Patrick Fiorilli
@patfio.bsky.social
writer, critic, & theorist; games & literature; bylines in the LA Review of Books, Gamers with Glasses, Bright Wall/Dark Room; lecturer in media arts & design at the University of Chicago; he/him; read my newsletter, "Critical Theorycraft," at www.patf.io
Pinned
Master & Apprentice: The Failed Mentors of George Lucas’ Star Wars Saga
In Lucas' Star Wars saga, it’s not the teacher’s wisdom, but his failure, that drives the protagonist to his destiny.
www.brightwalldarkroom.com
Beyond excited to contribute to Bright Wall/Dark Room @bwdr.bsky.social, and about Star Wars no less! A series whose heroic figures and iconic proverbs belie a simmering melodrama of teachers failing their students and students failing their teachers.
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
Shout out to Luis Aparicio -- real V.-heads know!
November 10, 2025 at 5:57 PM
Shout out to Luis Aparicio -- real V.-heads know!
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
A new episode of Pynchon Pals has arrived! 04: In which appear a bodacious cowboy, a Babylon sister, and several gentleman losers (V. Ch. 7) Listen now: redcircle.com/shows/3c4720...
November 5, 2025 at 3:20 PM
A new episode of Pynchon Pals has arrived! 04: In which appear a bodacious cowboy, a Babylon sister, and several gentleman losers (V. Ch. 7) Listen now: redcircle.com/shows/3c4720...
Pynchonesque Halloween ft. player-two palette-swapped Bob Ferguson and an alligator from V. -- listen to our podcast! pynchonpals.com @pynchonpals.bsky.social
October 31, 2025 at 3:30 PM
Pynchonesque Halloween ft. player-two palette-swapped Bob Ferguson and an alligator from V. -- listen to our podcast! pynchonpals.com @pynchonpals.bsky.social
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
In which an elderly puggle, quick change artist, does an impersonation of an alligator 🎃💀🐊 Happy Halloween!
October 31, 2025 at 3:05 PM
In which an elderly puggle, quick change artist, does an impersonation of an alligator 🎃💀🐊 Happy Halloween!
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
It's live! Listen to Pynchon Pals Episode 03: In which Andrew uncovers a conspiracy and North Carolina is mentioned (V. Chs. 5-6). redcircle.com/shows/3c4720...
October 22, 2025 at 6:30 PM
It's live! Listen to Pynchon Pals Episode 03: In which Andrew uncovers a conspiracy and North Carolina is mentioned (V. Chs. 5-6). redcircle.com/shows/3c4720...
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
“As far back as American Graffiti, George Lucas has posed the conundrum of teachers who fail their students. With Star Wars, he complicates the issue, considering students who fail their teachers, who fail their students, who grow into teachers whose students fail them and whom they likewise fail.”
Master & Apprentice: The Failed Mentors of George Lucas’ Star Wars Saga
In Lucas' Star Wars saga, it’s not the teacher’s wisdom, but his failure, that drives the protagonist to his destiny.
www.brightwalldarkroom.com
October 17, 2025 at 6:06 AM
“As far back as American Graffiti, George Lucas has posed the conundrum of teachers who fail their students. With Star Wars, he complicates the issue, considering students who fail their teachers, who fail their students, who grow into teachers whose students fail them and whom they likewise fail.”
Beyond excited to contribute to Bright Wall/Dark Room @bwdr.bsky.social, and about Star Wars no less! A series whose heroic figures and iconic proverbs belie a simmering melodrama of teachers failing their students and students failing their teachers.
Master & Apprentice: The Failed Mentors of George Lucas’ Star Wars Saga
In Lucas' Star Wars saga, it’s not the teacher’s wisdom, but his failure, that drives the protagonist to his destiny.
www.brightwalldarkroom.com
October 14, 2025 at 7:25 PM
Beyond excited to contribute to Bright Wall/Dark Room @bwdr.bsky.social, and about Star Wars no less! A series whose heroic figures and iconic proverbs belie a simmering melodrama of teachers failing their students and students failing their teachers.
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
New on the site!
Master and Apprentice: The Failed Mentors of George Lucas’ STAR WARS Saga - @patfio.bsky.social
Master and Apprentice: The Failed Mentors of George Lucas’ STAR WARS Saga - @patfio.bsky.social
Master & Apprentice: The Failed Mentors of George Lucas’ Star Wars Saga
In Lucas' Star Wars saga, it’s not the teacher’s wisdom, but his failure, that drives the protagonist to his destiny.
www.brightwalldarkroom.com
October 14, 2025 at 7:06 PM
New on the site!
