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Aja Romano

Aja Romano

Vox

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How JoJo Siwa’s “rebrand” got so messy

It’s a Hollywood cliche, but unfortunately true, that talented children rarely have it easy transitioning their careers into adulthood, much less...

26.04.2024 10

Vox

Aja Romano

Why the case at the center of Netflix’s What Jennifer Did isn’t over yet

The end of Netflix’s new true crime documentary What Jennifer Did reveals a bombshell detail: After we’ve learned of the alleged culprits and the...

16.04.2024 9

Vox

Aja Romano

The Chinese backlash over Netflix’s 3 Body Problem, explained

Netflix is banned in China — part of the government’s ongoing efforts to limit both foreign influence and Chinese citizens’ access to...

12.04.2024 40

Vox

Aja Romano

The Michigan school shooter’s parents face precedent-setting sentences

Today, the parents of the 2021 Michigan school shooter will cross a grim legal threshold: They will be the first parents in American history to be...

09.04.2024 10

Vox

Aja Romano

3 Body Problem, explained with the help of an astrophysicist

Netflix’s 3 Body Problem premiered March 21, and there’s a lot of science! The new Netflix series from screenwriter Alexander Woo and Game of...

22.03.2024 20

Vox

Aja Romano

J.K. Rowling’s transphobia: A history

15.03.2024 950

Vox

Aja Romano

Everyone is misquoting Jonathan Glazer’s Oscars speech 

Despite the pro-Palestinian protests taking place outside and the number of politically charged films up for awards, Sunday night’s Oscars ceremony...

11.03.2024 10

Vox

Aja Romano

7 winners and 0 losers from the surprisingly delightful 2024 Oscars

11.03.2024 10

Vox

Aja Romano

What does winning an Oscar even mean anyway?

Ah, the Oscars. Sunday night’s 96th Academy Awards are the night of a thousand stars and a thousand dreams (hello, Moonlight !) — or heartbreaks,...

08.03.2024 5

Vox

Aja Romano

A month later, we still don’t know what killed Nex Benedict

We know a gender-nonconforming teen in an Oklahoma high school is dead. We don’t know much else. Nex Benedict did not have a long and troubled...

06.03.2024 4

Vox

Aja Romano

Shane Gillis’s SNL hosting gig is an unearned rehabilitation

In 2016, three years before comedian Shane Gillis was hired and then immediately fired from Saturday Night Live , he told an interviewer that he was...

24.02.2024 30

Vox

Aja Romano

Netflix’s live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender is everything fans hoped it would be

Reader, you can relax: They nailed it. Halfway through the third episode of Netflix’s tremendously anticipated live-action adaptation of Avatar: The...

22.02.2024 30

Vox

Aja Romano

An attempt to reckon with True Detective: Night Country’s bonkers season finale

To be a True Detective fan is to wrestle with uncomfortable contradictions. The first season is both a masterpiece of cosmic horror noir and a piece...

19.02.2024 20

Vox

Aja Romano

Those evangelical Christian Super Bowl ads — and the backlash to them — explained 

What would Jesus do? The answer is more debatable than you might expect, at least according to the highly polarized reactions to a controversial Super...

15.02.2024 30

Vox

Aja Romano

What does the EGOT even mean, anyway?

Humans are funny little creatures. We love making lists, participating in oddball competitions, and creating weirdly specific metrics to be proud of...

04.02.2024 10

Vox

Aja Romano

Scott Peterson’s guilt, explained

In 2004, in one of the most high-profile trials of the past two decades, Scott Peterson was convicted of murdering his wife, Laci Peterson, 27, and...

29.01.2024 8

Vox

Aja Romano

4 winners and 3 losers from this year’s Oscar nominations

The 2024 Oscar nominations are in, and as always, all anyone can talk about are the snubs. Buzzy, highly debated audience favorites like Saltburn and...

23.01.2024 6

Vox

Aja Romano

Alec Baldwin’s criminal charges reinstated in Rust shooting — for now

By all accounts, it was an accident everyone saw coming, but the questions and chaos surrounding the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins have...

20.01.2024 70

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Aja Romano

If you want to understand modern politics, you have to understand modern fandom

18.01.2024 10

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Aja Romano

Will Gypsy-Rose Blanchard really benefit from this media circus?

When a prisoner leaves the carceral system, questions related to their stability and support are paramount: Can they find steady work? Can they secure...

06.01.2024 6

Vox

Aja Romano

The Golden Globes are (just barely) making a comeback. Here’s what to expect.

When the 81st Golden Globes arrive on Sunday, January 7, it may look a lot like the award show you remember: informal, mildly erratic, with caustic...

05.01.2024 30

Vox

Aja Romano

Broadway is full of jukebox musicals and movie adaptions. That might not be as bad as it sounds.

The current Broadway revival of the late Stephen Sondheim’s most notorious flop, 1981’s Merrily We Roll Along, has unquestionably reclaimed the...

