The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more

Book Review: Jewish Futures: Science Fiction from the World’s Oldest Diaspora edited by Michael A. Burstein

Book #46 of 2026:

Jewish Futures: Science Fiction from the World’s Oldest Diaspora edited by Michael A. Burstein

[Note: The cover of this book gives the subtitle as “Stories from the World’s Oldest Diaspora,” while the title page and listings online have it as “Science Fiction from…” instead.]

This 2023 Kickstarter-funded volume presents 16 new stories from Jewish authors imagining situations that might face the members of our common religious community in the decades or centuries to come. Some are bleak, including the opening entry “Shema” by Samantha Katz and the closing tale “The Last Chosen” by Jordan King-Lacroix, which each revolve around a single remaining Jew after some unspecified genocide. Others depict thriving populations facing familiar pressures of antisemitism in strange new locales, like Harry Turtledove’s “One Must Imagine” on a Martian outpost or Robert Greenberger’s “Legend Born” in an overcrowded colony-world refugee camp. Meanwhile my favorites tend to be those that find unexpected would-be converts that our practices would need to change in order to accommodate: inquisitive alien lifeforms in “Matzah Ball Soup for the Vershluggin Soul” by Randee Dawn, “The Ascent” by S. I. Rosenbaum and Abraham Josephine Riesman, and “The Aliens of Chelm: An Origin Story” by Valerie Estelle Frankel, and emergent artificial intelligences in Barbara Krasnoff’s “Baby Golem,” Leah Cypess’s “Frummer House,” and Shane Tourtellotte’s “The Kuiper Gemara.”

As with most such collections, the quality varies considerably from work to work. (I absolutely loathe “Mission Divergence” by E. M. Ben Shaul about an updated Iron Dome system for Israel, which is both poorly written / edited and rather insufferable in its uncritical full-throated Zionism.) Still, I really appreciate the overarching aim here of carving out a dedicated space for Judaism in a genre that often assumes minority faiths or even religion altogether will fall by the wayside as humanity marches on, and I think the results could be enjoyed by any sort of reader. This isn’t the first project to approach sci-fi through a specifically Jewish lens — the introduction highlights a few predecessors, all the way back to the similarly-focused Wandering Stars: An Anthology of Jewish Fantasy and Science Fiction from 1974 — but it’s certainly a welcome continuation of that trend.

[Content warning for gun violence and gore.]

★★★★☆

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Book Review: Last One Out by Jane Harper

Book #45 of 2026:

Last One Out by Jane Harper

Australian author Jane Harper typically excels at depicting the outback settings of her novels, but I don’t feel quite as struck by the location of this one, which takes place in a dying small town. The dynamic there is interesting, with a local mining company slowly but inexorably buying up everyone else’s property, but it’s all somewhat bloodless in execution. We don’t meet anyone who actually works for the mine, for instance, and while there are a few mysteries — most notably the fate of the heroine’s college-aged son, who vanished without a trace five years ago — there’s no sense of present danger or stakes at all.

It’s a decent enough story about characters feeling haunted by the failures and traumas and unanswered questions of the past, which reminds me a bit of True Detective among other things. But such tales generally offer more action than this one, in which the protagonist isn’t particularly investigating anything and largely just wanders around looking at the remnants of her former life for a few hundred pages. The quiet devastation in that is well-rendered, but it’s not exactly the most thrilling read. And when the genre-mandated twist reveals finally do arrive, still without much excitement or threat, that’s not especially satisfying either.

[Content warning for suicide and gore.]

★★★☆☆

TV Review: Tin Man, season 1

TV #14 of 2026:

Tin Man, season 1

This 2007 miniseries had been on my radar for a long while due to its great main cast, so I’m glad I finally tracked it down to watch it. (A quick note on that: the show is supposed to be three episodes of roughly 90 minutes each. A few platforms have it available as only two episodes of that length, and I saw people on Reddit saying they’re not just missing one; that’s a heavily trimmed-down version of the thing for some reason. I was ultimately able to find the originally-aired cut on Fawesome, which is a free streaming site I’d never even heard of before.)

