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The Year in Television 2012

by David Zahl on Dec 20, 2012 • 7 Comments

Since we’ve been talking so much about television this week, why not go all the way and do our annual recap? Truth be told, it was a slightly off year on the small screen, the first plateau in quality that I can remember in about ten years. A number of the top-drawer shows experienced something of a “downturn”, e.g. Justified and Louie, and new contenders were not quite as numerous. Which isn’t to say there hasn’t been plenty worth watching and commenting on. God no:

Top Twelve Television Series of 2012

12. Game of Thrones. I’ll admit I was pretty skeptical after…

The Beautiful Ugliness of HBO: A Conference Breakout

by WB on Sep 13, 2012 • 2 Comments

I don’t wanna just survive. It’s says in these movie writing books that every character has an arc. Understand?…Everybody starts out somewheres. And they do something, something gets done to them and it changes their life. That’s called an arc. Where’s my arc?

-Christopher Moltisanti, The Sopranos

HBO’s wild success in premium television belies an underlying sophistication in everything from writing, to editing, to photography. Perhaps the network’s most striking accomplishment is how down-to-earth its characters and plotting tend to be, while still retaining their series’ impressively novelistic scale. HBO seems to understand how deep the human obsession with “arced” narratives of…

Celebrity / Film / Humor / Music / Psychology / Science / Suffering / Technology / Theology / TV / Week In Review

Another Week Ends: Celebrity Body Image, Depression Chemistry, the Burden of Secrecy, Fitz Allison, Ryan Gosling, Community, Game of Thrones, and Spiritualized

by David Zahl on Apr 27, 2012 • 5 Comments

1. On Slate, Emily Shire asks, “Should Celebrity Body ‘Struggles’ Make Us Feel Better About Ourselves?” and her insightful little response doubles as quite the treatise on the function of Standards (of beauty etc) and how attempts to allay judgment often backfire, i.e. that the notch on the scale isn’t the issue so much as the scale itself:

Allure’s feature is only one of the latest in a long line of magazine stories about female celebrities “bravely” grappling with their “physical imperfections.” A growing number of publications are trying to pass off barely-clad celebrities strutting their stuff as an inspiring act…

Film / Humor / Psychology / Religion / Science / Sports / Theology / TV / Week In Review

Another Week Ends: Free Won’t, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Cars 2, more Super 8, Antinomian Letters, The Killing and Futurama

by David Zahl on Jun 24, 2011 • 4 Comments

1. I can’t stop my leg! A fascinating post on Psychology Today about the groundbreaking research of neuroscientist Benjamin Libet into the area conscious choice/willpower, entitled “Free Won’t,” ht JD:

Given our common sense notion of how our actions work, we might expect that we first have a conscious awareness of an intention or urge to act, then the brain activates the motor area that sends a signal to the muscles of the wrist or fingers. The surprising thing is this is not what Libet found.

Surprisingly, the participants’ reports of their conscious awareness of the urge to…

Art / Bible / Film / Music / News / Religion / Social Science / Sports / TV / Week In Review

Another Week Ends: More Pale King, Game of Thrones, Moonwalker, Manny Ramirez, Take The Money and Run

by David Zahl on Apr 15, 2011 • No Comments

Happy Tax Day! We hope you’ve enjoyed this first week on the new site. We certainly have. Be sure to be in touch as you notice things/bugs, either via the form at the bottom of each post or info@mbird.com. Two small updates: 1. The glossary section will be returning soon-ish, but in rewritten form. In the meantime, you can click on the Glossary category in the sidebar to find the old entries. And 2. We’re on Facebook! Like us, love us, share us, just please don’t ever break up with us… On that note:

1. In celebration of it hitting shelves…