The PC Thug: The End of Saturday Morning Cartoons

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Back in 1988, I fondly remember waking up very early on a Saturday to watch cartoons, and would officially pack up and prepare for the day the minute twelve in the afternoon reared it head ushering local sports.

2014 marked the end of many traditions that pop culture fans hold near and dear to their heart. One of the most surprising announcements was the official heralding of death of the tradition we all knew and love: Saturday Morning cartoons. In September 2014, the CW Network’s parent company Warner Bros. officially ended their run of morning long schedules of animated series, and reverted to cheaper educational programming in a time slot that barely filled three hours.  These days if you turn on the CW on a Saturday morning, you’ll likely find a ton of infomercials sandwiched between some vaguely family based animal shows.

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Envoy (2014)

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For now, David Weinstein’s “Envoy” is really just “Iron Giant” meets “Predator,” but I think with a wider scope and feature length, “Envoy” could be so much more. The short film from director Weinstein acts simultaneously as a spec film for a more fully realized follow-up and I’m anxious to see where he takes this premise. “Envoy” feels like Weinstein took Spielberg, “Iron Giant,” and The Zeta Project for one really good, but menacing science fiction adventure.

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Any Given Sunday (1999) 15th Anniversary Director’s Cut [Blu-ray]

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Oliver Stone’s “Any Given Sunday” is a film that literally anyone can watch. Because while it’s certainly a sport films centered on the industry of football, its central themes are relatable to anyone. While on the surface it’s about business and athletes, and competing, mainly “Any Given Sunday” is about a group of people trying desperately to out run the clock of time, and gain some sense of security for their future before father time catches up on them. When we meet these people in the narrative, many of them are at the beginning of their short careers trying to build a future, while others find their windows of opportunity closing and desperately cling to any chance to secure their future for themselves and their family. Stone composes a very richly defined ensemble drama about the football industry and how demanding it is both as an arena for skilled athletes, and athletes anxiously trying to bank on the momentum of their popularity, as fleeting it may be.

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The Slave (1969) [Blu-ray/DVD]

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It’s really tough to approach “The Slave” (also known as “Check To The Queen”) on a level where you would an average film. By all respects, Pasquale Festa Campanile’s drama is a unique and surreal drama based around a sadist-masochist relationship. For a long time I’d all but been convinced that “Secretary” was as good as film of this ilk got, but “The Slave” comes close to conquering this small sub-genre well. Pasquale Festa Campanile’s film is solely based around a young girl whose own lust for pain and humiliation is rivaled by her unusual obsession with her vanity.

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“The Flash” Season One, Episode One: City of Heroes Review

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It’s great to see DC and Warner bros. finally giving The Flash his due after so many years in limbo. “The Flash” has always been a wonderful character from the DC universe that was way too science fiction based to ever become a respectable series or movie, so for years fans had nothing. Surely John Wesley Shippe’s “The Flash” was a solid adaptation, but beyond that, it was merely table scraps. “The Flash” fully realizes what an amazing character the titular speedster is and completely sets up nothing but storylines and sub-plots in the pilot, while also telling a great origin tale of how a scientist became the fastest man alive.

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Similo (2014)

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In a dying world how far would you go to keep the environment you loved? And more importantly, in a world where you’ve lost the only person you’ve loved, can you ever really get them back? Is it worth trying to pretend you’re still where you were decades ago, or isn’t it just easier to let go and accept your fate? “Similo” is a brilliant and beautifully directed science fiction short that uses the world our character Heve lives in as an allegory for the relationship she lost a long time ago.

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Our Top Five “Spaced” Episodes

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If you haven’t seen “Spaced,” the odds are you’re missing out on the final puzzle that will cement you as a fan of Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, or Edgar Wright. The UK series was a massive hit for two seasons, and fifteen years later it still has a major following today. Many of the series’ stars went on to huge things in America and their home countries, including Simon Pegg, series director Edgar Wright, Nick Frost, and Jessica Hynes.

Fifteen years later, the show is still fresh, hilarious, and worth the hooplah it garnered when it finally arrived to the US a few years ago. It’s never too late to explore “Spaced,” so here are five essential episodes you should look out for while coasting through its fourteen episode run.

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