Stations of the Boss: "Tracks II: The Lost Albums," reviewed.

The only Boss I listen to. (Danny Clinch)

Bruce Springsteen’s curation of his own catalog has always been as beguiling as it is obsessive. Why, during the protracted sessions for his 1980 double album The River, did he pass over the many worthy songs that remained locked away until being compiled on the original Tracks almost 20 years later? While giving the nod to the turgid 8.5-minute ballad “Drive All Night”? And “Crush on You,” a D-list rocker I saw him introduce at a concert in Richmond in 2008 as “the worst song we ever wrote.” How did he decide to bury most of the 83 songs included on the new Tracks II: The Lost Albums for decades while determining that, say, clunkers from 2009’s Workin on a Dream like “Outlaw Pete" and “Queen of the Supermarket” needed to be delivered to his public immediately?

These questions are perhaps unanswerable, but Tracks II provides some clues. My Washington Post review is here.

Pop Culture Happy Hour: "F1 the Movie"

Damson Idris and Brad Pitt are the hot young prospect and the grizzled old vet in F1. (Warner Bros.)

I was in Las Vegas in September and December of 2023 for U2’s Achtung Baby show at Sphere, and saw the infrastructure going up for the Vegas F1 race that was photographed for what I must evidently refer to at least once as F1® The Movie. In our Pop Culture Happy Hour dissection of it I likened it to Bull Durham, which does a far better version of the same old-dog-clashes-with-young-dog thing. I had a good time discussing this vroom-vroom flick with old friends Linda Holmes and Ronald Young, Jr., and new friend — and F1-the-tradmarked-racing-league expert — Maria Sherman.

Undead Reckoning: "28 Years Later," reviewed.

You can trust him; he’s a doctor. Ralph Fiennes in 28 Years Later.

I don’t know if I need two more of these in the next couple of years, but 28 Years Later, the reunion of director Danny Boyle and screenwriter Alex Garland 23 year after their influential zombie flick 28 Days Later, is pretty great. My Washington City Paper review is here.

Actually, "Frankenstein" is the name of the asshole

Rebecca S’manga Frank and Nick Westrate create a monster. (DJ Corey Photography)

At Shakespeare Theatre Company, Emily Burns updates Mary Shelley’s 200-year-old monster mash for the tech oligarch age. My Washington City Paper review is here.

Snatching Defeat from the "Jaws" of Victory: A Chronicle of Sequels Unremembered

Can’t believe I forgot to mention that Jaws 3D heel Simon MacCorkindale starred in a short-lived NBC series about a shapeshifting crimefighter called Manimal that premiered two months after the shark three-quel hit cinemas.

Can’t believe I forgot to mention that the boat The Widow Brody uses to impale Jaws the Fourth in Jaws: The Revenge was named Neptune’s Folly.

I did remember to mention that J:TR cast member Mario Van Peebles directed a film 40 years after Jaws called U.S.S. Indianapolis: Men of Courage that dramatized the events Robert Shaw related in his immortal monologue from Jaws, but that was cut for space. Anyway, my contribution to the Paper of Record’s Jaws anniversary package — The Sequels, and a unified theory of sequelology — is here.

"We Are Gathered" to witness a real, legal marriage at Arena Stage

Kyle Beltran and Nic Ashe in We Are Gathered, a play that accompanies their characters’ fictional marriage with real ones. (T Charles Erickson)

I spent a beautifuly day with Jean Yoder and Rhys Price, who got married on stage in the finale of a performance of Arena Stage’s We Are Gathered. My Washington Post feature about their wedding day is here.

Pop Culture Happy Hour: "The Phoenician Scheme"

A new Wes Anderson joint is a cause for celebration if you’re me. I join pal-for-life Glen Weldon and Code Switch host B.A. Parker to scheme, Phoenician-style. My jokes about how Anderson never phoens it in have all been cut.

Dance Macabre: "Ballerina," reviewed

The right to bear de Armas: A girl gets a flamethrower in a flick From the World of John Wick. (Murray Close)

My Washington City Paper review of Ballerina, from the non-wizarding World of John Wick, is here.