This animated series was an MTV oddity, televised between 1991 and 1994 in a blur of non-linear, ambiguous chunks. We talk about how creator Peter Chung got this made while inserting symbolic references to the limits of 1990's storytelling. We also wonder why we're so nostalgic for a simpler time when our entertainment was more nebulous and weird.

Interested in the media we discussed this episode? Please support the show by purchasing it through our affiliate store:

• Aeon Flux

Additional Resources:

• Aeon Flux: All You've Ever Needed From Sci-Fi
• SOUND Interview with Peter Chung
• The Peter Chung Interview!!!!
• Aeon Flux: An animated future from the past
• We Don't Need Another Live-Action Aeon Flux
• Peter Chung On Aeon Flux
• Marin, R., & Gegax, T. T. (1995). Holy Akira! It's Aeon Flux. Newsweek, 126(7), 68.
• http://scf.usc.edu/~huntleym/itp104/assignment6/mainpage.html
• CRAIG MATHIESON. (2006, June 23). Will the real Aeon Flux please stand up. Age, The (Melbourne), p. 9.
• Atkinson, M. (1996). Inside aeon. Film Comment, 32(1), 20.

This 1975 children's book by Roald Dahl is about class conflict and an idealized relationship between a child and their parent. We talk about Dahl's notoriously disagreeable personality while trying to reconcile it with this genuinely joyful story.

Interested in the media we discussed this episode? Please support the show by purchasing it through our affiliate store:

• Danny, The Champion of the World

Additional Resources:

• Roald Dahl. By: Kelleghan, Fiona, Salem Press Biographical Encyclopedia, 2018
• Danny the Champion of the World Summary & Study Guide
• The Ambiguities of Growing Up: Danny the Champion of the World
• https://www.roalddahl.com/roald-dahl/stories/a-e/danny-the-champion-of-the-world
• Words & pictures. Creative Review, 02621037, Mar2012, Vol. 32, Issue 3
• THE CANDY MAN. By: Talbot, Margaret, New Yorker, 0028792X, 7/11/2005, Vol. 81, Issue 20
• Roald Dahl. By: Lee, Stephan, Entertainment Weekly, 10490434, 10/10/2014, Issue 1332
• Worlds of WONDER. By: DORN, JENNIFER, British Heritage, 01952633, May2014, Vol. 35, Issue 2
• The first Roald Dahl approved BFG illustration is whizzpopping

This 2017 graphic novel is a memoir about growing up, figure skating, and coming out of the closet. We talk about how Walden approached the project with guidance from her editor while we look at the comics industry as a whole and the tensions between the book market and the direct market.

Interested in the media we discussed this episode? Please support the show by purchasing it through our affiliate store:

• Spinning

Additional Resources:

• Tillie Walden on the Queer Characters and Emotional Turmoil of Her New Comic, I Love This Part
• "Everything I Had to Say about My Life Is in That Book": An Interview with Tillie Walden
• How LGBT Ice Skating Graphic Novel 'Spinning' Defies Definition
• Tillie Walden: That In-Between State
• Spinning's Tillie Walden on the Power of Pursuing and Ending Childhood Dreams
• Women make history, and receive overdue recognition, at 2018 Eisner Awards
• 'Spinning' is a heartfelt graphic novel about figure skating and teen life
• Surprising New Data Shows Comic Readers Are Leaving Superheroes Behind
• All-Ages Week: The Direct Market vs. The Book Market

This 2018 concept album is about reckoning, celebrating, and reclaiming what it means to be American. We discuss how Monáe uses her platform to advocate for queer and black women while working with big record labels to also produce commercial success.

