Loveday Brooke

Lately I've been reading the detective stories of Catherine Louisa Pirkis. Loveday Brooke is one of several fictional female detectives created in the Victorian era, long before real women were hired as police detectives. I don't like Miss Brooke as much as I liked Judith Lee, but she's an interesting character all the same. I wonder if the unusual name "Loveday" was supposed to indicate a Cornish ancestry or if it was just to echo Sherlock's unusual first name.

Anyway, she seems to work for a private detective agency owned by Mr. Dyer, but from the first story, she feels free to argue spiritedly with Mr. Dyer, and he never scolds her in sexist terms. He admits that she's a great detective, and his praise for her reminds me of how Allan Pinkerton often praised Kate Warne in his accounts of the cases they worked together. I do notice that the stories don't always give the clues that you need to solve them. For example, the narration will say that Brooke spent 15 minutes closely examining a room, but not tell you any of the clues she found there, until the end of the story when she explains her solution to Dyer. Then you'll suddenly find out "I found long blond locks in the fireplace, meaning somebody cut their hair and burned it to disguise themselves." So that's not entirely fair to the reader trying to figure out the mystery.

Also, I noticed in one of the tales the phenomenon of Church vs. Chapel. (I also came across this in one of the Daisy Dalyrmple mysteries.) Not being Christian myself, I thought the main religious divisions were between Catholics and various Protestant denominations. But it seems that, in England at least, religious people also make the distinction between High Anglican Church and the so-called "low" dissenters from the Church of England, who nevertheless are still Protestants sneering at the "papists". The so-called nonconformists call themselves "chapel" or by the specific name of their sect, such as the Wesleyans. It's a weird quirk for someone like me who doesn't know that there's any difference between church and chapel. Weird how religious people are so insistent on their tiny differences in doctrine. Oh, and the Loveday Brooke mystery features end-of-the-world cultists known as millenarians. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Holmes & Watson

I finally got to see this movie today after trying to avoid all spoilers and reviews. I liked it as a silly spoof, and I would rate it 2.5 out of 5 stars. I don't know how on earth it got 0% on Rotten Tomatoes. One reviewer complained about the actors' bad English accents. They were bad on purpose. That's part of the parody. Do you not get that? It's supposed to be broad and outrageous like a Mel Brooks movie or a Blackadder farce. You can love the original characters in the books, without taking them so seriously that you can't enjoy an irreverent romp like Without a Clue.

The story starts out with young Holmes being bullied at school, to the point where he "uncries" a tear and decides to be an emotionless automaton devoted to solving crimes (initially for revenge). He also meets young John Watson, a "janitor's son" and deduces that he will become a doctor one day. The movie then skips through years of Holmes's growing fame as a detective and Watson's admiration in his writings. I mean, it's not canon, but this revisionism about their first meeting isn't any more outlandish than the backstory shown in Young Sherlock Holmes.

I laughed at many jokes, and I loved Rebecca Hall as Dr Grace Hart. She became the love interest to Dr Watson while her sidekick character had a much shallower courtship with Holmes. And though the movie makes both Holmes and Watson heterosexual, their friendship becomes an important element in the movie. Grace encourages Watson to ask to be "co-detective" with Holmes, as a sign of real respect and trust between them. So we actually get Watson being a little less adoring and showing some spine, and Holmes eventually learns to value Watson in a heartfelt musical number, similar to a rom-com. I've seen far worse depictions of their friendship, reducing Watson to a servile and stupid puppy taking all the abuse of his callous master. In this film, Holmes is just dismissive and emotionally dumb about Watson, but when he gets better, it's nice. There are some points when the Moriarty plot gets a little frustrating and Holmes's ego becomes unbearable, but it's not long enough to make it unwatchable.

Yes there's low-brow potty humor, but also other kinds of satire. The movie spoofs Guy Ritchie's Holmes movies, Victorian medical quackery, American love for guns, Trumpian politics, and even the Titanic, for this exists in an anachronistic world where Victoria is still alive for the Titanic's maiden voyage. (I worried that Dr Hart wasn't going to survive the voyage, but then we get a brief glimpse of a newspaper headline saying "Lady Doctor saves 700" which I think is a good sign.) If you're willing to suspend your disbelief for improbable antics like Mycroft and Sherlock being able to have a telepathic conversation with each other at Diogenes, then this movie will be to your taste.

Happy Endings

Mary Poppins was fun nostalgia, and Emily Blunt was perfect in the role. Jane Banks was great too. I think that the opening credits were a little long, though, stopping the momentum and likely making children restless waiting for the magic to begin. Once the story started proper, we finally picked up the pace. Michael Banks's sad "Conversation" with his late wife was touching, and I loved the bathtub underwater fantasy. The writers tried to set up a romance between Jane Banks and Jack the lamplighter, but didn't push it too hard. Incidentally, I didn't think there were that many gaslit streetlamps left in 1930s London, but I read that there are still some left today, as part of a Heritage Foundation, so I guess there were more back then.

It was so good to see some side characters back, like Admiral Boom and Binnacle. (But if the sequel is set 25 years after the original, you'd think that those guys would have aged more or died in that time. I can handwave it away, for the sake of Admiral Boom's pleasure when Big Ben finally matched his time.) I do think that the movie went overlong on some songs like "Trip a Little Light Fantastic" and also the Big Ben sequence, when Mary Poppins could have flown the whole time. Great to see cameos from Angela Lansbury and Dick Van Dyke at the end. Even the original Jane Banks actress appeared briefly as the woman who asked for directions on Cherry Tree Lane. I wasn't quite sure it was her until she said "Thanks, most sincerely" like in the kids' letter advertising for a nanny. I loved the balloons at the end.

On TV, the Timeless finale was great. I loved that Rufus came back after the first half hour. I'm glad the writers wasted no time about the love triangle with Jessica, even writing out her pregnancy. No time for those soap opera hijinks anymore when you need to wrap the show in two hours. (God I wish Mitch Hurwitz would have learned that lesson and killed the stupid Rebel Alley storyline in season 5.) Losing Flynn was hard, though, and the North Korea episode was somewhat aimless until we got back to Flynn to make the show come full circle to the pilot. Even though they hinted at a new time machine in the final scene, the writers still wrote a satisfying end, and that's all I'm asking for. No real cliffhanger to frustrate fans endlessly. Just hope, which everybody needs lately.

Politics

Meanwhile, some Democrats this weekend called for closing the Tornillo detention facility; Beto O'Rourke was one of them. I'm glad that, despite people constantly talking him up for 2020, he still knows he has a job now. He's not neglecting his responsibilities to Texas, or humanity. Of course we still have the problem of what to do with all those children being held in such awful conditions. Hopefully the House Democrats might be able to do something next year, along with all the other issues they have to tackle.

Also in Texas, a woman was fired for refusing to sign the new anti-BDS pledge in her contract. She's suing the school district now, and I hope she wins for this violation of her freedom of speech. Republicans and Israel hardliners like to claim that any criticism of Israel's government is a anti-semitic, but it's not. There are plenty of Jewish people who don't support Israel's treatment of Palestinians, and boycotting Israel is the only thing we individuals can do as long as US policy remains to support Israel and fund them and coddle them about their war crimes. It's political protest, to try to economically punish Israel, since we can't get Congress to do anything. Fuck this awful anti-BDS law!

Mary Queen of Scots

The movie was excellent drama, and I enjoyed the diverse casting too. (It's been common in theatre, which is the director's background.) Both actresses were great, and Margot Robbie really did commit to playing Queen Elizabeth as she aged and hardened. I did sometimes miss dialogue due to whispering or accents, but I was able to keep straight most of the various characters even though I've forgotten a lot of British history. There's the usual complaints about historical accuracy, but I'm fine with dramatic license and simplification of complex issues about the Reformation so that we can concentrate on the royals as people.

Yes there is a feminist viewpoint on the political machinations, with the men often plotting around the queens and derisively talking about women's "whims" and "passions" that supposedly make them unfit to rule. Particularly egregious is John Knox, who doesn't care about Mary's religious tolerance for Protestants in Scotland, and keeps denouncing her as a papist and a sinful woman who does not deserve power. He gets more misogynistic as time wears on, calling her a harlot and murderer who needs to be overthrown.

Shows and Cinema

The CW crossover turned out to be a dud, a mere pre-advertisement for next year's "Crisis on Infinite Earths" which was a big to-do in the comics. So plenty of stuff was left unresolved, including whatever promise/sacrifice Green Arrow might have made with the Monitor for the lives of Barry and Kara. Still don't know what that Hammer in the Fortress of Solitude was. At least the Batwoman part was good, with knowing chats with Supergirl, and some sisterly bonding with the alternate Alex Danvers. Then after returning to their home dimension, Superman decided to move to Argo City with Lois, leaving Earth to his cousin to protect. Lois's pregnancy neatly explains Superman's absence for a while, and we even saw a proposal.

Meanwhile, Black Lightning is picking up the pace, with Jenn using her powers more and trying to run away with Khalil. I hope the family will reconcile, and Jenn will start wearing her costume. Tobias seems to be recruiting new henchmen with that assassin and the tech genius he bought. He was getting so tiresome bullying Khalil, but it does seem like he conveniently forgot about the reverend he wanted to kill.

The Timeless movie is coming soon! I can't wait to see Rufus live again. I'm finally gonna see the Mary Queen of Scots movie now that it's come to my area. The Mary Poppins sequel is coming soon, so I'll see that too. Yes it may be openly derivative and relying on cloying nostalgia about childhood, but at least it's about fictional characters and not real people, like that recent Christopher Robin movie exploiting the same emotions.

