Snippets

snip-pet -noun 1. a small part, piece, or thing; brief extract 2. a fragment of the creative life meant not to inform, but to inspire

[snippetstudios]

Kotomi and Rick and Morty's Ryan Elder on that Heartbreaking Oasis Cover

Many of the most poignant moments in the history of Adult Swim’s Rick and Morty are punctuated by powerful music tracks, and series composer Ryan Elder has a penchant for looping Lauren Culjak (stage name Kotomi) in when the show needs a female vocalist with a haunting voice to add the extra emotional punch. The mournful and contemplative “Don’t Look Back” that plays at the end of the Season 4…

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[snippetstudios]

Films On HBO: "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl" (2015)

Films On HBO: “Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” (2015)

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (2015) feels like the mildly cynical indie alternative to the already indie-feeling The Fault in Our Stars (2014), a film which, if you remember I loved, and I loved quite a bit. Fault came out in June 2014 and Earl only a few months later in January of 2015. It’s one of those odd phenomenon that happen where a year in cinema focuses in on one theme or trope. At…

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[snippetstudios]

"Overwatch" Beta Review

“Overwatch” Beta Review

Overwatch, an exciting but vapid lesson in political incorrectness and cultural appropriation, recently had a multiplatform beta that was met with much glee. The game, which has absolutely zero story to speak of, is a first-person, class-based shooter that comes off as a curious amalgamation of Super Smash Bros. and League of Legends transmuted into a FPS. The actually combat is easy and…

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[snippetstudios]

Starz's "The Girlfriend Experience" is ... an Experience

Starz’s “The Girlfriend Experience” is … an Experience

Disturbing but sexy. Intriguing but horrifying. Starz’s The Girlfriend Experience is a lot of things. Better and more insightful critics might tell you that The Girlfriend Experience is a cutting edge drama about a law school student interning at a top law firm who winds up becoming a high-end call girl, loosely based on the 2009 film starring Sasha Grey from 2009. I’d call it peculiar and…

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[superherofeed]

If Ryan Reynolds doesn’t show up at the Oscars in a Deadpool costume what’s the point.

[snippetstudios]

Marvel's "Jessica Jones" and Characters with Psychology (a.k.a., people)

Marvel’s “Jessica Jones” and Characters with Psychology (a.k.a., people)

Jessica Jones is not an invulnerable show, though it does have a super-powered capacity for awesomeness. It is incredibly, unnaturally strong in a lot of ways, but it still gets a cut above its brow during every single fight scene. I remember catching early promos for the show and thinking, “Oh! Jessie’s dead girlfriend is a superhero now!” (Don’t worry, without of context, that sort of isn’t a…

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[snippetstudios]

"Star Wars: The Force Awakens": Flight and Empathy

“Star Wars: The Force Awakens”: Flight and Empathy

Here’s the one with all the spoilers! Because you love me, you’ve hopefully read my generalized, vaguely non-spoiler review of “Star Wars: The Force Awakens”, in which I spoke lightly about the movie’s flaws and even lighter about the film’s greater triumphs. But here, we bring you the real deal. There are two things at battle in Star Wars, and it’s not just the Light and Dark side of the Force.…

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[snippetstudios]

"Star Wars: The Force Awakens" is a Force to Be Reckoned With (Spoiler-Free Edition)

“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” is a Force to Be Reckoned With (Spoiler-Free Edition)

Pun intended. What I really hate is when critics that positively review a space sci-fi story call it “stellar”. Isn’t that just terrible? The funny thing about this review was that I wrote a large chunk of it the other day, well before the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens. It was based off a few reviews I had read that were largely also spoiler-free and sadly a bit mixed (namely Liam’s —…

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[snippetstudios]

Narragansett Beer's "Big Mamie Indestructible American Pale Ale" Review

Narragansett Beer’s “Big Mamie Indestructible American Pale Ale” Review

Next in an ongoing series of locally infused ‘Gansett beers is “Big Mamie Indestructible American Pale Ale”. Brewed in honor of the USS Massachusetts, this American Pale Ale is as rigid, solid, and just as dependable as the vessel it was made for. This comes just in time for the 50th anniversary of Battleship Cove. It also coincides with Narragansett’s past attempts to preserve the vessel in…

