Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

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

A last alliance of elves and men. also pet photos.

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Americans barely caring about Afghanistan is so last month.

Not all heroes wear capes.

This fight is for everything.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

Peak wingnut was a lie.

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

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

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

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

I really should read my own blog.

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

You are here: Home / Politics / Domestic Politics / Friday Evening Open Thread

Friday Evening Open Thread

by | 189 Comments

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Rest in peace, Gayle McCormick of Smith. (Love the earlier version of that song by the Shirelles too.)

It’s a lovely evening here, so we’re hanging out at the tiki bar, having a glass of wine and watching the hens scavenge. We’ll throw something on the grill for dinner eventually. (Not a chicken!)

What are you up to? Open thread!

Reader Interactions

189Comments

  6. 6.

    benw

    I clicked on the right arrow on John’s post, and it took me to Adam’s post. I clicked left, and it brought me here. This is like a secret little post of my very own! I feel warm and safe.

  7. 7.

    Betty Cracker

    @Adam L Silverman: What, this old thing? No worries! It’ll be a refuge for those who never want to hear another word about the Bundys and / or are weary of playing Hillbots vs Berniacs. ?

  10. 10.

    Gin & Tonic

    It’s getting near bedtime here in London, and I’m beat, so a glass of wine and a pillow are in my immediate future.

  14. 14.

    redshirt

    Anyone watch the Netflix series “Daredevil” and “Jessica Jones”?

    I know I’m late to the table on both, but I just got to watch each. They’re both great, and I think JJ is the better series but I enjoyed Daredevil more, I think because of the content. It’s debatable though. Thoughts?

  17. 17.

    JMG

    Takeout Chinese tonight. Am perusing the menu now. Then we’re watching “Creed” on demand from FiOS.

  18. 18.

    Gin & Tonic

    @redshirt: Urban. London is a big city. Greenwich may have been rural 500 years ago, but it’s just a neighborhood in the city now. I have never been in rural England.

  19. 19.

    benw

    @redshirt: oh, that’s harder. Okay, I’ll answer the band question: Guns N’ Roses. Just the right mix of sleaze, punk, and metal to hit my musical sweet spot. True fact: my wife and I kicked off our wedding reception with “Sweet Child O’ Mine”. How about you?

  21. 21.

    delk

    I got an Anova immersion circulator a couple of weeks ago. So far I have made pork chops, bone-in and boneless chicken breasts.

    Trying steak for the first time tonight. New York Strips at 130 degrees for 2 hours.

  22. 22.

    Thoroughly Pizzled

    Months ago I thought that Trump would collapse and all his support and therefore the nomination would go to Ted Cruz. I’m actually glad that didn’t happen.

    Cruz seems to plugged into the right-wing mind more than the others. He recites the exact conservative memes that your horrible friends post to Facebook.

  23. 23.

    Betty Cracker

    @redshirt: I’ve seen both and like both but favor JJ, probably because I’m a feminazi. We (my husband and I) have odd TV habits because our media consumption is so different. Those two shows I watch with the mister, so it’ll probably take a year to get through them. Whereas I’m an insomniac, so series I watch without the mister, I blast through in short order.

  24. 24.

    Elmo

    @redshirt:
    Tried Daredevil and couldn’t stick with it. Jessica Jones, tho – David Tennant was in that, so that was a bingefest from start to finish.

    I love me some David Tennant!

  25. 25.

    gogol's wife

    @Hal:

    So cute.

    Another exciting evening here. Glass of wine to celebrate beginning of spring break (during which I have tons and tons and tons of work to do, but I started an article this morning that I’ve been blocked on, so I’m happy), then another thrilling evening of Midsomer Murders followed by Merle Oberon falling in love with an Irish rebel.

  26. 26.

    Brachiator

    @redshirt:

    We are safe here friend. Tell me your favorite band and why.

    I’m too old to have a favorite band. But the combo that Louis Armstrong put together to record “Tight Like This” is up there.

    Favorite novel, “Ulysses.” Why? Because “Astral Weeks” led me to it.

  27. 27.

    gogol's wife

    Oh, and I’m gearing up for the last episode of Downton tomorrow night! I can’t believe it! I bought all the DVDs, because it’s going to be like that Trollope novel you return to again and again.

  28. 28.

    Steve in the ATL

    @redshirt:

    What is your favorite novel and why?

    The only correct answer to this is A Confederacy of Dunces and because it’s awesome.

  29. 29.

    redshirt

    @Betty Cracker: I liked both alot but will go with Daredevil for this simple reason: Everyone on DD was sympathetic and “good” – even the bad guys. Fisk was a monster and yet he made omelets and got the girl and cried when his number one died. On JJ, everyone was fucked up and nasty, even the good guys. Kilgrave was just an out and out monster even with the somewhat sympathetic backstory, and even JJ was harsh and cruel and mean – even the last shot of the show brought this home. She’s a real anti-hero while Murdoch is a hero.

