Six years after its finale, “Breaking Bad,” the drama about a soft-spoken chemistry teacher turned corrupt meth-cooking crime lord, is still recognized as one of the greatest television shows to grace the small screen. Yet what made the AMC hit special was its conclusion, which strung together the show’s loose-ends in an emotionally satisfying and climactic hour.
James Gray’s “Ad Astra” puts Brad Pitt in space, with a pleasant and dichotomously different character portrayal than his role in “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.” It’s the most satisfying space-themed film I’ve seen since “Interstellar,” but it’s not without its flaws. Roy McBride (Pitt) is told that his long-lost astronaut father may still…
Warning: spoilers ahead. Thursday night. I’m tucked in the back of theater, wrapped in a fleece jacket, my eyes glued to the screen as Arthur Fleck chases a man down the pristine white halls of Arkham Hospital, leaving a bloody trail of footprints along the immaculate floor. Suddenly, the words “The End” appeared. For a…
“Go to heaven for the climate, hell for the company,” declares Mark Twain, played by Dan Hiatt. TheatreWorks Silicon Valley’s opening night of Randal Myler and Dan Wheetman’s Mark Twain’s River of Song was far from hellish; the company was indeed spectacular.
You need to see “Parasite” in theaters. Flinch as much as you’d like, but do not look away.
Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue. Vampire Weekend’s performance at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco this past week encapsulated this perfectly as a part of their “Father of the Bride” tour.
When Netflix recently released it on its platform (the first time the show could be legitimately accessed online in years), it was all my various video game and sci-fi geek websites could talk about. “Why you HAVE to watch Neon Genesis Evangelion,” “Why Neon Genesis Evangelion is the Greatest Anime of All Time” and similar stellar headlines graced my Google News feed. I’d already known the show’s reputation as one of the first anime to gain a following in the US. And the premise? A show about giant robots (“Evas”) in far-future Tokyo that fight bizarre monsters (“Angels”) rooted in Jewish mythology? I couldn’t help it. I had to see it for myself.
To “pass by catastrophe,” according to urban legend, you must experience a major earthquake or other catastrophic event during your final exam warranting the university registrars to give everyone passing grades. But in the case of the Stanford band, “Pass By Catastrophe,” the phrase means exploring making music together and dropping your first extended play (EP) on Oct. 4, amidst the Stanford grind.
