Yes, I am trying to be funny.
Years ago, my pal Calamity Jon Morris came up with an occasional series called Ask the Defenders, the conceit being that Marvel’s infamous superhero ‘non-team’ of the 1970s was actually an aggregation of dysfunctional, if highly entertaining, personalities who featured into a sort of workplace sitcom. Jon and I encouraged our readers to …
“HO HO HO! And what is your name, champ?” “Thulsa.” “And do you have a last name, Thulsa, so Santa can find your house from the mailbox?” “Doom.” “Well! Er, ho ho! That should be easy to remember! How many little boys named Doom can there be on your block?” …
Hi, everybody! Today we’re going to talk about a certain presidential candidate, and that means we’re going to have to use the f-word. The candidate is Donald Trump, and the word, of course, is “fuckface”. Ha ha! Just kidding! The word is “fascism”, and the candidate is “all of them”. …
Anyone who knows me, has read my writing, or has spent agonizing minutes in my company hearing me gas on and on about television knows that I think Mr. Show with Bob and David represents one of the high points in the history of TV comedy. It was, and still is, …
I recently moved back to Chicago after spending several years in less frigid climes. The wonders of global warming will soon ensure that every city in America will have delightful West Texas-style weather well into February, but for now, this is still one of the coldest cities once winter hits. …
It’s time we all sat down and had a little talk about rooting interests. Now, I warn you in advance: this is all completely subjective. What I am going to say here — what I am going to lay down as universal law that should be followed, with the punishment …
Hi there! I’m Jesse Popinski, better known as Uncle Hi-Finance. You may know me from HGTV’s Money Hole, the Anything You Can Do I Can Do Richer pamphlet series, and my best-selling satellite radio show, Uncle Hi-Finance’s Tax Shelter Hour. Thanks for tuning in to my podcast, which will appear on your credit …
Just when we thought we’d seen the one billionth iteration of the auteur argument in cinema, now we have to deal with it on television. Look, I get it! Television is hard. It takes a lot of people to put out that 22-44 minutes of televised entertainment. Even in the …
As anyone who has spent any time on Facebook — a cohort that, at last count, includes 92% of the human population of Earth, including pre-technological hunter-gatherer tribes in central Africa and your mom — knows, Words With Friends is one of the most popular games in the history of …
While the visitor from abroad or the hinterlands will find New York a largely agreeable clime, from the silvered canyons of finance on Wall Street to the richly variegated taxi dispatch yards of Castle Hill Avenue, it cannot be denied that there are, in these uncertain economic times, organized groups …
Excitement is hardly in short supply this year when it comes to politics, but the Republican Party, apparently committed to its position as a third-place network who will throw absolutely anything at the viewing audience just to see what sticks, is offering us fare like those overstuffed modern dramas where something …
Last night, the Chicago Cubs were swept out of baseball’s post-season after being completely manhandled by the New York Mets, and today, they will prepare to do what they have done for the last 107 years: watch two other teams play in the World Series. I enjoyed watching the Cubs …
Ever since the Hays Code took a fatal nosedive in the 1960s, movies have been cursing like there’s no tomorrow. At one point, movies, no matter how much they sublimated their sex and forefronted their violence, were as sanitary as a dentist’s tools. Sometimes this resulted in some finely suggestive …
For many first-time visitors to the United States, an understanding of its culture can be hard to come by. Despite the American entertainment industry’s never-flagging efforts to export the nation’s finest bullet- and fart-joke-imbued movies and television programs to far-flung parts of the globe, many foreign tourists have been insufficiently …
Well, that was edifying, wasn’t it? Last night, CNN gathered a bunch of rich assholes together to pretend that Barack Obama is Stalin reincarnated and to explain in vague terms about how they would restore America to its vanished glory by taking medical care away from women and poor people …
