Addendum: I’ve started in on the new season, and I think it’s stellar.

I haven’t started the new season yet (in Canada for me, it’s a work day - and a very busy one), but remember the adjustment from the first season, getting used to the pace of the jokes.

With PC computers, there are remarkably few fixed variables. There is tremendous variation in the hardware. Windows 10 can be run on computers made 15 years ago, or on computers made yesterday. There is even more variation in the software, the vast majority of which was initially designed for older operating systems…

I’m not also dismissive of a new season of Dexter, but for a different reason. If it comes back and the quality is on par with its last few seasons, then fuck no. The reason I’d be interested is the same reason I watched (most) of those last few seasons: the optimism that it might return to form and be as good as it…

Forcing monopolistic companies to subcontract out to competitors is actually not that unusual. In Canada, it’s particularly common with telcos, a select few of whom have enormous infrastructure advantages with phone/cell/cable networks. There are competition policies that force them to share network access to…

I said a thing that someone else said already, and I can’t delete my comment. Carry on.

***ACTUALLY*** ... NAKED GUN is Christmas movie.

The first Austin Powers is a truly great movie, which mixes perfectly-executed slapstick with brilliantly effective satire of Bond franchise tropes (to the extent that Austin Powers is probably owed some credit for the grittiness of the Casino Royale reboot).

Quite apart from the story, TDK is helped by looking (courtesy of Nolan) and sounding (courtesy of Zimmer) amazing.

It was an enjoyable watch, though it wasn’t as fun to me as it felt like it should have been. Everything is there to make it fun. The actors, the action, the goofy plot, even the dialog is solid. But the delivery of it all was flat. Maybe with better direction, sharper editing, and a more energetic score, this could…

Because, in theory, if the U.S. isn’t in Afghanistan it devolves back into a safe haven for terrorists.

For anyone looking back at these comments for a sense of whether the show is good, let me offer my thoughts now that it’s actually aired a bunch of dozen episodes, rather than just a teaser promo: it’s fantastic.

It’s impossible to dissect with certainty why the Democrats lost in 2016, but I doubt whether Democratic over-confidence - particularly among voters, was a big problem. It was a pretty high turnout election, so it’s not like people stayed home. And by all measures this is also going to be a huge turnout mid-term, with …

I thought your concern was that Trump would be able to use Democratic obstruction in the legislature as rallying cry to keep his base enthused, and that it would give him an excuse for his inevitable failure to achieve anything positive. To which I would have said, “Trump would blame Democrats even if they weren’t…

I wouldn’t stress about it. At this stage in the election process, there is a tremendous amount of inertia towards whatever the result is going to be. A huge fraction of people already cast their ballots. Of the remainder, it’s going to take something pretty huge to sway them. Pelosi exuding confidence on a show with…

I meant that the experience of being on the ship is portrayed in way that makes it look enjoyable. I wasn’t commenting on the entertainment value of the movie.

Hey, if you stop watching Titanic after the first hour, there’s a lot to like.

My comment was poorly worded. The “trope” I was referring to wasn’t just “time travel” generally, but the specific time travel trope of good time travelers trying to stop bad time travelers from disrupting history.

It’s more than just the broad time travel trope. It’s the entire structure of the story: landing in a time period without a clear objective, being in awe meeting the historical figure, realizing a major historical event is about to happen, deducing that a time-traveling antagonist is trying to stop that event, trying…

Can you think of any other examples?