The Wire: As Told in Lego Animation
Just when you thought you’d seen and read everything you could possibly handle about The Wire (aka The Best TV Show Ever Made), here comes something you need to watch. It’s The Wire as told in Lego animation, with all your favourite characters: Omar, McNulty, Bunk, Stringer Bell. Watch and enjoy!
Knitting the Olympics
So, sports fans (and major event lovers) around the world are fired up with Olympics fever at the moment. And some of them are celebrating in their own unique ways. Australian shooter Lauryn Mark is promoting a positive image of her sport by posing in a green and gold bikini, with a shotgun, for zoo Weekly. Her husband and fellow competitor Russell Mark is complaining that he and his wife are being discriminated against for being heterosexual because they’ve been told they can’t room together in London.
Others have a more genteel, creative response to all the excitement - like one East London lady who knits up a storm to create a garden display for every major event. And right now, her yard is a knitted tribute to the Olympics. The Atlantic has posted a series of gorgeous photographs.
50 Shades of Parody
The world is still talking about 50 Shades of Grey, with new views, reviews and movie news posted every day. We highly recommend Andrew O'Hagan’s acerbic review in the London Review of Books, especially the classic line: ‘I suspect the book has taken the world’s mums by storm because there’s no mess on the carpet and there are hot showers afterwards.’
Newsweek has compiled the best 50 Shades parody videos in one handy post - from a musical to a Saturday Night Live satire starring Kristen Wiig (our favourite) and Ellen Degeneres reading the audiobook, complete with unenthusiastic sound effects.
Caitlin Moran: ‘Feminism is paying for these drinks!’
Caitlin Moran’s very funny feminist bestseller, How to Be a Woman, is coming out in the US this week. And to celebrate, there’s a terrific long profile of Moran over at Slate, by Peggy Orenstein. She describes interviewing a Moran dressed in a T-shirt that reads, ‘My feminist Marxist dialectic brings all the boys to the yard’. Here’s a taste of Moran’s feminist approach to parenting:
As toddlers, Moran taught them to shout, ‘Thanks for that, the patriarchy!’ whenever they scraped a knee. At age 8, when Lizzie questioned Barbie’s improbable curves, Moran had her draw pictures of what the doll ought to look like (‘An outline that was kind of representative,’ Moran said, ‘feet big enough to stand on and a mono-brow because Lizzie has a mono-brow. Hair on her legs. And she made one breast slightly larger than the other, so I was like, Thanks.’) For Halloween last year, the girls dressed as suffragettes.
This video of Moran talking about how to apply feminism in your own home (shoes you can walk in! plasma TV bought with proceeds of not having Brazilians!) is completely brilliant:
Bill Murray colouring-in books
What do you give the hipster kid who has everything? The latest kids' book only an adult would really enjoy (a genre in itself) is Thrill Murray, a colouring-in book celebration of ‘the great man of cinema’ in some of his most iconic roles and moments, illustrated by 23 different artists. Okay, it’s not really for kids; it’s a cool toy for those who are kids at heart.
