I like to think alternate-universe Rusty isn't really any more competent, and still bald—he's just as full of bombast and self-delusion as regular Rusty, only happened to successfully get his musical off the ground, and has a good hairpiece.

I'm not talking about the novelty of floorplans adapted from the sets of television shows, but the sets as functional stages for producing television shows.

I'd love a whole series just analyzing the sets and production design of various television shows.  Frazier having the greatest sets of all time from technical and aesthetic standpoints, Cheers also having a brilliantly designed set for making the most of actor interactions and the 3-camera setup, Roseanne and All in…

The name always struck me as a really unfortunate choice to settle on.  How can one ever encounter it and not think "[Malcolm in] The Middle?"

Even if the following seasons were weaker than the first, the show remained elevated above other sitcoms for its entire run.

"Roseanne" had a very authentically mid-western working class production design.  I always felt like with "Roseanne" that I knew that house, had friends and relatives who lived exactly like that. But "Malcolm in the Middle" felt more realistic about what it's like to be fucking broke all the time.

I loved when there was a moment between Nancy and Bobby where Bobby's wordless reaction opened up the possibility that maybe even he knew about the affair.

So you poop pennies.  Big deal.

I dunno, I have a vague recollection of Elvis Costello being something of a late night talk show pinch hitter in the 90's.  Whatever he had to be pissed about this time, he probably suffered worse on Letterman at some point.

When I watched the series on Netflix, the Garden Weasel episode (What Have You Done for me Lately) was positioned as the final episode of season 1, and I found it worked perfectly as the season finale because of how Hank redeems himself.  Turns out that Hank's a natural pitchman, born to shill dumb products with…

The way it's set up when we finally see Hank's Lookaround Cafe is inspired.

So what about Crawford's wife?  No followup on that whole dying of lung cancer thing?

Who fucking draws a clock like that anyway, just jumping in writing the numbers around a circle?  A normal person marks out the quarter hours, maybe the five-minute marks, then enough numbers to make things clear, really just the 12, because people will figure out the rest.

I suspected from the beginning that she knew a lot, maybe pretty much everything.  She's too smart and perceptive not to have been suspicious of Hannibal, aware of his artfully constructed facade.  The fact that she still acts as his psychiatrist while in possession of this knowledge means that, if she doesn't…

Well if these shows exist in the same universe, then Lee Pace has to show up as a pie-maker talented enough to earn Hannibal's admiration, who resurrects the uneaten remains of Hannibal's victims.

Can you rent Bentleys at the airport?

No, but he might go for the novelty of preserving food in champagne bottles in the manner of Nicolas Appert.

So in the classic Tobias Wolff story Hunters in the Snow, a man named
Kenny is shot in the stomach by his companions on a hunting trip. They
put him in the back of the truck to take him to a hospital, but get
sidetracked and stop to eat at a diner…

There might be some smart strategy to that, too.  Better not to overplay your hand.  Let Bob have a little false confidence now, save the more severe threats for when you might need them later.

Cocaine?  Have none of you people ever had to pick out stems and seeds?