Tag Archives: current events

Oscars Quest ’26: The Best Documentary Short Film Nominees

February 25, 2026 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Craig and Brent Renaud sitting before a camera introducing themselves. Posters of their documentary work hang behind them.

Craig and Brent Renaud, brothers and journalists.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: Oscars Quest ’26 continues! Once again we see how many among the latest wave of Academy Award nominees I can catch before the big ABC ceremony on March 15th, including all the shorts we’d never heard of before the Academy brought attention to them.

Each year since 2009 (except for 2021’s pandemic lockdown marathon) I’ve ventured out to the few Indianapolis theaters carrying the big-screen releases of the Academy Award nominees for Best Live-Action Short Film and Best Animated Short Film. Results vary each time and aren’t always for all audiences, but I appreciate the opportunities to sample such works and see what the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences deemed worthy of honoring, whether I agree with their collective opinions or not.

Then there’s the Best Documentary Short Film collection, which gets treated like the black sheep of the trilogy and wasn’t even exhibited in Indy until the dedicated cineastes at Kan-Kan Cinema began carrying them a few years ago. I’ve usually skipped those and settled for trying to stream as many of those nominees as I legally could. That worked out to 100% completion for me exactly once; otherwise, there’s always a holdout or two that thwart me and aren’t legally available anywhere online until months after the Oscars telecast. Time and again, I fail to complete my scorecard before deadline and I heap shame upon myself.

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“No Other Land”: The Oscar Nominee THEY Didn’t Want You to See

February 23, 2025 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Movie poster in a black case hanging on an exterior brick wall. Poster image is a young Palestinian man fallen on a rocky plain and a bulldozer parked on the distant horizon.

Now playing in 54 theaters this weekend, as opposed to Captain America 4‘s 4,100+ screens.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: Oscar Quest ’25 continues! Once again we see how many among the latest wave of Academy Award nominees I can catch before the big ABC ceremony, assuming the filmmakers can afford a release wide enough to reach us Midwest film fans in time.

As of February 17th my Oscar Quest scorecard was down to the final five unseen works, all of which I’d assumed would remain out of my grasp for the rest of the season. Then up stepped Indy’s own Kan-Kan Cinema, an eclectic nonprofit who frequently hosts tiny new films that the major chains overlook or think aren’t worth their time and space, because they really really need a dozen screens showing Dog Man for the rest of the year. Of all our theaters, I should’ve known they’d be the first (and as of this weekend the only one) to jump at the chance to bring us No Other Land. In a true rarity for recent Oscar history, it was nominated for Best Documentary Feature without a preexisting distribution deal. The filmmakers themselves have had to foot the bills for a slow rollout because all the studios passed on it (major and minor), possibly because it contains that magic hot-button word guaranteed to start a riot whenever it’s dropped into a conversation among two or more people: “Palestine”.

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There, I Voted and Ate My Vegetables, Now to Spend the Evening Unplugged

November 5, 2024 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Comic book cover: campaign button reading "Vote the People's Choice: Captain America for President!" His smiling face is on a flag background. The rest of the cover is yellow.

I was 8 when Cap declined the chance to run for President. Today I’d vote for him three times if I could.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: I’m an introvert, I suck at belonging to things, I don’t do sports or frats or hivemind collectives, I tend to be disqualified from group identification, and yes, sometimes I feel extremely sad about this weekly during Sunday church service. My misfit attitude — some of it my own fault, some of it everyone else’s — goes double for political parties. Were it up to me, all parties would be dissolved, everyone would be forced to deliberate their votes alone in a soundproof closet, and all candidates would be forced to run alone with no support system whatsoever, just their resume and their wits, exactly like any applicant for every ordinary job ever.

But I vote! Because I can and I should. I’ve voted in every Presidential election since 1992. I have never, ever been given the option to vote enthusiastically for a Presidential candidate who radiated wisdom through their every gaze and was demonstrably, empirically without sin. I’ll keep a light on for my future President Dulcinea, should they be born and ascend through the mud-slung ranks before I die.

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Our Modest View of the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse from Indianapolis

April 8, 2024 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , 2 Comments
Me doing jazz hands on our sidewalk while the eclipse looks like an ordinary sun overhead. Skies are bluish gray.

3:09 p.m. EDT: Darkened skies during the window of totality here in Indy.

First things first: no, we didn’t catch any super awesome photos of the total eclipse itself looking like a cosmic coffee ring or the old Armageddon teaser poster. 600 million Instagram users got you covered. You did check with them first, right?