As you can probably guess, this is a Wizard of Oz retelling of sorts, though a lot of its dystopian tweaks are pretty silly. Zooey Deschanel plays “D.G.”, our Kansas farmgirl, who travels through a magic tornado to a region of another world called the Outer Zone. (Get it?) There’s also a dose of Star Wars / Lord of the Rings monomyth in this, so she’s fleeing the armed soldiers who have interrupted her tranquil existence to send her on her hero’s journey to discover her hidden destiny, overthrow a despot, and save the day. Once on the other side she acquires the usual traveling companions, although I’m not sure why the tin man — here simply a slang term for a sheriff’s deputy, not a person made of metal — gets to be the title of the piece overall. My favorite spin on the familiar canon is that the reason the scarecrow figure is somewhat brainless is because the evil witch who rules the land has scrambled his memories to prevent him from using his genius inventions against her.

Our protagonist never mentions the similarities to the classic novel or film, which I assume means they don’t exist in her reality. On the other hand, she does later commune with the spirit of the real Dorothy Gale, who was apparently an ancestor of hers, which raises some unanswered questions about why their two stories parallel one another so closely.

Mostly, however, this is good family fun. The vibe reminds me a lot of The 10th Kingdom, another fantasy miniseries from around that time, and to a lesser extent the live-action Super Mario Bros. movie from 1993. The plot takes some bizarre turns and the budget feels a little threadbare throughout, but it’s definitely short enough that it doesn’t overstay its welcome.

[Content warning for gun violence.]

★★★☆☆

Movie Review: Creed II (2018)

Movie #14 of 2026:

Creed II (2018)

Rocky IV (1985) was the low point of the original Rocky movies, but it ended up representing an important piece of the backstory for the spinoff Creed (2015). As such, I suppose it’s fitting that this next installment in the saga continues to draw from that source, this time bringing back Balboa’s old Russian opponent Ivan Drago, killer of the newer hero’s father Apollo. We learn now that he’s lived in shame ever since his defeat in that older film, but he has a son he’s raised to follow in his footsteps and avenge the family name.

It’s kind of an odd premise — the Italian Stallion is long retired from boxing, and he only met and started training Adonis Creed a few years ago, so who exactly was the young Viktor going to fight if Donny hadn’t burst onto the scene and won his father’s old heavyweight title? But setting such logic aside, it’s a decent hook with clear built-in stakes for both generations, which is just what the sequel needed to push the story forward. It also helps that the plot follows the rough shape of Rocky III (1982), in that the protagonist initially loses the bout to his surprise challenger and then has to spend the remaining runtime rebuilding himself and finding a new fighting style to try it again.

Although this is a sports series, I usually prefer the moments outside the ring, as the various contests can feel repetitive and offer unclear reasoning for who succeeds beyond some nebulous concept like determination or heart. This one does better than most in that regard, paying closer attention to the strategy Balboa devises for his protege in the climactic rematch and how Creed executes it from round to round. Meanwhile in the latter’s personal life, he proposes to his girlfriend Bianca and starts raising a baby daughter with her, while Rocky eventually reconciles with his own estranged son Robert, as played by Milo Ventimiglia reprising his role from Rocky Balboa (2006). Dolph Lundgren likewise returns to his old character Ivan (as does Brigitte Nielsen as his wife Ludmilla), and the scenes with him squaring off against Sylvester Stallone carry the tangible weight of the decades since their last encounter.

Sly has said in interviews that this would be his last time playing the part he originated back in Rocky (1976), and Creed III (2023) did indeed go on without him. That’s a major turning point for the franchise, but if this really is the end for the old boxer, at least it provides a strong sendoff that firmly anchors Michael B. Jordan as a compelling lead in his place.

[Content warning for gore.]

★★★★☆

Book Review: The First Bright Thing by J. R. Dawson

Book #44 of 2026:

The First Bright Thing by J. R. Dawson

This novel has a lot of heart and a couple interesting ideas that unfortunately just don’t cohere together for me. The tone often feels like it was written with a middle-grade audience in mind, but it touches on some pretty heavy topics and includes a few scenes of graphic violence and gore that would likewise be a poor fit for many younger readers. On the other hand, the plot seems intended to pivot around a twist reveal at the 82% mark that’s so glaringly obvious as to be frankly insulting to an adult sensibility.

