Sam Rockwell's character was supposed to be a dick; on the other hand, we were supposed to root for Tony Stark despite the fact that throughout the entire movie, he was incredibly selfish and arrogant, and not in an endearing way. As I said in my other post, I thought that the script overall was pretty shitty, and I…

That's cool. I just remember watching The Avengers and wondering if anyone who either hasn't seen or doesn't like the previous Marvel films would enjoy it The Avengers as much as I did, and I'm glad to hear that it works well enough as a standalone movie.

I loved both Star Trek and The Avengers - actually, they're almost exactly equal for me.

I thought that Sam Rockwell was the best part of Iron Man 2 (closely followed by Black Widow's fight scene). He had kind of a shitty script, but damn if I didn't think he was entertaining to watch. I was also kind of rooting for his character because they made Tony Stark such a dick in that movie.

@avclub-0d4efaa2c9d1041eb9b8b5319eec8531:disqus Todd didn't say that The Avengers is a TV show. He just mentioned that it has some elements that are frequently associated with TV - namely, that it relies heavily on an ensemble cast in a way that movies rarely do. I don't completely agree with them, but I think his…

I loved Star Trek, but I would definitely agree with that. I thought that Eric Bana's character was sympathetic because of his backstory, but he wasn't all that interesting or fun to watch. Especially as depicted in The Avengers and as played by Tom Hiddleston, I think that Loki is a pretty cool, exciting villain.

I'm kind of surprised that you liked The Avengers without having seen the previous films. I saw all five of them, and they're mixed for me (my favorites are Iron Man and Captain America), but while watching the movie, I had a hard time imagining someone enjoying it who hadn't already developed some sort of…

Hey, you're a Lost apologist too? Maybe we can team up!

@avclub-a071490b596e0cc770ff10b7eb5b2e85:disqus I'm reluctant to get into a debate about the ending of Lost because I know I'm not going to change anyone else's opinion, but how did the end make the rest of the show irrelevant? Even if the ending wasn't the best, I don't see how that negates the quality of the entire…

I thought that "Brave New World Part 2" was better than average as an individual piece of television (especially in comparison to "Brave New World Part 1"), but otherwise, I agree with you completely. While I probably wouldn't have loved the episode as a series finale, I thought it the upbeat ending felt natural,…

I'm hoping for something bittersweet for the Fringe series finale. I think I would have been fine with the happy ending we got with "Brave New World Part 2", but I wouldn't have loved it by any means. I overall liked the episode a lot more than Murray did, but I also watched it as the season finale that it was and…

That sounds about right. Though I was more just thinking about the fact that some female characters are, as you say, complex and realistically flawed, but they wouldn't necessarily be considered "strong" female characters by normal standards - for example, Nina Sayers from Black Swan or Betty Draper in Mad Men. They…

I'd choose the latter, though it feels like it's getting increasingly harder to figure out what a female character has to do in order to be considered "feminist".

I get your point, and I mostly agree (though I do think a lot of it has to do with Hollywood politics and the like), but the thing is that actresses shouldn't have to rely on small indie movies in order to get decent roles. They should be able to find an adequate amount of good parts in mainstream movies. Also, I'm…

I know you already mentioned Peggy Olson, but I would like to say that I think all of the main female characters on Mad Men are extraordinarily well-written. I'd say that that's ironic for a TV show set in the 1960s, but I actually think that's part of the reason that it does such a good job with female characters…

It's heavily flawed (though at least for me, the flaws were mostly to do with things they changed from the book), but I enjoyed it a lot, thanks in large part to the actors, who were all perfectly cast (except for Liam Hemsworth, because literally any blandly attractive guy could play that role). A solid B+. That…

You're pretty much right, though that term could be applied to Bella and Edward (the mopetagonist part, not the female part). I've only seen the first movie, FYI. It's awful. The sad thing is that it isn't even that fun to make fun of or snark about; it's just boring as hell.

I'd like to think that that's the one thing we can all agree on right now. Though judging from the people in my college dorm, there might be some people who somehow still derive something resembling legitimate enjoyment from the show. Personally, I quit after season 2, though I sort of follow via the AVClub recaps,…

My problem with Amberlivia choosing to cease to exist is that it felt
like a cop-out, like the writers were saying "We've got to get the real
Olivia back, so BAM, she's back, and everyone's okay with that".

Yeah, I don't really get why people had such a problem with the ending either. I can understand the complaints about Nina's dialogue (though at this point, I think I've gotten used to Fringe dialogue enough that the cheesiness doesn't stand out to me unless it's really bad) and about certain plots not being wrapped up…