[Spoiler Alert – it’s pretty much everything.]
After 12 years of serialized manga, Hajime Isayama’s Attack on Titan is done. It didn’t take long for the online critics to start dissecting the controversial conclusion: Is it unsatisfying? Is it maybe a little cringeworthy?
I’d argue it’s both. But more than that, now that we can analyze the work as a whole, I’d say Attack on Titan was probably never very good to begin with. The signs were there almost from the very beginning.
It’s hard to overstate how massive a phenomenon Attack on Titan was in its early years. In Tokyo, you could hardly buy snacks at a convenience store without seeing the image of the Colossus Titan peering over Wall Maria. In hindsight, though, maybe a few such iconic images were all the manga really had going for it. » More... »
If you stumbled across this article because of a web search, chances are you already know that Glenn Danzig (he of Misfits, Samhain, and his eponymous band) has made a movie. You probably know it’s called Verotika, and that it’s based on various works published by his comic book company of the same name. And you’ve probably heard it’s bad. Like, really bad. All these things are true.
When Netflix released Devilman Crybaby last year, I enjoyed the anime, but it made me realize that although I was cursorily familiar with the character, I had never really gone back and read Go Nagai’s original manga from the early 1970s. When I found out that Seven Seas Entertainment had released Devilman: The Classic Collection in two volumes the same year, I decided to check it out. And what a ride it is. 
I’ve long been a fan of Dario Argento’s 1977 horror flick Suspiria, and I’m certainly not alone. Among horror film aficionados, Suspiria is revered as much for its memorable cinematography and score as its ability to remain compelling despite having an almost nonsensical plot. So when the news came that a remake of this seminal Italian film was in the works, the natural question was, “Why?” 
Ah, Stephen King. I’ve always had a mixed relationship with his work. Some of it, I would say, makes his reputation as one of our leading fiction writers well deserved. Other examples are just bad. Unfortunately, The Outsider, a 2018 entry into the prolific author’s oeuvre, belongs squarely in the latter category.