what kind of apocalypse are you going to have?

an animated show, a song, and lessons for the end of the world

Feb 07, 2025

Greetings, earthlings.

Thank fucking god people are still making beautiful art.

Sometimes I struggle to come up with three things to share with you, but this week I had a hard time picking.

Maybe it’s because I’ve spent most of the past week without the stupidest, most distracting apps on my phone. Like almost everyone right now, I’m trying to figure out what information hygiene looks like for me.

Art is (thankfully) always flowing into my life, but when I’m thinking critically about what I’m paying attention to, art isn’t experienced against the internet din of AI-generated natural disaster videos, ads for Skyrizi, weird dating horror story clickbait on Threads where the vibes have always been off… and I can more deeply listen/look/feel things.

Anyway, I hope you’re able to find some connection and beauty amongst all the horror, and if not, I hope something in here does it for you.

Three things I’ll draw your attention to this week:

1. A show so good I watched it twice: Common Side Effects

I don’t gravitate towards animated shows. I don’t know why… I guess I’ve had this vague sense that the shows aren’t for me? Despite knowing better (see: Miyazaki, Lisa Hanawalt) I’ve subconsciously felt animated shows are for 13-year-old boys or men with 13-year-old boy sensibilities. Thankfully, Common Side Effects is ushering me into a new era.

The art in Common Side Effects is weird and gorgeous. The story about government and corporations colluding to generate profit at the expense of people is timely. The humor is dry and perfect. I love what this NYT reviewer wrote about the show’s plot being dark but its perspective being hopeful:

“[Common Side Effects] sees a system full of obstacles but with only a few true villains. It does not see humanity as a disease eating away at the Earth but as an ecosystem component that needs to be nudged into better alignment with the whole. It sees a society that is often sick or misguided but is not irredeemable.”

Common Side Effects is on HBO Max.

2. A song I can’t stop listening to: Caroline Rose’s everything in its right place

A few days ago Caroline Rose leaked their new album, Year of the Slug, and the first track is on repeat in my house and head. Baja blast, crunch wrap supreme…

The whole album is worth a playthrough.

3. An essay about despair that I loved: Lessons for the End of the World; On Octavia Butler, the L.A. fires, and the uses and misuses of the things that cannot be recovered, by Hanif Abdurraqib

“People are not incorrect about Octavia Butler predicting the future, but they’re not always clear about what kind of future she was envisioning. It’s not the fires or drug use or tumbling literacy rates that she invented—all of those problems were simply there for her to see. What “Sower” imagines, rather, is a future in which surviving the seemingly unsurvivable requires people to show some emotional dexterity, some ability to surrender whatever selfishness they’ve been harboring and see if they have something that someone else needs. This is the starting point of mutual aid: What do I have that someone else may need? Butler’s work is outlining a future where posing that question is a requirement. “Sower” isn’t just about a time and a fire and a place; it’s about people deciding what kind of apocalypse they are going to have, and then deciding how to live in its aftermath.”

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

While I’m here thanking-fucking-god for glimmers of hope and beauty–thank fucking god for Front Porch Forum and the folks who run it.

I was so so so excited when they reached out and asked for some illustrations to show how people use the platform to connect IRL with neighbors. I <3 FPF.

I love these spot guys: