Here I write about books, cinema, data science and analytics, Korean Pop, and various other oddities. I also write updates here about the status of my research and the courses I teach. Every now and again I also write technical articles about data science / software development at Medium.com.
What would be so bad about being erased: an unusually early review of Obsession (2026)
Topping my rolling list of ongoing obsessions recently is the indie-turned-blockbuster smash hit horror movie Obsession (2026), which I saw over the weekend with my wife. Neither of us are big on the horror genre, but the movie in particular had two strong points working for it that really piqued our interest. First, there’s the…
Cementing the Metanarrative: A Retrospective on the Eraserheads and Combo on the Run
There has been considerable online buzz surrounding the 2025 documentary Combo on the Run, framed as a deconstructionist retrospective on the mythic rise, fall, and long-lasting cultural impact of the Filipino alt-rock band Eraserheads (referred to endearingly by fans as the E-Heads, or simply the Heads). This renewed interest coincides with the documentary finally hitting…
READING: Jennifer Atkins’s Claustrophobic Debut and the Jealousy of Artistic Ambition
There is a specific, quiet thrill that comes with picking up a debut novel. You open the first page completely untethered from an author’s past baggage or established tropes, ready to be taken in by whatever voice they’ve chosen to introduce themselves to the world. It’s a feeling not unlike the stillness of a concert…
Tokyo, Again
I had to go back to Tokyo a propos of an all-hands meeting that my company was holding there. Not one to say no to a paid getaway (even though I would be working through the weekdays), I immediately booked my Shinkansen tickets and my favorite hotel in Shinjuku, with my wife in tow, for…
READING: Ned Beauman’s Frenetic and Prescient Take on our Tech Dystopia
It has been ages since I was this excited over a book. Don’t get me wrong – I’m always excited about books. It’s why my collection has grown to over 400 scattered across our house in Bulacan and our present residence here in Nara. But to be this excited, nearly skipping meals, even foregoing my…
READING: Mieko Kawakami’s silent contemplation of shared terror
Mieko Kawakami’s 2009 novel, Heaven, sometimes reads like a shelved treatment for the Saw franchise: one in which Jigsaw is a bully at a Japanese middle school. Its taut, unassuming prose makes descriptions of adolescent violence hard to stomach when it really gets going, but stomach it you will, because interweaved with its brutality is…
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Dominic Dayta 