John C. McGinley, an actor well-known for his role on Scrubs as Dr. Perry Cox, had no idea what it meant to love and to have the capacity to love until his son, Max, taught him what love is.
McGinley was expecting to have the idyllic “Norman Rockwell” moment when he was becoming a new father, going home with a healthy newborn baby.
However, once he received the diagnosis that Max has Down Syndrome, the hospital told him that he had the option to give Max up for adoption or have him placed in an institution. Max struggled to stay alive in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) for about a month with sleep apnea and seizures, which are some of the common issues that people that are diagnosed experience. “I had no idea what Down Syndrome meant when I got the diagnosis,” McGinley said, who came from a typical family of five children in New York.
Communication was the most challenging issue that he faced with Max when he was a young nonverbal child. Autism, intellectual disabilities, sleep apnea, congenital heart disease, and Alzheimer’s Disease can be seen in people who have been diagnosed.
“Max communicated with me by using gestures,” he said. ” Max attended school from K-12 with Santa Monica Unified School District, mainstreamed into classes with regular students. He had his own assistant to help him keep up with his classwork at school,” McGinley said. Additionally, McGinley paired Max with a typical buddy through BEST BUDDIES so that he would go out to places with someone at a regular basis that is age-appropriate rather than being without friends
McGinley turned to large organizations such as the Special Olympics and other organizations that serve the needs of people who have Down Syndrome for support to help him raise Max. He met Tim Shriver, the CEO of the Special Olympics, who has children with special needs. They both became longtime friends when McGinley became an advocate for
the Special Olympics 19 years ago.
McGinley helps to raise funding for the organization by meeting with people in Washington, D.C. such as Sen. Jack Reed from Rhode Island; Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives; and Timothy Shriver, disability rights activist and CEO/chairman of the Special Olympics.
“When the (Special Olympics) athletes met with members in Congress who handle the federal funding for this organization, I could tell that the Congress felt inspired by what they saw in those athletes,” McGinley said. For example, Congresswoman Pelosi was interested to know the goals and needs of the Special Olympics. “The Special Olympics allows athletes with intellectual disabilities to be in an environment for (positive) growth and empowerment,” McGinley said.
McGinley wants to make the world a better place for people who have intellectual disabilities by joining nationwide campaigns such as “Spread the Word to End the Word” and “Pledge Inclusion” with the Special Olympics. Max has a strong impact on how McGinley feels about people who have intellectual disabilities. He wants to eradicate the “R” (retarded) word because it can make people with intellectual disabilities feel less valued as human beings. “These innocent people with intellectual disabilities cannot defend themselves against such derogatory terms and do not deserve to be picked on,” he noted.
The challenges raising Max brought more depth to his role as Dr. Perry Cox by giving the character a big heart with a sense of compassion towards others. McGinley wants to educate others to show compassion towards other people with intellectual disabilities and interact with them with compassion and love, not by ignorance. There are millions of children and adults with intellectual disabilities who need to be understood, not ignored, McGinley said.
He also wants to focus on Max’s abilities, not disabilities. Max, now 21, has been working at Starbucks and is playing guitar in a band with Spectrum Laboratory, a Los Angeles based organization that allows individuals with autism spectrum and other developmental disabilities practice their art through film, music, and animation—founded by Jason Weissbrod and Garth Herberg.
“Max also helps take care of his two younger sisters”, McGinley said. He always makes sure that Max is included in life, not excluded. He has a trampoline to help him exercise his muscles, since people with Down Syndrome are more prone to poor muscular tone.
When it comes to medical care for Max, he strives to find individualized medical care for him to address his unique needs. Max receives medical care at different facilities in Los Angeles and in Denver. He finds it a big challenge to find clinicians who are willing to care for Max as a person. Down Syndrome receives the least funding for medical research by the National Institutes of Health. McGinley has also focused his efforts on finding a cure for Alzheimer’s Disease, because people with Down Syndrome have increased risk of developing this disease when they grow older later in life during adulthood.