Nobody's Safe

Now he wants to deport Vietnamese refugees who came here before 1995. Not just the ones after the cutoff in the 2008 deal. Fuck. Like I said before, being here for 40 years doesn't count for them. Being naturalized citizens doesn't count for them. We're still unwelcome foreigners to them. They're trying to kick out any non-white immigrants and make us all afraid to be next. Fucking bastards! The only hope is that Vietnam doesn't want these deportees, and that maybe a court will rule against the administration again.

At the same time, Trump was demanding his border wall again, threatening a government shutdown. Chuck and Nancy got him good during that press meeting, though. Nancy sure proved that she still has the chops to be Speaker of the House. This is why I'm so sick of stupid infighting among Democratic factions. Everything I've heard about Pelosi's priorities for the new Congress sound good to me. It's not either her or the younger generation. They can work together, to stop this madness and investigate the shit out of him. Don't waste the blue wave.

There's still talk of Beto running in 2020, and Julian Castro is considering a run too. But why can't they run for Governor or Cornyn's Senate seat? Why can't they stay and help Texas? We've been hearing about both Castro brothers for a long time being groomed for higher office. Maybe Wendy Davis will try again? I don't know. It just seems like everybody keeps talking about the Presidential election while ignoring other offices we need to win.

Slow Going

I found a cardigan with buttons on it! They've become so rare these days, when stores only carry those fake cardigans that have no buttons. Not even zippers! Some of those so-called cardigans are so flimsy and thin too, making them totally useless in keeping you warm, which is the whole point of a sweater. But at last I found a comfy cardigan with buttons and pockets. Even better, I found a pretty dress with pockets too. Fashion styles can be so weird. I prefer clothes to be classic, easy, and practical.

Anyway, tonight the CW apparently started the three-way crossover. I guess it's slightly better than last year, with a different villain than the generic alternate world Nazis, and I am curious to see this Batwoman that they intend to build a show around. Supergirl's plotlines are so depressing lately that I guess I could use a break with this crossover.

I watched the new Netflix movie called Dumplin' because of the good reviews and the love of Dolly Parton. I was hoping it would be sweet and charming like All the Boys I've Loved Before, but I was disappointed. From the trailers and the premise, I thought that the beauty pageant stuff would be a fun comedy romp, and that Willowdean would be sassy and confident. But she spends a lot of the movie grieving her aunt, fighting with her mother, arguing with her best friend Ellen, and rejecting her love interest. People say this film is body-positive, but Willowdean is so insecure about whether Bo really likes her, and even when he tells her so, she still thinks that's not something that happens in the real world. All her confidence is gone, and it takes her quite a while to rediscover her positive Dolly spirit.

Fake Allies

I've read that Al Franken wants to make a comeback to politics. Why won't he just go away? There's still left-wing idiots who are mad that he resigned, saying it was "feminism run amok" when #MeToo exposed him. Fuck those hypocrites. Letting Franken back in shows that you don't have any principles, that you'll overlook transgressions as long as the guy is in your party. That's fucking ugly. So many people kept minimizing the accusations from the start, saying "that photo was just a joke" and "touching women's butts is not the same as rape." Well of course it's not the same, but it is harassment! If it's seriously creepy when you hear that George H.W. Bush kept touching women who took photos with him, then why isn't it seriously creepy if Al Franken did it? And no, it's not "just a joke" if she was asleep and didn't find out about the "joke" until later. It was without her consent. She wasn't allowed to be in on the joke. Fuck anybody still defending Franken.

The sheen has also worn off on Michael Avenatti, considering the shady stuff he's done, and his ego-driven hinting that he'll run for President in 2020. For awhile he said he was taking cases about the families being separated at the border, but after a time, there was nothing more. So did he actually do anything? Did he drop the cases or hand them off to other lawyers? Maybe he was just an attention whore and we fell for it. But our eyes are opened now.

We need real allies, not these people pretending to help. I still say fuck Bernie Sanders too, who went back to being an Independent but continues to try to lecture Democrats on what they should do. If you don't want to help, then get out of the fucking way.

ETA: Just read that Bush senior died late Friday night. I don't necessarily believe in "don't speak ill of the dead." It was creepy hearing that he took advantage of being in a wheelchair to cop a feel on various women; people wanted to excuse it as dementia or something like that. Anyway, he's gone now, so we'll probably get the usual eulogizing of a former President. Given how the Bushes disliked the Trumps, I wonder if they'll be disinvited from that funeral too.

Troubling

Supergirl is really schizophrenic, making James Olsen agree to do propaganda for the Children of Liberty, then afterward regretting destroying his reputation. Why didn't you listen to Lena earlier about denouncing them and not trying to meet up with domestic terrorists? Lena spent the whole episode doing a human trial of the Harun-el, and it was boring as hell. Why do they stick her in such stupid plots, and make a backstory where she thinks she's evil for merely witnessing a death when she was four years old? What the fuck is that? Meanwhile, Manchester Black goes too far with his vigilante justice by betraying Supergirl and then spitefully putting an empathy enhancer on poor J'onn. So petty and selfish with his pain (much like Liam Neeson's character in Widows whining "I couldn't save us, so I had to save me" like he's a victim instead of a monster). I'm tired of Ben Lockwood as the main villain, and I wish we'd move onto some other plot like the Red Daughter Kara.

Anyway, I finally finished watching the She-Ra reboot, which is more entertaining and full of female friendships. Though it was a shame that Light Hope turned out to be almost as bad as the avatar that kept asking for an administrator. Light Hope wanted Adora to let go of all human attachments and just abandon the rebellion to train for years. Rather singleminded focus on balance rather than on moral right and wrong, and we didn't get any explanation of Grayskull in this universe, just a vague reference to generations of She-Ra's that came before.

Double Feature

Gambi lives after all on Black Lightning, though he's still in hiding. I'm not sure I'm following this new story with Sange and Perdi people in South Freeland. The silver element is creepy, and I don't know why Looker hasn't aged for 30 years, yet Jefferson aged normally. I'm also tired of Tobias Whale constantly threatening and attacking Khalil; it's so repetitive and uninteresting.

On my day off I went to see both Widows and Green Book, which I had been waiting for.

SPOILERS BELOW

Gambi, No!

I think Black Lightning just killed off Peter Gambi. I may be wrong. It may be another case of comic books killing people only to resurrect them later, just like Lala in season 1 of Black Lightning, but he got haunted and eventually died again. I kept looking for any hints in the episode that Gambi was still alive, but there was nothing concrete, just Jefferson saying that he wouldn't believe it until he saw a body. But eventually even Jefferson mourned as if it were true. I don't know what's going on, and I sometimes wish the show was more straightforward and less mysterious. I'm tired of Tobias Whale constantly threatening to kill Khalil too. We need more info about what was in that suitcase. We got a little taste of some blackmail material, but certainly not enough for Gambi to describe it as "hell."

As for a more straightforward superhero show, the new She-Ra has debuted on Netflix. I've only watched the first few episodes so far, but it's interesting seeing the new character designs. I do find it kind of troubling that Light Hope keeps asking Adora to pledge to honor Grayskull while not explaining what Grayskull is, and that Adora seems kind of vacant/possessed when she becomes She-Ra. Catra has a point that Adora is joining the rebellion after only knowing these people a couple of hours.

Recent TV

I'm glad that Murphy Brown brought Jim Dial back for another episode. He had one scene at the bar after returning from a boat trip, and I was afraid that would be all. Instead, he got to come back to receive his Lifetime Achievement Award at a journalist dinner. He went on a date with Phyllis while other characters also paired up that night. I liked that Avery mentioned things about growing up with his mom, such as having to learn how to cook, and Eldin teaching him about sex. I really like the family relationship even if I wonder if Avery will ever decide to get his own place to live, just for some privacy and independence.

Meanwhile, The Good Place spent the whole episode on a flashback, showing how Eleanor and Chidi fell in love in one of the reboots of the afterlife. It was okay seeing the magical world again, but I really wanted the story to move forward, and we only got that in the last few minutes when Michael had the idea about Canada, and the Bad Place demons built a portal to earth. Yet the Judge still doesn't do anything to punish any of the rogue people on Earth? Anyway, welcome back Vicki.

The actress had a part in a couple of Supergirl episodes this season as Fiona. It seemed gratuitous for her to seemingly die twice. :( I did like the new Manchester Black character, but apparently he's gone by the next episode. I'm kind of dreading where all the plots are going with Agent Liberty, and now Guardian now being used for anti-alien propaganda. Too much stuff, and yet not enough of other plots like the Red-Krypton Supergirl.

Fresh Off the Boat introduced another Chinese family to the neighborhood. Interesting so far, and much better than the stupid plotline about Kenny Rogers owning the restaurant last season.

Won the House

Well the Blue Wave wasn't enough to get us the Senate, but Democrats got the House, so we'll finally get some power to resist Trump's agenda. Checks and balances are in the Constitution, and the Republicans just ignored their duty. Democrats will step up.

I am sad that Beto didn't win, but the margin was only 3%, and he built a statewide infrastructure that we can use in the future. Also, there were some downticket races where Democrats were able to defeat Republican incumbents, like Collin Allred taking Session's seat, and Beverly Powell taking back Wendy Davis's old seat from Konni Burton. Glad to have a little blue back in Tarrant County. Yay for Democratic women helping flip 12 seats in the Texas House!

Nationally, there were also great Democrat wins for diversity and for voting rights. Of course it's disappointing not to win the marquee races, but it's important to get governorships and state legislatures so we can control redistricting and fix gerrymandering. I am still hopeful for the future, and relieved that the election is done finally, so we can stop seeing loathesome campaign ads.

I know everybody's gonna talk 2020 even more than they already have; everybody was pushing for Beto to run for President in 2020, like we didn't need him so badly to defeat Cruz and be our Senator. I do wish people would stop pushing the horse race and let us take a breather.

