Month: June 2020

  • Shot by Shot with the ‘Bill & Ted Face The Music’ Trailer

    Welcome to Shot by Shot, our ongoing series of breakdowns. We’re constantly scouring movie trailers for perfect shots. In this column, we share our favorites and discuss them. The sequel we thought we’d never see is finally here. After securing their future by going into the past for Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure and battling…

  • Bean Pie

    At first glance, you might think it’s a pumpkin or a sweet potato pie. Yet bean pies, a unique specialty in some Black American Muslim communities, are made with creamy navy beans, spices, and a whole-wheat crust. Read moreA Guide to The Perfect Bong Joon-ho MarathonThe sweet pies, sold for fundraising and at bakeries across…

  • Picarones

    During Peru’s near-300-year-period under Spanish rule, Spaniards introduced deep-fried dough balls called buñuelos to the region. As they colonized the nation, Spaniards also brought the African slave trade. It was enslaved African cooks who refitted the original buñuelos recipe to make use of Peruvian sweet potato and squash. They kneaded flour and salt with mashed…

  • What’s New to Stream on Hulu for June 2020, and What’s Leaving

    Hulu has been stuck in the third-place position when it comes to movie streaming behind Netflix and Amazon Prime because most people still see them strictly as a home for next-day television. They have movies too, though, and more than a few of them are gems that make Hulu a destination beyond last night’s TV…

  • Nature Tires of Humanity’s Bullshit in ‘A Cold Night’s Death’

    Welcome to 4:3 & Forgotten — a weekly column in which Kieran Fisher and I get to look back at TV terrors that scared adults (and the kids they let watch) across the limited airwaves of the ’70s. Horror movies set in extreme winter locales — Antarctica, Alaska, the Arctic, mountain peaks — are few and far between…

  • ‘Manborg’ Shows You Don’t Need Money to Make a Masterpiece

    Welcome to The Prime Sublime, a weekly column dedicated to the underseen and underloved films buried beneath page after page of far more popular fare on Amazon’s Prime Video collection. We’re not just cherry-picking obscure titles, though, as these are movies that we find beautiful in their own, often unique ways. You might even say we…

  • Our Pick of the Week Breathes New Life Into the Undead

    Streaming might be the future, but physical media is still the present. It’s also awesome, depending on the title, the label, and the release, so each week we take a look at the new Blu-rays and DVDs making their way into the world. Welcome to this week in home video! Pick of the Week One…

  • We Just Really Love This Episode of ‘Community’

    This essay is part of our series Episodes, a bi-weekly column in which senior contributor Valerie Ettenhofer digs into the singular chapters of television that make the medium great. Some TV shows have just one or two standout episodes. Community has dozens. The whip-smart meta-sitcom about a group of community college students started off normal enough, but early…

  • What’s New to Stream on Amazon Prime for June 2020

    Amazon Prime Video is the only streaming service with a cost that also gets you free shipping, and that my friends is a deal. They’re in the original programming game, but their biggest offering remains the ton of films available to watch anytime for Prime members. The complete list of titles hitting Amazon Prime this month…

  • All the Movies Made Available to Watch Free in Support of Black Lives Matter

    Movie fans, moviemakers, and movie distributors are doing what they can right now to support the Black Lives Matter movement and protests. In addition to those marching in the streets and donating money, a lot of websites are recommending films to better understand the systemic racism that’s rampant in America while many streaming services are…