Between that and Golden Earring I'm feeling some Dutch pride.

It's him. The actor is 36 years old (even though he dresses like a teenager), too.

Agreed, Vreenak's scene (and that line reading) seems silly out of context, but it's heart-stopping in the episode itself.

The cast is fantastic, it's definitely not smaller. Some major stars in here. It's mostly the writing.

What did Nikki see in the photograph? There seemed to be something under the dresser, a piece of the frame?

Ah yes, another David Simon show for people to not watch until after it's off the air and then for Simon to complain about that.

So did he go to all those screening advertised as women-only for the Fifty Shades films, too?

He did have Denise call him out on that specifically "I'm old-fashioned", which kind of seemed like a deflection. Whether you buy that as an excuse is something else, though.

Take grades as relative to each other within a series, not outside it. AV Club is definitely too lenient in giving out their A's, but in this case in particular it feels like an A- contrasting the first two episodes' A.

You'd be impressed what you can find with Google. Hell, there's tips for young jobseekers going out that "proficiency in Excel" can just mean "good at Googling what to do because your middle-aged boss can't".

It's definitely Ermantraub, not traut, but yeah, it could be a reference still - it's kind of an unusual name.

Was this actually typed by a hedgehog?

Like the big "REC" on Ray's sex tape, which makes no sense, it was done for clarity, under the assumption that viewers are kind of stupid.

So before the events of the season 3 Emmit and Sy had money problems and could not find anyone who would give them a loan. They found some financier Ermantraub, who connected them with some weird organization. They got a million dollar loan from them, and their business flourished.
They haven't heard from this…

Who knows, Bob Odenkirk in season one served a similar role and got more screentime near the end of the season.

Ray was the duck in Peter in the Wolf. The duck "dies" in that story, too ("If you listen very carefully, you'll hear the duck quacking inside the wolf's belly, because the wolf in his hurry had swallowed her alive."). Not that I see Ray coming back alive per se, but there's probably something more there.

Meemo coming into the office completely imitating the IRS guy was hilarious.

Betty Gilpin was phenomenal here.

She didn't believe in anything, so an Egyptian-themed casino that she spent all her time in was the best compromise they could find.

No Over the Garden Wall?