Feminist Frequency Radio

Anita decided to forego our usual intro banter this week, so we just jumped right into this week's topic: the social impact of our cultural obsession with depictions of policing. From Dragnet to Brooklyn 99, what lies behind our abiding interest in the people and institutions tasked with maintaining “law and order”? SEGMENT TIMESTAMPS: 1:34 - Anita and Ebony talk about the danger of being the sard...

On this week’s episode, we talk about the beautiful new film The Last Black Man in San Francisco, a deeply personal movie about identity, gentrification, and institutional power. Ebony Adams calls it “simultaneously tactile and dreamlike!” Also, the ramifications of Jay-Z’s new deal with the NFL, and Marvel’s disappointing refusal to publish an anthology introduction that has some (appropriately)...

This week, we're going toe-to-toe with writer-director Riley Stearns' new dark comedy The Art of Self Defense, starring Jesse Eisenberg and Alessandro Nivola. We talk about how the film brings a critical lens to the socially constructed "rules" of manhood, and to the ways in which men are pressured to perform masculinity among other men in the establishment of a kind of hierarchy. We als...

SPOILERS ABOUND FROM THE VERY BEGINNING OF THE EPISODE -- BE WARNED Blend yourself a frozen marg and buckle up for this week's episode of Feminist Frequency Radio, in which your Southern California stalwarts cruise up the 101 for a journey into Hollywood Past. This week, we discuss Quentin Tarantino's 9th feature film, an epic* ode to manly men and one uncomplicated babywoman. Two of your hosts le...

Time travel is such a powerful fictional device. It allows creators to shine a light on the cultural struggles and social ills of the present by making powerful connections with the past, and by offering wonderful or horrifying visions of the future. Of course, it can also just be a whole lot of fun! But time travel is uniquely powerful as a tool for feminist writers; after all, feminism has alway...

There’s a lot to celebrate about our increasingly diverse mainstream media landscape. Modern audiences can immerse themselves in so many different kinds of compelling stories-- stories from which POC, the disabled, queer people -- (basically anyone who wasn’t middle class, straight, and white) had traditionally been excluded. It’s a victory of a sort, but it only goes so far. We still have so far...

This week, we go on a swingin’ European adventure with Spider-Man: Far From Home. Anita’s friend Sara Fritzon joins us to serve as the token European for our conversation about Peter Parker’s latest escapades. Anita gushes over Tom Holland as Peter, Carolyn rants about the film’s politics, and longtime Spider-Fan Sara explains why she loves the MCU Spider-Man films, despite feeling that they don’t...

Your battle-hardened hosts gather in the Thunderdome to discuss Strong Female Characters in our media. What kinds of aesthetic and narrative features tend to mark someone as a “strong female character”? Which genres seem most invested in the presentation of a specific kind of sexualized female badass? How do we celebrate the presence of authentic strong female characters while keeping our critical...

Everyone is talking about HBO’s Chernobyl. They say it’s good but it’s not enjoyable. We decide to find out for ourselves. Entertainment this news includes: Megan Rapinoe, Colin Kaepernick, Nike and re-boycotting Nike for life, Disney’s live action Little Mermaid. Time Stamps: 03:14 - Entertainment News: Topic, Topic, Topic 13:50 - Main Segment: Chernobyl 41:31 - What’s Your FREQ Outs: 198X, Docto...

Who You Callin' Mary Sue? On this week’s episode, we tackle the topic of the Mary Sue! It’s a term that some have used as a cudgel in recent years with which to attack prominent female characters that they dislike for one reason or another, but what does the term really mean? Where did it come from? And does it still have any value in our modern-day conversations about female characters? SEGMENT T...

On this week’s episode, Carolyn and Ebony continue their conversation about Life Is Strange 2, a conversation that started back in episode 63. Today, we’re talking about Episode 3: Wastelands, and we’re joined for our conversation by the writer and critic Tevis Thompson. Our discussion explores the ever-increasing political relevance of the series, the game’s noteworthy sincerity, the unconvention...

This week, Anita plays hooky so Carolyn and Ebony are responsible for keeping the student body on track. Classic nerds! Our topic this week is Booksmart, Olivia Wilde's feature debut about two young overachieving women on the cusp of graduation. Tune in for a discussion of the way the film empathizes and delights with its multiplicity of characters, centers the teen girl experience, and is delight...

People often use the term “guilty pleasures” to talk about media they enjoy even though they feel it has little redeeming value. But what does it mean to be a feminist media critic who sometimes finds herself enjoying media that she believes is outright harmful? On this week’s FFR, we have a frank conversation about what guilty pleasures mean to us, and our own relationship to media that we may ap...

