Recently, this post popped into my feed: “Normalize not bringing up a relatable story about yourself when someone is telling you something about themselves, and just listen.”
I didn’t think much about it, to be honest. It seemed reasonable to me. Sometimes, folks want to be heard, and—sometimes—feeling heard requires the listener to focus on the speaker’s experience (as opposed to their own).
But then I read some of the comments.
There is much to unpack in these comments, including a few logical fallacies and some arguably misguided assertions about neurodiversity. But what surprised me was the widespread indignation of the commenters. The spirit of the comments is valid: vocalizing shared experience can be a way to empathize and deepen conversations. And, yes, active listening does not require silence on the part of the listener. But those elements were not the focus of the original post. The original post simply asked would-be listeners to spend time focusing on the speaker’s experience before pivoting to their own.
And some commenters couldn’t handle that.
The “Share a Similar Story method,” as one commenter described it, is a feature of empathy, not necessarily active listening, and it can feel dismissive to the speaker. Consider the snow globe analogy from Mae Martin’s stand-up special:
Okay, this is a little abstract, but don’t you think, in a way, our brains and our minds are like our rooms, and we furnish our minds with experiences that we collect to then build what we think of as our identity and selves? And that’s all we’re doing. We’re little experience hunters, collecting these to put them on our brain shelves and be like, “I’m me.” And I always visualize every experience that we collect is like a little novelty snow globe. We’re just going around, being like, “One time I saw Antonio Banderas at the airport. Yes, I did. I’m myself. And no one else is me.” And then all human interaction is . . . just basically taking turns showing each other our snow globes. And being like, “I…” And just pathetically taking turns. And, like, someone will be showing you their snow globe, you know, and you’re trying to be a good listener. It’s a story about a party they went to five years ago. And you’re like, “Yes, and you are you as well.” Like, “Yes, exactly, yes.” “How wonderful to be yourself as well.” But the whole time, your eyes are darting to your own shelf. A hundred percent, the whole time… You’re like, “Mmm, yes. Well, no. Yes.” Waiting for your moment to be like, “And me as well. I have one…”
Sometimes, effective listening requires sacrifice. Sometimes, to truly hear and appreciate the experiences of another person, a listener must abandon the temptation to match those experiences with their own—at least for a little while. While listening to another person, instead of searching your head for your own experience (AKA your snow globe), you could actively listen to (and comment on) the experience presented by the speaker.
For many people, effective listening is not the status quo. In fact, I argue that most people are bad listeners—a reality perpetuated by casual egotism and a widespread tendency to instinctively personalize the stories of others. In a video essay about Noah Baumbach’s 2017 film The Meyerowitz Stories (New and Selected), YouTuber Nerdwriter uses the film to examine the reality of day-to-day conversations. At one point, Nerdwriter dissects a scene between Matt (played by Ben Stiller) and his father Harold (played by Dustin Hoffman):
. . . What makes this exchange so heartbreaking and true to life, at least for me, is that they really are communicating with each other—just not explicitly. Matt brings up a major life change and expresses some of the hopes and fears he has about it, and his father immediately brings up his own major life event and some of the hopes and fears he has about that. Implicitly, Matt is asking for approval, he’s asking for reassurance, and he’s asking for consolation. Harold, on the other hand, is denying approval because he can’t his son being more successful than he is, while asking for reassurance of his own hopes and consolation for his own fears. It’s like the two men are firing a volley of missiles at each other: some are hitting, some are missing, and some are crashing into each other midair. I think Baumbach understands a key dynamic in conversations, especially conversations with family: When we speak to others, we’re often speaking to ourselves, attempting to frame dialogue so that the person we’re talking to will reflect back the things that we want to believe about us. . . . And the result is often conflict or a conversation that just goes nowhere.
Ultimately, much of this issue comes down to the nuances of specific conversations. If, for example, I quickly mention the fact that I have experienced depression as a way to establish a connection with someone who has just shared a story of their experiences with a recent depressive episode, I am showing empathy. If, however, I respond to my friend’s story about their depressive episode with an unsolicited story about my mental health, I am no longer just showing empathy—I am hijacking their moment to highlight my own experience.
The line between empathizing and commandeering is sometimes tricky to see, especially for those with notably solipsistic tendencies. Listeners must quickly consider a number of contextual variables: level of familiarity, the emotional disposition of the speaker, power dynamics, physical location, and more. If “reading the room” was easy, miscommunications and hurt feelings would never occur. But they do occur. Frequently, in fact. Which means that some of us are not as good at listening as we assume we are.
So let’s look at examples of obviously ineffective listening and fine-tune our approach from there. When arguments occur, we often demand understanding through tone and volume. During an argument, the struggle to feel heard often manifests as vocalized frustration: we shout to keep the other person from overlooking our perspective. Consider the flawed styles of communication in movies like Sam Mendes’s Revolutionary Road, Noah Baumbach’s Marriage Story, and Justine Triet’s Anatomy of a Fall.
In all three cases, the characters shout their feelings and experiences at each other, and they do so without earnest attempts to appreciate perspectives beyond their own. Most individuals, I imagine, would agree that these cinematic conversations exemplify a failure of effective communication. In these scenes, much is communicated, but little is understood. It’s easy to look at arguments and see the dangers of selfish exchanges. But self-centeredness is not limited to heated arguments: the clearly ineffective elements of hostile communication—the chaotic drive to be heard and the self-focused tendency to personalize the experiences of others—can also exist in casual, non-hostile conversations. They’re just more subtle.
