I don't know if there'll ever be a show that tops this one for me. So much wonderful dialogue that I try to remember but can't, which makes the re-watches so much fun. Reviews like yours highlight things I missed or didn't make connections to, and I appreciate that.

To each their own, I guess.

What with Alien: Earth showing up recently I've been watching all the Alien oeuvre – I've never seen all of Alien 3 nor Resurrection, and after attempts in the last week, I still haven't. I mustn't put words in your mouth – you're so much better with them than I – but I have a hunch you'd agree that the entire franchise would have been best served if only Alien and Aliens were ever made. Alien 3 and Resurrection both look cheap and, far worse, they're boring. How one does that to an Alien movie, especially with the cast Resurrection had, I could not say.

My very best to you and yours.

There has always been elements of comedy in horror. To believe a raunchy maid is hanging out in a murder house, you do have to giggle a little bit. But that doesn't mean it's not creepy as well.

I found Murder House surprisingly coherent for a haunted house story that includes a dash of Rosemary's Baby. The family drama anchors everything, and then it's basically 90210 for ghosts. And while the writers don't even pretend to take anything seriously, the actors and actresses do. Frances Conroy, Jessica Lange, and Denis O'Hare, and Connie Britton were all nominated for Emmys. And Lange actually won.

For all the laughter at this series, it won 17 primetime Emmy awards and was nominated for 55. So someone takes it seriously, if not critics.

Critics just can't understand horror, and that's sad, not funny.

About Schmidt is a much, much better movie.

And also, it was just so random. Like what sparked this??

That was one detraction from Boss. It didn’t need the sex scenes although one scene between Kane and his father-in-laws nurse actually showed his dementia and hallucinations were coming in (can’t remember specifically but it had to do with clothe). But beyond that, the sex scenes didn’t add anything to the story.

You also nailed the “Godfather” like methods of intimidation felt wrong. There was no reason to threaten a doctor who only went out of her way to protect his confidentiality in the very first scene of the show. That was over the top and unneeded.

Boss was an incredible show and I wish we could’ve gotten a proper ending to it.

Just got around to watching "Romulus" and agree with damn near everything you wrote here. Not great, but "3 stars, damn that was fun" good. Bits of 1, 2 and 4 woven together and presented like one of those greatest hits albums recorded by other artists. I did think that the human/alien hybrid was WAY more successful here than in "resurrection" however – correcting a poorly conceived misfire when the producers cheaped out and didn't want to pay Geiger his fee. (I could almost hear some execs in a room laughing as they said "sht – who needs that Geiger-fellow? How hard can it be to cook up something like that? I think we know the answer to that one)

All in all – this one delivered on it's promises and nothing more – which is becoming pretty rare these days…

Patiently, indeed. To be honest, it seems unlikely to happen now, although the five-year anniversary is in December. Might be a good time to revisit the series. We'll see…

We're on the same page regarding the first three films. "Alien" is a near masterpiece, marred only by Scott's poor treatment of composer Jerry Goldsmith. "Aliens" is a great action film. "Alien 3" is a misguided betrayal.

"Alien Resurrection" was, for me, a guilty pleasure, having previously watched "The City of Lost Children" and appreciating Jeunet's macabre sense of humor.

Director's cuts of the second, third and fourth films are superior to their theatrical releases, however the additional material isn't enough to save "Alien 3". Scott released a director's cut of "Alien", but there's an issue with where he placed one of the previously cut scenes.

I was very mixed on "Prometheus" but wanted to see the sequel where Elisabeth would confront the Engineers. So, like you, I saw "Alien Covenant" as a betrayal akin to "Alien 3". It also seemed like Scott was siding with his diabolical android David against us stupid humans.

If Roger Ebert, who coined the phrase "dead teenager movie," were to be resurrected by AI, it would likely describe "Alien Romulus" as a dead teenager movie in space. I agree very much with your review about the film's strengths and weaknesses, though I didn't mind the CGI/AI resurrected actor. I already knew who it was going to be from reviews that gave it away. One thing that stood out was that the gestation period for the chestburster seems a lot quicker than it used to be.

Yes, Andy does border on the "happy slave" trope, and I wish he could have risen above his programming, whether it was the original program by Rain's family or the override by the Company. Even the new directive Rain gives him at the end, though touching, doesn't really solve this fundamental problem.

Now, before anyone brings up David as a reason not to allow synthetics to be free, I'll counter with Winona Ryder's character in "Alien Resurrection", who was a force for good instead of evil.

Couldn't agree with you more.

I'm delighted to have serendipitously found your review — almost 13 years after it was published. This alone should tell you how much I hated this movie.

However, I disagree when you say "it's a well-made, well-acted, well-directed piece… ." The only good acting in the movie, IMO, came from Woodley. Clooney, on the other hand, as the leading actor, is wildly miscast. How he managed to receive a nomination for this performance, let alone win any awards for it, is another baffling mystery.

And while I agree that many of the jokes are cheap shots, Gloria's speech about the contradictory expectations society has of women makes an important point that's also a plot point.

Will you be reviewing them all in one (I don't wanna) go?

I passed the message on to Nakea, Zeke, and as a long-time fan of the show, I'm sure you can accurately imagine her response. (The phrase "suck a dick" may or may not have been directed at one or both of us.) But I'm working on it.

(Honestly, the bigger problem with the Halloween marathon at this point is picking the movies: I'm just about out of horror movies I'd subject her to in good faith.)

I have even less leverage with Nakea than you (less than zero) – however the Halloween marathon IS a tradition and please let her know that she should respect that. (Let me know how that goes for you!)

Zeke, "Which one was that?" is the question we most often ask about a Statham film in our house. I'd be hard-pressed to find the biggest disappointment in his career, but certainly PARKER (2013) is right up there. It had a fantastic cast (JLo, Nick Nolte, Wendall Pierce, et al), a decent director (Taylor Hackford) and Donald Westlake's relentless, ass-kicking wronged-criminal character should have generated a four-picture franchise for Statham. But the screenplay wasn't good, the tone was misjudged, and it was desperately lacking in the humor that might have made it fun. (If The Stathe would just hire me to manage his career already, I know we could find him his DIE HARD before he gets too old to make it.)

(Also, moment of sadness for losing THE JOY FUCK CLUB as a title. That would've been amazingly cheeky and hilarious, had they kept it.)

As someone who was half-interested in checking this film out, just for Hsu, I too think Cola's the highlight of the movie, both in the laugh-out-loud moments and subtler moments like watching her face as she chugs down that wine and absorbs her parents' lack of belief in her, to the point of joking she might need a lawyer someday, is wince-inducing. And, honestly, a lot of Wu's dramatic moments hit a little too close for me, especially her insecurities about online friends not being her real friends, and how she doesn't like her big family because all the more people to judge her for being "weird" (me too, bitch, me too).

I think what really struck me, watching it, is how it didn't rest on its laurels with its hilarious and raunchy dialogue for laughs, some of the editing choices are absolutely gold, starting with that opening gag with those shots of White Suburbia, complete with 90s music… and then ending on Lolo's parents, music cut short, remarking on how White it all is. And all the actors are well and capable of giving us amazing reaction faces and expressive humor.

Another is that most of the leads are Asian girlfailures who legitimately kind of suck as people! Audrey wants to leave Lolo behind and is quick to point the blame finger on her when things go south, when it's actually her own fault, Lolo is… genuinely kind of a toxic, possessive barnacle on Audrey's independence who hasn't planned for the future when she should, even if she's surprisingly carrying the bag on the trip most of the time, and Kat is a judgy, condescending shit who probably should've been more honest with her fiancée from the get-go! And it's GREAT. I love a movie that lets us Asians be total ass-clowns sometimes!

Lastly, I dig how very different the leads' reactions to diaspora and Chinese culture is, so no lead represents "the" experience: Audrey is torn across two different cultures, raised in a White household, and, no matter how hard she works, she'll never fit into one or the other, Deadeye isn't hugely hugely a fan of the traditional big family, nor fits into it, given her awkward self, Lolo fits into the large family like a glove, but definitely chafes against the traditional parental expectations, and Kat performs the best to the culture's ways, literally as a performer, and takes pride in being a "native speaker," but she too has her feet of clay moments.

Also, "raunchy simply to be raunchy" is SUCH a stupid-ass complaint, because it cuts across why this movie fundamentally works for me: a good chunk of the jokes have character and substance behind them. Lolo genuinely believes in her sex-positive message and art, Kat's pent-up libido and tattoo represents how much she feels she needs to hide her past from her fiancée or she'd lose a good partner. Audrey's threesome is still her wanting to resolve her diaspora with having a particular experience. Deadeye might be a weirdo passionate about K-pop, but she owns it as her form of expression and she's insecure about her lack of real connections. The character work is strong enough to imbue the raunchy jokes.

"Targets white people" is also a stupid-ass complaint, but I also dig how Audrey's parents aren't huge jokes? Like, they love her enough to want her to connect with an Asian friend, and she clearly loves them, enough that she doesn't care to look for her birth mother, and calls her dad when she's at her lowest moment. It's genuinely sweet.

I sure hope this movie recoups its budget and then some!

And that's so terribly tragic, given the first reunion had a very notable disconnect beat in the video chat, which… really says it all, doesn't it. For him, it was temporal, he kept seeing that little girl who left him. For her, it was geographical, she kept seeing a piece of familiar Korea. From the get-go, from the choice to immigrate, maybe even before then, given what Hae Sung brings up about Nora herself, it feels like the two of them would never come together in this life. It had different plans for them.

