What ideas did you draw regarding these questions from 2049? I really want to know what you think. For me, most of those questions were in the original movie, and I don’t feel this movie really furthered the discussion. As far as the most appealing character being AI - how many human characters were there, really? For…

What does it mean to be human? What is memory, and how is it connected to our concepts of identity, existence, soul? Where and when does the soul exist, if it does? What is free will, and does it even exist? If humans are composed of ACGT code and computers 1s and 0s, how different are we, really? The police seem to…

Gotta love how proudly Americans wear their ignorance as a badge of honor.

‘shitty on the representation of women’

That’s a good question I’d not thought of before. My guess is because that Chinese students don’t integrate well into the university community at all this girl preferred to live in close-quarters in order to have some other people from her culture around.

Good points, and as I said in another reply, I certainly wouldn’t be the one to argue that The Jetsons or The Greatest American Hero are pinnacles of television (and thanks for the correction on the year of TGAH! If I’m gettin’ all high-’n’-mighty ranty on history I should double check such things myself!)

The original article headline (and still used in the URL) was “What’s a good theme song on a bad TV show?”, which in my cranky opinion sets not just a different tone but a pretty strong position of value judgement. What’s more, I actually agree with Caitlin in broad strokes: the title sequence for The Jetsons sets up…

Bart Fargo’s story corner:

Seinfeld and women have a complicated history. No one forgets the time he dated a 17 year old high school student when he was almost 40. I think when you’re that rich you get kind of disconnected these kinds of things. He obviously knows what Cosby did was wrong, but really doesn’t have the strong moral outrage that…

I’m 51, and Jetsons and Greatest American Hero were not very good - I actually thought the writer who picked the latter was pretty on-the-money. But that WKRP roundtable was the worst...and hey, anybody remember that writer who seemed to think it was perfectly acceptable that she was reviewing black and white…

Blade Runner 2049 is literally better than the original.

It would be absurd to not be able to do the Cigar Store Indian episode today. It’s a funny episode about racism and the guys being insensitive and uncomfortable with not knowing how to navigate those waters. More relevant today than ever. The jump to reacting angrily without considering context is why it may not play…

What a story like this needs is an auto-playing video of Moshe Kasher right in the middle of it.

As someone who was just as annoyed (just check my comments under that article, if you can find them) by that WKRP discussion, and who is on the older end of AVClub long-termers (I’ll just say I was born in the mid-ish 1960s), and who otherwise agrees with your position, I just have to say that ignorance-of-youth isn’t…

I’m not going to get angry about the writer’s reaction to The Jetsons, because I honestly don’t remember it well enough to weigh in one way or another, but I am fuming over the description of a “robot slave.” Just because we’ve managed to give a piece of machinery the appearance of sentience doesn’t mean that it has…

I like how you spelled it “Frazier,” as I’m now picturing former heavyweight champion Joe Frazier moving to Seattle, fuming over his father’s disgusting recliner and overintelligent dog, and scheming with his brother to throw a party that will get them a better box at the opera.

Upon reflection, I’ve thought of a less draconian yet somehow more radical solution: the AV Club should hire a Boomer stringer who can write with knowledge and be a resource about older television shows. Surely to God there’s gotta be a few old ex-TV Guide writers floating around somewhere.

Yeah, there’s a certain element of “Wow, you don’t know jack about what life on television, which was mirroring real life, was like before 1990, do you?” Back then, Rob and Laura Petrie were Fine American Liberals (never mind that Working Writer Sally was a man-hungry spinster who frightened most guys, and when Laura…

the Scooby-Doo knockoff pet dog

Years ago longer than most are in ages here, I was on a bus with about 30 other American tourists to Ephesus, the phenomenal ruins in Turkey. The guide was this wonderful Turkish woman who taught history at a university. Well it was a schlep to the ruins so she sang a couple of traditional Turkish folk songs and…