My contention is that when attempts at empathetic “listening” are driven primarily by a desire to verbalize relatable experiences, those attempts often suffer from the same pitfalls as the arguments in Anatomy of a Fall—just maybe to a lesser degree. In both situations, understanding is overshadowed by verbalized personal experience. In the mind of the speaker, it is not clear if the listener has truly internalized what was said.
Let’s use Fences, the 2016 film adaptation of August Wilson’s play, as a case study. Troy Maxson (played by Denzel Washington) is a toxically masculine father who cheats on his wife Rose Maxson (played by Viola Davis). Like Willy Loman from Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, Troy is a problematic communicator: he has a notably tunnel-visioned view of the world that informs everything he says. Every comment or reply is filtered through a limited lens of baseball references and unyielding personal philosophies.
At the beginning of a pivotal scene, Troy tells Rose that he has fathered a baby with another woman, and this admission sparks a conversation about their marriage. Rose is understandably frustrated, and she explains that Troy should have “held her tight,” regardless of any emotional distance between them. Then Troy’s language shifts: he tries to explain his perspective through a series of baseball metaphors (“I bunted” and “I wasn’t gonna get that last strike” and “I wanted to steal second” and “I stood on first base for eighteen years”). Troy makes little attempt to empathize with Rose; instead, he insists on framing the conversation in a way that makes sense to him. He insists on language that reinforces his experience, not hers. (And, intriguingly, Troy actually accuses Rose of “not listening.” Sometimes, the most thunderous among us are the quickest to feel unheard.)
Finally, Rose yells, “We’re not talking about baseball! We’re talking about you going off to lay in bed with another woman—and then bring it home to me. That’s what we’re talking about. We’re not talking about no baseball.”
Now imagine that Troy is one of Rose’s friends, not her husband. Imagine that Rose is talking to a friend about her interactions with her adulterous husband, and Rose’s well-intentioned friend responds with a litany of baseball analogies. Would you describe that friend as an effective listener?
Now replace those baseball analogies with the “Share a Similar Story method.” Imagine that Rose is sharing her experiences, and her well-intentioned friend pivots to their own experience with an unfaithful partner. Would “effective listener” be an appropriate label for that friend?
Sometimes, effective listening requires sacrifice. Sometimes, as a listener, it’s not about you, and quickly pivoting to your experience—even if well-intentioned—feels self-serving. You may not mean to dominate or personalize the conversation, but impressions impact feelings more than intentions.
I believe that genuinely listening to another human being can change that person’s life. All human beings want to feel heard. All human beings crave the feeling of safety, sanity, and comfort that comes from knowing that another person truly heard, appreciated, and validated what they had to say. So when you have the opportunity to offer that to someone else, remind yourself that this is their life-changing moment, not yours.
Ben Boruff is a co-founder of Big B and Mo’ Money. Read more at BenBoruff.com.
Mike Birbiglia’s 2013 stand-up special My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend begins with a targeted critique of marriage:
So about five years ago, pretty much everyone who I know started to get married, and that was strange for me because I don’t really believe in the idea of marriage. And that would have been fine, except I have a problem where sometimes when I think that I am right about something, it can be a real source of tension between me and the person I’m arguing with. And the reason it’s a source of tension is that I’m right. And so I remember distinctly talking to my friend Dana, and she goes, “Well, you don’t believe in marriage for you, but, of course, you believe in it for other people.” And I was like, “No, I think it’s insane, you know, for anyone.” And she said, “Why?” And I said, “Well, first of all, it just seems doomed.” You know, 50% of marriages end in divorce. That’s just first marriages, by the way. Second marriages, 60% to 62% end in divorce. Third marriages, 70% to 75% end in divorce. That’s a learning curve.
And he doesn’t stop there. In his comedy special, This American Life and The Moth regular Mike Birbiglia reinforces his anti-marriage worldview with jokes about actively resisting the pending marriages of his friends:
I had one ally in all this, which is my friend Andy, and he’s a comedian as well. Not only did we decide we weren’t gonna get married, we actually tried to stop other people we knew from getting married. Yeah, we were pretty good at it. Like, we stopped or put on hold three or four marriages, you know. We were pretty good. I mean, we weren’t like the best in the world. I’m sure there are better in Europe. But we were solid, you know. Like, so, like, for example, at point my friend Alex was about to get engaged. And so we just took him to dinner. And during dessert, we gave him a long, hard stare. We said, “Are you sure this is what you want to do?” And then we went cold to give him the sense of what it would feel like when we weren’t friends anymore.
Throughout his special, Billionsand Orange Is the New Black guest star Mike Birbiglia critiques the gaudiness of marriage ceremonies (“I don’t buy into the flamboyant pageantry that goes into celebrating it”), the history of marriage (“marriage is an archaic institution invented in the middle ages based on exchanging property”), the legal mores of marriage (“why does it need to be written into a government contract?”), and marriage’s inherent connections to religion (“I’ve been to more weddings of my friends where the people on the altar don’t believe in the religion of the church they’ve invited us to!”).
Then, Cedar Rapids (2011) and Trainwreck(2015) actor Mike Birbiglia tells a personal story about the comically tragic aftermath of a car accident—a story he has told on This American Life and elsewhere—before transitioning back to his girlfriend Jenny: “The only person who would talk to me at this point was Jenny.”
Famoussleepwalker Mike Birbiglia ends his 2013 special with a heartwarming admission of his own stubbornness and a confession of his marriage to poet Jen “Jenny” Stein:
July 7, 2007, Jenny and I went to city hall and got married. I still didn’t believe in the idea of marriage, and I still don’t. But I believe in her, and I’ve given up on the idea of being right.