And, yeah, the relatively sparser script feels like a strength, in the sense that the actors bring their A-game in imbuing these characters with rich, unspoken depth. Even Magaro, who could've been a disposable husband to add to how Nora and Hae Sung should've gotten together, is acted with a friendly, nervous charm, bolstered by an intelligent script that has him as a decent, receptive, thoughtful man with an understandable chip on his shoulders with this whole scenario.

I also think it's fascinating how those 12 years timeskips contrast against the gentler pace of Song's day-to-day mundanity shots. Because Arthur mentions how there's a world he can't access with Nora when she dreams in Korean… but Hae Sung hasn't known the world Nora's been suffused in for years, either. In some ways, we're in a similar position to those two men: we don't have access to Nora's world, all of it, only she herself does. We're all in a position of not knowing the totality of another's world. And the steady shots are why that second-last scene HURTS so much to me: seeing them walk together, contrasted against Nora registering, perhaps for the last time, a life with someone that could've been, physically, and breaking down at the enormity of that what-if at the very end of that long shot.

Just a gutting, painful movie in ways I expected, but never anticipated how badly it'd hurt. Such a smart debut.

Thanks. (Sometimes, writing these things, I just have to amuse myself.) And Nakea and I watched THE SEA BEAST again after I posted this review, and it's even better than I'd remembered.

No joke, if TURNING RED went to theaters, like it should've, I would've bought two tickets. It was an original Pixar property with good legs and a better foot forward than LIGHTYEAR was.

I do wonder, though, if INSIDE OUT became the ground-zero of modern Pixar plots' problems, (it's one of those Pixar films that, the more I grow up and think about, the more problems I have with its conceptual legs), leading to my main complaint with SOUL: the earthbound stuff with Joe in his own body and the people in his life is actually really solid to me, and the stuff with the Great Beyond was so fatally misconceived, like you said, and had such a Pixar-brand aesthetic to it that it couldn't help but underwhelm. It's half a solid movie, and one that needed more Black creators, regardless.

(Hah! I mean, they're not wrong, absolutely deserved shot.)

Yeah, Twitter was using that movie to celebrate human labor, instead of "A.I. art" the week before it hit and… *sighs* Yeah. Those animators really need another Disney 1941 strike. And hopefully one day, the VFX people unionize.

I agree Turning Red is their best film in ages. I actually haven't seen Luca either—I'll get to it eventually—and I thought Soul had a LOT of serious problems on the story level. That's another one where the plot was horribly misconceived from the start, resulting in Pixar almost completely screwing up their first attempt at a Black protagonist. (That one needed not just more thought, but specifically more input and control from Black creators. I agreed with a lot of Black critics who called it Pixar's First Black Movie for White People.)

And yes, the story about conditions on Across the Spider-Verse was disappointing, since that's a film I would have said did everything right that this one gets wrong. Hollywood seems to have built its current business model on overworking animators and VFX people to death, and something needs to give. (The last I'd heard, Disney was still fighting their animators' attempts to unionize, and there's no VFX union at all.)

Though, you didn't like LUCA or SOUL? Not disagreeing with that, I haven't seen the former, but the latter did absolutely feel like twice the ambition of INSIDE OUT with half the imagination and reach of it, and everyone says those two are Pixar's recent solid-hitters.

(I would personally bang on the drum that TURNING RED is Pixar's best film since INSIDE OUT, for an abundance of reasons.)

…and it NEVER works. (Maybe just pick one good hiding place, instead of two crappy ones.)

"and hid the Transwarp Key in two pieces"

How many times have we seen the trope of a key to something being split into pieces in order to protect it? I've lost count.

Thanks, Bill. (You can watch the first one from the comfort of your own home, if you want to give the franchise a try before venturing into a crowded theater. Personally, after three years of pandemic, I'm finding being back in movie theaters pleasurable and nerve-wracking in equal measures.)

Hi, Marco! Glad you're back, too. (By the way—though you know better than to rely on anything I say—I am fully intending to return to reviewing Doctor Who in November, now that the era of Chibnall is over.)

Hey, Zeke! Good to see you back, too. (The podcast is probably on hold for the moment, so your marriage is on its own for a few months, but I'll lure Nakea back into the recording booth eventually.)

Thanks, Kyla! (Nice to see some of my long-time readers still remember me.) I'm halfway keeping an eye out for a TV show coming down the pike that I can dig into, as that's still my favorite thing to do. (I'm sort of sorry I didn't write about The Last of Us and Station Eleven last year.)

Thanks, Sean. I'm sure you won't have to wait long for an evisceration. (Transformers is this weekend. Sigh.)

I think Tom killed Clinton because he thought the option Clinton had on his one great (in Tom’s opinion) script would revert back to him. That seemed very important to him, at the beginning. He probably wanted to make that with his inheritance. Although it sounded like Lee would back it if she thought he would let her.

When Tom took the Homosexual card, it was a shock to his wife but not to his mistress. Alice, in her monologue, tells him about having the card because she knows it pertains to him (because they are looking on it as an experience rather than an aspect of identity; as the group says later, these things are all in the past). So he has confided in her or she knows somehow about him and Clinton. We know from her monologue that her lover has to be the Homosexual (actually bi, but the era).

There are a lot of clues to Tom and Clinton having been a thing: the golfing(?) photo where they stand extremely close, the way Clinton caresses Tom’s face when he tells Tom he would hate for him to miss the game that night (it would have been better for Clinton if Tom had), the flirting in the confessional (“Do you want to kiss me?”).

I too would like to see an alternate version where the game proceeds according to Clinton’s plans. Maybe one of those films without murder where bitter truths are told or something. But I really enjoy this film.

The character of Philip really hits oddly. There are weird little bits too. Lee thanking him for being so nice to her as a child (apparently nothing dicey there—because of rich father?). He seems genuinely fond of Lee. He’s the one who worries about her after she goes up to bed. He’s the one who goes to look for her. He’s the one saddened by her death. He does seem haunted by his secret, but we never get an explanation of it. “Those were just jokes because I work with children a lot.” Or: “I didn’t realize the girl wasn’t legal.” (Speaking of which, he was the one to help Alice when she got in trouble for shoplifting, and she wouldn’t tell Tom who helped her because he was a jealous person. How old was Alice then?) Or even: “I did a horrible thing, but I got psychiatric help.” His is the only secret without a story.

Lee could be the sympathetic character: an accident, Sheila dead, Lee panics, afraid and guilty for a year. But she laughs and jokes, seemingly unbothered, with Christine and Tom. And she’s not supposed to be an actress. So. Is that a cheat?

I think Welch was quite good in this movie. Her monologue especially.

I don’t care too much whether characters are likable or even sympathetic. It’s nice, but I really care whether they are interesting.

Oddly enough, over the last week I’ve rewatched Murder by Natural Causes, Sleuth, and The Last of Sheila.

I’ve been to a few murder mystery parties (usually fundraisers), and if I had that money and friends like Perkins and Sondheim who invited me, I’d certainly want to go. It sounds like brain-teasy fun (seems like they mostly weren’t murders but just mystery scavenger hunts).

I think you're onto something with the question of whether Cameron is implying that Rose and Jack's lovemaking, along with the sinking of the Titanic, ushered in the social changes of the 20th century, since he shows the lookouts distracted by the two lovers spilling out onto the deck to continue making out, just before they see the iceberg.

The Unenthusiastic Critic may not have approved of Rose braving the water in the bowels of the ship to rescue Jack, but that was my favorite sequence in the movie. (Was that one of the times Kate Winslet reportedly got hypothermia? She looked it in the scene where she was trying to aim the ax.)

Some of Cameron's shots are identical to those in the British film, "A Night to Remember", including the one of Mr. Andrews standing in front of the clock, one of the Captain returning to the wheelhouse to go down with the ship, and, earlier, one of kids gazing at the distress rockets.

About those rockets. As long as Cameron's "Titanic" is, it nevertheless has some glaring omissions. With the exception of a deleted scene, he completely leaves out the subplot of the Californian, the nearby ship that had shut down for the night and was the reason the Titanic was firing the rockets, to try and get its attention. In "A Night to Remember", that led to some scenes on board the Californian that would be darkly funny if they were not so tragic.

Cameron got in trouble for vilifying the first officer, Murdoch, and had to apologize to his family. He made the second officer, Lightroller, who was the hero of "A Night to Remember", considerably less heroic, but the evidence seems to back up Cameron on that one. However, the needs of the love story apparently caused Cameron to partially defame Molly Brown, who famously commandeered the lifeboat she was in to search for survivors and threatened to throw the crewman overboard if he tried to stop her. Cameron, instead, has the crewman threaten to throw Molly overboard to make her shut up. He made this change, apparently, because had Molly been the one to find Rose, then Rose would not have been able to change her identity. That bothered me more than anything else in the film.

About the elderly Rose returning the diamond to the sea, there's an alternate ending, where the explorers catch her about to toss the diamond and try to talk her out of it, but Bill Paxton has an epiphany and agrees that the diamond belongs there. As silly as that sounds, I think it works better, in context, than the theatrical version.

Thanks for doing another Halloween marathon!

Quick story – had tickets to a sneak peak of "Bound" prior to release, grabbed a buddy and we stopped by the theater on the way home from work. (Picture a couple of salesmen in matching khakis and blue oxford shirts who sat there giving each other sht before the movie started) The person behind us leaned forward and quietly asked "how long have you two been together?" We noticed the audience and our matching outfits in the moment and quickly pointed out that we worked together. All around us we heard people talking to themselves – "Ohhhhh – that makes sense too – we were wondering", and I don't think we said another word until leaving the theater after the closing credits…

Thanks for another fun podcast!

