So glad to see Bartlett mentioned. I think the grown men on The West Wing are good male role models. Not so much the younger guys like Josh & Sam, though there's nothing really wrong with them; but the older guys like Bartlett, Leo and Toby. They're pretty multi-faceted, principled, compassionate, serious but…

Kirk has been exaggerated and simplified and the Abrams movies made him go through the same arc twice, but he really was a gentleman and diplomat.

Actually, McCoy was pretty nonessential too. The duo of Kirk & Spock was all you really needed.

The Rock-a-Bye Baby version of Aerosmith's Dream On is, for me, the definitive version.

Holy shit.

Kraft Singles.

This piece is an enjoyable run thru my favorite era of music. The main point is a bit head-scratching, though. Why the emphasis on separating synth pop from New Wave and New Romantic? Aren't those inextricably bound? They feel like different strands of the same braid. It seems weird to talk about Human League and…

A-ha's first album was pretty relentlessly singable. About 5+ years later than most of this stuff, IIRC.

It's not the best song from Travelogue, not by any stretch, but 30 years later I often find myself singing:
"Its not easy to conceal
When you're so touchable!"
I knew the whole album very well at one point; I put "Gordon's Gin" and "Being Boiled" on an awesome 3-CD New Wave mix I made ~10 years ago; but I guess "The…

I remember seeing Dolby's video for "Europa and the Pirate Twins", and being riveted. Great song. Most arresting image from the video: Dolby as weatherman pointing at a map of Europe, which is starting to go up in flames, with the flashpoint centered (I believe) at Germany.

Hugely influential album.

I'm pleased about that too.

I've got facts
I know the truth
You're all corrupt
You're all depraved

Ok, this is weird: my copy of Rip It Up And Start Again has random pages inserted into it. Instead of the actual book, about 30 pages of it is actually from some other book, about Los Angeles water rights or some strange shit. There are whole chapters missing, replaced by these pages from some other nonfiction book…

Hell, Talk Talk's first album.

Where's Nicolas Cage's third act antics in Valley Girl? That stuff really is bad news: camping outside her bedroom window; barging into a car to sit with her and another minor on their way to school (and telling the mom driver to shut up); sneaking into her senior prom; beating up her date; stealing his limo and…

The thing is, there simply is not as much Marvel material, over the decades, to draw on in creating a Black Widow movie. She has almost always been a supporting character: I think she only headlined one solo series, and that didn't run for very long. Marvel has concentrated its efforts on properties that have moved…

Hey, I did! Only 15 hours late: but I hadn't read your comment yet.

"As good as Unforgiven" is a tough hurdle, but damn I loved Appaloosa with Ed Harris and Viggo, along with Jeremy Irons and Renee Zellweger. The major objection most people have to it is that Zellweger is super annoying, but that turns out to be a plot point, so I think it works well.

Eastwood made another movie that belongs in any list of finest Westerns: Outlaw Josey Wales.