It’s sweet.
But I hate it. I hate it because it doesn’t stop there.
At the beginning of his 2019 comedy special The New One, casual Taylor Swift friend Mike Birbiglia acknowledges his dislike of children:
Maybe I have a low tolerance for children. I’ve lost a lot of great friends to kids. Because it really is like a disease in some ways. But it’s worse than a disease because they want you to have it too. [zombie voice] “You should have kids too.” I’m watching you do it, and I’m thinkin’ I’m gonna not do it. They’re like zombies, they’re like [zombie voice] “You should eat brains.” I’m watching you eat brains, and it seems like it ruined your life.
By his own admission, past Late Night with Conan O’Brien intern Mike Birbiglia’s desire for a childless life was unambiguous: “I was very clear when we got married that I never wanted to have a kid. . . . I was clear I would never change.”
And throughout The New One, he offers specific reasons for not wanting kids:
Number one, I’ve never felt like there should be more of me in the world. . . . I had cancer, life-threatening sleeping disorder, Lyme disease, diabetes. I’m not exactly handing off A-plus genes here. Number two. I love my marriage, and I feel…I really do, I feel so lucky to have found my wife. . . . And I don’t want to give that up. I don’t want that to change. I don’t want a third person showing up, like, “What about me?” I’m like, “We don’t even know you!” Number three. I don’t know anything and I’m not ready to teach the children. I mean, I’ve read hundreds of books. I’ve retained very little. . . . Number four, I have a cat. Number five. I have a job. . . . It took me a long time to figure out anything I was good at. I wasn’t good at video games, or archery, or whatever the hell kids do. And then, I figured this out. I don’t want to give that up. My brother’s like, “Mike, you can have a kid and a career.” And I said, “Yeah, Joe, but it’ll be worse.” If we’re being honest with ourselves kids hold us back. . . . Number six. I don’t think there should be children anymore. Nothing drastic. I think the current children can see through their term. I just think maybe we cut it off there, because, look, we were given the earth and we failed. . . . Number seven. People aren’t great. Not just Nazis. I mean, people in general are not great. And look, you guys seem fine. And the conventional wisdom is that people are generally good. But are they?
And Jimmy KimmelLive fill-in Mike Birbiglia allegedly told his wife all of that: “Why would you want to bring a child into this world with me? I’m a walking pre-existing condition, the earth is sinking into the ocean, we’re about to be living in the movie Waterworld, which did terribly at the box office. People are horrible, and I’m not great.”
His wife allegedly responded, “I know all of that. And I think you’d be a good dad.”
So they had a kid. Not just in the comedy special anecdote. Real-life married father Mike Birbiglia actually has a child now.
Mike Birbiglia betrayed us.
I want to be abundantly clear: The problem is not that Birbiglia is married and has a child. Unlike Birbiglia in his own stand-up special, I do not mind when others get married or have children. The problem is that Birbiglia publicly and enthusiastically advocated for single, childless lifestyles before getting married and having a child—and then uses his past advocacy as fodder for comedy.
Consider the current socio-political landscape as it applies to perceptions of marriage, parenting, and “traditional” families:
In 2015, Pope Francis said that couples who choose not to have children are “selfish.” Pope Francis reinforced that belief again in 2024, praising cultures with averages of three to five children per household: “Keep going like this. It is an example for all countries.”
In 2016, Bella DePaulo, Ph.D., explained the inherent psychological biases we have against single individuals: “Nearly every other person describing married people, approximately 49 percent, spontaneously suggested that married people are kind, caring, or giving. Only 2 percent of the participants describing single people came up with those same characteristics. Every third person describing married people, around 32 percent, said that they were loving. No one—not one person—described single people this way. Married people were also more often described as happy, secure, loyal, compromising, and reliable. Single people, though, were more often described as independent.”
In 2021, JD Vance criticized “childless cat ladies,” which according to to NPRis an insult with a long history designed to paint childless women as either frightening or pitiful. (Vance has since claimed that his comment was meant as a critique of the “anti-family and anti-child” Democratic Party.)
Also in 2021, JD Vance stated that the idea of childless educators having influence over children “disorients” and “really disturbs” him. (Again, Vance later reframed his comment as a critique of “left-wing indoctrination” in schools.)
Again in 2021, JD Vance wondered during an interview whether or not childlessness might make people “people more sociopathic and ultimately our whole country a little bit less mentally stable.” The full quote: “There’s just these basic cadences of life I think are really powerful and really valuable when you have kids in your life, and the fact that so many people, especially in America’s leadership class, just don’t have that in their lives, you know — I worry that it makes people more sociopathic and ultimately our whole country a little bit less mentally stable.”
In 2022, a survey showed that “52% of 1,000 single UK adults reported experiencing single shaming ‘since the start of the pandemic.'” According to BBC, “researchers asked about the common ‘shaming phrases’ single people have heard from others, and 35% said they were told ‘you’ll find someone soon’. Twenty-nine percent heard ‘you must be so lonely’, while 38% reported general pity over their relationship status.”
A 2024 study from the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, unveiled “four overlapping ‘archetypes’ [perceptions] of single women and men”, including “‘Heartless (‘selfish,’ ‘promiscuous’), and Loner (‘lonely,’ ‘antisocial’).”