Therefore, this caveat pushed McGinley to accept Michelle Sie Whitten’s invitation to become a board member and international spokesperson with the Global Down Syndrome Foundation. Whitten, whose son has Down Syndrome, is the organization’s CEO and President. “We need to improve Alzheimer’s Disease research,” McGinley said. “I want to see the Down Syndrome Global Foundation to become a pioneer in research for Down Syndrome.” The Global Down Syndrome Foundation, based in Colorado, raises funding for education, awareness, and government advocacy for the Anna & John J. Sie Center for Down Syndrome, a medical care center for the Linda Crnic Institute for Down Syndrome housed at Children’s Hospital Colorado in Denver.
When asked what new parent of a Down Syndrome child should do, “A new parent should contact the Global Down Syndrome Foundation and move to Denver to learn the best tools to raise a child with Down Syndrome,” McGinley said. At this point, he feels that society has become more accepting of people who have disabilities including Down Syndrome, mentioning how Zack Gottsagen made Hollywood history at the 2020 Oscars as the first Oscar presenter with Down Syndrome. In fact, Tim Shriver from the Special Olympics and Michelle Sie Whitten from the Global Down Syndrome Foundation were some of the executive producers for the award-winning film, The Peanut Butter Falcon, that Gottsagen starred in with Shia LeBeouf.
Now at the age of 60, McGinley is still fighting to make the world a better place for people like Max, people with different types of disabilities, you and me to accept one another. “My son, Max, is my big gift. He is my life.”
With all the discourse surrounding the much anticipated Buffy the Vampire Slayer reboot, not
to mention Sarah Michelle Gellar’s and Alyson Hannigan’s joint interview on the Today show
discussing the show’s legacy! Many fans have revised their opinions on some of the
original show’s titular characters. One such character is Hannigan’s own, Willow Rosenberg. Once seen as the shy, lovable, nerdy sidekick, now her image is less than rosy. Manipulative? Petty? And maybe worst of all: a bad friend.
10. Easing us in with a somewhat annoying one. In Season 6, Episode 11, ‘Gone’, it is
morning in the Summers household. After throwing out most of Willow’s magical stash as
the fallen wiccan tries to go cold turkey with her magic addiction (more on that later). Buffy
is post-traumatic-resurrection trying to keep it all together after a night of hot,
passionate…fighting with a vampire. Willow appears to be living in the Summers’ home rent-free and is cooking Dawn (Michelle Trachtenberg) an apology omelette. She is making a
mess while cooking, as one does, but leaves her traumatised friend to clean up after her! Poor
Buffy (you’ll hear that a lot) was just lambasting herself for not noticing Willow’s self-
inflicted downfall. Buffy is literally chopping off her own hair in distress, and no one notices!
The audacity!
9. In Season 3, Episode 2, ‘Dead Man’s Party’, Buffy has returned to Sunnydale after her
secondment in LA. After a traumatic year, Buffy clearly just wants to hang out with her
friends like a regular teenager. Willow agrees to meet Buffy in town to re-bond over
shopping. Yes, Willow did say earlier in the episode that she had school work that she would
have to rearrange, which is fair enough, but at least cancel instead of leaving poor Buffy
(see?) sitting alone waiting for you!
8. Anya (Emma Caulfield), the ex-vengeance demon, was treated pretty coolly by the
Scoobies. Willow was clearly jealous of Anya’s relationship with Xander (Nicholas
Brendon), taking Xander’s attention from her. Throughout the final seasons, Willow treated
Anya like an annoyance at best and undermined her with cruel remarks at worst. In no
episode was this more obvious than Season 5, Episode 11, ‘Triangle’. Willow is brazenly
stealing spell ingredients from Anya’s and Giles’s (her friends) small business. Willow even
says herself she is not “stealing”, she is “…just taking things without paying for them. In what
twisted dictionary is that stealing?”.
Willow comes off as a bully throughout this episode, cruelly mimicking Anya and trying to
make Xander choose between his childhood best friend and his girlfriend. I want to mention
that not only is Willow gay, but has her own girlfriend at this point. So her possessiveness of
Xander comes off as particularly childish.
7. Willow’s irresponsibility with magic becomes a large feature of the series. Even her most
ardent fans can’t explain what she was thinking in Season 5, Episode 17, ‘Forever’ when she
draws Dawn’s attention to a dark spell book. This book encourages 15-year-old Dawn to raise
her mother from the dead. Culminating in what is, in my opinion, one of the creepiest scenes
in Buffy: the shadow of zombie Joyce walking past Summer’s curtained window, returning
home. Presumably, Willow knew the dangers but was fine with a child dabbling in dark
magic.
