The really weird thing about the Space Irish is … okay, so Riker isn't happy sharing his DNA.  And Picard says that the crew won't be fine with it either.  A little conservative and petty (and quite funny when Riker says how diminished he would be by being duplicated, when *we* know that he already has been), but Star…

One of the things I like about Pen Pals, actually, is that it sort of echoes a previous episode - Contagion, I think? - where Picard and Wesley talk about why the death of one person affects someone more than the death of hundreds.  Sarjenka's plight is easy for Picard to talk about in abstract terms, as merely an…

When alien species find the remains of human civilisation 100,000 years from now, they will puzzle over who keeps making these new episodes of The Simpsons.

Non-geeks don't understand that this is exactly how geeks show they love you - by obsessing over flaws that they only notice because they love you so much.

Comic rule of thumb: if you have to have a character say something like "Now THAT'S funny!" to indicate that something was funny, you shouldn't write about comedy.  Because the awful thing about "Okona" is that Data is pretty much ALWAYS funny.  Not just to the audience, but to everyone on the ship.  It never made…

"Instead, she's a bigot, and a charmless one. That's bad enough, but the way the rest of the crew treats her concerns as if they're worthy of argument is bizarre."

Have to say, the show's been hit and miss since its return, but this was one of the strongest episodes in the whole run.  I guess they've had it in the works for a long time.

I hope he gets trampled by a giraffe.

It's probably been said, but the big reveal re Staanz in The Flax could've worked a lot better if Staanz was just, you know… gay?

"Dowd's hatred for Millar is so apparent in this review that I have to assume he's read a fair amount of Millar's works. "

Haha, yes, of course, anyone who doesn't like anything just COULD NOT TAKE THE REALNESS.

I suppose it's more the fact that it's trying to dress it up as ironic or critical of those kinds of power fantasies, while it's actually just taking them to their logically unpleasant conclusion.  Whereas traditionally superhero movies ride the adolescent power fantasy and then try and offer some kind of loose "yeah,…

I'm sort of reassured that people didn't care for Kick-Ass.  It seemed like a movie that I was going to have to put up with everyone liking it.

Kinda confusing to refer to "classical" plot structure in opposition to Greek (i.e. classical) tragedy.  Shakespeare used the five-act classical plot structure - he didn't invent it, it existed already!

All of Shakespeare is over-rated?  Even the stuff that no one, um, rates?

Literally only heard of this movie as a result of it getting panned.  I've only seen one ad for it since.  I think that might have contributed to its failure.

One of the nice things about South Park is that, while it does occasionally do things that seem intended purely to court controversy, you don't get the sense that Stone & Parker are actually *disappointed* when they don't.  If anything, I think they're relieved when Society recognises that they're trying to get a rise…