So when folks like Mike Birbiglia softly belittle genuine concerns about marriage and procreating, they are perpetuating a longstanding and wholly damaging status quo of pro-marriage, pro-procreating propaganda. In his comedy specials, Birbiglia presents himself as an underdog who reluctantly succumbs to happiness, but he’s really just punching down. He creates a fun, quirky, freethinking single-life caricature of himself only so that he can later use self-deprecation as a means of discounting singleness and/or childlessness.
Mike Birbiglia is not the only one who does this. My least favorite scene in the entire run of Parks and Recreation is this one:
Like Birbiglia, April Ludgate had valid reservations about having a child. But then Andy, Ben, and Leslie effectively bully April into having children. And so she does. (Leslie tells April that she likes her “team” and would love to see more “team members,” whatever that means.)
In the episode, Ben’s assertion that April will inevitably “get there” and change her views about children is particularly heinous.
There are valid reasons to oppose marriage and/or a child-filled lifestyle. According to 2025 numbers from Forbes, 43% of first marriages end in divorce. Yes, that’s lower than the commonly spread divorce statistic of 50%, but a 57% success rate is still hardly worth celebrating. If a restaurant had a 57% satisfaction rate, would you make a reservation? If a university had a 57% job placement rate, would you pay tuition? The average wedding in 2023 cost $30,119, and the cost of raising one child is, on average, $21,681 per year, not including the cost of saving for college. (The cost of raising a child over 18 years is $237,482 “just for the basic necessities”). Plus, the idea of marriage as an act of love is relatively new. Marriage was “rarely a matter of free choice” until the late 20th century. For most of human history, “romantic love was not the primary motive for matrimony.”
Finally, there’s nothing selfless about having children, unless you can somehow guarantee that your kid is going to cure cancer or be the first interstellar pioneer to colonize another solar system. Otherwise, you’re having a kid for you—because you want a child. This is perfectly fine, but let’s be honest about it.
Even if someone does not have “valid” reasons for being hesitant about (or outright opposing) marriage and procreation, you should still respect those views without comment or objection. The validity of the worldview is not the point: the hesitation itself is the point. Many in society—pastors, parents, purveyors of the patriarchy—proselytize endlessly about the importance of the bonds of marriage and the roles of parenthood. So shouldn’t folks think long and hard about whether or not they want to enter into those commitments? Shouldn’t that hesitation be celebrated, not belittled? But, instead, many treat having children like buying lottery tickets: lots of uninformed finger-crossing (with plenty of awkward scratching and dirty fingernails, I assume).
But I’ll leave you with one of my favorite portrayals of a confident, single, and childless character—which, incidentally, comes from Parks and Recreation. Not early-seasons April Ludgate or Leslie Knope. I’m talking about Jennifer Barkley.
Yes, I know that the character of Jennifer Barkley reinforces the “heartless” stereotype of the single, childless individual and is a less-than-perfect symbol of my argument. But I can’t resist the comparison: In a world utterly filled with Leslie Knopes and April Ludgates, be bold enough to be a Jennifer Barkley.
Ben Boruff is a co-founder of Big B and Mo’ Money. Read more at BenBoruff.com.
The Cable Guy is a 1996 dark comedy about an unstable cable installer played by Jim Carrey. As a kid, I didn’t think much of the movie. I felt claustrophobic watching it. Directed by Ben Stiller and produced by Judd Apatow, The Cable Guy showcases the psyche of a guy who refuses to respect his new friend’s personal space. It’s like What About Bob? (1991) with violence and a trip to Medieval Times. Or like Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity (2013) if you replaced the deadly emptiness of space with uncountable copies of your most annoying friend.
But it’s also more than that. The Cable Guy is an examination of our relationships with media. Like Community‘s Abed Nadir, Gilmore Girls‘s Lorelai Gilmore, and The Big Bang Theory‘s Sheldon Cooper, the Cable Guy processes his world through the lens of visual storytelling—i.e. movies, television shows, and video games. Stories aren’t just stories. They’re a roadmap for interacting with others in real life.
At the film’s climactic moment, the Cable Guy holds his friend Steven’s girlfriend hostage at the top of a massive satellite dish. When Steven tries to intervene, the Cable Guy smiles and says, “This is a pretty cool place for an ending . . . It’s like that movie Goldeneye.”
Steven yells back, exasperated, “No, it’s not! It’s not ‘like’ anything! This isn’t a movie. This is reality. There’s a difference!”
Then, silhouetted by the bright lights of a police helicopter and standing at the edge of the multi-story satellite dish, the Cable Guy looks up and yells to the sky:
You were never there for me, were you mother? You expected Mike and Carol Brady to raise me! I’m the bastard son of Claire Huxtable! I am a lost Cunningham! I learned the facts of life from watching The Facts of Life! Oh, God!
Later, in an interview, Jim Carrey noted that The Cable Guy was one of his favorite films and expressed special fondness for the protagonist: “I love that character. That character is all of us: we were all raised by the TV.”
To be clear, none of us should scream about The Brady Bunch on the top of a satellite dish (unless that’s your thing). But there is something compelling about the story of a man who leaned a bit too far into his television-fueled fantasies. Because I think Jim Carrey was right, sort of. With the rise of streaming and the explosion of online content, The Cable Guy‘s message is more relevant now than it was in 1996. Parasocial relationships are common now, and several studies have revealed links between media consumption and perceptions of others. You may not actively think of film scenes when making moral decisions, but research shows that the films and media you watch impact skills like empathy and problem-solving.