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Top 10 Reasons Why Warner Brothers Canceled “Coyote vs. Acme”

November 12, 2023 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments
Wile E. Coyote answering an old-fashioned telephone whose cord is the only thing keeping him tethered to a cliff.

Wile E. Coyote on Friday getting the news from his agent.

All weekend long, rational onlookers with any shred of goodness in their hearts have been outraged at the news that Warner Bros. Pictures pulled the plug on what would’ve been a new Looney Tunes feature, Coyote vs. Acme. After spending five years and $70 million on the project — which combined animation and live-action, and would’ve starred Wile E. Coyote, the Road Runner, and John Cena — the company announced in an incoherent statement that they plan to concentrate on making films and this film didn’t qualify as a film. Or something. For want of a credible explanation, we’re 105% certain it’s another soulless tax write-off situation. Several folks involved in the production — including its director Dave Green, the editor, the composer, and the practical effects teams — have been sounding off about their collective heartbreak on social media and sharing tidbits from their work-spaces as evidence of What Might Have Been.

As usual, though, no one thinks of the billionaires. Sure, this act destroys WB’s integrity and signals to any and all actors and filmmakers that they have absolutely no reason to trust them as an employer ever again. Sure, audiences have no guarantee that they won’t give the same destructive treatment to other allegedly upcoming films like Dune: Part Two or the Joker sequel. Sure, this sends a heavy-handed message to James Gunn that they could do to Superman: Legacy what they did to Batgirl if he fails to satisfy their capricious whims. But wait! What if their boneheaded, pocket-lining, dismissive act of anti-art cruelty and complete waste of everyone’s creative efforts were remotely justifiable in any way to us, the non-lobotomized Viewers at Home? And what if they’re just too shy to be honest with us?

From the Home Office in Indianapolis, IN: Top 10 Reasons Why Warner Brothers Canceled “Coyote vs. Acme”:

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“Democracy, Democracy”: An Election Day Carol

November 8, 2022 By in Mundane Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Election Day Voting Sticker 2022!

Any resemblance between my Daredevil T-shirt and the Doomsday Clock, or any significance of placing my free “I Voted!” sticker at five minutes till, are largely incidental.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: I do the democracy thing twice a year (yes, even primaries) because I believe I ought to and because they keep letting me. I don’t recall why I didn’t post about it last year. Maybe society was to blame? Or maybe the reason was so dumb that I was counting on my aging brain to forget the reason why, just so I couldn’t blame myself for not writing about it I can’t recall, so maybe Past-Me’s plan worked. Politicians prefer long-term memory loss in their constituents anyway, so really this is just my brain getting into the spirit of the occasion.

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Five Miles Out from the Walmart Volcano

March 17, 2022 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Walmart volcano!

Lead photo by my wife Anne, who got wind of the event before I did.

I nearly called this “The Day They Nuked Walmart”, but that’s even less accurate and I’m told this isn’t a great moment in history to joke about nukes. One day nuke jokes shall make a comeback, possibly on my watch but not necessarily today.

What were we talking about? Oh, right, I didn’t mention it yet:

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Are We Cured Yet? Are We Cured Yet? Are We Cured Yet? Are We Cured Yet?

November 18, 2020 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
COVID-19 Vaccine!

“…but we might have some toilet paper and Clorox wipes left, if you ask nicely.”

“COVID-19 VACCINE NOT YET AVAILABLE” read the dual MS Word signs that have been hanging on the doors of our local Walgreens for at least a week, possibly longer. I can only imagine the conversation that sparked them, probably held a thousand times daily:

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Christmas in November

November 7, 2020 By in Mundane Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment
November joy!

Yes, it’s early, but hey, free speech.

This afternoon of November 7th, the Lord has blessed Indianapolis with 72 degrees of bright warmth in defiance of humanity’s calendar. Anne and I enjoy a sunny walk through a day that could have been darker like others around it.

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Last-Minute Cramming Before Election Day 2020

November 2, 2020 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Bobby Newport against crime!

Bobby Newport: the kind of simpleton America needs now more than ever. Or at least thinks it needs.

It’s that time again! Election Day is nigh, which might need to be mentioned to anyone outside America who was wondering why everything American and online intensified above and beyond our average 2020 levels of hysteria over the past few days. Whatever happens Tuesday and over the next several days as election staffers count ballots cast across a multitude of platforms and processes, America guarantees we won’t be dull to watch. Outsiders looking in may find themselves worn down by our emphatic, repetitive displays of all our worst concerns, fears, prejudices. and fiercest histrionics. If you stay tuned, we’ll have some cool toy commercials coming right up, we swear.

