Links 6/4

Due to a weekend-trip hiatus (NYC was great, thanks), this links post is a bit later than usual.  Coincidentally, many of these links seem to have a bit of an LGBTQ theme.
Happy Pride!

Let’s get the smell stuff out of the way first:

• Auklets are a bird species in which males demonstrate fitness not only by very fancy and sexy crests, but seemingly also by emitting a strong tangerine scent, research finds.
• Study finds that activation of a certain smell receptor speeds the progression of prostate cancer, suggesting new treatment methods via blocking of the receptor.
• Department stores reevaluate traditional beauty and fragrance marketing techniques as the beauty industry changes.

All the feels:

• One of the best things about the cultural shift toward acceptance of LGBTQ lifestyles (beyond thousands of people being able to live their truth) is the uptick in adorable stories like this.
• This animated short made me cry.
• If babies wrote travel reviews, too funny.

Film thoughts:

• You may have hard of the Post-Western- are we living in the age of the Post-Hero?
• DC vs Marvel action scenes (and why Marvel’s are so much better). Despite not being a fan of either company, I thought this was a very interesting analysis.
• The Power of the Vampire Myth
• Why Solo isn’t doing as well as previous Star Wars films.

Current events:

• A comedy bit about Mamoudou Gassama, France’s immigrant hero (but mostly about the French).
• Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, and my own interracial relationship.

Odds and Ends:

• The ‘twink’ controversy: Why can’t black men be twinks? and Can men be objectified? A response to the ‘twink’ controversy.
• Mental health is a journey: five lessons learned from treatment.
• How to get ride of clutter
• Two lovely children’s books: Prince and Knight and Julian is a Mermaid.
• Oh no.

I Loved Baby Driver (Spoiler Free)

I loved Baby Driver (trailer here!) extremely much but it kind of took a backseat to other things going on in life. Things like 1) AMERICA (‘MURICA) and 2) FRANCE and 3) TRAVEL to the quiet wilds of Pennsylvania.

So now let’s get down and dirty and talk about Baby Driver because it’s really excellent (assuming you like any one or combination of the following: heist films, gangster films, action, car chases, and/or music- should be most people, I think).

Wonder Women (Non-Spoiler)

I saw Wonder Woman yesterday and the above is what I posted to Facebook afterward.
I have a lot of thoughts on the film, most of them positive, and I’d like to talk about them and what I feel like the film means- because despite being ‘just a film’, it’s really tempting to point to it as being something more. In part because I want to see more of these strong leading ladies- and hopefully the film’s critical success will pave the way for that.

I’m going to be careful not to spoil this film in the following post (anything that is a spoiler will be blocked out- highlight it if you want to see the text) because I do recommend that people see it.