Amazing! It's almost like you've heard the podcast before, Zeke.

Haven't listened to the podcast yet – but will go out on a rather long limb and say "fun fact: no"

Thanks for all the superb reviews and articles you've written about GOT. They have considerably added to my enjoyment of the show.
I first started watching GOT in 2017, binge viweing seasons in their entirety. In August 2021 I discovered one of your GOT episode reviews and enjoyed it thoroughly. I decided to rewatch seasons 1 – 5, (my favorites) reading your individual show-reviews after viewing each episode. Just finished Season 3.
I wanted to thank you for the amazing work you have done bringing your astute insights and appreciation of this excellent series to your readers. Your essays have enhanced my Game of Thrones viewing experience considerably.

Thanks for watching this with me by proxy and being much more engaging (I know this was written over ten years ago, but still.) May dead hares and head-lopping sword dancers never darken your door.

Thank you.

I'd had every intention of getting the other two books released in time for the 10th anniversary, but somehow it didn't quite happen. (Story of my life, lately.) But yes, I still want to get them done, and possibly reformat them for Amazon's print-on-demand service, too, for people who like hard copies. It's on my to-do list.

Merion Cooper in 1933 may not have viewed the director character based on himself as the villain, although we do, and Jackson in 2005 very clearly does. When Robert Armstrong's Carl Denham said "It was beauty killed the beast," much of the audience probably believed him. But when Jack Black's Denham says it, we know that he, like a certain former occupant of the White House, is evading responsibility for his own actions.

Jackson's version also addresses The Unenthusiastic Critic's point regarding suspension of disbelief in make-believe creatures versus creatures that were real but shown in unreal ways. I've long had a pet peeve about the 1933 original showing a brontosaurus eating a man, which insulted my intelligence even as a child. The 1976 remake avoids the issue entirely by leaving out the dinosaurs. In the the 2005 remake, however, the men encounter the species in question peacefully eating vegetables, until raptors borrowed from Spielberg attack and start a stampede. I loved that.

The one problem with the earlier versions that Jackson failed to fix was the natives. He did change them but not in a good way. They were over the top. It took the Monsterverse to do right by the natives. They are now South Asian, and they get on well with Kong without sacrificing people.

Thank you for it. It has enriched my life.

Year later, after watching the tragedy that DW has become, I hope Whovians realize just how special Davies and Moffatt and

Thank you for the recommendation of Making It: We weren't aware of it, but we've now watched about three episodes, and it does indeed hit the spot. It's the right level of good-natured, and I like the wide variety of projects in each episode a lot.

More Deadwood is coming, I promise.

In my civilian identity, I do consulting and contract work, which allows me a fair amount of flexibility. I literally do not understand how people like you (and my wife) are managing to work full-time jobs right now. So good for you for sticking it out. (I hope your employer at least recognizes that nobody is working at the top of their game right now, and adjusts expectations accordingly.) As you said—and for what it's worth—hang in there.

Hey, get your cheeky wife to kick your butt into gear. I need by Timothy Oliphant fix.

I'll instead give a thanks to so deftly wrapping your prose around a malady I've someone how escaped reading about – perhaps I'm actively avoiding anything tied to the words "pandemic wall" and my subconscious isn't even aware that it's an actual "thing". Must have hit me hard in the last couple of weeks though, as I've struggled to not quit a job that has left me ridiculously (and gratefully) employed throughout.
With zero options on the horizon.
With a family of four to support.
And perhaps the only reason I didn't is because it seemed so damn hard to muster up the energy to actually follow through.
In any event, your piece gave consolation and perspective – thank you.

Hang in there, it will get better.

I appreciate the suggestion, Benjamin, but you have unfortunately identified my least favorite creator in the history of the human race creating things: Seth MacFarlane. So, sorry, but that's not going to be happening.

Allen's 7-year output from Purple Rose through Husbands and Wives used to be one of my favorite runs of any director. But I can't watch them anymore. (Ironically, that's the bulk of the Mia Farrow years. Maybe it was her all along.)

Agreed. I've had Midnight Cowboy and Deliverance on our podcast list for a long time, but I keep not wanting to watch them.

The still living actor who went so far over the line that I can't look at him again in any context is Jon Voight.

I never watched Whedon's Justice League, and I can't say I'm any more interested in the "Snyder Cut," since I've more or less hated everything Snyder has done since Dawn of the Dead. (Also the massive capitulation to/exploitation of toxic fandom that new version represents seems like a BAD precedent to set.)

And your approach to movies by terrible people is more or less my approach to dead artists, on a case-by-case basis. God knows LOTS of artists have been flaming racists, for example, but there's a special category for people who were actively pursuing a racist agenda in their art. (Margaret Mitchell, for one obvious example. Fortunately, I think she was a terrible writer, too, so that one's not a sacrifice.) With living artists, it gets trickier, because I go out of my way to avoid supporting them in any way. Also, in term of movie stars, I just can't look at Gibson or Spacey or Allen or any of these people anymore, even in movies I once loved.

If people could just stop being assholes, that would be great—but I'm not holding my breath.

In cases of an artist's abusive or toxic behavior, my ability to separate the art from the artist depends largely on context. Example: Mel Gibson. On the one hand, his trilogy of films that rewrite history to promote the very bigotry he revealed during his drunken arrest, "Braveheart", "The Passion of the Christ" and "Apocalypto," are to be avoided like the plague. (Of the three, I've seen only "Braveheart," but have read enough about the other two to make an informed decision not to see them.) On the other hand, I can watch or listen to the soundtrack of Disney's "Pocahontas." It too rewrites history, but for a humane rather than a malicious purpose.

Yes, it's strange. Alan Tudyk did respond to the Ray Fisher allegations back in July, and his response (since deleted) was not helpful: "Wasn't there, but I have known Joss for 17 years, I honestly can't even imagine it and I have a pretty good imagination."

It's possible that the dynamics on the Firefly set were not the same as the "toxic environment" on Buffy and Angel. But it's also possible that this is a case of a white man assuming that how the boss treats them is how the boss treats everyone. I don't know.

I think what stays with me about this episode is the pain in Al's eyes while watching Smith's deterioration and degradation. I entertained the thought that he was going to go to the street and take Smith in like he took in Jewel. He could only deal with the pain he was in by getting drunk and surly. What a complicated and fascinating character. This is my first watch and your discussions on the theme of family and community are enriching my experience.

That's an idea, though of course it sounds like a book to me rather than an essay. (Community is definitely one of those shows. Just glancing at my DVD shelf, Game of Thrones is one of those shows. Any Joss Whedon show would fit the category, particularly Firefly. BSG, Northern Exposure…Hell, I could make an argument for Mad Men…)

Sigh. I'll add it to my long list of rainy-day projects.

(Also, thanks for helping me catch the typo in that paragraph—"favorites"?—which I've now fixed in the piece, making it look like the mistake in your comment is yours, not mine.)

On (stupid) moral grounds I've refused to unfriend more than a couple of folks from my social media feeds – that act alone (how quaint) sparked a 1000 word essay on the word "friend" and how we often use it to describe people we haven't seen or talked to in 20 years. I've stopped following those (ironically enough) immigrant family members who have doubled down on the crazy train, and today I'd had enough – opened up a list and got ready for the purge. I scrolled, and scrolled for a couple of minutes and realized that it was a tiny percentage of folks in my (former) circles that were causing all the distress and heartache.

The events happening in the real world will still tear at my heart – but idiot family members and people I haven't seen since the 80's? Not so much anymore – they've lost their power over me as I see how insignificant they really are compared to the love and joy the rest of my feeds bring. Friends who stand and march for justice. Friends who understand the difference between suffering and inconvenience. Friends who will be a part of the the cure for our country.

The comfort of these people was dizzying. "Grievance" as a vacation. These are not orphaned Afghani youths, growing up in a failed state, turning to radicalization. These are people who have never known true fear, hunger, or hopelessness.

I'm very happy about the newsletter — I feel a jolt of joy when it pops up in my inbox.

"The Silent Partner" owes a debt to the 1971 safe deposit box heist film "$", where Warren Beatty and Goldie Hawn ignore the Unenthusiastic Critic's warning not to steal from people scarier than them. Though Christopher Plummer in "The Silent Partner" easily beats the earlier film's villains in the scary department.

Speaking of heist movies with amoral characters and fish tanks, did John Cleese see "The Silent Partner" before he wrote "A Fish Called Wanda"?

I didn't notice the one arm either, but was the person attached to it a mailman or just a paperboy?

I actually wasn't aware of "Blackthorn!" Thanks, I'll have to check that out one of these days.

Hi, DD, and welcome. I'm glad you found us, and I thank you for the kind words.

Your comment led me to go back and reread this review after so many years, and I remembered how much I miss writing about this show. I only covered a couple of seasons, but it's on my list of "someday" projects to go back and write about it from the beginning. One of these days…

Happy holidays, Sam! I don't know if you've listened to the episode yet, but I actually quoted from Hornaday's "The New Canon" piece (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/style/wp/2018/08/17/feature/these-are-the-best-movies-of-the-2000s/).

And I agree with you on all points, especially the cinematography: Nakea mentions in the episode how messy most war/action movies are in terms of following the movement, but how clear and clean Cuarón and Lubezki's visual storytelling is. It's precise, well-thought out, fluid, and amazing.

Happy Holidays!

DD

Got to give this one another watch this week, and I'll be sure to use enough dynamite…

Welcome back, Carol! I checked to make sure you were on our mailing list when I posted this, because I remembered you liked these posts. I'm glad you're still here, many years after the last one was supposed to appear.