I was reminded recently that there is no such thing as mindless scrolling or viewing. Our brains absorb everything we put in front of our eyes, even if it happens in ways we don’t comprehend. So it makes sense that we should analyze the types of media we experience. If the movies and shows I watch impact my perception of the world, I should examine which movies and shows I experience.
Below is an analysis of every movie, television show, video game, and feature-length YouTube video I experienced for the first time in 2024. The data is first, then an analysis, and then a comprehensive list of everything I experienced.
The Data
Of the films I watched for the first time in 2024:
3% are musicals
3% are Westerns
7% are romance films
9% are horror films
9% are animated films
15% are comedies
16% are international (primarily non-US) films
31% are action, thriller, or adventure films
33% are science fiction or fantasy films
33% are films that released in 2024
34% are documentaries
45% feature women protagonists and/or women-driven stories (though only 27% were directed by women)
Of the television show seasons I watched for the first time in 2024:
12% are historical dramas or comedies
16% are reality television shows
27% are animated shows
39% are comedies
40% are science fiction or fantasy shows
47% are dramas (not reality television)
65% feature women protagonists
Analysis
Documentary Film Explosion: In 2019, only 12% of the films I watched were documentaries. In 2018, only 6% were documentaries. In 2024, an impressive 34% of the films I watched for the first time were documentaries. I am not entirely sure why documentary films clicked with me in 2024. Perhaps the increase is the result of a newly fueled desire to remain emotionally and intellectually tethered to the very real and very chaotic happenings on this planet. Perhaps my rate of documentary consumption mirrored my increased interest in podcasts about real-life topics. (I recommend Devil in the Dorm, The Retrievals, The King Road Killings, and White Devil.) Perhaps Brian Cox’s speech from Adaptation (2002) finally sunk in. Whatever the reason, I’m proud of the increased number of documentary films. Surely, there is value in exploring real-life stories. Of all the documentaries I watched this year, these seven stand out: Ballerina (2016), The Waiting Room (2012), The Truth vs. Alex Jones (2024), The Greatest Night in Pop (2024), Bad Faith (2024), Skywalkers: A Love Story (2024), and Cirque du Soleil: Without a Net (2022).
Need for International Films and Non-Male Directors: Most years, my international film exposure plateaus at 15-20%, and 2024 was no exception. Additionally, only 27% of the films I watched were directed by women. Both pieces of data highlight areas of needed improvement. My 2024 movie-watching experience was primarily U.S.-centric and directed by men. Though my percentage of women-directed films (27%) is higher than some national trends—”women accounted for just 16% of directors working on the 250 highest-grossing domestic releases” in 2024, according to Variety—this is nonetheless a percentage that I aim to increase in the future. And I would love to break beyond 20% for international releases in 2025. The good news: according to Axios, “Americans are consuming more foreign content than ever.” I hope this trend continues.
Planting Seeds of Horror, History, and the West: Though horror (9%) and Western (3%) films did not dominate my 2024 movie-viewing experiences, I did watch more than previous years. (I watched notably fewer animated films—just 9%—than previous years. In 2019, animated films were at 16%.) And 12% of my new television show experiences were from the historical fiction genre. This is a mild departure from my usually tunnel-visioned focus on science fiction and fantasy. In 2019, 40% of the films I watched for the first time were science fiction, fantasy, or apocalyptic movies. In 2018, that number was 45%. In 2024, only 33% of the films I watched for the first time were science fiction or fantasy films. Science fiction and fantasy remain my favorite genres, but I find myself branching out more recently, which is exciting. The fact that I watched more documentary films (34%) than science fiction and/or fantasy films (33%) for the first time in 2024 is notably bonkers. I don’t imagine I will ever become a true horror aficionado, but it’s nice to know that my interests are still evolving. And the Western films I watched—particularly Unforgiven(1992),The Quick and the Dead (1995), andThe Ballad of Lefty Brown (2017)—were some of my favorite new experiences. Plus, I absolutely loved the historical television dramas Black Sails and Victoria.
Complete Lists of All Media Experienced in 2024 Are Below
LIST OF FILMS WATCHED FOR THE FIRST TIME IN 2024
