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‘American Horror Story: Delicate’ premiere deliberately paces out it’s pregnancy mystery

In the premiere episode from “Multiply Thy Pain,” the first episode from American Horror Story’s 12th season, Delicate cites the Genesis 3:16 bible verse when God cursed Eve after she ate an apple from the Tree of the Knowledge. Parents (hopefully) experience great joy and delight once a child is born, but the process women endure in welcoming the bundle of joy can be hell. Changes in body chemistry, overall pain, and intrusive medical procedures are some of the factors that make the process so
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Saying the show must go on during the Hollywood strikes is not a form of solidarity

The show must go on, but it's not a good slogan regarding the ongoing historic dual WGA and SAG-AFRA strikes. While the lights continue to be off in many studio lots, the non-WGA shows Live with Kelly and Mark and Sherri have returned to filming. But, the considerable backlash was geared toward Drew Barrymore and Bill Maher. Barrymore and Maher had put out respective statements and stated they would bring back their respective shows without using WGA writers. There was a pseudo apology (that als
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If only ‘It Lives Inside’s spookiness lived up to the more chilling premise of cultural assimilation

Bishal Dutta’s It Lives Inside begins in a macabre fashion coupled with the eerie piano-laden score from Wesley Hughes. You see the hallway of a dilapidated home and overhear a man chanting a Shanti prayer at something. You can hear a creature, but you can’t see it (one of the strengths the film uses, especially in the first two-thirds). Suddenly, you enter a room and witness the same man become burned alive, and a presence fills a jar like a black mist.

Considering the setup, It Lives Inside c
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Tactical thinking and competing ambitions imbue Ahsoka’s ‘Far Far Away’ episode

‘Shadow Warrior’ didn’t necessarily end Ahsoka’s arc, but it provided her with a colossal lesson hanging over her head for the first half of this series. It began the process of forgiving herself for Anakin’s choices. Yes, she chose to leave the Jedi order (and thus her master), but everything resulting in his eventual turn to Darth Vader was set in stone anyway. His desire to save Padime opened him up to the manipulative ways of Sidious, and the order’s ridigness in allowing emotions like love
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‘The Other Black Girl’s horrors stem from the stifling weight of corporate racism and stereotypes

For black workers in all facets of many corporate industries, two truths tend to exist. There has been progress regarding what voices matter and who gets to be featured on mastheads and positions of leadership (even though that has regressed since the 2020 protests). With elevation comes certain expectations, often leading to Black workers repressing certain things about individual aspects of themselves and overlooking prejudices to “go along and get along.” The Other Black Girl, a ten-episode s
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‘Love At First Sight’ onboards probabilities and statistics, but works best with classic rom-com aesthetic

I’d be remiss to wonder if there wasn’t consideration to slightly retweak the title based upon most of Love At First Sight’s setting. Based on Jennifer E. Smith’s 2011 novel, The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight, much of the film’s first half takes place inside an airport and a long plane ride to London. The essence of fate and statistical probability feels like they should cancel each other out. If there is a defined percentage of something happening, can chance make up the differ
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Parental problems and catchy tunes charmingly co-exist inside ‘Flora and Son’

Life doesn’t always pan out how we want it to, as sad as it sounds. Sometimes, it puts us in untenable circumstances where we feel stuck. In the opening moments of Flora and Son, it doesn’t feel that way for our title character. At first glance, Flora (Eve Hewson) is having a ball at a local neighborhood club in Dublin, dancing and having some drinks, while a guy (who is not her first choice) tries to make advances. The night goes on, and the prospects dwindle, leading to a quick hook-up. When F
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‘Dumb Money’ is The Social Network for the Gamestop stock everyman

Somebody sensed that we needed a balance to the corporate “feel-good” stories released this year, such as Air and Tetris (Blackberry for a more even experience). As aspiring as it may be, where is the fun of rooting for the rich to get richer? It's almost a stroke of serendipity that a film like Dumb Money is coming out during a time when the labor movement (both in the entertainment industry and in a broader sense) has been the most robust it’s been in years.

Director Craig Gillespie’s feature
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Becky Lynch’s NXT women's championship reign will benefit everyone

In wrestling, you can’t account for happy accidents. Sometimes, the universe works in your favor. When now-ex-NXT women’s champion Tiffany Stratton misspoke in a promo that she would be a better champion than Becky Lynch (who has never held the title), that's precisely what I’m talking about. It was a no-brainer in a season where the WWE has been actively integrating veteran talent from RAW and Smackdown into NXT television. It’s hard to think of an accolade escaping the tremendous hall-of-fame
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‘Shadow Warrior’ provides Ahsoka peace and continues the Hayden Christensen revival

At the start of the series, there was some initial concern about Ahsoka’s overall demeanor. In the first four episodes, she’s guarded and cold – the veil starts to come down at the end of ‘Fallen Jedi.’ It’s all because she’s still dealing with all the complex feelings revolving around Anakin, what he became, and if things would have been different if she had stayed by his side as a padawan.

