All Stories
The better way to make tomato toast
The mind keeps a strange little pantry of its own. It shelves a photograph you paused over, a dish you ate three summers ago, a flavor combination you praised enthusiastically in public and then apparently continued discussing with yourself in…
“Diarra From Detroit” shows what a media merger could cost TV
The trouble with Diarra Brickland is she can’t let things go. “Diarra From Detroit” presents this as the schoolteacher-turned-detective’s greatest asset and her biggest flaw. If it weren’t for her stubborn insistence on finding out why a great guy, Chris…
In “The Valley” finale, Count Bookula drains our patience
In the Season 3 finale of Bravo‘s “The Valley,” succinctly titled “The Valley of the Damned,” Danny Booko — who does voice work for movies and video games when not reigning as secret-glugger #1 in this Vanderpump-adjacent reality show —…
The painful cost of bringing “Children of Blood and Bone” to screen
My first reaction to the trailer for “Children of Blood and Bone,” Paramount’s lush adaptation of Tomi Adeyemi’s bestselling 2018 young adult novel, was that I buzzed with excitement. My second reaction? Why must good things come at a cost?…
“I Want Your Sex” is deliberately unsexy
Are you having sex? Do you want to be? These days, there are a million different possible answers to either question. Our culture has confused sex — a relatively uncomplicated, biological thing — with desire, which is an entirely different,…
Your magical burnout cure is in this Miyazaki film
Throughout July, The Swell is celebrating the lasting cultural inspiration of animator Hayao Miyazaki and the legendary films he created with Studio Ghibli. As part of GKIDS’ annual Studio Ghibli Fest, which kicked off in June, you can enjoy theatrical…
The art of the beach sandwich
It’s a $16 disappointment every time. These days, the airport sandwich tends to emerge from a fluorescent-lit vending machine with a name like Farmer On-the-Go or Nutrition Inc. The machine is usually white, decorated with soothing green or blue iconography…
The cult of New England Chinese food
Walk into any American-style Chinese restaurant in New England, and you’ll find locals sipping from umbrella-topped Scorpion Bowls and flaming Pu Pu Platters (pronounced plattah). Piled high with chicken fingers, chicken wings, spare ribs and teriyaki skewers crowded around a…
A no-spend week, starting in the kitchen
This is the time of year when the thrill of post-holiday spending gives way to the quiet guilt of all those little indulgences. That’s when a no-spend week starts to feel less like deprivation and more like a little ritual:…
Is ChatGPT Health the new WebMD?
For a few days around Christmas, Holly Jespersen, a 50-year-old living in New York, did not feel great. It felt like a cold was coming on, but she wasn’t sure if she should go to the doctor or not. “When…