media log Justice Hager media log Justice Hager

jeen-yuhs (part 1)

jeen-yuhs (1)

despite the problems with kanye (which are many-storied), it is an objectively amazing thing to have had a filmmaker following him around NYC and Chicago right before and during the time in which he ended up getting a record deal and crafting his first album.

cinema verité is the dominant mode throughout—the camera a witness and also an audience against which Kanye develops a media persona.

While I am generally skeptical of literally everything that Netflix does (television and films algorithmically optimized to be addictive), sometimes the giant wads of cash that they have to throw around result in something amazing, which I believe to be the case here.

Full judgement to be reserved till I reach the end.

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media log Justice Hager media log Justice Hager

Ozark Season 4 (Part 1)

image of the two leads of ozark with hazy mountain background behind them

I spent a lot of my life living in relationship to the Ozark Mountains that give this show its name. The etymology of the name remains ambiguous. We know that it comes from the phrase “aux arcs", but there seems to be some disagreement as to what, exactly, that phrase means. One interpretation on Wikipedia is that “aux arcs is an abbreviation of aux arcs-en-ciel, French for ‘toward the rainbows.’” Wendy and Marty are forever chasing rainbows but end up juggling more and more knives.

I’ve watched a lot of shows about money, power, and corruption recently, and I know that I’m not alone. Sometimes I am baffled by how people can watch House of Cards (not one of the shows that I’ve watched), Succession, Ozark, etc. and then turn around and be baffled by the Q phenomenon.

Interesting and Appropriate Developments in This Season

  • The FBI is more interested in having an informant who can help them seize cash from the cartels than to actually stop the flow of drugs into the United States… which is a totally rational move given that the latter is probably an unachievable goal.

  • An opioid magnate makes a generous donation to a foundation in order to facilitate the flow of cartel heroin into their possession with a clean paper trail. I’ve always wondered if there was a connection between Afghanistan and the opioid epidemic.

  • Wendy appears to be having a Lady MacBeth moment as a result of killing her own brother who was on the verge of betraying them.

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