    There was no one to really like on JJ while almost everyone had some-thing likable on DD. JJ became somewhat a chore to watch because of how depressing it was during the middle episodes, whereas DD kept building a hero/villain arc.

  30. 30.

    Technocrat

    @Elmo:

    Tennant’s portrayal of Kilgrave resulted in one of the most legitimately scary villains I can remember.

  31. 31.

    O. Felix Culpa

    I watched “Selma” last night (instead of the R-Schvantz “debate” [sic]) and was inspired. I was alive during the Civil Rights movement, but too young to remember much beyond the broad strokes. Does anyone have recommendations for good histories of the movement and/or biographies of Dr. King or other major figures? Thanks!

  32. 32.

    redshirt

    @benw: I will embarrassingly confess to Led Zeppelin as my favorite band. I rejected them in my youth but as I grow ever older I find myself amazed at how operatic their rock and roll is, and how much they pack into every song.

  33. 33.

    Joel

    Couldn’t stick with Daredevil past the pilot episode. As such, not really motivated to watch Jessica Jones.

    Those plots are just too canned for my tastes.

  34. 34.

    debbie

    @gogol’s wife:

    Is Downton on Saturday where you are? Here it’s on Sunday and repeated on Monday. I find I’m impatient to see how it all turns out.

  36. 36.

    Brachiator

    @redshirt:

    Anyone watch the Netflix series “Daredevil” and “Jessica Jones”?

    On my list, but have not watched either. I have heard a lot of good stuff about Jessica Jones, even from folks who don’t like “comic book” movies and TV shows.

    By contrast, I tried hard to watch Agent Carter. I think the actress that plays Carter is fantastic, but the series itself was just a piece of crap.

    “Deadpool” rocks.

  39. 39.

    redshirt

    @Technocrat: Totally. He was terrifying. Not just because of the nature of his powers and when you consider what the implications of those powers are, but how petty and childlike his motivations were. Given near absolute power as a child, he never matured. But then, does he represent men who have power from day one, and always get what they want? I think so.

  40. 40.

    Elmo

    @redshirt: Even better as that character. I’ve seen him in so many roles where he’s the conflicted or damaged good guy, and he’s great at that, but as a villain? A genuinely despicable monster? So much fun to see how he pulled it off!

  41. 41.

    MomSense

    @redshirt:

    Both excellent and I’m not generally a fan of the comic book genre. I had a hard time with some of the JJ episodes for content reasons. They were well done but upsetting.

    Having a beer and icing my foot. The pup has a new dog bed that has survived a whole 24 hours. We went to the feed store where she is treated like a princess by the staff. She charmed one of the local farmers into giving her a huge beef bone which she is now happily working on in front of the fire. If she weren’t a mutt she could absolutely win Westminster with her fancy pageant walking.

    My plan for tonight is to watch a movie, finish a commissioned knitting project, and avoid Republicans.

  42. 42.

    redshirt

    @Brachiator: I thought Agent Carter season 1 was quite good; season 2 was disappointing.

    But I LOVED both Daredevil and Jessica Jones, but each show is quite different from the other. They’re much more violent/sexual then anything else in the comic book universe on film, save Deadpool.

    I just got to see Deadpool too. Really funny and awesome.

  46. 46.

    Technocrat

    @redshirt:

    The “absolute power in a child” bit…his arc reminds me of a classic science fiction short story where everyone in town is afraid to say anything bad for fear of a psychic (?) child.

    Interesting point about the metaphor he represents. I think that’s even more explicit in the comics.

  47. 47.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @redshirt: nd even JJ was harsh and cruel and mean – even the last shot of the show brought this home.

    Can’t remember the last scene, but I did like the series, though I thought it could’ve been an episode or two shorter. I do like that the non-traditional providers (Netflix, Amazon, I guess FX and AMC) play with the season format a bit.

  48. 48.

    redshirt

    @Technocrat: That’s a Twilight Zone episode, I forget the name, but the kid can do anything and everyone lives in terror of him.

    Same with “Kevin”.

    As I was flying back home I got to watch the latest Star Wars movie and it occurred to me how unsettling the “jedi mind trick” really, is, AKA Kilgrave’s powers. To be able to make anyone do anything you say is a power that easily abused.

  50. 50.

    hamletta

    @redshirt: See, I always like watching a good actor play a villain. They’re always such juicy characters! Yes, George Sanders is my favorite actor of all time, why do you ask?

  51. 51.

    benw

    @redshirt: I sorta turned on Zep when I went through my exclusively hardcore/metal phase but I’ve come back around on them. I listen to them quite a bit these days.

  52. 52.

    Betty Cracker

    @redshirt: Good rationale. Will have to get further along in both series myself before drawing conclusions.