Election Eve

The tension is terrible. I already early voted of course, and I'll be working tomorrow, so I won't even be home to watch the election coverage. (The breakroom TV has been on the fritz for months.) So I'll have to hope that my news alerts on my phone will bring good news. I hope the Blue Wave will be able to overcome numerous voter suppression efforts.

In North Dakota, Native Americans are still fighting to vote. DailyKos raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to get voters new IDs with the required street addresses, but I read that emergency services started changing their addresses in the database, so now it doesn't match exactly. Throwing out hundreds of ballots! They shouldn't have changed any address without informing the people who live there, or mailing them a free ID for the trouble they caused. If that's not voter suppression, what is? Fuck those bastards, and fuck all the screaming about the caravan and ending birthright citizenship. Racist bastards.

Pretty soon they'll try to attack naturalized citizens too, try to round up every non-white race just like the Japanese internment camps and the families still separated at the border. Treating all immigrants like invaders rather than refugees from war-torn countries, or just families seeking a better life like all the white immigrants a century ago. The shooting at the synagogue is part of that fearmongering and hate indoctrination.

Still, there's a strong resistance. Many Native tribes are fired up and banding together to fight the ID fuckery. We might not have better gun laws yet, but the Parkland students do seem to have created a huge surge of youth voters this year, and the NRA has flailed around since they became a pariah. They claimed to be close to bankrupt, so they couldn't fund candidates like they used to. Hopefully we can flip enough of Congress to enact some real legislation and start holding the White House accountable. There's so much to fix.

Such Liars

There's now talk that Arrested Development's remaining episodes won't air until "early 2019" which means that Netflix lied to us when they said they would air in 2018. I just hope that Mitch won't end them on a cliffhanger, because there's no way there will be a season 6. I wouldn't come back for it, if there were. How fucking long do you need to complete the "movie" plot you said you had planned all these damn years? Fucking solve the Austero mystery and Tony Wonder's "death" and stop creating new unresolved questions! You never even answered who sabotaged Gob's wedding illusion. Kill the Rebel Alley plot and move the fuck on!

And boo to A Million Little Things last night for not letting Ashley give the fucking folder to Delilah. I care more about Jon's suicide plot than the damn paternity of the baby. I hate that the promo last week deceived us into thinking that Ashley would finally reveal the truth, but I hate the showrunners more for writing and filming the imaginary scene in the first place just to tease us. Either have the reveal, or don't have the reveal. Don't trick us. And of course we still have no clarification on why Jon killed himself, if life insurance won't pay for a suicide. And if Jon planned out everything so perfectly for every friend, then why the fuck did he fail to pay off an account and endanger the loan for the restaurant? Why did he attach his wife's name to the restaurant and risk ruining her credit too? And apparently he didn't confess this in the folder he left for Delilah, because Ashley had to discover the secret mailbox herself. Sounds like Jon didn't plan everything after all and was a bastard.

Movies and a Play

I had to do something to get out of the house and distract from all the horrible news. On Friday I went to see a play based on the Nate The Great books. I've never read them, but it's a boy detective like Encyclopedia Brown. It was fairly cute, with the child actors and the various pets also played by child actors. Nate wore a green deerstalker but otherwise wasn't like Sherlock, and his girl sidekick was just a part narrator and notetaker; she didn't get to do anything cool like Encyclopedia's bodyguard Sally Kimball.

On Saturday I also went to see Hocus Pocus, because I heard it was a fairly mild Halloween movie, and The Hate U Give. Hocus Pocus was enjoyable camp, funny and creepy but not too scary. I liked the talking cat and I guessed ahead of time that the zombie didn't really like obeying the witches; once he cut the stitches on his mouth, he was able to say so. Didn't realize that he was played by Doug Jones until later. Nice film overall, and glad that it's successful on its 25th anniversary.

As for The Hate U Give, I thought it was a really moving drama, and the actors were all excellent. I was rather shocked when we learned that Starr had witnessed another friend getting killed years before Khalil; their other friend Natasha got shot in a drive by when they were just little kids playing Harry Potter. Starr understandably had been too scared to speak up back then, and that guilt makes her want to speak up for Khalil. Though the media portray Khalil as a drug dealer who deserved to get shot, Starr understands that Khalil was just trying to make money because his grandmother had cancer, and there was no other job he could take that would provide enough money. Yet Starr is afraid to bring up Khalil in front of her white friends at Williamson high school. Even her boyfriend Chris naively says "I don't see race" as if that helps.

Starr's family life is fairly complex, since her half-brother Seven is related to Ayesha (girlfriend of the gang boss King) as well as Starr's friend Kenya. Starr's maternal uncle Carlos meanwhile is a cop, so that's an awkwardly close relationship between criminals and police. Starr's father Maverick used to be in King's gang, but went to prison for King, and was therefore let out of the gang. Maverick now owns a convenience store in the neighborhood, and his kids work there. He takes care of his family (but still he cheated on his wife with Ayesha) and tries to instill black pride in all his kids. I did think that Maverick went too far sometimes trying to defend his home and refusing to move out of the neighborhood even when King started threatening to kill Starr for talking to the police. Worse yet, Maverick let his older son Seven go with him instead of stay safe with the rest of the family. This naturally leads Maverick's younger son Sekani to think that being a man means pulling a gun to defend the family, but thankfully Starr defuses the situation, as she realizes how fucked up it is.

There's still no justice for Khalil, but of course police brutality is going to be an ongoing issue. However, Starr's family is able to recover and rebuild. I was beginning to worry about so many things happening to the family, one after the other, until I thought the violence would never stop, but we get some hope in their moving on. I'm glad that in the end Starr is able to drop her fake 2.0 self at Williamson, and that Chris is able to see her true self, including her blackness.

Mail Bombs

It seems like there's no end to all the mail bombs at Democratic targets. The right has the nerve to think that we're the angry mob, and that the bombs are "false flag" distractions from us. They really think that we'd do something that could potentially harm all the postal workers as well as the security people who handle these bombs? It's sickening. Trump doesn't want to take the blame for inciting violence, and now he's talking about sending troops to the border to block the caravan. He's the one looking for distractions. There's news of an arrest now, so I hope that means the reign of terror might be over soon.

So far, early voting totals in Texas are comparable to presidential election years rather than midterm election years. I hope the trend holds, and I already voted myself. I'm worried about voter suppression in North Dakota and Georgia, though.

New Beginnings

Black Lightning continues to have too-long titles, and too much plot per episode. Some of it feels too disconnected to be coherent, but I do care about what happens to the characters. I wonder why the creepy ASA agent is in charge of the pod people, and why they weren't forced to hand them over, since the original experiment was by ASA agents. What ever happened to that mysterious briefcase that Tobias has?

Supergirl premiered well on Sunday, though my recording was bad due to all the rainstorms. Hope I can get a cleaner copy if they rerun it later. It's nice to see President Marsden again, though her alien identity was exposed. I think this season will be more about aliens as refugees/immigrants being targeted for hate crimes, so more political metaphors, but it's not too blatant.

I saw the movie Colette, about the French novelist. Very good, with a glimpse at how radical art and free love were in fin de siècle France. Colette makes friends with a pantomime performer named Wague who trains her to become an actress when she separates from Willy. Colette also has a lesbian affair with Missy, who dresses in men's clothes and sometimes shares the stage with Colette. At one point Colette insists on saying Missy is a "he" yet they don't use the other name Max that Missy sometimes used, so it's a little ambiguous about his/her identity. I like that Paris is depicted to be diverse and cosmopolitan, not all white like some period movies. I hear Keira Knightly is cast in a new movie with Gugu Mbatha-Raw, about the first black Miss World. That will be interesting too.

So Bad

I watched the live-action Cinderella for the first time, and my God, it sucked. Slow, boring, and the actress mainly just breathed hard whenever she was excited or scared. So many scenes were derivative/stolen from The Slipper and the Rose, or the animated Sleeping Beauty. About the only good part was the Captain of the Guards, and the fact that some African and Asian princesses were invited to the royal ball, but that was only a fleeting glimpse.

It's bad enough that Cinderella's dress is made blue, when it was originally sparkling silver in the cartoon, but the transformation scene where the fairy godmother changed the pink to blue reminded me that Aurora's dress was blue/pink, transforming back and forth throughout Sleeping Beauty. Cinderella has stolen both her dress colors, and now has even stolen her "meet the prince anonymously in the woods" meet-cute too. Fuck Disney. I don't want to watch the Ralph Wreck-it movie with the Disney princesses in it because I'm afraid it's going to screw over Aurora yet again.

Kenneth Branagh sucked big-time as the director of this movie, just like he sucked in the Poirot adaptation he cast himself in. It's starting to make me wonder how he ever got a reputation as a good director. Thumbs down again to him.

Not Good

The Good Place is kind of frustrating. I do like the new character Simone, and how the show avoided a love triangle by having Eleanor support them. She's fun and gives good advice. But I wish the writers would stop trying to do time jumps and resets. I hated the episode last season that was just Michael rebooting the neighorhood 800 times. We're just supposed to believe that all the demons were fine with that and not one of them tattled to Michael's boss, until fake Eleanor finally started to blackmail him after the 800th time?

I don't want another reset. I just want Eleanor/Tahani, and Jason/Janet, now that they've found someone for Chidi. But instead, they flirt with Tahani/Jason again before bringing up Larry Hemsworth for an excuse to get Tahani to leave. And we're not supposed to wonder how Michael and Janet, with no powers whatsoever, are able to live on Earth for over a year and not get discovered, despite all the manipulations and money being spent? The Judge just yells at them from afar and doesn't try to send someone to punish Michael and Janet? That key is really the only key they have? How did the Bad Place demon sneak through without authorization from the Judge? I don't like that "consequences" are so spotty on a show that's supposedly about ethics and philosophy.

Oh well. Murphy Brown pushed back the Jim Dial episode until next week due to the #MeToo episode this week. The stupid app plot took away from the main message, and made it seem like the rules about sexual harassment are ambiguous or confusing. Also didn't like the ICE jokes at the bar.

