The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more

TV Review: Shameless, season 6

TV #25 of 2020:

Shameless, season 6

I generally wind up feeling more generous towards a year of Shameless as it approaches its endgame, and that’s definitely true again here. The beat-by-beat legwork of the plotting can be a tad shaky — it feels like we’re told Ian has his mental illness under control, for instance, rather than seeing actual evidence of that struggle — but we know the Gallaghers and their associates well enough at this point to feel invested as certain developments come to a climax.

I’ve had a harder time than usual with the beginning of this season, however, with its profoundly-misguided storylines like Carl imitating a stereotypical black gangster or the new character played by Will Sasso yelling about torturing and killing his lesbian neighbors for would-be comic relief. This show will always live up to its title in pursuing the outrageous, but these writing choices are more lazy than daring, aiming for an easy lowest-denominator laugh rather than attempting anything complicated in a distinctive voice.

I also have basic issues with the verisimilitude of too many of the scenarios in this particular run. As a dramedy that embraces its comic side, the series is entitled to some cartoonishness in logic, but there are weird inconsistencies in how even the more serious angles are set up. Why is a college sophomore (?) being given the research, teaching, and grading responsibilities of a grad student? Why do people on the poverty line we’ve seen struggle to pay their bills suddenly not seem to care when they lose huge sums of cash? Why does a promising eviction plot get walked back almost immediately? Why exactly does a young girl want to become a teen mom?

If the trajectory of this season had been reversed, I could see myself quitting in disgust over how ridiculous it had all grown. But, somewhat against my better judgment, I find that the program has instead recovered enough to rope me back in. Sigh. I’ll keep watching, at least for now.

[Side note: I don’t typically comment on promotional poster / cover art, since that’s an entirely separate creative process, but honestly… what on earth is going on here?]

★★☆☆☆

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Book Review: The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien

Book #154 of 2020:

The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien (The Lord of the Rings #3)

This conclusion to the classic fantasy trilogy probably has too much falling action after the main stakes are resolved, and its treatment of the anonymous hordes of dark-skinned humans who rally to the banner of evil may represent author J. R. R. Tolkien at his most racist. But it’s nevertheless a powerful piece of epic storytelling that stands the test of time, full of bold heroics and poignant farewells. Eowyn’s character arc also helps alleviate the lack of significant female roles in the preceding volumes, although this remains a saga that’s overwhelmingly focused on the deeds of men.

The Return of the King continues the dual-narrative approach of The Two Towers, but I think it works better here to spend so long without checking in on Frodo and Sam, given that we’ve left them in a state of immediate peril and are witnessing struggles that connect with theirs quite closely. The other members of the fellowship are actively trying to draw their enemy’s attention away from Mordor, and there’s genuine suspense over the outcome, as when the Mouth of Sauron taunts them that the pair has been discovered. The plotting justifies the stylistic choice to present one strand in its entirety first, which could before seem pretty arbitrary.

And despite the surprisingly early climax to the novel, I do love most of the extended denouement that follows — especially the Scouring of the Shire, an important component to Tolkien’s portrayal of the costs of war — as well as the inventive decision to never depict Lord Sauron directly. I suspect it’s one of the reasons this series feels so archetypal and has proven so influential in its genre, in that it doesn’t need a supreme villain personality to effectively challenge the protagonists. Like the depth of the writer’s worldbuilding, the ultimate internality of the respective quests bears witness to the enormous effort that has gone into crafting this tale.

In the end I still prefer the simpler charms of The Hobbit to these more-famous sequels, but I’m rather pleased in this reread to discover how much richer the later books are than I had recalled.

This book: ★★★★★

Overall series: ★★★★★

Individual rankings: 1 > 3 > 2

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Movie Review: 13th (2016)

Movie #9 of 2020:

13th (2016)

A decent overview of how America has continued to marginalize its black population after the abolition of slavery, first through discriminatory Jim Crow laws and now via mass incarceration that disproportionately targets African-American men. I particularly appreciate the insights into the corporate interests keeping the growing prison system full, and the reminder that felony convictions also determine who can vote to have a say in our government representation.

