Utterly Worthless: Why Seventeen Is A Useless Magazine!

The Good: A few lines about positive female empowerment
The Bad: Insufferably addy, Articles blended with advertisements, Expensive for what one gets, Mediocre writing.
The Basics: Seventeen is a way for advertisers to prey upon a key demographic without providing anything of real substance.


Occasionally, I will pick up a magazine or my wife gets a magazine sent to her and I tend to look through whatever crosses my path, at the very least. Recently, my wife started getting a gift subscription to Seventeen Magazine as part of a free promotion she was a part of and while neither of us is the magazine's target demographic, she had fond memories of the magazine from when she was younger. So, while I was originally concerned that my first impression of the magazine when I picked it up might have been biased based on my high reviewing standards, when she grumbled, "This is nothing like how it used to be," I felt pretty validated.

Apparently, back in the day, about a decade and a half ago, Seventeen was a magazine that focused on empowering young women. It was a magazine that had information on how to apply make-up in general and articles about health for young women. That, however, is not what the magazine is all about now. Now, Seventeen Magazine is all about the advertisements.

Right off the bat, I will acknowledge, I am not Seventeen's target demographic. I am not a girl aged fourteen to seventeen (which is pretty much the target demographic for the magazine. That said, from any objective standard, Seventeen fails to do right by its target demographic, while acting perfectly as a champion for the companies that advertise in the magazine.

Seventeen is the magazine for young women and it seems to be a magazine for young women desperate to fit in with the popular and accepted crowd. The magazine is about falling into social norms and looking like everyone else, more than it is about being accepted for being truly original. Seventeen is not a magazine empowering young women to be themselves; it is about expressing oneself within the popular, accepted, conventions of youth culture.

Seventeen, at least the September 2016 issue which I used for this review, is comprised of 142 glossy pages, including the back cover (which it might as well be, it has the same sense of substance as the rest of the magazine). Of those 142 pages, 47 are full page advertisements. But the thing is, more than any other magazine I have ever seen, Seventeen is subversive as its "content" is also filled with advertisements. As a result, interviews include photo spreads of the celebrity being profiled featuring specific identification for the items being worn and prices . . . in other words, advertisements. At least half of the non-overt, full-page advertisements are de facto advertisements for products that include shopping information. My wife phrased it perfectly for the difference between what she remembered and what the magazine has become - it used to be non-branded make-up advice (i.e. how to make a facial scrub) vs. "which facial scrub is right for you" (out of all of these brands, at these price points!).

So, for example, this month's comparison between the styles of Mean Girls and Bring It On features tiny pictures compiled from the two films, with blurbs on make-up and swag from each film, including brand names and retail prices. Similarly, on page 58, "Find Your Perfect Bra" is not an article on how to properly get fitted for a bra, it is a compilation of nine brand-name bras with online prices and the websites at which they may be purchased.

Outside a single picture of a real seventeen year-old student who took on her school for claiming her pro-lesbian shirt violated its dress code, all of the women depicted in Seventeen are stereotypical, stick-figure thin young women. In fact, the picture the magazine used of Amy Schumer managed to make the champion of women of substance (both intellectually and physically) look rail-thin. This, sadly, reinforces a cultural expectation that is impractical, overrated and more ridiculous than many want to admit. Yes, Seventeen helps reinforce the programming in popular culture by declaring (implicitly, if not explicitly) "This is what women should be!" In addition to outfit recommendations - each article proudly declaring labels and places to purchase the outfit components shown - Seventeen has make-up tips; the idea of natural beauty - i.e. no make-up - is not lauded in its pages.

Seventeen is lacking any commentary, social conscience or relevance to those outside its niche audience. The interviews asked ridiculous, soft-ball questions and the relationship advice is absurd. The writing in Seventeen has a particularly low level of diction, which might reflect today's education system, but the inclusion of popular slang does make the magazine appear to be talking down to the lowest common denominator . . . or at least, the lowest common denominator that might want to buy a Victoria's Secret bra!

For other magazine reviews, please check out:
Maxim
AAA Living
The Progressive

.5/10

For other magazine reviews, check out my Magazine Review Index Page for an organized listing of all of the magazine reviews I have done.

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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(Stupid) Men Get Told What Is Sexy And Stylish: Maxim Magazine!

The Good: Decent photography
The Bad: Lowbrow writing, Addy, Photography is hardly spectacular compared to all that is on the internet.
The Basics: Maxim is not worth the cover price.


I was not a fan of high school when I was in it. I was not popular and it was only when I embraced my own geekdom and stopped caring what others thought about me that I came into my own. So anything that tries to sell itself as an authority on what I (as an American or a human) should like, I tend to treat with the same eye roll of disdain that I have for most of my thoughts of what high school was like. So, when my wife picked me up a subscription to Maxim magazine, I had some real doubts that she truly knew me. She told me it was something she managed to get for free and that she intended for me to review it. Sadly, Maxim was not really worth my time and attention.

For the purposes of specific details, I am using the April 2015 issue of Maxim for review. I would have reviewed it last month, but I could not credibly review without a hint of disdain for a magazine with the cover advertising an article on the most desirable woman in the world. Talk about pretentious bullshit . . .

Maxim is a monthly magazine comprised of 98 glossy pages and it is a men's magazine for men with money and a dependence on being told what is fashionable and sexy. The advertisements - and there are many of them - are filled with good-looking guys who seem likely to score with the attractive women pictured and featured in the articles. Articles focus on desirable women, "cool" activities (gambling, sports, weaponry), and men's fashion.

The photography in Maxim is good, but the latest issue even manages to illustrate how obsolete the magazine is becoming in that way. The current issue features the women of Instagram and the photography in that article illustrates perfectly that one need not hire professional photographers to get high-quality pictures of women. They are, as most of the world already knows, already all over the internet.

Not overflowing with impressive diction or vocabulary, Maxim is incredibly ad-filled. The 98-page magazine features 31 pages of full ads (not counting the inside and back covers and two separate pictorial spreads that advertise all of the items the models/actors are wearing, which wipe another 14 reading pages out of the magazine). That is an insane amount of ads, especially for a magazine one is spending money on (it could be free for all who want it based on how much space is taken up with ads!).

But then, Maxim readers appear to need to be told what to buy as much as they need to be told what to like and how to spend their time. For the rest of us, there is real life and this magazine can be easily avoided.

