Author: Jordan Brown

I’m a sophomore studying economics and communications. I’m also a movie junkie who specializes in rom-coms with the philosophy that life is better at the lake.

Fall Tropes

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Every season has fun activities that people associate with it and they look forward to doing these activities when the season gets closer.  The activities tend to vary based on where you live because the weather tends to dictate what activities are doable. It in the Midwest activities for summer are going to the beach and playing in a pool, for winter it’s sledding and building snowmen and having a fire indoors, for spring it’s being able to not wear winter coats and walking outside again, and for fall it’s pumpkin carving and sweater weather.  Fall has a range of activities that people look forward to based on their interests in particular.

A lot of fall activities rely around Halloween, because Halloween is the main event that happens during the season.  Some Halloween fall related activities include haunted houses, trick or treating, and Halloween parades. These activities are directly related to Halloween, but a lot of other fall activities are associated with Halloween even though they are not directly related to it.  Some of these activities include pumpkin picking, apple orchards, and corn mazes. While carving pumpkins is a specific Halloween activity, going pumpkin picking is not. These activities get lumped into the same category because they happen around the same time because November might be too cold to do them.

Other fall activities are not related to Halloween, but are related to being back to school.  The main thing that this includes is football season. Fall is the season for high school, college, and professional football.  While professional football continues into the winter, high school and college generally do not. This means that for a lot of people across America, the leaves changing colors means football seasons and Saturdays being taken over by tailgates and football games.  This is especially true at the University of Michigan. Game day is the most popular day of the week for the entirety of football season (a.k.a. fall).

Fall also means seasonal retail items, mostly pumpkin flavored things.  Only in the fall can one find pumpkin bread and pie at the grocery store, and a pumpkin latte at Starbucks.  This is when people go overboard of consuming their favorite fall themed things, not only food. Fall scented candles and decorations with leaves and acorns on them also increase because they reflect the weather.

This happens with each season, fall is just particularly noticeable because people associate so many things with this one season unlike the others.

Romcom Redemption

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Since the late 1980’s romantic comedies (romcoms) have been a staple genre.  It was popular all the way until the late 2000’s when the genre feel out of popularity.  Now Netflix is bringing it back.

There seems to be a gigantic list of romantic comedies that came and are now classics from the 80’s.  There is “When Harry Met Sally”, “16 Candles”, “Pretty In Pink”and “Can’t buy Me Love”. These romcoms are now classics and must watches for all romcom lovers.  The 80’s also had several romcom stars. The most notable being Molly Ringwald who starred in “Pretty In Pink” and “16 Candles”. The theme of female romcom stars continued all the way to the present.

The 90’s was the arguably the golden age of the romcom.  Movies from “Notting Hill” to “10 Things I Hate About You” were somewhat popular while some of the biggest hits that every person still knows are “Sleepless In Seattle” and “Clueless”.  “Clueless” was the “Mean Girls” of the 90’s and became a quotable icon very quickly. “Sleepless In Seattle” is one of the most iconic romcoms that everyone knows and loves. It is one of the most must see romcoms and movies in general.  Some of the stars from the 90’s romcoms are Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks. Not only were the two popular romcom stars but they also starred opposite of each other in two of the biggest romcoms of the 90s (“Sleepless In Seattle” and “You’ve Got Mail”).

The 2000’s were the downhill slope of the romcom.  The theater and tv were getting so saturated that not that many stood out to the general public.  Some of the big romcoms were “27 Dresses”, “Bridget Jones Diary”, “The Proposal”, and “13 Going On 30”.  The 2000s split romcoms into several categories because there were so many movies. Romcoms were split into teen movie romcoms, made for tv romcoms and then hit romcoms.  Some of the teen romcoms were “She’s The Man”, “What A Girl Wants” and “A Cinderalla Story”. The star of the teen romcom category was Amanda Bynes who starred in over 5 romcom movies.  There were many stars of the popular romcoms, One of the stars of the popular romcoms was Sandra Bullock who starred in “Two Weeks Notice”, and “The Proposal”. Two others were Anne Hathaway and Jennifer Lopez.

After the early 2000s were over saturated with romcoms the genre died down for a little bit.  There was only made for tv romcoms, with most of them coming out of the Hallmark Channel. Over the past year Netflix has tried to redeem the genre and have been creating a large amount.  There most recent movies have gotten a lot of attention and they are bringing new romcom stars. The most popular Netflix romcoms are “The Kissing Booth”, “Set It Up”, and “To All The Boys I Loved Before”.  With these movies the biggest star that has risen is Noah Centineo who starred in “To All The Boys I Loved Before”. With all of these new Netflix romcoms the genre is coming back into the lime light and is being revived.

Happy Mean Girls Day

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“On October 3rd he asked me what day it was” said Cady Heron from the hit 2004 movie Mean Girls.  Ever since this movie has come out October 3rd is the official Mean Girls day. This year is more special in particular because October 3rd is a Wednesday, and even if someone hasn’t seen the movie it is a well known fact that “On Wednesdays we wear pink” – Karen a.k.a a plastic.

Mean Girls has been a phenomenon since its release in 2004.  It stars Rachel McAdams as the villain Regina George and Lindsay Lohan as the protagonist Cady Heron who just moved back to the United States from Africa with her parents.  This movie is a classic teen movie because it shows some truth to high school while also exaggerating everything in the funniest possible way. Mean Girls quickly expanded by adding a much less popular sequel in 2011.  This one starred Camp Rock star Meghan Martin. A Mean Girls musical was also created in 2017 and is now playing on Broadway.

