The Food/Beverage Vibes of Television & Film
Poker Face is a Cheeseburger
As a guest on the Black Men Can’t Jump In Hollywood podcast last year, I discovered my own personal food/beverage-based rating system. We were discussing the animated feature film Spies in Disquise on the podcast, and I compared the general vibe of the movie as… Pepsi. I couldn’t explain this connection with meaningful detail. It simply felt right. And I’m certain that if we could turn the movie into a set of ingredients, the resulting mixture would taste more like Pepsi than Coca-Cola.
I’ve been making more of these connections since that fateful moment on the podcast…
Take Peacock’s Poker Face, for instance. Clearly, this is a cheeseburger. Is it because of the show’s brilliant retro title cards that appear in a shade of cheddary yellow? Perhaps. But I think there’s something deeper. An episode of Poker Face provides the same mental satisfaction as a savory bite into a cheeseburger and a dip of a fry on a sunny day.
The Mandalorian, which I cover with my Yub Nub podcast co-hosts Greg Iwinski and Jim Fagan, is solidified in my mind as breakfast cereal. It occasionally ventures into bacon and eggs territory; but it’s still breakfast nonetheless. The Mandalorian is a show made for groggy Saturday mornings when the mind is in its most imaginative state. Yet, for some reason, it chooses to come out Wednesday mornings instead.
Comparatively, Andor is a glass of whiskey. Something you sip and savor while contemplating the world around you.
This list could go on forever—with me insisting that Succession is a steak and Last Week Tonight is champagne. And though I’ll likely be captured and experimented on by the food and beverage industry once they read this, I’m glad that I took this moment to share my truth.