Though I've said it before, I really am going to try to keep these coming regularly, though that will probably necessitate making them shorter. (I suspect they'll become more "essays on the movie" rather than "scene-by-scene walkthroughs of the movie." But we'll see: I do tend to get obsessive about the details.)

I'm looking forward to The Rules of the Game, though not without a little trepidation: I understand they're very different films, but I loved this one so much it's hard to imagine Renoir topping it.

Hey, Rob! You were a Game of Thrones man, if memory serves, but I'm glad you're still here, and I'm glad you enjoyed the post. If you get a chance to see the movie, I highly recommend it (obviously): It really is a great one.

Pesci clearly deserved that Oscar, but Graham Greene was great in Dances. He was excellent in a recurring role on Northern Exposure, as well. (That show was a boon for indigenous actors. Floyd "Red Crow" Westerman—Ten Bears in Dances—was on there as well.)

Oscar snubs used to bother me more, until I realized they get it wrong far more often than they get it right. Now it's just a pleasant surprise when the right person/picture wins.

One of the Native Americans, Graham Greene, did receive a nomination for Best Supporting Actor, but we all know who won in that category.

I was almost sure "Goodfellas" picked up a second Oscar for "Best Editing," but no. That went to "Dances with Wolves." Thelma Schoonmaker was robbed.

I just want to comment and express my gratitude for your deep, thorough and meticulous analysis of this show. For many fans, this type of review is necessary to fully experience the subtle but powerful references that make these episodes unforgettable. I hope you resume your review or find another avenue to share this rich and important work.

You may not have seen my announcement on Twitter, Sam, but I've suspended these reviews. Unfortunately, not enough people have been reading them (or sharing them) to justify the amount of time they take. (I also lost a little patience with the series itself: I think there are a lot of individual pieces that work, but I think the whole is slightly less than its parts.) I might still circle back and write one more post about the back half of the season: We'll see how tonight's finale goes.

Sorry. Thanks for reading and commenting, though, as always…

Maybe the transformation into the other person goes smoothly, but it's changing back into yourself that gets gory.

It might be worth consulting The Unenthusiastic Critic for the disturbing questions the episode raises, including whether Ruby's revenge against the employer who sexually abused his token black employee is justified.

Tic and Leti (Montrose seems to have other plans) are in a race to get the missing pages before the Order does, but it was Christina, offspring of the Order's former leader, who tipped Tic off about the existence of the pages. Are Tic and Leti prepared for Christina (or William) coming for the pages now that they have them?

To sum up the trend culminating with the outlandish "Batman and Robin," I'm reminded of Jim Carrey's line in "Batman Forever," "Was that over the top? I can never tell."

Given her enthusiasm for "Black Panther," has The Unenthusiastic Critic watched the CW's "Black Lightning"? I highly recommend it for being the most grounded (the pun fits) and character-driven of the DC comics adaptations. And it gets better as it goes along, with the protagonist's daughters coming into their own as, in some instances conflicted, heroes.

I almost listed The Fury among the De Palma films I like, but then I realized I have very little memory of The Fury beyond John Cassavetes with a dead arm. I need to watch that one again. Maybe we'll fit it into a Halloween marathon one of these years.

Just looked at that part again, and yes, you're right, we missed that, and the confluence of events makes more sense than I gave it credit for. (In our defense, it may be partially De Palma's fault we missed it, since it's not his clearest bit of editing: We never see her enter the subway after leaving the cab, and then there's just a two-second dissolve to suggest she's already ridden the subway and is coming out at home.)

Among the other De Palma films from the period, I took a particular liking to "The Fury." Made after "Carrie" and before "Dressed to Kill," it is very different from both, despite having the supernatural element, and Amy Irving, in common with "Carrie." And because the author of the novel wrote the screenplay, there was less opportunity for De Palma to nurse his obsessions, though they do occasionally turn up. I actually prefer "The Fury" to "Carrie," because I hated the ending of "Carrie" and loved the ending of "The Fury."

On the issue of George Washington, while the play doesn't address his ownership of slaves directly, watch, in the final scene, his contrite reaction in the background to the future Eliza's line, "I speak out against slavery."

Stay safe. Your writing is sorely missed.

Alas, I did it anyway.

No word since the pandemic hit. Are you all right?

I'm actually two—or three?—episodes behind right now. (This in itself tells you how much I'm currently invested in the Chibnall era, though I thought this season has been generally better than last.) I'll catch up and circle back.

My guess was partly right. The Senator turned into goo. But then they had to deal with Lady Trieu. That's still not a good enough reason for Dr. Manhattan to die, since he had alternative means to thwart the villains' plans. The only good reason for him to die the way he does is to pass his power on to someone more deserving than him, who would not accept it if he were still alive. But then, in the last shot, Lindelof doesn't show us whether eating the egg transferred the power to Angela or not.

I too hope they will not completely forget about Missy, that would be incredibly lazy. But all quibbles big and small aside, it at least felt connected to the show's history again, which was something I couldn't say about most of season 11 and almost had me give up on the show. Fingers crossed…

The episode does, however, lay the groundwork for an potentially challenging story arc debunking a central tenant of Timelord mythology.

In its second year, "The Expanse" made my all-time top ten list of science fiction series and, currently, tops the list as #1. This is hard science fiction, which addresses situations that most sci-fi ignores, for example what people who grew up in a low-gravity environment have to go through to visit Earth or an Earth-like planet.

Hey, I said it was a partial-but-shameful list. (I forgot about The Expanse, but I didn't watch that either. Worth it?)

I honestly haven't decided yet. I stopped last season because I really wasn't enjoying it at all: With a couple of exceptions ("Rosa" and "Demons of the Punjab"), I thought it was dully mediocre in exactly the ways I'd feared when Chibnall got the job, and I wouldn't have found much to say about most of the episodes. But—since I still root for the show (and Whittaker) to succeed—neither did I want to be the guy crapping on it every week.

So we'll see how I feel after the premiere, I guess?

What's odd is the majority of those who are today ideologically aligned with Rorschach, including those who claim to be moral absolutists, deride the reporting of facts as "fake news," and instead embrace "alternative facts" that support their worldview.

We've both seen Amirpour's movie—though we both forgot to mention it—but I somehow missed Byzantium completely. I'll have to check it out. Thanks.

It's been awhile since I've dropped in. I finished binge-watching the Dark Crystal: The Age of Resistance and had a great time. It really lends itself well to allegorical readings of contemporary society and recent events in the news: class struggle, feminism/female empowerment, environmental issues, truth and authority…. The list goes on. Some of it is very thinly veiled, and some of it is just my own willingness to read more deeply than necessary into a really richly told story and finely rendered world. (I guess I'm drinking the Kool-Aid, but then again, I enjoyed the story that the original movie was trying to tell.)

The 10-episode arc really allows for some great world-, character- and lore-building—much more than the original 90 minute movie. It would be interesting to hear your reaction to the new Netflix series, especially in light of some of the criticisms of the original movie. Be warned, the first 3 or 4 episodes form a lengthy exposition, but the build-up to the second half of the series is rewarding.

Pelarin

Oops! Fixed it. Thanks for the correction!

I think it makes sense, but would like to hear Michael's and other's opinion.

As for future projects, I would still be curious to hear your thoughts on The Sopranos and/or Better Call Saul (your Breaking Bad binge watch was much appreciated!).

Finally, congratulations on the book deal!

"Suddenly exhibiting a surprisingly comprehensive understanding of literary symbolism and political synecdoche, the Last Dragon expresses his grief and rage not by blasting the person who so obviously killed his "mother," but by melting the physical representation of her doomed quest, the Iron Throne itself."

Loved the way you phrase that. I would have found Drogon's action more believable had he previously expressed discomfort with some of the things 'mother' was ordering him to do.

Dany's speech at her Nuremberg-style rally echoes one she made from atop Drogon in Season Six, which in turn echoes the vows Kal Drogo made to her back in Season One. With that, Benioff and Weiss appear to be saying that this was her plan for Westeros the whole time. And the Unsullied thumping their spears on the ground like they did at the "awsome" end of "And Now His Watch is Ended," appears to be Benioff and Weiss wagging their fingers at us that we ever enjoyed that.

I can actually understand Grey Worm's inaction in "The Iron Throne." Yes, he became vengeful after Missandei's death, but he has always respected the chain of command. His vengeful acts in "The Bells" were, conveniently for him, in line with his Queen's orders. Following Dany's death, Grey Worm has a dilemma, as you will, between honor and duty. He demands "justice" yet recognizes that he is a soldier, not a king, and the authority to dispense justice for Jon's regicide rests with the remaining lords and ladies of the Seven Kingdoms. He also recognizes that, were he to take the law into his own hands, it would start a war, in which, without Dany and her dragon, he would be unlikely to prevail. He does, nevertheless, hold out a threat of mutiny, if those assembled at the meeting don't give him a face-saving compromise.

An example of the writers not playing fair with the audience is the impression left from "The Bells" was that the entire Red Keep collapsed like the Twin Towers on 9/11. That was one of the reasons I supported the decision for Arya to get out of there. Yet, in "The Iron Throne," much of the building is surprisingly intact, and there are only a few rocks on top of Cersei and Jamie, so Tyrion can uncover and cry over them.

Peter Dinklage rises above the material he's given to deliver his best performance since Season Four. The common element is that, then, Tyrion 'had it' with his father and the others who were framing him, and, here, he has 'had it' with Dany. "Yes, I freed my brother . . . and you slaughtered a city." Takes off his pin and throws it hard on the floor.

Thank you again for all your hard work.