For other magazine reviews, please visit my evaluations of:
The Week
Ladies’ Home Journal
Self Magazine

0/10

For other magazine reviews, please check out my Magazine Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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All The Most ? Of International Opinion: The Week!

The Good: Some well-culled articles, Interesting opinions, Delightfully low on ads
The Bad: No original reporting, Old news, Poor labeling of source’s authority
The Basics: Reprinting quite a range of opinion and soft news pieces from around the world, The Week is a hard-sell for a magazine in a world with trending topics on social media.


As a last-minute holiday gift last year, my father gave me a gift subscription to The Week. By that, I mean that everything else had been delivered when all of a sudden, I started getting The Week and I got a card announcing the gift subscription (he may have had it planned for months). I think it’s sweet that my father – who has long encouraged me to “get a real job” and “grow up and get into a career” which would offer me some stability – thinks that I have time to sit and read magazines as I wheel and deal, scrimp and move money around to try to pay the monthly bills on time. Self-employed people might seem like they have it made by not being bound to schedules, but the burden is on us to actually make and meet deadlines and that leaves me with a growing reading pile that now includes a weekly magazine.

But perhaps my father knew of my lifestyle’s inherent drawback when he gave me the gift subscription to The Week. Instead of getting me a subscription to a lengthy, wordy magazine that would engage and challenge me, he gave me a subscription to The Week, which seems to be the world news equivalent of Reader’s Digest (reviewed here!).

The Week is a 38 page magazine which reprints selections from other publications each week with little more depth than the “Trending Topics” column on Facebook. Major news stories are broken down into one to five paragraph blurbs that tend to give a very limited accounting of what the event being reported is before presenting well-culled opinions on the story. As a result, a paragraph in the average The Week article will elaborate on the headline before various pundits are quoted with their opinions on that story. The result is a publication that does not look for facts, subtlety or depth; this is not where one goes for a chain of evidence that exposes the next breaking story or scandal. The Week is barely where one would go to learn about opposing opinions on the trending topics from last week.

What readers can expect in The Week then are news blurbs that are a week old and other people’s opinions on them. While The Week might cull from respectable news sources, the full list of citations requires a trip to the website for the publication. I find that problematic because the mix of people cited within The Week seems to range from experts in the field to pundits with no clear authority on the subject being given equal weight. So, for example, in the March 6, 2015 issue of The Week, an article on Russia and the Ukraine cites opinions from Andrew Korybko, Rotislav Ischenko, Dmitriy Korotkov, and Andrei Lipsky with about equal weight and space for their opinions. Having absolutely no prior knowledge of anything about the situation in the Ukraine, it was virtually impossible to read the three paragraph “article” and come away with either an opinion or a sense that I even had any facts. Four pundits are quoted using judgmental terms – “illegal overthrow,” “neo-Nazi,” “anarchic” – and vague opinion-based words (“surely,” “probably,” “seamy”) and, despite their publications being cited, I have absolutely no knowledge of the veracity of any of their claims. The summary line that declares that there is now “proof” falls dramatically short of that assertion based on the text that precedes it. In other words, a bunch of people I’ve never heard of (Are they reporters? Pundits? Government officials? Whistleblowers with top secret clearance?) writing for magazines, newspapers and websites I’ve never heard of are writing opinions about a subject only vaguely detailed in The Week and I’m supposed to come away from it . . . informed? Convinced? Opinionated? Emotionally affected? At the end of reading the “article,” I am no more informed or educated than I was after reading the headline.

I was going to write more about The Week (about how few advertisements were in it, though I was going to object that their “best properties on the market” was essentially free advertising for the real estate agents they covered, how laughable their entertainment coverage was, etc.), but in this case, that says it all for the magazine. The Week is a glorified Facebook Trending Topics feed (with the top three comments) in printed form. Now I just hope my father didn’t overpay for the subscription . . .

For other magazines reviewed by me, please check out my take on:
The Bark
Decision
American Baby

1.5/10

For other book and magazine reviews, please visit my Book Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Sell To The Expectant: American Baby

The Good: Decent photography, Inexpensive enough
The Bad: Exceptionally advertisement-filled, Simplistic articles
The Basics: More a catalog with advice than a magazine, American Baby lacks real substance.


Magazines are a tough sell with me. With the explosion of the internet and the sheer volume of information found there (my wife has been reading me horror stories from parent boards on Reddit all day), it is hard to see magazines as a viable source of current information. Despite all of the trouble with ads on the internet, I find it so much more offensive to pay for magazines when they are largely advertisements. That is one of many issues I have with American Baby magazine.

American Baby is a magazine intended to help expectant parents prepare for having a child around. The magazine features tips for room preparation, prenatal health and the like . . . but what it actually seems to be is prime real estate for advertisers of products for babies, maternity wear and cleaners that are safe for using around newborns. The magazine, which is a monthly magazine, is a 68-page glossy magazine available at bookstores and newsstands for $1.99.

Out of 68 pages, thirty-one in the October 2014 issue of American Baby were pure, full-page advertisements, not including inside and back covers! The solid majority of the rest of the pages in the magazine have advertisements on part of the page or are articles that read like ads – a “Special” section on Baby Gear includes prices and shopping locations for all of the items pictured, making it seem like an abrupt catalog inside the magazine.

As for the articles, out of 68 pages, I found one paragraph to be truly useful out of the entire issue. The writers of American Baby present information on why an ultrasound video procedure might not be advisable. Arguably the most supported science presented in the magazine is the advice paragraph about ultrasound videos.

The rest of the magazine is fleshed out with articles on style, health and baby development. American Baby includes articles on creating gender-neutral baby environments, health tips for pregnant women and maternity style (ironically with models who are not pregnant enough to need the clothes they are modeling).

The photography in American Baby is good, but given how much of the photography in the magazine is from advertisers promoting their products, that is unsurprising. The pictures for the magazine are pretty simple pictures of babies – nothing surprising there – and, usually, happy-looking mothers.

While American Baby does not neglect fathers entirely, the magazine clearly targets expectant mothers and helps to perpetrate the unrealistic ideal of motherhood that gets so many women roped into the shackles of having a child. The magazine might not be to blame for the generations of hype and conditioning that surround the idea of tying a woman’s value and self-worth to her being a good mother, but it is certainly not doing anything to combat that!

