Yeah that terrible final scene made me bump this down from to a B+. In retrospect Dany's plot this season has yet again been a total drag: it appeared as if it were going somewhere interesting in the first few episodes, but it turned out to be very repetitive and tension free.

This was actually maybe my favorite episode of this season (though I also really liked George Martin's episode). It was certainly the first time since season 1 that I've been excited at the direction the story is going in, largely because it seems that the characters are all finally moving into their roles and on…

It really just seems like everyone's critical objectivity around here starts to crumble when Whedon is involved. Not that I'm criticizing, I'm the same way.

Seriously, it seems like with the regime change a bunch of people came to these boards who are weirdly furious when this site gives a less than glowing review of a summer tentpole film (sight unseen of course). At least the reaction to this one is less extreme than the comments for the Iron Man 3 review.

The show always seemed like Thomas designed it to be on HBO or Showtime but ended up with it on the WB/CW… it was constantly pushing stories that were much darker than what normally gets told on network television. I'll honestly be surprised if this doesn't get an R rating.

Yeah I've always thought that was a bit odd. He's a bit of an odd case because I'm about 90% sure he's an absolutely terrible actor, but somehow he worked perfectly for the character. Seeing him in FNL though he really stuck out like a sore thumb, in a bad way.

He does have a habit of sucking you in with awesome trailers, and then releasing pretty lame movies. And I keep falling for it for some reason…

It definitely does seem like Goyer and Nolan are the real cooks in the kitchen here… unfortunately with the emphasis on Goyer. I really don't like him, you could definitely tell what he contributed to the Batman movies, which were always the worst bits.

Very disappointed by the mixed reaction to this movie, it looked fantastic from the trailers. However, this disappointment is greatly tempered by the fact that I found out Before Midnight is unexpectedly coming to my town this weekend! I'll probably wait a couple weeks for this one till I can see it with a friend or…

Huh, I'm watching first time and I thought it was easily the strongest episode so far. Each episode has been a little bit better than the previous one thus far. This one definitely had an emotional resonance that the others didn't, and developed the characters of the Freaks and the Weir parents quite a bit.

Wait, why does Legolas look so weird? Are they CGI-ing his face to make him look more like he did in LOTR? Because that's just creepy.

This would hold more weight @avclub-176578e8de25dd19442a4b21a008357f:disqus if Jackson's previous film "The Lovely Bones" wasn't also full of entirely unnecessary and lame CGI. King Kong is also a lot more cartoony than the Rings films, though that's almost certainly completely intentional, but it seems like that…

That was really an incredibly wasted plot point. Why bother if you're going to put so little effort into it?

It doesn't really seem like it's ever been available on home video, at least as far as I can tell. It's weirdly difficult to track down.

Yeah it's always sad when certain directors constantly champion practical effects, and then they start down the CGI path and suddenly all their movies are full of lousy CGI. Tim Burton is another major perpetrator of this trend.

Isn't all the padding that's based on Tolkien just from the Appendix in Return of the King? I don't believe they actually have the rights to anything by Tolkien other than Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.  I'm pretty sure they just flat out made up quite a few things from these movies as well.

To be fair, Batman Forever was pretty atrocious in it's own right…

And apparently it was based on something that actually happened to the writer/director, which makes me think he's probably a pretty creepy guy…

I think it's just that they air daily, rather than weekly: it would be exhausting to do much more than recap them. Plus how would you grade those shows?

I didn't donate my two dollars to this movie so they could bring back Piz! I want my money back!