I like your bits about "wanting more." At this point, my wife and I have been going through season 1 to 7 five times. Two times for episode 1 to 5 of the final season, but only one viewing of the finale so far (we just couldn't). But, like you, I want us to find the place where you ended-up, actually not regretting a thing, and so "more" (of the same) it will be in the near future. We love this show, and all subsequent viewing after reading your posts since 2013 has always enriched the experience.

Thank you for everything, Michael, we shall be back!

That means I have the rest of my life to finish it, right?
(But it's coming. Today.)

Coming into the series at that point also affected first impressions of Cersei. She seemed halfway sympathetic in her bid for female empowerment which was rebuffed by a very unsympathetic Tywin. It took only a few more episodes to show how villainously narcissistic she was however.

"We thought she might plan to destroy the city with wildfire, as she destroyed her enemies before."

That may actually have been Cersei's plan if all else failed, but Dany's rampage beat her to it.

"Oh, what I wouldn't give for a 10-episode final season. Imagine at least one or two episodes between "The Last of the Starks" and "The Bells," in which a war between Dany and Cersei raged in a stand-off of equals, and in which Team Targaryen tried, and failed, to win the hearts and minds of the people of Westeros. It would have served all of the characters better, particularly Dany and Cersei, who bear the brunt of the hurried character assassination here."

Completely agree there.

"But Arya also gets saddled with a love story (for the first time ever), and a ramping up of her vulnerability throughout "The Long Night." Here, she is suddenly convinced by the Hound to run away, and abandon the mission of revenge she has pursued for half her life."

I don't mind Arya's love story, since, unlike some other characters, she maintains her agency throughout it. Her decision to take the Hound's advice and get away is actually the wise choice. By that point, Cersei was almost certainly going to die anyway and, if Arya continued her pursuit, she most likely would have died with her. And we need Arya alive to deal with Daenerys.

Thanks, Callene. You've been here longer than most anyone: I'm glad you're still with me here at the end.

There's a great article in "The Washington Post," where they consulted a military historian to critique the battle strategy in "The Long Night." https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2019/05/02/military-historian-rips-apart-plan-defend-winterfell-spoiler-alert-humans-were-idiots/?utm_term=.2986d18d2657

It's clear your suspension of disbelief has been completely broken. I can't even say I disagree with a lot of what you wrote, you just seem to be taking it a lot harder than most people. That doesn't make everybody else's interpretation wrong, it's just that you draw different conclusions from the same source material, and it's not working for you anymore (e.g. UC says the show has always been about the characters and the throne, while you say it's always been about the zombies). To each his own, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, one man's junk is another man's treasure, etc….

However, bailing now, when you *know* there are only 3 episodes (4 hours run-time) remaining, seems like *that* would make all the episodes before a real waste of your time, rather than just finishing it up anyway. That's like getting divorced at age 75, after a 53 year marriage. Why bother, when you'll be dead in a few years anyway? Why bother to boycott watching, when it'll be over in 16 days anyway?

However, the Wachowski relatives showed a truly beautiful daylight church fresco heavens in renaissance or baroque style, while Battle of Winterfell was less platonic (Sun = Idea of the eternally changeless Good) and more romantic (Moon = Light that is eternally waxing and waning, but never consumed by the darkness forever).

Nevertheless, both scenes were breathtakingly beautiful and serene in a Schopenhauerian sense of the word "resignation". https://existentialcomics.com/comic/18
Unfortunately, we the scene was rushed and we could not immerse in the experience that in real life takes far more time to sink in. Everything has been rushed since the supernatural elements of the story lost its relatable mystery. Truly powerful dark magic is disturbing in a psychological sense (nightmares, phobias, obssessions – true horror), not in a sensansational pseudo-logic of fan-service. The showrunners allowed wrights to be sometimes zombies and sometimes aliens, sometimes unstoppable and sometimes axe/sword/arrow-fodder. An inedible, even revolting recipe!

Why did not they go for a real horror episode? This was ludicrous stupidity in a wanna-be epic wrapping…

The first episode of the season felt slow and boring because it was a reunion show and the second episode, albeit a bit better on the character development, felt like fantasy 101 to me, filled with tropes and your standard 100 times-before-seen fairy tale stuff. But I could accept it as necessary to give a lot of characters a completed story and character arc before they would surely die in the big battle to come, right? RIGHT? Nope, almost all of them survived… which leads me to the first cardinal sin of the episode:

Not enough people (or better characters) died for what was shown on screen.

That distinction is important because killing off characters has to be not only impactful but logical. And the episode established early on that the plot armor would be off the charts when Jorah and Ghost helped the Dothraki in their stupid charge – only to survive miraculously. And the episode continued in that way by having Brienne, Jaimie, Greyworm and Tormund at the front line during the first charge – only to survive the entire battle miraculously. In that regard the plot armor of Tormund deserves special mention who in the span of 4 episodes has now survived the aequivalent of being on the top floor during 9/11 (he was on top of the wall looking down while the dragon was spewing ice-fire) and being one of the first to hop onto the beach during D-Day… Looks like Giant's breast milk is super effective…
And the episode continued on that path where characters either survived miraculously (how many of them were surrounded before they cut away and then clear of danger when we saw them again?) or were saved at the last second like Sam. In fact all the deaths in the episode but the one of Lyanna happened that way, Edd saving Sam, Beric saving Arya, Jorah saving Dany (on screen it looked like she pushed him into harm's way) and Theon defending Bran (who more or less sent him to his death despite knowing Arya would kill the night king…).
EVERYONE, even the smallest character (pun definitely intended) either had to survive against all odds or had to get a hero's death no matter how stupid or illogical it might be because as I said last week Game of Thrones is now your standard fairy tale trope filled fantasy 101 series. And by becoming that it is something we have all seen hundreds of times before…

Under the header of this sin I would also summarize what happened in the crypt. The constant "the crypts are the safest place" last week (despite a person with two functioning neurons realizing how bad of an idea that was) was obviously a setup for something bad happening there and the dead rose as expected. But guess what? It didn't matter a bit because EVERYONE there survived. The crypts WERE the safest place after all. There aren't enough facepalm emotes for this…

Benioff and Weiss are definitely to blame for this mess and massive failure. When you watch their comment video on the episode you realize how their minds work and how this letdown happened. When they talk about the massive cost of the battle in this episode I want to scream out loud WHERE? WHAT COST? and when they talk about "subverting expectations" you understand how decisions are made, not by logically deducting, not by character developement or characters behaving in a consistent manner but by having the most unexpected end and then working backwards somehow. And if the threads don't meet just ignore it and hope the viewers won't realize it amid all the action and/or can't see it anyways… By going for shock value over narrative continuity they are insulting the intelligence of viewers who can suspend their disbelief only for so long until even details that make no sense become a nuisance and finally a problem. And if it's not only the details but the entire story, well, that's where the wheels come off completely – and this is what happened in this episode and in retrospect with the entire series. Dany and Jon may very well unite Westeros in the end but these two have divided the GoT fandom forever.

Which leads me to the next cardinal sin of this episode:

This didn't feel like a Game of Thrones episode.

I know you could count the first sin as part of this one, too, but I think the low cost of this battle deserved a special mention. Where s07e06 (up to this point the worst episode of the series because it was insultingly stupid) had the chance to redeem itself because the ending was at least interesting and left the door open for intriguing things to happen, there is no such chance here. Normally you get the chance to correct your errors, do it better the next time but that's not possible in this case. This was the culmination of GoT, the big war as they themselves called it, the most anticipated episode (maybe of any TV series ever) and Benioff and Weiss blew it, when the light was the brightest, GoT couldn't deliver…
And it not only couldn't deliver, it fell apart at the seams because contrary to what people may tell you, even the filmmaking craft (cinematography, editing, music) that carried weaker episodes let this one down. The music was ok-ish albeit a bit overdramatic at times, but the editing was a terrible mess, the pacing of the entire episode was off and the lighting and shaky cam are well-known problems. Funnily enough I didn't care about the latter two at all as I'm a fan of found-footage horror movies. However I had a huge problem with the pacing of the episode. As Benioff and Weiss would tell you those breaks are necessary for the viewer to simulate the "ebb and flow of battle" and I guess to give viewers a chance to digest emotionally charged moments – but guess what? There were next to none of those moments you needed to digest or that would emotionally drain you because almost no one (and especially no one people cared about) died.
You get these slower moments in concerts, too, so that the audience doesn't get worn out after a hot start. But you don't get a slow section each time after two faster songs and if you have ever been at a concert where the hot start didn't materialize for some reason you know that the slower section tends to drag on and get boring. And that happend to this episode, too. The constant stop and go didn't create immersion, it took away from the flow of things and got boring in the end. Especially as EVERYTHING was telegraphed from a mile away. The plot armor was established right from the start and after that every (un)surprising turn was so obvious it didn't feel like GoT anymore. By putting EVERY major character in a do or die situation towards the end it was clear as day 5-10 minutes from the end (whenever the slow music started) that the night king would be killed right now because otherwise EVERY major character would have to die and the series would be essentially over not even half-way through the season.
It was WAY too obvious and could have been avoided so easily by having some characters who everyone believed to die continue the fight (Brienne, Tormund, Greyworm etc) while others (like Dany, Jaimie, Sam) could have saved the people in the crypts and started to flee through the tunnels that Sansa knows from there. That way the suspense about what would happen would have been kept open until the final seconds – but nope, once again Benioff and Weiss used a hamfisted approach to telegraph the end from a mile away and it made the act of killing the night king a mere formality.

