Yeah, I was all ready to hate this one and it was pretty decent overall. Hell, parts of the Milhouse stuff and Kirk's arrival were even fairly amusing.

Without saying anything specific, I was concerned about the "spooky kid" trope and ended up being happy with a later episode more focused on him. I'm not finished the season, so I don't know whether that impression will hold.

Special dispensation to never have more than three episodes of overlap before the number of black characters is reduced back to one.

Yeah, I came down to the comments specifically to mention the two good Ralph jokes. The rest of the episode was particularly dire. Given the relative weakness of last season as well it really seems like the late-period recovery (S20-23) has come to a close. Too many episodes of late have flitted so aimlessly between…

THANKS OBAMA

Which is confusing, since this episode was undoubtedly terrible.

You, me, 'n' Wikipedia.

It's a shame that team name is all that ever came out of the promotional campaign for the unreleased Canned Heat-Stevie Nicks album.

Sons and Daughters was so great. Wish they'd release that 11th produced episode that never aired.

In the early going it's mostly a collection of winning performances and a dedication to telling stories about their difficulties in making ends meet. Over time you come to realize how much attention to detail goes into establishing the continuity of the setting and in calibrating the writing and plotting to fit…

This is an excellent piece. You've really managed to express why a sitcom that seems so thoroughly mediocre on paper (and at first glance) really is one of the richest and best shows on TV.

It's decent for finding well-seeded full-season torrents of things. It's my go to when Pirate Bay fails me.

Whatever you do, don't open the file labelled DennyCrane.exe

I think it's that the product is so tremendously awful she can't find even the slightest positive attribute to comment on. If it wasn't irredeemable she could probably sell it without qualms even if it wasn't good.

Good lord, the poor ad agency interns who had to write 70 of these fucking things.

It's hard not to like Donal Logue in most things, but his entertaining performance here didn't do much to elevate the mostly terrible serialization throughout the series.  Portions of the show were definitely procedural, but I have to wonder if they wouldn't have been better off bucking the cable trend and making the…

"Also, would it have been so hard to write a letter to the editor of the paper to let them know they needed to make a correction? Super rudest."

Not that the lawsuit has merit, but it's worth noting that this "split-season" stuff is money grubbing bullshit on both the consumer side and in the way studios use it to keep cast salaries down.

I can see why you'd feel that way, though I think the level of squabbling and competition over the various roles, and the near total lack of talent some of the auditions showed did a pretty solid job of undercutting that (as well as the constant cuts to Piper's decidedly un-Christmas-y mood).  It perhaps didn't merit…

Will and should are only tangentially related concepts when it comes to the Emmys. It's quite possible the show could be shut out of nominations entirely.  If we're talking should, on the other hand, I'd definitely argue it's in the best drama conversation.