Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

she can read (much to my amazement)

by

Much to my amazement, our nearly 4-year-old seems to have quite suddenly gotten the hang of reading.

Actual reading. Not just spitting back memorized texted in a simulacrum of reading. I still remember the first time I witnessed that, because it was the day we told all our friends we were pregnant. It was our friend M’s daughter’s third birthday, and she “read” me an entire book from front to back. I was in total shock that she could read so many words and so quickly, until her father pointed out that she had simply memorized the entire thing.

Jumanji Cover

Our copy of Jumanji came with a CD of the audiobook narrated by Robin Williams. I put off playing it for EV6 as long as I could but finally the asking became more constant. I let her follow along with the book on the couch while I cried silently in the kitchen.

EV6 has always been good at memorization. It started one night when she was still impossibly small when she spat back the final page of Nightsong at me during her bedtime reading.

That was just the beginning. Since then I’ve heard this girl recite dozens of her books back at us – including a word-for-word rendition of Jumanji, and that is not a short children’s book.

Her current favorite thing to memorize is comic books, which I suppose must be slightly easier to do since you can focus on dialog balloons as if you are learning the script of a play. She has the entirety of the first 20 issues of Lumberjanes committed to memory. Sometimes she’s got it down after hearing it only two or three times, it’s amazing.

It’s amazing, and it keeps her nose buried in books all day every day, but it’s not reading.

I haven’t been too fussed with pushing reading skills on her while I’ve been staying at home. That’s in part because I learned to read so late, and partly because I feel like America’s school industrial process is overly quick to push advanced reading and math skills on kindergartners who aren’t always developmentally ready for them.

Despite that, I also haven’t ignored the skills. We’re always sounding out the words we encounter during the day and having little spelling bees on the refrigerator. I’s exclusively directed play and that’s fine. She’s three. I don’t expect her to read.

Or, didn’t expect her to read, because that’s what she’s been doing for the last week. [Read more…] about she can read (much to my amazement)

Song of the Day: “It’s Over, Isn’t It?” from Steven Universe

by

Heading into my life as a parent, one of my initial hard and fast rules was “no children’s music.”

It was a rule I held to pretty firmly, not only for my own sanity, but because there is no such thing as “children’s music” or “adult’s music.” There’s just music. Yes, you can scientifically construct a tune that might more easily earworm its way into the brain of a child compared to the typical pop song, but if you can get a kid to like The Beatles, Michael Jackson, and Sia, why bother with anything that’s watered down?

As a part of my rule, I tend to be avoidant of most kid-oriented musical movies and TV shows, because those songs are some super earwormy little fuckers. I watched what parents went through with “Let It Go,” and that wasn’t happening in my house.

(We also have a, “no song more than once in a day unless we are learning to play it” rule in place to protect us in those situations.)

Then came Steven Universe.

Steven Universe is a cartoon about a matriarchal society of planet-conquering inorganic gems whose bodies are hard light projections and who have a tendency to break out into genre-bending song and what happens when one of them rebels against her home world and also gives up her body in order to have a half-human/half-gem, ukulele-wielding, sensitive pre-teen son named Steven with her solo rock songwriter boyfriend Greg.

Got it?

Not only does that sound scientifically constructed for me, but it also came with heavy recommendations from sources I trust as an appropriate show that doesn’t rely on the crutch of crude jokes and traditional gender roles, and teaches positive lessons about sexual orientation and consent.

(At least half of the prominent couples on the show are same gender pairings; when couples feel especially connected and cooperative they can fuse to form a more powerful gem form.)

Like I said, scientifically constructed for me.

Thus, when EV6 turned three and gained the rights to watch TV once a week, Steven Universe was amongst the first things we screened for her.

She was instantly addicted – to the show, to its charming and dynamic characters, and to its mind-blowingly awesome songs.

Seriously: these songs. They carry the story like the best songs in musical theatre but with all the heft of the catchiest pop song, usually in two minutes or less (since each episode has an 11 minute run time).

They thwarted my rule about children’s music, because they just aren’t. And, they skate around my rule against repeats because EV6 wanted to learn to play them herself on piano and ukulele! Like, I wrote out the chords to the theme song to match stickers on her piano and she taught herself how to sight-read the song so she could hear it whenever she wanted.

Mind: blown.

Last week the show finally released an official soundtrack album so we didn’t all have to rely on YouTube rips and occasionally SoundCloud posts for our fix. Of course, we had all the songs already, but having them perfectly edited and with an optimized frequency range got us listening all over again!

I debated mightily on which song to share with you to turn you on to the wonder of Steve Universe, and while I was tempted by one of the many brief pop songs in the show’s oeuvre, I went with what EV6 would play for you first and chose “It’s Over, Isn’t It?”

(Note that this is very much a “Musical Theatre” type song, which is its character Pearl’s style. For a Wonders-like retro pastiche, try “Steven and the Stevens,” for acoustic songwriter try “Be Wherever You Are,” and for indie pop try “Tower of Mistakes.” I’d link to Garnet’s “Stronger Than You,” but it’s a heavy spoiler for the first season!)

