A Fond Farewell to Clone Club: Reviewing the End of Orphan Black

Luce: Well, guys, it’s been a long journey to the finale. Five years of twists and turns later, we’ve finally reached the end of the journey (or, at least, this journey) for Clone Club. But how did our favorite clones fare at this, the end of all things, and did they all make it through unscathed? Reviewing the end of Orphan Black is too much to take on alone, so I’m super glad to be joined by all of our faithful Orphan Black review team for this very last review.

Spoilers after the jump!

(via denofgeek)

Throwback Thursdays: Stargate SG-1

Welcome to another edition of Throwback Thursdays! I want to talk about the sci-fi show of my childhood—Stargate SG-1. The story starts as an ancient teleportation device, the Stargate, is discovered in Egypt, and Dr. Daniel Jackson, an anthropologist, joins the team lead by Col. Jack O’Neill to explore the worlds connected by the Stargates. The team is also joined by Dr. Samantha Carter, astrophysicist and member of the U.S. Air Force. On one of their expeditions they meet Teal’c, an alien slave warrior. He betrays his masters, the Goa’uld, and joins the team. The Goa’uld are a parasitic alien race pretending to be gods, and they remain the main enemies of our heroes for most of the show’s run.

As a child, I loved this show because it was set “now” and the Stargate allowed them to travel to different planets without any tedious or scary space travel. Daniel and Sam were my favorites—as a child who would grow up to be a scientist, I related to their excitement and curiosity about learning about different planets, people, and technology. Now, as an adult, I decided to revisit my favorite series to see if it’s as good as I remember. I actually just finished watching the entire series. And, well, the result is mixed. But despite my annoyance at various offensive tropes, I still loved it, mainly because of the awesome female characters.

Saika Reads Sex Criminals and You Should Too

Ah, Thanksgiving: a time where we reflect on the many things we’re grateful for. This year, I’m giving thanks for Sex Criminals. No, wait—don’t go. Sex Criminals is a relatively new comic out from Image Comics, written by Matt Fraction and illustrated by Chip Zdarsky. It follows Suzie, a young woman trying to get the money to save her library. Oh, and also when she orgasms, time stops. When she hooks up with a guy who has the same power, they decide to turn to crime as an—ah—alternative method to raise the money Suzie needs.

I originally didn’t plan to pick up this comic, fallaciously thinking to myself that I didn’t need to buy everything Matt Fraction writes. But pretty much every source I trust for comic reviews was singing its praises, and so I bowed to the court of public opinion and picked up #1 while I was at New York Comic Con. And boy, am I glad I did. This comic is a sexy laugh riot and it’s only getting better as new issues come out.

Fair warning: some of the panels I’ve included may be a little not safe for work, or, well, your family/Thanksgiving company.

Theatre Thursdays: The Rocky Horror Picture Show

Happy Halloween, everyone! I wish you all the spookiest of days! In honor of the hands-down awesomest holiday of the year, I figured I’d talk again about a true gem of musical theatre: the Rocky Horror Picture Show. I’ve covered this in the past, but I’m gonna analyze it a little more deeply today. RHPS is both a cult classic and a personal favorite of mine, and to celebrate the spirit of the day, let’s look at some of the things it does both right and wrong from a feminist perspective.

In other words: come up to my lab, and let’s see what’s on the slab.

Theatre Thursdays: Magic Mike… the Musical?

So I don’t think this movie is even out in theaters yet (I have a hefty contingent of female friends waiting to see it with me when it’s released) but hey, the people at Rotten Tomatoes think it’s gonna be pretty good.

What does this have to do with theatre, you say? Well, before the first carload of folks attracted to a bunch of traditionally hot male figures has even piled into their local cinema, the people behind this move are in talks to make a Magic Mike the musical.

It wouldn’t the first time a show about naked guys has made it to the Great White Way—Naked Boys Singing has been Off-Broadway for ages, and The Full Monty has the honor of preceding Mike as a movie-turned-musical about male stripping. As one website I found put it, it’s less a matter of getting an audience and more of a matter of how many repeat audiences they’ll have.

Besides it being about a musical and therefore tangentially qualifying it for the theatre-themed post, what is the relevance of this news to a blog about feminism? Well, there are a couple things I wanna talk about.

First, although it might be slow and a bit hackneyed at first, this movie is somewhat of a breakthrough in terms of gaze—in that is it shot from and clearly marketed to a female gaze rather than the male gaze.  (What is the male gaze, you ask? Think about when you are shown a ‘sexy’ female in a movie, how the camera scans her body in the same way a heterosexual male viewer would.)

This, I think, is part of the market finally coming to terms with something women have known a long time: women are sexual creatures, too. Call it the only good thing to come out of 50 Shades of Grey; call it whatever you like. But there it is. Sure, we like sweet romance. But sometimes we like to go watch hot guys romp around while undressing, and that’s totally okay. America is finally coming to terms with female desire, and that’s a good thing. So hopefully this movie is a breakaway success, and we can all go see them do that some more in New York while also singing.