On the other hand, I’m not a big fan of this style of documentary made up of so many talking-head interviews, especially when, as in this case, they are not consistently labeled with a reminder of who each speaker is. Because it’s drawing clips from so many different conversations, the overall narrative of the piece is a little disjointed, and the film’s length keeps it from the level of detail seen in books like Stamped from the Beginning or The New Jim Crow. Still, if you’re trying to learn more about the topic of modern U.S. race relations in the space of a couple hours, this movie could be a good resource.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: Ghost Squad by Claribel A. Ortega

Book #153 of 2020:

Ghost Squad by Claribel A. Ortega

I simply adore the Dominican-American family at the heart of this fantasy novel, most of whom are spirits of the dead that only twelve-year-old Lucely can see. To everyone else they appear as fireflies, as per the #ownvoices folklore that author Claribel A. Ortega is drawing upon, and I love that no one ever doubts the protagonist about the ghosts’ reality, an empowering writing choice that also avoids any tedious scenes spent convincing a skeptic. When you add in a charming spooky adventure and a great sense of the St. Augustine setting, the result is something like a middle-grade Maggie Stiefvater — or perhaps an American Diana Wynne Jones — full of fun characters, familial squabbling, and atmospheric spellcraft. I would have maybe preferred fewer of the offhand and unexplained Harry Potter references that pepper this story, but that’s a minor complaint compared to how enjoyable I’ve found the book overall.

[Content warning for anxiety attacks and threat of losing a house.]

★★★★☆

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Movie Review: Hamilton (2020)

Movie #8 of 2020:

Hamilton (2020)

A Broadway recording like this — taped back in 2016, but only released now for Disney’s streaming service — could be a tricky property to rate / review. After all, are we judging the dialogue and songs for the show itself? The performers in this particular staging of it? Or the quality of it as a filmed movie, separate from all of that? Luckily we can avoid the issue here, as Hamilton is pretty fantastic on all those fronts.

Lin-Manuel Miranda’s genius vision of ‘America then told by America now’ is basically a cultural institution at this point, but watching this new film makes it all feel fresh again. That auteur creator took a dense Founding Father biography and spun it into musical gold, singlehandedly writing the music, lyrics, and book and starring in the title role. It’s a brilliant reimagining, and Miranda is joined by an original cast who’s no less talented or hilarious. They’re a joy just to hear on the soundtrack for the play, and getting to actually see them act it out adds all sorts of further dimensions in body language, set design, choreography, and more that couldn’t be present in the audio alone.

I’ve seen the show twice before in person, including once with this exact cast, and every bit of that live theater experience carries over for the movie. If anything it’s almost improved, as the close-ups and dynamic camera angles situate us even nearer to the action than an auditorium seat ever could. I love that Lin has championed this method of bringing his work to the masses, much as he raffled off a number of $10 tickets to each performance that allowed folks like me in the door.

Anyway… Hamilton is outstanding as an album, as a stage production, and now as a film, and I can’t think of a better way to usher in this year’s Independence Day than by giving it your time.

★★★★★

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Book Review: Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor by Layla F. Saad

Book #152 of 2020:

Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor by Layla F. Saad

This short antiracism tract provides some handy definitions and examples, splitting the broad problem of white supremacy into more specific interconnected issues of privilege, fragility, complicit silence, and so forth that (white) readers can identify and address in our own thought processes and actions. It’s presented as a workbook with prompts for 28 days of reflective journaling, although I confess that I instead listened to the audiobook straight through — a behavior that author Layla F. Saad explicitly calls out as less helpful.

With that caveat, I do have some qualms about this overall project, which began life as a viral Instagram challenge before getting picked up for publication. The book is largely being marketed to U.S. audiences and speaks to some dynamics that are specific to this country, yet Saad is a Qatari writer who admits to never having lived in North America herself. She’s also a bit too insistent on her own program here as the only way for people to take a stand against bigotry, which comes across as self-promotional snake oil at times. And of course, the whole idea that individual choices can meaningfully alter the entrenched institutions of racism is pretty suspect — thinking about these discriminatory patterns and seeking to unlearn them is the moral approach for a private person to take, but it’s far from clear how that’s meant to trickle up and actually change the world.

I’m struggling with whether these critiques are born of the exact white defensiveness that Saad talks about in these pages, and I don’t want to dismiss her voice in the ongoing conversation on race. Take my comments with a grain of salt, but I personally haven’t found this to be the most effective example of its genre.

★★★☆☆

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TV Review: The Good Wife, season 3

TV #24 of 2020:

The Good Wife, season 3

The third year of this law drama is its best one yet, and not only because it finally acts upon the romantic will-they-won’t-they dimension that’s mostly lingered in the background subtext for the first two seasons. There’s also the smart writing decision to bring Eli’s crisis management business in-house at Alicia’s firm, which both displays that political operator in a new light and allows him to more fully interact with the rest of the cast. One of The Good Wife’s strengths is its constantly-growing universe of interesting figures across the Chicago legal landscape, and it’s always a joy when the program finds a way to bring two of them together for the first time, as happens repeatedly throughout this particular run.

