Yeah, you're probably right.

Oh, sure - I'd imagine the posters I'm thinking of were mostly bought by foreigners too. I was just responding to your original proposition of "do communists outside of Russia give a shit about Lenin?", to which I still think the answer is "officially, yes, kind of."

Yep, you beat me to it. When I was a student there many, many years ago, you used to be able to buy posters of Lenin (& Marx) in the shops, so one would assume he was officially well-regarded by the Chinese leadership.

Awesome! It's the day my Birds of a Feather / West Wing crossover fanfic community has been praying for!

Only if he dies soon (do you know something we don't?) - that's the way Roger Ebert's "Betsy Rule" works, anyway.

So, "Gaia Scodellaro" is apparently the actual name of an actress in this show, and not just some kind of epic misrendering of "Kaya Scodelario" (i.e., the actress from Skins (UK), Clash of the Titans, The Maze Runner)? One of them should change their name.

Ha! Yep, I had one of those lists for my Dad too, although it was mostly queries about American things mentioned in MAD that were unknown in 1970s Australia, like: Mr. Clean; The John Birch Society; Preparation H; Anita Bryant; Air Wick. (We have Air Wick in Australia now though, so: progress!)

Oh yeah, I remember that. Mostly because it involved me asking my parents what a slut was…

Are you all right? Do you need help with any hard-to-discuss mental wellness issues? I'm here for you, man.

Yep, that's Perth alright.

I have nothing germane to add to this, but would just like to remark that where I live (Perth), there's a bar that rather pathetically advertises itself as being "like the best pub in Melbourne - right here in Perth!" This is what happens when you live 2,500 kms away from the rest of civilisation.

Yes, I don't suppose most people have any idea what Beowulf is all about (other than a vague sense of Tolkienesque/Game of Thrones-type goings-on, maybe?). Perhaps it's the Angelina Jolie version from a few years back that's ultimately to blame for making this production viable.

If they did, I think I might actually respect that effort somewhat more than what they seem to have done, even if they failed in the attempt.

That's eminently sensible and fair-minded, but I guess I'm just a bit tired of all these modernized and mashed-up retellings of fairy tales, childhood stories and the like (e.g. Once Upon a Time, Snow White and the Huntsman, that stupid Peter Pan movie, etc, etc) - they're mostly crap, and you come away from them…

Ok, fine, let's turn Beowulf into an "unapologetic fantasy" instead of telling a story that has any kind of fidelity to the source material, but then what's the fucking point, in the end? Why did they bother doing an adaptation at all?

Yeah, you never know. Chad Michael Murray is the last person I would've thought of to play an unreconstructed 1940's-era male, but he generally acquits himself pretty well on this show.

He actually seems to enjoy this show (unlike Agents of SHIELD), so I'm prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Sorry, but there's a ranking, and it goes like this:
1st: the original BBC radio series from the late 1970s
Equal 1st: the novels (though the first three are the best)
Distant 2nd: the BBC TV series from the 1980s
Extremely Distant, Not Really Even Competitive 3rd: the 2005 movie, which, let's face it, if it wasn't for…

If you have them, turn on the subtitles. It really helps.

Me too, but I strongly suspect that you could distill it down to "there's no I in team".