Daily coverage of Criticism by Vulture

Criticism

  1. movie review
    Downton Abbey: A New Era Is Really the Same Old Downton AbbeyFor better and worse, the Crawleys are at it again.
    By Jen Chaney
  2. art review
    A Universe in South CentralLauren Halsey’s new show is an overflowing tribute to her Los Angeles neighborhood.
    By Jerry Saltz
  3. book review
    In These Novels of Tech Dystopia, Memories Belong to the CloudJennifer Egan’s The Candy House and Vauhini Vara’s The Immortal King Rao are two very different books with a troubling shared prediction.
    By Mallika Rao
  4. theater review
    In Exception to the Rule, Detention Is a Whole Other Class of PunishmentDave Harris’s play goes into an after-school penalty that’s not really intended to teach lessons.
    By Helen Shaw
  5. close read
    Tom Cruise’s Last StandThirty-six years after the original, Top Gun: Maverick eulogizes the actor’s entire career, and an America that may not exist anymore.
    By Bilge Ebiri
  6. tv review
    Angelyne Is the Total PackagePeacock’s miniseries about L.A.’s “Billboard Queen” is not just aware of the limitations of the biopic. It relishes disrupting them.
    By Roxana Hadadi
  7. movie review
    The Horror of Men Doesn’t Go Far EnoughAlex Garland’s latest body-mangling film lacks the depth and bravado it needs to succeed.
    By Angelica Jade Bastién
  8. album review
    How Does That Make You Feel, Kendrick?Whatever your problem, Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers wants you to talk it through.
    By Craig Jenkins
  9. yikes
    A Warning From the Future About The Time Traveler’s WifeA time-traveling TV critic considers Steven Moffat’s strangely chintzy, tonally odd adaptation of the 2003 novel.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  10. theater review
    A Cherry Orchard That Chops Down Most of the TreesChucking out the familiar in search of the truth.
    By Helen Shaw
  11. movie review
    Jerrod Carmichael Has Already Outgrown On the Count of ThreeHis feature directorial debut is a dark comedy about suicide that works more than it doesn’t, but still feels like a blip in a career that’s moved on.
    By Alison Willmore
  12. movie review
    Pleasure Can’t Get Out of Its Own HeadNinja Thyberg’s feature debut offers a judgment-free journey through the adult-film industry but never really gets going as a character study.
    By Alison Willmore
  13. album review
    The Smile’s A Light For Attracting Attention Peers Into an Ugly FutureThe Radiohead side project lingers in the space between roiling rage and burnout.
    By Craig Jenkins
  14. movie review
    The Lifeless New Firestarter Will Leave You ColdThey took a Stephen King novel and turned it into a hostage video starring Zac Efron.
    By Bilge Ebiri
  15. tv review
    The Kids in the Hall Make a Head-Crushing ReturnAgainst all odds, the sketch comedy’s Amazon revival is almost miraculous.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  16. tv review
    Conversations With Friends Thrives on What Goes UnsaidStrongly reminiscent of Hulu’s previous adaptation of a Sally Rooney Novel, the series puts sexual frankness at its center.
    By Jen Chaney
  17. tv review
    Hacks Seems a Bit LostThe Emmy-winning series hits the road in season two and needs some time to find its old rhythms.
    By Jen Chaney
  18. close read
    Winning Time Was No Match for the Showtime Lakers LegacyThe series made some fascinating moves in its debut season, but in its final moments, it succumbed to the inertia of a preordained narrative.
    By Nicholas Quah
  19. theater review
    Straight Line Crazy Gives Us Robert Moses Without the FireA very talky, very static play.
    By Christopher Bonanos
  20. theater review
    Which Way to the Stage Takes a Superfan’s View of the WorldEmbodied by two characters on the far fringes of theatrical success.
    By Helen Shaw
  21. theater review
    Oh God, A Show About Abortion Could Not Be More RelevantAlison Leiby’s one-woman show doesn’t have the spark it needs — so it’s handy that its audience is already on fire.
    By Helen Shaw
  22. tv review
    Candy Leaves a Sour AftertasteHulu’s weightless true-crime miniseries has little sense of what it wants to say about the 1978 axe murder of Betty Gore, or why it should say it.
    By Roxana Hadadi
  23. album review
    Bad Bunny’s Endless SummerBenito’s approach on Un Verano Sin Ti erodes the usual boundaries of the season, its infiniteness dotted by fun flings and moments alone on the beach.
    By Gary Suarez
  24. theater review
    Alice Childress’s Wedding Band Returns, Well-BurnishedChildress’s bitter play, now married to a modern sensibility, returns on a wave of acclaim.
    By Helen Shaw
  25. close read
    Undone Takes Us Back Into MadnessThe second season’s finale rewrites everything that precedes it and opens the door for Alma to experience real healing.
