This week I’m going to try something new and write about my media consumption from last month. I’ve enjoyed doing this kind of reflection at the end of every year, so why not do it every now and then? Here are my thoughts on some of the new things I watched, read, and listened to in June 2017.
Books
Mastery by Robert Greene: An OK book of stories about geniuses in various fields and what we can learn from them. But Robert Greene’s thesis — a framework drawn from these stories for how anyone can become a genius — was not credible. His writing was high on flowery language and low on evidence, and the connections he drew were superficial. That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy it. Reading about Einstein and Da Vinci and a lot more people that I hadn’t heard of before was interesting. And it’s not like I had high expectations; Greene is not a historian or a psychologist or any kind of expert that I can tell; his only background is in publishing books premised on simplifying the pursuit of things that everyone wants but that are hard to get — his other titles include The Art of Seduction and The 48 Laws of Power. But more entertaining than illuminating and you can read it in a couple days.
Movies
The Big Sick: I was excited to see Kumail Nanjiani, and he was funny, though still not as funny as he is playing Dinesh in Silicon Valley. And after more than ten years, I’m getting a little tired of Judd Apatow-style romantic comedies. There wasn’t anything wrong with this movie — I just felt like I’d seen all its jokes and romantic beats before.
Wonder Woman: I’ve been telling everyone I’m out on superhero movies for a while now but I made an exception because the internet was really buzzing about this. And I really enjoyed it. Chris Pine was hilarious and I’ll admit to getting really hype in the part where Wonder Woman goes over the top of the trenches in that World War I battle scene.
Kobe Bryant’s Muse: I knew that this was Kobe’s self-produced documentary for Showtime and would only be his side of the story of his career. But it was extremely well-made, self aware, and inspiring look inside the mind of a truly insane competitor. I definitely came away with a new level of respect for Kobe after watching this and if you care about the NBA, I highly recommend it.
Podcasts
Binge Mode: Binge Mode, where The Ringer’s two biggest A Song of Ice and Fire nerds recorded 40 minutes of discussion for each of all 60 episodes of Game of Thrones, is podcast heaven. I’ve re-watched all of GoT, in order, so many times that I get no pleasure from going back through old episodes anymore. But hearing Jason and Mallory laugh and debate and do really hilarious character impersonations allowed me to experience the whole series yet again from a new perspective. I’ll always be thankful to Binge Mode for allowing me to wring yet more water out of the ASOIAF towel, and for giving me something to do to feed the beast other than watching janky fan theory videos on YouTube.
Conversations with Tyler – Ben Sasse interviewed by Tyler Cowen: A non-political interview covering big-picture topics, so a perfect fit for me at this point in my life. Highlights: the origins of the Reagan Revolution, and how the rightward shift of the national dialogue that took place in the 1970s might have been about religious paranoia as much as a backlash agains the Civil Rights Movement; and the crisis in national loneliness, due to the fact that the average American has half as many close friends as she did 25 years ago. Most exciting for me was the way Sasse talked about the transition to an information-based economy as the root cause of our economic, cultural, and political problems, and how neither party is thinking enough about the long-term future, which is like, something I’ve been trying to figure out how to say for a long time. It was heartening to hear that from someone else, even if he plays for the wrong team.