I love the recent comedic device of asking a question which is answered by a song’s lyric in a surprising way!

But I’ve never liked recipes with ten pages of exposition, you know, why a German Shepherd gave birth on a plane and how that made the cook nostalgic for the ’40s, and then ingredients for pancakes. So without further ado, and in no particular order of funniness, here are some examples:

-Want anything from the gas station?

-Your protein powder scoop is missing?

-Check your bag at the airport?

-Inbox after checking Zillow once

-Holding my friend’s newborn

-How do you fall asleep so fast?

-What my friend who’s beating me at Battleship says

-Medium or large pizza?

-Rounding your total to help others?

-Use the pedal on the right to accelerate

-Can you help me move?

Funny, right?! I’ll add more as I find them.

And in case you didn’t watch the above videos but still want to understand, Google AI Mode says: “These memes use the first line (or a relevant line) of a well-known song as a witty or funny response to a question or statement.”

Leave links for your favorites in the comments!

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Hey Friends! Each year I give you highlights from WonderCon and this is that Newsletter! Before I get to that, I’m briefly asking you to check out my new podcast “But Keep Your Stories Closer” (available on all platforms, including Apple and Spotify) and for you to check out my recent article: “1985 vs. 2025: A Hope/less Hallelujah.”

Xomposition Exclusive

You can read my coverage of WonderCon 2023, WonderCon 2024, and WonderCon 2025. Here are the highlights from 2026:

Spiritual Themes in Comics

This is always an insightful panel put on by CCAS (Christian Comic Arts Society). The moderator’s (Kyle Keene) first question was whether fiction was a wise way to get through the world’s current difficulties. The panelists said not to use escapism, but gave examples of video games, TV shows, and films to see spiritual themes which tie back to our deeper beliefs.

Phenomenal artist and Disney editor Casey Robin (and other panelists) talked about curiosity where Christianity has historically archived (via conservatories, the arts, founding universities, etc.) and this also preserves culture (in some ways, “fandoms”). One sad example is that because of lower attendance in Black churches, their styles of singing are not being passed on.

Bobby Herbeck: TMNT Screenwriter

Screenwriter Bobby Herbeck wrote the original 1990 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TMNT) film. He was…let’s say, high energy. This meant he shared lots of cool, random stories (Clint Eastwood once held a script of his and said, “Too heavy, shorty”) but it also meant the moderator was unable to wrangle the panel into anything meaningful about the original TMNT film. I did learn Herbeck’s first TMNT draft was 150 pages, he doesn’t like Michael Bay’s versions, and there is a new live action slated for 2028!

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Aliens’ Jennette Goldstein & Mark Rolston

For the 40th anniversary of the sequel Aliens (1986), actors Jennette Goldstein (who played “Vasquez”) and Mark Rolston (“Drake”) shared humorous stories and heartfelt memories. Disappointingly, Michael Biehn had to cancel but Goldstein and Rolston still made it one of the best panels I attended.

One highlight was hearing that a British bodybuilder had been cast as “Vasquez” but the production was paying for her to take acting lessons. Goldstein read for “Vasquez” and “Hudson” (again, even though both were cast) and she won the “Vasquez” role! She said this was because she could act and had been working out for two years at the gym where Mr. and Mrs. Britain trained. Mark Rolston shared crazy stories like his death scene involved pyrotechnics (some attached to his face!) where he wasn’t allowed to breathe until two huge crew members could pull him off the floor up to a fan.

BONUS: I didn’t realize the M56 Smartguns were cantilevered off steadicam harnesses (new technology at the time) and firing real rounds (blanks, of course)!

Jim Cummings: Legendary Voice Actor

As the voice for beloved characters like Winnie-the-Pooh and Tigger, Jim Cummings was the consummate entertainer. Humorous anecdotes and a charming personality, he was everything you want in a panelist. I found it intriguing (and artsy) that he creates original voices by looking at the character and hearing the voice in his head. (He called this “very scientific”.) This applied to how he created Darkwing Duck and Hondo Ohnaka (Star Wars).

David Dastmalchian: Actor & Creator

I’ve enjoyed David Dastmalchian in The Suicide Squad (2021), Dune: Part One, Oppenheimer, and Murderbot (to name a few), so it was fun to hear him talk about his process and projects. Speaking on storytelling, Dast said, “…Down in its heart, like, in its guts, I love when [storytelling] really sings, because I think people, no matter where they are in their life, no matter who they are, no matter how they identify, how they look, how they live, where they’re from…they just feel connected, and they feel less alone.”

Moderator (and publicist) Gary Miereanu used this to segue into discussing Dastmalchian’s new graphic novel Through. I purposefully stayed in the dark about the details of Through because I will be buying it from my local comic book shop soon.

Xoncluding Thoughts

I appreciate you reading this far and hope you enjoyed the coverage! I did attend other panels, so let me know if you have questions or comments.

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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Xurrent News

With Christ and Pop Culture (CAPC), I had the opportunity to write about hope and hopelessness couched in pop culture and spirituality. My article “1985 vs. 2025: A Hope/less Hallelujah,” was born out of my bleak feelings about our national politics and the constant misrepresentation of Christianity.

I wasn’t sure whether I needed a therapist or a magician…turns out while magicians pull rabbits out of hats, therapists pull habits out of rats.

Clearly, I needed the therapist. So this article was my discovery of dreams and despondency, which are serious subjects; fortunately I was able to use everything from the Bible to The Golden Girls for clarity.

Coincidentally, I was asked to speak on a portion of the Bible that addresses how to honor authority figures in the midst of my political consternation. If you’d like to hear that talk, you can listen here.

Supplementary to that, check out Holy Post Media’s fantastic video on whether Romans 13 can be used to accept or condone ICE’s behavior.

I recently published “Creativity, Part 4 – Seriously Humorous” exclusively for you. The article focuses on the requirement for humor regarding serious subjects, and how we might factor it into our creativity.

Finally, in a one-off version of our “Xollection Machine,” I wanted to share an inspiring story of how one guy made a creative environment in a challenging space. Read “My Truck Desk by Bud Smith” here.

Xoncluding Thoughts

Let me know in the comments any of your thoughts on the above. And WonderCon is about two weeks away so I’ll be posting my con recap shortly thereafter. I appreciate you reading!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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Think about how myths and tales have influenced humanity throughout history and how stories play a huge role in our everyday life. Much of how we enjoy life, succeed at work, engage with friends, learn, and help others understand our point of view is through stories and storytelling.

So shouldn’t there be a podcast explaining (and telling stories) about all that? The answer is “no,” and yet, I’m doing it anyway.

Check out “But Keep Your Stories Closer” on Apple Podcasts, Spotify Podcasts, Amazon Music/Audible, iHeartRadio and more!

Fortunately (for you), I’ll have friends on telling their craziest and funniest workplace tales. It turns out ordinary people have some of the most extraordinary stories! And thankfully (for me) my wife is co-producing so it will actually be interesting.

Season 1 is focused on the theme of occupations (like jobs, not invading countries). And oddly enough, Episode 1 (the incredibly wittily titled “New Hire Story-entation”) serves as an introduction. I tell stories from my first job and current position, give some background, explain the premise, and attempt humor. We may even learn a little something about our real purpose in having a job.

I know, I know, I’m a talker, but it’s only 17 minutes. And that includes a “Read It and Weep” segment which covers media we’re consuming. Will you do me the honor of just trying it out? Sure, there’s a lot to lose, but let’s call it an IOU. We’ll tell stories about it later.

Did I mention it’s only 17 minutes?

BKYSC on Apple Podcasts

BKYSC on Spotify Podcasts

Thanks for listening!

In Him,

-Chris (the [podcasting] Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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As an only child, I played alone a lot. In 1989 I got the special Batman figure with a repelling belt for my birthday. It was, of course, the year of Tim Burton’s breathtaking Batman, which, uncharacteristically, I was allowed to watch at my friend Justin’s sleepover. Inspired, I spent hours building a Batcave out of cardboard.

I also played with my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles figures, most often with friends. Travis and I explored my scaled sewers; Uriah loved using my turtle van (the “Party Wagon,” for you uncultured Bebops). I had an epiphany as I wrote this: It was apt for me to play alone with the solo vigilante, while playing in community with a shellular family.[i]

As I mentioned in my second creativity article, the ability to play is foundational to our originality. Dr. Terry Lindvall’s book Surprised by Laughter explores C.S. Lewis’ theory that life, and especially the Christian faith, is seriously humorous. In this addition of our creativity series, we’ll explore both that seriousness and humor as it unlocks fulfillment in our lives and creative processes.

Playing to Lose Oneself: Golfers with Revolvers

Shockingly, as probably history’s most well-known thinker who also brought fun and humor,[ii] C.S. Lewis had horrible experiences with games in childhood. He loved to play (in the general sense of the word - losing yourself to a fun endeavor) but lacked skill or the body type to do well in sports. He describes the situation as such:

“If the reader will picture himself, unarmed, shut up for thirteen weeks on end, night and day, in a society of fanatical golfers - or, if he is a golfer himself, let him substitute fishermen, theosophists, bimetallists, Baconians, or German undergraduates with a taste for autobiography - who all carry revolvers and will probably shoot him if he ever seems to lose interest in their conversation, he will have an idea of my school life… For games (and gallantry) were the only subjects, and I cared for neither. But I must seem to care for both, for a boy goes to a Public School precisely to be made a normal, sensible boy - a good mixer - to be taken out of himself; and eccentricity is severely penalized.”[iii]

What a solemn, sad, and possibly very relatable experience. And yet, his description leaves me in impressed awe. Only Clive Staples (or “C.S.” to his closest strangers) could use a descriptor so horrifying, yet so hilarious as “who all carry revolvers, and will probably shoot him.” Then he brings it home (sorry to use an idiomatic phrasal verb for a baseball game) replacing “golfers” with apparent monsters like “bimetallists” (i.e. advocates of using two metals as a currency standard) and “German undergraduates,” to which he hilariously must add “with a taste for autobiography.”

Contrary to what we’ve been taught (or might think), humor doesn’t undermine the story’s severity, it strengthens Lewis’ point because he gives us permission to laugh at a tense situation. Scholar Peter Berger says “that when we surrender to our play and let it remain simply that, we encounter a ‘signal of transcendence.’” Adding commentary, Lindvall reminds us of instances when we played and lost track of time. “Play gives us a taste of eternal joy in the midst of the momentary…To be alive and to be laughing is itself an adventure and a game created by a miracle of God – a miracle that is beyond our comprehension.”[iv]

So play and games and humor aren’t just integral to our creative life, but to life itself. And this isn’t a prosperity doctrine or pseudo-spiritualism tenant, it actually addresses head on the brokenness of our world.

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Earth: A Painful Playground

We all go through pain, some much more than others. It’s easy to become hopeless from the tragedies and injustices inflicted daily.

Lewis knew about heartbreak and suffering (after all, he wrote The Problem of Pain), but he realized that God doesn’t give us unlimited happiness, or an IV drip of perpetual joy for a good reason. God created us to take pleasure in Him and the things He created.

Therefore, when we subvert God or what He has created, it stands to reason that He will not allow us to experience perfect joy. God created the chemicals in our bodies to experience emotions in a natural way, but when we snort cocaine to achieve a similar high, He’s not going to bless that because it will ultimately hurt us. Or, sticking with our “play” theme, Lewis (and his spiritual predecessor, G.K. Chesterton) believed once games and sports were elevated to the professional level, they were drained of all fun and whimsy and true creativity.[v]

In His goodness God gives us play and laughter and moments of joy to remind us of heaven, but in His wisdom He doesn’t give us unfettered joy, so that we don’t get too comfortable here on earth. Every ache at injustice or sigh at mundane normality is a God-infused longing for the joy of perfection.

Solempne Sterling

It shouldn’t surprise us then that solemn subjects like pain should be coupled with play and humor. I love Sterling K. Brown’s turn as a murder suspect on Brooklyn Nine-Nine’s episode “The Box.” Both Andre Braugher and Andy Samburg shine, but it is Brown who elevates the bottle episode to one of my favorites. Brown’s character – a dentist who may have killed his business parter – is self-assured, calm, and above all, serious.

It takes an exceptional actor to convey solemnity while delivering (and setting up) comedy gold. But this is actually a trait every human should possess…not the ability to play the straight man (although I hear there’s an opening for Bud Abbott’s spot). Every person should know they have permission to find humor in solemn situations.

