Why Theory

Ryan and Todd explore the genre of the sports film, focusing on important entries in the genre such as Chariots of Fire, Rocky, and Heaven Can Wait, among others. They define this genre through the ca...

18 Aug 20241h 41min

Ryan and Todd discuss what they see as the important moments from Freud's New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis--both its highlights and its lowlights. They explore the role that Freud's 1920 di...

4 Aug 20241h 22min

Ryan and Todd outline the arguments of Freud's Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis and highlight the key ideas that appear in this work. They also discuss what Freud mentions here that he doesn't ...

22 Jul 20241h 19min

Ryan and Todd delve into the concept of suture, as first developed by Jacques-Alain Miller. They trace the deformation that it underwent through the history of film studies and examine a few films whe...

9 Jul 20241h 13min

Ryan and Todd discuss the Jacques Lacan's neologism "extimacy," which first occurs in Seminar VII and then disappears. But they theorize that this concept offers an excellent starting point for graspi...

23 Jun 20241h 13min

Ryan and Todd explore the prequel as a narrative form. They consider its radical potential and how it might function ideologically. They discuss prequels such as Fire Walk With Me and Better Call Saul...

11 Jun 20241h 14min

Ryan and Todd theorize the modernist novel as a specific literary form, defined not by its time period but by its structural exigencies. They relate this form to the importance of the ending that func...

27 Mai 20241h 17min

Ryan and Todd explore the problem of the ending, focusing on when and why the ending becomes important in film and television. They discuss the relationship between the ending of life and the ending o...

11 Mai 20241h 25min