Mean Girls quotes became common knowledge after its release.  Some of the most popular are when Regina George yelled to Cady “Get in loser, we’re going shopping”, when Regina George told the other plastics that she “wants to lose 3 lbs”, when Janis and Damon described Gretchen saying “Her hair is full of secrets”, and when Gretchen repeatedly tried to make “fetch” happen.  It seems as though every other line of the movie is now a popular quote that most millennials know.

The mastermind behind Mean Girls is Tina Fey.  She wrote the movie and the musical. Fey was a writer on the tv show SNL and then she began to act on the series as well.  She then went on to create and star in her own tv series separate from SNL called 30 Rock. Tina Fey has a famous friendship with Amy Poehler.  The two of them were actors on SNL together and have starred in each others productions since then. They have become a famous dou by hosting award shows together as well.  Poehler had a role in Mean Girls as the “cool mom” of Regina George.

Andrew Lloyd Webber

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With the rise of popularity of the Broadway Musical Hamilton for the past several years, the entire Broadway community has gained more popularity.  While Hamilton was one of Lin Manuel Miranda’s first musicals, there are several other composers and playwrights that have created hit after Broadway hit for decades.  The most popular of these composers is Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Webber was born in London in 1948, and has been composing since 1965.  His two most famous musicals are the Phantom Of The Opera, and Cats. He has also composed Evita, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, School of Rock, Sunset Boulevard, and Starlight Express.  Most of his most popular work, like Phantom of the Opera, and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat were filmed and made into DVD’s. They were filmed as a Broadway musical using the stage and sets from when they performed on Broadway, they just did not have an audience during the filming.  Another musical of Webber’s musicals that got made into a movie was School of Rock. The School of Rock movie was different from the other two movies that were made because School of Rock was not filmed on a stage. It was filmed on a movie set, the movie was a film adaptation of the musical, whereas the other movies were just recorded versions of the Broadway shows.

All of his movies have some famous actors in them.  Johnny Osmond played Joseph in the movie of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, and Jack Black was the main character in the movie adaptation of School of Rock.  Webber has a new movie adaptation that is in the works. The movie rendition of his famous musical Cats is casting right now. Cats is set to star several famous actors and singers such as Jennifer Hudson, James Corden, and Taylor Swift.  Webber has been a big face in creating and composing musicals since the 1970s and he is not going anywhere soon.

Detroit’s Arenas

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Detroit has been a hub of activity in the state of Michigan since the state was formed.  Like all big cities in the US, there are a lot of events that are constantly going on in Detroit.  Everyday there is some form of sporting event, conference, and concert. Detroit has an abundance of concert venues from The Detroit Opera House to the Fox Theatre.  The newest venue is the Little Caesars Arena that is the hockey stadium for the Red Wings and also doubles as an event center. Little Caesars has replaced the Joe Louis Arena for the home of the Red Wings and for a concert venue.

The Joe Louis Arena was built in 1979 and replaced the Detroit Olympia.  The Joe Louis Arena was the 2nd oldest hockey arena in the U.S. with only Madison Square Garden being older.  The Arena hosted many other things besides just hockey games. They hosted figure skating competitions, basketball games and tournaments, and concerts. In 1980, the Palace of Auburn was built and had taken over a lot of the concerts that the Joe Louis Arena used to hold.  

The Little Caesars Arena opened in September 2017.  It succeeded both the Joe Louis Arena and the Palace of Auburn Hills as the home of the Detroit Red Wings and the home of the Detroit Pistons.  Like both the Palace and the Joe Louis Arena, the Little Caesars arena is also a concert venue, and it is now the only of the three venues that hosts concerts as well.  The Arena has a capacity of 22,000 for concerts, 20,000 for basketball games, and 19,000 for hockey games. This is bigger than the Joe Louis Arena by about 1,000 seats.

As Detroit grows and the sports teams become more popular, the stadiums and arenas increase in size.  The transition from the Joe Louis Arena to the Little Caesars arena is a perfect example of this because not only is the Little Caesars Arena bigger than the Joe Louis Arena, it also has newer amenities and a newer look.

Gardening in the City

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It is becoming more and more popular for people to be growing their own food, or at least part of their food.  Many people have small gardens in their yard that they will grow tomatoes and other vegetables that they can put into their meals.  For people in larger cities this is a challenge because they do not have the outdoor space to plant a garden. People in larger cities are becoming creative in the way that they can plant things, even with their limited resources.

Several new trends has started in some bigger cities that don’t offer much grass and land to garden in, like New York City.  One is rooftop gardening. Most people are familiar with this concept from seeing it on TV shows and movies if nothing else. This idea utilizes the space that is available in bigger cities with lots of buildings and not much grass or open area.  It is also a great spot for a garden because of all the natural light that rooftops get. Some rooftops are also used as a community leisure area, with tables, chairs, and a grill for the residents of the building to go up there and enjoy themselves.  These rooftops are an alternative to a backyard.

Some other cities, like Ann Arbor, utilize community gardens.  Community gardens are spaces with lots of land that anyone can come and plant food or flowers in and they can continue to visit the spot to water them and let them grow.  Some, like the one in Ann Arbor, are sectioned off by the type of plant to keep the area organized. Community gardens are used in areas that don’t have a lot of grass in the city but the roofs aren’t built to have people utilize them.  For example; Ann Arbor utilizes a community garden because the houses on campus and downtown have little to no yard, and even if they did most yards are not suitable for gardening. So the community garden is a great place to go and make the garden that they can not have at home.