Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

Bad news for Ron DeSantis is great news for America.

I really should read my own blog.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires republicans to act in good faith.

When do the post office & the dmv weigh in on the wuhan virus?

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

I’m pretty sure there’s only one Jack Smith.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

We still have time to mess this up!

Accountability, motherfuckers.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

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Late Night Open Thread

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I watch a lot of tv shows- far too many, to be exact. But I have to say that there have been more situations in Sons of Anarchy when I was watching and I just sat straight up and yelled “WOW!” or “HOLY SHIT!” or “OMFG, NO!” or “YOU HAVE TO BE SHITTING ME” (the last one was an inside joke) than any other television show I’ve ever watched other than maybe the Sopranos.

Obviously, I know this kind of show is not for everyone, but I’ve found it to be very entertaining with a deep character base. Sometimes it gets a little sloppy, but it is just a great show and I haven’t predicted many of the plot twists.

in other words, well done, writers!

Reader Interactions

124Comments

  1. 1.

    Spaghetti Lee

    I finally got around to seeing Elysium. Good sci-fi movie, though not mindblowing. And obviously a lot of interesting overtones. A lot of crabby commentary around the film is wondering why the rich Elysium-dwellers wouldn’t sell their all-healing medical pods to Earth, given that there’s probably some way to make money off of it. Well, I don’t know, man, why do rich people who actually exist seem so intent on destroying public education, organized labor, and Social Security even though it would probably be easier for them to work with those things? Because they can. The idea that a super-rich elite would deny things to poor people just to remind them of who’s rich and who’s poor did not strike me as unrealistic. Not one bit.

  2. 2.

    Felonius Monk

    Got hooked on it(SOA) for a couple of seasons and then kind of lost interest because I thought the plot was getting a little to crazy.

    Really liking Low Winter Sun on AMC.

  3. 3.

    Corner Stone

    Cole, you’re kind of stupid.
    Apologia to Mrs. Cole but maybe she can take comfort in the “lead paint” exposure excuse catalog.

  5. 5.

    different-church-lady

    I invented a new drinking game. It goes like this: come home, find notice on door from the animal control officer saying nothing but, “received cat complaint” — drink!

  7. 7.

    Felonius Monk

    Let’s not let different-church-lady drink alone!

    ETA: Exactly what was your cat complaining about? Maybe he needs a drink too.

  9. 9.

    Steeplejack

    @efgoldman:

    I have gravitated to North Dakota State-Kansas State (on Fox Sports 1). Closer game, and I’m a little amazed that NDSU has kept it so close (they’re behind 21-17 with about four minutes to go).

    And I keep checking U.S. Open tennis.

  10. 10.

    bnut

    @Felonius Monk: When I watch Breaking Bad all they do is advertise that show. Constantly. I feel like I’m in Mean Girls: Stop trying to make Low Winter Sun happen!

  11. 11.

    Alison

    Hey John, thanks to your constant touting, I bought a Furminator and dang, does that thing ever do work. My cat, who is usually pretty fussy regarding any kind of grooming or being made to stay in a certain spot or anything, seems to love it (as long as I give her treats first and let her lay on the couch while I use it) and lord, the amount of fur it takes off. She’s a shorthair but has a really thick, dense coat, and I could practically sculpt another cat out of the excess fur I got out of her. Poor baby. But that thing was really worth the money!

  12. 12.

    Steeplejack

    Damn, NDSU might win this game. Second and goal to go with 32 seconds left.

    ETA: “Goal to go” as in one yard.

    ETFA: And they score! Bison up 24-21 with 28 seconds left.

  15. 15.

    Steeplejack

    @MattR:

    This is sort of a big deal. K-State is not a powerhouse, but they are Division One, and NDSU is in the same conference as Whatsamatta U., I think.

  16. 16.

    J.Ty

    Seamus Heaney died. Great poet–his translation of the first word of Beowulf was worth his Nobel prize alone–with a great name. RIP

  17. 17.

    Mnemosyne

    Trying to get up the enthusiasm to go for a walk so I can get my 10K steps for the day. I was sick earlier in the week, so I’ve come up short a few times.

    Poor G is in the other room trying to deal with a work delivery that they were told was supposed to go to Anaheim, but now it turns out they meant Corona. Yes, it’s 9 pm at night.

  18. 18.

    Seanly

    Wife & I love SOA – started watching it on Netflix. Paid Amazon Video so we could get caught up with the 5th Season before the 6th Season starts in 10 days.

