Stephen King's editor:

“A real man does what’s right. A man serves others. A man doesn’t lie or cheat or steal.” You’re describing an ADULT those are qualities of emotional MATURITY that have nothing to do with gender!

<signaling to waiter> I’ve had enough Gender. Please take this away

reposting this for no reason :)

maybe i am being an annoying woman, but people who continue to talk about This Is a Real Man (as a response to Bad Man)...like...why? Is virtue and "doing the right thing" gendered? Is it assumed that women are naturally virtuous or that women are the object of virtue?

it's just always about feelings, you know? "men feel undervalued in the party," "men feel sidelined." i'm sure that's really hard for you! but, somehow, i don't find that quite as materially salient as "graham platner has been credibly accused of beating women"

i think i will start caring about the "democrats are too hard on poor little men!" thing when the democratic party goes six (6) months without a prominent democratic man being publicly accused of violence against women

i wanted to know if i was the only person thinking this so i searched bluesky for "mina the hollower" and INSTANTLY came across horrifying fetish porn of the cartoon mouse. bluesky can only be itself, i suppose

i'm bouncing HARD off of Mina the Hollower, like to the degree that i feel like something must be wrong with me???

If you're response to the vanity and frivolity of your opponent is just "doesn't this remind you of trans people" I don't think you're winning new voters or helping trans people

you're the same | patreon.com/lubchansky

Not lowkey either

i will defend my perfect son Ser Duncan the Tall with my life

rip euphoria. will never forget being swindled into watching the second season by a beloved friend who, for some reason, believed that sam levinson was a trans man who'd abused drugs as a teen to deal with gender dysphoria and that rue was his entirely autobiographical self-insert

Happy Pride.

my review of Backrooms (2026, dir. Kane Parsons): pretty good considering that he was born closer in time to the release of Tik Tok by Ke$ha than to 9/11

meet me in the backrooms if you're (bumpin that)

why would you call them that

I loved Margo's Got Money Troubles (the book), but wondered how the show would deal with Jinx and Margo's relationship. Turns out, I liked that too! You can see my thesis for free, but you've gotta subscribe for the rest :)

In this week's premium Friday newsletter: @lilywrites.bsky.social on how Margo's Got Money Troubles subverts the parental apology fantasy

i really like this show

In this week's free Wednesday newsletter: @lilywrites.bsky.social on Helen DeWitt's magnificient 2000 novel The Last Samurai and the ways it's misunderstood episodes.ghost.io/the-last-sam...

literary criticism? in THIS economy?? anyway, for a fun change of pace, here is my CONCLUSION as a little teaser! want to read the rest? great news: this piece is free for everyone, so dive in!!

Breaking my Bluesky fast to repost this essay! Not sure why social share cards aren't working on Bluesky right now (love 2 use the Normal Webiste That Works Great), so have a few paragraphs from the piece as compensation!

@lilywrites.bsky.social closes out our Pluribus coverage with a meditation on how the show handles loneliness

only take on the millennial music discourse is that it speaks to a deep psychic sickness on this website that i haven't seen anyone suggest tik tok

Quark attempting to show empathy to Major Kira:

In this week's premium Friday newsletter: @emilystjams.bsky.social on Blue Heron and what it means to make deeply personal art.

If you enjoy reading books, might I interest you in MINE?? Woodworking is available for just $3.99 at Apple Books from now through May 12!! You, too, can have love and joy in your life! books.apple.com/us/book/wood...

If you have missed me writing about The Sopranos, you are in luck!

i simply don't understand why this is being treated as some sort of accomplishment in the queer press. this is quite grim!!!!!!!!!

In a new 26 Episodes, @emilystjams.bsky.social takes on "Made in America," an episode of television that feels like a prophecy

what will become of Carol when she meets Manousos?? Find out below!! Little preview attached!

In this week's Monday Rundown: Charlie Kaufman, Martin Scorsese, Spike Jonze, and a gorgeously melancholic kids' show.

my official "the 90s were better" take: look i wish i was not expected to have more household technology than a VCR and a desktop computer and a landline! but also i like that i'm able to be gay married and that solar panels are cheap. i contain multitudes

SHAFT

ok yeah this is the one. mainline protestantism takes another well-earned W

dude watch out the ocean washed over your grave

ok i'm trying not to jinx it but i think i may have finally found a church that feels right for me :)

I’m not surprised it’s so expensive. Most cows don’t even lay eggs

there’s an objectively correct answer and it’s Live Más, you can instantly imagine 5 - 10 incredibly self-serious heartbreaking episode storylines that arrive there, my favorite is “Don Draper has seen Angels in America”

"It takes zero courage to love you." the ten year old trans kid in me is just ... welp, the 40yo me is crying.

This has been a great month at Episodes!! It's been the most productive in the modern history of the newsletter, and I'm grateful to @emilystjams.bsky.social for letting me be a part of it. Your subscriptions mean the world and get you access to a lot of cool writing — consider joining us <3

Here’s a free sampler platter of what @lilywrites.bsky.social and I got up to at the newsletter in April! Consider becoming a paid subscriber to access all of these great articles and more! episodes.ghost.io/check-out-wh...

really proud of this one — give it a read!

This is interesting because it challenges two widely held political assumptions: 1) that people love it when everything at the supermarket is at least $8.99 and 2) that the easiest way to win voters over is to go on TV every day and say that you need to build a big event space or you'll die.

I love this book… and you can too! (This one is free for all to read!)

New free Wednesday newsletter!! @emilystjams.bsky.social in conversation with Rachel Meredith, author of Girl Next Door, on writing romance that doesn't shy away from the complicated parts of life

when we mourn le guin, we mourn one of our greatest writers & thinkers. but we also mourn one of our all-time greatest haters