Four times, actually. You left out what is probably the most successful of his subsequent two-films-in-a-year efforts, 2002's Minority Report and Catch Me If You Can.

He's "clearly fake" because his body type, etc. are very obviously not something that you could ever do with a real actor (hence, no practical effects; no puppet would ever approach that level of realism).

I'd say it's a bit aged, but it still looks great (the Honest Trailer for this movie comments on how the special effects technology still holds up, unlike all the actual 1990s technology featured in the movie itself).

I liked it well enough when I saw it. I wouldn't call it a great movie, but I enjoyed it, and Hanks' performance is impressive (he doesn't get enough credit for being able to do accents, a skill you wouldn't associate with somebody so strongly identified as Average Joe USA).

Spielberg had both this and Schindler's List in 1993, which you could make the case for being the most successful year for any director ever. How many others have reached that apex of commercial and critical success with not one but two films in the same year?

Season 4, Season 1, Season 2, Season 5, Season 3, Season 6

They hope this will be more successful than Skin, the time ten years ago they tried to unite Romeo and Juliet with the porn industry.

I later heard one of my friends complain about the tears being a Disney deus ex machina, and they were amused when I told them that that's not only from the original story, but the movie actually provides some context for it.

Certainly up there, and particularly given the age she started at (compared to, say, most of the excellent kids on Game of Thrones, who were at least tween-aged when they started working).

That's what I thought.

The bit about the plastic bags has been stated by Weiner to actually be a commentary on today's obsession with child safety, and how kids in the 1960s were able to play without nearly so much supervision, and it wasn't a big deal.

"A custome lothsome to the eye, hatefull to the Nose, harmefull to the
braine, dangerous to the Lungs, and in the blacke stinking fume thereof,
neerest resembling the horrible Stigian smoke of the pit that is bottomelesse."

Since it's brought up in the review, I find Mad Men's focus on the establishment one of the most interesting things about it. The POV on the 1960s in pop culture belongs almost exclusively to the Baby Boomers, and generally features a bunch of teenagers/college students hitting any number (or all) of the following…

People have already mentioned a number of them, so I'll spotlight New Amsterdam. I like the look into Pete's situation, as well as the commentary on the lingering cultural presence of the old Anglo-Dutch aristocracy (you can imagine one of Newland Archer's great-grandkids in a similar situation). And, importantly,…

I remember when I rewatched the show a year or so ago one of the things that struck me about the pilot was how on-the-nose it was about the period setting and some of the features, in a way that the series as a whole isn't, and largely to its betterment. This episode also does something that Weiner would make a strong…

The actual story has very little to do with Andersen's tale, from what I've read. It's more like, in the decade-plus they spent in developing this, it gradually evolved into a story where there's a villain called the Snow Queen. So you should probably moderate your excitement on that specific count.

From the early reviews, it looks like Frozen is going to be the leader in this category. I saw separate assessments of the film itself and the soundtrack that both used "their best since Beauty and the Beast" as a lead-line. I can't imagine that being literally true, but it suggests a high-quality product.

Biden mentioned the show, though I thought he cited it as more impacting the culture in general than his specific views.

Julian Barnes' novel Arthur & George has a bit where the latter character notes that Arthur Conan Doyle is relying on Sherlock Holmes-style investigative logic, but that Holmes never had to to take the stand and have a defence attorney pick apart all his carefully ordered reasoning.

I imagine we'll be seeing a lot more of the Mother in the second half of the season, especially, but all her scenes are so good that it's irritating that they've been so stingy with her appearances so far (even though, within reason, I understand why).