Valerie Ettenhofer
School
Saint Mary's College Of California
Expertise
The Last Of Us, Stranger Things, Streaming TV Shows
- A major "Avatar: The Last Airbender" fan since 2005, Valerie has previously ranked every episode of the series and even has a tattoo of the four element symbols.
- Valerie wrote an essay about the Nicolas Cage drama "Pig" – her favorite movie of 2021 – that appears in the 2023 Simon & Schuster anthology "Sad Happens."
- Valerie has previously served on the Critics Choice Awards TV comedy nominating committee, where she was thrilled to help highlight breakout performances from great shows like "Reservation Dogs" and "Abbott Elementary."
Experience
Valerie has been working professionally as an entertainment journalist since 2012, when she began freelance writing for her local college newspaper and quickly rose through the ranks to become editor-in-chief. After college, Valerie interned at the historic Roxie Theater in San Francisco, writing copy for their website and falling even more in love with film in the process. Since then, her work has appeared in print in the East Bay Express, as well as on websites like The Playlist, IGN, Dread Central, IndieReader, Movie Mezzanine, and more. Valerie is a voting member of the Critics Choice Association's TV and Documentary branches and the LGBTQ+ critics' circle, GALECA. For several years, she served as the head TV critic at Film School Rejects. She also publishes a weekly pop culture newsletter titled "Hey, What Are You Watching?"
Education
Valerie graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor's degree from Saint Mary's College of California, where she studied English. Her film-heavy education allowed her to study special topics in pop culture, including independent film and the works of Alfred Hitchcock.
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Stories By Valerie Ettenhofer
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A new episode of the animated series Star Trek: Lower Decks brings back an obscure alien race first seen on Star Trek: The Next Generation.
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An Eddie Murphy comedy that Eddie Murphy would probably prefer for everyone to forget is dominating the streaming charts on Prime Video.
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Yellowstone made its long-awaited return without Kevin Costner this week. Judging by the initial numbers, it's still a ratings monster.
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Denzel Washington may yet join the Marvel Cinematic Universe with a role in Black Panther 3, at least according to the Oscar-winner himself.
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The Twilight Zone has its share of stinkers, but there's one particular episode that IMDb users have rated lower than any other (and for good reason).
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William Wyler's Best Picture winner The Best Years of Our Lives remains the only case of an actor winning two Oscars for the same performance.
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Having embodied Teal'c for 10 years on Stargate SG-1, Christopher Judge has some good advice for a potential reboot of the series.
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What the heck did The Big Bang Theory do to get itself temporarily banned in China? The answer is more complicated than you might expect.
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Agatha All Along doesn't reveal the identity of Agatha's son Nicholas Scratch's father, but a popular fan theory seems to hold the answer.
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Before Henry Cavill's career really took off, he starred in a movie that remains his lowest-rated work on Rotten Tomatoes to this day.
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The Tom Holland-led Uncharted is just about the last movie you'd expect to be controversial, yet it still got itself banned in multiple countries.
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Star Trek: Lower Decks season 5 has finally pulled back the curtain on Dr. Migleemo's species, and the details are as zany as you'd predict.
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Bryan Cranston is making his way up Netflix's top charts thanks to a crime thriller that many people have probably never even heard of.
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Of all the Stephen King TV shows on Rotten Tomatoes, this 2020 series was the highest rated. But all that critical acclaim couldn't secure it a second season.
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The Western series Gunsmoke was on TV for 20 years - and then it suddenly got canceled without warning. Here's what happened.
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The Big Bang Theory risked breaking the universe by casting Mayim Bialik after the show had previously referenced the actress's other major TV role.
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It's a bit of a fool's errand to try to rank the top 10 episodes of the spectacular anthology series Alfred Hitchcock Presents, but we've done it anyway.
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Helen Hunt almost seemed to vanish from Hollywood after her heyday as an actor in the '90s, but that's not what actually happened.
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Yellowstone is a soapy Western drama by design, but just how accurate is it? Here's what several real-life ranchers and farmers have said.
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Only one Dick Van Dyke film has a perfect Rotten Tomatoes score and it's a movie that finds the comedic legend in uncharted territory.
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A new direct-to-streaming murder mystery movie starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt & Shailene Woodley got bad reviews, but it's a hit on Prime Video.
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Ian McKellen has been acting for half a century, and according to Rotten Tomatoes, he's appeared in two 'perfect' movies.
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There have been many rumors about Matthew McConaughey's involvement in the Yellowstone universe, but here's what we know for sure.
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A never-made Star Trek movie had the potential to change the entire franchise as we know it today. Here's what we know about the canceled project.
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Sydney Sweeney is playing real-life boxer Christy Martin in an upcoming film, with photos from the set teasing her dramatic transformation.
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James Gunn has revealed the first look at the Man of Steel's dog Krypto in his Superman movie, along with the heartwarming story behind the character.
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A large chunk of the Star Trek movies are no longer available to stream on Paramount+. Here's where you can find them instead.