When games aren't games
Come on! Ouija is not a game! It's a tool. Just like Pick-up Sticks and Mousetrap.

On the subject of returning sex toys, I am compelled to quote this bit of concert patter from Tom Waits:

I do watch American Dad, along with the others in the line-up, and I also have to say that it gets less objective treatment. I mean, the scarfing trans-fat gross-out gag? Pretty lame in the canon of gross-out gags, and pretty lame even in comparison with standard gags on its sister show Family Guy. And yet it gets…

"If someone tosses a baby at you — slap it to the ground!"

I think there is a certain difference in context to the social function of entertainment. If I remember Sullivan's Travels, it kind of posits the value of light escapist fare as serving an important role in helping (who are basically still in the tail end of the Great Depression and facing global war) escape the daily…

Payment = Quality?
I wonder if part of your antipathy towards mediocre TV has anything to do with the fact that it's essentially free (cable bills notwithstanding). Does a mediocre rental somehow actual accrue perceived value just because you've paid for it, and because you've presumably set aside some time to watch…

Well, I have to give Death Note credit for an intriguing enough premise that I did watch it all on Adult Swim and was interested to see what would happen next, I nonetheless spent about half my time screaming at the terrible writing. Which I guess is a testament to the effectiveness of the ideas — because otherwise…

On the subject of rip-offs: the whole "It hurts when I touch my knee," "YOu have a broken finger" gag is such an old joke that it really felt lazy to me. Unless the patient was supposed to be having House on — his "Ow"s were awfully bizarre — but it didn't really seem to play that way to me.

There are plenty of documentaries like that still; they just don't make the headlines.

Also: there seems to be a certain double-standard applied when it comes to product placement. If something is hip or fringe enough, then the outrage/irritation is markedly less.

I guess my question is if it's the self-referentiality that's particularly irritating ("Hey look, we're doing a product placement!) or if it's the idea of product placement in general that's irritating.

So what is a funny way to draw someone's attention to a product without criticizing it in any way?

"The big difference now is that, thanks to cable, and 5 networks instead of 3, there's more of everything. We get frustrated because there's more crap, but there's more good stuff too."

The first season of "War of the Worlds" is also on DVD.

Well, I'd rather watch someone who's trying hard and failing than someone who's just coasting along.

I'm sorry, but if the Christian Bale thing was "fantastic," then truly 12-year-olds with YouTube accounts are the auteurs of our time.

I don't see what's so "outrageous" about the price. It's not exactly that far off from the price of many other wi-fi equipped media players. And in terms of comparative usage value, a year's print subscription to the New York Times runs (in my ZIP code, anyway) $348.40. So the hardware's about the price of a major…

I'll put a vote in for the Homicide: Life on the Streets complete series box, designed like a surpisingly quite functional file cabinet drawer. It's not media-shelf friendly because it's too deep, but it holds up well and you can stack things on top of it.

The problem with digipaks is that if, god forbid, the little plastic teeth or tabs that grip the center of the CD break (as they so often do), then the whole package is ruined. With a jewel case, you can pretty easily replace any part of the plastic if it breaks and keep the liner notes and the tray image. I…

I have to disagree slightly with Joanne's assessment of the importance of the script. Actors are more important. You can have a brilliantly written script, but if it's performed by a bad actor, you've almost certainly got a bad movie. On the other hand, a really good performance from an actor can more than compensate…