Seconded on Michael Mann, though I'd put him in the film category, as I have not seen "Luck." "Collateral" and "Heat" are great though. And "Public Enemies," while it eventually disappointed me, never bored me.

Shane Carruth. Terrence Malick. Quentin Tarantino, I guess. Mostly Shane Carruth though. Dang, "Upstream Color" was gorgeous and haunting. Oh, also Elbow, The National, Feist, and Todd Agnew.

Agreed. More Hickey! Jonathan Banks is killing it.

Aw man, now I want to see THAT episode.

Agreed that the Duncan and twin bit was the funniest. That and Hickey's line about his coma partner (I'd watch an episode about that). Overall I'd probably give this a B or B- though. It was okay. It was diverting. Maybe it's just because it's 1:30am and I'm tired and in a foul mood, but I wasn't really moved by the…

I saw Dark Knight midday sometime and exited into blinding sunlight, realizing how incredibly dim and grimy the color palette for that movie is. I mean, it works, but man…

Fair enough. Considering it a three-part finale does make sense. It almost feels like three alternate endings: 1) Walt destroys his family, makes one last effort to help them while also propping up his own legend, and leaves 2) Walt dies alone and powerless 3) Walt deals out revenge, comes to know himself, dies on his…

Samuel L Jackson is great and his presence in a movie generally increases the likelihood that I will watch it considerably, but I must admit, with Fury he often seems like he's phoning it in. For SLJ in fine form, watch Changing Lanes and Unbreakable (and, of course, Pulp Fiction).

Perhaps an exception could be made to contrast their starkly different methods of holding people and events accountable to logic VS being vague, and having a propulsive plot VS meandering, respectively.

Franch bestards.

I agree with this comment.

"All the Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues" indeed.

Gotta say, that description sounds kind of lame. I like the notion I'm getting that this show will be basically a series of origin stories for everyone in Gotham though. That could be interesting, if written/acted/shot/etc well.

Great list! You touched on many of my favorites there.
The really sad thing about the gradual waning of How I Met Your Mother's greatness is not that is has become less funny (which I say it has), but that it has become less uniquely itself in that instantly recognizable way that is nonetheless hard to put one's mental…

I like that you're from yesteryear and you're the one bringing up time travel. It fits.

Nice comparison! I'm watching through Lost for the first time now (I know!) and just watched Man Behind the Curtain recently. I think at its best Lost achieves something like the potent cave/self/father/death/rebirth, mythic, Joseph Cambell-lite symbolism of that scene (and others like it) from Empire.

Crowe sure loves to fictionally sail the sea . . .

Perhaps I have made it sound too preachy. It plays with these ideas, but it never demands that you agree with it on them. It is not a tract, and it takes substantial liberties with the Biblical story in order to examine its themes of justice/mercy etc and show more complicated characters than the Bible's brief,…

Saw this this morning. First reactions:

What a cool idea.