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Let’s (Not ALL) Go to the Movies: A Handy 4-Step Safety Guide (Safety Not Guaranteed)

September 27, 2020 By in Movies/Films/Flicks Tags: , , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments
AMC at Night!

What’s missing from this picture? The answers may not surprise you!

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: once upon a time I used to go to the movies a bit too often and write about my experiences. In 2020 I managed to catch Birds of Prey, The Invisible Man, and Onward on the big screen before the Age of Coronavirus slammed the doors shut on that hobby for the foreseeable future. On a related note, next January’s “Best and Worst Movies of the Year” entry should take me far less time to write than usual.

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The MCC Mighty Mask Try-On Haul!

August 30, 2020 By in Indiana, Mundane Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Marvel Heads Mask!

Me sporting a brand new Marvel Super-Heroes mask in a pandemic-era downtown parking garage as gray and uncaring as the year 2020 itself.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: it’s been over five months since I posted photos of my initial masking possibilities for navigating our broken pandemic world. At the time, masks weren’t yet mandated by state or city ordinances. They were simply among the best ideas for reducing your chances of catching The Virus, besides simply quarantining at home and bricking over all your doors and windows from the inside like a reverse “Cask of Amontillado”.

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The Least August of All Augusts

August 21, 2020 By in Mundane Tags: , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Wizard World Chicago 2020!

The formerly real Wizard World Chicago 2020 guest list, still happening this weekend in a much brighter timeline.

August has never been my favorite month under ordinary circumstances. Comics creator Evan Dorkin recently and accurately captured the essence in describing every August as “31 hot Sundays in a row”. Perfect description.

August has no major holidays and no whimsical minor holidays apart from fake internet ones. (I once created my own party-a-day August calendar, but no one supported this ambitious and deeply time-wasting endeavor.) Nearly all our local schools reopen, which means more traffic clogging up my daily commute. Temperatures soar to unpleasant levels. TV networks continue airing dross until the fall season’s starter pistol is fired. Movie studios run out of highly excitedly anticipated blockbusters and fill out their slates with second-tier products that should’ve gone straight to home video. Augusts would be a total waste of calendar space if not for the events humankind created to pass the time until September at least does us the kindness of bringing our next federally sanctioned three-day weekend.

Leave it to 2020, which is less like a year and more like a nonstop acid-rain thunderstorm over a minefield cursed by a cackling witches’ coven, to lay waste to any and all potential August plans and make the worst month even worst-er.

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Calculated and Recalculated Risks

August 6, 2020 By in Indiana, Mundane Tags: , , , , , , , , , 4 Comments
Before and After!

Even with clippers, with fullest safety measures observed it took a good thirty minutes to deescalate my hair status from Tom Waits to Bob Mould.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: among the many and varied complications arisen from the nonstop tension that is life during the interim normal, I went 5½ months between haircuts. I had hoped to go a full six months to round off that total, but when it came time for our 16th anniversary dinner, I decided to impress my wife with a seemingly heroic act of basic grooming.

It worked. Anne knows how jittery I’ve been lately and knows that I didn’t enter into it lightly. She’d gotten her own post-winter haircut a few weeks earlier and managed to avoid major illness, thanks in large part to the multitude of precautions taken on both sides of the salon cape. To an extent I was just following her lead. Haircuts shouldn’t need life-or-death deliberation, and yet here we are.

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Masked Riders: A Prologue to Our 2020 Road Trips

July 9, 2020 By in Indiana, Travel Tags: , , , , , , , , , 3 Comments
Muppet Seat Jazz Hands!

This is no ordinary theater. Those are no ordinary seats.

Whenever we look back on our 2020 vacation photos as we grow older, we will never, ever have to think long and hard to remember what year they were taken.

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Downtown, Distanced

June 30, 2020 By in Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , , 3 Comments
Social Distancing, Please!

Because we’re over three months into this catastrophe and some people still need practical advice.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: if your city’s like ours, and I know ours is, you had some protests and riots damaging your complacency back in May. Odds are you’re still seeing some combination of activity, activism, and/or action. Things seem quieter here in our own hometown of Indianapolis, though it could simply feel that way because local media have lost interest in encore performances and have moved on in their never-ending search for new hot topics to captivate audiences burned out on the old ones. In the daytime, at least, things have demonstrably calmed down.

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The Dawn of an All-New New Comic Book Day

May 22, 2020 By in Comics/Lit Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
New Comic Day 05-20-2020

This week’s fix.

