That would be a much, much better point if Tom Jones wasn't based on a novel written in 1749, centuries before any of those "far superior movies" existed. All of the mistaken identity comedy and fourth wall breaking is in the original, which is a hilariously bawdy low farce. The film was pretty much the best possible…

This is what sticks in my craw so badly. We've had ten seasons of hearing "You can't win Top Chef if you can't cook protein!" and "You can't win Top Chef if you can't season correctly!" and Nick did both in the finale, and underseasoned consistently all season. It goes against everything we've been told about judging…

I think the biggest problem is that this is actually the second time this has happened. Hosea was another notably mediocre contestant who remained on the show for seemingly inexplicable reasons and eventually won against more consistent, apparently more talented competition. And if I remember correctly, Colicchio also…

That dog was incredibly unthreatening. Ears and tail were up, tail was wagging a bit and it was bouncy and grinning. It pretty clearly just wanted to play. It made it really hard for me to take the scene seriously, honestly. (Pitbulls are also mostly really quite non-aggressive. They have a high prey drive and they're…

While I think they're still a pain to find outside major cities, ramen
places are (finally) starting to become trendy and so exist meaning that people in the States may actually experience it more than vicariously. I'm lucky
enough to have three in walking distance, one of which is even worth
eating at, which means in…

You do know that there's more to ramen than instant, right? And actually, if you looked, he didn't buy instant ramen packets, he bought a different kind of Chinese noodle. (Which is actually perfectly legitimate, since ramen noodles are considered to be a Chinese dish in Japan. You also see them called "Chinese…

Legend of the Seeker, too.

I was trying to remember why he looked so damn familiar. Of course, that was Craig Parker!

All my hate is now reserved for "I know Asian food! I only date Asians!" boy. I propose him as an excellent choice for your new target of ire: he's self important and doesn't know nearly as much as he thinks he does, plus he's all kinds of insufferable.

Parts of my family were people who fell for it. My great-uncle packed his family in the car and left. My great-grandmother tried to reach my grandfather (he was at Princeton and was in one of the labs working at the time, so missed the whole thing) because the early parts of the broadcast were set near him (as a kid,…

I'm… not actually sure that second one is really a golden rule if that pre-Crisis issue with the alien sex and the hand-holding is any indicator.

Pitch Black is pretty good SF/Horror. It's not deathless art or anything, but it's a coherent film that accomplishes exactly what it sets out to do. I like it a lot. (And it also has Claudia Black in it, which is definitely a point in its favor.)

Ah, okay sorry. I'm used to people outside the fanfic bits of the web not being familiar with her and her behavior, and I just figured you'd picked up the term from TV Tropes or something.

http://www.journalfen.net/c… contains the side-by-side comparisons, some of which are significantly more convincing than others. (Many of the early examples in particular are far too blatant to be anything like coincidence and too obscure and extensive to be fun games of "find the quote" as the author initially…

Oh it's better than that. The author is the person who started the Draco In Leather Pants trend. And then she got caught having plagiarized parts of the fic.

I saw a 6 at a con this weekend and was stunned.

@avclub-85ffb08f91a83b6566467b942828a560:disqus, I'm worried for the citizens of New York too, especially since I live there. If @avclub-e57f718840a576abbb40a7d046c4e3b0:disqus
hits me with his fucking car because he's too fucking distracted to
notice bicyclists on the road with him or pedestrians with right of way
cro…

Oh man, Oregon Trail. I played that a ton as a kid, and then I went to Carleton, so pretty much everyone I knew in college poked at the game at one point or another in a fit of nostalgia. I don't think I ever managed to finish without leaving someone dead at the side of the trail.

@avclub-b3d29f8f22c60a4b2c5fc2b1691c1d62:disqus , That makes perfect sense, and in that context, he's absolutely right. Even the cadence of the prose in LotR has a lot in common with Anglo-Saxon poetry, and it doesn't really feel Celtic at all.

I'm honestly kind of suspicious of that. I've never been able to figure out where the Elves came from if they're not the Tuatha de Danann. Even all that stuff about going west to Valinor seems to be really obviously based on Hy Brasil. Admittedly, that's the only bit of Celtic lore I've really noticed folded into…