Master and Apprentice: The Failed Mentors of George Lucas’ STAR WARS Saga - @patfio.bsky.social
Master and Apprentice: The Failed Mentors of George Lucas’ STAR WARS Saga - @patfio.bsky.social
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
Episode 02: In which the Pynchon Pals never resolve how to pronounce “Porpentine” (V. Chs. 3-4) is now live! Pic related. pynchonpals.com
October 8, 2025 at 12:34 PM
Episode 02: In which the Pynchon Pals never resolve how to pronounce “Porpentine” (V. Chs. 3-4) is now live! Pic related. pynchonpals.com
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
Alright, let's do it. Here's a little prospective reader's guide to every Thomas Pynchon novel. We'll take them in order of publication. This might be a long thread. Buckle up! 1/x
October 6, 2025 at 2:55 AM
Alright, let's do it. Here's a little prospective reader's guide to every Thomas Pynchon novel. We'll take them in order of publication. This might be a long thread. Buckle up! 1/x
New newsletter! In a very Pynchonesque way, Paul Thomas Anderson's One Battle After Another really is a Looney Tunes riff, featuring Sean Penn as a kind of ethnonationalist Wile E. Coyote confounded by a cadre of revolutionary Road Runners. Read more: www.patf.io/pynchon-pals...
Pynchon Pals Podcast Producer Patrick Perceives Parallel Pursuits Populating PTA's Picture
We started a podcast about reading Thomas Pynchon. I also saw One Battle After Another. Thoughts ahead!
Pynchon Pals—available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Podbean, and wherever else...
www.patf.io
October 2, 2025 at 4:07 PM
New newsletter! In a very Pynchonesque way, Paul Thomas Anderson's One Battle After Another really is a Looney Tunes riff, featuring Sean Penn as a kind of ethnonationalist Wile E. Coyote confounded by a cadre of revolutionary Road Runners. Read more: www.patf.io/pynchon-pals...
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
Check out this week's edition for a GwG triple play, feat. @srtrzinski.bsky.social, @mayorhere.bsky.social, and @patfio.bsky.social!
This week: 21 articles on culture movements, maps, difficulty, dungeon crawlers, and much more. No Freddi Fish articles this week, sorry:
critical-distance.com/2025/09/28/s...
critical-distance.com/2025/09/28/s...
September 28th
Welcome back readers. We’re two for two on this recent streak of on-time Sunday updates. I’m hoping to keep this up as I adapt my schedule to accommodate a couple of new work commitment…
critical-distance.com
September 30, 2025 at 2:03 AM
Check out this week's edition for a GwG triple play, feat. @srtrzinski.bsky.social, @mayorhere.bsky.social, and @patfio.bsky.social!
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
The first Blippo+ review to mention Marshall McLuhan *and* Emergency Broadcast Network!
We've got it all, they've got it all, on BLIPPO+. See what YACHT, @telefantasytv.bsky.social, @panic.com, and more have been up to just a ways away in spacetime. New contributor @patfio.bsky.social has the review!
BLIPPO+ Asks If You Want to Get Bent — Gamers with Glasses
It’s time to tune in, turn on, and.. blipp out? Patrick Fiorilli explores the channels of BLIPPO+ and its blend of the televisual and interactive. It’s hypermediated, unabashedly queer, and remediates...
www.gamerswithglasses.com
September 27, 2025 at 8:56 PM
The first Blippo+ review to mention Marshall McLuhan *and* Emergency Broadcast Network!
New writing! Jazzed to contribute to @gamerswithglasses.bsky.social about such a cool project.
We've got it all, they've got it all, on BLIPPO+. See what YACHT, @telefantasytv.bsky.social, @panic.com, and more have been up to just a ways away in spacetime. New contributor @patfio.bsky.social has the review!
BLIPPO+ Asks If You Want to Get Bent — Gamers with Glasses
It’s time to tune in, turn on, and.. blipp out? Patrick Fiorilli explores the channels of BLIPPO+ and its blend of the televisual and interactive. It’s hypermediated, unabashedly queer, and remediates...
www.gamerswithglasses.com
September 27, 2025 at 8:49 PM
New writing! Jazzed to contribute to @gamerswithglasses.bsky.social about such a cool project.
One Battle After Another! Shadow Ticket! It's Pynchon Season, and we've got a brand new read-along podcast to help you plot the paranoia for the first time, or all over again, starting where it all began with V.!
Give Pynchon Pals a listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, or elsewhere!
Give Pynchon Pals a listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, or elsewhere!
Pynchon Pals
Listen to Pynchon Pals on RedCircle
redcircle.com
September 24, 2025 at 3:31 PM
One Battle After Another! Shadow Ticket! It's Pynchon Season, and we've got a brand new read-along podcast to help you plot the paranoia for the first time, or all over again, starting where it all began with V.!
Give Pynchon Pals a listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, or elsewhere!
Give Pynchon Pals a listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, or elsewhere!
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
Pynchon Pals is live!
Seeing One Battle After Another? Pre-ordered Shadow Ticket? Had Gravity's Rainbow on your shelf for a decade? Or just a longtime fan looking to revisit your favorites? Read V. with us!
In this inaugural episode, we meet the Whole Sick Crew, who would have a podcast in 2025.
Seeing One Battle After Another? Pre-ordered Shadow Ticket? Had Gravity's Rainbow on your shelf for a decade? Or just a longtime fan looking to revisit your favorites? Read V. with us!
In this inaugural episode, we meet the Whole Sick Crew, who would have a podcast in 2025.
Pynchon Pals
Listen to Pynchon Pals on RedCircle
redcircle.com
September 24, 2025 at 12:43 PM
Pynchon Pals is live!
