Author: Mike Gray
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Step By Step – “J.T.’s World”
To call Step By Step stupid is an insult to stupidity: this lazy rehash of The Brady Bunch is about a blended family, thanks to the overzealous and impulsive marriage between two people (Suzanne Somers and Patrick Duffy) after they meet on vacation. Thing is, both of them have a shitload of kids of their…
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Perfect Movies: I ♥ Huckabees
“What am I doing? I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m doing the best that I can. I know that’s all I can ask of myself. Is that good enough? Is my work doing any good? Is anybody paying attention? Is it hopeless to try and change things? The African guy is a sign, right?…
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Totally 80’s: Sitcoms!
Ah, 1980’s sitcoms. One of the more comforting pop culture artifacts to a nostalgic mind, there were never cozier worlds built in fiction than the ½ hour laugh track-driven situation comedies of that decade. Featuring near-perfect families who lived in gigantic houses and got into weekly shenanigans that may or may not end up in…
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Cult Classics: UHF
Who doesn’t love Weird Al? I know I do: the first record I ever independently bought was In 3-D in 1988 from a flea market when I was 6. I’ve lost a lot of great vinyl albums over the years due to either lending them out, moving, or as break-up casualties, but there is no…
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TGIF Revisited: Family Matters – “Life of the Party”
It’s a rare condition, this day and age, to read any good news on the newspaper page. At least that’s what the catchy theme song to Family Matters says. Then again, this is the same show that gave us the Urkelbot, Stefan Urquelle, and The Urkel Dance. If you can discern a pattern here, it’s…
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10 Radical 90s Movies That Captured The Decade
O 1990s America, where art thou? This fantastic decade – the last of the American Century that found the country at the height of its powers economically, socially, and politically – can easily be considered a high watermark in American history. With a booming economy, a culture that was dominating the world through its film…
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10 Garbage TV Shows From The 1980s
Listen: television is a cesspool. You know it, I know it, hell even TV knows it. Instead of the respect, promotion, and (especially) money that gets pumped into creating films, television has traditionally been the ghetto of visual entertainment. Even paintings – images that don’t even move, for cripes sake – get entire buildings in…
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8 Beloved 90s TV Shows That Were Terrible
Listen: it’s not very positive to look back at the nostalgic past and trash shows that large swaths of people cherish. But this is the internet and being negative and mean about things pulls more traffic than positive articles, so here we are. Besides this, even though the 1990s is enjoying a nostalgia boom due…
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Awesome Garbage: Cool as Ice
At one point in the history of America -specifically the beautiful, stupid early 1990s – there was an awkward transition in pop culture when rap music was on the verge of being a mainstream genre and something entertainers aped to seem hip without actually working too hard at making their rap good or authentic. While…
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TGIF Revisited: Dinosaurs – “A New Leaf”
As has been mentioned on this site and in many other places, the 1990s was a weird time for television. Thanks to the booming economy in America, money was shooting out of everyone’s ears and was collected off the ground to throw at ideas that could potentially make even more money. This resulted in insane…
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Perfect Movies: American Psycho
“You like Huey Lewis & The News?” I sure do, and Patrick Bateman makes a solidargument for the strengths of their 1983 breakthrough album, Sports. It would be a great moment in any retro film for the main character to espouse his love of mainstream contemporary music, but becoming a counterpoint to the action depicted…
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10 Garbage TV Shows From The 1990s
The 1990s was a golden age for American culture and the last truly great decade this country has seen. Every week there was a new album, movie, or TV show to enjoy and both the quality and quantity of this media output would become the stuff of history. But with this largesse came a lot…
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