Content Consumed: Bottoms, Ashton and Mila, GUTS, football, and more

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Content Consumed

7 min readSep 11, 2023

Hey hi! I was sick all last week… which means I consumed quite a bit of content. Dig in!

In today’s edition of Content Consumed:

🎬 Bottoms, Shiva Baby, and more zillennial comedic cinema
👀 Ashton and Mila’s apology, Joe Jonas’ Ring camera, and Jimmy Fallon
💜 New album: Olivia Rodrigo’s GUTS
🧨 Football, Kylie and Timothee, The Great finale, and a bad book

Bottoms, Shiva Baby, and the Zillennial Cult Comedy Cinematic Universe

I finally saw Bottoms on Friday and yes, it lived up to the hype.

It’s hysterical, satirical, absurd, perfectly cast, flawlessly written, and made my cheeks hurt from smiling and laughing all night.

I don’t even know where to begin. I mean, just look at the voice memos I sent to my cinema buff bestie Rachel immediately after:

Clearly, there’s much to say! But I also don’t want to spoil everything.

My main points:

It’s so fantastic to be a woman in my mid-twenties, watching ~theater!~ created by other women in their twenties. The references, the style of humor, the 2000s teen flick homages, the realism in relationships… I connected with every point. It’s rare and it’s beautiful.
Emma Seligman is a creative genius. Rachel Sennott will be getting an Oscar nom within this decade. Ayo Edebiri ALREADY has an Emmy nod for The Bear and that isn’t even comedy! Multitalented queen! And the people whose names I didn’t even know—like the goddess Havana Rose Liu—will be getting many more roles after this.
It takes a turn for the absurd, and I thought it’d go too far, but it’s so self-aware that it works.

Okay, so I also watched Shiva Baby last week. I don’t know if someone told me it was a comedy or I just made that up in my head… but it’s not. It’s a damn thriller. My heart was racing.

It was also another one of those “oh, this art was created by a 20-something-year-old woman like myself, with similar hopes and fears” moments that almost made me cry at its realization.

Everything we’re all thinking about—toxic friendships, fucked-up relationships, babies, feminism, social justice, religion, nosy neighbors, dysfunctional family—is woven into a fantastic film (and it’s just over an hour long!).

Anyway, I’m off to continue exploring the Rachel Sennott — Emma Seligman—Molly Gordon—Ayo Edebiri universe. Join me.

The cinematic universe I’m referencing, courtesy of The Ringer:

Celebs being nasty:
Ashton Kutcher & Mila Kunis, Joe Jonas, Jimmy Fallon

Alright, lots to unpack here.

ASHTON KUTCHER AND MILA KUNIS SUPPORT RAPIST

Don’t pretend I’m oversimplifying.

That ‘70s Show stars Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis (now married) sent Danny Masterson’s judge letters of character after Danny was convicted of multiple rapes and sentenced to 30 years in jail.

Of course, the public found this out. Which Ashton and Mila didn’t think would happen.

Which led to this heinous “apology” video, in which they DON’T apologize for sending the letters BUT apologize for the public release of the letters.

It’s especially shitty considering Ashton’s work in sex trafficking justice.

Next up….

JOE JONAS SPIES ON SOPHIE TURNER WITH RING CAM

Yes, they’re getting a divorce, etc., and Joe’s team is attempting (and failing) to smear Sophie in the media.

But what really grinds my gears is the Ring camera story.

Sources tell TMZ that Joe Jonas filed for divorce after allegedly catching Sophie Turner doing or saying something on a ring camera:
“Joe had access to a ring cam that he said captured Sophie saying and/or doing something that made him realize the marriage was over.”

It screams misogyny, abusive control, and inappropriate surveillance. You’re watching your wife on a Ring camera?! If you already have such a lack of faith or trust in your marriage, why bother? So invasive of privacy.

And finally…

JIMMY FALLON EXPOSED (ARE WE SHOCKED?)

An exposé from The Rolling Stone told the public about the toxic workplace that Jimmy Fallon has created on the set of The Tonight Show.

I’m not super surprised, as this is said about a lot of late-night shows, and there have been plenty of rumors about Fallon already (especially surrounding his supposed alcoholism and a lasting coke problem from SNL). Fallon has apparently already apologized to his staff.

What’s interesting to me is the podcast Strike Force Five, which I started listening to just days before the Rolling Stone piece came out. It’s a podcast hosted by the big 5 late-night hosts: Fallon, Kimmel, Colbert, John Oliver, and Seth Meyers. They even dropped an episode the morning before the piece was published. There’s a lot of noticeable ribbing of Fallon—he’s clearly not everyone’s favorite. Worth listening to if you really wanna read into these relationships with me.

New album: Olivia Rodrigo’s GUTS

Our teen queen is back with another banger of an album.

GUTS is good—it’s not her debut SOUR, but it wasn’t expected to be. Olivia’s songwriting gets a bright spotlight, especially in lyrically witty songs like fan favorite “get him back!” and lead track “all-american bitch”.

The female rage is REAL and it’s represented so perfectly across the entire album. Not only do most of the songs sound like they could be the intros to any classic 2000s teen flick (I couldn’t stop thinking about Freaky Friday specifically), but the lyrics are jam-packed with references.

“bad idea, right?” and “vampire” were perfectly chosen lead singles, demonstrating Olivia’s emotional and vocal range. She has the experience now to reflect on real relationships in “vampire” and the maturity to speak on messy hookups on “bad idea, right?”

Girly pop means riot grrrl punk, teenage yearning meets adult decisions. A beautiful sophomore album. (One too many slow ballads, but that’s just my opinion.)

More from this weekend:
NFL, CFB, The Great, The Last Ranger, Kylie and Timmy

Okay, a bunch of random stuff I gotta mention:

Kylie Jenner and Timothee Chalamet have made their bicoastal public debut, first at Beyoncé’s Renaissance concert in LA then at NYC’s U.S. Open tennis semis. People ought to be slightly less shocked about this—Timmy may look like a withering Victorian child but he’s a fratty (rumored) chlamydia superspreader. Kylie’s just his type.
Football’s BACK. And thank god, because I was sick all weekend. Sco Ducks. RIP Chargers (and, as a result, my fantasy team’s Week One dreams).
We finally finished The Great and almost wished we hadn’t. The finale was awful. Especially the last scene. It just didn’t make sense, all the loose ends were tied up too easily, and Catherine’s character completely changed. You’re gonna introduce new characters in the finale and expect us to be chill with it?? Especially after episode 6 of season 3?? Have some more respect for your viewers. If you’re watching The Great… just stop after season 2.
I couldn’t finish a book for the first time in a while — The Last Ranger. Poetry and prose about nature and wilderness can only get you so far. There have to be practical elements and a real plot. Even I, who knows nothing about Yellowstone law enforcement, know that’s not how the job works. As soon as they introduced a dozen new characters within a dozen pages, I gave up. Messy.