10 movies, 9 books, 6 TV series: A media diary
In December, I resolved that in 2019 I would track my media consumption more closely in an effort to become more mindful and intentional about what I read and watch. Pretty quickly, I realized recording every online article, video, and half-glimpsed episode of “Paw Patrol” verges on obsessive (but I still thought about it!), so ultimately I determined I would tally only those books, movies, and TV show seasons I had not completed previously or with which I still felt unfamiliar, even if I’d seen or read them before.
They’re not included below, but I can also recommend subscribing to several newsletters, one podcast, and one magazine: Anne Helen Petersen’s newsletter, Will Leitch’s newsletter, the NextDraft newsletter by Dave Pell, The Right Time with Bomani Jones podcast, and The New Yorker magazine (a fantastic gift from my aunt). I’m subscribed to some other stuff, but these are the ones I actively look forward to reading or hearing and rarely skip. Furthermore, I regularly check in on Deadspin, Hmm Daily, and Kottke pretty much every day.
Let’s get to it. This is my list of books, movies, and television shows I finished during the first three months of 2019, in rough order of completion date, with brief comments about each work.
Angle of Repose • Wallace Stegner
As someone who lived the first 18 years of his life on the West Coast, then three years in the Northeast, another three years on the West Coast, 10 years in the South, and then finally moved back West for what I expect to be The Duration, this story of transcontinental dislocation, longing for home, American ambition, and not-quite-acceptance resonated with me. The woman at the center of the novel, Susan Burling Ward, swallows so much in order to make her marriage work; she never fully subsumes herself in her husband’s life. But is that because the narrator is her grandson, who idolized her? And is his telling further colored by his personal frustrations with living life in a wheelchair? Of course, of course. I’m still thinking about it, months later.
“The Great British Baking Show” (Six of the seven seasons available on Netflix)
Perfect for long rides on airplanes, because you don’t have to pay close attention, and it’s split pretty much into even hour-long episodes, which helps keep track of how much time has passed. Also, it’s kind of weird to notice over time that the bakers aren’t making many truly sweet desserts and that Americans tasting these creations would probably find them rather un-dessert-like.
“Role Models” • d. David Wain
Forgettable comedy that should have been a lot better given that LARPing figures prominently in the plot.
Northanger Abbey • Jane Austen
A thousand times better than I remembered it being when I last read it in 2003. John Thorpe is every boy who tried to impress girls by showing them his lovingly cared-for car and expecting said girls to swoon over him for it.
“The Good Place” (Season 3)
Not the best sitcom today, but that’s only because it’s not as funny as a few other contenders. It is, however, the most thought-provoking comedic TV show I’ve seen, which is amazing considering it is extremely funny and alive.
“Brooklyn 99” (Seasons 1–5, 6 ongoing)
Funnier than “The Good Place” and much more empathetic than traditional sitcoms, but ultimately it’s “just” a TV show in that it isn’t much more than a workplace comedy with characters who are kinder to their friends than what we were trained to think was funny back in the 1990s.
“Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” • d. Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey
A revelation. First, the animation is unlike any other major animated movie.
Second, this movie very casually blends high-flying superhero stuff with working-class life in New York City with a nuanced portrayal of teenage anxieties. It’s the second-best 2018 movie I’ve seen, after “Eighth Grade.”
“Bird Box” • d. Susanne Bier
Ultimately pointless, because the filmmakers didn’t have enough conviction to make it about something. It’s a movie seemingly designed to spur headcanon that fills in the blanks, which makes it nearly meaningless.
“Black Panther” • d. Ryan Coogler
As with “Wonder Woman,” it feels like a miracle when a blockbuster popcorn movie respects the audience’s intelligence — well, at least when it comes to giving characters developed political worldviews. As my buddy, Ben, put it, a lot of the plot gets explained away with “vibranium something something.”
“All the President’s Men” • d. Alan J. Pakula
Much more boring than I expected. I mean, there are entire scenes where the tension depends on the viewer understanding that Woodward (or Bernstein? Whatever…) wrote down a note that correctly synthesized a statement from someone, and subsequently had to convince his editor that, indeed, his note from the phone conversation of some minutes before was accurate and… zzzzzzzzzzz
There There • Tommy Orange
This novel changed the way I think about the Native American experience. Focusing on urban Indians, mainly in the Bay Area — and mostly in Oakland — Orange took me along so slowly that I didn’t realize until well after the halfway point how much of my previous understanding I’d discarded. It’s a special kind of power in fiction that even though I know it’s a “made-up” story, and even though I was already disposed to be sympathetic to the novel’s concerns, the experiences of these fictional characters shoved me into a new perspective.
The Glory of Their Times • edited by Lawrence S. Ritter
Worth a read for any baseball fan. A lot less “grit and heart” talk than you might expect. It was helpful to remember that this is primary-source material and the men interviewed for the book are mostly speaking about their distant youth in pre-Depression America.