For other magazine reviews, please check out my reviews of:
Maxim: The Hot 100
AAA Living
Blackest Night Special Edition #1

1/10

For other magazine reviews, please check out my Magazine Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Exactly As Droll As One Might Suspect: Maxim: The Hot 100 Disappoints

The Good: Decent photography, Good interviews
The Bad: Stupid concept, Addy, Lowbrow writing
The Basics: Maxim: The Hot 100 lives down to what one might expect of the annual magazine issue, though I was pleasantly surprised by the interviews!


One of the animated sitcoms - Family Guy, American Dad or The Simpsons has a line about Maxim that was utterly hilarious; something about their “Most Rape-able Celebrities” list. My wife recently gave me a gift subscription to Maxim, ostensibly for review and when Maxim: The Hot 100 (the annual special issue) arrived, I found myself trying to remember the joke from television about the publication. Maxim: The Hot 100 might not be quite the sinister issue that the joke insinuates, but it is pretty damn close.

Comprised of photos and a blurb for the 100 women that Maxim has decided (apparently through votes somehow) are the most desirable in the world, Maxim: The Hot 100 is like a catalog for shopping for unobtainable women. In addition to being a preposterous exercise (ranking women on their “hot” factor, as if there were a universal standard for the subjective emotion of desire), Maxim: The Hot 100 undermines itself far too frequently to be at all useful or even engaging. It’s not just some form of weird sour grapes that I write that; - favorites of mine like Anne Hathaway and Ellen Page did not make the list, but Bar Paly and Candice Swanepoel did(?!) – but any list where Katy Perry is ranked as more desirable than Sophia Vergara or Avril Lavigne ranks 44 and Anna Paquin is 78 seems skewed toward the absurd.

In addition to having a purpose that is ridiculous – are Maxim readers so stupid that they need to be told whom to be attracted to?! – and somewhat inscrutable (what are the readers supposed to do, exactly, with this information?), the Maxim: The Hot 100 special issue seems remarkably lowbrow in terms of the writing. Take, for example, the listing for Gal Gadot (who made #84 on the list) on page 13 of this year’s Maxim: The Hot 100. The blurb for Gadot reads, “Hollywood’s newest Wonder Woman is a total badass. She not only owns a motorcycle but also served two years in the Israeli army” (13). Gal Gadot is Israeli. You know who else served two years in the Israeli army? Every other Israeli citizen; it’s mandatory. Does that make her more of a badass than #39, Gina Carano, who was a MMA-brawler? Probably not. My point is that virtually none of the blurbs say anything useful, interesting or insightful about their subjects.

What keeps Maxim: The Hot 100 from the most dismal of ratings, then? First off, the photography. Most of the photos are incredibly good, exactly what one might hope for from a celebrity spankbook with a ridiculously low cover price of $3.99. The price of the magazine might make one think that it was not going to be a glossy, good-looking magazine, but apparently advertiser dollars subsidize the magazine enough that the special issue needs not charge an arm and a leg. Maxim: The Hot 100 features photographically solid pictures; in terms of color, contrast, and composition, the photographers utilized in Maxim: The Hot 100 clearly know what they are doing. In fact, because the photographers seem able and their subjects are undeniably photogenic, it is astonishing that they get some of the celebrities in remarkably unflattering looks (there’s something horrid about calling someone “hot” and smacking up a picture of them looking haggard, as at least one of the women was).

The other aspect that sells the magazine – the one that pleasantly surprised me – is the interviews. Maxim: The Hot 100 features interviews with cool celebrities (this year, it was Bryan Cranston and Nick Offerman). The questions asked of these celebrities are not the typical ones that have been asked to death and the answers are fun and informative.

Unfortunately, the two articles and a smattering of the hundreds of pictures throughout the magazine are hardly enough to justify the magazine’s existence. Several pages of the magazine are wasted debunking movie plot/effect issues (like would reversing the Earth’s direction a la Superman: The Movie turn back time). Does Maxim believe a large population of its readers are physicists who somehow slept through basic temporal mechanics? Or biology students who do not know the average size of a great white shark? Other preposterous articles focus on the latest supermodel, hot trends, and a short story about joining the mile-high club. The average length of an article in Maxim: The Hot 100 is one page, which suggests that the average reader’s attention span is ridiculously limited.

Not overflowing with impressive diction or vocabulary, Maxim: The Hot 100 is fairly ad-filled. The 120-page magazine features 22 pages of full ads (not counting the inside and back covers), along with 3 pages of partial ads and 8 pages of style articles which list all of the items in the photos, with a price (which is pretty much an advertisement to me!).

Maybe I’m not the target demographic, maybe I’m not desperately looking for unobtainable women or maybe I just don’t need a magazine to tell me what to like to have opinions. But, for those who don’t care about smart (the most common comment by women on the Maxim Hot 100 list is about their own butt; none of the quotes capture the intelligence of any of the smart women on the list), aren’t looking for a woman even close to 40 (Jennifer Lopez seems to be the most senior member of the list) and who want something more respectably portable than a hard-core magazine, Maxim: The Hot 100 is enough to entertain those who want to spend the four bucks on it.

For other magazine reviews, please visit my evaluations of:
AAA Living
Ladies’ Home Journal
Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine

2.5/10

For other magazine reviews, please check out my Magazine Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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A Nice Bonus, A Poor Magazine On Its Own: AAA Living!

The Good: Decent photography, The writing is all right
The Bad: Very simplistic, Surprisingly addy
The Basics: As one of the membership benefits to AAA, AAA Living provides travelers with surprisingly little to recommend the service.


When it comes to magazines, it is easy to see how their readership and production would be declining in the age of the internet. Nowhere is this more true for me than AAA Living. AAA Living is a magazine that comes to AAA (the travel/car club) members every two months.

AAA Living is a 64-page magazine that is glossy and presented as a membership benefit to AAA members. Readers of travel magazines, though, are likely to find the magazine a bit underwhelming. First, AAA Living is exceptionally addy. Out of sixty-four pages, AAA Living has twenty-seven pages of advertisements, several of which are for AAA or for AAA-affiliated deals. Part of the problem with AAA Living is that the advertisements are synergized with AAA deals.

Of the thirty-seven pages of substance in AAA Living, the magazine is broken into two features and three sections of columns: Members Corner, Travel Ideas, and “Life Matters.” The features have ambitious travel ideas – the current issue features Nothern Italy and Africa travel. The feature articles have impressive photography, though none of it is particularly audacious. AAA Living features pictures of very safe, easy-to-access places that they feature. The AAA seems to want to present images that would be common on someone’s travel through one of their trips. This comes across in AAA Living as mundane as opposed to anything near incredible.

