All six seasons of "Lost" are arriving on Netflix in the U.S. on July 1 — that's 121 episodes, from the pilot to the divisive finale. Total Film's Emily Garbutt says that some fans are lobbying for a re-evaulation of the final twist. She quotes one: "My firm stance remains that 'Lost' is good and the finale is great and haters will be welcomed with open arms on the right side of history after they reevaluate." Time for the big question: 14 years after it aired, what are your thoughts on the finale of "Lost?"
"Sound of Thunder" director Alejandro Monteverde has an unusual stipulation in his 10-year deal with Angel Studios. The distributor, which mostly focuses on Christian content, has agreed to purchase the filmmaker a house valued at $4-5 million in a location of his choosing. The studio also has an unusual approach to filmmaking — it decides what to green light based on the votes of the Angel Guild, 300,000 paid subscribers. Here's more from @IndieWire.
Hair jewelry — lockets, rings and other such items adorned with the locks of a loved one — is said to have come into fashion as an expression of mourning in the Victorian age. It was Queen Victoria herself who popularized the jewelry after her husband Albert died in 1861. @Allure's Alexis Benveniste writes about the history of this, how the craft of hairwork is being revived around the world, and why people continue to be repulsed by it.
"Black Barbie: A Documentary" produced by Shonda Rhimes, will be released on Netflix on June 19. TODAY shares this clip, featuring Kitty Black Perkins, the designer of Black Barbie, and Beulah Mae Mitchell, who worked on the production line at Mattel, remembering conversations with Barbie creator Ruth Handler. “(Handler) would say, ‘Do you have any suggestions?’” Mitchell recalled. “I was able to say, ‘We want a Black Barbie.’”
The term "fan" to mean avid supporter only came into popular use in the 19th century. Before that, words like "kranks," "habitués" and "lions" were used. There were even equivalents of today's fandoms that focus on a specific performer (like Swifties and Cumberbitches) in the form of Lisztians, who loved the composer Franz Liszt. Atlas Obscura spoke with Daniel Cavicchi, an American Studies scholar, about the history of fans and the words we've used to describe them. “How you name yourself says a lot about what you think of yourself and your very intense passions,” Cavicchi says. “But at the same time, another name or variation on the name, or another use of your name, maybe in a derogatory sense, may say something about what the culture thinks about you.”
Stephen Colbert has sat in the "Late Show" spinny chair for a decade now. He spoke with Entertainment Weekly about his office decor — his kids' old art projects hang beside a copy of Donald Trump's impeachment resolution — how he fell in love with the monologue, and the fine art of blending stupid and smart.
"Halt and Catch Fire" premiered 10 years ago and went on for four seasons and 40 episodes. @polygon's Devan Suber describes how the beloved AMC show understood the draw of video games better than any show that's come before it. "In the words of Joe MacMillan (Lee Pace), the computer was always 'the thing that gets us to the thing,' a vector for connection, expression, or some other deeper human need."
@Jyoti Hopefully it doesn't sound too weird to say that we thought of you when we saw this as one of our very early fediverse conversations was with you, about this show!
Two women in Mumbai are separated by only a few years in age and a 20-minute drive. Yet their starkly different lives spotlight India’s deepening wealth divide — and the inequality that has empowered some to reach new heights alongside the country’s fast-growing economy, while others are left behind. Take a look at this photo feature by CNN, which illustrates an India divided by prosperity and poverty amid a national election. https://flip.it/c8FMrd #Culture#India#Poverty#Wealth#Politics
The Cannes Film Festival finished last Saturday. As well as new movies, glamorous red carpets and — this year — overzealous security guards, it's become known for ludicrously long standing ovations. And these aren't always indicators of a good movie — Francis Ford Coppola's "Megalopolis" had the audience on their feet for seven minutes but currently has a Rotten Tomatoes score of 50%. Here's a story from the Independent about the festival's longest ever ovations. Most trips to the local cinema don't make people rise to their feet and applaud, but we want to know, what's your philosophy on ovations at live events?
"I’ve been thinking, lately, about the theme of 'American presidents who commit felonies.' I don’t know why; it’s just been on my mind recently for some reason," writes Crime Reads' Olivia Rutigliano. She's created this list of fictional presidents from TV and and film who've committed felonies, including President Fitz from "Scandal," President Frank Underwood from "House of Cards," and more. "As I just said, these are fictional examples, so if some real guy who was elected the President of the United States of America committed anything equivalent to these things in real life, it’d be way, way worse," Rutigliano concludes.
If you have a Samsung washing machine, you'll probably be familiar with its self-satisfied "I'm finished" chime — the 40-second jingle that plays when your wash cycle is complete. It's a version of Schubert's "Die Forelle," which was composed in 1817. Now, it's sparked an absurd copyright abuse flag on YouTube, with a Twitch streamer claiming his play-through of Fallout was demonetized because his washing machine finished while he was streaming. Seemingly YouTube's automatic scan had detected the washing machine chime as a song called "Done," which was uploaded to YouTube by a musician known as Audego nine years ago. Albino suggested that YouTube had potentially allowed Audego to make invalid copyright claims for years. Here's more from @arstechnica
@mayorbeetles Absolutely baffling! We're always struck by how needy the washing machine sounds. It's like a kid when they've learned to do a cartwheel or tidied their bedroom: "Look at me! I finished the washing all by myself!"
Camp Lost Boys, in the woods between Denver and Colorado Springs, is the world's only sleep-away camp and largest gathering space for adult trans men. Its goal is to encourage trans men to take up space and express love for their own masculinity. “Being a man is often seen as a terrible thing, particularly if you come from a queer space … and we internalize that,” says Rocco Kayiatos, founder of the Intentional Man Project, the nonprofit that makes camp happen. @19thnews talked to some of the men who attend Camp Lost Boys, who range from their teens to their 70s. “I have never seen that many trans guys in one space. To be honest, I haven’t seen this many trans adults, ever,” says 19-year-old Orion Pevehouse. “I have never seen an old trans person. And it just gives me a lot of hope that … I’m gonna live my entire life like this. And that’s just really exciting.”
@CultureDesk@19thnews I knew about trans men and women from when I was a child. My grandfather's ranch was a few miles from Trinidad, Colorado. Dr Stanley Biber, at one time the leading surgeon in the U.S. for gender-affirming surgery and one of the few doctors in the world who worked with transgender patients. His office in Trinidad, Colorado — a small town just 13 miles north of New Mexico — changed thousands of lives between 1969 and 2010.
@_9CL7T9k8cjnD_ Thanks for sharing this. He sounds like a remarkable person. Here's a story from 5280 — an extract from the 2021 book "Going to Trinidad" — that explains a bit more about his work.
We know the fediverse needs no excuse, but just FYI, today is International Hug Your Cat Day. Here's a @Flipboard Storyboard from Reader's Digest about where cats like kisses and get the zoomies, how to train them, and more.
The 1998 Fiat Multipla is almost always included on clickbaity listicles about the ugliest ever cars. The Autopian's Adrian Clarke makes the case for why its design, while aesthetically challenging, was actually brilliant. "A constant criticism of car design I hear a lot is the ‘form should follow function’ bulls***," he writes. "Be careful what you wish for, because the Multipla is what you could end up with."
A beluga can change the shape of its "melon" (the bulbous mass on its head) at will. Could this be used as a form of communication? A new study indicates that it might. Here's a story from @hakaimagazine with a six-panel comic illustrating the five different melon shapes and in what contexts some are used.