6. Back to Season 3, Episode 2 ‘Dead Man’s Party’. After not being satisfied standing Buffy
up, she also wants to rant at a clearly distressed Buffy that Willow’s now got a boyfriend and is
practicing witchcraft, AND had no one to talk to about it when Buffy ran away. Bear in mind
that Buffy had to stab her boyfriend through the heart and send him to Hell after months of
his evil alter ego psychologically torturing her. But Willow needs her gal pal.
Very similar to Season 7, Episode 19 ‘Empty Places’ when Willow joined the group pile on,
blaming poor Buffy (and again) for everything that’s gone wrong. And then throwing Buffy
out of her own house (you know the one she pays for?)! In the words of one Buffy fan ‘Y’all
hate her so much, why did you resurrect her?’
5. Going to my personal favourite season, Season 6 (I’m not arguing about it), Episode 10
‘Wrecked’. Willow is caught in the throes of magic addiction. Within the Buffy universe,
magic was a metaphor for lesbian sex, but the metaphor changes in Season 6 to substance
abuse. Willow takes Dawn to what is essentially a magical drug den and leaves her waiting
there for over an hour. Then, high on magic, he proceeds to not take Dawn home, instead
offering to teleport her back home. Willow then gets behind the wheel of a car with Dawn
while high and crashes the car.
Buffy was known to tackle social issues, and its handling of substance abuse was surprisingly
Realistic, mainly due to Alyson Hannigan’s amazing acting!
4. In Season 4, Episode 6, ‘Wild at Heart,’ we get to see the true darkness that appears to live
inside Willow. After being cheated on by her long-time boyfriend Oz (Seth Green), Willow
takes it upon herself to hex both Oz and his cheating partner, Veruca. She casts ‘in the name
of Hell’ wanting to break both their hearts and find no peace or solace…harsh. To be fair to
her, she does stop herself, but Willow, I appreciate you got cheated on, but we can’t just go
about hexing people.
3. And now to one of the best episodes ever! Season 6, Episode 8 ‘Tabula Rasa’ delivers
some serious comic gold, but the premise of the episode is rather disturbing. Despite
promising Tara (Amber Benson), her long-term partner, that she would give up magic for a
week, Willow casts a spell. Tara is understandably upset that the woman she loves cast a
memory spell on her to make her forget their arguments. Willow’s answer to this is to cast yet
another memory spell to make Tara forget the first memory spell (stay with me). Willow also tries to cast a spell on Buffy (you know her friend suffering from depression) to make her forget being in Heaven. As is a staple in the Buffy universe, the spell goes awry, making the whole gang forget who they are, leading to hilarious hijinks.
Yes, it’s one of the funniest Buffy episodes, but if the spell hadn’t accidentally been broken, then they all could have been stuck like that.
2. For such a trailblazing relationship, Willow and Tara have a lot of problems when
scrutinised. Almost everything stems from Willow’s overuse of magic. The relationship
gets darker the more you examine it. As Tara said in ‘Tabula Rasa’, Willow violated her
mind. Some fans have pointed out; not only was the flower Willow used to cast the forgetting
spell (Season 6, Episode 6) is in an oddly convenient place in their bedroom. This begs the
question: how many times has Willow cast these spells? Fans have also pointed out that if
Tara had sex with Willow after any spell was cast on her, she wouldn’t be consenting.
1. As a surprise to literally no one, the number one time Willow was a bad friend on top of
being completely irresponsible, resurrecting one Miss Buffy Summers. Now, many may
argue that after the finale of Season 5, ‘The Gift’, it would be understandable that Willow
would think Buffy was trapped in some Hell dimension.
Ok, let’s stay with that logic. Willow is aware that resurrection spells are extremely volatile,
presumably why the Scoobies have been planning it for weeks. Xander voices it perfectly, in
Season 6, Episode 1 ‘Bargaining Pt 1’, Buffy may try to “eat our brains”. Willow even
comments (Season 6, Episode 3) on how messed up Angel was when he came back from Hell.
Willow could have caused an emotional and physical catastrophe for them all by bringing
back a ‘wrong’ Buffy who still possesses super-strength and super-speed. Spike (James
Marsters) declares in the same episode that he shut down any idea Willow had about bringing
Buffy, back in case it went so badly, they would have to “get rid of what came back”. It’s bad
when the soulless vampire is more mature than you, isn’t it?
