On Sunday, two of baseball’s greatest, classiest players were inducted into the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame. Cal Ripken, Jr. and Tony Gwynn are the epitome of what professional athletes should be both on and off the field. Their induction ceremony and speeches are reminders of all that is good about baseball and professional [...]
I doubt that any group of filmmakers have been under the amount of pressure to create a successful film like the writers and animators of The Simpsons Movie have been over the past two or three years. With an eighteen-year-strong fan base, that has weakened some over the past few seasons, Matt Groening et al [...]
So here they are, on the eve of The Simpsons Movie‘s release, my top three “Spiritual Simpsons” episodes. I’m off to catch the midnight show with all the other fanboys(girls), but if you are waiting until later in the weekend to see it, let these memories of the good old days tide you over.
While Mark I. Pinsky’s religious dialogue with The Simpsons is certainly intriguing and Chris Turner’s Planet Simpson is an excellent example of how the series infiltrates nearly every aspect of the human experience, neither book, nor any of the others discussed here, offers the wealth of information on each episode like the “Complete Guide to [...]
Thankfully, yesterday’s post did not run the gamut of Simpsons-critical texts. Here are two more, one worth adding to your library, and the other, well it’s nothing short of the worst…book…ever.
D’oh! I mean, only four more days until The Simpsons Movie opens. PopTheology is dedicating every post this week to all things Simpsons. First, we will focus on several books based on pop-culture’s first family and, as the movie approaches, Daniel Skidmore and I will offer up our top five “spiritual Simpsons” episodes and hope [...]
The new Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (directed by David Yates) hit theaters last week, uncoincidentally close to the concluding book of the saga, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Unfortunately, I have not remained wrapped up in the books like most of the free world; however, I have [...]
In his latest contribution to PopTheology, Daniel Skidmore reflects on the MPAA’s rating system and its implications on the values that it promotes or withholds. The recent release of Live Free or Die Hard and the filmmakers controversial choice to edit it to garner a PG-13 rating has struck anew in my mind the debate [...]
Much has been written about Martin Scorsese’s films and hopefully we can expect more of both. Theologians and religious studies professors often drool over the theological over/undertones in his work. His early struggle of whether or not to enter the priesthood should add complexity to his work and our viewing of it. In The Word [...]
Thanks to Alexander Carpenter of the Beatitudes Society and The Spectrum blog for steering me toward this great article from Christianity Today. A couple of these films have been reviewed on PopTheology, and despite our negative review of Knocked Up, I happen to agree with McCracken’s take on it. I appreciate this writer’s willingness to [...]