Spoilers ahead, but the story is told along two unfolding timelines, about ten years apart. In the present, a woman known only as “the Ringmaster” has the ability to teleport anywhere she imagines, which she uses to hide from “the Circus King,” whose gift is a sort of mind control that must be obeyed. Meanwhile in the past, two characters are falling in love: a man named Edward who can magically order anyone to do what he wants, and his partner Ruth who can instantly jump to any place in the world. Do you see where this is heading yet? Would it help if I mentioned that Edward’s last name is King? The belated confirmation is played like a grand cliffhanger revelation at the end of a chapter, though I can’t imagine any other possible reason for why we’d be following the flashback sequence if the two storylines weren’t going to end up connected in that way.

Clearly the cards should have been on the table all along, for one of the definite strengths of this piece is to engage with the idea of an abusive relationship through the safer lens of fantastical allegory, and the remaining space is too limited once that’s officially established in the text. As with certain enemy figures in the Graceling books or the show Jessica Jones, the villain’s power of command is both creepy and deeply traumatizing for his victims, as well as causing a steady erosion on his morality as he goes through life getting whatever he thinks to ask for. It’s privilege, and toxic entitlement, and gaslighting, and so many similarly sinister behaviors that one might find outside of fiction. So why pretend for so long that that isn’t what’s happening here?

Besides that conflict, our older heroine is navigating a distinctive point in history, midway between the First and Second World Wars. In fact, since she can travel in time as well as space, she’s aware of the larger trouble yet to come, and for a while is seeking a way to change events and prevent it. Theoretically this has further weight from her being #ownvoices Jewish and queer, although in my opinion that level of surface representation isn’t especially well-integrated into the work. The protagonist has a wife now — so did she ever truly love her ex? Did she have an awakening either before or after she left him? She mentions that doing her part to help fix the world is considered a mitzvah — but wouldn’t tikkun olam be a more precise concept to explore there? And so on.

It’s a shame, because I think there’s a great deal of squandered potential to this title. The found family vibes of radical acceptance are nice, if somewhat implausible for the era — multiple people use they/them pronouns without comment, for instance — and the setting is fun in an X-Men / Checquy Files / Miss Peregrine’s Peculiar Children kind of way, with a wide range of unusual talents on display for us. But such neat individual elements don’t add up to an enjoyable read overall when there’s so much frustrating dissonance in and around them.

[Content for racism, homophobia, antisemitism, alcoholism, gun violence, and suicide.]

★★☆☆☆

TV Review: Homicide: Life on the Street, season 2

TV #13 of 2026:

Homicide: Life on the Street, season 2

A very short season at only four episodes, reportedly because NBC wasn’t confident the series had enough of an audience to justify making any more of it. (Contrary to those concerns, the show would ultimately last for another five standard-length seasons, followed by a capstone film conclusion.) The network also again meddled with the production order, airing what was intended to be the finale at the start to better capitalize off a high-profile appearance from guest star Robin Williams. He’s joined by Wilford Brimley and Julianna Margulies as other notable visiting actors this year, along with a preteen Jake Gyllenhaal in one of his earliest roles.

Otherwise, not much has changed from the debut run. Our returning Baltimore detectives continue investigating murders in their community, in a police procedural spin that goes deeper into the main cast of characters, rather than following through every step of their investigations. A lot of time is spent in the interrogation room, including an electrifying scene where Andre Braugher, disgusted by himself but doing what the bosses apparently want, convinces an innocent suspect to confess to killing his friend by needling him over getting the victim involved in gang life in the first place.

It’s good stuff, but way too brief. Still, three-and-a-half stars rounded up sounds about right.

[Content warning for racism, gun violence, suicide, and gore.]

★★★★☆

Book Review: Half His Age by Jennette McCurdy

Book #43 of 2026:

Half His Age by Jennette McCurdy

There’s a raw edge in author Jennette McCurdy’s debut novel that makes sense if you’ve read her autobiography I’m Glad My Mom Died, adding up to some very striking passages illuminating a young protagonist who likewise doesn’t have the support structure of a caring parental figure that every child should. In this case it’s more neglect than outright abuse, but the end result is still a girl forced to grow up and shoulder adult burdens far too early in life.