Willow Rosenberg is indeed a very complex character played expertly by Alyson Hannigan. Willow has her flaws, but it is those flaws that make her such a compelling character. I, for one, am very interested to see what they do with the character in the reboot.
From the World of John Wick: Ballerina is a stylish and brutal addition to the ever-expanding John Wick universe. Set between the explosive events of John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum and Chapter 4, the film seamlessly slots into the timeline without feeling like a stopgap. Instead, it builds something fresh, introducing a new protagonist on a vengeful journey of her own.
Ana de Armas delivers a fierce and emotionally layered performance as Eve Macarro, a ballerina-trained assassin seeking justice for her family. While her motivations mirror Wick’s, the film avoids repetition by diving deeper into the Ruska Roma and High Table lore. It’s a testament to the world-building that this spin-off doesn’t just feel justified—it feels essential.
As expected, the fight choreography is at its peak—gritty, inventive, and ruthlessly beautiful. Every action set-piece hits with a kinetic energy that’s both thrilling and brutal. This franchise continues to prove that when it comes to stunt work and direction, it’s in a league of its own. Can the John Wick series really disappoint? So far, no.
The story is tight, the pacing brisk, and each supporting performance, especially the cameos from familiar faces, adds weight and continuity to the narrative. Ballerina proves that this universe is more than just one man’s war; it’s a whole underworld waiting to be explored.
With compelling characters, rich mythology, and jaw-dropping action, Ballerina is a strong 9/10—one of the best spin-offs in recent memory.
Few directors in the modern cinematic landscape have reshaped genre filmmaking quite like James Gunn. Known for blending irreverent humor with profound emotional depth, Gunn has left an indelible mark on both indie horror and superhero franchises. As he transitions into leading DC Studios, it’s the perfect time to revisit his five finest works—each a statement of his unique voice in an often formulaic industry.
1. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)
Rating: 9.5/10
A rare sequel that deepens its characters rather than merely expanding its universe, Vol. 2 is Gunn at his most personal. The film wrestles with the pain of abandonment, the search for belonging, and the complexity of father-son dynamics—cloaked in vibrant visuals and a killer soundtrack. Yondu’s “He may have been your father, boy, but he wasn’t your daddy” line alone secures its legacy.
2. The Suicide Squad (2021)
Rating: 9/10
Chaotic, gory, and gleefully anarchic, The Suicide Squad is a wild remix of the superhero genre. Gunn injects pathos into misfits like Ratcatcher 2 and Polka-Dot Man, proving his unmatched talent for humanizing the bizarre. It’s a subversive spectacle that doubles as an anti-war allegory—with a giant alien starfish to boot.
3. Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
Rating: 8.8/10
The film that redefined Marvel’s creative boundaries, Guardians took a gang of obscure comic-book characters and turned them into pop culture icons. With its perfect balance of humor, heart, and ‘70s mixtape vibes, it’s the origin story of Gunn’s mainstream rise and one of the MCU’s most beloved entries.
4. Slither (2006)
Rating: 8/10
Before superheroes and intergalactic misfits, Gunn gave us Slither—a grotesque and hilarious horror-comedy with serious B-movie charm. This film showcases his roots: practical effects, quotable dialogue, and an affection for the genre’s oddballs. It’s disgusting, delightful, and distinctly Gunn.
5. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023)
Rating: 8/10
An emotionally charged finale to the Guardians trilogy, *Vol
Top Ten Times Willow was the Worst
Review: From the World of John Wick: Ballerina
The Top 5 Movies of James Gunn — A Symphony of Heart, Humor, and Heroism
The Ugly Stepsister Review
Final Destination: Bloodlines
The Ugly Stepsister Review
Top 10 Horror Houses
Top Ten Times Willow was the Worst
Movie Review: Wolf Children (2025)
Review: Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning
WonderCon 2025: A Faith Full Dickens Tale & The King of Kings Animated Movie
WonderCon 2025: Fade to Black Interviews
Comic-Con 2024: Arthur C Clarke’s Venus Prime TV series
Comic-Con 2024: Max Collins’s TRUE NOIR
Comic-Con 2024: Will Wight’s Cradle