    John, maybe you can email me with which plot twist had you saying that? Coz there’s at least 3 or 4 a season that could be a candidate.

  19. 19.

    J.Ty

    Oh, right, and other mr. J.Ty brought his parents’ dog over for an extended visit, so I can haz shih tzu this weekend! Hooray. She gets to hang out in the third-best municipal park in California tomorrow for sure.

  20. 20.

    Mnemosyne

    @efgoldman:

    Sadly, he does not work for the Giant Evil Corporation I do. He works for a crappy home infusion company that tries to offer 24/7 service with an 8:00 to 5:00 staff, so they’re constantly working huge amounts of overtime and getting yelled at for working too much overtime.

    ETA: Corona is a city about 25 miles from Anaheim, so being told your delivery is in one when it’s actually in the other is kind of a clusterfuck.

  21. 21.

    Steeplejack

    @efgoldman:

    Only 10 or 15?! My God, man, how will you survive?

    Game recap mentioned that K-State won the Big 12 last year, so they shouldn’t have been that hapless.

    And tearful NDSU quarterback Brock Jensen thanked his “Lord and Savior” for the win, because of course He preferred the Bison to the godless Wildcats. Now I hate NDSU.

  22. 22.

    BruinKid

    I know some people hate-watch it, but I really like The Newsroom. In the last episode, I was struck by Will McAvoy talking about how tiny details and decisions can have major ramifications, altering the entire course of human history. He brought up the black woman who refused to move to the back of the bus in Montgomery, who then became attached to the court case challenging the racist practice. And how Montgomery’s black leaders decided she wouldn’t help their movement, as she got pregnant while unmarried. That was Claudette Colvin. Rosa Parks refused to move 8 months after Colvin refused to move. But that was enough time for a new young preacher to start attracting attention, who was then tapped to lead the bus boycott, someone by the name of Martin Luther King, Jr. Had they gone with Colvin, perhaps King would’ve remained just a regular ol’ preacher nobody ever heard of outside of Montgomery.

    BTW, Colvin is still alive to this day, and gave an interview to Amy Goodman back in March. It’s well worth watching.

    Or how Guiseppe Zangara was standing on a wobbly chair, so when he fired his gun, he assassinated the mayor of Chicago, Anton Cermak, rather than what was assumed to be his intended target, newly elected President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Had FDR been assassinated, his VP John Nance Garner would’ve become President, and guess what? No New Deal. Garner was a fierce opponent of FDR’s economic policies.

    Or how about NASA testing these things called O-rings under every possible condition… except for extreme cold? Because when does it get that cold in Florida? Well, it did get unusually cold on January 28, 1986.

    That scene, and the episode as a whole, was just incredible to watch.

  23. 23.

    Chris

    @Spaghetti Lee:

    A lot of crabby commentary around the film is wondering why the rich Elysium-dwellers wouldn’t sell their all-healing medical pods to Earth, given that there’s probably some way to make money off of it. Well, I don’t know, man, why do rich people who actually exist seem so intent on destroying public education, organized labor, and Social Security even though it would probably be easier for them to work with those things?

    It’s funny, because that mirrors arguments you hear from conservatives all the time in real life – “no, of course our valiant Job Creators wouldn’t [insert whatever godawful they’re doing, or would be doing if the law they want repealed wasn’t in their way], it’s not good business!” The idea is that we can count on Job Creators to be socially responsible because it’s in their Rational Self Interest. Well, guess what… people are guided by other things besides Rational Self Interest. Yes, even our all knowing Masters Of The Universe.

  24. 24.

    J.Ty

    @Steeplejack: With a name and background like that, Brock Jensen is clearly set for his future career as a Ludlum-esque spy. After his mandatory tour with the Marines. Probably ending as a Lance Corporal because it sounds good. He’ll have an old football injury–either in his gun hand or dominant knee–but it only flares up when the plot demands it, somehow.

  26. 26.

    Steeplejack

    @efgoldman:

    I don’t even like college football that much, but what’re you gonna do on a slow Friday night? And I’ve been eyeballing Fox Sports 1 to see if it’s a new hot thing. So far it just seems to be another “me too” channel.

  27. 27.

    J.Ty

    @Steeplejack: I sincerely doubt that Brock Jensen has had a series of roommates who will turn out to be super-scientists and super-villains. Verisimilitude fail! :-p

    Anyway, the writers didn’t exactly invent the trope that spawned Brock.

