As someone who has basically (don’t ask how; it’s not pleasant) been all-but-confirmed to be on the spectrum myself, I’d say part of the problem with asking “what is autism?” is that the literal answer in the diagnostic manual amounts to “well, anything that causes significant difficulties in stereotypically…

C.O.T.D.

Also, Hermione is sidelined from the final battle because of temporary inability to successfully perform her gender. Harry is nearly killed as a consequence.

“Can anyone produce me a video of a police officer telling someone to do something, they comply and then the officer just shoots them.”

Oh, yeah . . .

And who didn’t need the help of other Italian cartographers to qualify as “American” in even the most technical sense of the word, the knaves!

Offhand, Helen Parr is the only one that comes to mind, though I think you could also say that Moana’s relationship with her grandmother fits as well (her mother’s alive, but kind of a tertiary character).

On that, fully agreed. Those videos did a great job of demonstrating to me something I didn’t see on first viewing, which is that Ashley is just as big a doofus as the rest of the southern aristocracy. He’s just seemingly profound because he cites his father a lot. He’s the 19th-century equivalent of that guy who…

Absolutely. One of the ways that politicians have let themselves off the hook about problems that have been building for 40-some odd years now is to toss the problem at the feet of the courts, and say “Oh, nothing we can do! So sorry!” Which might be true in cases where the courts are interpreting the Constitution.…

Yeah, I’ve been low-key mulling how to fix the plot of this film, and while I can’t exactly see the film without the bear, the best thing I can come up with is to delete the incompetent witch, have the curse come from the tearing of the tapestry alone, turn the King into the bear instead of the Queen, and have the…

But if they are corrupting the symbols of our country, you don’t just toss the synbol aside - you reclaim it. You don’t just say “that asshole abused an important symbol so I never can use it again”.

One would indeed, consulting only the historical record, think so.

The Captain Ron classic blunder . . .

It’s been a while since I last consulted a “Don’t Tread On Me” flag, but I’d swear there’s no asterisk on them that exempts parody. The message is pretty clear-cut, and these guys definitely seem like the kind of people to fly said flags.

I admit I haven’t seen the film in some time; it’s one of those “classics” I made sure to watch when I was in my early 20's and trying to become something of a film buff. But it didn’t grab me the way that Casablanca did, and I haven’t ever revisited it.

. . . No conversation about sleds with President Zod then, I see.

I’m in the minority, but I honestly loved the heck out of the film, even though the seams in the film are fairly evident. The “plot”, such as it, is needlessly convoluted, because Act 2 is basically a big plot snarl to hide the ball from Merida about the very-obviously-symbolic way to remove the curse, so that there…

It even has the Pixar Tears moment (at least for me - when the cart gets smashed up. Well, sniffles rather than tears).

Ball shots may be low comedy, but even so, I have rarely seen low comedy executed as well as Presto!

“I built ten ships, but do they call me Seamus the shipbuilder? No!”