Screen
The Teen Girls of “Big Mouth” Are Its Saving Grace
While Big Mouth is a show about teens of all genders, it shines best when it delves into the worlds and inner workings of its teen girl characters.
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“A Little Late with Lilly Singh” Has a Code-switching Problem
Lilly Singh is trailblazing as a South Asian woman on late night TV while also dismantling that good work by continuing to perform a Blackness that isn’t hers.
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Hell Is Older People: Aging as the Ultimate Cinematic Horror
Unlike horror-movie fates such as, say, decapitation by paper cutter, aging is the ultimate fright because viewers recognize that they cannot escape it.
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No Good Deeds: “Succession” Rejects the Redemption Arc for Its Ruthless Characters
HBO’s hourlong drama about a Murdoch-inspired family slyly toys with Americans’ impulse to see the good in the worst people, particularly when those people are white.
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Housebound: Why the Dollhouse Metaphor Remains So Indelible
The dollhouses of today are not, then, miniature playgrounds that train girls to believe their future paths go no further than their front door.
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Uneasy Spirits: Black Vengeance in Supernatural Pop Culture
There’s a specter in our midst, and it’s white people’s projection of their own guilt and fear onto the Black search for justice.
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Girl Watchers: The Uneasy Female Gaze of “Black Conflux” and “The Other Lamb”
Two new films challenge sexist coming-of-age tales where teen girls are master manipulators.
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Transmitting Culture: A New Slate of Films Serve as Love Letters to Korean American Mothers
Always Be My Maybe, Searching, and To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before depict Asian American mothers as worthy of the same care, sympathy, and compassion that they bestow on their children, family, and friends.
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In “Batwoman,” Lesbians and Queer Women Are Complicated—and Brave
A lesbian superhero who saves the city and her girl stands out considering that pop culture is still learning how to stop killing off lesbians onscreen.
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“Big Mouth” Endlessly Explores Sexuality, but Still Stumbles on Queerness
It’s not that I’m surprised a television show failed to accurately represent bisexuality and pansexuality. It’s that I’m surprised Big Mouth was one of those shows.
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