  31. 31.

    mike with a mic

    Cat bites are much more likely to cause major infections and spread disease than dog bites, and some people have severe (read fatal) reactions to them. Cats tend to kill off the wildlife and neighbors pets at a higher rate than dogs as well. Many people have allergic reactions to the cats themselves. Combine this with cat owners propensity to let them wander the fuck all over the place, or keep them in “not pets allowed” apartments because they think they can get away with it, and this damage is spread to victims all around the place.

    Plus, like guns and pitbulls, there’s no real reason you need them. It’s just as utterly inconsiderate as having a semi automatic rifle or a pit, I’d say more because the owners of the latter two don’t tend to try and smuggle them into places they aren’t allowed or pretend they don’t cause problems for other people. Cat owners tend to have this specific sense of ultra self entitlement about their pets.

    If you live in a home you own and keep them locked inside, no issues. If you bring one in an apartment building or let it roam outside people should call animal control and get it put the fuck down before it causes problems.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2144366/Moggie-lovers-beware-One-bite-cat-critical-list.html

    As someone who has relatives with cat allergies and has also seen the damage a cat bite can cause, pitbull owners are vastly less malicious towards their neighbors in terms of the animals they own.

  32. 32.

    Amir Khalid

    August 31 is a holiday here — Merdeka (independence) day. I’ve marched in the big parade, the one that used to start from the Selangor Club padang (field), twice: once as a private-sector employee, once as a public-sector one.

    The Selangor Club padang, now called Dataran Merdeka (Merdeka Square) is historic because it’s where the ceremonial lowering of the Union Jack took place in 1957.

    We don’t do the picnicking thing like you guys do on the 4th of July, but every Malaysian knows this grainy newsreel footage of Tunku Abdul Rahman leading the cheer from the royal box at Merdeka Stadium: “Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka!”

  33. 33.

    Steeplejack

    @Alison:

    True that. Actually, so much of life would be improved if this were an option.

    Hey, hope you checked back on that thread where you asked about Terry Pratchett. You got some additional responses, including one from me.

  37. 37.

    Steeplejack

    @Alison:

    Not angling for a reply, just hope you got some guidance. Pratchett is an amazingly good writer, but his early stuff (before the early ’90s) can be a little slapsticky, which can be offputting to people who have gotten the big buildup about how great he is. Got this reaction from a friend once and have tried to minimize the damage since then.

  38. 38.

    ? Martin

    Good reminder tonight of how nice it is to live here. Just got back from my son’s marching band family beach party at Big Corona. 88 degrees, great day for it. Hot dogs and smores at the fire pits. 250 teenagers and parents. Quite a production.

  40. 40.

    Suffern ACE

    Left loser bar where the patrons were comaining about how JoPa was mistreated. Moved to college bar where I’m about as welcome as a lech is anywhere. God I need moar choices.

  42. 42.

    Suzanne

    I just watched that Miley Cyrus VMAs performance, and, like, is it just me, or did that totally bore the fuck out of anyone else?

  49. 49.

    Amir Khalid

    @efgoldman:
    There were the usual fireworks at the park by the Petronas Towers last night, as there are every New Years Eve. The noise is loud enough to annoy Bianca (my pet feline menace to local suburban fauna, if mike with a mic is curious), but there’s a lovely view from my bedroom window if I feel like watching.

  50. 50.

    Suzanne

    @Steeplejack: The song sucks, she can’t sing, she isn’t cute, she had all the grace and sex appeal of a wadded-up dishrag, and GET OFF MY FUCKING LAWN.

  51. 51.

    Mnemosyne

    @? Martin:

    It’s still 80 degrees at 9:00 at night and humid as fuck here in the Valley.

    ETA: G and I were supposed to do the Ventura-to-Ojai bike path on Sunday, but now he’s nervous about it because, again, humid as fuck.

  54. 54.

    Radio One

    For some reason, I stopped watching SOA after the end of the season when they went abroad to Ireland. I like that it’s a tense gritty drama, and I sort of like the idea of a show ambitious enough to basically try to tell the Hamlet story over the course of many seasons. But I’ve never really liked the main characters. and that kills a tv show for me.

  56. 56.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Suzanne: Imagine you were forced to be Hannah Montana for years. Imagine your dad did Achy Breaky Heart. Wouldn’t you have some demons to exorcise?

  59. 59.

    Yatsuno

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Imagine you were forced to be Hannah Montana for years

    This might actually be true, if TMZ is to be believed. Apparently Dad missed fame and fortune from the one-hit wonder days and put his eldest daughter up to getting it back. It worked for a time but now she’s all growed up and rebelling like should surprise no one.

