While targeted at older audiences (20s-30s), the Onion A.V. Club covers a broad range of pop culture topics, including music, movies, video games, comics and more. Unlike the Onion, though, the news and stories are all real, though they still approach the subject matter with some humour. Think of it as the online version of your local alternative newspaper, without the, ahem, 'adult' classifieds in the back or the boring local politics.
The website usually delves into the deeper recesses and lesser lights of the entertainment industry, covering bands that don't make the Top 40 and movies that don't win the weekend box office (though they still do that, though generally just to mock them): things that a lot of clever and with-it teenagers seek out to escape the norm. For example, today's features are an interview with Mark Hamill and a video of They Might Be Giants performing Chumbawamba's Tubthumping.
More relevant to us here is the occasional features that they put up, in this case, the A.V. Club Inventory. Roughly every week, they produce a list on a random topic, like "11 Videogames That Prompted Fear and Outrage" or "6 Keanu Reeves Movies Somehow Not Ruined by Keanu Reeves". The lists were compiled into book format and they added a few by celebrities.
The lists are of a general theme, not so much just enumerating movies and songs, but actually giving a short discussion of the merits (or lack thereof) of the subject matter. While they are often oddly specific (the full title is
Inventory:
16 Films Featuring Manic Pixie Dream Girls, 10 Great Songs Nearly
Ruined by Saxophone, and 100 More Obsessively Specific Pop-Culture Lists, with emphasis on Obsessive), they often lead to new discoveries, something kids that age are looking for, something obscure that will make them feel special.
Not all of the lists are family-friendly, but that's not unusual for books of lists, and is in fact part of the appeal, the risque. That does mean that this is more appropriate for older teens, 16 and up, partly because of the mature themes of some of the lists, but also because the older kids are more likely to know the topics of discussion.
MR RIPLEY'S ENCHANTED BOOKS: Children's Book Cover Illustration Competition
- ROUND FOUR - 2024/25
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We welcome YOU once again to Mr Ripley's Enchanted Books 15th Annual
Children's Book Cover Illustration Competition! This vibrant event
showcases and celeb...
1 week ago
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