Black Lightning came back this week and finally did something with the Vice Principal character, who killed Syonide. Also, the police detective finally figured out Black Lightning's identity and confronted him on it. Not sure if he's going to tell anyone else.

Supergirl comes back soon. Hope it will be better now that Reign is gone.

Wishful Thinking

Hoping for a miracle on Saturday's vote was like wishing that the electoral college would vote for Hillary Clinton instead of the popular vote loser in 2016. Didn't happen, and I think I remember there was even somebody's futile protest vote for Bernie Sanders. These senators don't care about the will of the people. It's party over country, and now we have a second sexual abuser on the court. Fuck them, and I do hope that Maine finally gets rid of Susan Collins at the next election.

As if to match the gloomy mood, it's now rainy and cooler in Texas. Hope there won't be flooding this time.

But I wouldn't mind a Blue Wave in November. Vote 'em out, and then impeach Kavanaugh. Trump too, if Mueller comes out with enough stuff by then.

Worth Rewatching

Well the new TV season has begun. I was sad that the new Murphy Brown doesn't have Jim Dial as a regular, but then I heard that he'll guest star on episode three, so that will be good. I'm trying out new sitcoms but only like a couple so far. Hoping that the new Magnum stays light and breezy, though they still keep doing flashbacks to the guy who died in the pilot. At least they had an interesting lost fish case on the 2nd episode.

The drama A Million Little Things has a mystery going on about why Jon killed himself. He apparently left a whole packet explaining things to his wife, but his damn secretary took it and won't tell anybody. His last voicemail message, though, said "Love each other" which reminds me a little bit of how that line recurred in Arrested Development season 4. The insurance policy puzzles me, though, because I thought that insurance doesn't pay in the case of suicide, so how would his beneficiaries inherit? If he planned everything so carefully, surely he'd know that. Confusing, but I do like many characters and touching moments. However, there's also weird moments like a daddy/daughter dance where one of the songs is a breakup song by James Bay. What is up with choosing weird, inappropriate songs for your show?

I also saw a couple of movies, The House With the Clock in its Walls and Smallfoot. Both were entertaining. I usually don't like horror films, but the House movie was pretty mild. It was more family-friendly adventure with magic, and the trailers warned about the things that would be creepy, like the dolls/automatons that came to life, so I could handle it. I also liked the diverse casting even though it was a period movie. Strangely I found that some reviews by parents online kept claiming that it wasn't for kids, and that it was full of satanic rituals. The movie portrayed both good and bad magic, so the villains did do dark, evil stuff (or trick the boy into doing evil), but it's not any worse than Harry Potter fighting Voldemort. Anyway, I liked it, and it will probably be the only Halloween-themed movie I'll see this year, because I'm not into scary movies usually.

I was surprised by how much I liked Smallfoot. I guess the trailers made it seem more silly and slapsticky. The movie is actually kind of thoughtful, with its emphasis on integrity, and learning the truth. The backstory about how Yetis have encountered humans before, but it went badly, hinted at past colonialism and hunting species to extinction. The movie had really good messages about communication and tolerance between cultures. I also liked the song about being curious and asking questions. Good movie, and a good alternative for whichever parents think that House was somehow not family friendly.

Maigret at the Crossroads

On Sunday I watched an episode of Maigret on PBS. It's one of the recent ones starring Rowan Atkinson as the French police chief. From what I've seen, the shows are fairly good period mysteries, not quite a cozy, but at least not a soap opera like that stupid Grantchester. It's not "light" and jokey but also not bleak like those depressing Wallender shows either. Wallender most definitely turned me off any Scandinavian mysteries whatsoever.

I think Rowan is good at playing serious, in an understated way, but I wish Maigret's wife had more to do. I also really wanted to have some resolution about the plot with her friend whose policeman husband was cheating on her. The show seemed to have some really weird viewpoints on sexual politics and marriage.

SPOILERS

Get Ready to Vote!

The news has been exhausting, and all the discussion of sexual assaults with #WhyIDidntReport has been horrifying. I was glad to hear that the agent who assaulted Terry Crews finally got fired, and Crews posted the guy's apology letter. Finally some repercussions.

The Texas Senate race is a tossup, and they had their first debate on Friday. I didn't see it, but I did see a Cruz political ad on late night TV, with Cruz trying to stoke fears about illegal immigrants killing people and needing to be deported. Fuck you, Cruz, when a US border patrol agent is a serial killer maybe you shouldn't throw stones about who's killing people.

Even lawful immigrants like me are having their citizenship questioned, and being screwed over for taking government assistance, so excuse me if I don't trust Cruz to handle illegal immigrants any less cruelly. Even US citizens in Puerto Rico were fucking abandoned by Trump, but Cruz is fine with stoking racist sentiments. Fuck you, for saying you "serve the President" instead of Texans. Fuck you, for supporting Trump's horrifying Supreme Court pick and his family separation policies at the border. Fuck you, for wanting to kill Obamacare and support the NRA and the policewoman who shot a man in his own apartment.

Anyway, it's National Voter Registration day, so make sure you're registered. Midterms are coming. I gotta make some more donations and pick which races to spread my money.

The Price of Misogyny

In addition to the Murphy Brown sequel, there's going to be a Designing Women sequel in the works soon. Sure there are too many reboots and revivals lately, but this feels like a good resurgence of feminist shows. When I was growing up there were many successful TV shows created by women like Susan Harris, Linda Bloodworth Thomason and Diane English. They were so popular for a while and then suddenly they were gone, replaced by more masculine-oriented shows. I thought it was some kind of cyclical backlash or even due to misguided chasing of the 18-49 demographic. Later, I even thought the dearth of quality shows was due to the decline of scripted shows in the face of the rise of reality shows. All sorts of reasons were given for the changing TV landscape.

But no, some of this change was deliberate misogyny. Linda Bloodworth Thomason's scathing op-ed about how Les Moonves sabotaged her career, along with talk that Les Moonves repeatedly tried to destroy Janet Jackson's attempts at a comeback post-Superbowl (while forgiving Justin Timberlake), point to how fucked up Hollywood can be. That one mogul could have that much power to fuck over people he doesn't like, apart from the separate sexual abuse allegations, is what's wrong with the terrible good ol' boys' network. People against diversity always complain about "quota systems" and insist that "the best person for the job" should be hired on merit alone. But the problem with that is that the gatekeepers are deliberately keeping out people who have genuine merit and talent, for the sake of a whim at best and malevolent revenge at worst. That's WHY the system needs to change, in Hollywood and everywhere else. It's not fair when "the best person for the job" is almost always a white guy due to the inherent unfairness of power brokers rigging the available choices. Equal opportunity needs to be available to everyone, not just a handful of favorites deemed acceptable.

I'm glad more women came forward, forcing Moonves to finally step down, and I'm glad Linda Bloodworth Thomason is getting her long overdue revenge. Yes, ABC, this is the kind of nostalgia trip you should be pursuing instead of holding onto The Conners out of desperation

Rainy Days

It must really be fall, because we've had rain this week. Such a relief from all the hot weather this summer.

I recently read a historical novel called Unmentionables by Laurie Loewenstein. It's set in 1917 in a small town called Emporia, where people have gathered for the annual Chautaqua circuit show. The protagonist Marian Elliot Adams is a feminist lecturer whose subject is women's undergarments, and how women need dress reform so that they can do practical work free of restrictive fashion. Then she meets some residents and gets injured, forced to stay in the town until she recovers.

Dark Times

Sad that things are still so bad. Families still separated at the border, Puerto Rico still struggling, and now I hear that US Citizens are having their passports revoked and their citizenship questioned.

I'm a naturalized citizen myself, and my dad told me to get a passport (even though I don't travel much outside the country) as proof of my citizenship that I could show quickly without having to dig up old naturalization records. But if passports aren't enough, and people are getting deported based on ethnic heritage, rather than citizenship, what the fuck are people supposed to do? Perpetual immigrants, never to be accepted. Fuck. And it's only the white people who will be unquestioned, when they are immigrants just as much as any non-Native Americans.

And now we have the awful confirmation hearings and another lawsuit trying to shutdown Obamacare. There's so many things that need to be fixed NOW, and can't wait for midterms in November. It feels like nothing can save us, that it's already too late. But I gotta get myself out of that defeatist mindset.

At least Nike made a bold stand about Colin Kaepernick, so maybe resistance is getting more mainstream? Hope his lawsuit against the NFL succeeds. Trying to pretend they aren't all blackballing him.

Searching is Awesome

I saw that Alpha movie, and it was pretty good. I didn't realize that Leonor Varela was playing the Shaman who presided over all the rituals. She played the original Marta in Arrested Development, season 1. Since I have the AMC subscription, I could rewatch it, I guess. Nice that they thought to give that role to a woman rather than making the society totally patriarchal.

I also saw Searching finally on Saturday, and really enjoyed it. I love the way they planted clues throughout the movie, as well as red herrings to keep you guessing. It felt like a real mystery, like I've been missing for so long, in this age of countless serial killers and psychopaths that have no logic for their evil. I highly recommend seeing it.

SPOILERS BELOW

Liu Xing

I found a translation of that "Yellow" cover, and yes, the lyrics don't match Coldplay's lyrics at all. It's more metaphorical and poetical, focused on stars and yearning and torrents of feelings. The title, "Liú Xīng", means meteor or shooting star. Apparently these Mandarin lyrics are based on a version by Zheng Jun, later performed on China's The Voice show. So there's been a history of Chinese singers covering this song. Katherine Ho's version for the soundtrack is really lovely.

I also went to see that IMAX Pandas movie from back in April, because they re-released it this week for some reason. I might go to see the Alpha movie next time. Really, I spend so much money on movies and food that I might as well sign up for a subscription again. Maybe this one will work better than Moviepass, and at least it lets me see a movie more than once if I really like it.