The columns are used to further the AAA perspective of travel. The Members Corner articles promote AAA benefits for travel. They read very much like advertisements, but of the three sub-columns under the Members Corner banner, the “Car Care” section actually has decent advice about how to travel safely and well, but the other sections – “Savings” and “Benefits” are columns exclusively about how being a AAA member can benefit members. Those articles steer readers toward some of the discounts offered by AAA and its affiliated partners. The Travel Ideas section is exactly what the name suggests: columns that offer AAA members options for where to travel that might be off the beaten path. The Life Matters columns are broader articles on how money management and travel synergize. The articles promote safety, fiscal responsibility, and protecting one’s assets.

AAA Living uses very simplistic language and there is nothing audacious printed in the magazine. The magazine is a mix of advertisements, lifehacks and travel ideas . . . all of which is easily found on the internet. There is nothing printed in AAA Living that is at all extraordinary. The magazine is not terrible, it just is not particularly useful. Other travel magazines might have out-of-touch fantasy trips and exceptional photography, but AAA Living is so ruthlessly pragmatic that it lacks any real punch, vision, or anything at all extraordinary. The life hacks or travel hacks are interesting, but most of them are either common knowledge or information that could be easily found by reading one’s owner’s manual for their vehicle.

In the end, AAA Living is not even an incredible side benefit to being a AAA membership. While the content might enhance the AAA website, it is not worth tracking down on its own.

For other magazine reviews, please check out my reviews of:
Blackest Night Special Edition #1
Ladies Home Journal
Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine

3.5/10

For other magazine reviews, please check out my Book And Magazine Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2014 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Not All It Is Promised To Be: Blackest Night Special Edition #1 Is Hardly Special!

The Good: Compliments the action figure set fairly for two of the figures, Good artwork
The Bad: Entirely incomplete story, Short, Low collectible value, Odd coloring issue, Does not include two of the four characters from the box set!
The Basics: Blackest Night Special Edition #1 is a bonus book in the Blackest Night Action Figure Box Set . . . which provides unfortunately minimal context for the figures in the set!


When my wife was shopping for birthday gifts for me recently and she was on the fence about getting me the Blackest Night Action Figure Box Set (reviewed here!), one of the selling points that actually pushed me over into wanting the set (and asking her for it) was the Blackest Night Special Edition #1 book that came in the set. My hope was that the exclusive comic book would include a lost chapter for me in the Blackest Night Saga (reviewed here!). After all, despite my love of the Saga, I could not remember any chapters that included Black Lantern Blue Beetle specifically.

Upon receiving the gift, I enthusiastically broke out the figures and it took me a few extra days to get around to reading Blackest Night Special Edition #1. Unfortunately, for those looking for a grail in the boxed set, Blackest Night Special Edition #1 falls short; in fact, it does not even live up to the promise of its own table of contents! Blackest Night Special Edition #1 includes two issues of Green Lantern which were culled from the anthology Agent Orange (reviewed here!). The story is actually the story of Larfleeze, but it includes the brief time that Hal Jordan was a Green and Blue Lantern (simultaneously). The table of contents in Blackest Night Special Edition #1 promised Booster Gold issue #26 . . . but then does not actually include it! Instead, it has two covers, both featuring the Black Lantern Blue Beetle . . . but no story to go with it! That is a huge letdown for the fans.

In fact, Blackest Night Special Edition #1 poorly sells the set it is included in; it does not have any stories that include Munnk and only the pictures of the Black Lantern Blue Beetle. Rather ridiculously, the way the story is consumed with the tale of Larfleeze, fans reading the book are much more likely to wish the boxed set included a limited edition Larfleeze figure (it does not!).

What Blackest Night Special Edition #1 includes – outside incongruent covers and advertisements for the Blackest Night and Brightest Day action figure lines – are two chapters of Agent Orange. In them, Star Sapphire Fatality accepts her life beyond the Sinestro Corps as a member of the Star Sapphires. She journeys in search of Green Lantern John Stewart in an effort to find him and forgive him for the destruction of her homeworld. The main plot, however, has the Green Lantern Corps converging upon the Vega System. No longer a forbidden system, the Guardians insist the Green Lanterns go there to stop the criminals in the sector from fleeing to the rest of space.

On Okaara, the Green Lantern Corps encounters the universe’s sole Orange Lantern, Larfleeze. Hal Jordan, still wrestling with trying to get the blue power ring off his finger, tries to aid the Corps as it infiltrates Okaara. Once there, though, he falls to the mercy of Larfleeze while his compatriots are shocked at the quartering of Green Lantern Gretti . . . and his subsequent resurrection as an Orange Lantern construct. While the other Green Lanterns battle constructs, Hal Jordan gets the backstory on Larfleeze and John Stewart comes face to face with Fatality!

The adventure in Blackest Night Special Edition #1 is entirely incomplete. The story lacks a beginning and a resolution, so it is little more than an advertisement for Agent Orange, though the story in the book is engaging enough.

The artwork is generally wonderful, though Fatality’s coloring is much lighter than the action figure would have one believe for the character! The Fatality storyline is abruptly presented and left entirely unresolved, which is frustrating for readers hoping that Blackest Night Special Edition #1 would actually flesh out the characters in the box set.

In short, as people break open their Blackest Night Action Figure Box Set and Blackest Night Special Edition #1 books hit the secondary market independent of the toys in which it was included, it is very easy to pass by.

For other special comics, please visit my reviews of:
Wonder Woman 100-page Spectacular
Man Of Steel: The Prequel

2/10

For other reviews, please visit my Book Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Before Man Of Steel, The Man Of Steel: The Prequel . . . Is Unnecessary, But Cool!

| | | The Good: Imaginative, Decent artwork, Establishes well the Superman Universe
The Bad: Not truly consequential, Huge unresolved plot/character issue!
The Basics: In digital form via VUDU, Man Of Steel: The Prequel fleshes out the universe of Superman for the audience before they go to see Man Of Steel!


As audiences flock early to see Man Of Steel (reviewed here!) tonight, I thought I would check out the exclusive features to the preview event sponsored by *shudder* Wal-Mart and (annoyingly making my computer more complicated) VUDU. VUDU, apparently, is an online movie service and it is the only way (currently) to get the digital comic book: Man Of Steel: The Prequel. Man Of Steel: The Prequel is the subject of tonight’s review; there does not seem to be a physical version of the book (yet) and right up front, the 40 page comic book is NOT worth shelling out $8 for.

