the end of both their lives. Not exactly typical video game stuff.

    “It was about showing both the passage of time and the creation of a functioning relationship that implied that two people could have success in this world,” Mazin says. “Regardless of the nature of their love, whether it’s romantic or platonic or parental, not everything has to end badly. And they really do have a happy ending as far as I’m concerned.”

    Veterans of TV known for their more offbeat characterizations, Bartlett (The White Lotus) and Offerman (Parks and Recreation) pull off something magical in just a single episode, believably developing a relationship that initially feels new and exciting and strange, then turns worn and a little cranky and genuinely profound. The chemistry is natural and quiet, the depth of the performances intricately woven between them. Bartlett secured the part in an audition, and Mazin was able to cast Offerman—an acquaintance—after another actor couldn’t commit due to scheduling. In fact, Offerman himself first had to say no due to timing, only for the role to work out when it came back around.

    “Craig told me that they took a good look at Murray and said, ‘Oh man, we’re going to need some counterpoint to this guy,’” Offerman says and then laughs. By this point, White Lotus had made Bartlett an Emmy-bound star. “Imagine seeing Indiana Jones and then your agent is like, ‘So they want you to be in a relationship with the guy with the hat and the whip,’” Offerman says. “How did I get here?”

    The coup of “Long Long Time” comes down, in many ways, to just how quickly it establishes deep intimacy between the men. Bartlett and Offerman say that Mazin’s script laid much of the groundwork for allowing them to jump in, find that particular romantic texture, and then pop out for the main story to continue progressing. (The episode ends when Joel and Ellie, planning to hand Ellie off to the couple’s capable care, arrive at the house and find them dead.) “We were set up for success,” Bartlett says. “Some of these scenes are very vulnerable and very delicate. We were lucky enough to have someone [in Hoar] who would just tread very carefully in maneuvering us in the right directions to tell the version of the story that we wanted to tell.”

    It’s all in the little details—flashes of a life partnership taking place years apart. After they meet, we see them make love. Mazin, who is not gay, says it’s “the first sex scene I’ve ever written in my career.” The creator leaned on queer collaborators on the episode like Bartlett, Hoar, and others to ensure it and similar moments felt authentic and specific to these characters: “I do believe when you’re writing outside of your familiarity, it’s important to do your homework and to also have people nearby who are being paid and working with you—not just your friends that you’re bothering—who can say, ‘Actually, this is better, this would be more true.’”

    Offerman and Bartlett fell into a dynamic easily and in good humor. “Murray liked me, I’ll go that far,” Offerman says dryly over Zoom, with Bartlett smirking beside him. (“I liked you enough, dude,” Bartlett replies.) They approached the naked scenes, both literally and figuratively, “meticulously,” Bartlett says, zeroing in on upending tropes of “these two rugged guys in a postapocalyptic world.” They both chuckle recalling one key moment that marks a time jump of several years, with the two characters bickering like an old married couple—a signal that their love has lasted. “When we burst out of the house screaming at each other into the street, to me, it’s such a triumphant memory,” Offerman says. In one of the final sequences, Bill walks in from his garden while Frank, who now uses a wheelchair and is ill with some unnamed malady, is painting. They take each other in. “There’s no words,” Bartlett remembers of shooting the scene. “It’s a beautiful moment.”  

    David Canfield

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  • Pedro Pascal Survives The Zombie Apocalypse In ‘The Last Of Us’ Trailer

    Pedro Pascal Survives The Zombie Apocalypse In ‘The Last Of Us’ Trailer

    By Anita Tai.
    Published:

    It’s the end of the world as know it.

    HBO released the official trailer for its zombie apocalypse series based on the popular video game series “The Last of Us” on Saturday.

    Pedro Pascal stars as the gruff survivor Joel who is tasked with transporting a young girl named Ellie, played by Bella Ramsay, across a zombie-infested America. The girl may be the key to saving humanity in a post-apocalyptic world.


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    HBO Reveals New Footage Of ‘The Last of Us,’ ‘The White Lotus’ In Star-Studded Mega Trailer

    “If you don’t think there’s hope for the world, why bother going on?” Ramsay asks as the threatening shadows of the zombies loom in the foreground.

    The cast includes Gabriel Luna, Nick Offerman, Graham Greene and Elaine Miles. The original voice actors for Joel and Ellie, Ashley Johnson and Troy Baker, also appear in the show in the roles of a pregnant woman, Anna, and a senior member of a group of survivors named James respectively.


    READ MORE:
    Pedro Pascal Reveals Which Roles He’d Love To Swap With Nicolas Cage

    The original video game won awards across the board and sold over 17 million copies.

    “The Last of Us” comes out on HBO Max on Jan. 15.

    Anita Tai

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