Special Projects

‘Israel at 75’ conference hosts former prime ministers, incites protest

The “Israel at 75” conference hosted by the Baker Institute on April 27 explored the 75 years since Israel’s founding, including the relationship between Israel and the U.S. and the conflict between Israel and Palestine. The speakers included former Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority Salam Fayyad, former Prime Minister of Israel Ehud Barak and multiple current and former U.S. State Department officials.

Beware of dissenters, reinvestigate the real Israel

Israel is a special place and arguably the most misunderstood in the world. We will be celebrating Israel’s 75th birthday at Rice, commemorating the occasion with a conference hosted by the Baker Institute on April 27, 2023. It is important to understand that the Jewish connection to the land of Israel goes back thousands of years. Jews were always in this land before Israel was created. As I prepare to graduate, having founded a Students Supporting Israel chapter at Rice, I want students to be informed about Israel and Palestine. There are many people who spew misinformation and will not want to listen to facts because of the false narrative they love to believe.

Review: ‘Suzume’ is a thrilling, endearing, and at times dark ode to Japan

Makoto Shinkai clearly has a specialty — the “Your Name” and “Weathering With You” director is often said to make the same movie over and over again. It’s true that the three most recent entries in his filmography have all been fantastical, coming-of-age melodramas centered around some sort of ecological disaster, but  there’s nothing wrong with that. Audiences know what they’re getting with a Shinkai film: gorgeously-rendered anime vistas, strong female leads and an emotionally-charged storyline guaranteed to make viewers feel something. While it doesn’t reach the poignancy of “Your Name,” Shinkai’s newest film “Suzume” is one of the highlights in his œuvre.

Review: IVE embraces confidence on 'I’ve IVE’

After an incredibly successful debut year in 2022, IVE released their debut album “I’ve IVE” to the excitement of fans around the world. Last year, IVE put out two single albums, which are shorter, two to three track projects within K-pop. The sampling of Gloria Gaynor’s classic track “I Will Survive” in “After LIKE” and the moodier sound of “LOVE DIVE” show two distinct sides of the group that are expanded upon in their debut full-length release.

Review: Nicolas Cage as Dracula is a national treasure

“Renfield” is a 2023 comedy-horror film centering Nicolas Cage as Dracula and Nicolas Hoult as Renfield, Dracula’s loyal assistant. My comments on this movie should be prefaced by an acknowledgment of my bias; I absolutely adore Nicolas Cage as an actor. I could watch Mr. Cage do nothing but down an entire Subway Italian without him uttering a word and I would be absolutely enthralled, clinging to the edge of my seat. The subtle facial expressions, the charming yet hungry eyes, and the absolute Adonis of a body that Nicolas Cage possesses could make any film connoisseur faint at just a glimpse. Even taking into consideration my love for Cage’s acting in both his amazing and amazingly terrible works, “Renfield” is another absolute banger of a movie on nearly every level.

Schedule your Houston summer with these activities

In Houston for the summer? The Thresher has you covered.

Ink these tattoo and piercing shops into your calendar

As the weather heats up and requires more tank tops to be worn and long hair to be thrown into ponytails, you might be realizing that more people have tattoos and piercings than you first thought. Whether this has now made you want your first ear piercing or third tattoo, the vital first step is figuring out where to get it done. Now that I have a few ear piercings my dad probably doesn’t like and a fresh new tattoo, I feel almost obligated to give you this list of shops to get your own body modifications done in Houston, if only so you can be as cool as me. 

Wiess Tabletop stages tragicomedy ‘Fun Home’

Wiess Tabletop Theatre’s spring production, “Fun Home,” will run April 21 through 23 at 8 p.m. in Wiess College commons. The Broadway show is a Tony award-winning production based on Alison Bechdel’s graphic novel “Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic.” It was the first show on Broadway to feature a lesbian protagonist, Alison Bechdel, played by three different actors at three different ages.

Senior Spotlight: Cindy Sheng explores new experiences by design

Cindy Sheng’s biggest passion is for design, whether it’s creating a campus-wide organization, building ways to form connections with new people or her aspirations to develop products through user interface and user experience design avenues.

04-19-2023 Crossword Solutions

04-19-2023 Crossword: "Cross Pollinated"

Reassessing 2003: What Rice’s only national championship means 20 years later

Twenty years ago this June, Rice won its only national title in a team sport, the 2003 College Baseball World Series. In the 14 years that followed, the Owls made the NCAA regionals every season. But the six years since have seen the reign of long-time head coach Wayne Graham draw to a close and the short-lived tenure of his successor, Matt Bragga, come and go, as the Owls failed to qualify for even the conference tournament in Bragga’s final year.

Farewell to C-USA, the conference that was never supposed to last this long

There’s a trophy in the Rice baseball offices. It’s from 2006, the Owls’ first season in Conference USA. On the front, it reads “C-USA 2006 Baseball Tournament Champions.” On either side are the logos of nine schools.

04-19-2023 Sports Cartoon: "Owl-American"

Women’s tennis sweeps on Senior Day, men’s falls to SMU

Both Rice tennis teams held their annual Senior Days this weekend. On Saturday, the men’s team took a 4-2 loss at home against Southern Methodist University, putting their season record at 12-9. The following day, the women’s team swept Prairie View A&M University, to move to 11-8.

Mckyla Van der Westhuizen’s last name is long, her philosophy isn’t

There are 280 McDonald’s stores in Africa. 230 of them are in South Africa, according to freshman javelin thrower Mckyla Van der Westhuizen.

MBB’s Reed Myers: I hope to be an example for future Asian-American hoopers

The road to being a Division I basketball player is hard. It is even harder when you are an Asian-American. According to the most recent data from the 2019-2020 NCAA basketball season, players of Asian descent make up 0.4% of Division I Men’s basketball players. But growing up, that number never even came into my mind for a second. I just wanted to hoop. 

‘The only catharsis that comes to mind’: Students open up about suicide

“The way that people view suicidal ideation is very interesting to me,” Gargi Samarth, a Brown College senior, said. “You tend to see the person who is dealing with them as less of a person, [like] they’re not as capable of understanding themselves, being self aware or as possessing rationality.”

Ranking Rice publics, best to worst

While I maintain that the best party a Rice student can attend are University of Houston parties, some of this year’s publics have been bearable — enjoyable, even. A few might even be worth their ticket resale price on the Rice Clothing Resale GroupMe.

‘We’re still working’: The future of inter-college events

Rice’s residential college system is a cornerstone of the university’s culture, frequently touted for its ability to foster a sense of community for students. With 11 different colleges boasting unique structures, traditions and inhabitants, many students find it easy to connect with others within their college. However, while these dynamics produce tight-knit support systems and friend groups, some might find it challenging to broaden their relationships across colleges, and sometimes lack organized opportunities to develop them.