Also I spent the weekend making screencaps and trimming video from that Hogan Family episode where David has a puppet Clifford and does magic badly. Jason Bateman is so goofy and funny in it. Now I gotta see where I can upload them.

GoldOpen

I finally saw Crazy Rich Asians on Saturday. I've never read the book, so everything was new to me. I loved Constance Wu and the whole cast. Michelle Yeoh plays Nick's mother Eleanor, and starting from the first scene in London, she does get some depth and complexity beyond being a villain. Eleanor gave up her career as a lawyer to marry into the Young family, but even after all these years she never seems to satisfy her mother-in-law (even though she gave her son to Ah-Ma to raise). You'd think that would give her some sympathy for Rachel wanting to still have her career, but no, Eleanor's sacrifices mean nothing if she thinks that Rachel wouldn't make the same sacrifice for Nick. (It does rather remind me of Victorian romance novels; I recently watched an Edith Wharton adaptation where an old matriarch resents the younger generation of women shirking their responsibilities and not sacrificing like they were expected to.)

So that, along with tensions about class and cultural differences, provide lots of conflict among the characters. But there's also plenty of romance and humor. The soundtrack is gorgeous, and I recognized some of the songs right away, but it took me much longer to recognize Coldplay's "Yellow" when sung in Mandarin. Very beautiful cover, and I've since read some articles about the director loving that song, as a way to reclaim pride in his Asian identity. It's strange because I never associated that song with my being Asian, because I always misheard the lyrics. The lines where he sings about "your skin and bones" I've always heard as, "You're still, yeah you're still the one" or "you're still the force" as in a celestial force like the stars he keeps singing about. It never occurred to me that he was talking about her "skin and bones" because frankly that's a weird, somewhat creepy way to describe someone you love. I wonder how literal the Chinese translation is.

There's a lot of opulence on display in the film, but money doesn't always buy taste, because Rachel's college friend lives in a family mansion decorated like Trump's bathroom, and there's one guy Bernard whose shirt is always open, and he throws a tacky bachelor party on the ocean. The $40 million dollar wedding is so over-the-top, and I'm sorry but I do agree that decorating the church like a rice paddy was tacky as hell. (If you want an outdoor wedding, then make it outdoors!) Flooding the walkway for the bride might be an impressive feat, but is she saying she doesn't give a fuck about ruining the church floor? Ruining her dress and all the bridesmaid dresses in the water? Fuck. Crazy rich indeed. Money doesn't buy happiness either, as we learn in Astrid's troubled marriage, but at least she has Rachel to confide in and finally finds her voice. I will say, though, that Rachel let Nick off the hook too easily about omitting the truth from her for a year and not preparing her for his family before the Singapore trip. Don't throw her into the lion's den without warning.

Anyway, I'm so glad the film did well at the box office, and that lots of people celebrated the diversity before and behind the screen. I hope there will be a sequel, and they continue to keep it in theaters, not on Netflix where they can hide viewing numbers. Gotta keep it up so it becomes normal business, not a fluke or a "hot trend" of the moment. Can't let Hollywood keep getting away with whitewashing or yellowface again.

Movie stuff

Yay, a new picture from the Mulan movie, and news of more actors joining the cast. I hope it will be good. Still a long wait until 2020. The Crazy Rich Asians movie will have to do for now, but I won't be able to see it until Saturday.

In the meantime I saw BlacKkKlansman this weekend. It was riveting, especially the intercut between the Klan meeting and the Black Student Union meeting. The ending showed footage from Charlottesville; Spike Lee had chosen this release date for the anniversary.

I'm thinking of signing up for the AMC subscription thingie because I spend too much money on movies. I don't like being limited to one theater chain, but I guess there is an AMC near that sometimes has the smaller indie movies I like to see. I never got Moviepass to work for me so I cancelled it long ago, and now it's seriously sounding like it's in its death throes.

Representation Matters

Lately I've been reading a cozy mystery called A Gentleman's Murder by Christopher Huang. It's set in 1924 London, and the protagonist is a half-English, half-Chinese man who belongs to a prestigious gentleman's club. He counts being accepted there as validation that he's English, but some people still discriminate against him and treat him as a foreigner, asking "Where are you from?" like I've experienced so many times in my 30+ years in America. Eric Peterkin also reviews murder mysteries for a living, so of course a murder happens right in the club.

According to Deadline, it's going to be developed for television, and I'd be glad if we finally get an Asian detective on TV who's not a Charlie Chan stereotype or the token diversity in a procedural starring white people. I'd love it if he appeared on Masterpiece Mystery! but it seems like PBS is far more interested in period dramas to find their next Downtown Abbey, than mysteries lately. I hate that they keep showing Grantchester, which is just a glorified soap opera, not really a detective show like the classic Agatha Christies they used to do. With my luck, the show will end up on Amazon or some cable channel. At least I can enjoy the novel.

Reading it, and watching Kim's Convenience on Netflix, makes me wish that the Brits had made Wok into a show. I loved that pilot and would have enjoyed seeing more about the Chinese immigrant experience in London.

And where the fuck is the Chloe Kim Barbie that Mattel announced months ago for Women's Day? They were going to make a whole line of inspiring women Barbies, but so far I've only seen 3 of them released for sale. Where are the rest, Mattel?

Timeless and Kim's Convenience

NBC agreed to do a two-part finale for Timeless. I'm so happy we'll finally get closure; hopefully the writers will resolve everything efficiently and not try to over-extend the love triangle for drama. Apparently it will be a holiday movie, so I'll be looking forward to it. Finally some good news out of the summer press tour.

In the meantime, I found this Canadian sitcom on Netflix called Kim's Convenience. It's about Korean immigrants who own a convenience store in Toronto. Mr. Kim doesn't speak to his estranged son Jung, who works at a car rental agency, and the younger daughter Janet goes to art school to become a photographer. I like the most of the show, but I dislike the part that Jung's boss Shannon is attracted to him and abuses her position more than once (she tries to turn "mentoring" into a dinner date; another time she gives him basketball tickets as a bonus for good work, but she assumes that he's taking her on a date, instead of his best friend). This is especially egregious given that Shannon had to run a weird kind of sexual harassment/cultural sensitivity meeting when Jung's friend accused him of harassment as retaliation for criticizing his poor job performance. If she read the corporate policy on harassment, then she needs to stop violating it.

Stephen Colbert apparently addressed the allegations against Moonves, pointing out that he likes his boss, but he believes in accountability. #MeToo isn't just about going after people you dislike politically; it's for everyone who behaves inappropriately, so I appreciate Colbert making that point. That's the same thing about taking down Harvey Weinstein or Al Franken; it doesn't matter that they're liberals. What matters is what they did, and no I don't excuse Franken for it being a "joke" and claiming he doesn't remember.

I don't like that some news media have been reporting that Les Moonves denied the allegations against him. On the contrary, his statement admitted that in the past he "made women uncomfortable with advances" which he regrets; the only part he denies is abusing his office to end people's careers. However, he doesn't realize that he abused his power by making the advances in the first place during professional work meetings. If he sincerely wanted to date these women, the time to approach them is in a social setting outside of work, hopefully not in the same time period where he's making a deal to hire them, buy their show, etc. "Making advances" while at work implies that the job is dependent on the women giving you sexual favors. And by the way, you should start verbally with asking someone out or flirting; your first move should not be to immediately kiss or grope someone. If that's your idea of romance, then no, you don't understand that "no means no". Ok, maybe you didn't do a Harvey Weinstein maneuver of inviting them to a hotel room and raping them, but you still abused the vast power you had at the network. If you truly regret the "mistakes" then step down and get some counseling. I don't fucking care what power struggles are going on with the Redstones. Appoint a successor or have the board do it for you. I don't care. Fucking leave.

Teen Titans Go! to the Movies

I've only watched a few episodes of the TV show while on vacation; the cartoon was sometimes funny, but it was often juvenile too, and I would have preferred to watch Scooby-Doo reruns. I was afraid that the movie would be too juvenile or too meta about Hollywood. (God, did I get sick of Hollywood navel-gazing satire in Arrested Development's season 4 Hollywood plots.) But actually the movie was pretty good and fun; the movie-making stuff actually figured into the villain's plans for world domination. It wasn't just for meaningless jokes.

Also, before the main movie there was a short, just like Pixar movies open with shorts, and this film was about Batgirl trying to join the other DC Superhero Girls in crimefighting. It was nice; I've seen a few webisodes of their series set in high school, and this was fun.

Will Arnett voices Slade, whose specialty seems to be "mind manipulation." At first he doesn't take the Teen Titans seriously, because his first few tricks (I mean, illusions) are misdirections like "look over there" and pretending to pull off his thumb. When the Teen Titans finally start not to fall for the silly maneuvers, Slade starts doing more impressive magic and fights competently. Meanwhile Robin pursues his dream to get a Hollywood movie, convincing his fellow Titans to help him go back in time and change origin stories so all the other superheros don't become heroes, leaving just them. However, that doesn't work out, so they go back and fix everything before returning to pursue their archnemesis Slade.

The movie is bright and hectic as expected, but has some genuine heart and some good songs. Overall, a very respectable, kid-friendly movie. Good job on Arnett for producing this; he needs more projects like this and less talking-dog movies. Though I do want to see him do more live-action stuff instead of always being a voice actor. I can understand making the most of his wonderful voice, but seeing his charming face is nice too.

Living Nightmare

In Israel they recently passed that law that they're a Jewish nation-state, and Netanyahu is saying that Hitler was pushed into killing Jews by the Grand Mufti. Because of course right now is the time to inflame hatred against Arabs. Fuck him. How is he not forced to resign over this or the corruption charges? [ETA: Apparently Netanyahu said that in 2015, not recently. But the point still stands; how is he still in charge?]