01.01.2024 7

Vox

Aja Romano

Jonathan Majors’s arrest and conviction, explained 

After a three-week trial and two days of jury deliberation, Jonathan Majors, the Emmy-nominated star of Lovecraft Country and Creed III , has been...

19.12.2023 20

Vox

Aja Romano

The many layers of May December

In the opening moments of Todd Haynes’s May December, scandalous tabloid subject-turned-homemaker Gracie (Julianne Moore) opens a refrigerator,...

09.12.2023 10

Vox

Aja Romano

Blue Eye Samurai is one of the smartest Netflix shows in years

The criteria for success on Netflix have always been slippery, particularly regarding the platform’s hit-and-miss efforts with anime. Yet in the...

06.12.2023 2

Vox

Aja Romano

What Matt Rife’s baffling Netflix special tells us about comedy

Comedian Matt Rife’s debut Netflix special Natural Selection may be a hit — the show premiered in the top 10 on November 15 and has stayed there...

29.11.2023 2

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Aja Romano

Mary Kay Letourneau, the grim inspiration for May December, explained

In many ways, the country isn’t ready to revisit and reassess the story of Mary Kay Letourneau and her sexual-abuse-victim-turned-husband Vili...

25.11.2023 6

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Aja Romano

Alex Murdaugh stands guilty of killing his wife and son. That’s just scratching the surface.

While the most gripping true crime stories take us into the darkest parts of the soul, rarely does a case open the ugly heart of the nation itself....

17.11.2023 10

Vox

Aja Romano

The Crown increasingly becomes a fantastical apologetic for the royal family

As Netflix’s The Crown has progressed, its creator and arbiter Peter Morgan has increasingly preferred a humanist touch when it comes to his royal...

17.11.2023 9

Vox

Aja Romano

Eli Roth’s Thanksgiving is finally here. Was it worth the 16-year wait?

Eli Roth’s new film Thanksgiving bills itself as a tongue-in-cheek slasher about a killer stalking the streets of Plymouth, Massachusetts, the...

17.11.2023 20

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Aja Romano

Explaining “Twin Flames,” the subject of Netflix’s disturbing new documentary

Imagine a group that promises to help you find your soul mate. What could be more pure? When I stumbled across the concept of “twin flames” years...

14.11.2023 10

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Aja Romano

What the Hasan Minhaj controversy says about the trouble with storytelling

Rarely have public scandals been as confused or confusing as the one that caused comedian and former Patriot Act host Hasan Minhaj to lose the Daily...

10.11.2023 6

Vox

Aja Romano

From Amityville to Annabelle, the Warrens on film are a lie

The reputation of cute cuddly exorcists Ed and Lorraine Warren has grown outsized in 21st-century pop culture. That’s mainly thanks to the...

31.10.2023 5

Vox

Aja Romano

Five Nights at Freddy’s, the cult horror game turned movie, explained 

You might not think a story about a bunch of terrifying animatronic pizza joint robots who routinely kill children would make for a hot-ticket movie,...

26.10.2023 2

Vox

Aja Romano

The murder of Natalee Holloway finally has a resolution. Sort of.

Throughout the tabloid frenzy, the international headlines, the years of rumors and myths of stranger danger and child trafficking, there was only...

20.10.2023 6

Vox

Aja Romano

Watching Killers of the Flower Moon? Here’s what to know

Killers of the Flower Moon , Martin Scorsese’s highly anticipated film, opens in theaters on October 20. The newest epic from the acclaimed...

20.10.2023 2

Vox

Aja Romano

The horrifying, nearly forgotten history behind Killers of the Flower Moon

18.10.2023 10

Vox

Aja Romano

Netflix’s The Fall of the House of Usher lacks the passionate weirdness of Poe

What does it mean to adapt Poe for the modern age? Mike Flanagan’s latest Netflix series, The Fall of the House of Usher, a loose adaptation of the...

13.10.2023 10

Vox

Aja Romano

Travis Kelce, explained

If you’re a football fan, you’ve probably heard more about Taylor Swift in the last two weeks than you have in your life to date. If you’re a...

06.10.2023 3

Vox

Aja Romano

Jann Wenner is what happens when privilege distorts reality

So much for the virtue of staying silent. Several public figures have stepped in it recently by oversharing or making moves they simply didn’t have...

21.09.2023 20

Vox

Aja Romano

The true story of the fake unboxed aliens is wilder than actual aliens

The internet artist Zardulu — creator of Pizza Rat — has claimed that “the creation and perpetuation of myths is art of the highest form.” ...

16.09.2023 40

Vox

Aja Romano

Suits is an unlikely time capsule for a troubled decade

It’s 2023, and everyone is watching Suits. The question is, which Suits are they watching? In one corner, we have Suits, seasons one through four,...

09.09.2023 4

Vox

Aja Romano

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