Notes of a Defeatist

The Onion’s A.V. Club’s Nathan Rabin inventories eight sure fire fiascoes that somehow managed to succeed despite themselves. Amongst the unlikely eight: Late Night With Conan O’ Brien and the American version of The Office.

From Billboard magazine:

“Akron, Ohio-based rock duo the Black Keys have just finished their fourth studio album, which will arrive Sept. 3, almost exactly two years since the release of the band’s breakthrough, “Rubber Factory.”

The as-yet-untitled new album will be released by V2 in Europe and Asia and Modular in Australia. A new North American label [...]

J.J. Abrams has his work cut out for him.

Breathing new life into an ailing franchise (which really other than the theme music and title what about the two prior films was exactly Mission Impossible-ish?), trying to open a major movie with a certain actor everyone loves to hate, and squeezing in a few spare minutes [...]

“Jessica Abel is brilliant. She’s created amazing work for years, and La Perdida is her classic. It’s funny, politically astute, and heartbreaking. It’s graphic novel poetry.”

—Sherman Alexie, author of The Toughest Indian in the World

Jessica Abel author of Soundtrack, Mirror, Mirror, and Radio: An Illustrated Guide, the very excellent look into the production [...]