Is it the same reason that somehow Trump keeps hanging on after all his scandals and crime? The idiot started a stupid trade war with the whole world, and now because people thought his farmers' bailout was shit, he finally backed down and decided to make nice with Europe. And the deadline for reuniting the children passed, but he thinks he can get away with leaving a third of the kids separated because they're somehow "ineligible"? Glad the ACLU and RAICES are still on it, even if other people have moved on.

I don't know if it's the persistent triple-digit heat, or the stress of the world being on fire, but I keep waking up hours early and having really vivid dreams that seem to last forever. I feel physical sensations in them, like water flooding into my house, and a roomba (that I've never owned) zooming past my foot while I'm going through my closet. I thought that time had passed and I watched the last half of season 5, but I got really mad at how Mitch had ruined Arrested Development. And I thought that I was yelling and trying to calm down to write a blog review. After I woke up, it took me several minutes to realize that no, the dream didn't happen. It's very strange and disconcerting.

Meanwhile the summer TV press tour has started with more announcements. They might as well just make Comic-Con part of the press tour, because it's all the same marketing/hyping going on. At least I got to watch a nice interview about Crazy Rich Asians coming out soon. I can't wait.

More Franchises

Anyway, it's apparently Comic-Con weekend, so there's all sorts of news and trailers coming out. I'm a little concerned that Greg Berlanti has signed on to too many comic book shows at once, though it is good to have more diverse heroes out there. There's even a Buffy reboot looking for a black female lead.

Apparently the director of the Guardians of the Galaxy movies got fired for his tweets. It was orchestrated by the right as more revenge since they didn't get Sam Bee and Joy Reid fired. Yet they want to claim this is about PC culture and outrage. It's disingenuous but I don't really care about that guy anyway, especially since he used to think it was funny to troll and shock people. I don't care, just like I don't care about loudmouth Bill Maher. I hope Disney takes the opportunity to find a new director who's a woman or minority because we need for diversity behind the screens, not just in the casting. More diverse writers too.

No trailer yet, but some artwork for the She-Ra reboot came out this week. People are complaining that she doesn't look like her old self. I understand the characters are teens now, so it makes sense not to depict her has an adult. Will have to see the new She-Ra in action to really tell if it's good.

Sweltering

It's been fucking hot as hell lately, in the triple digits, such that it's like I'm living in Phoenix, not DFW. I feel sweaty and uncomfortable all the time, and my office is always too cold, so I'm going back and forth between the extremes. I don't remember a summer so hot before, and we're still only in July, not August.

It's been a horrible week starting with the debacle in Helsinki. Post-outrage, Trump tried to walk back the treason but the intelligence community is still rightfully pissed. If Republicans really thought Trump went too far, they should have voted to secure our elections from more attacks. At least they voted not to hand our ambassador over to Putin. So shame and resistance sometimes works.

Also, Tim Scott got a Trump-nominated judge to withdraw. If only we could get a similar outcome for the Supreme Court.

Representation

Scarlett Johansson backed down from playing the transman after all, and said that she's learning. One can doubt her sincerity and think that she did this to save her Black Widow movie. I'm still side-eyeing her. There's a lot of clueless internet comments from people thinking that she was "bullied" into withdrawing from the part and that "sensitivity" has gone amuck. But that's bullshit. She didn't even fucking look like the guy she was supposed to portray. Not remotely.

Hollywood has been making movies and TV shows about trans people for years now, profiting off them and getting Oscars and Emmys for the people that Johansson's rep listed in her stupid comeback. How many fucking years are trans people supposed to sit by watching all these great parts go to cis-actors, while they in turn don't get to play cis roles? I'm even appalled that Louie Anderson is playing a woman on the cable show Baskets; all I ever see is critics praising him for doing a brilliant homage to his mother, and not one person questions why the hell he's stealing a role from older actresses, who have to fight for any meaty good roles.

Yellow face and black face in Hollywood's past isn't acceptable anymore, and that's what we're talking about, privileged people stealing from underrepresented minorities who never had the chance to play the lead character. It's like fucking Luise Rainer getting that part in the Good Earth instead of Anna May Wong, who paid her dues for years playing stereotypes and dragon ladies. She had to go to Europe and China itself to get anything worthwhile, because of Hollywood's racism. I mean you wonder why it took 70 years to get the first Asian woman nominated as a lead actress in a drama series? It's because 1) they don't write that many lead roles for Asians, of either gender, and 2) even when they write them, Hollywood wants to cast white actors for those roles instead. Sandra Oh thought she was reading for the receptionist role, not the fucking lead. That's how crappy things have been. And in the meantime, on the comedy side, Constance Wu still has no Emmy noms.

So telling Scarlett to get her head out of her ass is not "bullying" her; it's telling her to fucking drop the mask of her white privilege and start being an ally. 'Cause fuck, I read recently that the London pride parade had been spoiled by transphobic women spouting that right-wing shit that transwomen are just men who want to rape women in bathrooms. This fucking nonsense needs to be eradicated, and it's not helped by having trans people constantly be played by the wrong fucking gender. When is Hollywood going to learn its lesson?

This and That

I read that a woman climbed the Statue of Liberty in protest. Aside from my being afraid of heights, that's much braver than I am. And she was doing it for the separated children. Thanks for keeping the resistance alive!

Also, a boys' soccer team in Thailand are trapped in a cave, but they've been found alive. Officials are trying rescue plans A, B, and C to get them out before monsoon rains flood the caves worse. It reminds me of the trapped miners in Chile, and I even read that one of the miners wants to go there to help. Good luck to them.

Meanwhile I'm glad that Private Eyes season 2 is now airing on ION. It's a perfect light summer mystery show. They take a variety of PI cases, not always murder, and they just added a new character to run their office. I hope she stays awhile unlike that babysitter character who disappeared off The Mysteries of Laura. So many networks do dumb reality shows during the summer.

Scarlett Johansson apparently didn't learn her lesson with Ghost in the Shell. She's signed on to play a transman in a biopic, and she defended herself by listing other cis actors playing trans, including freaking Jeffrey Tambor. It wasn't right with them either! She's really a garbage person; I won't be watching that Black Widow movie for sure.

Happy 4th

Well the rest of season 5 didn't show up on Netflix after all. It was just fan speculation and that "coming soon" tease. But after all, we had been hoping for episodes on Cinco, and they didn't come until nearly June. So maybe the second half will be weeks late as well.

There's an elaborate Cracked theory that Lindsay is Lucille Austero's daughter. While I'm glad to see people noticing that the Nichael birth certificate has the wrong gender, wrong birthdate, and wrong birthmother--basically everything on it is wrong--I think that Cracked's theory is farfetched and "cracked" if you will. After all, Lucille Austero could simply be dyeing her hair black because she doesn't want to have grey/white hair that makes her look old. There are other fan theories out there, like Tracey Bluth still being alive, or Murphybrown being Tony Wonder's nephew.

All these people think that these clues have been hidden and seeds planted in the way that Buster losing his hand was foreshadowed in seasons 1-2. And sure, AD does like doing long-range background jokes like that. But they've also retconned stuff and ignored Maeby and GM's marriage for two seasons now. They're not infallible and they mess up quite a bit of continuity at their convenience. (They're totally inconsistent on whether one family member --Tobias in season 2, Michael in season 5--can sign away rights for the whole family, or whether each person needs to sign the contracts--season 4.) And they do spiteful things like deporting Annyong for no reason.

Season 5 seems to be trying to hint that something happened in 1982, something blackmail worthy, and Lucille ended up bribing Buster by letting him ride in the July 4th parade that year. It's why Lucille objects to Ron Howard's TV series, because she thinks it will dig up buried family secrets. Apparently they've got something to tell us, but I'm pretty apathetic and almost expecting the secret to be a huge disappointment. Like the fucking staircar photo that makes not one ounce of sense, and becomes instantly moot because of Buster's prison escape. It doesn't matter who's in the photo, because now Buster's a fugitive!

Uggh. I'm not watching this show for some huge twist to be revealed at the end. I just want a wrapup of the murder mystery, a Gob/Tony ending, and some closure like the way that Development Arrested wrapped up the series in season 3. I don't want Lost conspiracy shit or the stupid "Live" gimmick Mitch talked about in his magazine interview. Mitch, doing that would mean that you officially became the idiot network rating stunt that you were parodying in S.O.B.s. Do you not see that? Why do you retread bad old jokes? Why can't you move the fucking story forward instead of spinning your wheels going nowhere? We fucking waited years for this. End the fucking movie you've been talking about all this time. Fix it, Mitch, and don't come back begging for a 6th season. I won't be there. I'm tired of these episodes not being worth it.

Stay Safe

Stay safe, Maxine Waters. Stay safe, Parkland teens. Stay safe, journalists. Stay safe, all you beautiful protesters this week. Stay safe, lawyers and judges trying to help the immigrant kids. Stay safe, everyone in Puerto Rico. Stay strong and keep fighting injustice. Activists make me feel better than any old "thoughts and prayers."

Waiting

Meanwhile, I did hear that NBC officially cancelled Timeless, though it got swamped by other news. I think they are still hoping to get a 2-hour wrap-up movie somewhere. I don't know if it's likely at this point, but good luck.

Netflix is showing that new episodes of Arrested Development are coming soon. Maybe they'll appear on July 2nd, where the 1st half left off. It better fix the damn cliffhanger and solve the Lucille Austero disappearance, because this mystery doesn't need to be dragged out any further. Also, they never answered who sabotaged Gob's wedding illusion with the mud hut. I hope they don't answer it with a stupid last-minute retcon. So much stuff about season 5 was terrible and haphazard, like they just threw random stuff at the wall. Are you FUCKING making up the story as you go? You had no thought out plan ahead of time after all these damn years? Bastards.

