Moms on TV May Change, But One Thing Stays the Same: Their Love
With Mother’s Day this weekend and nary a brunch to be found, we at Plugged In thought it might be an opportune time to look at great TV mothers. But how to choose? The website Ranker—which, true to its name, ranks everything and anything that its readers care to rank—was no help at all. Kitty […]
Movies Creeping Back to Normalcy? It’ll Be a Long Creep
Long, long ago—back in March, I think it was—every Monday we would typically recap the biggest, most lucrative movies playing in theaters over the weekend. The biggest of the big might clear $100 million or more in a weekend. But sometimes the theater turnstiles would turn a little slower. Back on Feb. 24, we reported […]
Self-Isolation Fosters a Different Kind of Video Gaming
I loved board games as a kid. The competition, the feel of the dice in your hands, the angry siblings turning over the Risk board after their attack on Kamchatka utterly failed … ah, good times. Truth be told, I still love me some good old-fashioned gameplay. My family and I are gamers—board gamers, that […]
What Parks and Recreation Says about Culture, the Coronavirus and Us
Coronavirus, Meet Ron Swanson. Five years after NBC’s Parks and Recreation went off the air, Ron, Leslie Knope and the rest of the show’s gang are reuniting tonight (virtually speaking) to raise money for Feeding America’s COVID-19 Response Fund. It’ll air on, y’know, old-fashioned, traditional TV (NBC, of course) at 8:30 ET/PT. To me, this […]
Culture Clips: Is Universal Trolling Theater Chains?
A couple of weeks ago—or, in quarantine time, several eons ago—we reported on the initial success of Trolls World Tour as it rolled out on video (instead of the theatrical blitz Universal Pictures originally intended). Turns out, the early returns were no mirage. Universal reported yesterday that in the space of three weeks, World Tour […]
Need to Get Away? The Internet Has You Covered.
I was supposed to be packing for Britain right now. Almost a year ago, I made plans for the family to visit England and Scotland. I bought tickets. I booked places to stay. I renewed my dusty passport, which still included a picture of me when I had hair. Even when the coronavirus hit, I […]
Director of ‘Jump Shot’ Talks About the Most Interesting Man You’ve Never Heard Of
Who invented basketball’s jump shot? Ten years ago, director and cinematographer Jacob Hamilton would’ve answered the question like most of us might: No one. “I thought it had always existed,” he says. And then he heard about Kenny Sailors. For the last nine years, Hamilton’s worked on bringing Sailors’ remarkable story to light—a story that […]
Culture clips: Capitalizing on the Quarantine
We all know that the coronavirus and the accompanying lockdowns have rocked the world economy. Nearly 18 million Americans have applied for unemployment in just the last three weeks in just about every field you can imagine. And those numbers could get worse. Entertainment has been hit hard (the prestigious Cannes Film Festival announced it […]
An Easter Like We’ve Never Seen … Right?
For the last several weeks, my wife and I have been watching church. Instead of pews, we sit on our couch. Instead of standing and singing ourselves, we sit and listen to the worship band play. The pastor still preaches and we still pray, but worship—intended as an active, shared experience—has taken on a sheen […]
The Best Movie Made About Jesus? A Few To Consider.
We’re all heading into what feels like a very unusual, perhaps unprecedented sort of Good Friday and Easter Sunday this year. Physically going to church is out for most of us. Extended family dinners are off the menu, too. Sure, we can color eggs … if we can find any at the grocery store to […]