by Robert McGinnis
Artwork of the Day: The April Robin Murders (by Robert McGinnis)
Monthly Archives: June 2018
Music Video of the Day: I’m Upset by Drake (2018, dir by Karena Evans)
We’re not even halfway through 2018 yet and I’m already prepared to declare that today’s music video of the day is the best of the year! Now, you’ll notice that I didn’t say that it’s the best song of the year but really, the song’s not that important. What’s important is that, with this video, Drake and director Karena Evans gives us the Degrassi reunion that we’ve all been waiting for!
(Okay, maybe not everyone. Apparently, some people aren’t as obsessed with Degrassi as the rest of us are. But you know what? I love Degrassi. I’ve got almost the entire series on DVD and I’ve watched and rewatched every episode so many times that I can quote most of them from memory.)
Before he found superstardom as Drake, Aubrey Graham was best known (by people like me) for playing Jimmy Brooks. When Degrassi first started, Jimmy was something of a random jock. He got into fights. He played basketball. He dated Ashley Kerwin and dumped her after she took ecstasy and ended up making out with Sean. He dated Hazel until she graduated. He dated Ashley again until she betrayed him to get a recording contract. And, of course, he ended up in a wheelchair after a mean-spirited prank led to Rick Murray shooting him in the back. Jimmy eventually left Toronto for Amsterdam and possibly law school but, as we see in this video, he’s back and so are all of our old favorites.
Admittedly, before this video, there was a previous Degrassi reunion. Back in 2016, the 500th episode of Degrassi featured a class reunion and several old characters did return. Unfortunately, everyone’s favorites — like Paige, Spinner, Marco, and Emma — didn’t get much screen time. Instead, Mo — who really shouldn’t have even been at the reunion since it had only been a year since he graduated — got most of the screen time and seriously, who ever cared about Mo? Meanwhile, beloved graduates like Ellie, Craig, and Manny didn’t even show up. In short, the official Degrassi reunion was a huge disappointment!
Fortunately, this video does a better job of bringing back almost all of our favorites. I guess that’s the power of Drake. True, it’s hard not to be disappointed that Sean Cameron, Joy Hogart, Alex, J.T. Yorke, Johnny DiMarco, and Bruce the Moose didn’t show up. (If you ever had any doubt that Degrassi was a Canadian show, just consider the fact that a major supporting character was named Bruce The Moose.) But check out who did return!
First off, here’s Spinner (Shane Kippel)!
Seriously, it’s not a Degrassi reunion if Spinner isn’t there. Despite the fact that Degrassi was a four-year school, Spinner was enrolled for seven seasons. Okay, so Spinner wasn’t that good of a student but so what? He was the heart and soul of Degrassi! Not only was he the drummer for Toronto’s greatest band, Downtown Sasquatch, but he was also Jimmy’s best friend, except for that time when Jimmy was angry over Spinner’s part in the prank that led to Jimmy getting shot in the back. (Fortunately, they made up.) I’ve seen some people online wondering why Spinner spends so much of this video throwing up. My theory is that it’s an homage to the seventh season episode, Pass the Dutchie. That’s the episode where Spinner, while undergoing chemotherapy, throws up on his English teacher.
(That episode also features one of the greatest lines in Degrassi history, when a stoned Spinner realizes that he’s about to fail English for the third time and exclaims, “What kind of idiot fails his own language three times!?”)
Four of my favorites all showed up together. Getting out of the stylish white car: Paige (Lauren Collins), Ellie (Stacey Farber), Marco (Adamo Ruggiero), and Craig (Jake Epstein). I always related to Ellie, largely because we both had red hair and always wore black to school. I also always felt bad that Craig and Ellie could never quite seem to make things works romantically, though Ellie and Sean were actually a better couple. But I’m just kind of rambling now…
Hey, it’s Terri (Christina Schmidt) and Hazel (Andrea Lewis)! Terri was on the first three seasons of Degrassi, until she was put into a coma by her abusive boyfriend, Rick Murray. (This was the same Rick who would later shoot Jimmy in the back.) Hazel was Jimmy’s girlfriend, until she eventually realized that Jimmy was actually in love with Ellie. It’s probably not a coincidence that Drake is rapping about his ex at the same time that Hazel shows up.
Then the teachers show up! Ms. Kwan (Linlyn Lue) was the tyrannical English teacher who was driven to tears when Jimmy and Spinner egged her car. As for Archie “Snake” Simpson (Stefan Brogren), he’s been the one constant over the course of all the different versions of Degrassi. He started out as a student on Degrassi Junior High and Degrassi High. In School’s Out, he was the first character to say “fuck” on Canadian television. Finally, Mr. Simpson taught the school’s media immersion class and eventually became principal of the school.
About halfway through the video, we learn that Mr. Simpson buys his drugs from Jay (Jason Mewes) and Silent Bob (Kevin Smith).
