Ken and Robin Consume Media: Unhinged Hong Kong Action, Canine Horror, and Occult-Adjacent Mysteries

June 2nd, 2026 | Robin

Ken and Robin Consume Media is brought to you by the discriminating and good-looking backers of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Patreon. Each week we provide capsule reviews of the books, movies, TV seasons and more we cram into our hyper-analytical sensoriums. Join the Patreon to help pick the items we’ll talk about in greater depth on a little podcast segment we like to call Tell Me More.

Recommended

Detective vs. Sleuths (Film, Hong Kong, Wai Ka-Fai, 2022) Hallucinating ex-cop (Lau Ching-wan) teams with a pregnant OCTB officer (Charlene Choi) chasing cult-like vigilantes on a murder rampage against unprosecutable offenders. Frenetic, high body count action mystery in which Wai, best known for his collaborations with Johnnie To, gets the budget to realize the fullest heights of his berserk vision. If a cop in her third trimester gets shot and is dangling off the side of a building and you’re only 28 minutes in, you may be watching a Wai Ka-Fai movie. Found on some platforms with wildly misleading cover art under the equally misleading alt title Demon Hunter.—RDL

Furie (Film, Vietnam, Le-van Kiet, 2019) Rural debt collector (Veronica Ngo) relentlessly fights her way through Saigon’s underworld to rescue her young daughter from organ traffickers. Expertly staged and performed action in gritty, street-level mode.—RDL

Good Boy (Film, US, Ben Leonberg, 2025) Loyal dog (Indy) senses a sinister force coming for his ill human in the old family house near the woods. Formally brilliant exercise in subjective horror anchored by an endearingly expressive animal actor.—RDL

Thought Crimes: the Case of the Cannibal Cop (Film, US, Erin Lee Carr, 2015) Documentary searches in vain for satisfying answers in the case of Gilberto Valle, the New York cop busted for seemingly taking steps to realize the heinously sadistic crimes he fantasized about on an Internet forum. Shows a legal case that wasn’t about what anyone wanted it to be about while staring into the void between the depravity of Valle’s forum posts and his self-presentation as a bewildered mooncalf.—RDL

Good

The Complete Curious Mr. Tarrant (Fiction, C. Daly King, 2003) Collects all twelve of the “episodes” of Trevis Tarrant written between 1935 and 1951. Tarrant is a less-annoying Philo Vance type of idle mystery solver, who specializes in impossibilities. Each episode has a somewhat occult air, even the conventional (and for the most part excellent) locked room problems, and it’s not too big a spoiler to suggest that one or two of them have “genuine” occult phenomena behind them. A mixed bag, as with many such collections, less charming than the Lucius Leffing tales but differently weird.—KH

Not Recommended

Cultures in Motion: Mapping Key Contacts and Their Imprints in World History (Nonfiction, Peter N. Stearns, 2001) Purporting to be an atlas of inter-cultural contact and transmission, this faintly stabs in the direction of “trade routes” and diasporas, with even the best maps (charting the expansion of McDonalds, soccer, and motion pictures in one map of “International Consumer Culture”) being more cartograms than anything else. Intriguing parallels between the spread of, say, Islam and Marxism go under-thought and under-mapped (only 23 maps in the book at all).—KH

Eureka (Film, France/Germany, Lisandro Alonso, 2023) In the old west, a gunfighter (Viggo Mortensen) seeks his daughter; a police officer on a South Dakota reservation faces too many problems at once; an indigenous Brazilian fugitive tries gold prospecting. Triptych of unresolved, enigmatic situations overestimates the impact of long takes and concludes with the thinnest segment.—RDL

Ken and Robin Consume Media: Obsession, a Very GUMSHOE Investigation, and Boris Karloff’s Police Procedural

May 26th, 2026 | Robin

Ken and Robin Consume Media is brought to you by the discriminating and good-looking backers of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Patreon. Each week we provide capsule reviews of the books, movies, TV seasons and more we cram into our hyper-analytical sensoriums. Join the Patreon to help pick the items we’ll talk about in greater depth on a little podcast segment we like to call Tell Me More.

