An asteroid impact in the worst case scenario is a terrifying thing. It seems very uncontrollable: in popular culture, it's often a metaphor for human powerlessness over the world.

Popular culture is simply a reflection of what the majority seems to want.

In their heyday, comics were a dominant force in popular culture, but that's over.

I'm interested in youth culture and popular culture.

They were unironic enthusiasts for all the mass pleasures the culture offered: television, NASCAR, cruises, Disney World, sports, celebrity gossip, and local politics. Szabo often wished that he could be as well adjusted as Melinda's family, but he would have had to be medicated to pursue her list of pleasures.

Popular culture has become engorged, broadening and thickening until it's the only culture anyone notices.