C.S. Lewis revealed a little known fact: One of the many gaps in the English language is that we lost the word “solempne” (soh-LEM-neh) from Middle English. The word is similar to “solemn” but not “gloomy, oppressive, or austere.” Instead, it allows for joy and proper pleasure. Lewis gives examples: A fast is solemn, a feast is solempne. Good Friday is solemn, Easter (or what I call Resurrection Day) is solempne.[vi]

This was a revelation for me. In our daily lives as well as our creativity, although not necessarily socially acceptable, it is okay to accidentally laugh at an impertinent time, it is healthy to release tension with a joke. This allows us to feel the burden of pain and the weight of respect, while interjecting joy at what might be its most needed time.

How might we see this played out creatively? Brooklyn Nine-Nine’s writers (né creatives) infuse much needed tension into the aforementioned episode by giving the detectives only a few hours in the middle of the night to get a confession out of Sterling K. Brown. And that premise is a hallmark that makes Brooklyn Nine-Nine so enjoyable – serious people and topics intertwined with hilarity.

Bullies and Batcaves

For creatives to play even in the midst of pain can seem impossibly insurmountable. But we must remember play “gives us a taste of eternal joy” in the midst of brokenness. And true creation never destroys, it may remodel, but ultimately it is a positive force.

Take hope from Lewis who hated organized sports in school but retained a passion for play. One of the most haunting phrases from his golfers with revolvers memory is “eccentricity is severely penalized.” I’ve been bullied and mocked (imagine being bald, bearded, tattooed, and weird like me…in third grade) on and off throughout my life. Trust me, building cardboard Batcaves and sewers and Party Wagons wasn’t cool (to the cool kids).

Unfortunately, some of the weird creative was beaten out of me and some was siphoned off (through the unbearable weight of adulthood). So don’t hear this as: “Just follow your dreams.” I’m no motivational speaker, I’m no creative hero, but maybe, like Tina Turner heralded, “We don’t need another hero.”

Instead let’s pragmatically focus on what we can control. Maybe whether we built cardboard Batcaves as kids or not, what matters is that we accept permission to play now. How much better and free-flowing will our creativity be if we are free to let humor and joy break up the seriousness? Don’t forget solempne’s lesson of respecting the solemn while injecting joy. Oh, and consider building a cardboard Batcave, but don’t feel pressured into a Party Wagon – I don’t think you’re ready for that yet.

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[i] Am I the first to use a play on words for the phrase “cellular family” regarding the Turtles?

[ii] Or maybe Mark Twain?

[iii] C.S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy, p. 80; quoted by Lindvall, Surprised by Laughter, p. 165.

[iv] Lindvall, Surprised by Laughter, p. 166.

[v] ibid, pp. 164-166.

[vi] ibid, pp. 86-87.

Welcome to my 40^th Newsletter! Writing for you has given my life additional purpose so I can’t tell you how much I appreciate all of you reading and subscribing over the last few years.

Below you’ll find: (1) A list of my 2025 articles, (2) My favorite media consumed this year, (3) Media consumed for my 1985 vs. 2025 article, and finally, (4) some of the cool stuff I’m working on for the new year. (You can read my 2022 favs, my 2023 favs, and 2024 favs.) Enjoy!

#1 - My 2025 Articles:

• 1984 vs. 2024: What Does Real Freedom Look Like?

• CAPC’s Favorite TV (Fallout, Season 1)

• CAPC’s Favorite Music (While She Sleeps “To the Flowers”)

• Back to the Future: The Musical (website)

• Severance, Season 1 and the Christian’s Basic Responsibility

• Why Christianity’s New Fad of Denouncing Empathy is Actually Narcissistic (website)

• Mini-Article: Muzak’s Musical Manipulation (website)

• The Last of Us: Promise & Purpose in “The Price” (website)

• Back to the Future: A 40th Anniversary Lesson in Adaptability

• 1984 vs. 2024: Miami Vice & Racism & Music (website)

• Mini-Article: Why Fictionalized Crime is the Most Flourishing Streaming Genre (website)

• Mini-Article: Space Songs (website)

• Mini-Article: Timebridge: How 2024 Revived 1985 (website)

• Mini-Article: Thanksgiving TV Episodes 2025 (website)

• Marty’s Supreme Marketing: A Cultural Moment (website)

• “1985 vs. 2025” – slated to publish with Christ and Pop Culture early January 2026

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#2 - Media Favorites Consumed (But Not Necessarily Created) in 2025

Just as I gave you my favorite media consumed mid-way through the year (read Newsletter # 34), here’s a smattering from the last six-ish months (with sporadic commentary):

TV Shows

• Dept. Q (2025, Season 1). I loved this show so much I wrote a blurb for Christ and Pop Culture which will be coming out any day. UPDATE: Here’s the blurb.

• Poker Face (Season 1)

• House of David (Season 1). Not just one of the best Christian shows I’ve ever seen (sadly, the bar isn’t high), but one of the best shows I saw all year. Get started because Season 2 came out recently.

• The Paper (Season 1)

• Stranger Things (Season 5). The series finale aired today and I loved it. I’m sure trolls will spout hatred, but I thought it subverted most people’s expectations while pulling off two possible endings.

• The Night Agent (Season 1)

• The Penguin. Set in the immediate aftermath of Matt Reeves’ The Batman (2022), the show centers around Colin Farrell’s unrecognizable Penguin, which deservedly won two makeup Emmy’s. If you like unraveling mysteries, mobster media, and psychological scenarios of what makes monsters, watch this show.

TV BONUS: Shows I Started but Haven’t Finished (Yet)

• Pluribus (Season 1)

• The Handmaid’s Tale (Season 1)

Films

• Mank (2020)

• KPop Demon Hunters. I don’t know anyone who didn’t enjoy this film, which is pretty monumental! That’s due to a clarity of vision from creators Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans who, despite breaking many records, have remained resolute in keeping the concept intact (i.e. rejecting a live-action adaptation, etc.).

• Heretic (2024)

• James Gunn’s Superman (2025). I had to ask myself, Has DC’s live-action cinematic universe failed so many times that I think Superman was good when maybe it was just mediocre? But I’m at peace saying the film was genuinely good, blending the absurdity and necessity of superhero drama with humor which, since there are really only two players in the game, gets close to Marvel’s recipe.

• Weapons (2025)

• Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein (2025). As always, del Toro’s visuals are a masterpiece. Granted, as an unqualified arm-chair editor I would have cut around 30 minutes and added a scene or two building Elizabeth’s relationship with The Creature, but overall a very enjoyable film.

• Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954)

• The New Yorker at 100 (documentary)

Books

FYI: I read more books than what’s mentioned below, if you want to see my list go to: Chris Fogle’s Goodreads.

• When Narcissism Comes to Church by Chuck DeGroat. In researching my forthcoming humility book, DeGroat’s work was indispensable for a therapist’s view on arrogance within Christian church leadership. If you want to know why we’ve seen so many pastoral scandals and abuse cases recently (and how to solve them), read this book.

• Mr. Harrigan’s Phone by Stephen King

• Uncomfortable: The Awkward and Essential Challenge of Christian Community by Brett McCracken. A necessary book for the church to understand why so much of practicing the Christian faith is naturally uncomfortable.

• Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert

• Becoming the Pastor’s Wife by Beth Allison Barr. I devote a major section of my forthcoming 1985 vs. 2025 article to this book because it’s incredibly important to understand the history and man-made motivations behind relegating women to “acceptable” ministries. Get out of your comfort zone and read this book.

• God Has a Name by John Mark Comer

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Music

• Memphis May Fire’s entire “Shapeshifter” album is phenomenal but having “Overdose” feature Christian Lindskog from Blindside was a taste of perfection. And later that taste became a meal with Blindside’s “Dead Weight”!

• I love finding foreign bands and Shepherds Reign mesmerized me for several months this year. One of my favorite songs is “Samoa Mo Samoa.”

• Speaking of foreign bands, Her Last Sight’s album “SEASONS // WINTER” is pretty great and I especially love “The Fall.”

• Silent Planet’s “Mindframe” feels like all the best portions of the band’s journey.

#3 – Media Consumed for my 1985 vs. 2025 Article:

Here are some of the 1985 film, TV shows, books and music I consumed in preparation for my article:

• Luc Besson’s Subway. I really enjoyed this French film written, directed and produced by Luc Besson as part of the cinéma du look movement, a reaction to the New Wave aesthetic (not the ’80s “New Wave,” but from the ’50s-’60s).

• Max Headroom: 20 Minutes into the Future. I loved everything about this BBC original: the dystopian cinematography, futuristic predictions (many of which have eerily transpired), and offbeat sarcasm. Naturally, this made-for-TV-movie spawned several equally quirky spinoffs.

• The Handmaid’s Tale by Margret Atwood. The first of Atwood’s dystopian series is especially relevant in light of women’s current strangling of independence. Since I curated this 1985 list for my forthcoming 1985 vs. 2025 article, it’s worth mentioning that Hulu’s adaptation was immensely popular when it premiered in 2017 primarily because of viewer’s concerns around Trump’s first term (as were book sales).[i] It should be no surprise then that the 2025 series finale had some of the highest viewing numbers in Nielsen’s history!

• The Holiness of God by R.C. Sproul. One of my best reads of the year - accessible hardcore theology.

• Tina Turner’s “We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome).” I’ve long wrestled with the paradox of a song for the protagonist Mad Max to declare “We don’t need another hero.” (Yes, I’m a pensive nerd.) There is something communal yet independent, despairing yet hopeful in Turner’s anthem.

• Wang Chung’s “To Live and Die in L.A.” A fantastic song. As I said here the melody is “haunting yet hopeful.”

1985 BONUS:

• Check out Eric Serra’s “Guns Don’t Kill People” performed in Subway’s tense climax.

• Here’s my curated list of the songs I bet you’ll be shocked all came out in 1985:

Pat Benatar “We Belong”, Dead or Alive “You Spin me Round (Like a Record), DeBarge “Rhythm of the Night”, Don Henley “The Boys of Summer”, Katrina and the Waves “Walking on Sunshine”, Huey Lewis and the News “The Power of Love”, Madonna “Like a Virgin” and “Material Girl”, John Parr “St. Elmo’s Fire”, REO Speedwagon “Can’t Fight this Feeling”, Run-D.M.C. “King of Rock”, Simple Minds “Don’t You (Forget About Me)”, Starship “We Built This City”, Tina Turner “We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)”, Tears for Fears “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” and “Shout”, Wham! “Careless Whisper”, “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go”, Foreigner “I Want to Know What Love Is”, Dire Straits “Money for Nothing”, a-ha “Take on Me”, by Wang Chung “To Live and Die in L.A.”

#4 - Upcoming in 2026

I’ve given serious consideration to hosting a podcast in 2026 and have written some humorist essays which I’d love to publish somewhere. As always, I’ll be publishing exclusives for you on topics such as: how wrong it is for Christians to amass political power, my annual highlights from WonderCon, and possibly another creativity entry, among others. Happy end of 2025 and kick off to 2026!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

[i] As I said in my 1984 vs. 2024 article: “Interestingly, upon Trump’s 2024 win, book sales of Nineteen Eighty-Four shot up (similar to when he won in 2016), as well as other dystopian narratives, including The Handmaid’s Tale (again, as when Trump won in 2016), ‘about a country in which women are brutally repressed.’”

I just saw something overhead that made me question reality.

Well, the reality of marketing.

I’m driving through L.A. (City of Angeles, not Louisiana) and saw a bright orange blimp flying. I took the crappy picture below simply to read the writing. It said: “Marty Supreme.”

I took the bait. Dearest Google, who is Martin Supreme and why is he flying over Dodger City? Result: Marty Supreme is an upcoming film set in the ’50s starring Timothée Chalamet. Hmmm. Click link. Johanna Brooslin says writer/director “Josh Safdie artfully captures a restless society ready for reinvention and renewal while still healing from past trauma.” Consider my interest piqued. Sounds like it’s partly a commentary on our current society’s restlessness and desire for reinvention (even if some people wish for a past era that never existed). Sounds cool, daddy-o.

