Several weeks ago, a friend at work talked me into a truly bonkers journalism experience that I’m finally undertaking this week: Twenty-four straight hours of Marvel Cinematic Universe films, all 11 screened in order in a theater, culminating in Avengers: Age of Ultron. That’s Wednesday and Thursday, basically, and I’ll probably be pretty loopy through the weekend, if I’m honest.
At heart, though, I am someone who loves committing to big endeavors hard, and I’m really looking forward to enjoying everyone who shows up to do the same. Given all this, I thought I’d clear out some of the great articles I’ve been hoarding in the depths of my One Tab bookmark/tab keeper. We all need some good reading to get us through things.
From Metropolis to Ex Machina: Why Are So Many Robots Female? is a smart, intriguing look at the history of person-shaped AI (although, in the case of Her‘s Samantha, not always).
The art and science behind the glow of Chicago’s skyline answers some questions about the look of my best beloved toddlin’ town.
Instagram’s Endangered Ephemera is sort of a twee New Yorker piece of fluff, but I am 100% its target audience and I tend to love very narrowly focused visual blogs like it describes.
The Case for Leaning Out is an all too familiar look at work-life balance and the terrible way in which that’s even a thing in the first place.
Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett are apparently soulmates and that fills me with joy.
One Man’s Quest to Rid Wikipedia of Exactly One Grammatical Mistake makes me, as a copy editor, want to slow clap right out of my seat.
The Road From Danzig is a vivid look at Gunter Grass and his complicated biography. I have both an unread and an unwatched copy of The Tin Drum somewhere on my shelves, and I’ve always meant to fix that. This should push me.
Andre Braugher, the Undercover Comedian of Brooklyn Nine-Nine gives me something wonderful: a look at an actor I’ve only recently discovered (via the aforementioned half-hour comedy) is completely, astoundingly, winningly flawless onscreen.
Among the Reindeer is personally interesting to me. Apparently, thanks to one of those DNA ancestry tests, we know on my father’s side that I’m descended from people who lived north of the Arctic Circle. This writer gets similar results, and goes to vastly greater lengths to understand them.
Mark Watches Captain America: The Winter Soldier is the perfect maraschino cherry on top of this post. Winter Soldier is far and away both the best MCU movie (fight me) and my favorite. Mark Oshiro’s unspoiled reaction and unfiltered feelingsplosion sums up so much of what it is to love and engage with these films.
The deep breath before the deep dive. Catch you on the flip side, cats and kittens!
Magpie & Whale 