Just finished first season of The Man in the High Castle, and am one episode in on Westworld. I'm digging this deep-thinking, adult sci-fi stuff. Does anyone know of any other shows in that mold?

I just started it yesterday. Only one episode in, but I'm definitely excited. To me that's the kind of show you shouldn't binge watch. Like the other sci-fi show I'm into, "The Man in the High Castle," "Westworld" seems like the kind of show where you watch the episodes one at a time, and let them really sink in…

Totally not doing the hey-you-can't-enjoy-that-pop-culture-item-because-of-who-created-it! thing, but I've always had a hard time separating the "Jeepers Creepers" movies from director's past.

The "Never Let Me Go" movie was also a case of filmmakers not totally f-ing up an adaptation. I found it pretty true to the book, and a good balance of being viewable by people who hadn't read the book while still rewarding those who had.

I was really trying not to do the Jonathan Franzen backlash thing, but, yeah, "Purity" was kind of a letdown after "The Corrections" and "Freedom." I found too many of the characters insufferable and unrelatable.

Was that one part of his "Celebrity Apprentice" catchphrases? I heard a news report that seemed to suggest that it was, but it was left ambiguous.

All my genuine affection for the Obamas aside… I heard someone make a frightening point recently: what if Obama is the last real president? Meaning one who is educated and has a background in relevant fields (military, law) and experience governing.

I was gonna add "Sexy celebrity from bygone era has aged!" but I guess that's more perennial clickbait.

My two favorite unconventional college courses:

The things that pass for knowledge I just can't understand.

I have expended thousands and thousands of words the last two months—both written and spoken—articulating how I feel about what's happening in this country.

The GOP power-grab is really going to be striking. I don't think anything will hold them back now that they've got the presidency and both houses.

Now there's some karma.

Yes.

Next thing you know major news networks will be entertaining the question of whether Jews are people.

Is he ever going to write another novel? It has been 12 years since "The Road."

You're gonna pick "State of Love and Trust" over "Breathe" as the best Pearl Jam song on that soundtrack? Really?

If nothing else, I still have fond memories of Smashing Pumpkins's "Drown"… They really seemed like something special, at the time; of course this was before the mainstream popularity and mind-blowing pretentiousness.

Read Ghostland. It delivers so much more than its packaging would suggest. It's actually a brilliant book that's thought-provoking beyond all expectation (I'd never before considered the relevance of the Indian Wars in the ghost stories of the Amityville Horror and the Winchester Mystery House).

I remember hearing that, in Zodiac, Fincher made one of the first uses of a new type of CGI to create what you described. I thought: that's why it's such a cut-above-the-rest movie: the director uses this new CGI technology not to create some alien landscape, or show giant robots fighting or some shit, but rather to…