I got high-speed internet for the first time in my 30s, in my apartment in Brooklyn. I said to the guy installing it, "Is this really necessary? Isn't it fine to just have dial-up?" He gave me this look and said, "No one ever goes back," in a real ominous tone. Something about the way he said it made me think he was talking about porn. Now I could see naked women all the time, freely, without anybody else knowing—and that felt like a great, great thing. It wasn't long after that I noticed porn was affecting my relationships. I would be with a girlfriend and fantasizing about a porn scene I had watched. One time I was with a girlfriend and I suggested we watch porn while having sex. She caught me staring at the screen, and not at her, and she said, "Do I even need to be here?" That one felt terrible. But in general, I thought my behavior was completely normal. |
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| The Burberry Trench Is an Icon—and Rightfully So |
The trench coat is so deeply embedded in the way we think about menswear that it's almost strange to think of it having a (mostly) definable origin point. But it does. And that was way back in World War I, when upper-crusty British officers turned to the already-venerable outdoor outfitter Burberry to protect them from the elements in a new creation. Double-breasted, built for the realities of war but still designed to cut a clean line, it quickly made the transition from military garb to civilian essential, adopted first by the British establishment and soon after fixed in the firmament of the Golden Age of Hollywood. Looking to understand just how iconic this style is? Bogart wore a Burberry trench in the promo photos for Casablanca. Here's looking at you. Nowadays, you can get a trench from all kinds of makers and at pretty much any price from dirt cheap to astoundingly expensive. But there's one—an investment, for sure, but far from the ultra-luxury prices you can find with a quick online search—that deserves the consideration of anyone who cares about timeless style, a good story, and just plain looking great. It's Burberry's long Kensington trench. Cut from soft-but-sturdy cotton gabardine, expertly fitted, and made in England, it's a testament to why the OG maker of the style still owns it to this day. Don't think you're a trench coat guy? I didn't either. Then I slipped the Kensington over my shoulders and I understood. It's channeling the best of the past, all those turned-out guys and silver-screen stars from way back when, and putting your own, contemporary spin on things. It's indulging in an icon, and understanding exactly why it became one in the first place. |
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Welcome to Brandon Sanderson's Fantasy Empire |
Sanderson has been extremely popular among fantasy readers for more than a decade, but last year, he made international headlines for raising $41 million on Kickstarter (doubling the previous fundraising record) to self-publish four secret books and deliver them directly to 185,341 fans. No publisher, no Amazon, no bookstores. "I think some of the things [traditional publishing companies] do in New York are wrong-headed," he says. "Somebody has to step up and say, 'Here's another way.'" But not everyone was thrilled by the runaway success of Sanderson's record-breaking Kickstarter. "Today is a really good day to support your favorite author who hasn't made $18M in the last few days," tweeted Natania Barron, a fantasy novelist based in North Carolina. Some critics of Sanderson's Kickstarter campaign also expressed concerns that backing the project was tantamount to proxy-donating to the Mormon Church, whose members are known to tithe, and which, like many religious traditions, has a complicated history with LGBTQ rights. Another Sanderson critic emerged just a few hours before this story was originally scheduled to go live: Jason Kehe, a senior editor at WIRED magazine, who spent even more time in Sanderson's orbit than I did. In his viral profile, "Brandon Sanderson Is Your God," Kehe criticized Sanderson's prose, reputation, clothing, eating habits, state of residence, faith, fans, friends, and family for being—among other adjectives—"depressingly, story-killingly lame." Unsurprisingly, a legion of fans came to Sanderson's defense on social media. Sanderson paid it forward by donating some of his Kickstarter proceeds to almost every other publishing project on the platform last year, so I ask if he was surprised by all the criticism. "I wasn't surprised. When you're at the top of your field, you're a lightning rod for criticism, and that's actually healthy. The industry needs that. We don't need people criticizing the person just starting out. This is where the criticism should go," he says, pointing to himself. |
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The Incredibly Wild Story of FAU, the Most Improbable Final Four School. Ever. |
Wanting to win in college basketball? At Florida Athletic University? How about Find Another University. Before it punched its ticket last weekend to the Final Four (!), FAU was a forgotten school. Even its campus used to be such a top-secret military base that breathing one word about it got you booted back to the Infantry. FAU was an afterthought, way down in Boca Raton—the place where you go to run out life's clock—where the basketball program didn't exist until November 18, 1988, played 16 road games in its first season in Division I just to get by, and didn't play a game in the NCAA Tournament until March 14, 2002 (an eight-point loss to #2-seed Alabama), and hadn't been back since. Until this year. Because before the nets came down at Madison Square Garden on Saturday night, before the 35-win season that has them on the cusp of a national freakin' championship, FAU meant always being the punchline. Now, suddenly, FAU means Cinderella. Wait—no. Not Cinderella. No way. Cinderella had it easy. Walt Disney wishes he had a rags-to-riches story like Florida Atlantic University. Because this Cinderella was created from nothing. Honed by moments like getting your brains beat in on a basketball court for the better part of three decades. Cinderella wishes she had it that hard. Eminent Domain (!), a coach in handcuffs (!!), biological warfare testing (?!). Florida Atlantic's backstory is like nothing you've ever heard before. |
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Kieran Culkin Bares (a Lot of) His Soul |
It's been four days since he returned from filming the final scenes of the fourth season of Succession, which its creator, Jesse Armstrong, recently announced will be its last. It marks the end of a transformative time for Culkin. Over his six years on the show, he's become a father; bought his first place, in Greenpoint, Brooklyn; and moved from the island he'd lived on for his entire life. The show has raised his profile and his reputation. He's received two Emmy and three Golden Globe nominations; last year, he won a Critics Choice Award. "There cannot be a better job on the planet for an actor," he says. It's also given him plenty of options. But at the moment, none of them are as enticing as being at home with his wife and kids. For a guy who's always been ambivalent about acting as a career but at the same time revels in the work itself, this is a tough situation. "I haven't had a fucking moment to think about how I feel about it. All I know is I feel kind of down," Culkin says. "It's hard to sort of accept. What are the stages of grief? I don't know which one I'm in right now. Maybe depression or denial. Maybe a little bit of both." |
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The Best Keanu Reeves Movies of All Time |
Can you believe it? John Wick: Chapter 4 finally premiered this past weekend—becoming the film that proves ol' Johnny Wick is a certifiable action franchise and not a trilogy that has stayed past its welcome. Keanu Reeves is a national treasure and he simply does not age. This is Neo from The Matrix we're talking about here. He didn't have to completely reinvent himself as a legendary assassin in a whole other franchise, but boy are we glad he did. We're also thrilled that he spent his career going back in time as a stoner, doing stunts as a children's toy, and trying multiple times to stop a bus with no brakes. While, yes, every time we see Keanu's face in one of his movies is a privilege, there is a hierarchy of his filmography. So, we parsed through everything from the big franchises (The Matrix, John Wick, Bill & Ted), sports (Point Break, The Replacements), to huh? (Bram Stoker's Dracula) to come up with a definitive best-to-worst list of our favorite Keanu Reeves films. Here's a ranking of our friend Keanu's most notable movies from his career. |
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