Like the writer’s memoir, it’s an intentionally discomforting read. As our seventeen-year-old heroine embarks on an affair with her high school English teacher, her narrated perspective pushes us to see her as the obsessed initiator and him as the reluctant innocent. Objectively, of course, we know that he’s the responsible authority who holds all the blame here for creating the opportunity and not rejecting her juvenile advances firmly enough, but in her own mind, he’s the prize that she wants and gets for herself, the only thing besides her compulsive shopping habit that makes her feel a modicum of control. It’s a reverse Lolita of sorts, and McCurdy excels at crafting clinically unsexy descriptions of the ensuing sex, lest we think for one moment that the intent is to titillate.

All of this provides a great character study, but I don’t really love it as a full story. The plot is pretty repetitive, and there’s not much of an arc beyond the teenager gradually realizing just how tawdry the relationship is (and to a lesser extent, how her older lover has taken advantage of his power and status to manipulate her after all). No emotional climax ever kicks the drama into a higher gear, and no individual decisions stand out as particularly important ones. The eventual ending comes quickly and perfunctorily, at least in my opinion, with no real sense of lasting consequences for anyone’s actions. I’m not asking for a melodramatic soap opera, but this flat neutrality isn’t especially satisfying, either.

[Content for ableist slurs.]

★★★☆☆

Movie Review: KPop Demon Hunters (2025)

Movie #13 of 2026:

KPop Demon Hunters (2025)

Even after it won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature last night, I sort of assumed that this musical fantasy cartoon was being overhyped on the basis of its ubiquitous breakout track “Golden” (which also won Best Original Song). As it turns out, however, the rest of the film around that single is actually pretty great too, and the earworm itself is even better in the context of the full story.

I do wish the supporting characters and worldbuilding concepts were a little more fleshed-out, and I think the movie overall would have benefitted from a longer runtime. On the other hand, this is a picture aimed predominantly at younger audiences, and I can’t fault the main plot beats here. Our heroine Rumi is a singer in a popular vocal group and also a secret warrior against evil, which is a fun Buffy/Miraculous/Animorphs-meets-Hannah-Montana kind of premise even before we get the additional twist that she has demonic ancestry herself and is hiding that from her friends, whom she imagines would turn on her if they learned the truth. It makes for a neat allegory about queerness or self-harm or anything else that a person might want to keep private, and it builds to a transcendent moment when her armor is symbolically ripped away and she finds that her bandmates love her all the more once she’s able to share her whole identity authentically in front of them.

In the meantime there are villains in the form of a rival act who are demons in disguise, although their powers and exact motives are again a bit undefined and I’m not a big fan of how one of them is positioned as the morally-ambiguous romantic interest for the protagonist. (A young human falling for a centuries-old immortal has got to be one of my least favorite genre tropes, and though there are titles that manage to sell it reasonably well, this one doesn’t get there for me.) Still, their maneuvering back and forth whenever the cameras are off creates some nice bits of action comedy, and the soundtrack on both sides is full of catchy tunes that deliver solid emotional breakthroughs.

I’m not familiar enough with either K-pop or Korean culture in general to pick up on all of the background that’s clearly informing the production, but it all feels like such a specific #ownvoices perspective and body of reference material, which I always appreciate. The end result isn’t flawless, but it’s distinctive as heck and easily deserving of its various accolades.

★★★★☆

Movie Review: Creed (2015)

Movie #12 of 2026:

Creed (2015)

An unexpected franchise spinoff that swiftly establishes its own unique vision around a different protagonist played by an outstanding Michael B. Jordan. The Rocky movies ended for the natural reason of the titular character’s advancing age, and it was already silly in 2006, thirty years after his debut, to see him climbing into the ring again. This next installment wisely looks to a new generation instead, casting the 70-year-old Italian Stallion as the trainer and mentor figure he was initially supposed to be back in Rocky V, rather than a still-active boxer.