And despite what people may think after my last comment about how I wanted the Whitewalkers to win because that was the most logical conclusion to the story in my opinion I wouldn't have been opposed to the humans winning if it was shown and explained in a great way. I would have had the night king win this battle convincingly and with some characters just getting crushed (not getting a hero's death) and sending the rest of the pack running. Because as was established the size of the army of the dead isn't important it's just about one character. So have them fly with the dragons to Dragonstone and for example let Bran have a vision because of the cave drawings there that tells him something about the past of the nightking or how to defeat him. And let the human interaction with Cersei be about saving the world instead of just a puny struggle about the throne. And no matter how it would end exactly (in episode 5 at Kings Landing after the Whitewalkers overrun the Riverlands in episode 4, episode 6 would be the epilogue to tie together the remaining characters' arcs) I always envisioned Bran sacrificing himself to either defeat, trap or at least distract the night king so someone else like Arya or Jon could kill him.

But I digress and the main sin, the original sin, is still to come:

With "The Long Night" Game of Thrones has given up what made it unique and special and turned into just another series about human power struggles and relationship drama.

This is the big one, the major flaw, and why this episode damages the entire series in retrospect. By getting rid of the Whitewalkers and the Night King so easily and swiftly GoT doubled down on the fact that the puny struggle by some people about who rules a certain piece of land for some time is THE story, the main story that counts, everything else was just fluff to stretch the run time. If you thought otherwise you fooled yourself, there's no deeper meaning here, no layers, THAT is your story. And it's a story we have seen sooo many times before because human history has been that for thousands of years, we can watch documentaries about that topic or read about in history books… and guess what, reality was way more gruesome than GoT ever was by the way. The show voluntarily gave away its uniqueness and turned itself into something all too common… If I want to see people fight over power I just need to turn on the news…

It is no coincidence that there's a correlation between the disappointment people are feeling and how invested they were in the story. If you look at content creators, they are the ones underwhelmed, not because of their high expectations or their fanboy toxicity but because they know best that this episode devalues so much of what came before. The Whitewalker symbols you analyzed and discussed in videos for hours? Didn't matter (and where apparently just meant to be some form of blasphemy according to Benioff and Weiss)… The prophecies you analyzed and discussed with friends for hours? Didn't matter… It was all just an illusion, just imagination, parts of the story that were teased but that you actually made up in your mind. The real story always was about the stupid struggle for the pointy throne after all. Everything else you thought about GoT was in your head, a story you made up yourself that meant absolutely NOTHING. To be honest I wouldn't be surprised if a character went up to Jon Snow in the next episode and told him "That was the great danger you were crowing on about for years?!?"

It looks like Benioff and Weiss forgot everything that happened before during the two year break because otherwise it would mean they chose to ignore everything that came before on purpose which would make it even more of a sin. You have to wonder why the children of the forest opted for fighting the whitewalkers, pushing them back and building a huge magic wall instead of just putting a little dagger into the night king like Arya… But I guess it's my fault for thinking like that, asking these questions and trying to find explanations…

A lot of people draw comparisons to The Walking Dead or tell you the Nightwalkers never were the main plot much like the zombies aren't the main plot there and that it's all about the people and relationships. But on the one hand that comparison is flawed and on the other hand it's just a very hollow interpretation in my opinion.
It's flawed because the zombies in Walking Dead are a dangerous but passive force, if you make a mistake you die just like in GoT (or at least it was like that), whereas the Night King and therefore the Whitewalkers were very much active and apparently objective-driven. Therefore these two should never be put in the same category. But the more important part is the second one:

The Walking Dead just like Game of Thrones now voluntarily gave up what made it unique and special.

There are hundreds of series about people, relationship drama, power struggles. These are run of the mill topics that wouldn't get people's attention. What gets people's attention is the Unique Selling Proposition as it's called in marketing. What makes this series about people stand out from the others? Why is it special? What's unique about it? All of that meaning: Why is it worth my time?

What made The Walking Dead stand out all those years ago and got them viewers was that there were these characters with their relationship problems, strengths and weaknesses and human/power struggles EMBEDDED into the larger context of the zombie apocalypse. That is important because these plots were connected and finely balanced. There was an overarching story about what was going on, why it happened and the characters made decisions based on this (for example trying to get to the cdc in the first season, trying to find a safe space to hide/survive or trying to get to a military base because one of them had said he knows a cure and needs to get it there). People died because of their own mistakes or those of others and the threat felt real at all times while the characters struggled to progress in their story as well as the bigger story.
And then all of that changed and the zombies just became background noise, a nuisance easily dealt with and the show focussed entirely on the human problems, the relationship drama and the power struggles between groups (and logic went out of the window too many times one has to add). And guess what? That's when it started to tank in the ratings because that's nothing special at all – no matter how well it's done. The Walking Dead voluntarily gave up it's unique selling proposition and became a boring, run of the mill (and in many ways nonsensical) story.

And the same has now happened to Game of Thrones. The way I interpreted the story (and I know a lot of people saw it that way) was that there were these characters fighting for power and might, playing their stupid Game of Thrones while not realizing or not caring about the real threat looming on the horizon. That was a unique story, a new way to embed people and relationship drama. It was obvious the Whitewalkers and the Night King weren't the main plot but an absolutely necessary side plot to give the main plot way more meaning than it would ever had on its own. And by not only giving up on that part of the story so easily but also telling the viewers you were stupid for ever believing it was more than some background noise, some nuisance that you could swat away like a fly the series devalued itself – not only what is to come but also all the season that came before. Now it's obvious that the story you thought you were being told wasn't all that special and that viewers (and people commenting and analyzing) projected meaning that was never there. And unsurprisingly, people aren't happy about that…

I would count myself among them because in retrospect I feel my time with Game of Thrones was wasted. I don't care about what happens in the coming episodes because I can't see Cersei and Euron as credible threats and if they would kill a lot of characters it would make the Night King even weaker in comparison. I would rather have Jon and Dany just burn down Kings Landing with the dragons (both survived of course despite one's stomach being clawed open by another dragon and Drogon being stabbed with the aequivalent of thousand toothpicks…) and then celebrate with Ewoks… Yeah, that sounds appropriate…

Season 7 was difficult to stomach and definitely the end of the honeymoon period with the series because the flaws couldn't be overlooked anymore. But at least the Night King killing a dragon, getting it on his own side and destroying the wall left the door open for a thrilling final season where the ridiculous human struggle for power and the overarching story of the living vs the dead would be connected and finally reveal the larger lesson and meaning of the story. But we all know now that will never happen because there is no larger lesson, no deeper meaning, no layers. The story was always about the stupid relationship drama and the human struggle for power. The only difference now is that the characters (much like in the Walking Dead or Star Wars) have turned from relatable people into perfect idols where everyone is superhuman or gets his redemption and/or a hero's death. Once again, Game of Thrones is now just another fairy tale, a fantasy story like so many others…

And that realization means that season 8 has been the falling out of love for me. If you have ever experienced this you know what I'm talking about. You thought you were still in love, had a special bond, but then there's that day or moment that makes you realize, you just imagined that. There is nothing special there anymore and there hasn't been for quite some time… And unless you want to punish yourself for not realizing it sooner that's the time to say good-bye.

So here it goes: Thank you for the memories, it's a shame it had to end like this, good-bye Game of Thrones.

Why you traitorous, narrow-minded, random fool-EGON! Take that to your disloyal gizzard! Touche!

With that out of the way, I thank you for your entirely valid, and well argued points. I especially like the one about Tormund's unexplained survival and arrival at Winterfell. And it would truly be interesting to see the Night King wipe out Westeros.

But you know what Mark Twain said about fiction? "Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities. Truth isn't." Ironically, this is doubly true of fantasy fiction.

It was quite refreshing to have a fantasy series that seemed so real with so many major characters meeting early ends (and it would be a nice, consistent touch for the Night King to wipe out all the rest). But Egon, you must have known that that could not continue indefinitely in GOT, at least not without alienating most of its audience. Because in the end, most people don't want their fiction, especially their fantasy, to be too realistic. We want it to be mythic and archetypal, fair and balanced.

Do you think our ancient hunter-gatherer ancestors told and retold strictly factual, realistic tales, around their camp fires? I think not. Like them we dislike too much meaningless randomness. But unlike them we also want to escape from a real civilization where inequality, wealth, power and unfairness always seem to prevail. We want to experience a world as it *should* be, not as our "civilized" and random world actually is. We want a respite from the "real" world, and we desperately hope GOT will provide that respite, that ending, however "unrealistic" the ending turns out to be. (But it does have to be a close call, with some random surprises thrown in. Otherwise just wake us up when it's finally over.)

In summary, you are right with your criticisms, but so is the Unaffiliated Critic with his praises. And thanks again for your delightful comment.