But Google’s second offering fascinated me. It was an article by Preetika Ravidas titled “Timothée Chalamet’s bizarre Marty Supreme press run taps into a deeper cultural mood.” Ravidas says:

Over the last decade, daily life has become defined by economic pressure, political stagnation, and a general sense of grinding seriousness. Even entertainment, once a shared escape, has splintered into dozens of micro-fandoms spread across an ever-expanding landscape of platforms and formats. In that environment, the appetite for something genuinely communal, and spontaneous has only sharpened.

That’s a great contrast. But how did the film do it?

Apparently, Chalamet was the face of impromptu Time Square previews, sweatshirt giveaways, the blimp, and more. None of the campaign has to do with the movie’s plot but that doesn’t matter. Marketing is about people remembering the brand and partaking. Sure, for longevity a film should actually be good (and a quick scroll of reviews shows Marty Supreme to be well, supreme), but people must see it first.

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And that’s why Marty’s marketing is genius. Now, I don’t like advertising, unless it’s good.

Marty Supreme is a drama, but that doesn’t necessitate stoic, rigid, or serious marketing. Case in point: I just finished the first volume of Stranger Things Season 5 episodes where the show is dramatic but the merchandise is fun. And Marty Supreme’s advertising is experiential fun. The careless joy of being carefree. I mean, big-name celebrities are sporting Marty Supreme swag unpaid. Just part of the whimsy!

I think Chalamet’s big-budgeted experiential approach could signal a change for the industry. Then again, it is an anomaly because it is pure and fun and funny. And Hollywood’s agencies would just make it cookie-cluttered.

In conclusion, I’ll break the fourth wall[i] (and you thought my conversational style couldn’t get worse) by acknowledging a writer is never supposed to end on someone else’s quote. It lessens their authority. But hey, Chalamet and Marty Supreme have given me an unwarranted boldness for out-of-the-box risk taking. Plus Preetika Ravidas states this better than I could: “When news cycles feel endless and algorithms flatten everything into sameness, a burst of collective silliness feels almost restorative. Perhaps that is the true meaning of the orange blimp: a reminder that in a world where so much feels heavy and joy is scarce, even the silliest idea can become a cultural moment.”

[i] Like Ryan Reynolds, another current marketing innovator.

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Like last year (see Newsletter here), below is a list of Thanksgiving episodes to watch. But first, a few thoughts on thankfulness.

Three Thoughts on Thanks

Last year I explained how thankfulness forces us to recognize external benevolence (read Part 1 here) and then I gave some personal stories where one external Giver (who I believe is God) provided for my needs (read Part 2 here).

As you may know, I’m writing a book on humility. Consequently, I’ve been reading books on humility, and several quotes stood out. I never gave much thought about the tie from gratitude to humility. If you haven’t explored this connection and aren’t feeling particularly thankful – you’re welcome for me doing you this incredible favor!

We’ll start with something not directly spiritual. Archbishop of Canterbury Michael Ramsey said, “Thankfulness is a soil in which pride does not easily grow.”[i] I remember in elementary school around this time of year, putting pumpkin seeds in wet paper towels and watching them grow. In the same way, giving humility new life comes from thankfulness. You can’t-er-bury pride seeds in thankfulness soil.

As we move into the more spiritual side of gratitude, it was said of Puritan titan Matthew Henry that “he was an alert and thankful observer of answered prayer…”[ii] I love that reminder of action. First, Henry prayed but when those prayers were answered, he didn’t forget to thank the Gifter. Coincidentally, my Thanksgiving meals are Puritan: bland, simple, but nevertheless guilt-inducing.

Thankfully unrelated to that tastelessness, we’ve arrived at our last quote where Pastor Stuart Scott explains, “Humble people thank God and others often. They expect nothing, so anything that is received is greatly appreciated (1 Thessalonians 5:18).”[iii] I wouldn’t assume someone who is not a Christian to expect nothing; but for the Christian, we should recognize that because as humans we don’t intrinsically deserve any gifts, we shouldn’t expect anything. That’s not to say God doesn’t provide basic needs for all people,[iv] but recognizing those provisions and anything beyond as a gift, is humbling yet healthy.

Healthier (and ultimately more fun) than a tofurky!

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List of 2024 Fogle Thanksgiving Episodes Watched

Brooklyn Nine-Nine, “Thanksgiving” (S1, E10). Read summary here. Thanksgiving dinner is repeatedly ruined but Jake and Holt partner up for the first time. Classic 99 perfection.

Gossip Girl, “The Treasure of Serena Madre” (S3, E11). Read summary here. I’ve watched dozens of Thanksgiving shows somewhere in the middle of their seasons and never been more lost than here. And. this. show. Wow. Not my cup of drama, although I enjoyed the witty title.

Blackish, “Auntsgiving” (S3, E7). Read summary here. Although not overly Thanksgiving-y, still a pretty funny episode and seems pivotal for several of the character’s relationships. Also the second episode in a row where someone pulls an emergency stop in an elevator to make out (i.e. Gossip Girl). Interestingly, the first episode (vs. upcoming It’s Always Sunny) where people resolve to make amends.

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, “The Gang Squashes Their Beefs” (S9, E10). Read summary here. A chaotic episode which, nine seasons in, has a lot of inside jokes, but was still enjoyable. Food for thought: The idea of making peace is probably more in the vein of the holiday than just sitting around a traditional meal.

Bob’s Burgers, “An Indecent Thanksgiving Proposal.” (S3, E5). Read summary here. I think of this classic episode semi-regularly. It’s the first time Bob talks to food (and gives it a voice), includes a Totoro homage, and highlights the Belcher’s quirky but beautiful familial love. As a bonus, it has Lin’s “Pass the Cranberry Sauce” song, which my wife sings multiple times around the holidays.

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Xoncluding Thoughts

I hope you enjoyed this, have a great Thanksgiving!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

[i] Michael Ramsey, The Christian Priest Today, 1972.

[ii] Ready for a wild ride? Ligon Duncan said that others said this about Matthew Henry in the book Method for Prayer, 1994. And that was said by C.J. Mahaney in the book Humility: True Greatness, Multnomah, Penguin Random House, 2005, p. 70.

[iii] Stuart Scott, From Pride to Humility, Focus Publishing, Minnesota, 2002, p. 21.

[iv] Psalm 145:9; Job 25:3; Matthew 5:45, etc.

Badalint-doont … badalint…bada..lint…

Yep, that’s an attempt at Wang Chung’s “To Live and Die in L.A.” and as those haunting yet hopeful first bars rang out on Everybody’s in LA, I knew the show would be distinctive. But the series was indicative of a deeper trend.

I believe the 2020s are consistently reviving, recycling, and reliving the ’80s. After all, that’s the premise of my annual comparison articles. But there is something truly unique about 1985 and there was a fascinating fixation on that year, specifically in 2024. We’ll explore why 1985 was such a pivotal year and why pop culture artifacts like To Live and Die in LA, Run-D.M.C., and the Brat Pack’s St. Elmo’s Fire, were celebrated. Seriously, if To Live and Die in LA had been written in 2024 it would have been called To Live and Revive in LA.

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Kings From Queens: The Run DMC Story

King’s From Queens: The Run DMC Story (2024) is a three-part documentary about legendary rap group Run-D.M.C. Much of the story centers around 1985, including the film Krush Groove from that year. A concise statement on the importance of Run-D.M.C.’s 1985 album “King of Rock” and the documentary, is found in David Phillips’ article “Kings From Queens: the Long Overdue Story of RUN-D.M.C. on Peacock”:

As Ice-T states in the long overdue documentary about the legendary hip-hop trio, “The window of hip-hop relevance is so small,” and just two years later, with their follow up album “Tougher Than Leather,” hip-hop had moved away from their hard hitting boast rhymes and into the field of gangsta rap.

BONUS: Article: “MTV Firsts: Country, Rock, Rap, and Reality” from The Colorado Sound.

BONUS, BONUS: The above image of Jam Master J is from 1985’s Live Aid.

Everybody: is Both in LA and is Wang Chunging Tonight

As I wrote here, John Mulaney Presents: Everybody’s in LA explores the fact that LA is confusing, postulating that comedians and community experts can unravel the mysteries. The show used Wang Chung’s “To Live and Die in L.A.” as the theme song, and if you know Mulaney’s fastidiousness, it’s no surprise. (Coincidentally, Wang Chung was shocked but excited that Mulaney used their song.) Here’s an excerpt from a Hollywood Reporter interview:

Hollywood Reporter: And who chose To Live and Die in L.A. as the theme song?

JM: I did.

HR: Good choice.

JM: Thank you. I watched To Live and Die in L.A. because I’d been watching a lot of William Friedkin movies and read his autobiography during the making of the show. And as soon as I heard the song, I thought, “Oh my God, we have to get that.

HR: It’s so good. Wang Chung.

JM: A whole great soundtrack.

I really wanted to like the film To Live and Die in L.A. Parts were good, but it definitely doesn’t feel “essential” or like it deserves to be on a bucket list. For me, To Live and Die in L.A. the film could have died, but Wang Chung’s song – wow, I’m glad it lived! And initially critics agreed with me. But since then a growing base considers it to be ahead of it’s time.

And maybe this distinct ’80s feel, often compared to 1984’s Miami Vice, is why Wang Chung’s song feels “very” eighties, while maintaining relevance today. Mulaney could have only pulled this show together in 2024 for at least three reasons:

First, Mulaney is new to L.A. so he has fresh, investigative eyes. Second, the specific comedians who appeared were in town for 2024’s Netflix festival. And lastly, although Mulaney has always had a sophisticated wardrobe, and he took a run at nostalgic design in The Sack Lunch Bunch, it’s here on Everybody’s in LA, that ’80s reminiscence matches this cultural moment.

Netflix’s Eric

Set in 1985, Netflix’s Eric tells the story of generational trauma and the monsters we all have lurking in our closets. This was certainly the theme of my Christ and Pop Culture article “Eric: Bringing Light to the Darkness and Facing Our Monsters.” And specifically regarding the 1985 tie to 2024, I detailed:

When listing out the limited series’ newsworthy topics—like kidnapping, racism, homophobia, homelessness, and public sanitation—one might assume the storytelling is disjointed or bloated. It’s not. But 2024 culture is certainly comparable.

Consider jaded views of political candidates and corruption, a humanitarian heart for the unhoused, acceptance for the bullied, and empathy for mental illness. The writer’s empathy for societal issues, while also depicting filth and greed, is layered by characters attempting to do the same: bringing truth and light into darkness.

It also seemed fitting that the Eric trailer features a 2024 cover of ABBA’s “S.O.S” by Nari and Steve Tosi.

Hulu’s Brats

The documentary Brats highlights St. Elmo’s Fire (1985) and initial use of the term “Brat Pack” in 1985. Andrew McCarthy, one of the Brat Pack, directs and stars in the film, saying, “Hollywood discovered the box office potential of a young audience. They aimed their money-making tractor beam directly at it.”

The shot immediately cuts to a newscaster explaining, “It’s the Hollywood class of 1985, a crop of young movie actors that’s giving young audiences a whole new generation of heroes to root for.” McCarthy follows up, “And then on June 10, 1985, New York Magazine published a story called ‘Hollywood’s Brat Pack.’”

But the influence of the term and the time can’t be overstated. Most of the Pack members hated the expression and felt it damaged their careers. McCarthy asked Malcolm Gladwell, author and social critic, his thoughts on the anomaly. Amidst a fascinating interview, Gladwell explains that the obvious take on the Rat Pack coincided with “youth movies” taking over.

Brat Pack alum Rob Lowe agrees: “…the movie business was beginning to transition to where it landed and still exists, which is movies made almost exclusively for 18- to 20-year-olds. I mean, every summer movie that’s out is geared towards that audience. It wasn’t always like that.” McCarthy concurs but tries to pump the breaks on the group’s fame, saying, “Well, we didn’t fill Shea Stadium, but I mean there were moments (laughing).”

Lowe argues: “We could have. 1985, I think we could have. It was fun, excitement, the world is your oyster. You can’t believe what’s happening, confusion. And it was at the height of the Brat Pack, and it was super unbelievable.”

So 1985 and the Brat Pack changed the movie industry but it’s always evolving, right? In some ways, yes, yet Maxwell argues that this specific change could have only happened in the mid-eighties and, maybe more importantly, that it could not happen now. Here’s my transcription of the conversation:

Gladwell: Well, [it’s] possible then in a way it’s not possible now. So nothing like that can happen anymore. You can’t have a cultural touchstone that everyone in their 20s can refer to. If you gathered one hundred 17-year-olds at random in America in 1986, 90 would have seen, or at least be conversant about Pretty in Pink. No question. They wouldn’t even have to see it to be able to hold a conversation about it.

