“for some reason” is decades of hate spewed into Middle America by Rush Limbaugh who used her as a boogeyman to sell his show. He lied about her for likely 10,000 hours of airtime. The last guy on a similar mission was Adolf Hitler lying about the Jews to get himself in a position of power. Rush was too addicted to…

This is a great insight and I think you’re dead-on. Another element — and this is dicey — is how the show dances around issues of race and ethnicity. The episode where Nate wanted to take his parents to dinner — and wanted to give them the front window seat — hinted that the reticence of the restaurant to initially…

I think he also has a fair dose of self-loathing, given that his power move to psych himself up at the restaurant was spitting in his own face (which seemed pretty disturbing to me). Will is basically the replacement Nate, and it makes sense that Nate would project his dislike of himself on the guy.  But also, what…

Even when I’m not TALKING about Higgins, just presume that I’m in full support of Higgins.

I used to listen to a radio morning show that did a mystery guest segment, except the gag was that the *interviewer* didn’t know who the guest was.

I think you’ve basically got it. Nate at 60 will be voting against workplace harassment laws because “back in my day, I got punched nine times a week and never felt the need to go crying to HR.” He got a little taste of power and used it to perpetuate the cycle.

It was a meaningless flub, but I think that’s the point. Everyone but Nate sees “Wonder Kid” as endearing, while Nate, because of his insecurities, thinks the phrase is mocking him. He’s too thin-skinned to laugh off even the most innocuous joke at his expense.

Nothing about Higgins? I love him more and more. I live the jazz scatting, the proudness in his lifetime movie marriage, and pulling a pipe out in the boot room.

It is a bit weird now that you mention it, but I think it works ok enough as a way to show how deep Nate’s insecurities are. Wonder Kid is a reasonably cool sounding nickname that stuck because of the reporter’s pedantry, but Nate can’t help but think that he, and by extension everyone else, is making fun of him and…

It’s actually pretty simple - “wunderkind” is the correct phrase in context, and even though the translation is literally “wonder kid,” the implication that Nate didn’t know the correct label, or that he flubbed saying it on camera, just festers in Nate’s mind as another in a long line of humiliations he believes that…

That’s also the IT dilemma: when it works, “why are we paying you?” And when it breaks, “why are we paying you?”

Definitely. Unlike the book, it just seems to mostly be a relaxing resort getaway for the uber-wealthy.

It’s called ‘job security.’ If you’re the only person that knows how to do something they won’t be in a hurry to fire you if they want that something done.

Yeah, I’m much more interested in the production process than I am in the story. Like, how do you do shots involving props that he has to manipulate in a certain way? If he does it wrong so that it wouldn’t make sense, do they give him a hint for the next take? And if it’s a continuous shot involving multiple people,…

Why does God keep taunting us by infecting the worst among us and then letting them recover through their wealth? 

It’s really a dirty trick to not show an actor the script. For example, I don’t know how Mark Wahlberg has tolerated it all these years.

You mention the plaid boxers but neglect to point out how, in a true display of ultimate dad energy, they were pulled up well over his belly button.

“Still, one of the best jokes in the premiere involves the fake sponsors for the fake Serial podcast.”

Selena Gomez is a much better comedic actress than she ever was as a pop star.

Samara Weaving is killing it as Jessica, in my opinion. She’s got that great combo of seeming very vapid and very naïve at the same time.