
Dusty Rhodes is new at Jefferson High, and she sticks out like a... well, a cowgirl. Dusty is a real cowgirl from Texas. Her parents are in the U.S. Army: her mother a helicopter pilot and her father a Special Forces Army Ranger. At first, Dusty is an outcast, but eventually she makes friends with a group that includes Savanah, a girl whose father was killed while fighting in Iraq three years earlier. Even though Savanah is kind of Goth and Dusty is all cowgirl they have a special connection and they bond. Dusty gets the school to agree to an Equestrian Drill Team and she enlists her new city slicker friends to join the team. As Dusty and the team practice, Dusty deals with the fears that come with her mother fighting in Afghanistan.
The plot could’ve really been interesting if the elements of lycanthropy was integrated with perhaps the struggle of identity of being LGBTQ+. It's an experience for so many that as they’re starting to realizing their true selves, they feel like a monster, especially if they come from unsupportive homes or communities. Instead, the horror and transformation elements seem thrown in without contemplation of how this could deepen the narrative.
Richard speaks with Dia Frampton about some of her experiences with acting and music.
Who knew a drunken game of truth or dare could launch one of the most chaotic rom-coms of the year? The Threesome takes Connor’s fantasy night with Olivia (Zoey Deutch, in peak queen-of-indie form) and Jenny (Ruby Cruz) and flips it into a deliciously messy nightmare when both women end up pregnant. What follows isn’t cheap comedy—it’s a whip-smart, heartfelt exploration of love, consequence, and the beautiful disasters we call adulthood.
After We Collided is a sequel to last year’s After, which itself was based on Anna Todd’s 2014 novel of the same name, and which was originally published as a Harry Styles-centric fan-fiction on WattPad (a similar path as E.L. James’ Fifty Shades of Grey series).