Beware of Volcanoes, Avoid Serial Killers, and Other Advice for People New to Seattle

Film/TV • Unstreamable

Unstreamable

by Chase Burns and Jasmyne Keimig • Saturday at 9:00 am

The face of a movie star.
The face of a movie star. Courtesy of New Line Cinema
Unstreamable is a weekly column that recommends films and TV shows you can't find on major streaming services in the United States. This week: power ruins robots in Metropolis, heroin ruins lives in The Basketball Diaries, Mr. Charlie rides a lot of chicks in The Body Is Willing, and a little girl rides a lot of buses in Ayneh (The Mirror). Find over 100 more unstreamable films and recommendations here.

METROPOLIS
Japan, 2001, 108 min, Dir. Rintaro
Ma'am, if you could only see 2020.
Ma'am, if you could only see 2020. Chase Burns

Near the start of Metropolis (the pretty anime version of Metropolis, not the old German version of Metropolis), a junk robot is assigned to work on a case with a private detective and his nephew. The robot, who can speak and emote, tells them that his name is just random numbers and letters: 803-D-RP-DM-497-3-C. Impossible to remember. The humans don't like this—how will they develop a relationship with him if they don't give him a proper name? They decide on "Pero," which the robot resists, because robots aren't allowed to have human names. It infringes on human rights. I laughed when I heard this and thought of Alexa and Siri. Clearly, we've catapulted over these concerns.

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News • Film/TV • Olympia • Slog AM/PM • 2020

Slog PM: Tim Eyman's "Lies Won't Work in a Courtroom," I'm Still Laughing That This Dope Is the Leading Republican Candidate for Governor

by Chase Burns • Friday at 5:15 pm

Republicans best shot, currently.
Republican's best shot, currently. Lester Black

Shocker: The Seattle Times endorses Amy Klobuchar. My favorite line from the endorsement is "she’s the only candidate so far to have the guts to serve up some veggies alongside the sweets." Is this in reference to the salad incident?

I suspect many of you will love this line: "Tim Eyman has been in violation of Washington campaign finance laws for at least the last seven years, concealing nearly $800,000 in political contributions," writes David Gutman for the Seattle Times. A judge found Eyman in violation of campaign finance laws today. “Eyman is being held in contempt of court—and today’s ruling reveals his contempt for our campaign finance laws,” said Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson in a statement. “Eyman will say anything to avoid accountability for his conduct, but his lies won’t work in a courtroom.” Eyman, notably, is currently the leading Republican candidate for Governor. More from the Times:

Eyman has been in contempt of court for nearly two years for refusing to cooperate with the lawsuit against him, and currently owes more than $230,000 in sanctions, a sum that’s growing at $500 a day.

He faces a potential lifetime ban on directing the finances of political committees when he goes to trial this summer.

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Beer

Back to Ballard: Urban Family Brewing Opens New Expansive Taproom

by Lester Black • Friday at 5:00 pm

Urban Family owner Andy Gundel pours some of the brewerys well-known fruited sours.
Urban Family owner Andy Gundel pours some of the brewery's well-known fruited sours. Lester Black

When Urban Family Brewing first opened in 2011 it was a small, dimly lit taproom along Ballard Avenue. The beer was brewed in a tiny space in the back hallway. They made middling beer and then decamped from Ballard for Magnolia in 2015.

Now they’re back in Ballard, opening an expansive new brewery today in the heart of the neighborhood’s beer district. And the beer they're selling has improved dramatically.

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Music • Inbox Jukebox

Inbox Jukebox Track of the Day: The Hypnotic Tom-Tom Orgy "Taho: I" by Bad Luck Drummer Chris Icasiano

by Dave Segal • Friday at 4:15 pm

It is our good fortune that Bad Lucks drummer formed his own tom-tom club.
It is our good fortune that Bad Luck's drummer formed his own tom-tom club. Haley Freedlund

Chris Icasiano, "Taho: I" (Origin Records)

Chris Icasiano has established himself as one of the boldest musicians in Seattle's jazz and experimental-music scenes as a drummer in the Bad Luck duo with saxophonist Neil Welch. Together they've delved into free-jazz maelstroms and more nuanced and somber pieces with masterly skill.