McCarthy: Right.

Gladwell: There is absolutely no cultural phenomenon at the present time of which that can be said – impossible.

McCarthy: Why?

Gladwell: Well, because things have been fractured. We’ve gone from a relatively unified youth culture to a youth culture that looks like every other aspect of American society, which is everything’s all over the place. There’s no common denominator.

I find it fascinating that as interwoven as we are with the ’80s, we can’t have another redefining moment like the Brat Pack. Maybe our current culture alarms us because we are nostalgic for a time (even if we didn’t experience it) that we subconsciously know we can never return to. Or maybe we who can’t afford rent…or groceries or gas in the mid-2020s can’t relate to the St. Elmo’s Fire characters who are depressed because they have…jobs and housing. Yep, bring in the therapists.

BONUS: Watch John Parr’s tasty little music video “St. Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion).”

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Peacock’s Gary

Gary, a 2024 documentary about Gary Coleman, covers his life and career. It’s a sad story examining Coleman’s desire for companionship and meaningful roles. Dion Mial, friend and business manager, said, “When Gary was seventeen as well as his poor health, he was not comfortable with the fact that the character of Arnold Jackson was not aging at the same pace that Gary Coleman was aging.”

A scene from 1985 portrays Gary as a little kid needing his dad to drive him to school (Season 6 of Diff’rent Strokes). Eve Brandstein, Diff’rent Strokes casting director, notes that the network didn’t want to change their golden goose. “That caused him pain emotionally, I’m sure.” Cut to The Tonight Show with Joan Rivers, 1985 where Rivers asks, “Are they maturing you on the show?” Gary scowls, “Not much.” Rivers questions, “Are you complaining?” Without hesitation, Gary replies, “Of course,” shrugs, “not much I can do about it…yet.”

Runner Up’s

There were a few runner’s up that I didn’t have time to watch or fully research:

Modula Font

Tom May says, “Designed by Zuzana Licko in 1985, Modula was the first high-resolution headline typeface created using a Macintosh, during a time when most digital font creation focused on mechanical digitization of traditional typefaces.”

BONUS: See the full article “The best typography of the 1980s, as chosen by design experts” on Creative Bloq.

When God Introduces a High-Resolution Headline Typeface on a Mac, He Opens a Window(s)

Microsoft released Windows 1.0 in 1985. Check out Medium’s 2024 article here.

Every Minute Counts

A limited series about the 1985 earthquake in Mexico City.

Conclusion

I can’t be 100 percent sure why 2024 focused so heavily on 1985 but here’s a SWAG. Some of it had to do with the right timing for the stories to be told, as I believe was true for the documentaries Brats and Gary. Some of it had to do with 1985’s litany of touchstone pop culture (Some of which we didn’t cover such as Back to the Future, The Breakfast Club, and Madonna’s “Like a Virgin”).

And according to the Los Angeles Sentinel, there were two primary reasons why the Run-D.M.C. documentary was made in 2024: (1) biopics were popular in 2024, and (2) Darryl “DMC” McDaniels wanted to strategically tell the group’s story in a doc to leverage the aforementioned trend for a future, scripted opportunity.

By the middle of the decade there was a sound, look and attitude already defining the era. That means shows like Eric could be set in 1985 and use a plethora of period accurate pop culture. And for partially scripted shows like Everybody’s in LA, design choices could be made to use the very best of what the mid-eighties had to offer. (I’m pretty sure Mulaney and NPR commissioned David Lynch to design a waiting room as the set – that was a joke, but the set is pretty perfect.)

So maybe 2024 didn’t revive 1985, maybe we just syndicated it.

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I’m a scaredy cat but have been enjoying the spooky season. I’m going to give you a list of Halloween media I’ve watched this year then some fun bonus stuff. But first, as I mentioned in my last Newsletter, I recently realized that early in our marriage, I didn’t respect my wife’s preference of holidays.

Partnering in Holiday Preferences

Between my preference for Christmas and Western culture’s affinity for the holiday, I never considered that it wasn’t at the top of my spouse’s list too. How blindly selfish! She loves Halloween, so when I said we didn’t have money to buy pumpkins, or was too busy to do trunk-or-treat, or didn’t hand out candy, it was disrespectfully unsupportive. Was I Reverend Moore in Footloose, or worse Dad Meiks (yes, DAD) in Frailty, or worse Jack Torrance in The Shining?

Not that my sweet wife guilted or resented me, or even mentioned it, but how sad that I was too oblivious to notice how much she enjoyed the season.[i] I may never love Halloween, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t love my wife enough to surprise her and celebrate something she enjoys.

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Xollection Machine: Halloween 2025

Below is most of the spooky media I’ve watched this season. There are three categories: “Not Scary,” “Scary,” and “’80 & ’90s Spooky.” Each category has three TV shows or movies and, yes, I rated them. Enjoy!

Not Scary

#1. Abbott Elementary, “Candy Zombies,” (S2, E6) [2022]. This was the most fun Halloween episode I’ve seen in a long time! Sooo many pop culture references. Rocky Horror edited for church, Wanda’s impassioned scream at the hand of Thanos, and for thought provoking, Quinta Brunson’s lament that Sully Sullenberger, “Shouldn’t have had a movie before Harriet Tubman.”

#2. Sing: Thriller (2024). Cute short including all the characters from the Sing franchise with MJ’s hypnotic beat.

#3. Gilmore Girls, “Twenty-One Is the Loneliest Number,” (S6, E7) [2005]. Lorelei wants to create new Halloween traditions with Luke to distract herself from missing Rory. So Lorelei decides on a front yard skit where she has an operating table and quips at trick-or-treaters. And poor Luke will come out in an electric chair and have his intestines pulled out. (Is this where Modern Family got their ideas?!) Much of the magic is that we never see it.

Scary

#1. Weapons (2025). I thoroughly enjoyed solving the mystery while being creeped out. Great storytelling, cinematography, and acting.

#2. I See You (2019). Dumb title, great movie. I’d label this suspense, not gory horror.

#3. IT (2017) and IT: Chapter II (2019). I read the book twenty years ago (which was great but I don’t recommend) and watched both of these in the theater. The story hits some of the worst fears: a supernatural, decades long horror dwells in the drain pipes. But the heart of the tale is the relationship between the kids. Bonus: I’ve seen the first episode of IT: Welcome to Derry and enjoyed it.

’80s & ’90s Spooky

#1. The Midnight Hour (1985). This ABC TV Movie is fantastic (and available for free on YouTube here)! Clearly a product of 1985: a “Thriller” dance number, ’50s nostalgia a la Back to the Future, and Satanic Panic influences. If you look beyond every high schooler being in their 40s and a teacher constantly demanding alcohol at a high school party, this delightfully cheesy cinema is a ton of fun.

#2. The Gate (1987). A great ’lil ’80s treasure that dances between silly and eerie. I loved some of the irregular points (playing records backwards to get rid of demons) coupled with traditional horror tropes (like reading from Psalm 59 [“deliver me from my enemies”]). My wife noted they pandered to the Satanic Panic and to Christians for sealing up the Gate with the Bible.

Related: Listen to Christianity Today’s new podcast “Be Afraid”!

#3. X-Files, “Colony,” (Season 2, Episode 16) [1995]. Not really horror and yet so much of X-Files is spooky. I really enjoyed this one both for the shapeshifting alien storyline and as a (what I consider to be pretty big) mythology episode. FYI: This is Part 1. Part 2 is “End Game.” (No MCU affiliation, although I’d love if you wrote a crossover fan fic!)

Bonus

-You may know how much I despise commercials but when they’re good, I love ’em. So for a funny/cute one about Frankenstein’s monster, watch this!

-Check out Jordan Peele & Conan O’Brien on their favorite horror films and tropes.

-Last year for my Thanksgiving precursor I wrote about the comic Avengers: Vision and the Scarlet Witch (1985-86). I thought it was interesting that before covering Thanksgiving, the previous issue’s (# 5) final pages have Agatha (yes, of recent WandaVision and Agatha All Along MCU fame) talking about Samhain and “this night of all hallows.”

And the issue following Thanksgiving [titled “Batteries Not Included!” (# 7)] was set during the yuletide season. Apparently, Marvel hasn’t done it much, but they actively covered Halloween in October, Thanksgiving around November (oddly released 12/3/85), and Christmas in December. (Is this your tie in for the X-Files fan fic?!)

Xoncluding Thoughts

I hope you enjoyed the thoughts and lists. Have a safe Halloween!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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[i] Empathy is a good partnership practice. How would it make me feel if she said we weren’t decorating for Christmas, that there wasn’t enough money to get the kid’s presents (there wasn’t, but she sacrificed so they had something), or if she said we couldn’t attend an advent service?

Hola, we’re covering two topics: my wife’s guide to being a good partner and a LIGHTS-ON experience at Universal Studios!

Xurrent News

I was recently on “The Ride Home with John and Kathy” – you can listen to my interview here. They had me on specifically because of my confession here that I used to unwittingly take my wife for granted (you can read it in Newsletter # 37).

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The night before the interview, I asked my wife, “If you had this platform, what would you say?” She fired off six practices so fast it made me nervous. Evidently, I still have some work to do! After comically pulling on my nonexistent collar, which apparently was not funny after all (okay, clearly, I have work to do!), I started typing her thoughts. I briefly shared these on the show, here they are with a little more detail:

Jenna’s 6 Practices for Being a Good Partner:

1. Use your eyes: If you see a need, take care of it yourself (and quickly).

   -In what we call the “spill experiment,” one time my wife left a dried spill on the kitchen floor to see how long it would take us to clean it. She ended up yelling at everyone weeks later and cleaning it herself. Not our proudest moment.

2. Anticipate the needs of people in your life.

   -Have communal lists and discussions. Everyone contributes to anticipatory needs.

   -If you’re running out of Tide pods, order them. If you’re running out of milk, put it on the list.

3. If you are hungry or thirsty, see if your spouse or kids need something too.

4. If your spouse asks for help, do it ASAP.

   -Just because it’s not a priority to you, doesn’t mean it isn’t important.

   -If you wait, they might do it themselves, but it will be a loss in the long run.

   -When my wife asks for help it’s usually because it’s time sensitive. I might have clean clothes, but the rest of the household will go to work and school in their chonies if we don’t get Tide pods immediately.

5. Listen and ask questions.

   -Really listen to your partner. Pay attention to what they like.

   -Ask questions if you’re confused or curious. You should be able to order them something from a restaurant or make their favorite meal without them being present.

6. Realize others have a mental load.

   -Not all domestic work is physical labor. I prefer written lists, but many people keep mental lists. For a homemaker this can be calculations of how many Tide pods are used weekly (no, I don’t get paid for mentioning Tide repeatedly), kid’s shoe and clothes sizes, memorizing each appointment, remembering birthdays, anniversaries, teacher’s names, contact info, and covering for other parents. Or knowing it’s tamale day so little Aaliyah needs spare pants while chasing the diarrhea dragon.
   -When we say, “Give me a list,” or “Tell me what to do,” we are handing the mental load back to our partner (this ties back to “use your eyes”).

If you’re looking for “fair,” you’ve missed the point. Especially for Christians. When Jesus told us to turn the other cheek and esteem others as better than ourselves, there is an implication, and directly addressed acknowledgement, life won’t be fair.

In fact, we’re intentionally inconveniencing ourselves, so others are better off. The other side, though, is that we don’t know everything another person is doing. We shouldn’t run through the list of everything we’ve done (mentally or verbally). It’s not a contest. It’s a partnership.

One area I failed at early on was recognizing what holidays were important to my wife. I’ll share more on that in my upcoming Halloween article (with an application for you). <Insert Dad joke about how scary it is that I still have much to learn about being a good partner.>

Fallout Lights-on Experience 2025

I’m a scaredy cat but my wife loves horror stuff. She’s asked me to go with her to Knott’s Scary Farm and Universal’s Halloween Horror Nights for years. But there’s only a few things I’d like to do less. Like eating tapioca pudding or getting a colonoscopy. Or getting a colonoscopy after eating tapioca pudding.

She’s always said, “I just wish you could see the production value at Universal without people jumping out at you.” And it finally happened! This year Universal Studios offered Pass Members a “Special Lights-on Fallout Walkthrough.”

