Bobbi: You've got those, like, kind eyes. But you know what Henry? Nice guys finish last. Grab your destiny by the balls and squeeze hard. I bet you've never done that in your career.
Henry: No, I wouldn't even know where destiny's balls are.

Yeah, that's the quickest decision of all time. "Hmm, stick with a show nobody's heard of on a channel nobody's heard of that could literally be canceled any minute, or go be Amy Poehler's boyfriend on a beloved network sitcom that actually has a budget. Gee, let me think about it . . ."

Cheap, too. No standing sets, you just film wherever is cheapest and available that week.

"This is basically a badly written and poorly plotted confession."

They'd more or less have to completely recast. The whole point is for most of these people this is a transient job, they'll all either move on to "real" jobs or have some measure of success in their chosen artistic field within a few years. That's the thing with centering a sitcom around a truly shitty job that most…

At the time, it was that movie channel that you probably had that only showed movies from 15 years ago.

So, like ER, where they just dropped and added characters all the time so the show just ran for-freakin' ever.

I seem to remember reading somewhere that it was Weber's idea to have the one messed up eye.

I was amazed it was on as long as it was. A fantastic show, but as the article said, it was a show nobody'd ever heard of, on a channel they didn't know they had.

That's interesting. As Marlowe, Bogart was quick-witted, sardonic and funny. But in his most famous role as Rick in Casablanca, he was hauntedly sad. I wonder if the two famous roles might have been conflated in people's minds over the decades, so they see Marlowe as an extension of Rick even though that's not at all…

I didn't know about that one. I'm curious now, I like Robert B. Parker and The Big Sleep is one of my favorites.

They altered it in the film, cutting the bit about Vivian's legs (she was wearing pants in the scene, so it wouldn't have made sense). Though I seem to remember Bogie delivering that line, so they might have just relocated it.

Marlowe, in the novels, is reasonably tough, he's just not a super-supreme badass and he loses fights as often as he wins them. One of the best thing about those books, actually, a protagonist who's quick witted, cagey, clever, funny, and good at his job, but NOT a secret ninja-kickboxer-kung-fu master.

He's tall, at least fairly handsome, quick witted and cagey. He's tough, but he's a long, long way from the now-expected supreme badass.

Is hauntedly sad a Marlowe trait? He tends towards sardonic wit in the novels.
"I don't see what there is to be cagey about," she snapped. "And I don't like your manners."
"I'm not crazy about yours," I said. "I didn't ask to see you. You sent for me. I don't mind your ritzing me or drinking your lunch out of a Scotch…

Whoever plays Marlowe needs to be able to read this bit of dialogue with an appropriate smirk:
"I don't see what there is to be cagey about," she snapped. "And I don't like your manners."
"I'm not crazy about yours," I said. "I didn't ask to see you. You sent for me. I don't mind your ritzing me or drinking your lunch…

All true. And eventually the world is going to have to figure out what a "post-employment" economy is going to look like.
Capitalism, in general, though, doesn't have to operate like that. It certainly didn't used to. Generally (very generally) the rise of the professional CEO screwed the pooch quite a bit, with the…

I get your point with undermining Ren, but it also undermines the drama of the scene with a joke. That's fine, I enjoy that in most cases, but (to me) it doesn't fit into the specific Space Opera that is Star Wars. One of the reasons the OT is timeless is that, aside from the hairstyles and the occasional porny…

I came here about 14 years ago, and yeah, it's still a constant process of escalating rent. Wicker Park got safe, then got expensive and dull as hell (they even killed the Double Door, but Reckless, Quimby's, and Myopic are still around, which are the only reasons for going to that neighborhood anymore). The…

Also, "Why do you need my address?"
"We like to send out a mailer."
I don't know why, but the way Doyle-Murray delivers that line is always hilarious.