Icasiano's debut solo album, Provinces (out today), consists of field recordings he took during a trip to the Philippines, where his ancestors lived; he's woven them throughout compositions created on drums, synths, keyboards, and various percussion instruments. The two suites here, Icasiano explains in the press notes, "explore the complexity of cultural identity and community as a second-generation immigrant in Seattle." Even if you don't know the back story, the tracks here cast riveting spells.

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Media

Seattle Times Systematically Misinformed Readers About Boeing Until It Was Too Late

by Charles Mudede • Friday at 3:29 pm

The sun sets on the Boeing 737 Max.
The sun sets on the Boeing 737 Max. Getty Images
If you examine the articles by Seattle Times' aviation reporter Dominic Gates and its business section over the past seven years, you find something that is truly astonishing. At the time that Boeing was subjecting large sections of its labor force to continuous layoffs, or the psychological stress of pending layoffs, it never made or even suggested a connection between these cost cuts and the enormous sums of money that the executives in Chicago were devoting to stock buybacks. Reading Seattle Times, you will have the impression that the one, layoffs, and the other, buying back shares, existed on two different planets, that nothing existed between them but the vacuum of space. And yet, you read that execs are offered on the regular shares as a considerable part of their pay packages. The value of these shares is in the millions.

Now, why is this all odd? You will not find in this and other articles about executive packages a mention of the aggressive buyback program that Boeing initiated in 2013. Meaning, the executives in Chicago own shares in the company, and, at the same time, they are allocating company cash to purchasing company shares to raise the value of these shares. This is what a buyback is all about. It manipulates share prices by reducing the number of shares available on the market.

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Food & Drink • Things To Do • Food News • EverOut

A Hypebeast Boba Tea Shop and More Seattle Food News You Can Use: February 21, 2020 Edition

by Stranger EverOut Staff • Friday at 2:30 pm

Calling all clout-seekers: Capitol Hills new hypebeast boba shop Drip Tea has bear-shaped taiyaki with ube and vanilla soft serve and a cannabis backdrop for your Instagram photos.
Calling all clout-seekers: Capitol Hill's new "hypebeast boba shop" Drip Tea has bear-shaped taiyaki with ube and vanilla soft serve and a cannabis backdrop for your Instagram photos. Drip Tea

This week, Seattle gets a fancy spirits-sipping destination with a medical theme, a boba tea shop for Instagram hypebeasts, and a long-awaited craft brewery. Plus, Pike Place's beloved family-owned Filipino spot receives an honor from the James Beard Foundation, and Sunset Hill will soon have a new spot for Detroit-style pizza. Read on for details on all that and more, plus weekend events for foodies, like the Seattle Wine and Food Experience. For more ideas, check out our list of unique margaritas to try for National Margarita Day this Saturday, our list of food and drink specials to try for February, and our full food and drink calendar.

OPENINGS
The Doctor's Office
Feeling under the weather? Maybe you're due for a visit to this tiny, intimate whiskey bar with seating for a dozen guests, which opens today, February 21. The project is brought to you by Keith Waldbauer (a former owner of Liberty) and Matthew Powell, MD (yes, an actual working doctor!). Think less "stethoscopes and tongue depressors" and more "rare Japanese whiskeys and yakitori skewers," with a focus on hospitality (hot towels and champagne are offered to guests upon entry). High-rolling spirits lovers might consider shelling out for the "Pap Smir" (yikes), a $220 boilermaker of rare Pappy Van Winkle bourbon and Smirnoff Ice—100% of the sales from that drink are donated to Planned Parenthood in order to cover the full cost of preventative care for a patient who cannot afford it.
Capitol Hill

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New to Town • Death

How You're Going to Die

by Katie Herzog • Friday at 2:00 pm

death_mag.jpg
RACHELLE ABELLAR

Seattle is a green city, a healthy city, a city where half the population owns snowshoes and more people go to spin class than to church. And yet, despite its reputation as one of the healthiest and fittest cities in America, Seattle is also a ticking time bomb—in more ways than one. While you're sure to enjoy our fair city while you're living, here's how life in this city can end.