That said, Man Of Steel: The Prequel is a forty-page story that very loosely leads into the summer film Man Of Steel. The overlap between Man Of Steel: The Prequel and Man Of Steel is tangential; the book does not feature the character’s primary characters. This volume is much more like Transformers: Dark Of The Moon - Foundation (reviewed here!) than, for example, Star Trek: Countdown To Darkness (reviewed here!). In fact, the underlying purpose of Man Of Steel: The Prequel might just be to flesh out the idea of who the Kryptonians are and what their powers and reach are (as well as eliminate one little nitpick some viewers might have with the presence of the buried Kryptonian ship on Earth).

Opening on Krypton, during its Golden Age Of Exploration, Kara Zor-El is in her final test to be one of the planet’s explorers. Leading the group, which seems to come easy because Kara Zor-El seems more interested in completing the mission than passing the course, Kara has her teammates, who include her boyfriend, Kell-Ur, split up to complete the mission. In the process, one of her teammates, Dev-Em commits murder, killing Kell-Ur and assaulting Kara, who is able to incapacitate him.

The murder causes a schism amongst the elders of Krypton and, unsure what to do with Dev-Em, they imprison him while they deliberate. When Kara goes out into the galaxy on one of the thousands of Kryptonian ships exploring, she goes into suspended animation oblivious to the fact that Dev-Em is a stowaway aboard her ship and he has sinister plans for her and her crew!

Man Of Steel: The Prequel is a very simple story that establishes the look and feel of Man Of Steel without fundamentally spoiling any of the film for those for whom their first viewing is their first experience with the franchise. Instead, Kal-El’s cousin Kara Zor-El is presented as the protagonist of her own story divorced from any mention of her extended family. This is very much her story.

As one might expect from such a comic book prequel, Man Of Steel: The Prequel is predictably low on character development. This is a one-shot much more concerned with establishing some sense of Kryptonian culture and teasing the abilities Kryptonians have when they encounter Earth’s son more than telling a well-rounded character-driven story. While the romantic subplot works well to humanize Kara Zor-El, the book is spent with Kara reacting to situations as opposed to creating her own destiny and moving the plot forward. It does, however, tease the codex from the film!

The artwork in the book is actually impressive and enough to make me believe that there is a physical version of the comic book either in existence or to be included in a forthcoming anthology (though I would bet this digital version would be on the DVD or Blu-Ray as a bonus feature!). The story is not exceptional, but it does what it is supposed to: it establishes the Kryptonians as they will appear in Man Of Steel and effectively generates enthusiasm for the film. It does not, however, do more than that.

For other Superman books, please visit my reviews of:
The Death Of Superman
World Without Superman
Superman: Sacrifice
Superman/Batman: Public Enemies
Superman/Batman: Supergirl
Brainiac

5/10

For other book reviews, please check out my Book Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Not At All Impressed: Ladies' Home Journal Mixes Gossip And Diet Information In With Its Advertisements And Hopes You Won't Notice!

The Good: Some of the articles are substantive and interesting, Decent enough photography.
The Bad: Exceptionally addy, Advertisements blend with articles, Light diction, "Fluffy" articles.
The Basics: In another magazine that assumes women are less substantive than they are, Ladies' Home Journal is mostly advertisements with a few softball articles and dieting tips.


It has been a while since I last reviewed a magazine, so I figured I was about due. For that, I picked up a copy of Ladies' Home Journal my wife had from the library. Women's magazines like Self (reviewed here!) and Lucky (reviewed here!) have fared poorly under my pen for the simple reason that they tend to insult the intelligence of women or are completely out of touch with reality - i.e. most women aren't spending thousands of dollars on purses these days. But Ladies' Home Journal has a reputation as a better women's magazine on the market and the issue I was perusing had a cover story I was actually interested in, so I thought I would approach it with as little bias as I could and try to enjoy it.

Alas, I did not enjoy it.

Despite its reputation as a magazine for substantial, educated women, Ladies' Home Journal insults its customer base by presenting a magazine that is so filled with advertisements that only the most clueless readers would not notice the lack of substance. Ladies' Home Journal truly is a magazine of advertisements with articles squeezed in. For the purposes of my review, I used the May 2011 issue of Ladies' Home Journal. I was pysched because it had a cover story on Lauren Graham, whom I recall from NewsRadio, but have enjoyed more recently on Gilmore Girls and Parenthood.

Issues of Ladies' Home Journal are 160 pages, not counting the covers which have plenty of printed information (or advertisements, anyway). What alarmed me right off the bat was that with 160 pages of magazine, I counted ninety-three full pages of ads, with another twenty pages having column or half-page advertisements. When 58% of your magazine is entirely advertisements, it's time to shut down or start giving your magazine away. With more than 60% of the magazine devoted to advertising to one of the most choice demographics in America, Ladies' Home Journal ought to be free. It is not.

So, what does one get in the forty-seven full, substantive pages (and twenty partial pages that remain for the "meat" of the magazine)? Ladies' Home Journal is broken down into five feature articles running between two and five pages each. The issue I reviewed included an article on actress Lauren Graham, wherein she responded to softball questions about life, family and acting. It gave her a chance to plug Parenthood and discuss in vague, general terms the state of the American family. Other feature articles explore the relationship between ignorance and poverty in rural America and the article skirts some of the more edgy issues, like the links between poverty and abuse and young teenage pregnancy. Instead, a surprisingly safe Kentucky family is featured as the challenges to their daughter's success are outlined. The other features are an article on sugary snacks (basic sixth grade Health class stuff), current style, and homemade gifts (which are admittedly cute).

Outside the changing features each month - though the magazine seems to get at least one female celebrity on its cover to focus on and provide an expose for - Ladies' Home Journal has regular columns on Style, Life, Home, Food and Health issues. The style articles are pretty blase and usually include one body and one fashion style topic. The month I read featured hair dying tips and Mexican retro clothing. Neither grabbed me in any way.

Arguably the most useful section of the magazine is the Life section. Ladies Home Journal explores the lifestyles and attitudes that might make living as a woman today easier or more fulfilling. While there are schmaltzy fluff pieces - like a feel-good feature on Bethany Hamilton (the one-armed surfer) and ways to be happy - the magazine has useful articles like how to search for a therapist and how to recognize serious issues in a marriage. There is also a "Dear Abby" type column where experts explore questions asked by readers.

