Sophie Gilbert
How to Tell the Story of a Cult
Two docuseries about NXIVM present a question: Are the people who have escaped a controlling organization the most reliable sources on what happened to them?
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CNN / Focus Features The Missing Pieces of Anthony Bourdain
Roadrunner, a new documentary about the chef and television star, tries to uncover who he really was, but neglects vital parts of his story.
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HBO; The Atlantic The Awful Secret of Wealth Privilege
Mike White’s caustic six-part HBO series, The White Lotus, tackles the stickiest American addiction of all.
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Karolina Wojtasik / HBO Max How Gossip Girl Got Creepy
HBO Max’s reboot of the soapy teen drama is a reminder that overexposure isn’t just the realm of teens anymore.
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CNN Films The Soft Radicalism of Erotic Fiction
Jackie Collins sold half a billion books, taught women to demand power, and told the truth about Hollywood, yet she’s never gotten her due.
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Apple TV+ The Dark Side of Fitness Culture
The Apple TV+ series Physical is a reminder that making people hate their body is a thriving pillar of American commerce.
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Marvel Studios Is Loki Darker Than It Seems?
A Brutalist aesthetic. Allusions to autocracy. The early episodes of Marvel’s new series may seem breezy, but its dystopian design hints at more sinister twists ahead.
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Daniel Mihailescu; Siro Rodenas Cortes; Stefanie Keenan; Marvin … We Choose Our Cults Every Day
Cultish, a new book by the linguist Amanda Montell, reveals how insidery language informs the communities of modern life.
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Michele K. Short / HBO The Real Twist of Mare of Easttown
In the HBO show’s finale, the impulses to care and to crime-solve collide. But the miniseries has thoughtfully explored how the two aren’t always mutually exclusive.
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The Atlantic / Amazon Studios / Netflix Even TV Is Struggling to Connect
Two new shows, Amazon’s Solos and Netflix’s Master of None, feature characters desperate for human warmth.
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Najeebah Al-Ghadban The Literary-Abuser Trope Is Everywhere
A spate of recent works—some memoiristic, some fictional—points to how uniquely teachers and mentors can manipulate their power.
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HBO What Hacks Proves About Jean Smart
The HBO Max series finally gives a stellar performer the kind of role she deserves. It also slyly questions what took TV so long.
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HBO / Focus / Amazon / Hulu / … What the Sexual Violence of Game of Thrones Begot
Ten years after the hit series debuted, television’s reliance on rape culture still feels exploitative.
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Marvel Studios The Power of a Skeptical Captain America
All season long, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier asked not only what it meant for a Black man to inherit the storied shield—it asked whether the shield was worthy of him.
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Michele K. Short / HBO What HBO’s New Crime Show Gets Exactly Right
Mare of Easttown, starring Kate Winslet as a Delaware County detective, is brilliantly specific in its portrayal of a community. More of its peers should follow suit.
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HBO Max When Love Is Optimized, Is It Still Love?
Television, of late, has been obsessing over technological advances that don’t yet exist—rather than the innovations that are already changing our romantic lives.
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AMC / SKY The Crime Drama That Will Enthrall and Repel You
In the ornately violent AMC series Gangs of London, even the pigeons are on cocaine.
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Alan Tiegreen / Ramona The Brave The Mortifications of Beverly Cleary
The author recognized that humiliation is a kind of trauma—and that gentle humor could help neutralize it.
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Kypros / Getty / The Atlantic The Unending Assaults on Girlhood
Rape culture permeates adolescence. The lessons that it teaches girls cast long shadows.
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HBO The New QAnon Docuseries Is a Gamified Mess
HBO’s six-part Q: Into the Storm turns the conspiracy theory into a rollicking adventure.
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Rose Marie Cromwell Becoming a Parent During the Pandemic Was the Hardest Thing I’ve Ever Done
This completely different person I’ve become since I gave birth is someone virtually no one knows.
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