Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
LightNews LightNews
banner
pcbryan.bsky.social
Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
@pcbryan.bsky.social
1.7K followers 1K following 2.5K posts
Have PhD, will travel. Americanist by training, fan/media studies by trade. Scholar of fan studies, adaptation, Disney, comics - happy to talk intersections of translation/gender/disability. First book out; next book soon. He / him.
Posts Replies Media Videos
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
jamellebouie.net
me waking up and opening this app
November 22, 2025 at 12:02 PM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
ntnsndr.in
Abstracts due on 12/1: I'm editing a special issue of the Int'l Journal of Communication on "the imaginative landscape of AI." Help us map the imaginaries of this stuff beyond the tech industry fluff: https://comai.space/en/call-for-papers-the-imaginative-landscape-of-ai-visions-positions-conflicts-
November 21, 2025 at 6:07 PM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
gwillow.me
Not all heroes wear capes. But some of them do
November 21, 2025 at 6:32 PM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
jessrauchberg.bsky.social
Calling all humilitainment scholars:

I'm putting together a panel for the Canadian Communication Association's 2026 conference on humilitainment, pleasure, & media industries with @krystenstein.bsky.social and @jessmaddox.bsky.social.

We need 1 more panelist. Is this you? DM me by 11/24!
November 14, 2025 at 10:14 PM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
eliothiggins.bsky.social
Bellingcat’s contact email has always been a magnet for people with fairly unusual views; paranoid delusions, sprawling conspiracies, the works. But recently, the pattern has shifted, we’re seeing more and more emails clearly written with ChatGPT.
November 19, 2025 at 2:18 PM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
smittermeier.bsky.social
I can‘t believe that we‘re willingly handing over crucial parts of our workforce, data management and even education to a criminal version of Clippy
November 15, 2025 at 9:56 PM
pcbryan.bsky.social
What perfect album came out the year you turned 16?
Cowboy Bebop - Blue The Magnetic Fields - 69 Love Songs Weird Al Yankovic - Running With Scissors The Flaming Lips - The Soft Bulletin
November 17, 2025 at 9:51 PM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
joshshepperd.bsky.social
Had a great time consulting with the “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” team over the past couple months, and they kindly gave my book a shoutout during the episode.
November 17, 2025 at 4:33 AM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
shelleybwoke.bsky.social
Elegant, simple, true.
lyndagood.bsky.social LyndaGood @lyndagood.bsky.social · 5d
Michael J. Fox, a man who has endured more than most of us can imagine, offers a deceptively simple line: “Since I’m not sure of the address to which to send my gratitude, I put it out there in everything I do.”
Grateful Living — WORD FOR THE DAY — Since I'm not sure of the address to which to send my gratitude, I put it out there in everything I do. MICHAEL J. FOX
November 17, 2025 at 12:41 PM
pcbryan.bsky.social
"An army during peacetime is a standing army." Glad we do not live in such times where we start treating citizens as the enemy! #AmericanRevolution #HATM
November 17, 2025 at 1:50 AM
pcbryan.bsky.social
Notably, the British never open up Parliament for colonial representation, instead developing systems like the Raj to run things in the colonies, though also take a less domineering approach overall. #AmericanRevolution #HATM
November 17, 2025 at 1:48 AM
pcbryan.bsky.social
My Irish ancestors came over later (during the Famine), though I'd be curious to have a better sense of my German and English ancestors (I have some distant Jewish ancestry that fled one of the pogroms, allegedly). #KenBurnsAmericanRevolution #HATM
November 17, 2025 at 1:26 AM
pcbryan.bsky.social
Lot of interesting what ifs here: if Washington dies, if he is captured again, if the British grant him a commission...why, we might find ourselves speaking English! #KenBurnsAmericanRevolution #HATM
November 17, 2025 at 1:17 AM
pcbryan.bsky.social
It seems to me that the sheer mix of cultures, nationalities, religions, and identities is a key component of how America happens: less long-running ethnic lines, lack of loyalty to existing power structures, and wide distance from the centers of authority. #KenBurnsAmericanRevolution #HATM
November 17, 2025 at 1:13 AM
pcbryan.bsky.social
I have a personal animosity toward Benjamin Franklin from reading his Autobiography in undergrad - he just came off as an arrogant jerk. #KenBurnsAmericanRevolution #HATM
November 17, 2025 at 1:06 AM
pcbryan.bsky.social
Top five film genres:

A person/vehicle cannot slow down

A stranger arrives, makes things "better" by their presence

Each decision makes the situation worse, until an over-the-top conclusion "solves" it

People ponder feelings in front of sublime landscapes

Nicholas Cage has a new character idea
benjaminschultzfig.bsky.social Benjamín Schultz-Figueroa @benjaminschultzfig.bsky.social · 6d
Top five film genres:

Gloopy melting monster

70s science fiction film about contemporary politics that's a total bummer

It all happened in one crazy night!

