Seriously. Though once you get to a certain level of fame, it seems like you just start thinking of yourself as a king of all media and act accordingly. Howard Stern said it in those words and actually managed to make a hit movie—the hardest medium to master—but he flopped on television. Rush Limbaugh flopped several…

I forget. How does her work in that compare to her work in Less Than Zero?

Which killed the band, ultimately. Eddie VH threw out Sammy's lyrics, which led to the latter splitting right after the song was done.

I was just thinking about this the other day. I was wondering why back in the '80s, even run-of-the-mill Hollywood movies had a sort of baseline competence to them. Footloose is not a great film, but damn if it doesn't have strong characters, rising tension, conflict and even some character arcs. The battle within…

"That's not me. You're looking for a guy with a soul patch and…um…hair."

Nobody's Fool, where he plays a sheriff's deputy who haplessly tries to bust Paul Newman, is also a prime choice.

Dennis Quaid was handsome. Bill Paxton was funny (and had a big assist from buddy James Cameron). Pullman—eh, I don't know what his deal was. Thought he was great in Lost Highway though. He sold "I'm furious that Patricia Arquette is telling me my time's up after I couldn't make her come" extremely well.

He was more convincing as an ironic Robin Hood than Kevin Costner was as a serious Robin Hood.

Tell that to Frasier Crane.

Well, a basis in reality is another issue I have with the show. I mean, I'm not a former Congressman or a congressional aide or anything, but I know enough about the House enough to know that it works absolutely nothing like House of Cards thinks it does. I mean, if having the Congressional Black Caucus and the GOP…

He really held that fourth episode together. That was one of the most ludicrous hours of television I've ever seen, if you know anything about how the House works, Underwood's plan to get the GOP and the Congressional Black Caucus to join together in deposing the Speaker would have failed for like fifteen different…

Yeah, so I initially avoided this show because I loved the original version with Ian Richardson, which is nearly a perfect series (except for a poorly-considered ending to the third season). But then I figured, well, I might as well go ahead and check it out anyway, since if I don't, it'll be this thing that will…

I thought Greg Daniels was supposed to bring the show back to its roots, and take it to a strong, satisfying conclusion.

Re 4:

I know exactly what you mean. I actually don't even have cable, so Hulu was my way of experiencing new episodes. I used to watch them within 24 hours, now it's totally no big deal if I let a few days (or weeks!) go by.

The concept of the BBC series was that Gervais was such a buffoon because the cameras were there—he was consciously shooting to be a breakout character. That's how he could hold down his job for years, even to get promoted—because he was a competent and well-liked boss until he wanted to get famous.

I actually did watch and enjoy Cedar Rapids, though Anne Heche and Isaiah "Clay Davis" Whitlock were each much more compelling than Helms. I think they took turns stealing scenes from him.

…with additional material by Donald Kaufman.

It's because the show was never canceled in your waking life.

So long as people both want to be thin and eat shitloads of meat, sure.