I planned on giving you a ton of photos but that wasn’t allowed, so all I’m left with are words. But due to spoilers, why waste time say a lot of words when a few words do the trick? If you’ve seen the show then the experience had a vault interior, a Super Duty Mart (interior and exterior), desert with sand corpses, and a massive animatronic radiation bear, all inside a sound stage. Ring-a-ding-ding!

Universal Light’s-on Fallout Blurb:

“Can you survive the post-apocalyptic world of the hit show Fallout? Join Lucy, The Ghoul, Maximus and more for a special lights-on walkthrough at one of this year’s Halloween Horror Nights haunted houses—just for valid Annual or Season Pass Members. Spaces are limited. RSVP required. Enter if you dare.”

Fallout had a phenomenal first season (read my review on CAPC Magazine here), nominated for 16 Emmys. And I’m excited for Season 2, slated to air December 2025 – February 2026.

Possibilities for Us Scaredy Cats

I’m hoping this means that other places with high production value will invest in lights-on experiences. Another non-scary option is Universal’s Fan Fest Nights, which will run again in Spring 2026. Do you know of any lights-on experiences? If so, leave a comment!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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In the 2025 novel Atmosphere, some astronauts argue over “what was the best song about space.” Certainly this is just the author’s (Taylor Jenkins Reid) opinion narrated through characters. But both space and music can be distant and ethereal yet, especially in the last century, accessible and imaginative.

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I love that Reid captured this inaccessible accessibility. (I’ve seen enough Sci-Fi to know anything can happen in space even contradictory and lazy writing like “inaccessible accessibility.”) But Reid’s writing isn’t lazy and I think you’ll enjoy the list below. Consequently, I present Atmosphere’s songs in order of appearance (on page 223) and then a few of my own:

• Two characters agree that Bowie has the top spot but passionately argue over which song. Therefore, tied for first is David Bowie’s “Space Oddity” (1969) and “Starman” (1972).

• Third is “Rocket Man” (1972) by Elton John.

• Next is The Tubes’ “Space Baby” (1975).

• Followed by The Kinks (unnamed, but I assume it’s “Supersonic Rocket Ship” [1972]).

• And lastly, Burt and Ernie’s “I Don’t Want to Live on the Moon” (1978).

I don’t fault Atmosphere’s author for focusing on the ’70s (I mean wow, 1972!), clearly, it was a pretty big era for space-related tunes. And the book is set in 1984, so she was limited. But there are a few fun ones from other decades I suggest:

• I just watched the first episode of Ash vs. Evil Dead and he psyches himself up with Deep Purple’s “Space Truckin’ (1997 Remix).”

• Frank Sinatra’s “Fly Me to the Moon” (1964). Quintessential crooner.

• “Spaceman” (2022) by Electric Callboy. I had to throw a metal (and rap…and German…) song in.

Finally, although Andy Weir’s phenomenal novel Project Hail Mary doesn’t specifically name any space songs, user “Andrea” made this Spotify playlist (which I found in a comment from this Reddit user). I’m excited to see what the Ryan Gosling helmed upcoming Project Hail Mary film soundtrack looks (sounds?) like!

What are your favorite songs about space?

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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Xurrent News

I was interviewed on “The Ride Home” radio show on August 14^th (2025) and really enjoyed the conversation. The topics involved a horrible industrial accident in Pittsburgh, my time in manufacturing, and where we can find hope when things get bad. Spoiler: I talked a little about a new kitten we adopted named Marion (Murder Mittens). I’d love if you listen here!

I’ve also been hard at work on my Humility book and on a few mini-article exclusives for you. A few weeks ago I published “Why Fictionalized Crime is the Most Flourishing Streaming Genre.” This was my first mini-article, although I’ve done a ton of them for you as parts of my Newsletters in the past.

I have three more mini-article drafts already started for you, so I hope to be giving you some fun stuff consistently in the future. I’ll dangle the topics: appreciating good music, space songs, and biblical connections about gender and marriage.

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Xollection Machine: Re-Watching Shows, Relationship Advice & Wrexham

Why We Re-Watch Shows

In an article published back in July titled “Seen it All Before,” Melissa Kirsch asked why everyone is “rewatching the prestige shows of the early 21^st century”? It seems like every couple months someone is writing about the comfort of watching old shows. But Kirsch’s article is interesting for a few reasons.

Firstly, that there is a focus on the last 25 years (yes, she addresses that we’re a quarter of the way through this century, humorously acknowledging: “I don’t know how to process that either”). But second, she gives quite a few reasons why we re-watch even while our queues of unwatched content stack up. For those reasons, read the article!

Problems with Married Partnership (and How to Fix)

Recently I was apologizing to my wife for how much I unwittingly took her for granted in the early years of our marriage. I thought I was pulling my weight but over the years realized I wasn’t a good partner. And shortly after that conversation, these videos from marriageishappening on Instagram came across her feed. I highly recommend:

-Part 1 - Societal norms of unbalanced married partnership

-Part 2 - As the video’s description says: “Women often move through the world centering community vs. men who have been encouraged and allowed to center [themselves].” (Plus a great highway patrol officer analogy!)

-Part 3 - Examples of fixing partnership

Welcome to Wrexham’s Emmys

Also, I’m not sure if I’m happier about Welcome to Wrexham’s nomination for Outstanding Unstructured Reality Program, or that the Emmy’s have something called “Unstructured Reality.” (BONUS: I wrote a little something on Welcome to Wrexham here.)

Xoncluding Thoughts

As always I appreciate you reading my Newsletter and hope you enjoyed the Xollection Machine!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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“Crime has always been one of fiction’s juiciest hooks, but it’s arguably the genre that has flourished the most in the streaming era.”

As a Netflix subscriber, I was sent a Tudum email about Dept. Q – my favorite show in recent history. Tudum, named for the onomatopoeia that plays during Netflix’s title card, is their “global fan event” and companion site. The Tudum email I received pointed to another article which I found fascinating: “11 Gripping Detective Shows to Solve the Mystery of Your Next Stream.”

Well, I found the article’s opening line fascinating, I kinda skimmed everything else until I got to their eleven suggested shows.

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To be clear, far from impartial, this is a streaming platform pushing shows currently on… their platform. But that introductory line – crime fiction flourished most in the streaming era – made me ask, who has better user data than Netflix?

No one.

No one has been around longer, been more successful, or been more aware of data mining opportunities than Netflix. So I’ve got to believe this is true. But why?

(Detective) Netflix takes a stab at a few theories around fictionalized crime’s popularity: (1) Battling villains from the safety of your living room is an engaging premise, (2) Viewers want content that’s “propulsive and escapist,” and (3) that very escapism allows audiences to play armchair detective.

I find it noteworthy that we’re not talking about true crime or documentaries, this is very clearly fictionalized crime. Granted, much imagined storytelling is adapted or based on true happenings. But there truly is something captivating about hitting the streets with new detective friends from the comfort of your couch.

BONUS: Of the eleven suggested shows, I’ve seen: Bodies, Mindhunter, Murderville, and The Residence. And based on their suggestions, I plan to watch The Good Detective.

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Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

Every year I publish a 1980s article vs. the current year and every following July I give you an exclusive article of content that was cut for length. This year’s exclusive is specifically based off the article “1984 vs. 2024: What Does Real Freedom Look Like?”

1984 vs. 2024: Miami Vice & Racism & Music

I realized Miami Vice is the answer.

Well, at least for this article. I mean for other stuff too. If your question is “What show popularized pastel T-shirts, Armani jackets, sockless loafers, and aviators?”, then bingo. And while that question is probably crucial to a life well-lived, my quandary was in trying to figure out how to connect 1984’s themes of race and music. Yep, Miami Vice is the connection.

The theme of my original article was “freedom” and we see the cry for that at the heart of Doctor James Cone’s 1984 book For My People: Black Theology and the Black Church. Nowhere does he summarize the problem better than in saying: “Do not the widening gap between the rich and the poor and the real possibility of nuclear annihilation mean that we need to reevaluate our definition of freedom and the methods we have used to attain it?”

Cone was frustrated with governments and powerful institutions either proclaiming everyone was equally free or ignoring evidence to the contrary. His next statement, although not particularly concise, has so much to unpack that I could write a book on it. This isn’t that venue, but I do challenge you to think about what he says, then I’ll add some commentary. This will serve as our cornerstone. Cone remarks:

“However, as we look back over the black struggle in the United States, recounting its accomplishments and feeling proud of how far we have come, let us not forget that we are living in the year of George Orwell’s 1984. The world of 1984 is a world moving toward its own destruction. Obsessed with its own power, it tries to make right wrong and wrong right. Although the oppressed have been struggling for freedom throughout the globe, oppressors have become much more powerful than they were in 1955. In control of the mass media, they now can make lies sound factual and disseminate them further and faster than ever before. The enormous military power of the ruling elites in the U.S.A. and the U.S.S.R. is staggering, and it keeps on escalating. Multinational corporations have become giants bigger than many nations and accountable to none. The rich are getting richer and the poor poorer, dying of hunger and malnutrition in a world that seems not to care.”

Let’s look at the Black and disadvantaged person’s struggle, fearmongering, and the cultural context.

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The Black and Disadvantaged Person’s Struggle

Our first consideration on Doctor Cone’s quote is the subject matter: the Black and disadvantaged person’s struggle. Cone’s statement is based on the real people he saw struggling – the disparities of reality. I think Miami Vice’s creators attempted to give a voice to the disadvantaged through fiction based on reality. As we’ll see shortly, their success on that front is debatable. But as a show, Miami Vice changed the cultural landscape: Filled with complex characters (one of which was the city itself), cinematic storytelling (unseen on TV at that time), and legitimacy earned by taking music seriously. I felt so strongly about Vice’s groundbreaking and cinematic style, that while sitting in a taproom with several cinephiles (one being a legitimate director), I bought Vice’s pilot episode on the owner’s Prime account and played it for the surprised patrons.

But the subject at hand is the reality of racism, and the showrunner’s credit a piece of legislation as one impetus for the show. The “Omnibus Crime Bill of 1984” allowed law enforcement to confiscate drug dealers’ assets. The showrunners explored taking the undocumented billions of dollars and confiscated items like Ferraris and Armani’s that were streaming through Miami and giving them to underpaid cops.

And, in a meta move I love, Crockett references the Bill in the first season. So what did Miami actually look like in 1984? As the Gen X Watch article “Miami Vice and 40 Years of Art Transforming!” says: “Police brutality of black people was on the rise [in Miami] and the government’s failing war on drugs was leading to organized crime fighting deadly wars for market share of the mountains of cocaine white middle class people were yearning for.”

But Miami was only one city, right? What did the nation believe? It turns out Miami reflected the U.S.’ greater fears: Too many immigrants were entering the country, stealing jobs, and bringing in illegal drugs, guns, and money. (No, that wasn’t taken from Trump’s 2024 campaign.) These fears led to something called “White Flight.”

As previously mentioned, how Vice handled race is seen in two ways:

• The first, that executive producer Michael Mann’s personal, radically conservative views were racist and it showed. For example, Jon Stratton says: “Indeed, [Miami Vice’s] racial politics were very conservative and…in particular, the series played to growing (white) American anxieties in the early 1980s over the increase in the number of Hispanics entering and taking up residence in the United States…[T]he predominant image of Hispanics in the series was of violent gangsters and…the show echoed and reinforced white American concerns about their future loss of dominance, both in numerical terms but also in cultural terms, in the United States.”

• The second view is that Mann and other showrunners gave representation, even normalizing multiethnic teams. For example, T.D. Allman explains: “To be sure, Vice could indulge in stereotypes, with drug-dealing Colombians and Jamaicans often at the end of the short stick, and horror-show depictions of Jamaican Rastafarianism and Santeria, the Afro-Cuban religion. But the good guys were also black and white and Hispanic. It was all presented in matter-of-fact fashion, without apology, simply a new, polyglot American reality. It foretold — as did Miami — the country’s demographic shifts.”

Maybe it’s two sides of the same coin. Maybe Mann portrayed the reality of white anxieties, while imagining how diversity could be the strength of a police department.

In fact, I think Vice’s department was designed to be just that. The show’s Omnibus Crime Bill motivation drove storylines that juxtaposed the products of crime and opulence to actually help the disenfranchised victims.

And the heroes were hip.

