Sheldon is actually a well-written, three-dimensional character… sometimes.  Other times he's a repetitive riff.  It depends on the episode (sometimes it depends on the season).  If you put together just his best episodes - mostly the ones where he pairs off with Penny for some reason as well as the last few that…

"But I have met many a person with otherwise excellent taste purport to genuinely enjoy BBT, which is just…strange."

@avclub-c156902f5b20b572848be18c11634dfb:disqus  Good post.

What?  A sitcom where the characters seem ridiculous and the joke is frequently at their expense??  I can't believe this has happened!

The franchise

Exactly, man.  Exactly.  Lithgow was transcendent and we got a last peek at the great Frank Lundy, but much of the writing that year was puzzlingly stupid, and it was one of the worst as far as pointless and ongoing side character bullshit.  (In seasons 1-3, the side character stuff more often tied into Dexter's main…

They needed to kill him under the circumstances - no going back from that point.  But they should have had Dexter do it, then dealt with the consequences instead of Dextering them under the rug.  (Yes, I'm trying to make that a thing.)  Also, they needed to replace him with some kind of persistent lawful threat to…

I'll stand up for season 5.  It's the only tolerable season of the last 4.  Actually I think I liked it better than 3; at least it wasn't completely boring and forgettable, though the writing was probably a bit worse.

@avclub-6fe1e85f49aff7aaf3710a9707135ef8:disqus  The problem with season 4, and one which was arbitrarily and pointlessly repeated in this finale episode, was that there were consequences for Dexter's actions, but they were the wrong actions.  Trinity killed Rita… but only because Dexter didn't kill Trinity fast…

Season 2 > Season 1 >>>>>> Season 4 >> Season 5 (yep) > Season 3 >>>>>>> Season 7 >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Season 6 >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>…….. >>>>>>> Season 8

Quinn has always been a decent actor - he's just not a good character.  You're right though, this looked like his best work.  Everybody else was pretty horrible.

The Julia Stiles season was like fine-spun gold compared to this final year.  I'm actually nostalgiac for it.  It had a theme, an overall plot structure that seemed to be considered in advance, and a pretty reasonable downer ending.  The Big Bad sucked and there was more tippy-toeing around Deb finding out, and that…

Boardwalk's reputation seems to be exactly right: it's well-made but it's kind of dull a lot of the time.

Zero percent chance that machine gun is for Elliott or Gretchen.  Sub-zero, even.  I don't understand how you people watch TV that you think this is on the table.  I'll give you this, though - you're not as insane as the people that still think he's going to murder Skyler for no reason whatsoever.

I think it's really weird that people ever expected Walt to kill Skyler, but it's particularly weird that you still think it NOW.

Pointing out that a thing is liked predominantly by men or women is not inherently misogynistic.  If anything, it's mean to nerds, not to women.  And also, it's painfully close to being the truth (says a guy who played D&D for roughly fifteen years, and with barely a woman in sight among the dozens upon dozens of…

95% of the customers for D&D and comics are guys.  Source: my lifetime of being into those things (and other geeky or semi-geeky pursuits such as heavy metal and shooter games). It's not accurate to say a woman has never played D&D, but it's close enough for a joke.

I think the Bruce Hornsbyness of "End of the Innocence" helps it.  Did he play on that song?  Or write it?

That song is terrible. 

What's weird is that "Boys of Summer" was the first Don Henley song that existed for me, since it was a huge hit right when I was getting into that age when you pay attention to music and try to know who sings what.  I loved it, and therefore I loved Don Henley.  As soon as I had money, I bought a tape by him -…