This week I have two pieces up at Romance @ Random, both of which are a little more relevant to what Erin and I write than usual.

The first is a review of Begin Again, a quasi-romantic comedy from the creator of Once, featuring Keira Knightly and Mark Ruffalo. Everything you need to know is in the review, but the TL;DR version is that it’s deeply flawed, not what you are expecting, and charming anyway. The relevant to this blog version is that the film is entirely about collaboration and the toxicity of fame. For all its flaws, I was excited just by the movie existing and delineating these types of relationships and the impact of their context.

The second is this week’s True Blood recap, which features Jason Stackhouse having a sex dream about Eric Northman that is both hot and a highlight of just how terrible at everything Jason is. Other features include a long sequence that can most kindly be called an homage to 28 Days Later and a former primary school teacher melting into a puddle of goo between Arlene’s legs in the worst possible way.