Recommended

Hidden in the Fog (Film, Sweden, Lars-Eric Kjellgren, 1953) Heiress flees into the big city after shooting her husband. Noir explicitly modeled on its American counterparts with a great second act twist that also signals a shift in tone and protagonist.—RDL

Last Known Address (Film, France, José Giovanni, 1970) Unjustly sidelined police inspector (Lino Ventura) and open-hearted rookie (Marlène Jobert) doggedly search for a missing witness to a murder by a wealthy businessman. The mundanity of the quest heightens its existentialism in this philosophical police procedural. An extremely GUMSHOE movie where you can very clearly see the protagonists using their abilities to gain core clues that lead to new scenes.—RDL

Personality Crisis: One Night Only (Film, US, Martin Scorsese & David Tedeschi, 2023) Combination concert and biographical documentary intersperses archival footage and interviews with David Johansen performing his New York Dolls and solo songs in his Buster Poindexter style at New York’s Cafe Carlyle in January 2020. It’s a huge blessing to have a record of this delightful and moving performance, captured months before his cancer diagnosis.—RDL

Good

Bolero (Film, France, Anne Fontaine, 2024) Brilliant but neurotically self-negating composer Maurice Ravel (Raphaël Personnaz) struggles with a commission from ballet dancer Ida Rubinstein (Jeanne Balibar). Lush and often witty prestige drama with a script perched between two concepts—procedural origin story of Bolero, or standard biopic?—RDL

Colonel March of Scotland Yard (Television, UK, ITV, Hannah Weinstein, 1955–56) Colonel March (Boris Karloff) of Scotland Yard’s Department of Queer Complaints investigates unusual crimes and impossible reports (which turn out to also be crimes). March is a John Dickson Carr series character, and the best of the episodes are those taken from his stories; others drag a bit even at half-hour runtimes. Karloff’s twinkling delight remains the best reason to watch these, seven decades on, but Eric Pohlmann’s Inspector Gorot of the Sureté holds his own when the episodes cross the Channel.—KH

Obsession (Film, US, Curry Barker, 2026) Shy schlemiel Bear (Michael Johnston) wishes on an ironic retro novelty item for his unrequited crush Nikki (Inde Navarette) to love him more than anything, which goes even more wrong than you’re thinking right now. Flashes of this film are as original and scary as anything in new horror, and again it’s good to see a horror movie that keeps the subtext (mostly) out of the text, but audience identification is hard enough with a schlemiel without also making him a moral and narrative nullity for 100 minutes.—KH

Visible Secret (Film, Hong Kong, Ann Hui, 2001) Hapless hairdresser (Eason Chan) falls for a charming but mysterious girl (Shu Qi) whose left eye sees ghosts. Early entry in the cycle of Asian Sixth Sense riffs focuses as much on naturalistic romantic drama as eerie manifestations.—RDL

Ken and Robin Consume Media: Mesopotamian Artifacts, Mr. Moto, and The Department of Queer Complaints

May 19th, 2026 | Robin

Ken and Robin Consume Media is brought to you by the discriminating and good-looking backers of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Patreon. Each week we provide capsule reviews of the books, movies, TV seasons and more we cram into our hyper-analytical sensoriums. Join the Patreon to help pick the items we’ll talk about in greater depth on a little podcast segment we like to call Tell Me More.

Recommended

Between Two Rivers: Ancient Mesopotamia and the Birth of History (Nonfiction, Moudhy Al-Rashid, 2025) Artifacts found in the temple of 6th century BCE princess and moon priestess Ennigaldi-Nanna, which might have comprised a museum or antiquities collection, highlight such aspects of Mesopotamian life as commerce, education, warfare, and the role of women. Engaging overview of an ancient society that seems especially relatable because the cuneiform tablets they left behind preserve so much of their workaday correspondence, including the complaints.—RDL

BlackBerry (Film, Canada, Matt Johnson, 2023) Fumbling tech savant (Jay Baruchel) and his protectively overbearing ubernerd buddy (Matt Johnson) team with shouty business shark (Glenn Howerton) to usher in the BlackBerry mobile device and ride out a rise and fall of epic proportions. So much better than any film with this subject matter could possibly be, thanks to a brilliant structure giving in-depth treatment to a handful of major developments, driven forward by bubbling suspense beats.—RDL

The Department of Queer Complaints (Fiction, John Dickson Carr, 1940) Seven of the short stories in this collection feature Colonel March of the titular Scotland Yard department dealing with impossible reports to the police; annoyingly only two of them count as properly queer complaints, though for the most part they’re all entertaining puzzles, and “The Silver Curtain” ranks with top-tier Carr. The rest include one fun legal tall tale, and three borderline ghost story mysteries that make me wish Carr had pursued his Gothic tendencies in that direction more often.—KH