Seriously: are these the sorts of lyrics you expect to hear in most children’s cartoons (especially as sung by a female character)?

I was fine with the men
Who would come into her life now and again
I was fine ’cause I knew
That they didn’t really matter until you

I was fine when you came
And we fought like it was all some silly game
Over her, who she’d choose
After all those years I never thought I’d lose

What can you even say to that? [Read more…] about Song of the Day: “It’s Over, Isn’t It?” from Steven Universe

Here’s the dealio…

by

A brief note for those of you who have been dutifully keeping up with my Most-Wanted omnibus blogging (and everything else – I see you, Drag Racers).

Your intrepid author sitting on his front step (which is called a “stoop” in his ancestral home of South Philly), still glistening from his Monday workout in his never-ending bucket list quest for visible abs (slowly but surely) and with a little bit of a neck beard (I ain’t getting pretty just to get sweaty).

First: you are wonderful. I’ve been receiving so much awesome feedback both here in comments and on the various message boards I inhabit. This writing has been really fun to do and I am very happy you are enjoying it.

Second: As you may have noticed, I am about two weeks behind on the omnibus posts. That’s not only because they take a long time to research and write, but because I had a one-two punch of (positive!) life stuff happen for over a week that keep me from writing.

Because I am incredibly stubborn, I am still posting the Most-Wanted posts on the days they were scheduled to hit. However, also in my stubbornness I haven’t been posting any posts that would be ahead of the omnibus posts or debuting new comic guides.

I’m going to put an end to that stubbornness and get back to making more timely posts. I’ll still be filling in the Most-Wanted posts as quickly as I can – and we are absolutely going all the way to #1 – but it might run into July. Keep your eye on the slider images in the sidebar for a quick view of what’s new – or, just head to the Most Wanted Omnibus tag or the “comics” category.

I only get to make this post because you are reading, which is a great situation to be in. As a reminder, CK’s hosting expenses are now supported by readers on Patreon. If you’ve enjoyed reading this in the past month as much as you have some of your traditional favorite web sites, comics, or magazines, consider chipping in $1 a month to keep CK up and running all year round.

xo

RuPaul’s Drag Race Power Rankings, S09E12 – “Category Is”

by

This week the world got flipped turned upside down in more than one way.

First, RuPaul made the unprecedented decision to go with a final four queens in the finale!

If you’ve been following my rankings, you’ll know I’m pretty pleased with the development, as I’ve been shuffling the same four queens back and fourth in the top four for weeks now.

However, the other thing that feels totally flipped tonight are the rankings themselves! I feel like we’re completely topsy turvy compared to what the queen’s average rankings from the season were telling us coming out of last week.

I got the distinct sense tonight that the queens are no longer competing against each other, but battling against themselves to turn the best version of their own take on drag. As such, I’ll be grading each queen individually in their own 50 point scale based on their original song verse, their choreography, their dance outfit, their final runway look, and their brief speeches.

No points will be awarded for the four-way lip sync because nobody cares. [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race Power Rankings, S09E12 – “Category Is”

RuPaul’s Drag Race Power Rankings, S09E11 – “Gayest Ball Ever”

by

It’s my favorite every-season episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race – the Drag Ball – and this year’s Gayest Ball Ever did not disappoint!

(How could anything be a disappointment when it involves sexy unicorns?)

Our consistent finale foursome absolutely delivered in every look without a single fail amongst them, and it made for some very interesting final jockeying in the rankings after last week and before the final elimination next week.

Because this episode was all about gag-worthy looks, I’m going to rank each of the three ball looks individually before recapping the queen’s overall power ranks! I won’t bother ranking our departed queen since she was the worst in every look.

(It’s not shady if it’s true.)

Look #1: Rainbow-She-Betta-Do

If this was any other group of queens we’d be at risk of being pounded over the head with the most rainbow-y rainbow looks that ever rainbowed, so it was a pleasant surprise to see all four of these brainy queens depart from the expected color spectrum in their own way.

1. Sasha Velour

I was living for Sasha’s deconstruction of the rainbow!

Sasha Velour’s color-blocking approach to wearing the rainbow was a genius turn, and her tailored skirt set with green leather gloves and Dorothy shoes was gorgeous. That she had a tiny rainbow house tucked beneath her red hat (wrapped with fabric from her cowgirl costume!) just sealed the deal of her outfit’s excellence.

2. Shea Couleé

Shea’s pastel graffiti rainbow dress might go down as the most controversial look of the entire season … at least, for me it will.

There’s no denying the cut and silhouette was high fashion, but was it rainbow bright? Honestly, I was getting “dirty sofa” from it way more than “rainbow,” especially from the structured top.

Yet, this is an instance where I can tell my read is a total mismatch with the judges – Shea’s desaturated take on rainbow was clearly a hit with the panel. [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race Power Rankings, S09E11 – “Gayest Ball Ever”