It’s a nice extension of his previous character arc, but the real genius of the film rests in the new hero that’s set up in his place. Adonis is the son of Rocky’s old friend Apollo Creed, but he was born out of wedlock and after the former champ had already died. As we see in the short prologue that launches this picture, he didn’t even know who his father was until the man’s widow found him as a child in a juvenile detention facility and offered to bring him home with her, and although there’s a resulting chip on his shoulder about the Creed name — which he at first rejects and is pressured into adopting professionally, before finally embracing it — the script offers no doubt that he’s the rightful inheritor of that legacy. He was a fighter even before learning the truth, and despite wanting to follow in Apollo’s footsteps now that he’s grown, he’s not trying to coast on someone else’s reputation.

To that end he moves from L.A. to Philadelphia, where he corners Balboa at his restaurant, reveals his identity, and asks the septuagenarian to train him. The scenes between the two of them are electric throughout, which is a particular achievement given that it’s all the brainchild of writer-director Ryan Coogler and his cowriter Aaron Covington, the first time that Rocky has been penned by anyone but Sylvester Stallone (or directed by anyone but him and John G. Avildsen). So Rocky starts training Don, who’s meanwhile falling for his cute neighbor played by Tessa Thompson, and their partnership gets media attention that soon provides the hotheaded athlete with his own chance to compete for a title championship.

There are the inspiring training montages you’d expect, but also a left-field lurch when Rocky is diagnosed with a serious cancer requiring immediate chemotherapy treatment. In the end he and Adonis push one another to keep fighting, and the climactic bout is as thrilling as anything from the original series. This Creed is neither Rocky nor Apollo, but he brings a young, modern energy that’s just what their story needed to continue on. He’s moreover a channel for Coogler’s meditations on Black culture and men who grow up fatherless, which is obviously a theme that none of the Balboa-centered predecessors could remotely have handled. Both stylish and fun, it’s almost automatically one of the better entries of its saga.

[Content warning for gore.]

★★★★☆

TV Review: Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, season 1

TV #12 of 2026:

Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, season 1

A reasonably successful merger of the larger Star Trek franchise with the rhythms of a CW-ish teen drama. This is a Discovery spinoff by means of Jett Reno and Admiral Vance in the supporting cast, but the main focus is on a small cohort of cadets (and their chancellor, played by Holly Hunter) who have genre-typical coming-of-age moments as they navigate their particular difficulties and learn to pull together as a team. It also features the holographic Doctor from Voyager and Prodigy as one of their teachers, although it never quite gets around to exploring what it’s been like for him to have survived the last eight centuries.

In truth, there’s a lot about the logic to the premise here that’s unfortunately underdeveloped. What exactly is the relationship between the central institution and the nearby War College, which seems to share some of its facilities and instructors? What drew our protagonists to join the one and not the other? What are their regular classes like, in between the inevitable crises? I’m often taken out of the action by such questions while watching, which is never a great sign for a program. (On the other hand, my favorite episode is the Deep Space Nine retrospective “Series Acclimation Mil,” which practically demands that you set all practicalities aside and yet soars regardless. So take this criticism with a grain of salt vampire, I suppose.)

As for the teens, well, they’re the nervous and hormonal bunch you might expect. Our primary viewpoint character is a streetwise criminal recruited from prison against his better judgement, who clashes nicely with a scenery-chewing Paul Giamatti as his archenemy but is otherwise a bit too prominent over the rest of the ensemble. There’s the resident Spock/Data/Odo/etc. outsider who doesn’t understand human emotions — in this case a bubbly photonic Black girl who quickly latches onto the Doctor for guidance — alongside an overachiever with daddy issues, a Klingon who eschews his people’s traditional violence, and so on. None of these archetypes are radically new for Trek, but the younger bent at least provides a slightly different window into them.

As usual for a modern TV series, the short season length cuts against the effectiveness significantly. The cast is still gelling and the writers are still perfecting their approach after only ten episodes, but since the second season finished shooting before this one even aired, they’ll have no chance to incorporate critical feedback on what elements are working or not anytime soon. I’m satisfied enough to keep tuning in, and this is certainly lightyears stronger than late-stage Discovery or the lousy Section 31 movie, but it’s not winning me over just yet.

[Content warning for gun violence, torture, genocide, and gore.]

★★★☆☆