Pop Culture Archives

Sacred Games: Why You Don’t Mess With the Marathi Tai

We can continue to criticise the portrayal of women as mere pawns in the sacred games of men. But take a minute to look beyond the obvious. The women in the Netflix series aren’t mere cheerleaders – they’re controllers in their own right.

Damian D'souza June 8, 2016

Pop Culture

What Was 2019’s Meme of the Year?

While meme templates and pop references come and go like rainfall in Mumbai, some pieces of content captured the essence of this year quite succinctly. Here are our contenders for Meme of the Year.

Arré Bench June 8, 2016

Pop Culture

15 Years After Britney Sang About It, Why “Toxic” is Oxford’s Word of the Year

Fifteen years ago, Britney Spears made a frothy pop song about a toxic relationship. Today, in the era of #MeToo, the word has a very different connotation. It was so much in vogue over the last year that Oxford English Dictionary anointed it 2018’s Word of the Year.

Kahini Iyer June 8, 2016

Pop Culture

Valerian and the Slow Rise of Cli-Fi

Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets isn’t a climate-change movie, but a healthy reminder of a collective anxiety artists feel about the future of the planet.

Parthshri Arora June 7, 2016

Pop Culture

Dhamaka Review: Ram Madhvani and Kartik Aaryan offer a barnstorming critique of news media

Kartik Aaryan and Ram Madhavani’s Dhamaka is a riveting thriller that works even better as a critique of media greed and frenzy.

Manik Sharma June 7, 2016

Pop Culture

Amen, Angamaly Diaries, and Jallikattu: The Decade of Lijo Jose Pellissery

Every Malayalam filmmaker of repute today has had a similar pattern of learning and self-reflection: There’s an ambitious film here, a glorious misfire there, tied together by cinema that defined the decade. Lijo Jose Pellissery's debut and steady rise – from a talent to watch out for, to one of the industry’s very best – reflects the journey of everyone who came along with him.

Aditya Shrikrishna June 7, 2016

Pop Culture

7 Years of Queen: The Complicated Legacy of the Film that Celebrated Feminism

Rewatching Queen is a surreal experience. For once, it isn’t because a movie has aged so horribly, you question your own sensibility and past self for ever liking it. On the contrary, Queen is a rare legit classic, as relevant today as it was in 2014. Queen’s legacy, however, is a complicated mess.

Runjhun Noopur June 6, 2016

Pop Culture

Life Lessons from Frank Underwood

House of Cards is a window into what would happen if Donald Trump was actually competent. The life lessons from Frank Underwood, a well-rounded evil genius with a dysfunctional morality metre and the power to change the world, are invaluable.

Parthshri Arora June 6, 2016

Pop Culture

Rocket Boys is a game-changing portrayal of two iconic scientists

Jim Sarbh and Ishwak Singh star as Homi Bhabha and Vikram Sarabhai in this comprehensive and intimate look at the lives of two scientists, thankfully sans the jingoism, that attempts to show a young country and a people in transition.

Samarth Mahajan June 5, 2016

Pop Culture

One Mic Stand: Shashi Tharoor Pulls a Kunal Kamra, Just in Better English

Amazon Prime Video’s One Mic Stand shows us Shashi Tharoor’s likeable, charming side. Look, he’s the guy you can hang out with. But we don’t need Tharoor to be relatable. We needed him to be cutting and crisp, to shame us out of the political coma most of us seem to have slipped into as we wait to hear on our Canadian PR application status.

Sonali Kokra June 5, 2016