Finding One’s Own Way (or Doctrine and the Individual) Hermann Hesse and Iron Fist By Matthew William Brake A Word Before… For this blog, I sought the help of friends in determining the perfect existentialist thinker for Danny Rand. Iron Fist’s character and background is rooted in Eastern thought (or at least, Western stereotypes of…
Live Forward Luke Cage and Frantz Fanon By Muoki Musau and Matthew William Brake While viewers familiar with the Jessica Jones Netflix series met Luke Cage in that show, Cage’s own series begins with him working in a barber shop in Harlem, owned by a respected man in the community everyone refers to as Pop.…
Freedom and Imprisonment Jessica Jones and Simone de Beauvior By Jennifer Anvari and Matthew William Brake Marvel’s Netflix series Jessica Jones is a story about what binds us and what makes us free. As a low-key superhero, Jessica works as a private investigator in a sketchy neighborhood, using her powers primarily to access fire escapes…
The Guilt of Being Someone Daredevil and Martin Heidegger By Sam Bennett and Matthew William Brake Deeply influenced by his Catholic faith, Matthew Murdock — aka Daredevil — is one of the more explicitly religious superheroes in mainstream comic books. The first season of the Netflix series Daredevil begins with Matt in a confessional, asking…
Iron Man, the Syrian Refugee Crisis, and Noam Chomsky By Matthew William Brake I have the coolest girlfriend in the world. I set a goal that we would watch all of the movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe all the way through, and she agreed! So we were watching Iron Man the other night (which…
Hegelian Sublation, Comic Book Continuity, and DC Rebirth By Matthew William Brake Comic book continuity is a difficult topic to write on, to say nothing of Hegel. Both require an oversimplification in order to explain them to a newcomer, which often requires clarity at the loss of nuance. To begin, let’s briefly look at Marvel…
Overwatch and Philosophy Adam Smith on Why We Choose Hanzo By Sajan Prabhakar, Robert Thomas, and Matthew William Brake Overwatch is a six-versus-six first-person shooter game developed by Blizzard Entertainment. The game, released in 2016, now has over 25 million players. Players may choose from a roster of 25 characters from four different roles: the…
Miss Martian and This Sex Which is Not One By Matthew William Brake Greg Weisman and Brandon Vietti’s Young Justice series, previously written about here and recently renewed for a third season due to a Netflix binge (we did it guys!), has been praised for making its cast of characters diverse in terms of gender…
When Chance Took Us to Church The Problem with (White) Liberal Neutrality By Matthew William Brake Did you watch the Grammys last week? Yeah, me neither, but I heard about them the next day. One of the main stories to come out of the Grammys was Chance the Rapper’s performance of various Christian worship songs…
Rogue One and a Philosophy of Hope By Matthew William Brake After enduring years of crappy prequels, Star Wars fans have now received not one, but two good Star Wars movies since Disney’s acquisition of Lucasfilm. While I liked The Force Awakens, the Honest Trailer for the movie voices all of my criticisms of that…
The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series 