Earthquake

Look to your east. Now look to your west. Lurking behind those dense gray clouds are the Cascades and the Olympics, respectively. These are your new wilderness playgrounds. But while these mountain ranges provide some of the most scenic views in the continental United States, the reason they exist is because the tectonic plates beneath your feet are volatile and will, at some point, shift. Or even worse, subduct.

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Theater

Great Performances Stand Out in Nordo's Thriller, The Angel in the House

by Rich Smith • Friday at 1:30 pm

The faces of revenge, (L-R) Tatiana Pavelo, Amelia Brown, and Ayo Tushinde.
The faces of revenge, (L-R) Tatiana Pavela, Angela DiMarco, and Ayo Tushinde. Cafe Nordo

During the Victorian era, Coventry Patmore wrote a poem describing the ideal wife as an "angel in the house" who lives to please her man.

Nobody liked the poem at the time, but it became popular around the turn of the century, and its ideology was pervasive enough to spur Virginia Woolf to write a whole essay collection critiquing it. "Killing the Angel in the House was part of the occupation of a woman writer," she wrote.

In Cafe Nordo's production of The Angel in the House, which runs through March 8, quadruple-threat Sara Porkalob and co-director Andy Buffelen shove a few more knives into the back of Patmore's infamous poem with their queer, feminist Victorian dinner party thriller.

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Savage Love

Unbreakable Dicks, Desirable Bellies, Credible Straights — Reader Advice Roundup!

by Dan Savage • Friday at 12:30 pm

SAVAGE-Letter-of-the-Day-STAMP-2020.jpg

This week's Savage Love Letters of the Day: a gay man trapped in a woman's body is uncomfortable with the label "girlfag" and wonders if there's some other label that applies; a straight man with a thing for belly fat is worried about his wife's newly expressed desire to lose the weight he loves; a gay man doesn't know whether to out himself to a former coworker who already outed himself to the LW on a gay kink app; and a straight woman who has a mini-orgasm every time she poops wants to know what the hell is going on with her junk. And, of course, this week's Savage Love and this week's Savage Lovecast.

First up, regarding BROKE...

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Science

Another Study Casts Doubt on Effectiveness of Trigger Warnings

by Katie Herzog • Friday at 12:00 pm

Youve been warned.
You've been warned. jxfzsy/Getty Images

Trigger warnings are everywhere. They’re on television, movies, newscasts, podcasts, radio shows, on the internet, in conversation, and, especially, they're on college campuses, where a 2016 survey found that about half of professors have used them. If there’s a chance that someone, somewhere, could be triggered, there’s a distinct possibility we’ll be warned about it.

But despite the ubiquity of trigger warnings, evidence keeps mounting that they do little to help people, and, in fact, may actually be counterproductive for people who've experienced trauma.

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News • Bumbershoot

Bumbershoot Will Return This Year, But Expect a Downsized Festival

by Lester Black • Friday at 11:00 am

Bumbershoot will be back this year, but it might not have as many EDM acts for the teens.
This year might not have as many EDM acts for the teens. Timothy Kenney

The future of Seattle’s Bumbershoot music festival was looking bleak last fall. The festival’s attendance was in a freefall and the event’s producer, AEG, declined to renew their contract with the city. It looked uncertain whether Bumbershoot would make it to its 50th anniversary.

But the show will go on. The city and One Reel, the nonprofit with the exclusive contract to present Bumbershoot, said this week that the festival will return to Seattle Center—although expect to see a smaller event this year.

“We will produce the festival in 2020,” said Marty Griswold, the executive director of One Reel, “but I think it’s safe to say that we will have to downsize to some degree, to be able to deliver that. Our goal is to provide a sustainable future long-term for the festival and be financially responsible in those actions.”