There’s a reason Vice is known as “MTV Cops.”[i] The show set a standard for television and one lever it pulled was to use music’s influence. I highly recommend the elaborately detailed article “Why Was the Miami Vice Pilot So Good?.” In the article, Matt Zoller Seitz says, “Another element in the mix was MTV, which debuted in 1981 and normalized a music-video aesthetic that was more about highlights and moments than literary concepts of conventional storytelling.”

That idea of music-video highlights (and news network’s sound bites, as we’ll see in a minute), was crucial to 1984’s MTV era.

Initially MTV was accused of being racist in their programming, catering to a white audience. As I wrote about regarding 1982’s groundbreaking year of music, Michael Jackson’s Thriller album was so huge, MTV had no choice but to air its videos. Then in 1983, David Bowie criticized MTV for not playing videos by Black artists…on MTV! Singer Rick James did too, but as Elahe Izadi details, “The optics worked differently for Bowie, a famous white musician beloved by the network and who wielded “influence and power.”

So by 1984, as their two explosive singles released, Run-DMC not only cemented Black artists on MTV, they introduced rap and the Black community to the masses. The excellent 2024 documentary Kings from Queens: The Run DMC Story describes this historical moment. About the documentary, The Wrap wrote, “For 1984’s ‘Rock Box,’ the follow-up to ‘It’s Like That,’ [Darryl] McDaniels was inspired by Billy Squier’s 1980 song ‘The Big Beat.’ They didn’t sample the song itself, but created a similar beat on their own…[W]e did it with ‘Rock Box,’ and it changed the world. They got us on MTV, put hip-hop in everybody’s living room,’ he added.”

Today, in 2024, most of us would view Run-DMC’s earned popularity as something interesting and in many ways, a victory. But there are always those scared by the new and different. Fears real or, often, imagined.

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Fearmongering of the Unknown

American and Christian mindsets are “significantly fear-based.”[ii] This means we are ripe for fearmongering. As I said in my 1983 vs. 2023 article, these concerns come from ’80s Cold War terror melded with religious fear of the apocalypse, which we’re still feeling today. (Sidenote: Enter Shikari’s song “apøcaholics anonymøus” does a frantic and fantastic job of explaining our addiction to a doomsday mentality.)

I’ll be the first to acknowledge that Cone’s above quote could inspire fear. Although I don’t think I’d call it fearmongering. Not to split hairs, but it’s a message on the problem of racism situated atop some fearful truths. I don’t think Cone was trying to manipulate people, more that he was sharing difficulties that could make someone fearful, but he also provides hope later. He may not have had another way to build his case: frustrated with the terror many Blacks faced while others were shielded and uncaring. But in many ways, Cone stands on the Bible’s tradition of balance in pronouncing truths that may incite fear while providing hope in how to avoid that which causes distress.

Fearmongering, on the other hand, is wrong because it preys on weakness and worry by deceit, in order to manipulate an audience to act as the fearmongerer intends. Over time news media has employed fearmongering with greater ferocity and part of that, as I mentioned in my recent Back to the Future article, was due to how drastically communication has changed since the ’80s.

“…most media—newspapers, radio, mailed letters—was virtually unaltered. But with the advent of faster information sharing, the speed of life increased. Smartphones, the Internet, and social media have brought constant connection and real-time news coverage, but paradoxically created emotional distance and superficial communication.”

The authors of “The World isn’t Nearly as Horrible as We Think (or is it?)” agree and note: “But there’s one thing that news outlets of all ages have in common, namely, their selective nature.” That selectivity, seen in corporations and individuals, has varying motivations. And in the case of the news, major incentives have become profitability and influencing opinions. This leads us back to the sound bites I mentioned earlier. Although the idea of sound bites was around in the ’70s, it wasn’t until 1980 that the term[iii] was seen in print media.

By 1983, Time explained: “TV’s formula these days is perhaps 100 words from the reporter, and a ‘sound bite’ of 15 or 20 words from the speaker.” As Phrase Finder details: “Ronald Reagan, who won the nomination as Republican candidate for US President in 1980, was adapt at coining these media-friendly, ‘direct to the people’ phrases; for example [in 1987]: ‘Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.’”

It wasn’t long (the mid-eighties) before manipulators, known as spin doctors, spun the sound bites and news to fit their narrative. Knowing that our American society is predisposed to act out of fear, how can we in 2024 defend ourselves? Well, I’ll give you some helpful applications in the Conclusion of this article, but in the meantime, a few thoughts.

First, we do have some critical thinking skills. One example comes from audience reactions to the music of Miami Vice. Having described Vice’s willingness to pay top dollar for top songs, ONC Wang explains:

“Compare Miami Vice with its short-lived ABC imitator, The Insiders, where the latter choreographed a car scene to a recording that was obviously a studio attempt at "new wave" music. The lack of a real recording artist immediately pegged The Insiders as a cultural production outside of the culture it wished to address. In contrast, the authentic songs which Miami Vice uses have become the footnotes of its cultural authority, the signature of itself as a cultural spokesperson for a culture that grew up listening to rock & roll in the sixties and seventies, and now has become one of the most prominent audiences for consumer advertising.”

We’ll look at the weight behind Wang’s analysis in a minute, but regarding society’s B.S. meter, it’s obvious audiences caught and sidelined The Insiders’ inauthenticity.

Another example comes from comedian Ronny Chieng’s 2024 explanation on why Boomers can’t tell when something is AI, but Millennials and younger generations can. [Warning: The video has strong language and may seem offensive to some Boomers.] I should pump the brakes here and add: As individuals, we often believe we’re better at things than we really are. Psychology Today puts it succinctly: “The Dunning-Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people wrongly overestimate their knowledge or ability in a specific area.” This realization should humbly be applied to our entire life, but for our purposes, suffice it to say that we should attempt to work at the discernment of fearmongering.

Fearmongering doesn’t only originate with corporations and organizations, but can come from anyone with an audience. This includes pastors, individual influencers, parents, employees with co-workers, the list goes on. So, for those of you who want to continue to disseminate fear, I can’t change your mind. If you believe it’s your duty to regularly inform the masses of how horrifying everything is, just stop reading. Yes, yes, you’re the lions, we’re the sheep.

But for those tired of having perpetual anxiety from a news system that is built to only report the worst events, structured to inflate the gravity of that bad news, to overwhelmingly flood all avenues, and to do so constantly, there is hope.

Back to the “The World isn’t Nearly as Horrible…” article I mentioned. The authors say: “Although time seems to pass by linearly, it also moves in cyclical patterns…A clear vision of the world aligns with reality, at least as much as possible. Someone with a clear vision doesn’t necessarily deny the validity of the information stream, but remains skeptical, puts it in perspective, and knows that the vast majority of the circulating information isn’t a big deal. The input of disturbing news is not proportionate to what’s going on at large. It’s just a tiny pixel in the vastness of reality, selected, magnified, and presented engagingly.”

Sometimes we need that “disturbing news is not proportionate to what’s going on at large” reminder. I’ll admit, even as I read the aforementioned article, I questioned it simply for being published in 2022. Like, oh you thought it was bad back then, you couldn’t fathom how bad 2024 was. (And as you read this in 2025 [and 2026 and 2027…] you’ll probably make the same incorrect assumption about this very article!). But the “The World isn’t Nearly as Horrible…” article is solid and was written after the pandemic, so it is “aware” of modern concerns. I needed my own medicine! As always, context is a major factor in our perception of reality.

Cultural Context: A Culture of Pop

I’ve already rooted this article in cultural context: we’ve discussed the “Omnibus Crime Bill of 1984,” police brutality, MTV, Run-DMC, sound bites, Reagan, fearmongering, and of course, Miami Vice. But now it’s time to dive deeper.

When I first read Cone’s thoughts around freedom for the disadvantaged, I was surprised by his list, although I shouldn’t have been. I had written about each of his concerns: “mass media” here,[iv] “military might” here, powerful nations here and here, and “unaccountable corporations” recently in my Severance Season 1 article.

It’s also interesting that Cone tied back to 1955 (before this quote he explained that it had been 29 years since Rosa Park started the civil rights movement), considering Reagan shaped the ’80s from the ’50s and Trump has recycled both decade’s nostalgias. But primarily Cone was frustrated. It was the fact of an “explosion in Black poverty,” coupled with the ignorance and misinformation and willful refusal to acknowledge the disparity that angered so many Persons of Color (POC) including Doctor Cone. For example, I learned from Cone that the term “negro” had a historical connotation of desiring integration, but as the rules of integration were found to be controlled by whites, organizations with “negro” in their title began substituting the term “Black.” So when I watched The American Society of Magical Negroes (2024) premise of Blacks making white people’s lives easier, I understood exactly why the filmmakers used the term “negroes.”

The ignorance and misinformation was seen in the previously mentioned “White Flight.” Interestingly, like 1982’s Blade Runner, “…Miami Vice was a key influence in helping make cities cool again among young Americans whose parents had decamped for the suburbs. Like those films, Miami Vice did so in part by embracing the city’s multiethnic demographic, a cause of much of the anxiety surrounding the city’s future. Vice just turned it into a virtue.”[v]

So some young people, who we now call Boomers and ONC Wang earlier called the generation “that grew up listening to rock & roll in the sixties and seventies,” weren’t afraid of multiethnic communities. This begs the question: how does that generation vote now in 2024?

Certainly political votes are a huge part of this, but as we’ll see in a second, we all vote via what we watch and listen to. First, the politics. I spent a significant amount of the original 1984 vs. 2024 article painstakingly explaining the two year’s political interconnectedness, so I won’t exactly rehash that here. But, in a section influenced by music, I would be remiss in not mentioning the effect songs had on 2024 campaign rallies.

As Kevin Dolak detailed in a Hollywood Reporter article:

“It’s easy to look at the campaign soundtracks heard at Harris and Trump rallies and see a contrast (as well as the curated innovative set of songs played during the delegate roll call on the second night of the DNC).

On one side [RNC], voters are presented with classic American [rock] music, with tracks from past decades that are battle-tested to evoke strong emotions and harness nostalgia’s hopeful sense of a return to when listeners were younger and happier. On the other, voters are hearing some of today’s popular artists come together in a multicultural mix that at times veers into lyrical and thematic content that might have made Tipper Gore blush, but is reflective of America in 2024.”[vi]

On the rock side, 1984 boasted Kenny Loggins’ “Footloose,” Queen’s “Radio Ga-Ga,” Scorpions’ “Rock You Like a Hurricane,” Twisted Sister’s “We’re Not Gonna Take It,” and Van Halen’s “Jump.” And if you were looking for what is considered the best concert ever, the Talking Heads documentary Stop Making Sense was released that year. For many the Talking Heads were a bridge for the quintessential sound of the eighties: new wave synth.

Many examples exist, but a few fun ones include: Wang Chung’s “Dance Hall Days,” Romeo Void’s “A Girl in Trouble (Is a Temporary Thing),” or even Basil Poledouris’ Red Dawn soundtrack which is solely comprised of instrumentals but uses synthesizers. (Sidenote: On June 19, 1984, The Motion Picture Association of America instituted the PG-13 rating, with Red Dawn being the first film bestowed with the new rating.) It’s hard to overemphasize how impactful 1984’s music has been, maybe Michaelangelo Mato’s book title Can’t Slow Down: How 1984 Became Pop’s Blockbuster Year will convince you. But one of Vice’s greatest strengths was knowing exactly how to plug into that modern musical moment.

Author Matt Zoller Seitz says Michael Mann’s contribution to the series was huge, one important move was hiring “Jan Hammer, a Czech fusion-jazz keyboardist, to compose all-new synth-driven instrumental music for each episode.” But the show also used popular music. In what is probably the pilot’s best sequence, the newly founded duo drive to confront the main antagonist with Phil Collins’ “In the Air Tonight” playing at length.[vii] As the pilot’s director says, “‘In the Air Tonight’ would become inextricably linked to Miami Vice, even though it had been released as a single in 1981…The show had immediately taken ownership of the song.”

The pilot also featured two brand new songs: Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” and Rockwell’s “Somebody’s Watching Me” (assisted by Michael Jackson’s backing vocals). A popular perspective was built around Rockwell and Michael Jackson and The Cosby Show and other Black artists that their success was indicative of success for all POC.