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[snippetstudios]

"American Ultra" Review

“American Ultra” Review

American Ultra is a hyperviolent and marijuana infused action film written by the stoner (assumed) nerd who brought us Chronicle and directed by the dude who did Project X. You know, that terrible, soulless party movie. This entire movie basically takes place in an alternate universe of NBC’s Chuck around the time season 2 kicks off. American Ultra is the crass, drug-filled long haired dirty…

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[snippetstudios]

"Trainwreck" and the Perpetuation of Adolescence

“Trainwreck” and the Perpetuation of Adolescence

Trainwreck is a current film in which Amy Shumer shooms and amies her way through a movie playing a character named Amy while she Amy Shoomers her way through a vapid job in the right career field and boinks from one-night stand to one-night stand on a booze-crazed sex-driven adventure, all before finding herself in a relationship that finally convinces her to “try” to be better in all aspects of…

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[snippetstudios]

Dead Men Don't Dream: Ruminations on "True Detective" Season 2 Thus Far

Dead Men Don’t Dream: Ruminations on “True Detective” Season 2 Thus Far

By the end of episode two of “True Detective” season two — perhaps even by the end of the first episode — I realized that I had to stop. The story analyst in me was picking the show apart. It’s uncommon for a show’s second season to be a completely different cast and story, even if its mired in a pretty similar tone. Nonetheless I found myself asking, “So who’s Ruste here? Which one is supposed…

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[snippetstudios]

The Point of Fiction, Wish Fulfillment, and HIMYM Reflections

The Point of Fiction, Wish Fulfillment, and HIMYM Reflections

What’s the point of fiction stories anyway? In J. R. R. Tolkien’s On Fairy-Stories — an essay that predates anything to do with Hobbits — he intimately discusses the “fairy story” as a literary form, which we by extension might just call “fantasy” for simplicity’s sake, or “speculative fiction” for over-complication’s sake. In a broader sense, we might as well even assume that pretty much all of…

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[snippetstudios]

The Fun Madness of "Bloodborne"

The Fun Madness of “Bloodborne”

At its very core, “Bloodborne” is a game about madness.   We’ve all heard that cliche, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.” It’s often misattributed to Einstein, who despite all his erudite knowledge of physics, spouted some odd and/or funny quotes about life (“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I’m not…

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[snippetstudios]

Netflix Review: "The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Them"

Netflix Review: “The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby: Them”

It takes a lot for me to be surprised by the way a movie is made. I’m not talking about jump-scares or even the horror genre; I’m talking about the process of filmmaking and how even with a budget differences in the millions, whether you’re on the set of the third Avengers movie or the latest normcore flick from the Duplass brothers, the general process is remarkably similar: People with cameras…

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[snippetstudios]

"Ex Machina" Review: Unsettling Techno-Cautionary Tale

“Ex Machina” Review: Unsettling Techno-Cautionary Tale

Imagine if  brilliant wunkerkind founded Google at the age 13. It’d make Mark Zuckerberg look like a chump. Now imagine it’s a near future, in a time where this kid is now at a nice medium age where day drinking is on the cusp of being cool, just about to fade out of style for him. He drinks more and more on a daily basis, seemingly because of that frustration with his own ego and guilt for what…

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[snippetstudios]

"The Avengers: Age of Ultron": A Delightfully Familiar Novelty

“The Avengers: Age of Ultron”: A Delightfully Familiar Novelty

“Ultron” is the kind of movie that needs no introduction.

Even if you’re a lazy MCU fan like myself and skipped “Thor: The Dark World,” you know what’s going on here, and you know how the story will end. Though the unity of the Avengers is tested by Ultron and the Scarlet Witch’s mind games — reminding us again of the cacophonous squabbles in the first Avengers flick — we know the squad will find…

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