The ramblings of a wannabe cineaste. Join me as I dissect the art of storytelling in films, comics, TV shows, and video games.
O'GRADY FILM

Eternals: The Burden of Purpose
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] I am Loki of Asgard, and I am burdened with glorious purpose....
Dune: Humanity Amidst the Spectacle
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] The Gom Jabbar. The doomed Duke Leto’s courageous defiance in the...
From Our Nightmares: Last Night in Soho
[The following essay contains MINOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] In Edgar Wright’s Last Night in Soho, ghosts are real. Skeptics may...
From Our Nightmares: Candyman (2021)
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] In Bernard Rose’s original Candyman, the eponymous hook-handed...
The Art of Heroic Villainy: Xu Wenwu (Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings)
In my Black Widow review, I argued: The villains, sadly, are far less compelling and memorable, existing only as shallow, generic...
Bo Burnham: Inside - Existing in a Digital Purgatory
For the majority of its duration, “White Woman’s Instagram”—a song penned by Bo Burnham for Inside, his self-produced Netflix comedy...
The Suicide Squad: The Cost of Peace
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] During his promotional tour for The Suicide Squad, John Cena...
The Green Knight: Honor Pricks Me On
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] While digesting The Green Knight's stylistic and structural...
Unraveling the Tangled Narrative Web of Fatal Deviation
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] On Saint Patrick’s Day, I watched Fatal Deviation—which proudly...
The Long Good Friday: Trapped by Time
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] Things change, Harold. Don't get nostalgic. Look to the future....
Revisiting Mars Attacks!
Mars Attacks! absolutely terrified me when it was first released. Actually, that’s a bit of an understatement. It would be more accurate...
Wolfwalkers: The Shape of Oppression
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] As complex and compelling as Robyn Goodefellowe, her father, and...
Hades: The Labor of Sisyphus
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] Even if you’re a complete newcomer to the wild world of Greek...
Mank: Nightmares in the Dream Factory
[The following essay contains SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] Early in the first act of David Fincher’s Mank, protagonist Herman J....
Soul: Finding the Spark
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] Like nearly all of Pixar’s work, Soul gets pretty goddamn...
Tenet: Fatalism, Free Will, and the Inflexibility of Time
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] I’ll see you at the beginning, friend. As the dust settles following...
The Mandalorian: A Larger World
[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] Several critics have argued that Season 2 of The Mandalorian...
MST3K: Learning Through Laughter
You can accuse the writers behind Mystery Science Theater 3000 of aiming at low-hanging fruit. You can argue that their sense of humor...
The Amorphous Horror of Tomie
[WARNING: The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS!] I spent hours searching for the right adjective to describe the unique flavor of...



