  61. 61.

    Suzanne

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    “Mile, if twerkin woulda been invented…. And I had a foam finger…. I woulda done the same thang you did.” – DAD

    Anybody who votes the same way as this mouthbreather is the one that needs to exorcise the demons.

  62. 62.

    Amir Khalid

    @mike with a mic:
    On the other hand, house cats, unlike many dogs, aren’t big or strong enough to cause serious or even fatal injury to humans. And cats know this well enough not to try it no matter how angry they get.

  64. 64.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Suzanne: Votes? Quoi?

    The girl does have some vocal talent. A couple of days ago, AL front paged a video of a Dylan cover she did. She’s 20; let her work through her issues and maybe she’ll do good work in the future.

  67. 67.

    Yatsuno

    @Suzanne: They’re from Kentucky IIRC. (Too lazy to Google) They can certainly vote for Grimes over the turtle or the teatard. I shan’t complain.

  68. 68.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Suzanne: As has been noted, it blatantly lifts from an old Marvin Gaye song. What is uncool about it is that he preemptively sued Gaye’s heirs. I mean, give Gaye a songwriting credit and some royalties.

    ETA: It may be the song of the summer but it doesn’t beat this one from 2009.

  69. 69.

    JordanRules

    @Suzanne: You mean that Marvin Gaye song? It is indeed! But it’s clearly been done before and Gaye’s fam and Thicke are in a legal battle to sort it out. I do enjoy both versions.

    And Miley’s gonna be alright me thinks. Some of the interviews she’s done in response to people being shocked at her new image hint at a certain grasp of reality. I hope that is the case.

  70. 70.

    Suffern ACE

    Egada. I’d deplore the behavior of the kids in this bar if I didn’t have a memory of my own behavior in college.

  73. 73.

    Hal

    I saw Dredd on Netflix streaming the other day and it wasn’t bad for nihilistic dystopian future sci-fi.

  74. 74.

    JordanRules

    @Suffern ACE: It’d be fun if you could get a glimpse of them in 10 to 20 years having the exact same thought as you about the next group of youngins.

  76. 76.

    Suzanne

    @Suffern ACE: oh, I was a total ho for awhile. Based on everything I read/heard, I was prepared to be truly scandalized. Instead…..snore. I just thought she would show, you know, SKILL.

  80. 80.

    Suzanne

    @JordanRules: you know what song is on the radio that I hate? The “AND IT FEELS LIKE I AM JUST TOO CLOSE TO LOVE YOU!!” song. My husband and I call it “the song that doesn’t start” because it just feels like a really long intro to a song that never shows up.

  81. 81.

    Amir Khalid

    @Hal:
    Karl Urban’s unshaven chin is a much better looking Dredd than Sly’s had-too-much-cosmetic-surgery face. And the movie captures the atmosphere of the comic book so much better too. It deserves a sequel, but with an original plot of its own rather than one ripped off from The Raid.

  85. 85.

    JordanRules

    @Suzanne: Ha! Course! I can’t escape that song. That’s a great way to put it and when I’m belting it out against my will I’m wondering when I finally get to break it down. I feel so unsatisfied.

  90. 90.

    Suzanne

    @Mnemosyne: I do love clever lyrics! I so admire those that can write them! If I was writing a song, the lyrics would be akin to “I am hungry, I want a pop tart/ Fuck yeah, DONUTS”.

  91. 91.

    ruemara

    @Mnemosyne: Have you already seen a rough? Because I’m interested in what they’re gonna do with that story.

    I had a friend drop in from the Bay, so I taught her how to make a homemade pizza after I dragged her all over putah creek. Made me remember how much I miss being close to friends and being a more social butterfly. It’s also cool because she’s nearly 10 years my junior and I remember how shy and retiring she was when I met her (fresh from Japan) and she’s now so much more forthright and her funny, smart self. And, 1/2 rye flour in your pizza dough gives a nice beery scent to your steak sammich pizza.

  92. 92.

    Mnemosyne

    @Suzanne:

    You’ll love it, then. I’m tempted to call Lopez our new Howard Ashman, but I’m afraid to jinx him since Ashman died so young.

  94. 94.

    Mnemosyne

    @ruemara:

    Yes, and it has absolutely NOTHING AT ALL to do with the Andersen story. Zippo. Just so you’re not disappointed and wondering where Gerda and Kay are and why these two sisters have taken over the story.

    But (IMO) it’s a really strong story in itself with a terrific soundrack — they went all the way back to a Broadway-style animated musical like Beauty & the Beast.