I saw the Incredibles sequel this weekend, and it was okay. Funny at times but also slow at others. I mostly just wanted to see the short Bao that people had been talking about. That was fine, but I guess I'm not moved that much by Pixar anymore. I wasn't excited for the Lego Movie 2 trailer either. The only recent movie that I haven't felt meh about was that Netflix Set it Up romcom.

I really want to see Crazy Rich Asians, and everything else looks boring lately. I'm also waiting impatiently for the Miss Fisher movie to finish and get a release date for America.

Supreme Court

With Kennedy retiring, and the prospect of a new Trump nominee, things are looking very dire. He really screwed us. I couldn't even process the shock at first and just needed to get away from the internet for a while. Democrats can't filibuster anymore so we have to somehow get some Republicans to vote against confirming a new justice; if they're anything like our Texas senators, than that's going to be a lost cause.

And yet, I have to believe that we can somehow fight on, with public protests and voting in the midterms so we can at least reclaim Congress. Otherwise you're only left with futility and paralysis. Or lots of people vowing to move to Canada, but that leaves behind everyone who can't go and need help. Gotta find a path through Mueller or someone else that can bring an end to this destruction. Just hope it's not actual war with North Korea.

Court Orders

The Supreme Court also upheld the travel ban and made other bad rulings lately. Hopefully, since they've now recessed until October, the damage is over for now. A federal judge in San Diego has ruled that the separated children get reunited with their parents, with 14-day and 30-day deadlines. I hope the protests planned this weekend will keep the pressure on.

Meanwhile, I heard that Terry Crews testified to Congress about sexual harassment. I'm glad he's still speaking up even though the police declined to prosecute his case due to statute of limitations. He's a great guy, even willing to talk about his faults and his past behavior that he regrets.

There were a lot of primary elections last night, some surprises but no big trend that I saw. Some progressive newcomers, some establishment candidates won. I'm trying to stay hopeful, but now there's going to be a summit in Russia. Of course.

Despair

Fuck the Supreme Court for overturning the ruling on Texas redistricting. This case has been in court for years, through multiple elections, and Texas kept losing. But we never got to enjoy one fair election map. And now it's all ruined, and the precedent will probably be bad for other redistricting cases. How can we turn Texas blue when we can't get any fair maps? Fuck them!

Fuck Congress for holding that Supreme Court seat open Trump. Fuck the voters who didn't think this mattered. Fuck people arguing about how we need to be "civil" when our fucking rights are being taken away, and we're on the verge of internment camps. They're complicit in monstrous policies, and we're supposed to tiptoe around their feelings? Fuck the media for trying to tone-police genuine outrage.

Hope the righteous fury can maintain through the June 30th marches. I have to work that weekend, but I hope the protests force some other concession from Trump. He's already trashed immigration bills again.

Won't You Be My Neighbor?

I saw the Mr. Rogers documentary and learned some things I didn't know about him, like his 143 quirk, where he thought he needed to maintain that weight because the phrase "I love you" is made up of 1,4,and 3 letters. It was nice to see some clips of him with Koko too, and to see his family members being interviewed. I was rather surprised by the topics that his show covered in the early weeks, about war, walls, and assassination. It was 1968, but he didn't choose to avoid those topics of conversation for kids. He wanted to provide guidance and reassurance to kids who were afraid. Also, I didn't know that Rogers stopped the Neighborhood show for a while to try a show for adults. I'm glad he came back.

I also learned about Francois Clemmons being gay, but Fred Rogers told him he could not come out, and he got married to stay in the closet. Still, they remained friends and continued to work together; Francois said he still felt loved, and that Fred was like a surrogate father to him. I mean, I get it, this was decades ago, when people still thought gay people were scandalous and couldn't be on a children's show. There were sponsors to think about, and PBS at risk. It's like how Rogers was a lifelong Republican; back then being Christian and Republican didn't mean you had to be a rightwing looney. (In fact the documentary mentions some 1990s backlash accusing Rogers of making children feel entitled and overly special.) He felt very deeply about his philosophy about children needing their emotions to be taken seriously. I'm glad too that Rogers washed his feet in the pool with Clemmons to make a point about civil rights in the era of segregated pools. It's sad to hear that he was very disheartened about 9/11 and almost thought his doing a PSA about it was pointless. But I do appreciate that even though Rogers was a minister, he never tried to preach to children about religion; he knew his message would be more universal if he didn't approach kids as a minister and try to convert them. I appreciate that, because America has many religions and some agnostics and athiests.

I hear that Tom Hanks is going to play Rogers in a movie. I wonder if it will be any good or if they will sanitize his life too much.

Upheavals

I'm sad to hear that Koko the gorilla died. I remember the story of her kitten All Ball. The world is so tragic these days that I'm looking for that new Mr. Rogers documentary so I can have a little hope and kindness.

I read that Netanyahu's wife got charged for misusing public funds. I thought this might be related to the corruption case against Netanyahu himself, but apparently not. I do hope he gets arrested and ousted. Shame on him for supporting Trump's policies, like moving the embassy and nixing the Iran nuclear deal. Trump kept saying it was a bad deal, but he made a worse one with North Korea.

Anyway, there have been some thunderstorms lately, but now it looks like the oppressive summer heat is here. I tried out a new recipe for lasagna and it turned out pretty good. Might try to add mushrooms or spinach next time.

I don't know if I was just tired when I watched the Supergirl finale, but I didn't understand how they killed Reign for good. Supergirl traveled back in time to prevent her friends dying, right? Then they grabbed the black rock and got transported to the "Dark Valley"? Then somehow Sam got Reign to drink water and get snuffed out by dark shadow ghosts? Then only Sam and Supergirl returned from the Dark Valley? I don't get it, and I don't know how Supergirl knew that would happen. She kept saying "there is one place that can trap her", but that's not true, is it? The Dark Valley didn't trap her for good. She got out and she's more powerful now than when Lena kept her on ice with kryptonite. It makes no sense, but fine, handwave it away. Bye, Sam and Ruby. Your story took forever. Bye, Dark Witches and Alura. Bye Legion of Superheroes and Winn. Apparently the actor asked to be written out for new career opportunities, but will come back as recurring. I don't really care about Brainy, but the allusions to Brainiac are perhaps foreshadowing. I don't understand what's happening with J'onn now and James coming out as Guardian. I hope next season will be better with less disjointed stories.

The World is Watching

So Trump signed an executive order to stop the family separation (never mind that he started all this without an executive order) and now it means that families will be detained together indefinitely. There will be a lawsuit about it, and it's not clear that this will do anything to reunite the people that have already been separated. But still, he finally gave in to the furor and the protests. He realized that his space force distraction wasn't going to cut it. Maybe Nielson caved first, after being shamed in a Mexican restaurant. Maybe this administration can be shamed after all?

We'll see. I'm glad that Beto O'Rourke did that Father's Day march to Tornillo, TX, and I gave him a donation for his campaign. I'm mostly trying to fund Texas Democrats because I can't afford to give to all the national campaigns. I hope it makes a difference. I think that the protests planned for June 30th will still go ahead, and I hope there will be enough public pressure that an immigration bill can get passed. Maybe they can even fix DACA?

The US has withdrawn from the UN Human Rights Council, I heard. Well, we certainly don't uphold human rights these days, and deserve to be censured by the international community.

Ramblings

The world is garbage, so you have to take your unexpected pleasures where you can find them. I've been watching reruns of The Hogan Family, and I came across an episode where David (Jason Bateman) tries both ventriloquism and magic! It's not the main plot; the A plot is about his twin brothers in a Cyrano situation, but David's story is fun.

In season 5's "The Go-Between", David volunteers to perform at a charity event for the homeless. He first tries a ventriloquist act with a redhead puppet named Clifford, but David's lips always move when Clifford speaks and his jokes are corny. (Shades of Gob!) Then David tries a magic act, wearing a cape and brandishing a sword. He calls himself Hoganini the Magnificent, puts on a top hat, and does his own music/sound effects. He even mentions the magician Doug Henning. (Shades of Tony Wonder!) So David tries to practice a trick where his aunt Sandy lies in a box while he stabs it with swords. He doesn't get very far until he breaks the key in the lock, and she gets stuck in the box when she has an important work meeting. A locksmith eventually gets her out, and later, David tries to do a card trick for the charity event, but he's bad at that too. (Shades of Gob again!) It's so cute, and I kind of want to screencap it, but I think I don't have the right software, and I don't remember my photobucket details if I even wanted to sign up for their new paid accounts.

Speaking of The Hogan Family, Jason Bateman lived through the upheaval with Valerie Harper getting fired, and he always had to speak diplomatically about it. But in his most recent Deadline interview, Bateman says he still has fond memories of the show. I've noticed that his old buddy Steve Witting (Burt Weems) has popped up in a lot of Bateman's movies and TV shows over the years, including AD, so Jason is obviously still friends with the guy. Though Valerie getting fired was an ugly incident, I still like the show overall because there are some genuinely great episodes after Valerie leaves. Also Mrs. Poole started out as just a wacky neighbor but she really blossoms into a goddamn delight, even getting flirty dialogue from men who genuinely find her attractive; she's not somebody's punchline.

As for Will Arnett, I didn't know or remember that in one episode of Up All Night, his character sings "Total Eclipse of the Heart" to his wife, played by Christina Applegate. I don't remember the context now, but I saw a video clip of it and was surprised. I love that song, but I do wonder why people don't get the slightly sinister nature of the lyrics. Jim Steinman called it a vampire love song, and the music video is very Gothic. It's why I used it as Gob's love ballad to Michael in "Dirty Little Secret", something desperate and needy about "making things right" and "your love is like a shadow on me all of the time." Well anyway, now I know what Will sounds like singing it. Love his voice.