I understand that this is a special situation because the know about the army approaching but that's another illogical plot point: How do they know about it? From a group of people where some of them like Tormund were on top of the wall WHILE it was already falling down and still survived… HOW?!? And after that they missed the whitewalkers at Last Hearth but were fast enough to go around them without being detected and bring these news to Winterfell. Sorry, but GoT has pulled these mind-numbingly stupid moves too many times in the last few seasons to just ignore them…

Since the show has overtaken the books GoT has just turned into fairy tale 101, just like the real Aegon Targaryen died in s05e10 which is were his story should have ended. The reanimated corpse of Jon Snow is just a plot device filled to the brim with fairy tale tropes. And that's the reason why his love story with Dany felt hollow and artificial (apart from the two actors having absolutely zero chemistry): Because it felt unnatural and forced (in contrast to his love to Ygritte that progressed naturally or the relationship between Jaime and Cersei which is probably the best told love story in the entire series). And the show itself confirmed that this love story is absolutely hollow with the final scene in the crypt. Just hours before that Dany confessed to Sansa how deep her love to Jon is (while still thinking about Drogo…) but after he said he could have a claim to "her" throne she looked like she wanted to kill him. My impression of that look on her face was: "I should just fly away with my dragons and leave you here to die so no one will ever know about your claim to my throne."
That just confirmed that her character hasn't changed one bit through all the seasons. Her supposed change and growth was just lip service, she is still a ruthless, selfish, entitled tyrant just like Cersei – and the show has confirmed that at various points throughout the series where she showed absolutely no regard for human life. The only creatures Dany cares about are herself and her children/dragons – again just like Cersei…

And this is the point where I have to critique the author of this article – because this main character arc doesn't fit his narratives he just ignores it although it's the main interaction of the episode between two of the main protagonists. By saying he doesn't care he more or less confirms my impression that the main story of GoT is limping along to the finish line – and it has been limping along for quite some time now.
Unfortunately, I fully expect them to copy the Battle of Helms Deep in the next episode and pull another deus ex machina saved just in the nick of time out of their fairy tale hat just like they already did in season 6 (Sansa and Littlefinger arriving with the knights just at the right time at the Battle of the Bastards) and in season 7 (Dany arriving with the dragons just at the right moment), this time probably with Melisandra doing her best/worst Gandalf impression.
Let's face it: GoT is just like any other fantasy series ever by now and it may hurt some more than others. Some may have more goodwill built up because of the great early seasons, others may find solace in the stories of minor/side characters but the main story is collapsing just like the wall. If the army of the dead is defeated in episode 3 and we have to look forward to more than half of the season still left just of high-school romance and drama as well as stupid arguments, backstabbing and nonsensical talk between the remaining human protagonists on a level of series like 90210, Melrose Place, Gossip Girl, Bold and Beautiful etc. I won't be watching.

I fully expect the GoT white knights to arrive just in the nick of time to call me random labels like "narrow-minded" etc again but I don't care. I won't apologize for my opinions about this (once great) series and I even admit and understand that my impressions may be influenced by how I feel the series should end: With the Night King overrunning Westeros. Not because I'm nihilistic or miserable but because it would be the logical lesson and conclusion to a story that shows (primarily) the weaknesses of humans. And that's why the final scene in the crypt – unfortunately ignored by the Unaffiliated critic – was the most important of them all.

Even now, despite knowing about the danger and with the army of the dead approaching, Dany is more worried about the Iron Throne and her selfish needs than anything else. Her "love" to Jon Snow seemed to evaporate in a single second. And with leaders like that and Cersei it should come as no surprise that the struggling and infighting humans should get decimated. Moreover, if even the children of the forest and the first men working together couldn't kill the Night King but just push him back and lock him out with the help of a magic wall why should it happen now? He should be immune to dragon glass as he has had a large junk inside of him since his creation and the show itself showed him to be immune to (dragon) fire in s07e06 when he walked right through it before throwing the spear. He shouldn't be killed because death can only be avoided for so long, not forever… And Westeros' time has come…

I think that is not only the crossbow Tyrion used to kill Tywin, but also the crossbow Joffrey used to torment people for several seasons.

Thank you.

My bet is on Jon "winning" and then having his dragon melt the iron throne.

Really appreciated the perspective you gave that the characters don't know what we know. When I re-watched the episode, those seemingly superfluous/wasted moments became more necessary IMHO.

And this: "To date, I’ve written over a quarter of a million words on Game of Thrones."
You certainly have – and with much talent – so again, I thank you!

I'm purchasing the Kindle e-book right after this post, but if I may offer a suggestion (as I have helped a novelist friend do this), look into publishing them as paperbacks on KDP. KDP prints your book on demand, and I would definitely purchase them again as tangible items (I love real books!).

Thanks, Sean. Enjoy!

Thanks, Ro! I really appreciate it, and I hope you enjoy the book.

Your assessment of Jon and his actions is flawed, in multiple ways, making you narrow-minded about his character…

You said, \"He tried to appease everyone,\" but that is not really true; he tried to do what was right: it wasn\'t about appeasement at all, it was about survival against The Night King (a.k.a. \"breaking down walls\" between the people).

You said, \"he made so many enemies along the way he finally got killed by his own brothers and a little boy\". However, those that killed him were not *all* of his brothers, but a minority faction of malcontents inside the Watch, and their actions were in no way a representative consequence of the overall work he had done uniting the disparate factions. The Wildlings, and all those in the Watch who didn\'t participate in the mutiny-murder, accepted Jon\'s call to unite against their common foe (again, \"breaking down walls\"). If anything, Jon\'s reanimation was a righting-of-wrongs after his unnecessary death, in much the same way allowing the Wildlings through the Wall was a righting-of-wrongs after the unnecessary battle for the Wall led by Mance Rayder. Melisandre\'s doubt is *self*-doubt, an issue of her own faith in light of recent failures, not an issue of Jon\'s unworthiness to return to the living.

You said, \"Jon Snow never paid for his mistakes,\" but again, this is a mischaracterization, because Jon didn\'t make a mistake. Jon uniting the Watch and the Wildlings wasn\'t a mistake, it wasn\'t unanimously agreed upon, but falling short of unanimous approval does not automatically equal a mistake (this actually proves he wasn\'t trying to appease *everyone*). Reaping what he had truly sown was fulfilled with the Wildlings fighting alongside him in the Battle of the Bastards; his untimely death actually undermined the very concept you preach (reaping and sowing), because it seemed he would not get to see the fruits of his labors (\"breaking down walls\" between Wildlings and Crows).

If you want a different example of someone actually not facing consequences, Sam faced literally no reprisal whatsoever for the theft of Heartsbane, the ancestral Valyrian blade of House Tarly; you would think his father, while still alive, would have sent out a search party, or at least would have mentioned it in passing to Jaime or someone around him, etc. The Ringer has a good write-up on this angle.

All that being said, I somewhat agree with you on the part the gods play in the story, and I am likewise concerned it will not be explained in the show. I do hope you enjoy the final season.

I really like your GoT reviews but I'm kind of surprised about the praise of Jon Snow here and in your other reviews. In my opinion he isn't the hero of the story, the savior, the ultimate boundary-crosser, on the contrary, he is the point where the logic of the story fell on its face, the deus-ex machina the story needed to progress in a "positive direction" – just like Gandalf saving everyone juuust at the right time, at that moment Lord of the Rings was finally uninteresting for me.

The truth is Jon Snow is dead and should remain dead. He tried to appease everyone – or as you put it decide what's right for sometimes selfish reasons like love – that he made so many enemies along the way he finally got killed by his own brothers and a little boy. He paid the price for his behavior just like Robb did before. But where Robb stayed dead, Jon Snow had to magically be reanimated to give the story a positive spin. That was the moment I turned sour on GoT and season seven's weird pacing, logical flaws and rush towards an action-packed end made it worse.

There is only one way this huge spot can be explained – and I doubt it will happen in the TV series: The question of fate vs self determination. All along we have seen talk about gods, the god without face, the god of light etc. Apparently there are gods at work in the background as one of the characters claims to have been reanimated multiple times… why? And for what cause? Is this really all a game played by god(s) who use the characters as pawns with a pre-determined end so that they can just interfere with death as they like? That overarching story needs to be answered to make any sense of Jon Snow's reanimation – otherwise that's the point the story broke down for good. Even Melisandre was surprised it worked which points to some other powers and forces being the real driving force…

I'll wait for the final season to conclude for final thoughts and assessments but that was the moment for me when GoT started to fade because before that moment people paid for what they had sown. The series was compelling because all characters were shades of grey and if they made mistakes they had to pay for them – at least somewhere down the line… Jon Snow never paid for his mistakes, he is the one who doesn't fit in the story. Despite all the magic and dragons, he is the rainbow unicorn. As a consequence of all his decisions and what he has done Jon Snow should be dead and it would make GoT a way better story.

When Littlefinger was saying that, I thought back at the screen something like, 'Let's play that little game with you. What's the worst reason you have for what you're saying and doing?' My guess is Sansa thought pretty much the same thing, and it was the turning point for her realizing how Littlefinger was manipulating her and Arya. If so, that line was his fatal mistake.

While we can agree Littlefinger got what he deserved, that wasn't exactly a fair trial. Sansa acted as both prosecutor and judge, admitting into evidence her brother's psychic visions. Granted, previous trials in "Game of Thrones" weren't fair either.

Loved Jamie's logic: "If the dead win, they will march south and kill us all! If the living win, and know we betrayed them, they will march south and kill us all!." That Cersei isn't swayed, despite pretending to be rational earlier, shows just how much of a sociopath she has become.

Hurray!

Though I'm sure that was sarcastic (and I don't blame you): Yes! Any day now!
(And other exciting new stuff coming too.)

Any day now!

Not too far off topic, the fourth and, by far, darkest season of "Supergirl" has twice had uncanny timing. The episode detailing how steel plant owner's son and former college professor Ben Lockwood slowly radicalized and became an anti-alien domestic terrorist aired the day after the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre. The episode catching up on Kara's amnesiac doppelganger in the former Soviet republic of 'Kaznia' (By the way, Melissa Benoist speaks very convincing Russian.) aired on the weekend of the release of "Us" and the 'Barr'ing of the Mueller report.

Well as to that…
https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/george-fielding-eliot/the-copper-bowl-short-reads/9780330537612

That's incredible and it's amazing how time flies. Look forward to it and hopefully "The Dirty Dozen" finally makes it into the National Film Registry later this year!