    (Full disclosure: yes, the mouse signs my paycheck, but it really is a good movie. Really!)

  95. 95.

    Suzanne

    @Mnemosyne: My Disney complaint: the illustration of the backgrounds is always so layered and gorgeous, and then the characters are always flat with black outlines. Visually discordant. In the CGI movies, this is avoided. In 101Dalmatians, the backgrounds have the same style as the characters and it looks great.

  96. 96.

    Spaghetti Lee

    @Mnemosyne:

    I’m still smarting over the all-but-shuttering of the 2D animation unit. I was raised on the likes of Aladdin and The Lion King. Any chance of that coming back?

  97. 97.

    handy

    @Mnemosyne:

    The wife and I decided to beat the heat and take an evening drive to Malibu. We got there at a little after 8. It was still 78 degrees. 78 degrees. At night. At the beach.

  99. 99.

    Spaghetti Lee

    @Suzanne:

    My Disney complaint: the illustration of the backgrounds is always so layered and gorgeous, and then the characters are always flat with black outlines.

    Isn’t that the case with a lot of cartoons? You have to draw the characters running and jumping and emoting such, so going into too much detail or getting too artsy with the painterly effects makes that much harder.

  101. 101.

    Suzanne

    @Spaghetti Lee: Naw, some do the backgrounds in a more graphic style. The “Almost There” sequence in “Princess and the Frog” is so good. Love it.

  102. 102.

    Comrade Luke

    @Radio One: Yup, that’s the season that did it for me, too. I keep watching it, because it’s only supposed to go a couple more seasons, but it’s no longer “must see”.

    Actually, I think it peaked with the school bus finale.

  103. 103.

    Mnemosyne

    @Suzanne:

    That never bothers me, but I could see how it could. Ironically, One Hundred and One Dalmatians was the first feature where they used the Xerox camera rather than hand-inking the cels. So what you’re seeing is actually a human step removed from the process.

    (Short version: up until that movie, the lines of each animation drawing would be hand-traced onto a cel by an inker and then passed along to a painter. Starting with that one, they would essentially photocopy each drawing onto a cel, removing the inking step. Now, of course, even hand-drawn movies like The Princess and the Frog are digitally inked and painted.)

    @Spaghetti Lee:

    I honestly don’t know — I’m just a lowly cog in the machine.

  104. 104.

    Spaghetti Lee

    @Mnemosyne:

    Oh, it was more a rhetorical question than anything. It amazes me that the suits have apparently convinced themselves that people won’t watch 2D animation anymore. Well, chew on this, suits: my generation (people in their 20s) was raised on some of the best animated movies ever made (Beauty and the Beast, Lion King, the first Land Before Time, etc.) And we’re a) all about to start having kids, and b) obsessed with pop cultural nostalgia to ridiculous levels-we’re the reason places like Buzzfeed exist. Make a movie in that tradition, and we’ll be dragging the kids to go see it.

  105. 105.

    NotMax

    @Mnemosyne

    Now that the Jedi filmic rights are held by Disney, mayhaps we’ll see Mickey, Donald and Pluto in a Snakes On A Death Star short.

    Or not.

  106. 106.

    Spaghetti Lee

    @Suzanne:

    I thought PATF’s animation and art direction was awesome. Story and characters, ehh…(yes, I watch Disney for the story. That shit matters too). It made a hundred million dollars, yet everyone thinks it was some sort of failure because it got bulldozed by Cameron’s avatar. It was supposed to be the start of a new crop of non-CGI movies and then it all just puttered out. RRRGH. I feel very strongly about this, as you can tell.

  107. 107.

    Omnes Omnibus

    So late night trolling… Is this improper appropriation or respectful citation? Honestly, I think it is people who love the music, but I missing be missing context. What do you think?

  108. 108.

    Suffern ACE

    @Spaghetti Lee: you will take youre kids so whatever family friendly fare you can find and you’ll pay $3 extra per ticket and buy a 3D TV because precious child demands it and you’ll like it.

  109. 109.

    Mnemosyne

    @Spaghetti Lee:

    It’s not just the suits, though — it’s the artists and directors. Our biggest “suit” is John freakin’ Lasseter, and if he said, “We’re making a new 2D film starting tomorrow,” the other suits would say, “Yessir, Mr. Lasseter, sir.”

    The generation of artists who worked on those films of the 1980s-1990s, like Glen Keane, are retiring, and most of the younger artists cut their teeth on 3D animation, so that’s what they want to make. The last 2D film from the studio was made by the directors of The Little Mermaid.