Seeing One Battle After Another? Pre-ordered Shadow Ticket? Had Gravity's Rainbow on your shelf for a decade? Or just a longtime fan looking to revisit your favorites? Read V. with us!
In this inaugural episode, we meet the Whole Sick Crew, who would have a podcast in 2025.
Seeing One Battle After Another? Pre-ordered Shadow Ticket? Had Gravity's Rainbow on your shelf for a decade? Or just a longtime fan looking to revisit your favorites? Read V. with us!
In this inaugural episode, we meet the Whole Sick Crew, who would have a podcast in 2025.
New post: I played the demo for Erenshor -- the single-player MMO --recorded it, and wrote about it!
Impressions: ERENSHOR (Burgee Media, 2025, Early Access, Demo)
Playing video games in front of a camera and then writing about it? Why, that's almost as novel as a single-player MMO!
I log in to Erenshor with a username and password that don't actually exist. I ...
www.patf.io
September 18, 2025 at 2:05 PM
New post: I played the demo for Erenshor -- the single-player MMO --recorded it, and wrote about it!
New post about Red Rooms and We're All Going to the World's Fair. Two movies about the abyss of the Internet and, oddly enough, the balding weirdo on the other side of the screen. www.patf.io/into-the-scr...
September 3, 2025 at 2:22 PM
New post about Red Rooms and We're All Going to the World's Fair. Two movies about the abyss of the Internet and, oddly enough, the balding weirdo on the other side of the screen. www.patf.io/into-the-scr...
New newsletter up today about my recent one-page outlaw country RPG, THE HIGHWAYMEN, and the 16 year old World of Warcraft machinima music video that ultimately inspired it.
Introducing, The Highwaymen
Did you know that metrics show that Tuesdays and Thursdays are the optimal days to release a newsletter? What a fool I was to publish the first one on a Saturday! At least we're all on the same page n...
www.patf.io
August 19, 2025 at 7:31 PM
New newsletter up today about my recent one-page outlaw country RPG, THE HIGHWAYMEN, and the 16 year old World of Warcraft machinima music video that ultimately inspired it.
Inspired by the absolute banger and winner of the 1985 Grammy for Best Country Song that is "Highwayman" by The Highwaymen, I finally put together an idea I've been kicking around for years as my submission for the One-Page RPG Jam! Give it a look, or better, a play with some friends.
The Highwaymen by Patrick Fiorilli
An Outlaw country Role-Playing Game for a Dealer, a deck of 52 cards, and 1-4 Players by Patrick Fiorilli.
patfio.itch.io
August 17, 2025 at 9:35 PM
Inspired by the absolute banger and winner of the 1985 Grammy for Best Country Song that is "Highwayman" by The Highwaymen, I finally put together an idea I've been kicking around for years as my submission for the One-Page RPG Jam! Give it a look, or better, a play with some friends.
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
I started a newsletter! It's called "Critical Theorycraft," and I'll be writing broadly about games, literature, and media every two weeks or so. The first post is up today, and it's about how cool it was to play Nintendo 64 in a hotel room. Toss me your email and you shall be rewarded with posts!
Playing (With) Video Games
According to a famous anecdote about the origins of Super Mario 64—that is, about the origins of 3D platforming—before designing any levels, enemies, or objectives, the game's designers began with mov...
www.patf.io
August 2, 2025 at 3:03 PM
I started a newsletter! It's called "Critical Theorycraft," and I'll be writing broadly about games, literature, and media every two weeks or so. The first post is up today, and it's about how cool it was to play Nintendo 64 in a hotel room. Toss me your email and you shall be rewarded with posts!
Jorge Luis Borges: In my book I invented Pierre Menard, author of the Quixote as a cautionary tale
Tech Company: At long last, we have created Pierre Menard, author of the Quixote
Tech Company: At long last, we have created Pierre Menard, author of the Quixote
So can most fanfiction writers and no one's giving them a billion dollars an hour
Study: Meta AI model can reproduce almost half of Harry Potter book
The research could have big implications for generative AI copyright lawsuits.
arstechnica.com
June 21, 2025 at 1:20 AM
Jorge Luis Borges: In my book I invented Pierre Menard, author of the Quixote as a cautionary tale
Tech Company: At long last, we have created Pierre Menard, author of the Quixote
Tech Company: At long last, we have created Pierre Menard, author of the Quixote
Reposted by Patrick Fiorilli
Excited for my student Richard Zhang to present our paper “Beyond Content: Leaning on the Poetics of Defamiliarization in Design Fictions” this week at GROUP 2025.
dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1...
dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1...
Beyond Content: Leaning on the Poetics of Defamiliarization in Design Fictions | Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction
Literary approaches to design fictions, though previously theorized to be diverse
in form and content, often fall within narrow stylistic and content boundaries such
as speculative abstracts, memos, a...
dl.acm.org
January 13, 2025 at 1:03 AM
Excited for my student Richard Zhang to present our paper “Beyond Content: Leaning on the Poetics of Defamiliarization in Design Fictions” this week at GROUP 2025.
dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1...
dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1...