“The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part” • d. Mike Mitchell
Not nearly as entertaining or audacious as the first movie. Still better than the majority of the dreck that finds its way into movie theaters.
“Harriet the Spy” • d. Bronwen Hughes
Low production value and sloppy writing can often be saved with charm and ingenuity. This is not one of those instances.
Second Wind • Bill Russell with Taylor Branch
It’s much more a memoir about gaining cultural awareness than a basketball book, though Russell’s experiences as the leader of the Boston Celtics inform the book throughout. There are surprising moments, as when Russell talks relatively extensively and with nuance about his gender non-conforming auntie (in a book published in 1979), but there are also plenty of moments where I couldn’t help thinking to myself that Russell was playing dorm-room philosopher and expounding at length on subjects of which he had slightly more than passing knowledge and/or didn’t do any rigorous study.
“Atlanta” (Season 2/Robbin’ Season)
There’s so much genius in “Atlanta.” Somehow, it strikes a balance between anthology show and serial, comedy and drama, dream and reality. To compare it to another critically-lauded show driven by another young man of color who found fame on an NBC sitcom, “Atlanta” has 10 times the gravitas of “Master of None” with at least as many laughs and a bajillion times better acting. And even though there’s so much for me to appreciate, I still feel like I’m missing something essential because I’m not black, I’m not a southerner, and I didn’t grow up poor. This show isn’t written for me, but it still offers to give me what it can, which is way more than a typical production.
“Seven Brides for Seven Brothers” • d. Stanley Donen
A really bad and retrograde movie sandwiched around a stunning dance sequence (the whole barn-raising).
New York 2140 • Kim Stanley Robinson
I loved reading Robinson’s novel, “Aurora,” loved reading “Red Mars” a little less than that, and “New York 2140” a little less than that. All three share a common thread: Earth is the only home we have, and we’re screwing everything up, but “New York 2140” takes the full step of having a narrator say so explicitly at various points. Even as a pinko environmental hardliner myself, the heavy-handedness of The Message grew tiresome after the first 400 pages.
“Big Hero 6” • d. Don Hall, Chris Williams
I’d seen this a couple years ago, and thought it was solid, but something was amiss. Watching it again more recently, I realized there are two elements that bother me: First, Baymax becomes a stand-in for Tadashi, quite literally, and I’m not sure we want to tell young people that computers and AI can be our friends, let alone our family. Second, Hiro turns Baymax into a war machine, which, in the logic of the movie, is good because he wants to stop a bad person. It turns bad when Hiro programs Baymax to kill the bad person, which is the line Hiro’s friends draw. But in the end, turning the medical droid into a war machine was good because we can trust Hiro and his friends to do good things with the technology. There’s precious little (is there any?) questioning about whether Baymax, as shown in the movie, is actually a net good advance for humankind as a medical droid, let alone as a war machine.
“Russian Doll” (Season 1)
Unlike “Bird Box,” there’s character development in this story that actually made me care about whether Nadia succeeded or not, even if there’s no answer to the central why. A bit predictable in that it turns out genuinely caring about other people matters, but much deeper and referential than an initial viewing would suggest.
The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up • Marie Kondo
There are three key insights that matter from this book and from the related TV show:
- Choosing what to discard and what to keep is the most important element of decluttering one’s home. If you don’t make those decisions first, you’ll just be stuck trying to find places for things you don’t actually want.
- Say “thank you” to the items you’re leaning toward discarding. Having gratitude for an item and what it once did for you makes it easier to let it go.
- Fold your clothes according to her recommendations. It really makes a huge difference.
The Mother Tongue: English and How it Got that Way • Bill Bryson | A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail • Bill Bryson
I’m pairing these two books together because I read them back-to-back and was left with the same impression: Bryson has some interesting information to share, but (especially in “Walk”) he can’t help but be a condescending dick a lot of the time. What’s worse, it doesn’t appear he realizes he’s being a condescending dick and, instead, thinks the reader is right there with him in chuckling that Westerners think of Japanese as “inscrutable” because their language relies on context for certain elements that are explicit in English, or that he was obviously justified in being rude to a restaurant server in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, because his burger, fries, and Coke cost $10, and on and on.
“Catastrophe” (Season 4)
Wildly funny. Legitimately moving in its depiction of a rough marriage that, nonetheless, the principals won’t leave because they do love each other dearly and care about their children. The whole series is super-short, with only 24 total episodes, but there’s not a single wasted breath in the whole thing.
“The Greatest Showman” • d. Michael Gracey
The songs are about as good as can be without really being memorable. Like, “A Million Dreams” is probably the most impactful song on a standalone basis, but just like all the others it kind of blends together with the other tunes. A paint-by-numbers plot that gets by on Hugh Jackman’s, Michelle Williams’s, and Zac Efron’s sheer charisma.