    By Cristina Escobar
  26. album review
    Arcade Fire’s WE Is a Smart ResetThe new album feels like a calculated retrenchment, a heaping pile of everything you want from Arcade Fire.
    By Craig Jenkins
  27. tv review
    The Staircase Defies ExpectationsA seminal true-crime story takes on new dimension in a scripted series that proves there’s still more to say about Michael and Kathleen Peterson.
    By Jen Chaney
  28. tv review
    Mike Myers Returns, Cautiously, With The PentaverateThe Netflix series feels way too timid — except for all the poop jokes.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  29. movie review
    There Is Hell, and Then There Is Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of MadnessFaced with infinite plot possibilities, Marvel couldn’t come up with a less sexist Wanda story line?
    By Angelica Jade Bastién
  30. tv review
    Let’s Hear It 4 Girls5eva’s Triumphant Second ActAn unabashedly silly yet satisfying new season digs back into everything that made season one so amusing and then some.
    By Roxana Hadadi
  31. album review
    The Improbable Return of Black StarIt’s been 24 years since Yasiin Bey and Talib Kweli released an album together. Was it worth the wait?
    By Craig Jenkins
  32. art review
    Matisse’s Miracle in RedA small exhibition at MoMA captures a big moment in Modernism.
    By Jerry Saltz
  33. theater review
    Two Men, Twin Falls: Samuel Hunter’s A Case for the Existence of GodSamuel D. Hunter’s play about male friendship, latter-day American desperation, and the passage of time.
    By Helen Shaw
  34. tv review
    The 2022 White House Correspondents’ Dinner Was a Respectable-Enough RebootIt wasn’t Twin Peaks: The Return, but it also wasn’t, like, Heroes Reborn either.
    By Jen Chaney
  35. theater review
    Something Distanced This Way Comes: Craig and Negga in MacbethCelebrity squares off against experiment, from Birnam Wood to Dunsinane.
    By Helen Shaw
  36. album review
    The Astounding Consistency of FutureLike a Gulfstream or a Cartier, a new Future album offers careful variation on a winning concept.
    By Craig Jenkins
  37. movie review
    In Memory, Liam Neeson Gets to Act More Than UsualMartin Campbell’s hitman-with-dementia film offers visceral violence and surprising anguish.
    By Bilge Ebiri
  38. movie review
    Gaspar Noé’s Vortex Is His Most Human Film. And His Cruelest.Every second of this brutal, beautiful film seethes with emotion of an intensely personal kind.
    By Bilge Ebiri
  39. tv review
    Under the Banner of Heaven Scratches the True Detective ItchAndrew Garfield finds fresh empathy in the FX on Hulu series’s tired true-crime patterns.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  40. theater review
    POTUS and Mr. Saturday Night Mine Laughs From Behind the ScenesTwo comedies about the business of image-making.
    By Helen Shaw
  41. tv review
    The Offer’s Exhausting Self-Congratulation Makes The Godfather Into GabagoolDespite some strong performances, the overlong miniseries is an incurious bit of nostalgia bait.
    By Roxana Hadadi
  42. theater review
    A Strange Loop Moves to Broadway, Its Furious Energy Changed But IntactMichael R. Jackson’s metamusical masterpiece spins forward.
    By Helen Shaw
  43. theater review
    The Skin of Our Teeth Is No DinosaurSure, some of the humor is dated. But that third act is anything but.
    By Helen Shaw
  44. tv review
    We Own This City Dissolves the Line Between Cop and CriminalDavid Simon returns to the world of Baltimore police in a limited series that is not a sequel to The Wire, but is not not a sequel to The Wire.
    By Jen Chaney
  45. movie review
    Hit the Road Treads Softly Between Trespass and TransformationThere is a sparseness to Hit the Road that reveals the ways fear, paranoia, and loss turn us into people we might not like.
    By Roxana Hadadi
  46. theater review
    If Someone Takes a Spill: Funny Girl ReturnsBeanie Feldstein takes the titular role.
    By Helen Shaw
  47. tv review
    The Man Who Fell to Earth Doesn’t Know Where to LandUnsteady writing muddles a compelling premise in Showtime’s serial adaptation of the 1963 Walter Tevis novel and 1976 David Bowie–starring film.
    By Roxana Hadadi
  48. tv review
    Barry Is Killer in Season ThreeAfter an extended hiatus, the HBO dramedy about Bill Hader’s hitman-actor is back and better than it’s ever been.
    By Jen Chaney
  49. movie review
    The Perfection in Miniature of Céline Sciamma’s Petite MamanThe Portrait of a Lady on Fire director’s latest is about a simple but devastating child’s fantasy.
    By Alison Willmore
  50. movie review
    How to Save a Movie Star From HimselfIn The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, Nicolas Cage tries very hard to be Nicolas Cage.
    By Bilge Ebiri
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