Not to discount the effects of these cultural moments. In fact, regarding the impact of Michael Jackson Thriller album (mentioned in 1982 vs. 2022 and here), Reuters says,

“…‘Thriller’ redefined the expectations for blockbuster releases. Starting in 1984, Columbia released seven singles from Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Born in the U.S.A.,’ all of which landed in the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100. Around the same time, Warner Bros. sent to radio five singles from Prince’s ‘Purple Rain.’ Mercury found seven singles on Def Leppard’s ‘Hysteria,’ all of which went to the pop chart. All three albums eventually sold more than 10 million copies each in the United States alone.”

Indeed, a standard in the music industry was set. This was Cone’s cultural moment. But this success wasn’t representative of the vast majority of POC experience.

Facing our Fear(mongering)

And that POC experience coupled with abuse of power and the poor getting poorer can feel hopeless. Doctor Cone said the world was moving toward its own destruction. Things may feel worse than the rose-colored glasses of nostalgia, but much of it is within our perspective. One thing we can control is how we behave with our audiences and how we cast our viewer vote (I told you I’d bring back the vote idea!).

Fearmongering can be stopped. We the audience can limit it by not clicking on click-bait links, not searching for those types of videos and articles, and unfollowing or unsubscribing from those who use these tactics. All of this presupposes that creators are intentionally fearmongering. And many are. But there are those who unintentionally do this too. So, firstly, if you are someone addressing the public, take an honest look at your content and message. Are you driving fear consciously or subconsciously into your audience? Are you posting a video or speaking in front of your prayer group or giving a presentation at work telling people “How bad it is”?

And second, for us consumers, since we are all members of an audience, where are we placing our votes? Our attendance, our watches and views and subscriptions and rentals, where we spend our time, these are monitored and collated and become “votes.” if you watch fearmongering news programs or attend a fearmongering Bible study or repost fearmongering videos, you are casting your vote.

Applying these suggestions should reduce the acceptance of fearmongering, it might even continue Doctor Cone’s good work of standing against racism. The more informed we are of our past (let’s say 1984), the more we can serve and support those in need. And hey, you don’t even have to wear Armani jackets and aviators doing it…but you’d look pretty cool.

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Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

[i] Credited to Brandon Tartikoff, President of NBC

[ii] For more on this see my article “1983 vs. 2023: When Is Revival Right for America?”; Kaitlyn Schiess’ The Ballot and the Bible; Dr. Charlene Sinclair and Dr. Obery Hendricks Momentum podcast episode “Pushing Back Against the Rise of Christian Nationalism;” and Terry Gross’ interview of Tim Alberta for his book The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory.

[iii] The term was published as “sound bite,” although it’s also been seen as “sound-bite” and “soundbite.”

[iv] In an unpublished article draft from 2020, I wrote: “In 1980 people still trusted the news, and with the advent of an unprecedented fourth news network, CNN made news by making news available 24 hours a day. But the problem of selective coverage existed then too.”

[v] T.D. Allman, quoted by Andres Viglucci in: “The Vice Effect: 30 Years After the Show that Changed Miami.”

[vi] I also realized President Reagan had Lee Greenwood sing his 1984 song “God bless the U.S.A” at the RNC, used the song as his official campaign theme, and praised Bruce Springsteen’s 1984 “Born in the U.S.A.” Reagan, “and many of Springsteen’s fans, cheerfully ignored the antigovernment rage of the song, and Springsteen rejected Reagan’s attempt to appropriate him and his song for the conservative cause” (Victor Bondi, American Decades, 1994, p. 47).

[vii] NBC’s official Miami Vice YouTube channel says: “The ‘In the Air Tonight’ Scene is arguably the most memorable and famous scene from the Miami Vice television series, and is regularly cited as one of the greatest, most influential moments in the history of television.”

Xurrent News

A few weeks ago I celebrated the half-way point of 2025 with lists of my favorites thus far. I included all the media I’ve watched (around 50 films and shows), a fantastic podcast, the books I’ve read and some random stuff like a TV record recently broken and the ability to back a film studio.

I’m excited to say my article “Back to the Future: A 40th Anniversary Lesson in Adaptability” posted on the exact date the film was released (July 3^rd). I’ve dreamed about writing this piece for years even though I wasn’t sure exactly where it would go. I ended up exploring why BTTF is still relevant, where it fails (although has been modernized recently), and, surprisingly, how it teaches us about adaptability. There’s a really high chance you’ve seen the movie, so check out the article and enjoy!

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Xollection Machine: Videos, Boomers & the Church, and “Popular Times”

Random Videos: Brooklyn’s Interstate, Alien Ant Farm and The Kelly Family

Below are a few videos I’ve collected over the last few months:

-The YouTube channel Half as Interesting’s video “Brooklyn’s Only Interstate Is Doomed”

-The band Alien Ant Farm’s music video “Movies”

-The band The Kelly Family’s weird music video “Fell in Love With An Alien”

A Millennial’s Comparison to Boomers and the Church

Labeled the “Me Generation,” Boomers emphasized individualism and accidentally raised Millennials to value teamwork. In this video, Instagram user “Shwa004” explains that as Millennials entered the work force they split: some valued their parents’ dog-eat-dog focus; some valued participation and cleaning up the mess that extreme selfishness inflicted.

But Boomers doubled down on belittling the participation trophy generation they created. Many Boomers don’t comprehend that they came into a booming economy, but what goes up, must come down. Shwa004 elaborates,

“This split is similar to what we’re seeing in Christianity: you’ve got prosperity gospel Christians who think that all they have to do is be saved, versus Christians who are focused on doing the work of the gospel…every time the opportunity presents itself regardless of whether they’re going to get compensated or not.”

How Google’s “Popular Times” Works

Have you ever looked up a business and seen Google’s projection for how busy it will be? I use this to plan my visits for particularly slow times – and it’s usually right! But for all this convenience, how does it actually work?

Sydney Yang gives a quick rundown in the aptly titled article “How Does Google’s Popular Times Work?”

Xoncluding Thoughts

There it is. A quick update and smattering of pop culture I found interesting. I’ll be posting my annual July 1980’s vs. 2020’s extended exclusive in a few weeks. Read you then!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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Xurrent News

I didn’t post this Newsletter on July 2^nd because I’m writing a Back to the Future piece for Christ and Pop Culture (CAPC) which should publish July 3^rd (Back to the Future’s release date). My article celebrates the film’s 40^th anniversary by looking at why it’s such an enduring miracle, how it’s adapted, and an unexpected life application. Consider supporting CAPC by becoming a member (FYI: I don’t earn a commission whether you subscribe or not).

I also wrote an exclusive for you a few weeks ago. If you haven’t gotten a chance, read “The Last of Us: Promise & Purpose in ‘The Price’” where I explore some beautiful moments from Season 2, Episode 6. The article also provides another life application on making promises and finding purpose.

Lastly, I’m working hard on my book about humility. It’s a daunting task but I’m energized in mining biblical principles and tying them to pop culture as it relates to bettering our lives.

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2025: The Halfway Mark

We’ll start with a recent broken record, then a cool streaming service, and finish with my lists of media consumed thus far.

TV Record

Check out CNET’s article: “Streaming Has Overtaken Traditional TV for the First Time Ever”

In May, streaming television was responsible for more TV viewing than cable and broadcast TV combined.

Angel Studios

Angel is a faith-based distributer hosting the only streaming platform where you can share entire movies and shows with friends and family. Granted, you need to subscribe (what they call “the Guild”) before you can share some content with others, but they also have free content available to everyone.

One of the coolest things about Angel Studios is that you can invest in their productions. I backed the new show Testament, a modern telling of the book of Acts.

Thus Far: All the Media I Consumed (But Not Necessarily Created) in 2025

Film & TV

Red One, A Man on the Inside (Season 1), Outer Range (Season 2), Carry-On, What We Do in the Shadows (Seasons 5 & 6), FBI True: “Pizza Bomber” (S6, E1-2), Tag (docudrama film), Skeleton Crew [Star Wars] (Season 1), New Girl (Seasons 5 & 6), The Kings of Tupelo: A Southern Crime Saga, Conclave, Thelma, Bad Sisters (Seasons 1 & 2), Ladies and Gentlemen…50 Years of SNL Music (doc), SNL 50: Beyond Saturday Night (doc series), Gilmore Girls (Seasons 2 & 3), Bob’s Burgers (Seasons 14), Boy Kills World, Loki (Season 2), Prometheus, The Last Stop in Yuma County, Alien: Covenant (2017), Severance (Season 2), Running Point (Season 1), Alien (1979), Love on the Spectrum US (Season 3), Wolf Man (2025), The Residence (Season 1), Back to the Future, Conan O’Brien: The Kennedy Center Mark Twain Prize for American Humor (2025), John Mulaney: “Baby J,” The Last of Us (Season 2), His Girl Friday, For Your Consideration, The Apprentice (2024 film), The Studio (Season 1), and Welcome to Wrexham (Season 1).

Currently Watching:

St. Denis Medical (Season 1), Murderbot, (Season 1), The Hunting Party (Season 1), House of David (Season 1), Poker Face (Season 1), John Mulaney Presents: Everybody’s in LA, Gilmore Girls (Season 4), The Completely Made-Up Adventures of Dick Turpin, Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace, Bob’s Burgers (Season 15), Brooklyn 99 (Season 5), and Dept. Q (Season 1).

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Music/Podcasts

• Earlier in the year Memphis May Fire released “Overdose” featuring Christian Lindskog from Blindside. More than a Marketing stunt, the song and Matty & Christian’s vocals are incredible.

• Watch Ladies and Gentlemen…50 Years of SNL Music! I mentioned it here but it bears repeating: you have to watch the first five minute’s music montage.

• I stumbled across Eiffel 65’s “Blue (Da Ba Dee)” music video and it’s awful. But, you know, so bad it’s good - and I don’t mean antiquated CGI (I can respect Toy Story’s innovation as a Citizen Cane of sorts) I mean what the CGI is doing, what the band is doing, and, of course, joyfully meaningless lyrics. As a bonus, a few months ago electronicore band The Browning covered “Blue,” which is pretty great.

• My daughter introduced me to Alex Warren’s “Ordinary.” I’m heavily leaning toward a theme of hope/lessness for this year’s upcoming 1980s vs. 2020s comparison article and with lyrics like “Hopeless hallelujah,” this song has a great shot of making it in. The video, released 3 months ago, is approaching 64 million views.

• A fantastic podcast called “The Redefector” also has a great shot for this year’s 1985 vs. 2025 article. The series explores Cold War spy battles, focusing on KGB Colonel Vitaly Yurchenko’s fascinating defection in 1985.

Books

I’ve only read eight books – sorry, I’m a slow reader! The ones I rated highest are: The Handmaid’s Tale, When Narcissism Comes to Church, Dune: Messiah, and Daredevil, Vol. 3: Living Hell. Check out: Chris Fogle’s Goodreads.

Xoncluding Thoughts

Thanks for reading my mid-year lists! Is there anything I should be watching or reading or listening to? Anything with a tie to 1985 or that magnifies 2025’s cultural moment? Please leave a comment!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

“I don't think I can forgive you for this.”

Season 2 of The Last of Us (TLoU) has its ups and downs but episode 6, titled “The Price,” provides well written explanations and motivations in cinematographically tight storytelling. And the two main characters give us some surprisingly applicable lessons on making promises and finding purpose.

This article contains spoilers for The Last of Us (Seasons 1 & 2)

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Preamble to the Porch

Season 1 introduced us to the cordyceps-riddled world of TLoU. But as many have said, this isn’t a zombie show in the traditional sense. As with any good storytelling, relational aspects are preeminent. And that’s where the surrogate father-daughter duo of Joel (played by Pedro Pascal) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey), come in.

In my article “The Last of Us: Episode 4’s Pivotal Pistol & Joke Joinery,” Joel and Ellie cemented their trust in one specific episode of Season 1. Similarly, I believe this episode of Season 2, like a ribbon drawn into a bow, ties their seemingly fractured relationship together.

But, as with most dystopian tales where actions have real and permanent consequences, Season 2 pulls no punches. Most shocking and heartbreaking for me, was Joel’s death in episode 2. Did you notice the intro’s subtle change from the duo’s shadowy silhouettes to Ellie alone (see Nerdist’s comparison here)?

Joel’s absence not only shapes the remaining episode storylines but permeates the audience’s perspective of every following event and interaction. “The Price” is rife with flashbacks, moving from tortured tension (Joel and his father in 1983) to sunny and surreal (Ellie’s early birthdays), and finally back to strained storms (later birthdays). But each of these complex moments are layered – cleverly providing subtext and juxtaposition for the family’s unraveling trust.

