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themetropolitan.bsky.social
The Metropolitan
@themetropolitan.bsky.social
35 followers 69 following 370 posts
Weekly Substack of Gen X cultural review. No dunking. No hot takes. No false nostalgia.

https://www.themetropolitan.uk/
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themetropolitan.bsky.social
The comedy we watch as teenagers, like pop music, becomes an intrinsic piece of our characters, creating core, inescapable, memories.
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There is a fertile period, memory-formation-wise, that kicks off around the age of 10 and peaks somewhere between 15 and 25. This explains why cinemas are full of billion-dollar remakes of ‘80s comic books, why Facebook groups are full of crumblies posting about Spangles, and the existence of this newsletter.
January 23, 2026 at 1:01 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
This week we’re visiting Tudor England with Edmund Blackadder, who is hardly the first historical villain to get the benefit of the doubt.
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January 22, 2026 at 8:03 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
‘Blackadder II’ was one of those rare things, a sequel that was not only as good as but which vastly surpassed its predecessor.
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It is often claimed that it was Elton who brought the nob gags to Blackadder II, but this flies in the face of the evidence: there are plenty of rude jokes in The Black Adder. They’re just not very good.
January 21, 2026 at 12:02 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
‘On the box’ this week is ‘Blackadder II’, co-written by Ben Elton, who also co-wrote the anarchic alt-sitcom ‘The Young Ones’.
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January 20, 2026 at 8:01 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
This week we’re re-watching ‘Blackadder II’, one of the great happy miracles of BBC comedy.
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Producer John Lloyd said The Black Adder looked a million dollars, but unfortunately cost two. But it was nevertheless recommissioned, because this was a time when the BBC was willing to give shows a chance.
January 19, 2026 at 1:00 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
Introverts complain about social situations, but is the real problem awkwardness or egotism?
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There’s an undeniable correlation between situations in which introverts feel comfortable — intimate conversations, small groups of close friends — and situations in which the introvert gets to hold forth and be constantly affirmed.
January 16, 2026 at 8:02 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
Rowan’s piece this week on how her introversion makes her avoid social situations may be related to the fact that they’re awfully noisy too.
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January 15, 2026 at 1:02 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
This week Rowan Davies is writing about what a revelation the idea of a social battery was in handling her own introversion.
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Introverts can be social; they can happily give a presentation at a conference or go to the pub. What makes you an introvert is when, after doing these things, you have an immensely strong, almost sub-cognitive need to sit by yourself in a quiet room for a few hours.
January 14, 2026 at 7:02 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
This week Rowan Davies is writing about how being an introvert makes maintaining social contacts hard, which is where having a ‘firecraker’ friend can come in very useful indeed.
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January 13, 2026 at 12:01 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
There’s a famous dunk in Mad Men when a kid says to Don Draper ‘I feel bad for you’ and Don Draper devastatingly replies ‘I don’t think about you at all.’ But is this put-down actually advice for social awkwardness?
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Most of us aren’t thinking about most other people, most of the time. This rubric explains 99% of petty social hurts. ‘They’re probably not thinking about me’ is a life hack, not an opening of hostilities.
January 12, 2026 at 6:01 PM
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We’re making a gentle start to 2026, playing among the stars with Iain M. Banks’ ‘Excession’.
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Science fiction is simply another form of game playing, of imaginative exercise. But play has a purpose. It is a practice as much as a pleasure, a way of modelling reality and thinking about it.
January 9, 2026 at 12:01 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
We’re re-reading some of Iain M. Banks’ sci fi this week, but we’ve written about his literary fiction before and his smash debut, ‘The Wasp Factory’.
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The Wasp Factory
Iain Banks (1984, Macmillan)
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January 8, 2026 at 8:02 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
This week we’re re-reading Iain M. Banks’ ‘Excession’, which remains spellbinding in its depiction of his high tech ‘luxury space anarchy’
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Hugo Gernsback’s definition of scientifiction begins: ‘a charming romance intermingled with scientific fact and prophetic vision’. That romance, that sense of wonder is a key part of science fiction.
January 7, 2026 at 1:02 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
Just before Christmas we wound up our season on Sherlock Holmes and, not coincidentally, went on a little ‘Blue Carbuncle’ themed walk round London. Here’s Tobias holding both forth and Mr Henry Baker’s hat.