The "Home" section is a catchall that seems to be part style and life (like an article on hair) and part life (articles on the family pet seem to end up here). The Food section is a practical guide to cooking easy, healthy and/or inexpensively. The Health section is very basic, generic advice for living a healthy life and understanding it, with articles on women and bone density, allergies and advice geared toward the needs of middle aged women.

Outside the sheer volume of advertisements, what struck me about Ladies' Home Journal was the was it didn't challenge any expectations. The diction is at the level that a fourth grade student could easily read the magazine. The photographs are lush and colorful and are of women who almost all possess a very standard appearance of the norm for beauty. Even the poverty-ridden Kentucky couple looks pretty close to the Hollywood ideal. The advertisements are exactly what those who speak out about the influence of media on body type rail against. The make-up, medicine and store ads all have thin, airbrushed women who look quite unlike the average woman who will buy this magazine.

In other words, like virtually every other women's magazine, Ladies' Home Journal sells an ideal and it is an unrealistic one that comes across as silly to those who are looking for substance in their publications.

For other magazines reviewed by me, please check out my take on:
Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine
Selecciones
Newsweek En Espanol


3/10

For other magazine reviews, please visit my index page on the subject by clicking here!

© 2011 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Back When It Was On The Air, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine Didn't Bite!

The Good: Good pictures, Interesting articles, Light on ads
The Bad: Lousy diction, Outdated stories, fluffy.
The Basics: With disappointingly simple diction considering the quality of the source material, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine is a relic from when the series was being made.


Back in the day, there was a little television show called Buffy The Vampire Slayer (reviewed here!) and fans wanted everything they could get of it, but the people who merchandise such things had no idea the magnitude of the show. As a result, fans of Joss Whedon and his various projects - Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, and various comic book endeavors - had very little to spend their money on to support their favorite series and they bought up all the same DVDs, toys, novels, trading cards and comic books that were on the market at the time. One of the few ways for Buffy The Vampire Slayer fans to spend their hard-earned money - or allowances - (other than on groceries or rent) was Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine.

Long-since last published, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine followed the on-set and on-screen exploits of everyone associated with Buffy The Vampire Slayer, the dramedy television series by Joss Whedon. For years, it provided fans with information on all that was going on with Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Angel, Firefly, and Joss Whedon's comic book endeavors. Since Angel was canceled, though, the magazine disbanded and now the only remnants of it are the back issues. Looking back at the magazine, it is hard to get excited about it.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine is the ideal magazine for fans who will cut it up and hang pictures from it on their walls, much like other publications based upon television shows. Outside the fan base, and now the reminiscing fan base, readers will find the magazine problematic in one form or another. Those who are only casual fans of the Buffy The Vampire Slayer franchise will find the articles too in-depth to comfortably enjoy and process, those who are die-hard fans will already know everything printed within these pages, especially considering how the magazine is no longer published and all of the information that was hinting at future developments is now well-past.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine, like many fan-oriented print publications, was another casualty of the Internet - even when it was originally published - and given how far behind the times print magazines are compared to the Internet, anything printed in Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine was already available to those who would want the information long before the magazine hit newsstands. Now, there is something ridiculous about going back to read the magazine as the musings within it are all commonly distributed on fansites around the Internet and allude to events in the Buffyverse that have been encapsulated onscreen for years now.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine is a glossy, sixty-five page magazine that was published every two months and bears a cover price of $6.99. It was packed with full-color pictures and includes as much information as can be squeezed in about the Buffy The Vampire Slayer franchise, the current gossip on the lives of those who participated in the television series', and fans gushing over the series.

The average issue of Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine has a cover story, usually focusing on one of the characters/actors from one of the Buffy The Vampire Slayer series. This feature is usually based around an interview with the celebrity wherein the interviewer asks softball questions that allows the celebrity to both gush about their experiences on whichever Buffy The Vampire Slayer series they appeared on as well as point fans toward their current works. So, for example, an interview with Anthony Stewart Head in Volume #5, Issue #5, included him enthusiastically recapping his experiences in the first six seasons of Buffy The Vampire Slayer, discussing the spin-off Ripper (which, sadly, never came to pass), and discussing his work on the BBC series Spooks. In addition to Anthony Stewart Head, the issue highlighted the forthcoming episode featuring Emma Caulfield; the celebrity interactions with the magazine sell the issues . . . or at least they did back in the day. Also interesting is that when an issue was particularly light on Angel information, the next issue was promised to be heavier in it, helping to keep readership up between the disparate fans of projects in the Buffyverse!

Despite the emphasis on Buffy The Vampire Slayer celebrities there were occasional a theme issue, like demons or vampires where Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine devotes its attentions to one race within the Buffy The Vampire Slayer universe. Still, looking back now, the information is seldom audacious or even especially interesting. It is written such that twelve year-olds can read the magazine and the low-level of diction only reinforces the idea that the show was overrated teen fare as opposed to a serious adult show (which it largely was). At least the magazine panders to the language of twelve year-old girls and not twelve year-old boys!

In addition to a primary feature on one actor or character, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine usually had a secondary feature on one of the behind-the-scenes personas who is able to leak information about the franchise to the magazine. Writer/director/creator Joss Whedon, for example, frequently made himself available for interviews wherein he revealed the state of his many projects. While the information was hot in its day, it was almost always trumped by the speed of the Internet and the Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine remained more the fodder of fans who wanted posters and photos for their walls.

Fortunately, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine knew its precise audience; each issue comes with a poster in the center. The 15 1/2" x 10 1/2" poster is essentially a centerfold that can be pulled out and hung on the wall of the fan who bought the magazine.

As well, there is usually a two to five page article on a secondary character or actor who appeared somewhere in the franchise, complete with full-color pictures. As well, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine tends to include several pages updating fans on birthdays for the celebrities from the franchise and projects the actors are currently involved in, like Sarah Michelle Gellar marrying Freddie Prinze Jr. By the time Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine hits the stands, all of this information is already widely available on the Internet. And now, some of it - like the presentations made by the cast and crew before the Museum Of Radio And Television - has ended up on the DVDs as bonus features where fans have the source material and do not need the Magazine-digested version.

In addition, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine usually highlights one aspect of production - direction, lighting design, scoring - from Buffy The Vampire Slayer or "Angel" and presents a feature on that. This information tends to be interesting, but so esoteric that casual fans or those flipping through the magazine will be totally turned off by it. And because there was so little merchandise for Buffy The Vampire Slayer, the magazine offers features on current video games, trading cards, and toys that were hitting the market at the time.