Paroxysms of Promise

Earlier in the season we had seen Ellie walk past Joel sitting on the porch after the New Year’s celebration. The rift was more than speech or body language - Ellie had annexed herself to the garage. Yet, she was still tethered to Joel and the house like an angsty astronaut to her ship. So what caused such a divide?

We learn that Joel and Ellie investigated a zombie attack, finding Psychotherapist Gail’s (Catherine O’Hara) husband, Eugene (Joe Pantoliano), had been bitten. Rifle drawn, Joel calmly explained they couldn’t bring him home. Ellie argued and Joel agreed to bring Eugene back. But Ellie was cautious - only once she heard Joel say, “I promise,” did she relent and go back for the horses.

It’s what happens next, Joel shooting Eugene, that breaks his relationship with Ellie. This is the pertinent backstory, along with Ellie’s enraged whistleblowing, that they’ve never talked about.

So when “The Price” brings us back to the porch on New Years night, the audience thinks they’re caught up. But more is in store. I love having seen a scene, then returning later, where the creators reveal that more transpired (similar to the Rashomon effect). Simply writing about this powerful dialogue does a disservice, here’s the transcript:

Joel: Making a cure... would've killed you.

Ellie: Then, I was supposed to die. That was my purpose. My life would have f---ing mattered! But you took that from me! You took it from everyone.

Joel: Yes. And I'll pay the price... because you're gonna turn away from me. But if somehow I had a second chance at that moment... I would do it all over again.
Ellie: Because you're selfish.

Joel: Because I love you. In a way you... you can't understand. Maybe you never will. But if that day should come... if you should ever have one of your own... well, then... I hope you do a little better than me.

Ellie: I don't think I can forgive you for this. But I would like to try.

There’s so much here – Ellie felt purposeless, her hunch of Joel’s genocide imbued by a selfish motive, the tee’d up trifecta of parenting “a little better than me” – but there’s one thing immediately more important, more impactful. That last line contains a pause we don’t see or feel in the written word. It is a break in dialogue with the potential to heal the break in the relationship.

Oh, that rends the heartstrings, that’s a chance at redemption and reconciliation! That’s everything Joel could have hoped for.

In retrospect, Joel’s initial mistake was not trusting Ellie with the truth of his Salt Lake City massacre. As soon as Joel lied about Eugene, Ellie believed he was a serial liar.[i] She said as much. Had he lied about anything else? So she had to draw a line in the sand and tell him he could never break a promise again. And if he broke this promise, she would never forgive him.

My wife has a theory that in some ways Ellie was being a moody teen who was mad at Joel for lying but didn’t actually hate him for saving her in Salt Lake. Daniel Chin argues that the two flashback episodes of Season 1 set the relational stakes with “Ellie finding someone who would never abandon her.” Makes sense, right? Orphaned, hunted, held prisoner, Ellie must protect herself but once she trusts Joel, she can relax a little.

There’s nothing quite like feeling someone has your back. Not only does it feel a lot like love, it builds belief too. But a willingness to try and forgive shows maturity and Jesus’ love. Think of those fueled by having enemies and holding grudges, what a meaningless and purposeless life.

Chin’s line about Ellie wanting someone who wouldn’t abandon her, keeps rattling around in my brain. Our word should be an unbreakable promise. My pastor recently showed a graph where a line of trust is consistently increasing unless it’s broken, then the line dips low, taking a long time to start an upward trajectory (if ever). Often, we never get the trust level back to where it was.

Potential Purpose: Defying Doomsday

Trust is a crucial yet intangible factor in all relationships. My nephew has been lying recently and it makes me question literally everything he says. He’s a good kid and often there’s no reason or benefit to the dishonesty, but it’s become a (hopefully temporary) habit. Parents not being able to trust their kids is scary, yet adults are supposed to have the emotional stability and toolkit to guide them toward maturity. But imagine being a child unable to trust their guardian.

When, as a parent like Joel, we let fear dictate our measure of truth-telling, our kid’s foundations can be shaken to the core. After all, learning your protector and provider is withholding or actively lying does incredible damage.

Unsurprisingly, Ellie’s trauma festers. She rehearses questions for Joel about how he overpowered the Fireflies in Salt Lake City. She pushes for more responsibility in the Jackson community (a characteristic mentioned in my previous TLoU article). Amidst her sketches, she has written “You have a greater purpose” around one of the moths.

That lack of purpose haunts Ellie and, if we’re honest, it can haunt us. As I said at the beginning, good writing makes relational aspects preeminent. I’m fortunate to know my purpose. It’s not as decisive or glamorous or deterministic as it sounds. For me, it’s a general understanding of what God wants me doing, but the path and details often require instruction.

It’s comforting knowing the Creator of the universe has appointed each of us to do specific things. And while this mentality can lead to manifest destiny and a host of other atrocities, a proper biblical worldview can build a humble and healthy confidence.

But with an untrustworthy father-figure, Ellie is sorely lacking that healthy confidence. Ellie is also unique. She is a typical teen in that she’s discontent, simultaneously seeking safety and stunts. But she’s also a walking immunization - humanity’s hope. So even if Ellie doesn’t believe in a higher power, she knows she has a potential purpose.

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The Promise of Purpose

I can’t be the first to realize Ellie modified her purpose midway through the season. Even knowing everything bad Joel had done, the lies and killing, she still went to avenge him. And maybe this change from perceived purpose (savior of humanity) to attempted purpose (vengeance and bringing the Wolves to justice) has a lesson for us. Now, as Westerners, it can be difficult to accept storytelling where a savior would “throw their life away.”

No, I’m not going to lazily manipulate Ellie into some kind of Christological figure. Instead, I wonder: do we ever ask if our perceived purpose is worthy of Jesus’ sacrifice and calling? Is it possible that a higher power, who I believe is God, has a purpose different than what we believe to be glaringly obvious? It’s easy enough to find out – just ask Him. He promises to answer if we’re sincere…and don’t worry, He’s trustworthy.

[i] I think Ellie would rather Joel be a serial killer than a serial liar.

Xurrent News

In writing my humility book, I’ve secured a few endorsements, completed drafts of the first two chapters, and am exploring how pride is the hub of all sins for Chapter Three. I’m also starting the rough draft of an article on Back to the Future’s 40^th anniversary for Christ and Pop Culture (CAPC). Semi-related, you can read my review of Back to the Future: The Musical here.

Xomposition Exclusive

Muzak’s Musical Manipulation: A Mini-Article

I never gave muzak much thought, other than bland music assaulting my ears in grocery stores and elevators. But recently I found that inventor General George Squier created the company Muzak in 1934, after patenting technology capable of transmitting music through long-distance wires. Over time, the company performed several studies, eventually piping muzak into factories to increase productivity (“Stimulus Progression”).

I was alerted to some of Muzak’s more “nefarious” psychological components in musician Sam McPheeters’ book Mutations. “Postwar America migrated this concept to retail,” says McPheeters, “using fast tempo to get customers in and out (supermarkets), slow tempo to boost browsing (high-end retail), its twangy guitars licks and ethereal synth lines and sleepy sax solos used strategically to lure certain demographics and subtly repel others.”

McPheeters’ ideas of luring and repelling got stuck in my head like an earworm, which gave birth to this article. So I did some research. In 1991 Southern Californian convenience stores started blasting muzak in their parking lots to “repel youthful chronic loiterers.” Although the company did not propose this use, they were happy profiting from it.

A few years later, writing for The Seattle Times, Elisabeth Dunham summarized Muzak’s psychological effect on consumerism: “Much of the research has focused on supermarkets. Studies show that if you play slower music, people shop at a more leisurely pace.” I found the difference between the initial supermarket techniques mentioned by McPheeters and later sales approaches recorded by Dunham interesting. Who knew that boring ’ol muzak was actually being used to manipulate behavior?

[END EXCLUSIVE ARTICLE CONTENT]

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Xollection Machine: Christian Media and AI Conversing with AI, Metal Albums

Christian Media Critique

Back in 2023 I wrote an exclusive article for you titled “How to Improve Christian Video Media for Artists and Audiences.” It was fine, but over the months I’ve seen a couple of other articles about Christian media that expand what I was shooting for. Check them out:

• “Christian Filmmaking Needs a Shift” by Cap Stewart via CAPC.

• “Amazon’s House of David Takes Biblical Speculative Fiction to the Next Level” again by Cap Stewart via CAPC.

• Both above articles happen to be by Cap Stewart, you can subscribe to his Substack “Unpop Culture” here.

Robo Talk: AI Conversing with AI

Sure, I’m nervous about AI and Skynet, but this video is crazy cool. Warning: my wife had a visceral reaction:

Nu Metal: Three New Metal Albums

I’ve been cycling through three new albums:

• Bloodywood’s “Nu Delhi”: YouTube album playlist here

• Memphis May Fire’s “Shapeshifter”: YouTube album playlist here

• And new to me: Shepherds Reign’s “Ala Mai (Digital album)”: YouTube album playlist here

Xoncluding Thoughts

I hope you enjoyed this volume of the Xollection Machine. I’d love to hear your comments – disagreements or otherwise. I appreciate your reading!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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Hey Friends! Each year I give you highlights from WonderCon and this is that Newsletter!

Back in 2023 I wrote about the top WonderCon TV/Film panels (in Newsletter # 13), then in 2024 I broadened the scope giving more highlights from the rest of the Con (in Newsletter # 22). I’m carrying on that tradition this year, so here are the highlights (not rated):

Clown in a Cornfield, Brian Posehn & Todd McFarlane (3/28/25)

More than just a horror movie, Clown in a Cornfield is based on a novel by Adam Cesare. The exclusive clips we saw looked scary but there also seemed like a deeper story beneath. And Will Sasso was hilarious. I ran into Brian Posehn in a bathroom and awkwardly made a joke about his role on New Girl. He was very gracious, even holding the door as I exited, but then returned inside. I know when I’m not wanted, Brian. I caught the end of Todd McFarlane’s panel where he gave a sweet eulogy about Stan Lee and encouraged unpublished creators to persevere.

Spiritual Themes in Comics (3/28/25)

This is always an insightful panel put on by CCAS (Christian Comic Arts Society). I found a discussion on the themes of hope and redemption in 2025, both in stories told (Thunderbolts, Superman [2025], The Fantastic Four: First Steps) and for studios themselves, especially interesting. I was fortunate to sit with the talented Geoff Strout as he sketched the panelists in the picture above.

BONUS: Unpictured: I got to see the first two episodes of a new anime called Lazarus. I’m not an anime aficionado but it reminded me of Cowboy Bebop, which I later found out was also created by Shinichiro Watanabe (just search Lazarus images and you’ll see a blatant tonal clone). The story and the art were cool, the music was horrible (dissonant jazz that distracted from the images and narrative). I couldn’t take a picture because there was no panel.

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Star Wars: Skeleton Crew (3/29/25)

Young stars Ravi Cabot-Conyers (Wim) and Robert Timothy Smith (Neel) were a delight. Exactly what you’d expect: spastic energy, humor, behind the scenes insights, and a lightsaber duel.

Gremlins: The Wild Batch (3/29/25)

This panel featured a soon-to-be-aired episode from the animated series Gremlins: Secrets of the Mogwai. Best part: Gremlins creator Joe Dante and John Glover (from Gremlins 2) were on the panel!

The Hunting Party (3/29/25)

I didn’t know the show The Hunting Party existed, but having seen some clips and hearing the creators and stars discuss, I’ll definitely be watching. I found it especially interesting that Universal Studios put JJ Bailey and Jake Coburn together to see if they wanted to partner on anything and this show was born.

Until Dawn (3/29/25)

Director David F. Sandberg started the panel explaining he wanted to do a horror film but couldn’t decide on the subgenre (slasher, monster, etc.). Then this screenplay came along which has the character’s face a new subgenre each day. It seems like an innovative concept, in some ways subverting expectations like Scream, The Cabin in the Woods, or Haunting of Hill House.

Bonus: A new graphic novel by Ridley Scott called Modville is coming out and I got a teaser copy. The above photo is of Mechanical Cake’s (publisher) awesome booth on the Exhibit Floor.

Xoncluding Thoughts

I appreciate you reading this far and hope you enjoyed the coverage!

Thanks, in Him,

-Chris (the Bearded Wonder) Fogle

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