A longtime fan of the Degrassi franchise, Kevin Smith appeared as himself during season 4 and 5 and also in the second Degrassi movie, Degrassi Goes Hollywood. Smith came to Degrassi to shoot his latest movie, Jay and Silent Bob Go Canadian, Eh? Of course, he brought Mewes with him. While Kevin Smith did end up contributing to the break-up of Caitlin and Joey, he also helped to track down Craig, who was having a manic episode and living on the streets at the time. Later, Smith would return to Degrassi to encourage Paige to take a chance with Alex and to also help launch the acting career of Manny Santos (Cassie Steele).
Speaking of Manny, she returns for Drake’s reunion and, appropriately enough, she’s seen hanging out with Emma (Miriam McDonald). Interestingly, in Degrassi Takes Manhattan, Emma ended up marrying Spinner in a plot twist that caused thousands of Degrassi fans (like me) to roll their eyes in unison. (Seriously, Emma and Spinner barely spoke to each other for 9 seasons and then they suddenly got married.) In this video, Spinner and Emma don’t even seem to acknowledge each other. Maybe they got divorced.
Among the other former Degrassi cast members to make an appearance: Melissa McIntyre (a.k.a. the one and only Ashley Kerwin), Nina Dobrev (who played teen mom-turned-super model Mia), A.J. Saudin (a.k.a. Simpson’s autistic godson, Connor), Sarah Barrable-Tishauer (a.k.a., class President Liberty Van Zandt), Jake Goldsbie (a.k.a. adorable nerd Toby Isaacs), Marc Donato and Dalmar Abuzeid (a.k.a. dorky friends Derek and Danny), and Paula Brancati (who played Jane, the girl who Spinner probably should have married.)
And then there’s Rick Murray (Ephraim Ellis). Despite the fact that Rick was reported to have died shortly after shooting Jimmy, he still showed up for the reunion. Of course, not everyone was happy to see him:
So, for those of you keeping track: Jimmy regained his ability walk, Emma and Spinner are divorced, Rick Murray apparently didn’t die after all, and J.T. Yorke is still dead. Poor J.T.
(Then again, if Rick’s still alive then you have to wonder how his ghost was able to possess Holy J in The Curse of Degrassi. Maybe I’m overthinking this. Anyway…)
Enjoy!
Greatest video of 2018, have no doubt
“Soft X-Ray/Mindhunters” : Alex Degen Refuses To Buckle Under To The Aesthetic Fascists
Chances are that it would be almost unbearably pretentious, not to mention way less clever than it sounds, if I were to refer to Alex Degen’s latest Koyama Press-published graphic novel, Soft X-Ray/Mindhunters — which originally began “life” as a 44-page comic and now stands, expanded and extrapolated upon, at a whopping 392 pages — as “a visual feast – for the mind!” or somesuch, and yet —
Yeah, you guessed it. that’s definitely what it is. And I’m just as definitely kicking myself for not coming up with some genuinely unique, as opposed to glib, way to describe it — because “A.” (as the cover would have it) Degen’s cartooning is, in fact, consistently unique, and deserves same in return. Bursting at the seams with information, if not words (barring its gloriously, deliriously verbose chapter titles), there’s so much here to partake in, to parse, and to ponder over…
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Lonesome Cowboy: Randolph Scott in RIDE LONESOME (United Artists 1959)
Randolph Scott and director Budd Boetticher teamed again for RIDE LONESOME, their sixth of seven Westerns and fourth with writer Burt Kennedy. Scott’s a hard case bounty hunter bringing in a killer, joined in his trek by an old “acquaintance” with an agenda of his own. Everyone’s playing things close to the vest here, and the stark naked desert of Lone Pine’s Alabama Hills, with its vast emptiness, plays as big a part as the fine acting ensemble.
Ben Brigade (Scott) has captured the murderous Billy John and intends to bring him to justice in Santa Cruz. Coming to a waystation, he finds Sam Boone and his lanky young companion Whit, known outlaws who’ve heard the territorial governor is granting amnesty to whoever brings in Billy. Also at the station is Mrs. Crane, whose husband has been murdered by marauding Mescaleros. Sam’s interested in forming a partnership and taking Billy…
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Artwork of the Day: Argosy (by V.E. Pike)
by V.E. Pike
Music Video of the Day: Chemistry by Arcade Fire (2018, dir by Ray Tintori)
Oh hell yeah!
I love this video! A dog tries to romance a cat and ends up getting kicked out of the party by a bunch of sharks. But he’s not ready to give up! And, of course, it all leads to arson and space travel. Because of course it does…
This video was directed by Ray Tintori, who also directed the video for Lindsey Stirling’s Crystallize.
Enjoy!
Film Review: Game Night (dir by John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein)
In this time of division and conflict, can we all agree that Game Night is a damn funny movie?
The film tells the story of three couples who regularly get together for, as the title suggests, a game night. Ryan (Billy Magnussen) and Sharon (Sharon Horgan) are quirky and a little bit daffy. Kevin (Lamorne Morris) and his wife, Michelle (Kylie Bunbury) are generally dependable and Michelle has a really interesting story about the time that she met a man who may have been Denzel Washington but probably wasn’t. Meanwhile, Annie (Rachel McAdams) and Max (Jason Bateman) are an ultracompetitive married couple, frustrated in their attempts to conceive a child but always confident in their ability to win any game that they play. At one time, Gary (Jesse Plemons) and his wife used to be a part of the group but, after they got divorced, Max and Annie stopped inviting him. You really can’t blame them. Gary’s seriously creepy.