Undercurrent (Film, Japan, Kozaburo Yoshimura, 1956) Independent-minded silk artisan (Fujiko Yamamoto) yearns for a university professor (Ken Uehara). Romantic drama of turbulent contained emotion with a stunning palette of muted colors.—RDL

Warfare (Film, US, Alex Mendoza & Alex Garland, 2025) During the US Occupation of Iraq, Navy SEALS in a besieged, commandeered house on a tightly packed street attempt to evacuate wounded comrades. Recreates without broader context a specific engagement with obsessive detail and visceral you-are-there immediacy. Cast includes Will Poulter, Michael Gandolfini and Charles Melton.—RDL

Good

Cold War 1994 (Film, Hong Kong, Lok Man Leung, 2026) OCTB chief (Terrance Lau) and his Special Branch counterpart (Daniel Wu) clash over the kidnapping of a business magnate’s heir apparent in pre-handover Hong Kong. Police conspiracy thriller prequel packed with cameos from 90s HK stars outshines the rest of the franchise.—RDL

The Pre-War Mr. Moto Novels (Fiction, John P. Marquand, 1935-1942) Each of these five novels follows the same basic structure: an American (usually morally broken, sometimes just feckless) gets caught up in dangerous machinations in an exotic location, usually with a mysterious, beautiful woman involved. He resolves to do the right thing, and discovers that the polite gentleman Mr. Moto who gave him a bit of help or advice was actually an agent of Japanese intelligence. Mr. Moto comes out looking much cleverer, usually with his (and Japan’s) position strengthened. Marquand’s great strengths are travelogue and internal character; Mr. Moto is So Sorry and Last Laugh, Mr. Moto are fairly strong Ambler-esque spy novels as well. [CW: Period racism, unfortunately worse and more foregrounded in Last Laugh, Mr. Moto, set in the Caribbean.]—KH

Sailor’s Luck (Film, US, Raoul Walsh, 1933) Brash but jealousy-prone sailor (James Dunn) woos down-on-her-luck blond (Sally Ellers). Careening romcom stuffed with stock characters shows off Walsh’s ability to wrest entertainment from the slimmest material.—RDL

Ken and Robin Consume Media: Reality Horror Super Spies, a Belle Epoque Superstar, and Murderous Hair

May 12th, 2026 | Robin

Ken and Robin Consume Media is brought to you by the discriminating and good-looking backers of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Patreon. Each week we provide capsule reviews of the books, movies, TV seasons and more we cram into our hyper-analytical sensoriums. Join the Patreon to help pick the items we’ll talk about in greater depth on a little podcast segment we like to call Tell Me More.

Recommended

Obsessed with Light (Film, US, 2023) Documentary profile reveals the life, technological innovations, and lingering influence of Loie Fuller, the American dancer whose fabric and light performance art made her a star in Belle Époque Paris. Fuller appears in The Yellow King RPG, leading one to nod knowingly at plot hooks shown here, like the one involving radium and her friendship with Marie Curie.—RDL

Reflections in a Dead Diamond (Film, Belgium, Hélène Cattet & Bruno Forzani, 2025) The glint on a diamond nipple ring prompts an old man at a luxury beach resort (Fabio Testa) to recall his past exploits as a suave super-agent (Yannick Renier) locked in a deadly game against Serpentik, a female catsuit-clad assassin with a thousand faces. Deconstructed homage to the 60s euro spy genre blurs the line between meta-fiction and reality horror.—RDL

Good

Exte: Hair Extensions (Film, Japan, Sion Sono, 2007) Freaky morgue attendant (Ren Ôsugi) sells hair extensions harvested from a zombie-like corpse, endangering a protective apprentice stylist (Chiaki Kuriyama) and her traumatized niece (Miku Satô). Outre body horror lets the momentum flag in stretches between disturbing hair attacks.—RDL

Sapphire (Film, UK, Basil Dearden, 1959) Briskly professional police superintendent (Nigel Patrick) leads the investigation into a young woman who was passing as white. Social issue police procedural in a mold that has become a television staple isn’t the most dated anti-racist film of its era. Features lushly muted Eastmancolor cinematography by Harry Waxman.—RDL

Okay

Killer Nun (Film, Italy, Giulo Berruti, 1979) A string of murders enforces the reign of a delusional nun (Anita Ekberg) over the long term care ward she cruelly domineers. Visually undistinguished mix of nunsploitation and hospital horror, loosely based on a real case, plays like grindhouse Buñuel.—RDL

Ken and Robin Consume Media: A Magic Shirt, the Last Mr. Moto Novel, and the Yellow King in Minecraft

May 5th, 2026 | Robin

Ken and Robin Consume Media is brought to you by the discriminating and good-looking backers of the Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff Patreon. Each week we provide capsule reviews of the books, movies, TV seasons and more we cram into our hyper-analytical sensoriums. Join the Patreon to help pick the items we’ll talk about in greater depth on a little podcast segment we like to call Tell Me More.