The Platform (2019) dir. Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia The First Purge (2018) dir. Gerard McMurray Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023) dir. James Wan Ted (2012) dir. Seth MacFarlane Ted 2 (2015) dir. Seth MacFarlane Wonka(2023) dir. Paul King John Wick: Chapter 2(2017) dir. Chad Stahelski John Wick: Chapter 3—Parabellum (2019) dir. Chad Stahelski John Wick: Chapter 4(2023) dir. Chad Stahelski The Lady Vanishes(1938) dir. Alfred Hitchcock The Bleeding Edge (2018) dir. Kirby Dick Crazy, Not Insane(2020) dir. Alex Gibney The Marvels (2023) dir. Nia DaCosta Mission: Impossible (1996) dir. Brian De Palma Mission: Impossible II (2000) dir. John Woo In the Shadow of the Moon (2019) dir. Jim Mickle Life (2017) dir. Daniel Espinosa Poisoned: The Dirty Truth About Your Food (2023) dir. Stephanie Soechtig Coded Bias (2020) dir. Shalini Kantayya Mister Organ (2022) dir. David Farrier Boys State (2020) dir Jesse Moss, Amanda McBaine Miller’s Girl(2024) dir. Jade Halley Bartlett Hellraiser(2022) dir. David Bruckner Spaceman (2024) dir. Johan Renck Next Goal Wins (2023) dir. Taika Waititi Last Knights (2015) dir. Kazuaki Kiriya Hellraiser(1987) dir. Clive Barker Dune: Part Two (2024) dir. Denis Villeneuve The Last Voyage of the Demeter(2023) dir. André Øvredal Ballerina (2016) dir. Douglas Watkin The Zone of Interest(2023) dir. Jonathan Glazer Queenpins(2021) dir. Aron Gaudet, Gita Pullapilly The Secret Life of the Cruise (2018) dir. Ben Ryder Nintendo Quest: The Most Unofficial and Unauthorized Nintendo Documentary Ever! (2015) dir. Rob McCallum Hell of a Cruise (2022) dir. by Nick Quested Solitary: Inside Red Onion State Prison(2016) dir. Kristi Jacobson The Anthrax Attacks: In the Shadow of 9/11(2022) dir. Dan Krauss The Waiting Room (2012) dir. Peter Nicks The Last Tourist(2021) dir. Tyson Sadler Pharma Bro(2021) dir. Brent Hodge Persona: The Dark Truth Behind Personality Tests (2021) dir. Tim Travers Hawkins WeWork: Or The Making and Breaking of a $47 Billion Unicorn (2021) dir. Jed Rothstein Brandy Hellville & the Cult of Fast Fashion(2024) dir. Eva Orner BS High(2023) dir. Travon Free, Martin Desmond Roe 15 Minutes of Shame (2021) dir. Max Joseph American Pain (2022) dir. Darren Foster The Truth vs. Alex Jones (2024) dir. Dan Reed Rebel Moon – Part Two: The Scargiver (2024) dir. Zack Snyder The Cold Blue(2018) dir. Erik Nelson Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths – Part One(2024) dir. Jeff Wamester God Forbid: The Sex Scandal That Brought Down a Dynasty (2022) dir. Billy Corben A Compassionate Spy (2022) dir. Steve James Enemies of the State(2020) dir. Sonia Kennebeck After Truth: Disinformation and the Cost of Fake News (2020) dir. Andrew Rossi Hans Zimmer: Hollywood Rebel(2022) dir. Francis Hanly Hellboy II: The Golden Army(2008) dir. Guillermo del Toro Triangle of Sadness (2022) dir. Ruben Östlund The Greatest Night in Pop (2024) dir. Bao Nguyen The Final: Attack on Wembley (2024) dir. Robert Miller, Kwabena Oppong What Jennifer Did (2024) dir. Jenny Popplewell Challengers (2024) dir. Luca Guadagnino My Old School (2022) dir. Jono McLeod Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga(2024) dir. George Miller Butterfly in the Sky: The Story of Reading Rainbow(2022) dir. Bradford Thomason MoviePass, MovieCrash(2024) dir. Muta’Ali Theater Camp(2023) dir. Molly Gordon, Nick Lieberman Civil War (2024) dir. Alex Garland Love Lies Bleeding(2024) dir. Rose Glass Boy Kills World (2023) dir. Moritz Mohr Outstanding: A Comedy Revolution(2024) dir. Page Hurwitz Hate to Love: Nickelback(2023) dir. Leigh Brooks They Called Him Mostly Harmless (2024) dir. Patricia E. Gillespie The Croods (2013) dir. Chris Sanders, Kirk DeMicco Lilo & Stitch (2002) dir. Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois Time Bomb Y2K(2023) dir. Marley McDonald, Brian Becker The Croods: A New Age (2020) dir. Joel Crawford Bad Faith (2024) dir. Stephen Ujlaki, Chris Jones IF(2024) dir. John Krasinski The Sunset Limited(2011) dir. Tommy Lee Jones Wish(2023) dir. Chris Buck, Fawn Veerasunthorn The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare(2024) dir. Guy Ritchie Inside Out 2 (2024) dir. Kelsey Mann Wild Wild Space (2024) dir. Ross Kauffman Skywalkers: A Love Story(2024) dir. Jeff Zimbalist, Maria Bukhonina Bones and All (2022) dir. Luca Guadagnino Molli and Max in the Future (2023) dir. Michael Lukk Litwak Cirque du Soleil: Without a Net(2022) dir. Dawn Porter A Quiet Place: Day One(2024) dir. Michael Sarnoski Sorry/Not Sorry(2023) dir. Cara Mones, Caroline Suh Deadpool & Wolverine (2024) dir. Shawn Levy Touch (2011) dir. Minh Duc Nguyen Trap (2024) dir. M. Night Shyamalan Fall (1997) dir. Eric Schaeffer BookendS (2016) dir. Delavega Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths – Part Two (2024) dir. Jeff Wamester Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths – Part Three(2024) dir. Jeff Wamester Solomon Kane (2009) dir. M.J. Bassett Borderlands (2024) dir. Eli Roth Suncoast (2024) dir. Laura Chinn Coup!