And then there’s Brooks Davis (Kyle Chandler).
Brooks is Max’s brother and, at first glance, he would appear to be everything that Max isn’t. Brooks appears to have a lot of money. He claims to have a successful career, even if no one’s quite sure what he does for a living. He drives a nice car. When he comes to town to visit his brother, he rents out a mansion. Brooks is the type of older sibling who always has an embarrassing story or two to share about his younger brother. In fact, Max feels so inadequate when compared to Brooks that it’s even interfering with Max and Annie’s efforts to have a child. When Brooks invites everyone to come to his house for a very special game night, Annie and Max are determined to beat Brooks at whatever game he’s planning on having them play.
It turns out that Brooks has hired a company to put on an interactive role-playing game. While listening to a fake FBI agent (Geoffrey Wright) explain the background of the mystery that they’re about to solve, the couples are shocked when several masked men burst into the house. Everyone’s impressed as the men beat the fake FBI agent unconscious. When the men start beating up Brooks, everyone praises Brooks for the realism of his game. After Brooks is dragged out of the house, the couples set out to solve the mystery of who is behind this kidnapping. As for the fake FBI agent, he lies on the floor motionless. Even when Ryan kicks his body, the agent doesn’t move. Everyone agrees that the agent is a really good and committed actor.
Of course, the joke is that Brooks really has been kidnapped but nobody realizes it. It’s a good joke but, to the film’s credit, it’s not the only joke. In fact, Game Night actually get funnier after everyone eventually realizes that they’re no longer playing a game. Ever after they realize that Brooks actually has been kidnapped, Annie and Max are so competitive that they still keep trying to outdo everyone else.
Annie and Max also discover that they have no choice but to involve their creepy neighbor and former friend, Gary. Jesse Plemons doesn’t have a lot of screentime but he gives a performance that is so exquisitely strange and awkward that he ends up stealing the entire movie. Watching Plemons, you both feel sorry for Gary and understand why no one wants to play with him. His desperation to be apart of the group is both exasperating and somewhat touching.
In fact, the entire cast does a good job, bringing their often clueless characters to life. Max and Annie are a likable couple and Bateman and McAdams have a natural chemistry that makes them a lot of fun to watch. There’s a great scene where Max and Annie, still thinking that they’re just playing a game, subdue a group of criminals in a bar. Max and Annie’s clueless joy is intoxicating. They’re having fun playing at being tough and we’re having fun watching them. Of course, it eventually turns out that the gun that Annie thought was a toy is real and loaded and … well, things get a little bit messy. While the scene where Annie and Max try to figure out how to dig a bullet out of a man’s arm may have made me cringe a little, it also made me laugh. That’s a credit to both Bateman and McAdams, who made the scene both real and funny at the same time.
Anyway, I really enjoyed Game Night. Clocking in at 100 minutes, it’s a briskly paced and good-natured comedy that never makes the mistake of lingering for too long over its own cleverness. Director Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley both redeem themselves for 2015’s Vacation. If, earlier this year, you missed this one when it was in theaters, see it now and have a good time.
Artwork of the Day: Amazing Stories (by Hans W. Wessolowski)
by Hans W. Wessolowski
Music Video Of The Day: Little Black Submarines by The Black Keys (2012, dir by Danny Clinch)
Let’s just start with the obvious. Despite the fact that we do have our share of similar bars down here, this video was not shot in Texas. That “No Guns Allowed” sign was dead giveaway.
Instead, this video was shot in Nashville, Tennessee, at a place called Springwater Supper Club and Lounge. Apparently, Springwater has been around forever. It’s old enough that it was a speakeasy back during prohibition and then, after prohibition was repealed, it was the first place in Nashville to receive a license to sell liquor.
Apparently, the plan for the video was originally to have some sort of story going on while the Black Keys played in the background but those plans were abandoned during filming. The band also ended up playing an entire show for the benefit of the fans who had shown up to the be in the video. Good for them!
On a personal note, this is a song that I often listen to while driving. I find that it tends to curb the tendency towards road rage. Thank you, Black Keys! You saved my driving record!
Enjoy!
Katie Skelly Gathers Up All Her Recruits For “The Agency” (Advance Review)
I think it’s fair to say that 2017 was a “break-out year” for New York-based cartoonist Katie Skelly, what with her OGN My Pretty Vampire ranking among the year’s best-reviewed books and proving to be an out-of-left-field success for its publisher, Fantagraphics, so it doesn’t come as any surprise that a follow-up would be rushed to presses fairly quickly — and it’s a doubly-obvious move since her “next book” was already, as the saying goes, “in the can.”
By way of making that statement seem far less mysterious, I suppose I should explain that the strips that make up Skelly’s forthcoming The Agency have already seen the light of day as webcomics, so collecting them all in one volume makes all kinds of sense given that she’s sure to have a solid group of freshly-minted fans who will be eager to see something new with her name on it on…
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Through the Shattered Lens 