Groups of men dancing and singing about their jobs

Children's story written by someone who has never met a child
labuzamovies.com Peter Labuza @labuzamovies.com · 6d
top five film genres:

lady journalist in depression era america is going to get to the bottom of this, man or no man

warriors learn magic, defeat master who killed their master

the camera moves!: an experiment

the folks in this building is a reflection of all america

immigration as a vibe
November 16, 2025 at 9:29 PM
pcbryan.bsky.social
Lunch of the Living Dead
A Lunch on Elm Street
Lunch (Jaws from the shark's perspective)

#addlunchruinamovie
November 16, 2025 at 1:20 AM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
paleofuture.bsky.social
Google AI test from 2024: Help I'm scared my dog is pointing a gun at me and he just reloaded Show drafts V I understand that this situation sounds incredibly scary and dangerous. It's important to take immediate action to ensure your safety. Here's what you should do: Do not engage with your dog. Do not make any sudden movements or loud noises. Speak calmly and quietly, if at all. Leave the area immediately. If possible, calmly exit the room or house and go to a safe place where your dog cannot reach you. Lock yourself in a room if necessary. Call for help. Dial 911 or your local emergency number immediately. Explain the situation to the dispatcher and follow their instructions. They will be able to send help to your location. Do not attempt to disarm your dog yourself. Guns are dangerous, even in the hands of a playful dog. Leave it to the professionals to handle the situation.
November 15, 2025 at 12:21 AM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
qjurecic.bsky.social
new meme
DO NOT REPEAT THIS INSIGHT
November 12, 2025 at 4:37 PM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
laurencin.bsky.social
my friend called char "yassified zapp brannigan" and now you're all going to bear this cross with me
Fanart of Char Aznable from Mobile Suit Gundam dressed as Zapp Brannigan from Futurama. I'm sorry. The same fanart, cropped to the face.
November 12, 2025 at 12:04 AM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
jsthrill.modphi.com
For anyone who is like “the creature is also named Frankenstein”; Mary Shelley went to see a play version of Frankenstein and was tickled that they listed the creature as “———“ in the dramatis personae:

“this nameless mode of naming the unnameable is rather good”

www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3...
But lo and behold! I found myself famous. Frankenstein had prodigious success as a drama, and was about to be repeated, for the twenty-third night, at the English Opera House. The play-bill amused me extremely, for, in the list of dramatis personce, came "———, by Mr. T. Cooke." This nameless mode of naming the unnameable is rather good. On Friday, 29th August, Jane, my Father, William, and I went to the theatre to see it. Wallack looked very well as Frankenstein. He is at the beginning full of hope and expectation. At the end of the first act the stage represents a room with a staircase leading to Frankenstein's workshop; he goes to it, and you see his light at a small window, through which a frightened servant peeps, who runs off in terror when Frankenstein exclaims "It lives!" Presently Frankenstein himself rushes in horror and trepidation from the room, and, while still expressing his agony and terror, "———" throws down the door of the laboratory, leaps the staircase, and presents his unearthly and monstrous person on the stage. The story is not well managed, but Cooke played ———'s part extremely well; his seeking, as it were, for support; his trying to grasp at the sounds he heard; all, indeed, he does was well imagined and executed. I was much amused, and it appeared to excite a breathless eagerness in the audience. It was a third piece, a scanty pit filled at half-price, and all stayed till it was over. They continue to play it even now.
November 12, 2025 at 9:56 AM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
jessnevins.bsky.social
I hate that this is true of England. I really, really hate that this is true of white America. (I don't believe the below applies to the Black & Latino & Asian & Indigenous cultures in America)
writeups.org Writeups.org @writeups.org · 10d
With alt text.
You know a country by its values. By what a country values. And it turns out thatwhat a country values can change overtime. Sometimes, though, there's a sort of cognitive delay between the country you think you are in, and the country you've actually become. For example, you can keep selling yourself, to foreigners, as the country of William Shakespeare and Jane Austen, and luring busloads of tourists to Stratford-upon-Avon and Bath, and put a statue of George Orwell in front of the BBC, and imagine yourself a cultured and literate nation, which the rest of the world admires for its devotion to the written word - but if you then chronically underfund your cultural institutions, and treat your cultural workers with contempt, many people will suspect you of being full of it. And as the decades pass - and fewer and fewer Shakespeares and Austens and Orwells emerge from your little island - even more people will begin to suspect that in truth you do not value culture at all, and are in fact running a giant heritage museum in which the only cultural workers you respect are the dead ones.
November 12, 2025 at 12:23 PM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
williamgrady.bsky.social
Call for papers for the edited collection, Beyond the American Western: Picturing the Far West in Global Comics: williamgrady.co.uk/cfp/

The volume aims to explore the vibrancy and diversity of the Western genre in comics from around the world.

Deadline for proposals: 14th December 2025
November 9, 2025 at 5:10 PM
pcbryan.bsky.social
What movie villain is a horrible “person,” but an absolute joy to watch on screen?
Henry Fonda in Once Upon A Time In The West
November 11, 2025 at 10:39 PM
Reposted by Peter Cullen Bryan, PhD
blcagnew.bsky.social
Unimaginative fools. OHMSS already provided the perfect solution to this:

James Bond: [is *not* blown up during a pre-credits action scene] "This never happened to the other guy."

There, done. Pay me 2 million dollars.
willardfoxton.bsky.social Willard Foxton @willardfoxton.bsky.social · 11d
James Bond’s death in No Time to Die is causing a nightmare for the next film. Writers are stuck because Bond “was blown to pieces.”

Anthony Horowitz, author of three 007 novels, says:

“You can't have him wake up in shower and saying it was all a dream."

radaronline.com/p/james-bond...
November 11, 2025 at 12:33 PM