On the plus side, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine is very light on advertisements. The issue I counted out had eight pages of advertisements and two of them were for back-issues or subscriptions to the magazine itself! Rather oddly, because the merchandising for the show was so light, several of the advertisements were for publications related to other cult-following science fiction shows like The X-Files, Farscape or Stargate!

Finally, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine is packed with beautiful, glossy full-color photographs. The problem here is that many of them are simple promotional shots that are widely available elsewhere. Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine is hardly a wealth of great, heretofore unfound rare shots from the sets or obscure screen shots.

As a result, Buffy The Vampire Slayer Magazine is a bit of a tough sell, even to die-hard fans. But now that the information is not current, it truly is just for those who want pictures to hang on their dorm, apartment or parent's house-allotted room wall.

For other magazines reviewed by me, please check out my take on:
Selecciones
Newsweek En Espanol
Decision

3/10

For other magazine reviews, please be sure to visit my index page on the subject by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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I’m Not A Reader's Digest Fan, But Selecciones Can Be A Good Way To Learn/Remember Espanol!

The Good: Generally simple diction, Good translations, Generally light on ads
The Bad: Generally fluffy articles/interviews, Nothing original
The Basics: Very average and as biased as Reader’s Digest, Selecciones is nothing more than the monthly Reader’s Digest translated into Spanish.


I’ve never been a fan of Reader’s Digest (reviewed here!), so it might surprise some that my review of Selecciones, the Spanish-language translation of Reader’s Digest rates the magazine as highly as it does. The reason for this is simple. The non-threatening and generally literal translation style of Reader’s Digest for Selecciones makes it an ideal tool for those utilizing high school Spanish-language skills. That includes me as I have recently become seriously bothered by how much Spanish I have forgotten. I studied it for eight years and now, over a decade since using it daily, I have forgotten most of what I learned. So, I turned to magazines to try to help me remember.

That is when I came upon Selecciones. Selecciones is Reader’s Digest in Spanish. That is all. It has the exact same flaws and selling points as the English-language version of the magazine. The only difference between the two magazines is Selecciones is in Spanish and Reader’s Digest is in English. As well, some of the advertisements are swapped out as products, notably collectible products, are frequently only available in the United States. Outside that, Selecciones IS Reader’s Digest in every way.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, Reader’s Digest is a physically small 100 page magazine which reprints selections from other publications each month so readers can get what the magazine feels is the “best of” American printing. The rather inoffensive concept runs into technical problems for objectivity when one views the content of what Reader’s Digest reprints. Reader’s Digest, and by extension Selecciones reprints inoffensive, socially conservative articles which have an inflated sense of Americana and a narrow view of social mores and patriotism. Selecciones reprints these same reprinted articles, translated into Spanish.

What readers can expect in Selecciones then are stories that generally make the reader feel good and stories of triumph over adversity, reinforcing the antiquated and unrealistic notions that good triumphs over evil and trust in authority are good things. The jokes are inoffensive and are the style one might expect from a kindly grandparent and the interviews are loaded with softball questions. So, for example, a recent interview of Michael J. Fox allowed Fox to plug his new book, discuss how he was bravely fighting Parkinson’s disease. The interview neglects the real struggles of day to day living for Fox and it certainly does not explore the pain and suffering of a person without Fox’s resources goes through while struggling with Parkinson’s.

“Selecciones” is a good translation of Reader’s Digest, though. The magazine does not take liberties with content and those looking to use it as an educational tool will find that the articles mirror the English equivalent. As a result, having students translate Selecciones into English leaves them with a perfect key for their translation works with the English equivalent of the magazine. Selecciones does not include regional articles about Spain or Mexico (or any other Spanish-speaking countries). As a result, it is very much “America for the Spanish Reader”. . . at least as the folks at Reader’s Digest would like it to be.

Ultimately, though, I don’t recommend Selecciones because I don’t think it’s good journalism. I loathe biased writing and Selecciones, because it is simply Reader’s Digest in Spanish includes the same slant and very limited viewpoint. It is inoffensive enough for students and those studying (or trying to remember) Spanish to use as a tool to experience basic Spanish grammar and sentence structure, but beyond that, I have no use for it.

For other magazines reviewed by me, please check out my take on:
Newsweek En Espanol
Decision
The Progressive

5/10

For other magazine reviews, please be sure to visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2010 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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No Better In Spanish, Newsweek En Espanol Is The Same Lousy Magazine.

The Good: Nice pictures, Occasionally decent articles
The Bad: Not exactly hard-hitting investigative journalism, Biased, Expensive for what one gets, Mediocre
The Basics: As uninspired as the American English version, Newsweek En Espanol is a literal translation of the popular newsmagazine into modern Spanish.


Sometimes, life hands us gift-wrapped packages that we simply need to recognize for what they are. As a reviewer, I encounter a lot of different items, some of which I simply cannot review for one reason or another. But recently, I found myself in a doctor's office leafing through magazines and I encountered Newsweek En Espanol. Not only did I encounter Newsweek En Espanol, but I found the same old issue of the magazine I had used when reviewing the English version of Newsweek. This was fortuitous for two reasons: 1. It allowed me to do a side-by-side comparison between Newsweek and Newsweek En Espanol and 2. It allowed me to brush up on my Spanish, which I have not used in a decade since I fled a Level Four Spanish class in tears and ultimately gave up my attempt to get a double major B.A. in under three years.

The side-by-side comparison of the same issue of Newsweek and Newsweek En Espanol afforded me an important opportunity: the two magazines are identical, save in the language they are written in. Newsweek En Espanol is (as close as possible) a literal translation of Newsweek into Spanish. It is geared toward Spanish-speaking Americans and, presumably, Spanish-speaking individuals who are interested in an American take on news, culture and world events. What this means is that there are no sections catering to Hispanic or Latino culture in Newsweek En Espanol. All of the politics, celebrity gossip and information is following the exploits of those who interest mainstream America. So, for example, while a Latino or Hispanic-oriented Newsweek might keep tabs on famous Mexican soap stars or celebrities, Newsweek En Espanol reprints the same articles stalking Angelina Jolie in Spanish that were in the English version. As a result, Newsweek En Espanol has the exact same strengths and weaknesses as its American English counterpart.