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A man old enough to know better, holding a hat and a set of cue cards, gesturing wildly in an attempt to distract his audience from his ineptitude
January 6, 2026 at 8:03 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
The Metropolitan is starting the year with some science fiction: Iain M. Banks’ ‘Excession’, which is considerably more interesting than the genre’s reputation might have you believe.
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This was fiction by and for engineers, men like Isaac Asimov or Arthur C. Clarke, who could conjure fascinating scientific possibilities but who couldn’t write believable dialogue.
January 5, 2026 at 2:00 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
Part of the magic of Christmas is how it enchants the everyday world and part of the magic of Raymond Briggs’ book is how he reversed that, making the ‘Father Christmas’ part of the ordinary world.
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By depicting a recognisable and familiar world, and making Father Christmas himself a recognisable and familiar grumpy old man, he is insisting on this most mysterious quotidian magic.
December 19, 2025 at 6:01 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
This week we’re snuggled up with Raymond Briggs’ ‘Father Christmas’. This isn’t the first seasonal comic book we’ve featured, but Posy Simmonds’ ‘Cassandra Darke’ is more a much older audience.
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December 18, 2025 at 12:02 PM
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The detailed realism of Raymond Briggs’ 1973 hard-working night-in-the-life of ‘Father Christmas’ shows how well he knew his audience.
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Small children live in a small world; small matters such as household brand logos — mysterious, impenetrable, laden with occult meanings — receive the full focus of their attention.
December 17, 2025 at 8:03 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
This week we’re revisiting Raymond Briggs’ very British ‘Father Christmas’ and for another appearance by the old man, can we recommend our sister Substack’s Christmas story ‘An All Too Magical Christmas’?
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An All Too Magical Christmas #1
Watch now | In which a magician (second class) is mocked in the street by teenagers before being mocked at home by a clockwork robot
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December 16, 2025 at 12:00 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
One of the chief delights of Raymond Briggs’ 1973 picture book ‘Father Christmas’ is that the lead character isn’t a jolly old elf or mystical, magical being but just another hard working stiff.
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Father Christmas, inspired by Briggs’s father’s own experiences as a milkman, is a fully recognisable British working man of the period, begrudging and swearing his way through the night shift.
December 15, 2025 at 7:01 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
The Coen Brothers are notorious for their refusal to explain or comment on the themes of their films, something that only makes them more appealing to those of us inclined to ‘reading too much into things’.
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The Coens’ Gen X fans appreciate their penchant for splicing together wildly different approaches and sliding gleefully across genres, as if the canonical guidelines weren’t there. (Which, of course, they’re not.)
December 12, 2025 at 8:01 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
The Metropolitan’s sister substack Christmas Stories is now almost half way through this year’s story: ‘The Wish List’, the story of Alfie, who takes a seasonal job packing boxes, only to discover that the warehouse contains a good deal more than just presents.
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The Wish List - Item 11
Alfie wishes he could escape the warehouse.
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December 11, 2025 at 12:01 PM
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‘The Hudsucker Proxy’ was famously a financial disaster, but what producer Joel Silver may have lost in terms of investment, the audience certainly gained in terms of Coen Brothers films.
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It is tempting to wonder what might have happened if the Coens had followed a similar trajectory to Sam Raimi. In a world where Hudsucker had been a vast success, might the Coens now be directing Doctor Strange movies for Marvel?
December 10, 2025 at 8:01 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
This week we’re suggesting the Coen Brothers’ ‘Hudsucker Proxy’ for seasonal viewing, but we have plenty of other suggestions in our Christmas season of movie musicals.
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Christmas Movie Season 2025
And a one, two, three, four...
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December 9, 2025 at 12:02 PM
themetropolitan.bsky.social
It’s time for the seasonal debate about what is or isn’t a Christmas movie. Well, the Coen Brothers’ ‘The Hudsucker Proxy’ definitely is, in style and in content.
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The Hudsucker Proxy is a Christmas movie. More specifically, it’s a seasonal movie that parodies and celebrates other classic seasonal movies, from It’s a Wonderful Life (1946) to The Apartment (1960).
December 8, 2025 at 8:01 PM