Ellie surprised me with her moralizing comment to Cath's husband about his sexual dalliance. Didn't ring true. She's a detective; these things happen and you don't make judgments of the people you are interviewing to their fact.

Yes, this show has a way of suddenly presenting stuff that had been happening away from what we were seeing. Hardy's daughter has been AWOL before even though things were going on with her, we'd later learn.

Yeah, the beach game was straight out of Agatha Christie, rounding up all the characters into one place.

The other rule is that there will situations that bring all the characters/suspects together, sometimes almost probably (trial, funeral) sometimes less so (community football game)

Yeah, but somebody in that club (besides Richard Pryor) must be funny. I've always had more laughs at some random night at a city comedy club than I do with an episode of this.

Many layers—and several accents!

Well, we can still talk about it. Most new shows get better as they find their legs. This one keeps getting worse! The main problem is that the comics (did they call themselves comics in the 1970s? I thought they were comedians then) are interesting and unlikeable, and not unlikeable in an Andy Kaufman way but in an…

The show has become like The Office, restrained and clever in the beginning, mining the humor of the situation by portraying it realistically. Veep has become a vulgar ham fest, with no limitations on the writers and little resemblance to the Washington culture it once roasted so precisely.

OK, but the point of the battery demonstration was that when Chuck did not know about an electric field that was present—which is what the battery was supposed to be—he didn't feel pain. I know what Jimmy was showing.

I realize that. But to conclusively demonstrate that, you would think he would he would demonstrate with something giving off an electric field, such as an On cellphone. A battery just sitting there isn't giving off a field.

I commented above that that also struck me as an anachronism; I don't recall hearing it till much after the '70s.And yes it is a tired putdown.

Quite so. They repeatedly can't resist imprinting today's sensibilities on the characters, with the rationale that they are making them "prescient." Accept the limitations of your characters. Let them really live in the time.

Anachronisim: Goldie saying (something like), "I'm sure being in Las Vegas was good for your brand." I don't think an individual in the '70s would know what she was talking about.
If the extended "fucked your mama" spiel suddenly won him cred from the more established comics, they have extremely bad comedy taste.
And…

He's not sneering at it; just wondering if it could happen.

I know. He's very content, and working. That's a good outcome.

It's not really even the same. All the major characters, who used to be realistic Washington types, have become clowns.

I assume the high marks this season of Veep is getting is on a curve, because compared to the first four seasons, it's trash. It used to be carefully wrought sendup of Washington and politics, and the pettiness and puffery and vanity of the place. Now it has not boundaries and no wit; it's a raunchy cartoon. I guess…

"That’s 20 minutes of my life I’ll never get back.” To my ear that is an anachronism. I don't recall hearing it till well after the '70s. Same for calling her Pet Rock a "rescue." "Rescue" as a noun for a rescued animal also seems more recent.

If his illness were real, wouldn't his issue be with devices powered by batteries and operating? A battery by itself doesn't give off a field does it? I would think they would have slipped in a phone with a battery in it.

I think that is the consensus here. Seems obvious now that I read the comments here, but I missed it.