Interested in the media we discussed this episode? Please support the show by purchasing it through our affiliate store:

• Dirty Computer

Additional Resources:

• Janelle Monáe Bends More Than Gender In Two New Videos From 'Dirty Computer'
• Why Janelle Monae's 'Dirty Computer' Film Is a Timely New Sci-Fi Masterpiece
• Why Janelle Monáe Put Her Music on Hold to Take Hollywood by Storm
• Prince apparently wrote the synth line on Janelle Monáe's new single
• How Janelle Monáe Found Her Voice
• Janelle Monáe On Her Dirty, World-Dominating Year
• Unpacking the meaning of 'Dirty Computer,' in which Janelle Monáe finally gets to be herself
• Janelle Monáe on the meaning of "Dirty Computer" and what she promised her grandmother

This is a special repost of the first episode of our Patreon-only series, SuperKINGcontext.

Stephen King's first novel was adapted into this 1976 cautionary movie about adolescence, bullying, and female representation by a team of middle-aged men. How does the male gaze impact this story that is so often referred to as "feminist"?

Interested in the media we discussed this episode? Please support the show by purchasing it through our affiliate store:

• Carrie

Additional Resources:

• https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/apr/04/carrie-stephen-king-horror
• https://web.archive.org/web/20000510093031/http://www.briandepalma.net/carrie/carrint.htm
• http://www.vulture.com/2013/10/pj-soles-reminisces-about-the-original-carrie.html
• https://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/nov/03/carrie-stephen-king-brian-de-palma-horror-films-feminism
• https://cinephiliabeyond.org/four-decades-later-brian-de-palmas-carrie-stands-one-capably-crafted-horror-films-time/
• https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/10474858/Carrie-the-growing-pains-of-a-horror-classic.html
• https://sites.google.com/site/cultoddities/home/carrie/carrie-1976/press/sissy-spacek-interviews
• https://birthmoviesdeath.com/2016/11/03/carries-prom-scene-an-oral-history-part-one
• https://birthmoviesdeath.com/2016/11/04/carries-prom-scene-an-oral-history-part-two

This political comedy podcast makes over a million dollars a year from its Patreon subscribers alone. We try to unpack how it gets made while learning more about the personal values associated with the "dirtbag left."

• Chapo Trap House podcast on Soundcloud

Additional Resources:

• Meet Chapo Trap House: The Funniest and Most F**ked Up New Podcast About Media and Politics
• THE RADICAL CHEEK OF 'CHAPO TRAP HOUSE'
• Chapo Trap House are the Vulgar, Brilliant Demigods of the New Progressive Left
• Explaining the 'Chapo Trap House' Podcast to the Uninitiated
• Liberals are making bank on a site called Patreon. The right calls it "hipster welfare."
• What Will Become of the Dirtbag Left?
• Is This the Stupidest Book Ever Written About Socialism?
• Chapo Trap House subreddit quarantined for allegedly encouraging violence
• SOCIALISM IS BACK, AND THE KIDS ARE LOVING IT. Reason. Aug/Sep2019, Vol. 51 Issue 4, p55-52. 4p. 2
• 'The Voice of the Dirtbag Left': socialist US comics Chapo Trap House
• Chapo Trap House: Socialism for the Extremely Online

This 2015 comic mixes folklore and magic with science and technology. We discuss how each creator brings their own experimentation to the project, and how it's been received by the comic book industry and its more philosophical readers.

Interested in the media we discussed this episode? Please support the show by purchasing it through our affiliate store:

• Injection

Additional Resources:

• Warren Ellis' Freaky Scifi Comic Series Injection Gets Optioned for TV
• Exclusive Interview with Injection's Warren Ellis
• INTERVIEW: Warren Ellis talks about 'Injection' without crying
• AN INJECTION OF WARREN ELLIS IN THIS EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
• Matt Chats: Declan Shalvey on Wolverine, Injection, Learning from Scripting Comics, and Why He Brings up ArtCred Less
• What's at Stake with Warren Ellis's 'Injection'
• INJECTION #1 TALK WITH WARREN ELLIS, DECLAN SHALVEY & JORDIE BELLAIRE
• Take Control Of Your World: Revisiting 'Injection' By Ellis, Shalvey & Bellaire [Sci-Fi Week] Read More: Take Control Of Your World: Revisiting 'Injection' [Review]
• https://injectioncomic.tumblr.com/
• BELLAIRE & SHALVEY: ART & COLOR, WORKING IN CONCERT [GALLERY]
• INJECTION #2: LETHAL DECOMPRESSION [CLOSE READ]
• Haug H. The Alchemical Singularity: Magic and Technology in Warren Ellis's Injection. Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction. 2019;48(132):22

This collection of non-fiction essays attempts to define two modes of storytelling by providing examples of each from popular culture. We talk about how Fisher's argument fits into our larger discussions of horror stories and how his definitions may be useful for considering the end of capitalism.