(2023) dir. Austin Stark, Joseph Schuman Army of Darkness(1992) dir. Sam Raimi Gentlemen Broncos(2009) dir. Jared Hess Uprising (2024) dir. Kim Sang-man Lux Æterna(2019) dir. Gaspar Noé The Quick and the Dead(1995) dir. Sam Raimi Kung Fu Panda 4 (2024) dir. Mike Mitchell Sleep Call (2023) dir. Fajar Nugros Girls State (2024) dir. Amanda McBaine, Jesse Moss We’re All Going to the World’s Fair(2021) dir. Jane Schoenbrun It’s What’s Inside (2024) dir. Greg Jardin Fat Girl(2001) dir. Catherine Breillat Overlord(2018) dir. Julius Avery Land of Bad (2024) dir. William Eubank Attack the Block (2011) dir. Joe Cornish Despicable Me 4(2024) dir. Chris Renaud, Patrick Delage Abigail (2024) dir. Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett Chris Brown: A History of Violence (2024) dir. Investigation Discovery Unforgiven(1992) dir. Clint Eastwood The Ballad of Lefty Brown(2017) dir. Jared Moshe 3:10 to Yuma(2007) dir. James Mangold Rumours (2024) dir. Guy Maddin, Evan Johnson, Galen Johnson Wicked (2024) dir. Jon M. Chu Conclave (2024) dir. Edward Berger Dream Scenario (2023) dir. Kristoffer Borgli Buy Now! The Shopping Conspiracy(2024) dir. Nic Stacey Joker: Folie à Deux (2024) dir. Todd Phillips Ice Age: Continental Drift(2012) dir. Steve Martino, Michael Thurmeier Anatomy of a Fall (2023) dir. Justine Triet Transformers One(2024) dir. Josh Cooley Child Star (2024) dir. Demi Lovato, Nicola Marsh Noelle (2019) dir. Marc Lawrence Nomadland(2020) dir. Chloé Zhao The Wheel(2021) dir. Steve Pink Stars at Noon(2022) dir. Claire Denis Carry-On(2024) dir. Jaume Collet-Serra Prey (2022) dir. Dan Trachtenberg Lou (2022) dir. Anna Foester
LIST OF TV SHOW SEASONS WATCHED FOR THE FIRST TIME IN 2024
Peacemaker, S1 Survivor, S25, S26, S29, S36, S38, S39, S45, S47 Miracle Workers, S3, S4 Industry, S2, S3 Archer, S14 Hazbin Hotel, S1 Rick and Morty, S7 South Side, S2 Abbott Elementary, S2 Invincible, S2 Gary and His Demons, S1, S2 Bob’s Burgers, S13 Fallout, S1 Star Trek: Discovery, S5 Blood of Zeus, S2 Black Sails, S1, S2, S3, S4 Tires, S1 The Boys, S4 House of the Dragon, S2 Kite Man: Hell Yeah!, S1 The Decameron, S1 Angie Tribeca, S1 Victoria, S1 ER, S10, S11 Solar Opposites, S5 All of Us Are Dead, S1 Very Important People, S1 Boldly Going Nowhere, Unaired Pilot The Penguin, S1 Twilight of the Gods, S1 The Legend of Vox Machina, S3 The Franchise, S1 Arcane, S2 Dune: Prophecy, S1 Secret Level, S1
LIST OF VIDEO GAMES BEAT IN 2024
Super Mario Odyssey(Nintendo Switch) – beat Disco Elysium(Nintendo Switch) – beat: Sorry Cop; Recruit Detective Kim Kitsuragi Rust (Xbox) – “beat” i.e. defended medium solo base against multi-player rocket raid Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords (Nintendo Switch) – beat Far Cry 5 (Xbox) – beat Fallout: New Vegas (Xbox) – beat: Yes Man independent New Vegas ending Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen (Nintendo Switch) – beat Fallout 3 (Xbox) – beat: good karma; Fawkes hero ending Slay the Princess (PC) – beat: “Through Conflict” and “There are no endings” ending The Coffin of Andy and Leyley (PC) – beat: ep. 1, 2 Skyrim (Xbox) – beat: Alduin and Stormcloak questlines The Quarry(Xbox) – beat: RIP Laura, Ryan, Jacob; (Kaitlyn survived, which was literally all I cared about) The Dark Pictures: Man of Medan(Xbox) – beat: everybody survived West of Loathing (Nintendo Switch) – beat Gears 5 (Xbox) – beat Borderlands (Xbox) – beat Far Cry Primal(Xbox) – beat Baldur’s Gate 3 (PC) – beat: Shadowheart left Shar; killed Raphael; freed Orpheus; Ceremorphosis; destroyed the Netherbrain; went to Avernus with Karlach to save her life; go-to team Lae’zel, Wyll, Gale Borderlands 2(Xbox) – beat The Outer Worlds (Xbox) – beat: Welles ending; Adelaide McDevitt replaced Reed Tobson; sided with Halcyon Helen; established peace; saved Phineas; became leader Cyberpunk 2077(Xbox) – beat: left Night City with the Aldecaldos
YOUTUBE VIDEOS (VIDEOS & VIDEO ESSAYS OVER 45 MINUTES AND/OR OF NOTABLE QUALITY) WATCHED IN 2024
Below is your guide to the science fiction, fantasy, and superhero films of 2017—complete with trailers, release dates, pros and cons, and an Excitement Rating that quantifies Big B’s interest in each film.
Pro: the possibility that Will Arnett will be the best Batman yet; the realization that this movie is essentially an animated amalgam of all the Batman memes that exist on the Internet Continue reading →
I loved Cloverfield. As an avid monster movie fan and gamer—I liken the feel of Cloverfield to a mix of Call of Duty and Resident Evil—this is not the type of sequel I anticipated. When the marketing for 10 Cloverfield Lane came out, I was baffled that what looked like a psychological thriller bore the Cloverfield title and was the supposed next entry in a giant alien monster movie franchise. All these things left my expectations low but hopeful.
The beginning starts cautiously, establishing the mood with a strong and foreboding score at the forefront. You are given details and character hints without any dialogue. Then, once you’ve been established in the world and you settle in for what you expect to be a slow build to the first tension of a slow psychological thriller, everything explodes on screen in full audio and visual. I think this opening epitomizes the shock that I felt throughout the entire film. This movie is an odd but pleasant surprise throughout, and definitely nothing I was expecting.