    I’m not saying it will never happen, but it would have to be driven by interest from the inside, and that interest hasn’t reached any kind of critical mass.

  110. 110.

    Spaghetti Lee

    @Suffern ACE:

    You sound kinda bitter.

    Well, if I don’t have kids, I’ll have to come up with some other excuse to go see cartoons on my own. It gets a bit awkward when you’re male, older than 15 or so, and fat and hairy. People get the wrong impressions. And I’m not gutsy enough to say “fuck you, I like cartoons.”

  113. 113.

    Mnemosyne

    @Spaghetti Lee:

    Did you ever see Waking Sleeping Beauty, Don Hahn’s film about that 1980s Disney animation renaissance? If not, you definitely should — it explains a lot about how it happened and how it all fell apart. Really fascinating and made almost entirely from archival footage.

    ETA: Also, if you’re anywhere near western Massachussetts, you’ll want to check out the Disney exhibit at the Norman Rockwell Museum out in Stockbridge.

  114. 114.

    Spaghetti Lee

    @handy:

    Adulthood sounds like so much fun. Why do you think kids my age are in such a state of arrested development? Because we’ve put our ears to the door of the Adulthood Room, heard the wailing of tortured souls, and run screaming in the other direction.

    @Mnemosyne:

    but it would have to be driven by interest from the inside, and that interest hasn’t reached any kind of critical mass.

    But…what about the magic of the internet?! Crowdsourcing! Kickstarter! New Media! Fan feedback! Why, it couldn’t be that that’s all bullshit, could it?

    I started getting suspicious of kickstarter-type sites once I realized that 1) it’s basically online panhandling, but some people think it’s the wave of the future for artists, and 2) man, what a wonderful way to get people to pay for the production of a movie/album/book and then pay to purchase it! It was major news when Kickstarter coughed up a few million dollars for Veronica Mars. Full-length animated films run close to a hundred million, if I’m not mistaken. So yeah, hand-drawn cartoon fans like me are S.O.L.

  115. 115.

    Yatsuno

    @Mnemosyne: Just curious: how much does it address the end of the Don Bluth era? I know he gets a lot of the blame for Disney going so far downhill (how fair that is is another question) but I don’t see how that topic can be avoided.

  116. 116.

    Mnemosyne

    @Yatsuno:

    Actually, it starts right when Bluth leaves — the focus is essentially the rise and fall of Eisner and Katzenberg, so they only spend a few minutes on where that part of the story started.

    It’s interesting because, for all of his many many (many) (many) faults, Katzenberg really did fall in love with animation once he was put in charge of it and really championed it when Eisner was thinking about killing it off entirely.

  119. 119.

    max

    @NotMax: Now that the Jedi filmic rights are held by Disney, mayhaps we’ll see Mickey, Donald and Pluto in a Snakes On A Death Star short.

    Weekend At Yoda’s
    Vader vs. Predator
    Tattoine Lightsaber Massacre
    Death Star vs. MechaGodzilla
    50 Things To Do In Mos Eisley When You’re Dead
    101 Stormtroopers
    Dumbo: Flying Jedi Elephant
    Night of the Living Sith Lord
    I Have An Action Figure And I Must Scream
    Death Star Cop
    Die Hard In a Giant Power Shaft
    Darby O’Gill and the Little Jedis
    Jedi Family Robinson
    The Emperor Wore Tennis Shoes
    Honey, I Shrunk the X-Wings

    max
    [‘Yeah, it’s been done, but I don’t care.’]

  121. 121.

    droog

    @Radio One

    That’s about where I left it, too. From a production point of view it annoyed me that Northern Ireland seemed to be California through a blue lens. Surely if they needed to keep costs down they should at least gone up to Vancouver or something? But in truth it all started to come undone a bit before that when it became apparent that if a story line got too difficult they would just diffuse it. I won’t say which ones and spoil it for John but I remember at least 4 big story arcs that got so difficult that the writers just evaporated them and went along like none of it mattered.

  123. 123.

    Liquid

    So there’s news of an “INDEPENDENCE DAY 2.” I bought the ID4 ‘book’ (I was a young’un – Event Horizon was better in book form) and I was the ONLY person in the theater that did not just freak when the alien suit split open.

    My mother related a similar tale when she went to see Alien back in ’79. Of course nobody knew what was coming and the reaction was superior to anything Roland Emmerich might conceive on a dirty couch.

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