She's not as good a comic as a lot of the progressive left is trying to force her to be, and a lot of her views are pretty generic. She has an approachable persona, though, which goes a long way.

I understand that perspective, but what I actually think makes the movie difficult and interesting is that it's a hedonistic romp about our 1% oppressors.

That's a pretty valid complaint, no?
[Someone's being barbecued. TEXT: REMEMBER, THIS REALLY HAPPENED! Yes, how surprising and delightful.]

I also like movies with female protagonists!

Wolf of Wall Street was at least the most energized Scorsese has been since he stopped making personal films. Spring Breakers impressed the unimaginative, and would have been three times as affecting if the four leads were developed as human beings. Instead, it settles for the *point* that they're archetypes,…

Most movies (even blockbusters) favour the underdog. But Bay's have a bully's mentality. That's only part of what leads me to say that, but I'm always concerned that people in his films who aren't jaw-droppingly attractive (John Turturro or Rebel Wilson, for instance) go home from his sets feeling dissed.

I actually think Bay always knows what he's doing, and is a lot more talented than most working action directors. Nobody can frame an image quite like he can. The problem is, he's a bad person, and you can tell just by watching his films.

I think it's a lot more representative of Bay as auteur than The Rock, and was the best cumulation of a lot of his tropes and obsessions. So, I find the movie more interesting. You can't take the problematic out of Michael Bay completely, or he would cease to exist, but Transformers felt like a pure expression that…

I think Transformers might be his best movie. Along with Armageddon, it's at least his most representative without going too far into the political idiocy that hurts stuff like Pearl Harbor, Bad Boys 2, and Pain & Gain (sorry, it's terrible).

It isn't a comparison, but if you're going to compare them, the difference is that Leslie Jones has a clear comic persona, as one-note as it may be. One interesting thing is the show's writing somehow became more reliant on "black people act like this and white people act like this" humour over the past three years.

It's okay, but you're not really. Martin is a talented writer, but there's more interesting fantasy out there.

Winnie the Pooh sketch wasn't good, but I also just think this is where American humour is right now. I prefer it to a couple years ago when every SNL sketch was an excuse to show off the cast's repertoire of celebrity impersonations.

It was funny to me, but I like when SNL takes risks on absurdist concepts.

I miss seeing her, but I wonder if her repertoire for impersonations and characters beyond herself and "sassy high school friend" is kind of limited. Or at least, she hasn't shown that side of herself.

Yeah, those stupid music videos.

It isn't very good. There are some laughs, but not the big ones it anticipates, the vignettes are uninspired, they didn't think up a fresh storyline, and the energy isn't there. Mothersbaugh's score (while nowhere near the insanity Elfman brought) is good, though.

There were random movies I wasn't allowed to see. I remember Cape Fear being a big one after I'd already seen Silence of the Lambs. And my mom wasn't too happy when I watched a copy of Jungle Fever they rented, when I was in seventh grade. But parents just have to remind themselves to do their parenting at odd times.

Kids in the '80s liked when movies targeted to them were scary. They were formative experiences. I saw The Black Cauldron at age six in a theatre in Toronto (and I wish I knew which one, because in my memory, it looks like an opera house). And I walked past posters in the lobby for Fright Night, Return of the Living…

If I'm to put this in simplified terms, is it fair to say the show is a satire of people with attitudes similar to Abbi and Ilana, but the audience is a step behind, and embraces it as a celebration of such? This has happened quite often—Scarface, Fight Club, Andrew Dice Clay (so I'm told), Larry the Cable Guy.

At the same time, their money concerns are more "relatable" than the (mostly) pampered characters on Girls.