Anyone of those people you listed would call you an idiot for believing there's no artistry in performance.

Oh yeah, I definitely think he's doing it to aim for a particular audience - but being tactically racist is still being racist. He mightn't actually want to ban Muslims from entering the country but he's more than willing to throw them on the fire if it helps him.

"Trump is a racist monster (boo!)"
You take exception to the statement of this fact?

100% tru

Maybe the Osgood boxes worked sort of like The Moment in that the interface visualised in some way that was specific to the user? So it took the Zygons catchphrase for it's two buttons. That's fanwanking quite a bit but the looks of the box did seem pretty reminiscent to The Moment box to me.

It'll be like Community and move to Netflix or Amazon and it'll turn out lots of people were watching all along and NBC's old television ways just have no way of recording/exploiting that potential.

I think Jon is a Targaryen. That fact doesn't have to come into play the exact way fans think it will.

There's a lot of about it sure that could tie into a lot of the series story-lines but as it stands the question of Jon's parentage just isn't one the show has been that interested in. It isn't the driving force of literally any story-line or conflict in the show right now and is far from the "central question of the…

In what way has Jon Snow's parentage been the driving force of the whole story? It's something fans have seized upon for sure but it's never driven any of the conflict or drama in the show and has at best only been obliquely referenced.

You said PC types don't understand free speech. This issue has literally nothing to do with free speech, and the constant invocation of free speech by status quo warrior types is misleading and annoying.

"First, it's that a fair portion of the population don't really
understand that free speech means you have to tolerate all speech, not
just the people that agree with you"

Seriously? Incorrectly calling someone racist is just as prejudiced as actually being racist? How?

Death of the Author empowers anyone reading the text, not just critics. It simply acknowledges the fact that there are many factors that create meaning within a text and that the authors intentions are just one of them. It doesn't render the critic an artist at all, it just accounts for the influence of the readers…

I don't think they should have to appear at all in a review. Why should a piece of criticism have to tell you its opinion? Everyone knows it is.

You're right, of course. I probably should have clarified any interpretation reasonably supported by the text or something like that.

"It's not incorrect to attribute intentions to an artist that that artist didn't intend?"
No, it isn't. Look up Death of the Author.
Should every sentence in a piece of criticism start with "I think"? Everyone reading it knows it is the author's opinion. It's just strong writing.

Their interpretation of a piece of art can't really be incorrect. I highly doubt any of the critics you were reading were putting forward their interpretation of the episode as the only correct one, either. I don't think you understand the purpose or function of criticism so it's really weird that you would read so…

"Critics are hilarious. Just read three reviews in a row which all
expounded at length upon the supposed motif of this episode. They were
all completely different and completely sure of themselves."

we don't really know whats coming back post-Secret Wars yet though

you think people are gonna stop reading All-New X-Men because Iceman is gay? Really?