Hollywood Shambles

“Hollywood Is in Shambles”

Our recent discussion about the slow death of the legacy gatekeepers drew a lot of comment. One reader who's in the know wrote in to relate his personal experience. I know I'm a little late to this but just wanted to give my own inside info on Hollywood's status to…
Pump Up the Volume 1

Pump Up the Volume, Pump Up the Jam

A Gen X introvert's Baby Boomer dad uproots their family from New York and moves them across the country to a prefab Arizona suburb. Gifted a short-wave radio to keep in touch with his friends back east, the isolated and disoriented Mark finds an outlet for his existential angst as…
WotC Cynthia Williams

Wizards of the Coast President Resigns

The tabletop role-playing scene was rocked yesterday by news that Wizards of the Coast president Cynthia Williams is stepping down. Wizards of the Coast president Cynthia Williams is leaving the company at the end of the month. An SEC filing disclosed that Cynthia Williams, the president of Wizards of the…
Demoralization

The Pop Cult Demoralization Trap

  For years I've been charting the decline of all pop culture media while urging people to stop consuming content by companies that hate them. Recent days have provided a plethora of case studies illustrating why. Take this exchange on X from just yesterday: Related: Mark Kern – Calling All…
The Metal

The Downfall of Heavy Metal

Get get FREE books and first looks at my exciting new projects monthly! Join my elite neopatrons to read my new dark fantasy novel The Burned Book as I write it! Join on Patreon or SubscribeStar now. Ragging on Zoomers' taste in music has become common among older generations. Spend a few minutes sampling tunes that…
Joker It's Not About the Money

Mark Kern: Calling All Gamers

Get get FREE books and first looks at my exciting new projects monthly! Join my elite neopatrons to read my new dark fantasy novel The Burned Book as I write it! Join on Patreon or SubscribeStar now. Just weeks after helping to kick off what some are now calling GamerGate 2, legendary game dev and CEO…
The World You Were Raised to Survive In No Longer Exists

The School of Hard Knocks

The recent post on Generation Y drew a lot of comment. One of the most prominent questions pertained to why so many members of generations after X are seemingly unsalvageable. As Bruce Lee taught us, understanding the problem points to the solution. So let's examine Gen Y's besetting vice: terminal…
Sanderson Mistborn Movie 1

Not Even King Brandon Can Get a Movie Made

Getting a movie adaptation of their books isn't just a perennial dream of writers. Spend any length of time in online reader circles, and you'll soon hear multiple fans asking when they can expect to see their favorite books by their top authors on the silver screen. As most of…
Generation Video Banner

Generation Video Grand Opening

OG readers will know that I have a soft spot for retro film review podcasts. Whether it's author JD Cowan's Cannon Cruisers or, to go all the way back, the late, great Drunken Zombie Podcast, listening in while a couple of guys talk 80s and 90s movies is a guilty…
Comic Book Guy

Growing out of Comic Books

If you had the fortune of being a kid back when we still had a coherent society, and if you'd developed a taste for comic books, odds were that at least one adult in your life warned you against the habit. If the warning went unheeded, the common wisdom held…