With the secrets pinata episode I was a bit sad they didn't make the whole show about that. Now I see that the secrets theme was meant to be the throughline for the whole season, and it is quite delicious indeed!

Last week Brandon assumed that Arnold and Josh had already talked about Ben, which several people called him out on. I rather wonder if he's making another big assumption about the two of them, this time that Arnold and Josh broke up based on that one scene. It's certainly possible. But it's also possible they had a…

@sus:disqus I felt genuinely sorry for Ella for the first time this week. She tells jokes twice because nobody's laughing, then she thanks herself on behalf of everyone else, and tells herself she's welcome. Literally, she has to tell herself, "you're welcome". Nobody else in the GROUP will say that she's WELCOME.…

It's almost a two parter, Brandon is kinda right they are a pair. You will see some conclusion to a lot of the plotlines with the finale. I guess that's a pretty common problem for episodes-before-finales.

Yeah this was inconvenient. Kinda wish you waited to review #2. None of the "alternative means" of viewing episodes even have 3x10 up yet, apparently they're all going by the Aussie schedule too. So I had to use the Pivot website, which is utter shit. (I have never seen an exception to the rule that pirates offer far…

"Watchers":

"Survivors":
Troi starts us off on the more useless side of her spectrum. "There's something…strange…I dunno." Gee, they're the two survivors of planetary annihilation, ya THINK? Then, while Sirtis did the anguish thing pretty well, the music torture was hard not to laugh at a little. The clip of Troi hallucinating a…

Picard also specifically reminds everyone the scientists pledged to give their lives for the directive in this one, in reference to not being willing to risk too much to find the missing guy.

Apparently the Minitakan blanket shows up through ALL the movies except the one we don't talk about! Says Mem Alpha anyway.

The Dr. Crusher episode "Suspicions" had a Klingon scientist, but you may have blocked that one from memory.

I didn't think I'd ever characterize an actor as being "on fire this week" for just two lines, but "I admire gall" and "good tea, nice house" totally did it :)

Iiii'm…dreamingg…of a Christmas six feet underrr…just like the reviews I uuused to knoooow…

Hero of the episode: Pops. Him and Dre at the end there might've been the finest acting moment the two of them have shared on this show. And for that matter, in retrospect I appreciate Fishburne's work at the dinner table - especially him somewhat bitterly sipping on his liquor as he gives up on everyone appreciating…

That's what really threw me. I accidentally watched these two out of order and was like "what the fuck, 3 work people have been replaced by Wanda Sykes? Did I miss an episode?" As it turned out I did. But yeah where was Josh? Would've thought after such a changeup they'd want to sort of reestablish a status quo. Maybe…

The workplace provides much needed balance. I like the kids (one of the reasons this works way better than Fresh Off the Boat for me), but their stories would get grating without some more…well, I hesitate to say "grown-up" with those coworkers, but yeah without some contrast. Hopefully they can develop Sykes and…

Uh, wasn't so much the seventies as "had no money". That can happen regardless of decade.

Actually I like her because of that. She's ACTUALLY a hardass, unlike most of the characters who only say things that could come off as mean because they're clueless. Nice contrast.

The pickles bit WAS sharp, so sharp I think it disguised the comic weakness of the rest of the episode. Well, the lane-changing bits were good too. Basically Ruby and Pops were on point this week, but I was disappointed in the rest.

They left with Charlie.

Yeah I assumed it was Hollywood Generic Brand. This show's never not real!