Review: This Iconic Musical Reminds Us That Open Debate Still Matters
1776 is a musical about John Adams' pursuit of American independence.
Reviews
Review: Gore Vidal's Burr Is the Anti-Hamilton
America's Founding through the eyes of the least popular Founding Father
Review: A Fresh-Eyed Tour Through Revolutionary America
My American Revolution revisits the American Revolution through those that keep the revolutionary spirit alive.
Review: The Short Life of a Formerly Enslaved Poet
The Odyssey of Phillis Wheatley tells the story of early America's "African poetess."
Review: George Washington's Apple Brandy
A replica of Washington's apple brandy is available for purchase at his Mount Vernon estate.
Review: The Lesser-Known Texts That Shaped the American Revolution
The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution draws upon writings and speeches you might not have heard of.
Review: Drunk History and the American Revolution
Hamilton, Jefferson, Franklin, and others appear in the irreverent TV series.
Review: Visit Independence Hall, Where Founders Signed Their Own 'Death Warrants'
Modern visitors to the site where they signed the Declaration of Independence can still feel a sense of uncertainty and trepidation.
Review: Racism, Immigration, and the American Dream in This Ragtime Revival
The musical contemplates the best way to achieve social change in the face of injustice.
Review: A Sci-Fi War Movie About the Pentagon's Inscrutable Budget
The Pentagon's budget is so vast that a soldier believes the extraterrestrial machine shooting lasers at them might be taxpayer–funded.
Review: A Victim of Chinese Authoritarianism Explains Censorship and Surveillance
"A primary aim of censorship is to normalize itself," Ai Weiwei writes in his new book On Censorship.
Review: A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms Is a Fantasy Drama About Occupational Licensing
The first season of this Game of Thrones spinoff considers whether the main character is officially a knight.
Review: The Boring History for Sleep Podcast Mostly Delivers on Its Promise
If this podcast has a flaw, it's that occasionally the episodes are slightly too interesting.
Review: Latest Bridgerton Season Explores Personal Autonomy
A gossip column runs up against monarchical censorship.
Review: Minecraft Is Still Getting Better Over 15 Years After Its Original Release
Contrary to the concerns of big-is-bad types, the game's charm has only grown since its Big Tech acquisition.
Review: A Novel About a Tradwife Influencer Taken Back in Time
The protagonist in Yesteryear wakes up one day in what appears to be a real 1800s homestead.
Review: Queer Eye Helped Promote LGBTQ Acceptance Without Yelling at People
The show, now in its final season, reminds viewers that people of different races, political parties, and sexual orientations can have mutually enriching interactions.
Review: This Cirque du Soleil Show Reminds Us Nature Knows No Borders
Luzia brings the outdoors in, using impressive engineering to highlight water's beauty.
Review: A Cognitive Neuroscientist's Take on How AI Models Think
Author Christopher Summerfield engages seriously with skeptics who claim that large language models are really thinking.
Review: Giant Dramatizes Roald Dahl's Antisemitism Controversy
The play presents characters subtly negotiating the entanglements of identity and the perils of cancel culture.
Review: Church Committee Report on Illegal Spying Is Relevant Again in the Trump Era
A new book revisits this 50-year-old Watergate report as President Donald Trump pursues his own politically motivated investigations.
Review: Flavor-Changing Gum Is Finally a Reality
Unfortunately it's nothing like Willy Wonka's "three-course dinner gum."
Review: A Thorough Account of Socialism's History
On Origin Story, podcasters Dorian Lynskey and Ian Dunt cover everything from Karl Marx to the British Labour Party.
Review: Did the Feds Finally Crack the Food Pyramid Code? Probably Not.
It's far more likely we'll be back to revise the pyramid again a decade from now.
Review: This Podcast Details the Brutal Effects of the War on Drugs
Collateral Damage tells some of the many stories of drug enforcement gone wrong.
Review: Have Aliens Visited Earth? This Documentary Says Yes.
The Age of Disclosure makes bold claims but is frustratingly thin on specifics.
Review: A Period Drama About the Price of Progress in the American West
Train Dreams follows a logger in the Pacific Northwest during the age of westward expansion.
Review: The Libertarianism of Stranger Things
The final season of the Netflix show delivers a message about moral responsibility.
Review: Resisting the Hive Mind Virus in PLUR1BUS
The protagonist in the Apple TV series does not want her consciousness absorbed into a collective human mind.
Review: The Outer Worlds 2 Is a Video Game About Unchecked Corporate Power
The video game's anti-corporate satire is so over the top that it undermines its point.
Review: The Anarchist Writings of Robert Anton Wilson
"I'm the kind of anarchist whose chief objection to the state is that it kills so many people," Wilson said in a 1976 interview
Review: South Park Is Somehow Still Good in the Age of Hyperpoliticization
"It's not that South Park suddenly quote got political. It's that politics became pop," co-creator Trey Parker said in a recent interview.
Review: Charting the 3 Factions of the MAGA Movement
Furious Minds identifies national conservatives, postliberals, and Claremonters as the coalition driving the New Right.
Review: A Hit Country Song Made by AI
Should it matter whether a song was made by a human or a machine?
Review: D.C.'s $500 Million Shrine to Capitalism
The new Milken Center for Advancing the American Dream in Washington, D.C., sidesteps its founder's complicated history.
Review: Why You've Probably Never Heard of James Garfield's Assassin
The Death by Lightning miniseries dramatizes the assassination of a president who left little lasting impact on Americans' lives.
Review: A Novel About Masculinity and Weightlifting
Muscle Man offers a subtler commentary than any thinkpiece about the bro-ification of the right.
Review: Tron: Ares Reminds Us That Artificial Intelligence Is Not the Enemy
It's the humans who develop and use AI for malicious ends, not the tech itself, who should worry us.
Review: The Sound of Music's Anti-Authoritarianism
The 65-year-old musical's depiction of an us-vs.-them mentality remains poignant.
Review: Wayward Spotlights the Dark Secrets of Troubled-Teen Programs
Characters in the Netflix show undergo psychological torture, manipulation, and psychedelic treatment.
Review: When the CIA Tried To Unlock Mind Control
Project Mind Control tells the story of the federal government's failed MKUltra program.
Review: Progressive Myths Rebuts the Left's Histrionic Takes
The author argues America is still "among the freest, most egalitarian, and most open-to-progress societies in history."
Review: The British Spy Novelist Beloved by Fellow Spies
Tradecraft chronicles the career of John le Carré, intelligence officer turned author.
Review: The Paper Parodies Work Life at a Struggling Local Newspaper
The Office spin-off contrasts journalists' self-image as a pillar of democracy with what the job often entails.
Review: Quasi-Government Megacompanies Collide in Alien: Earth
The FX series is a direct prequel to the 1979 movie.
Review: Frank S. Meyer's Fusionism Melded Classical Liberalism With Traditional Religion
Biographer Daniel J. Flynn uncovered long forgotten documents in the conservative thinker's former home.
Review: Charting Jerry Garcia's Enormous Cultural Impact
Here Beside the Rising Tide tells the story of the Grateful Dead and the 1960s counterculture.
Review: 'The Greatest Songwriter of All Time' Finally Gets a Biography
Carole King became one of the most influential musicians in the '60s, '70s, and beyond.
