Consortium of Seven: Year 4

        Before proceeding with anything new, I want to emphasize something from last week's piece . While I'm less than halfway through the new season of Sweet Tooth , that's been a matter of time limitation and restraint on my part. I'm giving it time to settle in, enjoying its unfolding rather than binge-rushing through.        The item from last week I want to strongly recommend is Judy Blume Forever .        It covers her life and career, and some of the lives her work's touched. It's especially timely in an era of renewed book bans, and the drive by some to silence anything they're uncomfortable with, all action weaponized by being framed as moves to protect children.        I'm especially happy that this got to come together now, with Judy directly involved and noting the parallels between now and the '80s, rather than being done as a tribute piece by others. Judy was 83 when this film w...

      The final days of April this weekend, here in Eastern PA nature seems intent on holding to those showers. Trying to keep a glass half full perspective on another damp weekend, I've plenty to do indoors and it appears I'll be given another weekend's excuse for not starting on those yard chores. If I want the glass to be full, I can just leave it on a windowsill.       Arriving yesterday on Netflix, just under two years since season one, is the eight-episode second season of Sweet Tooth . ( I'd first mentioned the series back in early June of 2021. )       An adaptation of a 40-issue comics series of the same name, written and drawn by Jeff Lemire back in 2009-12. It tells of an event that comes to be known as The Great Crumble, a decade before the main events of this series, where a pandemic comes close to wiping out mankind, while at the same time some children begin to be born as human-animal hybrids. These t...