The main storyline is also better realized, with the investigation into Will’s shady past and subsequent power struggle among the other partners deeply rooted in personalities and histories that we’ve seen develop over time. On paper the intrigue is not all that different from the somewhat bloodless Derrick Bond maneuvering of the year before, but it tends to play out more as the specific characters driving the plot, rather than the other way around. We also get to witness a realistically gradual evolution in Cary reconciling with his former colleagues, one of the rare instances when the long seasonal episode counts work in the narrative’s favor. (The slow thawing of the heroine’s relationship with her old friend Kalinda progresses similarly.) And always and forever, the series continues its exploration of the uneasy dynamics behind using personal connections for professional gain and vice versa.

There’s not always much movement to these arcs from week to week, but everything goes off like fireworks when the threads come together for episodes like “Another Ham Sandwich.” And even when individual hours carry little forward motion, they continue the show’s habit of finding new and distinctive fashions in which to present its cases, from panel review to arbitration to proving a mistrial and beyond. That alone keeps The Good Wife from ever growing stale, even aside from its other considerable charms.

★★★★☆

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Book Review: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë

Book #151 of 2020:

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë

This 1848 novel is a neat early tale of women’s liberation, and one I was not expecting to have such sparklingly funny dialogue throughout. The comedy of manners doesn’t occlude the impact of the heroine leaving her abusive husband — although it makes it easy to sometimes forget that that’s the main thrust of the narrative — and overall author Anne Brontë balances the various tones of her text well. These characters can be a tad ridiculous, but the gravity of Helen’s situation is never treated as a joke.

The only real sore spot for me is when the narrator mistakes a friend’s intentions towards the titular tenant and proceeds to beat him bloody and leave him for dead on the side of the road, a fairly shocking act that is forgiven and forgotten far too quickly in my opinion. It fits with a general pattern of this protagonist leaping to all sorts of outrageous conclusions on the flimsiest evidence, and could have been a wake-up call for him to start improving on that front, but instead it’s just an odd impulse that never really gets examined.

Still, for a Victorian treatise on morality that draws back the veil on household turmoil and unequivocally takes the side of the alienated wife, it’s a pretty remarkable publication.

★★★★☆

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Book Review: Coming of Age in Jim Crow DC: Navigating the Politics of Everyday Life by Paula C. Austin

Book #150 of 2020:

Coming of Age in Jim Crow DC: Navigating the Politics of Everyday Life by Paula C. Austin

Interesting but far too brief, with the whole first third of the text a dry academic overview of author Paula C. Austin’s archival source material. In the rest of the book, she brings the late 1930s to life and presents not merely the racist structures governing young African-Americans in the nation’s capital, but also how those youths understood and agentively constructed their own social realities. Drawing on sociological interviews of the time, Austin crafts an ethnography enlightened by the words of her (not-that-)long-ago subjects, and reminds us how a segregated underclass can still make active choices. I only wish there were more substance to the finished result.

[Content warning for discussion of rape.]

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: A Song Below Water by Bethany C. Morrow

Book #149 of 2020:

A Song Below Water by Bethany C. Morrow

This 2020 YA novel has so much to say about contemporary racism and sexism (and their intersection, sometimes called misogynoir), and I could see it both validating the experiences of some readers and providing others a valuable window into their lives. From school microaggressions over haircare, to the outrageously deadly peril of a ‘routine’ traffic stop, to the #BlackLivesMatter rallies imploring the nation to “Say Her Name,” this story puts the concerns of its African-American teen heroines front and center and insists that we acknowledge their pain.

It’s also a book about a girl who’s a siren and her adopted sister who thinks she might be a mermaid, and I struggle to reconcile this heightened escapist aspect of the text with its harsh realities alluded to above. There’s a subtle point here that only sirens are viewed with fear whereas other magical people are celebrated, but the idea of a world so similar to ours yet openly populated with the supernatural isn’t delivered with enough conviction for me to ever wholly buy into it. I also feel like the rules behind the setting’s mythology need to be a lot clearer, in order for certain developments to land with their intended impact.

Still, the characters are fierce and fiercely loyal, and it’s easy to root for them even while not completely understanding the stakes (which I suppose is another lesson in and of itself). If an urban fantasy spin on The Hate U Give sounds up your alley, you may well enjoy this one more than I have.

★★★☆☆

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