30 December 2018

Stuff I've Been Consuming 2018


So I made this brand spanking new Stuff I Consumed spreadsheet, to track everything I consumed — inclusive of books, movies, TV shows, music, games, podcasts, and events — and then promptly didn’t really update it as I got lost in the swirl of traveling and, um, not updating. So I find myself scrambling to figure out how many books I read and how many movies I watched in a nod to Fifty Fifty, even if we had retired it for this year. In the end, I watched approximately 62 movies and read 22 books, a far cry from last year. Still, on with the recommends!

BOOKS: Despite starting strong with a string of good books earlier this year, I really faltered down the stretch. I can still readily recommend The Girls and Annihilation — which I endorsed in my lone 2018 issue of Cool It Now — and I can add to that two more. The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen was fantastic, and I liked it much better than The Refugees. I also enjoyed Gene Luen Yang’s Boxers and Saints, a two-book companion graphic novel set about the Boxer Rebellion.

And then there’s my long time friend Dhonielle’s solo debut, The Belles, which came out in February and has a sequel, The Everlasting Rose, coming out in March. It’s a thrill to see friends publish, especially people that you were friends with way before the writing thing. The Belles hit the New York Times Bestseller list right out of the gate and deservedly so!

MOVIES: I feel like I missed almost all the major “good” movies this year, so much so that I just made a list of things to catch up on for the beginning of next year. So Burning, Shoplifters, Roma, First Reformed, The Rider, Skate Kitchen, Wildlife, The Favourite, Shirkers, I’m coming for you!

I changed my film rating system from A-F to 1-10 and ended up with only four ten-score movies: Avengers: Infinity War, Crazy Rich Asians, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, and A Star is Born. Clearly three of those four were auto tens and A Star is Born blew me out of the water. I wanted to drag my sister to go see it on the big screen but she just wouldn't go with me! Ultimate sibling fail.

There were only six movies that netted a nine and they were Go-Go Sisters, Sicario: Day of the Soldado, All the President’s Men, First Man, Spider-Man: Into the Spider Verse, and this lovely Japanese movie I saw on an airplane, Kako: My Sullen Past. Still, to be honest, I can’t wholeheartedly recommend any of these for everyone as they seem pretty genre specific.

Of course, I’ve dedicated my life to watching every remake of Go-Go Sisters so I guess I’d recommend that, but only if you are open to teenage tales that’ll make you cry. So far I’ve seen the original Korean Sunny, the Japanese remake, and Go-Go Sisters twice on the big screen on two different continents. Plus I watched 1995’s Now and Then for research. My favorite remains the Vietnamese version.

My big downvote? Minding the Gap, which is a documentary that is getting lauded everywhere but I found mostly unwatchable and not compelling in the least. Nice skate scenes though. But overall, bleh.


TELEVISION: I finished ten TV series and most of them were so-so, but I really loved The End of the F***ing World (again), Succession, and Maniac, which we haven’t even finished yet. A special shout out for Jean-Claude Van Johnson, which was a nostalgic, and unexpectedly fun, delight.

Oh and if you’re looking for some Taiwan/American romcom, Netflix is carrying A Taiwanese Tale of Two Cities, about two women who swap locations. It’s not for everyone but the Taiwanese cultural stuff and overall FOB-ness is spot on and hilarious.

GAMES: I bought a Switch this year, mainly to play Overcooked 2. I’ve been afraid to jump into more games because well, I’m bad at regulating my time with games. So more on this next year. In the meantime, for iOS games I can wholeheartedly recommend Antihero, Polytopia, and Soul Knight, the latter of which is a free-to-play rogue like dungeon crawler that works seamlessly for local co-op. High recommend for all three! And although I’ve yet to play it on any platform I’ve bought it on, Stardew Valley for iOS dropped and I can’t wait to get into it.

EVENTS: I didn’t get to that many events this year, but did see Katharine McPhee on Broadway in Waitress and then an absolute highlight of the year, Taylor Swift’s Reputation tour, which is now showing on Netflix as a concert film. My friend offered me two free tickets that morning and a few hours later I was out in the rain, singing along to Tay Tay!