Boo

So Netflix is picking up Lucifer. I won't be watching. They squandered all their good will to waste an entire season on love triangles and Cain's fucked up, go nowhere plot. Fine, if those other viewers want to keep watching the show, keep trusting those shitawful writers with another season, let them. But me, I'm checking out like I did when Sherlock turned to crap and Castle turned to crap and Person of Interest turned to crap.

Meanwhile, ABC is still trying to do that Roseanne revival without her on the show. Such hypocrites, saying they canceled the show on principle, but they still want the rest of the Conners back, even though it means that somebody has to buy out Barr's rights and give her another payment. Fuck you. Trying to pull a Hogan Family maneuver. (Or for a more recent example, Charlie Sheen getting replaced on Two and a Half Men.) You can't just let the show die. I know, they're pretending that they're trying to save jobs, but if you just released the cast and crew, they could join other shows, perhaps something else that you pick up to replace Roseanne. But no, you want to cling to the toxic brand. Fuck you for learning nothing.

Anyway, Supergirl has been kind of all over the place lately, and with Alex using Kryptonite bullets on the Daughters of Juru, I ask, what the hell is Kara's problem about Lena having and making kryptonite? I mean, why did we have to go through that whole mistrust crisis, and Kara lecturing people that everybody should destroy their kryptonite? She seriously thinks they should be defenseless should any other Kryptonian villains show up? I don't get why the writers had to ruin the friendship over this. Plus there's news about next season, with Brainy returning and Winn being recurring. Wow, so much shakeup. I don't know where the show is going anymore. The Reign plot took so long to build and I still don't get what was the point of reviving Kara's mother and company. I'm not totally hating everything, but I'm disappointed at how meandering and haphazard everything is.

Worse the 2nd time

I rewatched season 5 trying to understand the timeline. They keep saying that it's been two months since Cinco de Cuarto, but 2 months is technically July 4th, and episode 8 ends on July 2nd, so already it's patently WRONG. And they keep referring back to Lucille calling everybody back two weeks ago, then Lindsay quitting 1 week ago, so surely all that stuff should have taken place in June, NOT two months after May 4th. Why the fuck couldn't they just put dates on the episodes? Or if they redid the timeline in the editing room, and were going to do ADR anyway, why couldn't they have fixed the dialogue to say "1 month ago" instead of the freaking impossible "two months"? So sloppy.

My rewatch made me hate the first 4 episodes even more. I don't understand why Mitch had to double down on the WORST parts of season 4, the Rebel Alley love triangle and the awful conversations between Michael and GM where they tell escalating lies to each other. I mean, I zoned out of their "God laughs" conversation by the elevator as BORING and NONSENSICAL, and the only thing that snapped me out was the sudden hallway fight. Why did we have to suffer through the CRAP to get the good part? Why couldn't the crap be reduced to half, at least? And they doubled-down on Tobias as the jerk from hell, imposing his acting dream on somebody else. I already had enough of him destroying Debrie in season 4. What makes you think I want to see it again, on some bastard son that appeared out of nowhere? If he's going to be a jerk, at least let me see his comeuppance. Let Tobias go back to fucking jail for being a sex offender. He should have been fired for what he did to Debrie. Isn't Argyle there to fire him?

History repeating

I watched the recent PBS show about the Chinese Exclusion Act, and it's really chilling how long that law was in place. It wasn't just a ban on immigration; it also said that Chinese people already here could never become citizens, denying them the right to vote. The show talked about many fascinating things like "paper sons" invented after the San Francisco earthquake destroyed all the records about which immigrants were born here. America only started to repeal the law when it looked bad during WWII after Japan invaded China, and we called China our ally. (Of course that in turn led to Japanese internment camps and racism against Japanese Americans as potential enemy spies.) It's so fucked up, how America will turn on immigrants, making them constantly prove their right to be here. The Supreme Court ruling in US vs Wong Kim Ark finally established that everyone born in America is a citizen by birth, yet the Exclusion Act still continued, favoring immigrants from white European backgrounds.

But nowadays we have Trump trying to ban immigration based purely on nationality, and ICE deporting people, and splitting up families at the border, trying so hard to kick out the people they consider undesirable. It's so disgusting and scary. What would my family have done if the US didn't accept refugees from Vietnam? Why are we shutting out refugees now and equating them with terrorists, as if they haven't been vetted thoroughly?

Now Trump is petulantly complaining about the G7 and attacking Canada. And he thinks he's going to somehow "win" the summit with North Korea when he's done diddly squat to prepare for negotiations? What an awful world this is.

Retcons

Goddammit, I rewatched the 4th episode with the old beach cottage, and I've just realized something. They retconned Tracey's death, and that's why they said that GM had no mother figure before Lucille. They've moved Tracey's death to years earlier. Goddamnit!

In season 1, set in 2003, the Narrator used to tell us that Tracey died two years ago, i.e. 2001. We also get a brief glimpse of a wedding video from 1989, with Gob setting Tracey's hair on fire. Therefore, the marriage lasted 12 years, and GM grew up with a mother for the first dozen years of his life.

SPOILERS

Fucking Hollywood

Anyway, still no word about Timeless being cancelled. Are they still negotiating with NBC or shopping it around? Also, after Roseanne got cancelled, there were all these rumors and suggestions that some other show would get picked up and get that slot. But now the current gossip is that they're trying to do a spinoff about Darlene instead. Why won't they let that show go? Pick up some other pilot or whatever. Stop giving money to Roseanne Barr, who as far as I know still owns the characters she created.

There was uproar about Sam Bee's comment about Ivanka Trump, and the right wants her gone in revenge for Roseanne's cancellation. I guess I should be glad they didn't get Michelle Wolf's Netflix show cancelled, though I haven't seen it yet. What I wish, though, is that the media firestorm wouldn't keep blotting out all other news.

And I can't believe that Trump is on a pardoning-spree lately. I thought he'd just do the Jack Johnson thing because Stallone asked him, but no, that's not enough for him. Just makes no sense, and he's still got to do the Korea summit soon! Unless he cancels it again before then. Sigh.

Bateman as Jimmy Stewart

Bateman is one of six guys in a "roundtable" interview in the Hollywood Reporter. The interview was done back in April, and it focuses on dramas, so no mention of Arrested Development. The online article includes video clips. It's okay, though I don't really care about Ozark.

Bateman responds to a question about pay equity, saying that the industry nowadays is a "fertile ground for parity" and there's less excuse now for the idiots who kept saying the men draw more audience. That's fine, but then the other guys say that all actors are discouraged from discussing salary. It's not just actors, people! Every industry tells its employees not to share salary info with colleagues! That's how we wind up with cases where women don't find out until years later that they were paid less than men doing the same work! In Hollywood, though, there are agents negotiating salaries for actors, which was why it was so egregious when Michelle Williams's agent didn't let her know that she was paid so much less than Wahlberg for those All the Money in the World reshoots. If an actress can't even trust her agent to get her fair pay, then what the hell hope does anyone have?

I say, start discussing your salaries in Hollywood. Don't fucking listen to agents saying, "trust me", and use your star power to help others get fair pay, like when Jessica Chastain helped Octavia Spencer. Do something about it, and be an example to all the other industries that aren't fighting the wage gap.

But back to the HR article. Later, Bateman also claims to want to play a woman in a Tootsie-like role, but says that he's overall satisfied with his niche as the everyman. Darren Criss is surprised, mentioning a friend of his saying, "Oh, Jason Bateman, he's just the ultimate Jimmy Stewart straight man. He's the 21st century straight man and he does it so well and with such variance but he's always in that lane." Darren Criss thinks it's cool that Bateman is self aware and likes being in that lane.

I do wonder, though. Bateman says he wants to be the relatable everyman, and yet I find that he's constantly playing jerks in movies and shows, which is why I don't watch everything he does. I do wish he would do more nice guys, not jerks. Then I could see more stuff like Game Night. ETA: I mean, I don't mind sly rascals like Nick from Zootopia, but I'm tired of entitled jerks with no redeeming qualities. Really, what I want to see is him and Will Arnett do a movie together. Why do they never do that?

Season 5 uneven

I watched 3 episodes before I left for work in the morning, and they were SO bad. The only bright spot I remember was when Steve Holt joined his cousins for a road trip to Mexico, but after a while he left, and then the plot became meandering and baffling. For hours at work I had time to stew on how much I hated those 3 episodes, and to dread how bad the rest would be. However, when I came home and finished the half-season, it was better. Well episode 4 still sucked, but then episode 5 finally clicked somewhere around the underwater scene. They finally started addressing Buster's storyline and Lucille 2's disappearance after postponing it with Michael's shitshow missing person plan, just as bad as his roommate voting plan in season 4. Why would you delay such an important plot?

It also took awhile for Gob's Tony Wonder plot to get going, because they had that Beard woman, in a head brace, with no explanation given whatsoever. And they had Sally Sitwell and Tony Wonder leave town, and I was so afraid they wouldn't come back, but eventually they did. But that just makes me angrier at Mitch that he front-loaded the season with the off-putting crap, and made us wade through it to get to the good parts.

And there's still plenty of baffling choices, unnecessary characters, retcons, and timeline issues. Put fucking dates on your episodes! You didn't used to be too good for dates, Mitch! Don't think that it's disguising your messed up timeline. Lean into the mess and have the Narrator make a joke about how 2012 suddenly turned into 2015 for no earthly reason at all.

SPOILERS

Good Riddance

They cancelled Roseanne. Finally. I was worried that, due to its high ratings, nothing she could do would cause ABC to end her revived show. But I was wrong. I hope the rest of the cast and crew find work elsewhere. Just make a new contemporary show that's working class, so we can tackle social and political issues. And also try to be funny.

Good riddance still to Lucifer. Its last episodes were pointless, but at least they didn't feature Pierce/Cain. What a wasted season. Too little, too late to rectify the mess they made.