Recommended

The Bowery (Film, US, Raoul Walsh, 1933) Two gamblers, a big lug (Wallace Beery) and a dapper charmer (George Raft), pursue an epic rivalry on the hardscrabble side of Gilded Age New York. Walsh’s ultimate salute to roughneck knuckleheads features a franker-than-usual depiction of period racism and a looser-than-usual performance from Raft.—RDL

Elena and Her Men (Film, France, Jean Renoir, 1956) A much-adored Polish princess (Ingrid Bergman) who specializes in assisting men with their ambitions sets her sights on a general touted for the presidency (Jean Marais), to the consternation of a rival suitor, a suave aristocrat without other aspirations (Mel Ferrer). Renoir fills the screen with people and keeps them in motion in a color-drenched, farcical reimagining of the Belle Époque’s Boulanger Affair, featuring Bergman at her most glamorous and charming.—RDL

The Golden Fern (Film, Czechoslovakia, Jiri Weiss, 1963) Handsome but thin-skinned 18th century shepherd (Wit Omer) takes up with a beautiful forest nymph (Karla Chadimová), who fashions a magic shirt to protect him when he is hauled off to war. Starkly atmospheric folk tale of unheeded warnings and untrustworthy nobles could have made our Fantasy Film Essentials series had I seen it back then.—RDL

A House of Dynamite (Film, US, Kathryn Bigelow, 2025) After an ICBM launch of unknown origin, US government officials, from the personnel at an anti-missile station to mid-level analysts to the Defense Secretary (Jared Haris) and President (Idris Elba) struggle to assemble the information needed to decide whether to trigger global nuclear war. Bigelow marshals her mastery of the stiff-lipped procedural in a speculative docudrama told in three repeated slices of nail-biting time. A telling acknowledgment that the technothriller genre only makes sense if set before the end of the Obama years.—RDL

Right You Are, Mr. Moto (Fiction, John P. Marquand, 1957) American spy Jack Rhyce is sent to Japan to uncover a Communist assassination plot and the elusive “Big Ben,” but complications arise in the form of last-minute spy partner Ruth Bogart and mysterious manipulator Mr. Moto. The only postwar Mr. Moto novel combines genuinely thrilling espionage minutiae and Marquand’s habitual command of the travelogue with reveals that of course “Moto” is an alias, and of course Mr. Moto’s cartoonish English is a cover.—KH

Searching For a World That Doesn’t Exist (Film, US, Wifies, 2025) YouTuber Avery (Owen Yarnold) finds a world he didn’t build inside his Minecraft instance, and tries to track down the mysterious builder and crack his enigmatic message. By far the most-watched Yellow King Mythos work is a tight 42-minute reality horror tale taking place inside Minecraft. This does mean lots of watching Avery walk through Minecraft tunnels, but even that can turn chillingly interesting on a dime.—KH

Good

Beijing Watermelon (Film, Japan, Nobuhiko Ôbayashi, 1989) Stubborn greengrocer (Bengal) fixates on helping Chinese exchange students, threatening his business, family, and health. Somewhat overlong drama of obsessive altruism takes a surprising late swerve from naturalism to metafiction. A huge contrast with the director’s best-known film outside Japan, the berserk horror flick House.—RDL

Destroying a World That Doesn’t Exist (Film, US, Wifies, 2026) Avery (Owen Yarnold) tracks the supposed builder, D3rLord3 (Wifies), and we watch D3rLord3 try to seal up the King in Yellow, who he unleashed by exploring the mysterious instance. Two hours plus runtime and explanations for many of the first film’s brilliantly elliptical mysteries lessen the tension and horror in the sequel, although we get far more explicit Yellow Mythos in this one. The Minecraft scenery is if anything even better and more evocative this time around, though.—KH