Slate’s Culture Gabfest on They Came Together, HBO’s The Leftovers, and The Onion’s new parody site ClickHole.

The Gabbers Talk Click Bait. You Won’t Believe What They Say.

The Gabbers Talk Click Bait. You Won’t Believe What They Say.

Slate's weekly roundtable.
July 2 2014 1:18 PM

The Culture Gabfest “Grief Sandwich” Edition

Slate’s Culture Gabfest on They Came Together, HBO’s The Leftovers, and ClickHole

The Culture Gabfest has moved! Find new episodes here.

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Listen to Culture Gabfest No. 302 with Stephen Metcalf, John Swansburg, and Julia Turner with the audio player below.

And join the lively conversation on the Culturefest Facebook page here:

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On this week’s episode, the critics discuss They Came Together, a new film from the creators of Wet Hot American Summer, starring Amy Poehler and Paul Rudd. It’s a broad parody of romantic comedies, a genre already replete with self-parody. Next, the gabbers turn to The Leftovers, an HBO adaptation of Tom Perrotta’s 2011 novel, which envisions something like the Rapture—and its bleak suburban aftermath. And finally, the critics turn to ClickHole, the Onion’s new site lampooning clickbait-driven Web culture.

Links to some of the things we discussed this week follow:

Endorsements:

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John: Max Ophuls’ La Ronde (1950), based on Arthur Schnitzler’s fin de siècle “rom-com” play.

Julia: Left Behind, Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins’ evangelical series about the Rapture, which provides anthropological and sociological insight into American religious extremism.

Steve: Carl L. Becker’s Declaration of Independence: A Study in the History of Political Ideas, in anticipation of the Fourth of July.

Outro: “An American Dream” by Love and Rockets

You can email us at culturefest@slate.com.

This podcast was produced by Ann Heppermann. Our intern is Anna Shechtman.

Follow us on Twitter. And please like the Culture Gabfest on Facebook.

Stephen Metcalf is Slate’s critic at large. He is working on a book about the 1980s.

John Swansburg is a senior editor at the Atlantic.

Julia Turner, the former editor in chief of Slate, is a regular on Slate’s Culture Gabfest podcast.