Peregrine Lake – A Weekly Webcomic Written by Trae Dorn and Drawn by Ethan Flanagan

This has been a strange week for a lot of reasons, but one of those reasons is deeply ironic. If you recall I wrote a whole blog entry about how I don’t care about having a large audience — instead preferring a smaller, intentional one. In that post I mentioned how I had a decent TikTok following, and how it was probably the least fulfilling part of my online presence.

Don’t get me wrong, I like using TikTok and posting to that platform, and I wouldn’t use it at all if I didn’t. Like, there’s a reason my Instagram is an abandoned mess, and my Facebook pages are largely automated. I just choose not to prioritize the pursuit of an audience there, y’know?

Well, that audience just got me a movie screener.

Like, literally the same day I wrote that post I got an email from a PR company offering me an advanced screener for the upcoming Bryan Fuller directed Dust Bunny. Why did I get this offer? My modest TikTok following, that’s why.

Now, normally I would have ignored that. I’m used to getting review requests I ignore, it’s just usually from some publisher of esoteric books trying to get me to review their author’s work on BS-Free Witchcraft. But, y’see, Crysta apparently had been following the production of this movie for quite a while, and my saying yes let us watch it weeks before it would hit theaters.

So I said yes.

I mean, I was just agreeing to review the movie, so what did I have to lose? I was going to see this thing eventually anyway. So on Saturday we watched it, I recorded my review Sunday night, and on Monday I posted it to TikTok.

Now here’s the thing, I don’t think this video is going to do that well for me. TikTok tends to hate any video I make that isn’t Witchcraft related or related to very specific BookTok drama. The algorithm driven engine behind that site doesn’t show my videos to the audiences that might want to see this review. It’s the whole reason I pitch my Internet Cockroach Theory to begin with. There’s a real chance I never get sent another opportunity like this again because, honestly, I don’t know if anyone’s going to really see this thing.

So, uh, maybe go watch this and share it if you want me to have future chances to see free movies ahead of time. 😆

It’s funny, offers like this never really came when I used to regularly review movies for Nerd & Tie. Now that I’ve seemingly stepped out of pop culture commentary though, stuff just seems to come in on its own. Life is weird, and who knows what’s going to happen next.

I certainly don’t.

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