Simon Thompson delves into the career of Brian De Palma… Brian De Palma is a filmmaker whose career is a Rorschach ink blot for various commentators to project their own perceptions on. To some he’s a brilliant and daring master of suspense, an American Alfred Hitchcock, while to others he’s a cheap purveyor of sex […]
The Top 10 Star Trek: The Next Generation Episodes
Simon Thompson presents his picks for the best episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation… Anybody who knows me personally for any length of time knows that I’m a huge fan of Star Trek: The Next Generation, given that I never shut up about movies, TV shows, games, and books that I love in general. […]
The Top 10 Batman: The Animated Series Episodes
Simon Thompson presents his picks for the top ten episodes of Batman: The Animated Series… To describe Batman as a pop culture institution would, quite frankly, be an understatement. Ever since his creation by Bill Finger and Bob Kane (who it turns out took a tonne of credit and profit from his creative partner but […]
Ralph Bakshi: A Forgotten Pioneer
Simon Thompson takes a deep dive into the career of pioneering animated filmmaker Ralph Bakshi… This is only tangentially related to the topic at hand but I’m going to draw this parallel anyway; when the great American author Hubert Selby Jr died and a documentary was made about him and one of the talking heads […]
Incredible TV Shows That Were Cancelled Too Soon
Simon Thompson with ten great television shows that were cancelled too soon… Over a lifetime of watching TV shows, I’ve come to realise that television show life expectancy is the exact opposite of boxing. In boxing great fighters almost always continue when their best days are long behind them, but when it comes to TV […]
10 Great Movies About Making Movies
Simon Thompson presents ten great movies about making movies… The job of a filmmaker is one of great artistic fulfilment, but it is also a taxing, emotionally fraught line of work connected to a rapidly changing industry that is more often than not undergoing a great existential crisis over being about art or commerce. It […]
The Rise of John Carpenter: Maestro of Horror
Simon Thompson looks at the rise of John Carpenter and his peak years throughout the 1970s and 80s… Director, musician, and Master Roshi look-alike John Howard Carpenter is a living legend. Carpenter’s work has guided scores of creatives from filmmakers, to musicians, to writers, to illustrators and game designers – a legacy of which very […]
The Rise of Paul Thomas Anderson: A Living Legend
Ahead of One Battle After Another, Simon Thompson takes a deep dive into the rise of filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson… Paul Thomas Anderson is a filmmaker with a career that feels like a study in irony. He’s an arthouse filmmaker, but possesses Hollywood insider status, seemingly able to tell his stories even in the most […]
Ten Unmade Film Masterpieces
Simon Thompson looks at the story behind ten great unmade films… “What if…?” scenarios are something which truly gnaw at the human psyche, in almost every context. Socially, romantically, and professionally human beings constantly mull over things that they didn’t do or say, and how they would play it if they had a second chance […]
The Rise and Disappointing Disappearance of Director Richard Kelly
Simon Thompson looks at the rise and disappointing disappearance of filmmaker Richard Kelly… The paradox of being a talented independent film director is that if your work is deemed to be interesting and unique, eventually mainstream Hollywood will come along and try and co-opt it into being like everyone else’s. Kelly (and his contemporary Shane […]
