He wasn’t wrong...

rogueindy’s cite is on-point with regard to the cat generally. With regard to people asking about why he can talk, though, I think it’s more a matter of the cat’s being used to engaging with others on the basis of his “mystery”. Without that, there’s really no reason for anyone to particularly care what a cat has to…

Of course, Jesus was tempted and had his faith tested in the Bible. You could argue over whether it would have been possible for him to fail, but for the tests to be meaningful, he has to have been able to entertain the possibility of failure. It’d be pretty amusing if the power bar and other indicators in the game…

Not so much paying to see it, as paying to be able to say they paid to see it.

Those were so cool! To me... as a 10 year-old... in 1974...

I think that goes without saying, regardless of whether I’ve seen the movie or not. ;)

And also as “Ventriloquiver”?

I agree. There’s something that seems sort of arbitrary about a hatred of heist films, kind of like a love of Szechuan sauce. At most, it seems like a genre that Rick would dislike because it relies on “putting one over” on the audience, and Rick is pretty allergic to having anything put over on him.

She and Tina tie for most relatable subplot. The thankful trees my siblings made in Sunday school still adorn our Thanksgiving table over a decade later.

I think that sequestration problem is aggravated by financial laws and mechanisms. A portfolio of rights to music or movies or whatever has a certain appraised value, which allows it to be used as collateral for loans or similar financing mechanisms. Those appraised values can be fudged, of course, by cherry picking…

The cast was an important part of making Star Wars great, but I’d add that editing, and the unacknowledged contributions of Lucas’ buddies like Coppola and DePalma, helped as well.

Perhaps he’s a Tulpa, projected by Shaggy’s affection for the original, real, non-talking Scooby-Doo.

I’d have gotten away with it too, if it wasn’t for you meddling kids and... Harlan Ellison!

Shouldn’t the prize be bell-less, by that logic?

I didn’t realize the pronunciation of “Akira” was going for “proper Japanese”. I thought he was supposed to be mispronouncing it as the name of the dog breed.

I think the series always had him pretty firmly in the “good guy” camp, though he would indeed mete out the fantasy you needed, as opposed to the one you wanted, in order to teach the appropriate lesson. The pilot, on the other hand, definitely made him more “be-careful-what-you-wish-for” menacing, and the ‘90s…

Ben was a serious networker. I could see him joining damn near any organization if it had influential people in it and he could charm them.

Eventually we’ll get down to the ill-tempered Sea Bass.

I honestly think you’re on the right track. It’s a fine line between “I’m so racist I think even the Dutch are suspect” and “I’m flat out paranoid about everyone, and everything”. The latter is a pretty legitimate horror trope.

Certainly the aesthetic was established by the mid-’80s, but I wasn’t sure when the name got associated with it. Please do elaborate, though... ;)