Interested in the media we discussed this episode? Please support the show by purchasing it through our affiliate store:

• The Weird and the Eerie

Additional Resources:

• The Revolution Will Be Weird and Eerie
• Eugene Thacker – Weird, Eerie, and Monstrous: A Review of "The Weird and the Eerie" by Mark Fisher
• Making Sense of "The Weird and the Eerie"
• In Memoriam: Mark Fisher
• why we quit: tariq goddard on leaving zero books
• Toward a Theory of the New Weird

Thank you to our Co-producer patron Kevin Wetter for selecting this week's topic!

This 2009 TV show, helmed by Joss Whedon, was meant to be a thematic exploration of identity and sexuality but many have argued about its problematic story. Was that because of corporate interference or Whedon's own issues with feminist representation?

Interested in the media we discussed this episode? Please support the show by purchasing it through our affiliate store:

• Dollhouse, Season 1

Additional Resources:

• Adams, Pippa. Women in Science Fiction: Opportunities and Constraints of Representations in Postfeminist Worlds
• Joss Whedon on Comic Books, Abusing Language and the Joys of Genre
• JOSS WHEDON TALKS FIREFLY, DOLLHOUSE AND LEAVING TELEVISION
• The Mind-Transplant Script Whedon Wrote Before Dollhouse
• Anderson, D. (2016). Echoes of Frankenstein: Shelley's Masterpiece in Joss Whedon's Dollhouse and Our Relationship with Technology. Slayage, 43, 1
• Kitchens, J. (2016). Object Entanglements: From Postmodern Subjectivity to Posthuman Thingness in Joss Whedon's Dollhouse. Studies in Popular Culture, 38(2), 1.
• Rogers, S. (2011). Joss Whedon's Dollhouse and Joss Whedon's Dollhouse. Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts, 22(2), 153.
• Avni, S. (2008). Inside the Dollhouse. Mother Jones, 33(6), 88–89.
• Jensen, J. (2008). Welcome to the "Dollhouse" Fan Frenzy. Entertainment Weekly, (997), 14.
• The Expired Feminism of Joss Whedon
• In defence of Joss Whedon's Dollhouse
• Joss Whedon's Dollhouse: Confounding Purpose, Confusing Identity, edited by Sherry Ginn, Alyson R. Buckman, Heather M. Porter
• • "Fantasy Is His Business, but It Is Not His Purpose" by Alyson R. Buckman
• The Fascinating No-Consent Fantasia of Dollhouse and Mad Men
• POSTMORTEM: WHY WE HATED DOLLHOUSE. AND WHY WE LOVED IT.

THIS IS A REPOST OF A 2016 EPISODE. As the release of the film JOKER looms, we revisit our discussion about Batman, the Joker, and ambiguity.

Looking back on the Batman film "The Dark Knight," does it stand for anything? Or does it simply soak up whatever morals we bring to it? Christopher Nolan's intentions remain mysterious, but we do our best to figure them out.

Interested in the media we discussed this episode? Please support the show by purchasing it through our affiliate store:

• The Dark Knight

Additional Resources:

• JOHNSON, V. (2014). 'It's What You Do that Defines You:' Christopher Nolan's Batman as Moral Philosopher. Journal Of Popular Culture, 47(5), 952. doi:10.1111/jpcu.12181
• The Dark Knight of the American Empire
• Hunting The Dark Knight : Twenty-First Century Batman. London: I.B.Tauris
• Dive Deep Into the Making of Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight Trilogy With This Documentary