Matt Barber says...
I’ve spent years studying and writing about popular culture – so long in fact that out of sheer irritation they finally gave me a doctorate for it. I want to carry on my academic approach of fixing a popular text within a broader context but in a more geeky, more free-range and accessible way.
My particular skill is finding worth in the worthless – finding relevance and permanence in the most transient and insubstantial of cultural phenomena.
My interests are wide and quite often shallow (and I’m afraid my writing will at some point include the phrase ‘British telefantasy’). I’ve been trained in medieval literature, art and architecture, the history and literature of witchcraft and American politics.
I also have a passing interest in the history and fictional depiction of British and American intelligence agencies, the relationships between genre and urban and rural landscapes, the history of British telefantasy and popular interpretations of psychogeography.
I live in Exeter with Becky and the memory of a rabbit.
Matt Barber
Welcome. This is Matt Barber
This site is dedicated to popular culture and genre texts. I’ll be writing about, criticising, pulling apart and sticking together with glue a whole range of television shows, films, books, radio series, and other cultural riff-raff. From The Archers to Agatha Christie, from Oliver Stone to Oliver Postgate, nothing is beyond or, indeed, beneath me.
I’ll also offer a service of sorts: through my reviews and heads-up articles I’ll try to suggest interesting and unique ways of looking at the latest films, books and television and offering my own recommendations.
I’ll also decorate my recommendations with trailers for movies or clips I think may be worth a look at and link to the many genre and cult sites I’d want to use regularly.
Featured Movie Trailer
In my opinion...
Taste is subjective – I wish I possessed it.
I’m capable of loving the most outrageous and derided films and television series and have been known to violently take against several much loved national treasures.
I make no apology for my own opinions nor for the sheer range of what I consider – I’ll think nothing of highlighting comparisons between Bagpuss and Kill Bill: Vol. 1 if they can be justified (they can’t).
Genre Reviews and Articles
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