Newsweek, and by extension Newsweek En Espanol, like many other corporately-owned, glossy magazines written with a vocabulary and diction an American fourth-grade student could read failed utterly to investigate the supposed evidence presented by the Bush Administration in its build-up to war in Iraq. As one of several standard-bearers, Newsweek reported Bush Administration allegations as facts and helped bolster public opinion for the war. And before one chimes in with "We were all swept up in post-9/11 frenzy and NO ONE questioned the Bush Administration allegations!" I'll cut that right down by pointing out that in the United States, several magazines (The Nation, The Progressive, The Washington Spectator), a handful of newspapers (I'm sure more if one counts college publications) and virtually every foreign press publication observed that the Bush Administration was selling the people of the U.S. on shaky evidence. And before one blames the American spies, it was U.S. spies that came forward to say that the Bush Administration was not being truthful BEFORE we became mired in the war.

The point of this, of course, is not to start a political debate, but rather to make the observation that Newsweek En Espanol is hardly an ambitious reporter of news or events. It is not the deepest publication, not the best-written and certainly not the one that exposes the truths of the world in order to prevent government from abusing its powers, which is supposedly what news organizations are supposed to do.

What Newsweek En Espanol is, because it is not ambitious, groundbreaking or controversial, is a collection of articles that summarizes the state of the world an average of a week after events happen. It is a glossy, ad-heavy, sixty-four page weekly magazine. The random issue I picked up to review (having read articles in most issues for the past year) had twenty-six pages of advertisements, not counting the inside front and back covers. Most of the ads were placed by pharmaceutical companies. It is also worth noting that that same issue (February 4, 2008 cover date) had no columns on health or pharmaceuticals outside a rather blase article on chemicals people commonly ingest.

In addition to being over 1/3 advertisement space, Newsweek En Espanol is a fairly well-organized magazine that offers reports on news, U.S. culture and political and business events. After a table of contents (complete with easy to understand pictures), the editor comments on articles within the magazine before Newsweek.com gets a page of press with notes on the hottest articles not in this week's magazine, but available on Newsweek.com. They highlight their bloggers and list the ten most popular articles on the site (ironically, three of the ten have a pharmaceutical bent, which suggests that Newsweek.com might be reporting stories that the print magazine's advertisers are not so keen on). Again, there were no specific stories unique to Newsweek.com highlighting issues for Spanish-speaking people.

What follows, then, are eight pages of news columns exploring foreign affairs, the state of terrorists and other nations (Israel was given about a column, in which the magazine reported there were problems with the new porous border between Egypt and the Gaza strip). There was a celebrity obituary (of Heath Ledger, written by Christopher Nolan) side by side with a column on a National Book Award winner's favorite book list and a monitoring of current political trends in primary season. Strangely, the meter on the various campaigns was combined with a snippet of highlights from the Outdoor Retailer trade show in Salt Lake City, so it is pretty easy to look at Newsweek En Espanol as an authority on both politics and culture that takes both seriously. After a column on religion, a guest columnist writing about trusting Evangelicals, there was a column on how the U.S. needs faster internet service and another on the mathematical organizations of elections.

After two pages of letters from readers and corrections to previous issues' errors, there is a single page of political cartoons and quotes and for a magazine from 2008, it seemed odd that both cartoons - which essentially had the same punchline - featured Bill Clinton. No, Newsweek En Espanol is not part of the alleged liberal media.

One of the two main features begins then with a full two page photograph and ten pages on politics. The issue, written at the start of primary season, focused several pages on Bill Clinton's effect on Hillary Clinton's campaign for president before exploring the Obama and Romney and (finally) Clinton camps. The article, like all of the others, is written simply, broken up by several photographs and explores how angry a man Bill Clinton can be. It is worth noting that by page 37 of Newsweek En Espanol in the last year of his administration there was not a mention of George W. Bush or any of his current initiatives. So much for a full view of politics!

The other feature (the cover story of the week) was an eight page expose on the economy. While the graphs manage to resist the literal definition of a recession, the magazine reports enough to prove their point, that America was headed for a recession. But the oddity is that in the same article, there is an expose on critics of the Federal Reserve being big business operators. Rather bafflingly, that article does not illustrate how the Fed, which the banks were criticizing, keep banks, money managers, etc. in line and regulated. Instead, the magazine repeats and emphasizes the claims of the money managers that the Fed is behind the times. The economic news is wrapped up with a fairly balanced perspective of the international effect of a U.S. recession on the world.

The two main articles are followed by two interviews, one of Hamid Karzai and another of Ehud Barak. Neither interview is especially revealing and, in fact, interviewer Lally Weymouth steers both interviews by making biased statements instead of asking questions at some points. Most of the questions are leading questions and lead to predictable answers that fit with the questioner's clear bias.

Following that is an opinion column on the war in Afghanistan, followed by a science article repeating information easily available for decades on chemicals that get into foods from our plastic storage containers. Culture is then explored in gushing tones that read like a tabloid. The issue I picked for review had a columnist drooling over the wholesomeness of the Jonas Brothers, another putting in their two cents on a highly criticized book, and a culture page that claimed fashions of the real people are now all the rage, but it was still reporting from SoHo in New York City. I'll believe the fashion world is honestly ready to adopt the common person as their image when they start doing photoshoots at the YMCA in Des Moines, Iowa.

The last pages offer commentary on food and drink, celebrities and the magazine closes with one of Anna Quindlen's wholesome feel-good columns that one supposes senior citizens and middle aged housewives clip and put up on their refrigerator to remind them of something (being neither I have no idea what that would be).

In all, Newsweek En Espanol is behind the times, biased and in no way exceptional. With the old phrase, "once you've had X, you can never go back . . ." if X are magazines that actually investigate and report the news, do not fill up space with advertisements and actually have wit and character to them, then I can never go back to Newsweek En Espanol. The magazine is self-censoring, including limiting some of its quotes for a family-friendly audience and if the magazine is truly intended for an adult audience, then it is falling severely flat.

I want current (the internet has it), I want insightful (The Nation has that) and I want direct (magazines without extensive ads have that). Newsweek En Espanol does not. It is biased, looks good, but lacks real substance and depth. And yes, it fell down with actual reporting during the Bush Administration. Some of us won't forget that.

Despite my issues with it, Spanish-speaking readers are likely to be disappointed by the lack of differentiation between the standard Newsweek and Newsweek En Espanol. The lack of any articles catering to the Spanish-speaking audience leaves little for that niche to get excited about.

For other magazines reviewed by me, please check out my take on:
Decision
The Progressive
Sunset


3.5/10

For other magazine reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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