The Take
This is the Take. It's where you come to understand more about your favorite movies, shows and culture. Our video essays make the story worlds you enter richer and deeper. Think: Endings Explained, Character Studies, Hidden Messages and Symbols Revealed, Actor and Director Profiles, and more.
We want to share our love of visual culture with the world. So here's our Take.
351
Cassie’s Euphoria Season 2 looks and their hidd...
In season 2 of Euphoria, Cassie goes through some major changes, and so does her style. So what’s the secret emotional meaning underneath each of Cassie’s looks?
9 min
352
Why Gen Z is already burning out (and how to cope)
Gen Z is just getting started with adult life. So what does it say if the youngest adults are feeling burnt out already – and will the kids be alright?
12 min
353
Stars' Second Chapters - Why They Give Us Hope
So often we’re led to believe that, after a certain age, people are just stuck with their lot in life, however bad the job or relationship is. But the celebrity-starting-over trend is here to give us hope!
11 min
354
How Fight Club Predicted Today
Fight Club has long been a cult classic, and today Tyler’s complaints about the spiritual costs of turning ourselves into consumers instead of people feel more prophetic than ever – so do any of his solutions make any sense, too?
13 min
355
How the Manipulative Victim Trope Shaped the De...
Stories about women being deceptive or manipulative have been embedded in our culture for millennia, dating all the way back to Adam and Eve. Here’s our take on how narratives around the Depp-Heard trial draw on the tropes of the perfect victim and the devious manipulative woman, and how both of these fictional ideas fuel dangerous societal misogyny.
12 min
356
The It Girl - What Makes Her "It" In Every Era
The “It” girl represents something indefinable — a quality, charisma, or spark that makes her stand out and captures something of her time. So what truly makes a generation’s It Girl?
11 min
357
House of The Dragon - A Targaryen Deep Dive and...
Three years after the end of Game of Thrones, we’re heading back to Westeros. But what can we expect from HBO’s upcoming House of the Dragon?
12 min
358
The Cougar Trope - Why this joke is outdated
The Cougar used to be a punchline, but has the joke of an older woman preying on younger men stopped being funny? And was it ever?
16 min
359
Donnie Darko - What's the Meaning of Life?
For all its confusion and ambiguity and humanoid rabbits, what major takeaways did Donnie Darko leave us with?
16 min
360
The Handmaid's Tale - What's Come True and What...
Is America truly becoming Gilead? How much of The Handmaid’s Tale’s terrifying fiction has already come to pass? Maybe more than you’d think.
13 min
361
Euphoria Rue - A modern portrait of the addict
What is it about Euphoria’s portrait of Rue and her addiction that feels so honest?
16 min
362
The Elder Millennial - A generation lost in time
As quickly as they arrived, it seems like millennials might be over. So where is the Elder Millennial today – and will they be okay?
14 min
363
Stranger Things Season 4’s deeper meaning, expl...
Stranger Things’ epic fourth season hits close to home: unlike in the previous two seasons, the threat feels personal. So what did season 4 really mean?
12 min
364
Celebs don't age anymore. Is that bad for the r...
Aging is an unavoidable part of life - or at least it used to be. But this doesn’t seem to be true for today’s celebrities. Here's our take on the mixed messages that today’s never-aging celebrities send us about how (and whether) it's okay to get older.
15 min
365
Teen stories onscreen are all so risqué. How tr...
Teens on screens big and small are having some wild times. But is the risque teen trope an accurate depiction of what teenage life is like (now or ever)? Or is it an adult’s imagination of what kids today are up to?
13 min
366
The Single Lady - Why single life is in fashion
Are we finally moving into a new age where the single lady is aspirational? While she may still have her challenges, the single lady has come a long way from being shunned, to being celebrated.
13 min
367
How Millie Bobby Brown overcame the child star ...
Millie Bobby Brown is breaking free of the child star curse with poise and confidence – and exposing a lot of what’s pretty shocking in today’s culture along the way.
8 min
368
Fifty Shades’ Toxic Takeaways - What’s Not Hot ...
What are the messages the Fifty Shades trilogy leaves us with – and are any of them actually useful in real romances, or should we pretty much view this story as a cautionary tale?
19 min
369
How Workplace Dystopias Represent Our Toxic Job...
The workplace sitcom has given way to widespread workplace dystopia and how it reflects our angst that the nature of work today is not just soul-crushingly meaningless but actively wrong.
14 min
370
Margot Robbie’s Barbie - How The Doll Became Fe...
Who is the real Barbie, and who is she for? Here’s our take on how Barbie has managed to remain relevant and iconic for so long, and the essence of this character that’s persisted across her series of changing models.
11 min
371
What Daria says about the 90s (and today)
Daria made it cool to be a wry and cynical loner and was the picture-perfect example of ‘90s alienation. Years later, Daria still resonates with anyone who’s ever questioned whether the problem is you or the system you’re living in.
19 min
372
How the "Diva" label went from insulting to iconic
The term is often thrown around as an insult, but the diva is a figure of self-created power many of us can take inspiration from. Here’s our Take on why the diva has become an icon to so many people.
12 min
373
Everything Everywhere All At Once - Every Symbo...
True to its name, Everything Everywhere All At Once has a lot going on. What’s the deeper symbolism?
14 min
374
Who's the real Jennifer Aniston?
Jennifer Aniston was the archetypal girl next door of the 90s – but has that label limited her career, and did it ever actually represent who she really was?
17 min
375
The Brainy Brunette Trope - Why people think sh...
Bookish, quiet, intelligent… and brown haired? The brainy brunette is embedded in our culture, but why do we correlate female smarts with hair color?
13 min