The thing that stands out first is the score and the sound mixing. The mechanical noise of the door opening and shutting, the clatter of objects, the jostling of a car shaking and rolling; all the sound in the film feels like it’s turned up to 11 and it presents a visceral world that keeps you braced for something terrible yet to come. At some points I thought the sound and the score might’ve tried a little too hard to push the drama of a scene, but they played a big part in shaping it as well. Ultimately, as the film rises to its peaks the sound really stands out in delivering the drama of each scene.Continue reading →
When countless individuals sat down to read Rick Warren’s The Purpose Driven Life with some chardonnay and oversized Snuggies, they likely did so with a sense of cautious enthusiasm and understandable desperation. Who, honestly, would not want to discover how to make his or her life as meaningful as possible? Secular or not, human beings search for meaning. Laurence Fishburne’s vague philosophizing in The Matrix taught me that, on some level, everyone searches for truth. And, from what I’ve learned from Community‘s Jeff Winger about the search for truth, personal introspection seems like a good place to start. If I can’t know the truth about life, I can at least know the truth about myself, right?
Equipped with that half-baked logic, I propose that the following question can effectively serve as a lens through which to peer deep into your soul:
Which film director would direct your life?
Observant readers will note that I used “would” instead of other possible auxiliary verbs. This diction suggests, among other things, that your life harmonizes with the style of a particular director so well that that director would have no choice but to direct your life. That director is your soul mate, your spirit animal, your emotional doppelganger. To pick your director, you must know yourself. This is where the introspection begins.
Some matches may be obvious. If you appreciate calculated violence, targeted monologues (mostly about violence), and looking in car trunks (or out of them), then Quentin Tarantino would direct your life. Wes Anderson would direct the lives of those who prefer quirkysymmetry (meaning lives that feature chaotic naïveté over backdrops of security and comfort). And Ang Lee would direct your life if it is filled with frustrating beauty—an aesthetically pleasing pain, as if the beauty highlights the acuteness of your angst.
Some directors are difficult to categorize. The following paragraphs explain several brilliant directors and their ideal matches.
Kathryn Bigelow often showcases the struggles and consequences associated with fierce individuality. Her protagonists are alone against the world, whether that world is symbolized as a bomb, a looming nuclear war, or Osama bin Laden. Her emotional doppelgängers are strong-willed, almost hard-headed individuals who believe that, ultimately, one truly significant accomplishment can overshadow an entire life filled with loneliness and skepticism.
If Sam Mendes directs your life, you fall into one of two categories: you are either a somewhat weathered renegade who fights for the greater good, or you live in the suburbs. And, as odd as it sounds, those two categories are closely linked. Like extended narrative versions of “Rockin’ the Suburbs” by Ben Folds, movies like American Beauty, Revolutionary Road, and Away We Go highlight the hopelessness of suburbia. Oscar-winner American Beauty combines the bleak social commentary of Paul Thomas Anderson and the unfiltered angst of Blink-182. Reframed as an inner-city spy version of Lester Burnham, James Bond becomes a stark symbol of the middle-class’s struggle against oppressive systems. To pick Sam Mendes as your life’s director, you must bounce between extremes of against-the-odds hopefulness and utter despair. You get to decide which wins: your hope (James) or your despair (Lester).Continue reading →
For a movie that prides itself on yippee-ki-yay-style action, A Good Day to Die Hard is well-peppered with awkward one-on-one dialogue. The new Die Hard movie has the usual explosions, gunfights, and cliched one-liners—writers replaced John McClane’s usual “I’m too old for this” catch phrases with the more original, “I’m on vacation!”—but those scenes are just toppings on a cake of weird conversations and unnecessary interactions.
The relationship between John McClane and his son, Jack McClane, is like the relationship between Bradley Cooper and Robert De Niro in Silver Linings Playbook, except without the emotional nuance and Oscar-nominated performances. Both films contain strained father-son relationships. Both pairs have communication problems. In the opening scenes of A Good Day to Die Hard, John disrupts an elaborate rescue mission by attempting to manufacture heart-to-hearts amid gunfire and car chases. McClane’s journey toward suburban-style parenting is a long one, and his son is more understanding that he should be. More understanding than I was.
While John and Jack gushed about guns and feelings, I imagined what the movie would be like if it really were a blend of Die Hard and Silver Linings Playbook.
John McClane: “Just sit down, come on. Help turn the juju around. The CIA is stupid.”
Jack: “What? Stupid? How is—you know what? Excelsior.”
John McClane: “What the f*** is ‘excelsior’?”
Jack: “You know what I’m gonna do? I’m gonna take all this negativity, and I’m going to use it to find a silver lining. I’ll be the best CIA agent ever. Better than Tony Mendez.”
I’d watch that movie. Die Hard Playbook. At least that movie would better analyze the father-son dynamic that Die Hard both highlights and under-develops. And maybe it would feature a Carter–Danny hybrid, a character played by Chris Tucker who would wisecrack his way into dangerous situations and then sweet-talk his way to freedom. And Jennifer Lawrence would be there. So many possibilities.
I loved 
When countless individuals sat down to read Rick Warren’s 
Observant readers will note that I used “would” instead of other possible auxiliary verbs. This diction suggests, among other things, that your life harmonizes with the style of a particular director so well that that director would have no choice but to direct your life. That director is your soul mate, your 
Some directors are difficult to categorize. The following paragraphs explain several brilliant directors and their ideal matches.
Big B and Mo' Money 