 | Big Gulp Innovative culture jammers or bratty legal masochists? Whatever the case, Negativland's latest album, which wreaks havoc with Pepsi commercials, is one of their finest moments -- and very likely to get them sued. |
 | The Smoldering Fire Surgeon General's Warning: Participating in a war against tobacco use may lead to hysteria, feelings of futility, and a profound sense of déjà vu. |
 | The Zine Scene Raw, voyeuristic, and brutally honest, 'zines boldy go where no publications have gone before...but other than spending every waking moment in coffeehouses and underground record stores, how do you find the good ones? |
 | The Pen-Ultimate Fest Screenwriters -- who rarely receive credit for good movies, but often get blamed for bad ones -- speak out at a recent conference in Austin. |
 | Keeping the Faith Terry Waite, who endured over four years as a hostage in Lebanon, knows a thing or two about solitude. |
October 13 - October 20, 1997
What's New 
No longer does Weekly Wire combine material from eight of the nation's finest alternative newsweeklies. Now the number is ten. With The Boston Phoenix and Chicago NewCity aboard, this here news and arts magazine has become more diverse, comprehensive and, well, fat than ever. We've reorganized our contents pages to accommodate the enormity, and the result is a better, sleeker Weekly Wire. It's almost as if we went full-circle from creamy to chunky-style to creamy again.
If you like cartoons, I mean if you really like cartoons, take a
gander at this Comics Xtra, containing first-rate artwork from some of the
best national cartoonists you've never seen. Also: read about National
Public Radio's refusal to air a poem by Martin Espada, and peruse the
Weekly Wire staff's favorite articles from the first 10 issues.
Film Vault 
Hundreds of film reviews and thousands of links! Sort alphabetically or by
publication, genre, director, or date. Check it out!
Red Meat
The most tasteless and twisted comic strip in the world. Featuring the Red
Meat Archive, Reader Favorite Archive, and the Meat Conference Forum!
Talk Back 
Got the newsgroup blues? Get away from the spammers, scammers, and rapid
scrolling of Usenet groups and try our cozy, easy-to-use BBS instead.
Additional Vaults
Besides the Film Vault, we carry multitudinous archives that include various
cities' Best Of editions, local music registers, album reviews, book
reviews, and plenty more.
Info Booth
This is your one-stop shop for communicating with Weekly Wire. From here you
can email the staff, check our latest press releases, read our FAQ, and find
general information about Weekly Wire and its content partners.
News & Opinion
Will the socially engineered, anti-tobacco stigma stick? The swinging pendulum of history suggests otherwise. Aye, and what a powerful pendulum history can be: it can effect the rise and fall of seedy motels, or even result in Irish Americans immigrating back to Ireland. In other immigration news, find out why American Indians and Mexican Indians are hoppin' mad at the Border Patrol. Perhaps we should be letting more immigrants in, not forcing them out, says one columnist. Perhaps politicians who criticize Clinton's contribution-seeking should put their foots in their mouths, says another. Says a third: never, ever, ever give abusive boyfriends your sympathy. [14 articles]
Film & TV
Get festive! The Austin Heart of Film Screenwriters Conference and Festival is a good start. The Chicago International Film Festival, with its many movies, happenings, and weirdos, is another. Heck, even attending a Screening of a Michael Moore documentary can be festive. The point is to have fun. Oliver Stone aims for just that in U-Turn, and these three reviewers (1, 2, 3) tear him apart with equal amounts of glee. Unfortunately, Seven Years in Tibet lacks such mirth: this review and this one explain. Not interested? What, would you rather be reading about Jimmy Smit's butt on NYPD Blue? [27 articles]
Music
Sadly, we've got the abundance-of-blues-articles blues. Bluesmen are everywhere, and we're not talking about Smurfs. With articles about Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, Delbert McClinton, Martin Sexton, Bo Ramsey, and folklorist Alan Lomax's new documentary about blues roots, we've got even more blues than a Gainsborough painting. We've also got a weirdly chaotic interview with The Adults, reviews of dozens of Texas albums, a profile of the lucrative business of producing and packaging CDs and tapes, and articles about Green Day, the Foo Fighters, and Negativland. [27 articles]
Arts & Leisure
So, which is worse, Burger King's attempt to do McDonald's, or McDonald's attempt to do Burger King? The greasy, cheesy answer may not surprise you. Also: Other than mountains, what's up in Appalachia's party scene? Does George Bernard Shaw's My Fair Lady hold up in rain, in Spain, or mainly in the plain? Does master printmaker Fritz Eichenberg know how to etch a woodblock, or what? What's new in the fascinating world of online Mah Jong? And why on earth does everything look so weird when you come back to town after a long vacation? [9 articles]
Books
Though zines are often raw, weird, and erratically laid out, a variety of publishers have found that anthologizing them is good business -- and refreshingly good reading. Where else, after all, can you find out what happened to the Rainbow Afro guy? If you prefer to hold something weighty and staple-free in your hands, try John Updike's latest work, a suburban sci-fi tale called Toward the End of Time, instead. Also reviewed within: Already Dead: A California Gothic by Denis Johnson, Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden, and Unexpected Turn by Jim Sagel. [13 articles]
Comics
Come down from your Staggering Heights and get to the Red Meat of the matter with this swell set of cartoons that also includes Mueller, Eye of the Beholder, K. Rat, Random Shots, and La Cucaracha. [7 comics]
All the contributors to Weekly Wire, along with other AAN (Association of Alternative Newsweeklies) publications, can be read from this one easily accessible spot. Strongly recommended for bookmarking. [107 newspapers]
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