PODCASTS: As for podcasts, I already gushed about Night Call, and I’ll add Shedunnit to the list, "storytelling podcast that unravels the mysteries behind classic detective stories.” I had been following Caroline Crampton’s No Complaints newsletter and her podcast was a real thrill. Plus I’d like to push my cousin’s podcast, APT 504, which is Ashley and Emily talking about their pop culture and celebrity obsessions. I also love their tagline: "It's time for pillow talk.”

03 August 2018

It's a Small Book After All

It’s a throwback, a Stuff I’ve Been Reading column! Well, actually, it’s just a Stuff I’ve Bought collection because while I’ve been reading, it’s more interesting to look at what I picked up in New York recently. It’s rare nowadays that I bother with physical books, unless it’s used, graphic, or a friend’s book. Everything else is digital because nothing beats the portability of a Kindle.

[Note: This is the last post I'm going to bother italicizing titles of movies, books, TV shows, etc. It's just too much work to highlight and italicize things. But just know that I have now learned how to italicize properly, thanks.]

However, I grabbed a handful of stuff in New York because I figured I’d never see them again. My stroll through Williamsburg took me to Book Thug Nation and the new-ish McNally Jackson there. Overall, I bought the following:


Masculinities is Cindy Crabb’s interview with men about well, masculinity. Which is interesting coming from the Doris creator, as Crabb's zine was a defining feminist zine. Personally my attention span nowadays for men talking about masculinity is low but if Crabb’s asking the questions, I’ll read the answers. Also snatched up issues #56 and #58 of Cometbus, because I always get Cometbus if I see them. And then a real throwback, as I saw Ayun Halliday’s East Village Inky on the rack and it brought me back to years ago when I interviewed her about Zinester’s Guide to NYC. Hello 2010, hello East Village Inky, still going strong with issue #58!

Also at Book Thug, I got a copy of The Eyes of the Skin: Architecture and the Senses by Juhani Pallasmaa, which explores why architecture caters mainly to only one of the five senses. (Spoiler: it's sight.) It promises to be very interesting. I realized most of the used books I buy are old ones about buildings or traffic -- or personal essay collections. Eyes of the Skin should dovetail nicely with this mini-book I got at the Whitney gift shop, Confessions of a Poor Collector, which was a speech Eugene Schwartz gave in 1970 about his rules, discoveries, and principles of art collecting. Despite it being only thirty-nine pages long and costing $18, it seems like an excellent purchase already. I hope to be a budding art collector. But you know, not really...

The other area I tend to hit up in bookstores is graphic memoirs, especially little pocket sized ones. I grabbed Trying Not to Notice by Will Dinski and Square Comix #16, by Ian McMurry, neither of whom were familiar to me. If it’s physically small and the pages are filled with cartoonified images your quotidian life, I’ll probably buy it. And since I have aspirations of making a similar type of book myself, I picked up Cartooning: Philosophy and Practice by Ivan Brunetti at McNally, which condenses Brunetti's cartooning instructions into a short (and small) book. Perfect!

09 June 2018

The Games We Play

Is this just becoming a recommendation blog? Sure looks like it! It’s been awhile since I’ve recommended some iOS games -- the last ones were Lost Frontier and Guild of Dungeoneering -- so here we go, more phone games...

 Antihero ($2.99)
This gem of a game has kept me entertained for long hours as I suffered through some bad fried chicken in Bali. In Antihero you play as a master thief, and your goal is to pilfer the city before your opponent does. You’re aided by urchins, thugs, gangs, assassins, and other fun fellows, all speaking in darling Dickensian accents. The campaign is a delight and playing against another human has the potential for great back-and-forth while using differing strategies, depending on the map. I couldn’t recommend Antihero enough and I’ve gotten two people hooked on it, neither of whom have ever played an iOS game before!

Teeny Titans ($3.99)
What happens when you combine Teen Titans with Pokemon? You get figure collecting and battling, all wrapped up in the delightful animation style of Teen Titans Go!, which appeals to all my sensibilities. I’ve recently just started watching the show and while the game itself isn’t all that difficult (or long), it is a freaking blast to rip through racks at the in-game figurine stores to find the rare one you’ve been searching for.