However, we know from watching the prequel trilogy that it was more about the manipulation of Sidious, t
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Olivia Rodrigo confidently excoriates the vortex of our expectations, fame, and love on ‘Guts’

Olivia Rodrigo’s sophomore album, Guts, is a confident, heart-bearing, intricately disorienting encapsulation of what it must feel like to be a young woman trying to sift through the world of unrealistic societal expectations, heartbreak, and artistic pressures. Sometimes, you want to wallow in a particular betrayal. Other times, you want to get with a group of friends and contemplate methods of revenge against said ex-significant other. You don’t have everything figured out yet, and that’s the
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‘Killer Book Club’ draws from, but rarely adds to the themes of slashers before it

Killer Book Club wants you to know that it’s aware of the slasher road films like the Scream franchise and I Know What You Did Last Summer have paved for it. It’s to the extent that it combines many of the classic elements into one package. You have many different characters serving different high school personality archetypes coming together around one cause. Then, of course, something unexpectedly goes wrong, and many of them get caught in the vengeful crosshairs of a serial killer.

For what
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Charlotte Regan’s ‘Scrapper’ is a known father-daughter story boasting performances that gives its flair

Georgie (Lola Campbell) is a highly independent and ingenuitious 12-year-old. Tragically, she has no choice but not to be. Her mother, Vicky (Olivia Brady), died of cancer, and somehow, Georgie occupied their apartment alone. Thus, writer-director Charlotte Regan’s dramedy, Scrapper begins with the audience gaining a breadth of Georgie’s daily routine, which includes stealing bikes in Mcguyver-like-fashion with her lone friend Ali (Alin Uzun) and selling them to a local bike dealer for money. Th
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‘Scouts Honor’ shines a light on the blind eye of the Boys Scouts and the bravery of survivors who were failed

In the opening moments of director Brian Knappenberger’s documentary, Scouts Honor: The Secret Files of the Boy Scouts of America, the organization is painted as “mom, pop, and apple pie.” Classic footage plays of young boys doing archery, smiling, and in the backdrop of various Presidents. The Boy Scouts have always had the patriotic air to it, and they’ve used that to conceal a rather insidious sexual abuse problem the organization has had since its inception in England in 1908. In the first t
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All Elite Wrestling’s tumultuous, contention-filled, record-setting week

In a way, just getting to last Sunday’s All Out pay-per-view in Chicago felt like a relief for All Elite Wrestling. The show ended with the crowd thanking a bloody and beaten workhorse, Orange Cassidy, after dropping the All-Atlantic title to Jon Moxley after 31 successful title defenses. This, coupled with the sudden return of Bryan Danielson, the various losses from various members of The Elite, and the continued success of the Better Than You Baybay, felt like a much-needed smash of the reset
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‘The Nun II’ has double the characters and a bigger story, but can’t shake Conjuring habits

Nine entries into The Conjuring Universe and around $2.1 billion earned; these contained sets of horror films resonate with audiences who want the pantheon of cursed dolls, haunted houses, paranormal investigating couples – or, in The Nun’s case, a demon with an unnerving gaze. First introduced in 2016’s The Conjuring 2, Valek (portrayed by Bonnie Aarons), Valak has become as much of a totem as Annabelle and The Warrens. The Nun II looks to do what many horror sequels do in flipping the script r
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Ahsoka’s ‘Fallen Jedi’ is chock full of division, regrets, and shaky trust foundations

As she stands outside while Sabine and Huying are working on getting the ship running, Ahsoka can tell something is not right. In the beginning of ‘Fallen Jedi,’ this is something two-fold. First, with Morgan’s base nearby, it’s only a matter of time before they find them. Secondly, the motivations inside Sabine and Ahsoka would eventually come to a head. When we think of the Jedi, it’s not to have attachments or emotions because those are the most likely paths to the dark side.

However, the fi
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Time is not on your side with ‘The Dive,’ even if backstory submerges the tense moments

The ocean has a lot for humans to fear – whether on the surface in the case of films like Jaws’ great white shark fin of death or a beautiful, but daunting bottomless abyss. Maximilian Erlenwein’s The Dive doesn’t look to waste time to find its extremely tense scenario – where 2022’s Fall set up more of an entire backstory and motivations between its main characters; this film only provides enough context for things to go awry.

At the heart of the matter are two sisters named Drew (Sophie Lowe)
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‘The Good Mother’s sudden need for surprises upends this topical murder mystery

Marissa (Hilary Swank) seems to know unspeakable loss at all corners of her life. In the first moments of Miles Joris-Peyrafitte’s The Good Mother, we see her arise from her living room couch after a long night of drinking. There are subtle shots of family photos that lessen the amount of people in each frame. As a journalist, not only is Marissa dealing with writer’s block and grieving over the loss of her husband five years ago, but she’ll soon be mourning her youngest son, Michael – a drug us
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‘Ahsoka’s ‘Time To Fly’ is considerably short on time, but leans on expanding of older Star Wars ideologies

The significant action setpiece of the starfighter battle takes center stage in the latter half of Ahsoka’s third episode, ‘Time To Fly.’ In fairness, it might seem like most of it because the episode is a little over half an hour long. However, where the dogfight and revelations do dazzle at some point, the meat and potatoes of the story come within the conversations of themes that have been shown to the audience previously.

After a long, drag-out war, people will thirst for quiet periods of p
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