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EverOut

Last-Minute Plans: 76 Free, Cheap & Easy Things To Do in Seattle This Weekend: February 21-23, 2020

by Stranger EverOut Staff • Friday at 10:45 am

At Saturdays Alki Winter Beer & Food Truck Festival, the Mobile Food Rodeo will provide sustenance to Polar Plunge participants and onlookers.
At Saturday's Alki Winter Beer & Food Truck Festival, the Mobile Food Rodeo will provide sustenance to Polar Plunge participants and onlookers.

Panicking because you don’t know what to do this weekend and you're short on cash? Don't worry—below, find all of your options for last-minute entertainment that won't cost more than $10, ranging from Fremont's pre-Mardi Gras Petit Troll Parade to Community Day at the Frye Art Museum, and from a Full Moon Market to the opening of Tara Flores's Subtle Matter at J. Rinehart Gallery. For even more options, check out our complete EverOut Things To Do calendar and our list of cheap & easy things to do in Seattle all year long.

FRIDAY

GEEK
1. Trivia Night: The History of Black Science Fiction
Prominent local sci-fi authors Nisi Shawl and Somaiya Daud will host this night of trivia about Afro-futurism and Black speculative fiction.
(University District, free)

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New to Town

Do Shit Alone

by Jasmyne Keimig • Friday at 10:20 am

Self-portrait of the author in a mirror at Cafe Allegro.
Self-portrait of the author in a mirror at Cafe Allegro. JASMYNE KEIMIG

Seattle can be a dreary, lonely place. There is, of course, the myth of the Seattle Freeze, a phenomenon where newcomers to the area have trouble making new friends with Seattleites because we do not want to talk to people we don't already know. While I do think the hype around the Freeze is overblown—Seattle people are friendly, just extremely flaky—the gloomy skies and rain sometimes ensure that new acquaintances would rather just stay inside and watch Gwyneth Paltrow make her employees stick weird things into their vaginas instead of trying that new bar on the corner.

In my opinion, having no one to go to a show or gallery or movie with isn't a good excuse to not do something. Seattle is a paradise for loners. There are all kinds of things here a person can enjoy on their own. This isn't a call or plea for social isolation, but rather a call to embrace being alone.

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News • City

Seattle's LEAD Diversion Program Still Doesn't Have 2020 Funding—Or a Contract

by Nathalie Graham • Friday at 9:37 am

Durkan still hasnt funded the nationally-lauded diversion program.
Durkan still hasn't funded the nationally-lauded diversion program. Lester Black

In her State of the City address, Mayor Jenny Durkan patted herself and the City of Seattle on the back for utilizing diversion programs when it comes to criminal justice. She failed to mention Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD), a nationally recognized diversion program dubbed by the New York Times as the "way to end the war on drugs." Maybe that's because she's still withholding funding from LEAD. According to LEAD project managers, LEAD still doesn't have a contract with the city for 2020.

As Erica Barnett originally reported in January, Durkan has withheld the funding for LEAD that was agreed upon in the 2020 budget she signed. Barnett reported that this—a mayor not funding what is in the approved budget—is "unprecedented." On top of that, LEAD has not even received a contract for this year, according to the Public Defender Association which runs LEAD.

Why has Durkan not committed to supporting a first-of-its-kind program that is getting people out of the criminal justice system, especially when she proposed expanding LEAD citywide in her 2017 mayor campaign?

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Savage Love

Savage Love: Throwing Bones

by Dan Savage • Friday at 9:15 am

feb20_savage_throwing-bones_mag.jpg
Joe Newton
I'm 20, straight, male, fit, and active. I masturbated prone—flat on my stomach—for years. I've now changed to a more traditional position (on my back or sitting upright), and I'm using my hand rather than grinding against a mattress. I can easily orgasm when I masturbate. I've had sex four times in my life, and I'm worried because I wasn't able to orgasm by someone else's hand, through oral, or during penetration. I felt more sensation with oral or by hand than I did during intercourse, but I wasn't able to get off. This is extremely worrying, and I am increasingly depressed. Am I broken? Is my sex life ruined?

Boy Reeling Over Kaput Equipment

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