The Powerpuff Girls: Flipped Out ($2.99)
Arizona-based developer Grumpyface has kicked out a bunch of Cartoon Network properties and between my experience with Teeny Titans and this Powerpuff Girls game, I’m sold! Besides using Bubbles, Blossom, and Buttercup at their butt-kicking cutest, Flipped Out has an innovative flip mechanic that allows you to instantly turn it from a horizontal fighting game into a vertical match-three one. It’s really so smooth and a little bit genius. Throw in pickle collecting, the funny assortment of Powerpuff villains, plus super solid gameplay and I may just have to get all of Grumpyface’s games!

Death Coming ($1.99)
While I’ve barely started this one, the pixel art alone drew me in. You play as Death’s assistant, using semi-omniscient powers to drop things on people or bait them into unfortunate deaths. The goal is to kill the little people on-screen and it’s a freaking delight! While I do agree with some of the reviews that cite eventual frustration—and some tiny finicky controls at times—the game is unique enough, and the art so lovely, that I can recommend it for the killer in everyone.


Miracle Merchant ($1.99)
I’m actually pretty bad at solitaire type games like this but Tiny Touchables, who made Card Crawl, has always won me over with its personality-infused artwork by Thomas Wellmann and its simple yet deep mechanics. If you like a touch of math, and am into mixing potions for an imaginary apothecary, Miracle Merchant is the game for you!

30 January 2018

Five...Plus More

A listing of recommends and things that have caught my attention lately...

1) The End of the F***ing World. Best show I’ve seen all year. It’s a mini-series on Netflix about two dour (and destructive) teens. Think reverse Moonlight Kingdom. With just eight twenty-five minute episodes, The End of the F***ing World is the perfect binge watch.
2) Miami Heat “Vice” jerseys. They’re beautiful, that’s all.

3) Shinsuke Nakamura. Somehow I went deep on WWE superstar Nakamura, a Japanese import who has the most interesting style and entrance music I’ve ever seen. While I haven’t paid any attention to pro wrestling since I was a teen, diving in on Nakamura — and his backstory and growing US fanbase — was a nostalgia call of sorts. Also, I did a little look see at Asuka, another Japanese import who just won’t the woman’s side of the Royal Rumble (which Nakamura did for the men).
4) Echo Fox. I have been playing League of Legends for about a year now. “Playing” is an understatement, but that’s okay. Originally my friend just got me on-board so we could follow the eSport, but now I crave hour long sessions of LoL. Anyway, I’ve thrown my support behind Echo Fox (based on logo alone), which just happens to be owned by ex-NBA player Rick Fox. League games are weekly and I’ve not only been following Echo Fox but also signed up for a fantasy team of LoL players because why not?
5) Danny Chau, “Chau Down: A New Orleans Food Diary.” It wasn’t the food talk that captured me, but Chau’s reflections about his immigrant family. Specifically this, from the beginning:
"My brother’s first meal in America was a piece of fried chicken. It was specifically the aroma wafting within the car that he remembers so fondly, the smell of something completely foreign. That was his first memory of the States, a Proustian moment so vivid even our cousin retells the story as though it were her own. My dad’s first memory of America was of the giant mosquito that bit him just as he opened the airport doors. Two generations, two different perspectives; one rapt by the newness of it all, the other acutely aware of the challenges ahead. I was two years away.”
6) Night Call. A new podcast from Emily Yoshida, Molly Lambert, and Tess Lynch, three ex-Grantlanders whose old podcast, Girls in Hoodies, was brilliant. Their chemistry is unparalleled. The debut episode starts with a discussion about shower rat and then segues into Paddington 2 and Black Mirror, which is exactly as to be expected from "a free jazz blend of pop culture theory, internet fascinations, and venture down a plethora of half-baked conspiracy theory rabbit holes."

7) The Girls, Emma Cline. I completely missed this 2016 literary hit, but have read it now and it’s great. Ostensibly set around the Manson Family murders, Cline’s multi-million dollar garnering debut book is better than expected and it’s really not about the salacious hook at all.

8) Jada Yuan. The New York Times was looking for someone to travel to their 2018 places to go, one per week for a year. They found her! Margot and I were speculating who the NYT might pick and Margot wasn't far off. Yuan is a half-Asian, a writer (mainly of celebrity profiles), and of a nice medium age. Let's all follow Jada on her adventures!

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