This week we dive into Always Be My Maybe, Netflix’s latest romcom staring Ali Wong, Randall Park (and of course) Keanu Reeves. Because we are rapidly turning into a Keanu Reeves podcast. Ebony and Anita had very different opinions on this movie. Anita tried to opt-out of this episode because she feels bad about her opinions. Carolyn still refuses to bring us any positive entertainment news but do...

It's finally here! We made it! We have arrived at our John Wick 3 episode. Carolyn and Ebony can finally calm the hell down (not bloody likely). Tune in for a discussion of the assassin economy, visual style vs narrative coherence, fairytale logic, and really digging movies that also maybekindasorta feed our most problematic desires. Time Stamps: 01:24 - Entertainment News: Moby; Leonardo DiCaprio...

On this FFR, we’re talkin’ ‘bout the wonderful new animated series Tuca and Bertie! Created by Bojack Horseman producer and production designer Lisa Hanawalt, Tuca and Bertie stars Tiffany Haddish and Ali Wong as best friends whose friendship must evolve when Bertie moves in with her boyfriend Speckle. Oh, and also they’re all birds. Our conversation covers the way in which the show explores numer...

This week we go into the perilous unknown with the 2019 reboot of The Twilight Zone airing on CBS All Access. We dive into episodes like Not All Men, Wunderkind, The Traveler, and others to see which each of us liked best… and we certainly don’t all agree. 2:32 - Entertainment News 14:49 - Main Segment: Twilight Zone 46:48 - What’s Your FREQ Out Relevant Links Dandelion Immersive art project https...

Hey, Feminist Frequency Listeners! We had a fantastic discussion about the new Netflix documentary Knock Down the House, which documents the thrilling challenges posed to the political establishment by the record numbers of women and people of color looking to unseat long-time incumbents in 2018. In addition to Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez of New York, the film introduces viewers to candidates navigati...

In this week’s FFR, our 75th episode, it’s a spoilerific conversation about the latest MCU crossover epic, Avengers: Endgame. First we talk about whether or not the film worked for us purely on the level of being an enjoyable superhero film that offers a satisfying conclusion to the cliffhanger of Infinity War, before delving into deeper discussions of fat-shaming, queer representation, and the fi...

Anita has returned! But Ebony is gone. To make up for it we’ve brought back very a special guest, everyone’s favorite Iranian-American Muslim Comedian, Zahra Noorbakhsh. This week we dive into Hulu’s newest sitcom Ramy. Created by comedian Ramy Youssef we follow the story of a 20-something Egyptian-American Muslim living in New Jersey, and trying to sort out who he really is and what he really wan...

Anita’s off on another one of her globehopping adventures, so Ebony and Carolyn hold it down this week with a look at the latest DC Comics flick, Shazam! There’s a refreshing sense of lighthearted fun to this film, especially in contrast to the grimdark Batman and stuffy Superman of DC’s recent movie output, and a welcome dose of heartwarming sentiment as well. We talk about the way the film contr...

In this week's episode, Anita and Ebony are joined by comedian, correspondent, and host of The Bitchuation Room Podcast, Francesca Fiorentini. The topic under discussion in this episode is the 2-part HBO documentary Leaving Neverland, about the decades-long child sexual abuse alleged against Michael Jackson by two survivors, Wade Robson and James Safechuck. We talk about living through a moment of...

Our Patreon backers get exclusive access to special bonus episodes every single week in the form of our FREQin’ AfterParty. This week, we continued our discussion of Jordan Peele’s Us because we couldn’t quite contain all of our thoughts in the main episode. As we talked more about some of the film’s complex layers, its deeper meanings, and what aspects of it we found to be successful and not so s...

Everyone is talking about Us. And for good reason. This week we dive into the hotly anticipated new horror movie from the mind of Jordan Peele. SEGMENT TIMESTAMPS: 1:27 - Intro baner 1:44 - Entertainment News: Zach Snyder said some dumb things, Jussie Smollett and the Chicago PD, Alanis Morissette critique 14:10 - Main Topic: Us 45:02 - What’s Your FREQ Outs 50:28 - Guest FREQ out from Katie RELEV...

This week on FFR, we’re talking about the new film from Neil Jordan, director of The Crying Game, Interview With a Vampire and others: Greta. Greta is a psychologically terrifying tale of an innocent young woman named Frances (Chloe Grace Moretz) who befriends a lonely, older French woman named Greta (Isabelle Huppert), only to discover that she’s gotten much more than she’s bargained for as Greta...