That last sentence is pointless shit-stirring— Byrne & Eno weren't threatened or anything, they got one letter from one organization, not unlike the protest statements that Christian groups like the Catholic League churn out by the hundreds every year. But Byrne agrees with you that they were overly deferential, for…

One of many reasons "Walkabout" made me awfully happy was that I remembered Terry O'Quinn from the 1987 movie The Stepfather; when that came out I had thought "this guy is great, I bet he'll be famous in a couple years," and then when that didn't happen I thought "well, being a good but obscure character actor is…

I don't understand your point. Sansa, not being a viewer of the show, doesn't know the details of how any of those people died; she's not going to think "Lysa must have been speaking metaphorically, since I know she and Littlefinger didn't personally cause all those deaths." If anything, the dialogue on the show has…

Lysa still said more than enough for Sansa to figure it out. She said she had done all kinds of unspecified terrible things for Petyr, and she said don't get in my way or you'll end up dead like all these other people including my husband.

Goddammit, of course you're right— I mix them up every time.

Sure, that's one of the moments when the progression of the scene surprises us— another being the moment when Palin tries to use "no it's not" to draw out the argument past the ending bell, so we can see that despite his contempt for Cleese's approach, he's hooked. And it's great to see Cleese making a tiny bit more…

And, just to over-analyze this even more: "Argument Clinic" surpasses "Who's on First" in the category of magic tricks that are done in full view of the audience. That is, nothing depends on a sneaky assist (like Abbott just happening to pick the worst phrasing every time), or something the viewer couldn't have known…

I didn't read Tami's fear that way because I didn't think of this particular guy as a threat— he's Matt, he's a relatively nice boy, and Tami probably thinks he's a relatively nice boy too. But Sonia made a very relevant point: Dillon football players as a group are a bunch of big strong guys who are basically…

Either it's the momentum, or his character is just naturally abuse-oriented and thus it's the right job for him.

It's hard to express how much I don't like sketches that rely on "regular folks vs. the wacky ones" (do comedians have a standard name for these?). They worked well on SNL sometimes because of the strength of the performances, but on average they're just lazy and boring - the "regular" one has no notes to play other…

They didn't cover season 1 of Lost, so they're filling it in now. Similarly, they didn't do episode reviews of season 1 of Mad Men the first time around, so they went back and did those this year. I don't know why they chose to file the Lost ones under "classic" when they didn't label the Mad Men ones that way, but…

I think we're talking past each other (I never said anything about early Smithers being "likable") and I don't want to beat a dead horse, but I think it's interesting that you originally thought of him the same way I did based on what you saw in the show, and only later saw it this other way based on inside…

I haven't read Planet Simpson, but according to the DVD commentary material that's quoted on Wikipedia, the boss in question was Barry Diller, not Brooks.

Hmm, my comment went into moderation - I think I know why - let me try reposting it with a slight edit:
***

Maybe because I originally used the F-word (in quoting your sarcastic description of the joke); I edited & rephrased it, but that didn't break the moderation curse.

(reposted below)

P is for Psycho

Could've been done by a different artist/studio.

I like Ghost World better overall but I don't agree that the art school part in particular was better. GW is mostly from Enid's perspective, so all we can really see there is that the art class is stupid, and that when she tries to figure out what they want and imitate it, she fails. Things are a little more…

I'm possibly the only person who didn't think the murder plot was a bad fit for the movie; it's sort of the logical endpoint of the extreme satirical bitterness that pervades the whole story. Jerome thinks of himself as a Romantic hero, a lonely outsider who has contempt for the silliness of everyone else, but he's…