Glad you found us, Joe. And good news: BOTH of those movies are on our list. (June—the 50th Anniversary of The Wild Bunch—would be a good bet for that one.)

If it isn't on the watch list, what would be awesome is a viewing of "The Dirty Dozen" (1967). Plan B being "The Wild Bunch" (1969).

Get well soon and regards from Australia,
Joe

I myself am an inveterate romantic and earnest to a fault. However, one of my favourite movie romances is James Cameron's "The Abyss". I'm not kidding.

The Academy has always been overly impressed with actors who direct: Redford, Beatty, Costner, Gibson, and Eastwood (twice) all won Best Director over much better nominees.

Wolfgang Petersen directed a remake, "Poseidon," which I have not seen, in part because the mostly negative reviews indicated that its bootstraps political messaging is more in-your-face than in the first film.

Speaking of Dante in TV, there's also his prescient 1997 made-for-cable movie, "The Second Civil War," in which a refugee crisis sets the plot in motion.

I really need to watch Gremlins 2. And it's so strange to me that Dante's working mostly in TV these days, directing episodes of Hawaii 5-0.

Thank you, Sam.

One possible reason the the sequel, "Gremlins 2: the new Batch", is being re-assessed is the gremlins' target in the 1990 film is the Trump Organization. (Of course, the names are changed. You know how litigious Trump is.)

Another Joe Dante film in a similar vein, which I enjoyed more than most critics and think deserves re-assessment is the 1998 "Small Soldiers".

Weird. I'm relaunching the site early in the new year, newly designed, so hopefully these problems will disappear (and new ones, inevitably, will start showing up).

I thought that was why WordPress wasn't working, but it didn't seem to work with the revised comment either. When commenting on other reviews, a comment, once submitted, appears saying it is awaiting moderation, but attempts to comment on "Brazil" just vanished.

I ended up using the Facebook comment plugin instead. Sorry about that causing it to appear twice.

The comments system stopped you from writing "S.O.B."? I have no idea why. I can't find anything in my settings that filters profanity, and that shouldn't even count as profanity. Truly bizarre.

I long ago bought Jack Matthews' book, "The Battle of Brazil", and admire Terry Gilliam for standing up to the studio. Though it's perplexing why Gilliam would try to defend Harvey Weinstein, given that Weinstein violated not only women, but also foreign films for which he purchased the US distribution rights and had his way with them, much like what Sid Sheinberg had wanted to do with "Brazil." For one such film, "Snowpiercer," which bears stylistic and thematic similarities to Gilliam's work, director Bong Joon-ho fought Weinstein much like Gilliam had fought Sheinberg and eventually got the uncut version released.

Yeah, that's a plot point that's definitely included more for the metaphor and humor than for any kind of realism. But I like the idea that when animals run out in front of our cars they're really trying to kill us so they can eat us.

And, yes, the scene of Mr. Smith punching reporters is very problematic today.

That sounds like a wise approach to this season. I am still very unsure what to make of it all, but I will wait and see what the final four episodes have to offer.

My plan exactly! (See below.) And I agree about the historicals being the interesting ones: the others aren't terrible—they're better than Chibnall's usual stories—but they seem a little phoned-in and formulaic.

No, I haven't given up, I'm just way behind. At this point, I'm probably going to skip writing about "Arachnids" and "Tsuranga," but I'm hoping to have my review of "Demons" up by Sunday. And for the rest of the season I may only write about the ones I think worth writing about. (I didn't think "Arachnids" or "Tsuranga" were terrible, but I also didn't find much interesting in them to discuss.)

The 12th Doctor's last words as he was regenerating were to "be kind," and, apparently, the 13th Doctor has honored her predecessor's dying wish as a guiding principle.

For me, Chris Chibnall's experience in "Torchwood" is a net plus, having found its first three seasons highly engaging, especially the latter half of Season 2. Its fourth season, however, was a letdown.

We've both seen Fantasia, of course. The Secret of NIMH—and the whole Don Bluth Disney split and oeuvre—is one of many things I meant to mention in this discussion, but just didn't get around to. (Off the top of my head, I also forgot Rikki Tikki Tavi and Charlotte's Web, surely two favorite animations in my own childhood.) These conversations are as meandering and disorganized as they sound; I have notes, but I seldom get around to everything in them.

I knew about The Plague Dogs by reputation—and, again, meant to mention it—but I've actually never seen it. Maybe the UC and I will watch it together for a future episode.

Don Bluth's "The Secret of N.I.M.H.," also involving animals escaped from a lab, came out the same year, but the comparison ends there. There are no super-intelligent rodents or magical stones to save the heroes in "The Plague Dogs."

There are, however, reasons to also see "The Secret of N.I.M.H.": animation of a quality that Disney was no longer producing, a mouse heroine who finds her bravery, and a score by the great Jerry Goldsmith.

Speaking of music, a classic animated film that is a must-see if you have not seen it is "Fantasia."

I forgot to mention "The Girl with All the Gifts," which is essentially what happens if they didn't kill the zombie baby.

Personally, I prefer the recently evolved sub-genre of zombies who are conscious, have personalities, and are the protagonists of their stories. Examples are the movie, "Warm Bodies," the BBC series, "In the Flesh," and the admittedly uneven CW series, "I Zombie."

"Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom": The heroes in this one are saved, not by magic, but by their own actions, enabling it to have most thrilling third act of the three films, despite having the worst acts one and two. The downsides are the misogynistic treatment of Kate Capshaw's character and the orientalism, mentioned by the Unenthusiastic Critic, which extends to the scenes in India and led to an official protest from the Indian government.

"Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade": Though awake for 100% of it, I recall few details. The presence of Sean Connery as Indy's father was a plus. There was, however, a missed opportunity in the casting of the Grail Knight. John Cleese in a surprise cameo would have brought the house down. A question I had at the end of the film was how much did drinking from the grail extend Indy's and his father's lifespans. Apparently not much, since although I have not seen "Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," the clips and what I've read indicate Indy is aging normally. I don't recall much about Elsa, but from your descriptions, she fits the pattern of women characters in George Lucas productions post-Leia.

Thanks, Sam. We tend towards self-deprecation, so we understated our listenership slightly. But I agree we should have a larger audience. To that end, I hope our (dozens of!) fans consider leaving us a review on iTunes and proselytizing for us on social media. Every little bit helps.

And, as far as I'm concerned, any discussion of Trump that omits the words "white supremacy" is incomplete and irresponsible. But that's me.

A side note: Angela Lansbury was only 3 years older than Laurence Harvey yet was so convincing playing his mother.

The discussion of Russia and white supremacy was echoed in Bill Maher's show last night.

"What was he doing with his hands?" What do people do with their hands today? They push tiny buttons and scroll through card-size pages on phones, with their faces glued to the screen, walking like zombies, addicted and suggestible. That's how Russian social media manipulators got just enough of them in the right states to tip the scale for what Paul Krugman termed, "The Siberian Candidate."

You guys left out that the plan that Goldfinger lays out with the big map to the guys he immediately kills is the FAKE plan.

James Bond movies are all terrible. Except for Goldeneye.

More wine, perhaps, but otherwise not so different from a normal episode. (That she still makes really excellent observations while totally sloshed is one of the great mysteries of my wife.) But I'm glad you found us: let us know if you like the sober episodes as well.

Vito doesn't want to pivot to video. That's excellent.

Wow, you stumped the band: I'd never heard of "$." (I see from IMDB it's pronounced "Dollars," which would not occur to me: I'd probably call it "Dollar Sign" or "Sssssss," like the great Dirk Benedict-turns-into-a-snake movie. Either way, it sounds like the title was not the only reason the movie is obscure…)

And for some reason, just this moment, I just remembered another great "stealing from criminals" movie: "The Silent Partner," with Elliot Gould as a bank teller who rips off bank-robber Christopher Plummer. (I haven't seen it since I was a kid, but I still remember CP as the kind of chillingly scary bastard you do NOT want to double-cross.) Looks like it's on Amazon: I may go watch that and see if it's as good as I remember.

Yes, "Dog Day Afternoon" is a great film, for all the reasons you've stated, and I'm looking forward to your review of "Network".

Re the pre-screening discussion of films where the protagonists steal from more professional criminals, and it goes badly, there is a notable exception: the 1971 safe-deposit box heist movie with the one symbol title "$".

I overall agree with the rest of the list.

Yeah, I need to watch TLJ again—I've only seen it once—but I came out of this viewing of ROTJ convinced Johnson was reacting to it (and often against it) specifically.

And that's interesting about "Solo"—though, since it's a prequel, the Droid Rights activists apparently didn't make much headway…

I really liked the first season of Humans. I keep meaning to catch up with it, so thanks for the reminder.

"Solo" partly addresses the issue you raised that the droids should rise up against the humans and other creatures enslaving them. Lando's copilot, L3-37, is a rights activist who seizes upon an opportunity to lead a revolt both of droid slaves and the flesh and blood kind.

A more straightforward take on robot rebellion than in the convoluted "Westworld" can be found in the British series "Humans," whose third season now airing in the UK is surprisingly analogous to real world events.

Hi, Sara. I'm glad the piece was useful to you! I'm not exactly sure what you're asking, however. Are you asking what I call these? If so, I suppose they're not really "reviews," so I guess "essay" or "analysis" would be the closest approximations. (I tend to call them, "That thing I wrote," so feel free to get creative.) And let me know if I've misunderstood the question.

And I'd love to read your piece when it's published. (Maybe I'll even understand some of it.)

M.

It will definitely be up before the next episode airs. (So that gives me another year, right?)