In a week that’s been marred by weird illness symptoms (no, not THAT one), severe illness elsewhere in our family (no, thankfully still not that one), news of one distant relative’s recent death (it, um…it was that one), complicated cases at work, the monotony of internet outrage, and daily-routine malaise…it’s heartening whenever I spot signs of the Old Normal popping up, like a stray flower sprouting in a scorched field.

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Comics in My Future, Ever So Slightly

May 8, 2020 By in Comics/Lit Tags: , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Hawkeye Freefall set!

Those of us who’ve been patiently waiting to complete our sets of Matthew Rosenberg and Otto Schmidt’s five-issue miniseries Hawkeye: Freefall now have a conundrum on our hands. (All cover art by Kim Jacinto and Tamra Bonvillain, presumably including the itty-bitty one for #5.)

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: as a direct result of the ongoing and measurably non-resolved Coronavirus epidemic, Diamond Comics Distributors effectively shut down the comic book industry at the tail end of March, a temporary but unprecedented cessation that has vexed comic book shops worldwide and deprived habitual comics collectors such as myself of their weekly fixes of printed, single-issue graphic storytelling. We understood the decrees and the crisis at hand, but we lamented seeing a large portion of the medium paused in unison.

America’s 2200 remaining retailers, many of whom were already surviving on razor-thin profit margins, were justifiably nervous about their long-term financial stability through this era, whenever they weren’t too busy grappling with pervasive COVID-19 anxiety. Or with literal COVID-19, for all we know. Those shop owners thinking ahead wondered aloud: what happens if our customers’ habits are suspended for too long? What if deprivation begins to feel to them more like liberation? What do we do if the audience that had already been shrinking for years gets even tinier? Especially if too many of them are unemployed and can’t afford comics anymore?

Fantastic questions, those. I’m still mulling over my parts in some of those equations.

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Updates from the Interim Normal: Masks and Other Tasks

May 6, 2020 By in Indiana, Mundane Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment
Mask Black!

Our niece made us masks! Very sweet of her.

Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover, everything’s coming up COVID-19 worldwide:

…whenever we think we’ve settled down and the tension has eased as we’ve adapted to each change thrown at us, some knowledgeable authority or some know-nothing internet crank picks up a megaphone and bellows in our ears like William Dozier on ye olde Batman TV show, “THE WORST IS YET TO COME!”

The story is far from over — more so in other countries disproportionately hit by the Coronavirus disease. I’d rather not imagine what a “Chapter 2” for this post would look like. I have other things I’d much rather write about, but I’m skeptical as to whether anyone would take a break from refreshing their Coronavirus phone updates to glance at anything else. Frankly, I know the feeling.

We’ve been rolling with the changes. Anne is still working from our home library while I’m among the 3% of employees in my legally Essential company still driving to the office every day, handling critical in-person tasks so my coworkers can stay home. I’m weathering the indefinite suspension of the comic book direct market, which has given me an opportunity to dive into my gigantic backlog of unread books. To while away the hours between shifts we’ve doubled down on family game night, supported our local journalists and their greedy overlords, reminisced about restaurants, and discovered Zoom. We enjoyed a weekend of free HBO, found mixed results with a new streaming service, and, may the Lord have mercy upon us, withdrawn from Tiger King mania.

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The Last New Comics Day?

March 24, 2020 By in Comics/Lit, Indiana Tags: , , , , , , , , , 1 Comment
New Comics 03-25-2020!

New releases on my pull list for the week of March 25, 2020, a date I can hopefully forget someday.

As dimwitted youngsters insist spring break simply must go on, as certain stubborn governors take turns doing their macho impression of the mayor from Jaws, and as other top-ranking officials demand we all agree to hurry up and pretend everything is basically fine ASAP…it’s painfully obvious Americans hate change, hate being told what to do, hate self-control and self-restraint, hate hate hate when someone tells us we have to be patient, and intensely, passionately despise when the solution to a problem is “do what other countries did”. Like an insufferable teen rebel, we think we know best and we want to do things our way because, like, freedom an’ fun an’ whatnot.

Thousands of people are hospitalized. More will need the same as Coronavirus/COVID-19 testing becomes less of a unicorn-level rarity. Sacrifices are being made on innumerable levels. Nevertheless, idiocy continues to run nearly as rampant as the virus itself because the ramifications aren’t being grasped, the horrors are being downplayed, and the fatalities aren’t occurring four inches away from those in denial. That senseless obliviousness can’t last. Sooner or later this catastrophe will get to someone or something they do care about.

It might be major upheaval. And it might be the small stuff.

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