    @Steve in the ATL: I can’t pick a single novel as an all-time favorite, but that’s in my top 10.

  55. 55.

    Hal

    @redshirt: Loved Jessica Jones. I’m getting ready to watch Daredevil. The trailer for season two of dd looked great.

    I just hope Jessica gets more raw power in the series and maybe a more diversified storyline for season 2. In the comics the character can actually fly and threw a truck through a building. But the storyline for season one really called for a more muted super powered character in recovery and trying to overcome her trauma. Tennant was awesome but I loved that his character wasn’t portrayed as anything but a villain.

    Oh, and my one nitpick. Why did everyone find it so hard to believe Killgrave existed? This is NYC post Avengers 1. The movie were aliens opened a portal above the city and were defeated by Thor and the Hulk. But everyone around Jessica, including bullet proof, super strong Luke Cage are just can’t believe a guy with mind control powers could possibly exist?

  56. 56.

    redshirt

    @benw: I rejected them as “dinosaur rock” in my youth, but now, they sound so good.

    But then, for some weird reason, AC/DC just keeps sounding better and better to me every year. They might take my vote soon enough.

  58. 58.

    MomSense

    @redshirt:

    Yes. I’m on night 4 of this. Nothing is broken but my right metatarsal,four toes, and instep are swollen and bruised.

    I was boxing out my dog to keep her from getting the food I was preparing and managed to bump a heavy ceramic serving bowl off the counter with my elbow. It didn’t break because it landed rim first on my bare foot. It’s getting better but I think I won’t be able to hike or go to the gym for another week.

  59. 59.

    trollhattan

    @delk:
    Fun! I have something similar. For steaks I typically sear outside on the grill for at the most, a minute/side but it can also be done indoors on a REALLY hot skillet, preferably iron.

    Enjoy.

    Grumble, dinner is hours off.

  61. 61.

    redshirt

    @Brachiator: Do you read “Ulysses” for fun?

    I am so conflicted by the novel. I’ve read it, but hate it, but know it’s generally accepted as the greatest novel ever. And yet, I hate it.

  62. 62.

    Brachiator

    @redshirt:

    That’s a Twilight Zone episode, I forget the name, but the kid can do anything and everyone lives in terror of him.

    It’s a Good Life.

    Scenes

    I bet that Romney wishes he could send Trump to the cornfield.

  65. 65.

    trollhattan

    @Hal:
    I watched it cold, maybe even based on Cole’s recommendation (something about jeans), so knew nothing about the backstory, prequels, whatever, so they needed to goddamn explain the smattering of throwaway “You know, after the aliens and all” comments in the script. I kept looking for aliens.

    Great actress that I only knew from Breaking Bad.

  66. 66.

    redshirt

    @Hal: I actually get that. It’s a weird power, nothing like anyone has seen. Super strength? Fine. Can fly? OK. But able to control people with a word? Weird. And that’s why I get one of the central tensions of the show – Jessica lets Kilgrave live when she could kill him – because she’s hoping she can gather evidence to prove to a superhero exposed population that this guy is to blame. As opposed to just killing him the first chance she gets.

  69. 69.

    Brachiator

    @redshirt:

    Do you read “Ulysses” for fun?

    Why else would one read it?

    A co-worker, Irish American, read it. He came to it without fears of its literary magnitude. He used to read it out loud and caught puns that overly serious lit majors couldn’t see.

    I am so conflicted by the novel. I’ve read it, but hate it, but know it’s generally accepted as the greatest novel ever. And yet, I hate it.

    As Joyce said in the wake, some people are just “jung and easily freudened.”

    I love the chip that Joyce has on his shoulder, his disdain for the stubborn ignorance of his countrymen and their stupid dependence on religion, and his love for his countrymen and women, and their stubborn ignorance and stupid dependence on religion.

    But then again, I also love The Odyssey and Dante, two major influences on the work.

    And I like the through line from Joyce to Van Morrison.

  71. 71.

    April

    @redshirt: “Ulysses” is only called the greatest because it is so dang hard to get through you feel you have to call it great to excuse all the effort of reading it. I’ve always preferred “Portrait of the Artist” from Joyce.

    Seems any discussion of great novels has to first be divided into genre. How to rank the best science fiction verses the best romantic fiction verses the best historical novel…….

  74. 74.

    PurpleGirl

    @Steve in the ATL: A knew someone who was very much like the main character. I read the book once, won’t read it again… reminded me too much of that person.

  75. 75.

    Betty Cracker

    @trollhattan: You might also enjoy the short-lived series “Don’t Trust the B” featuring the same actor in a comedic turn. Also free on Netflix.

  76. 76.

    soledavid

    Hello, new member here but VERY longtime lurker – as in I started reading shortly after Cole turned from the dark side. Hope to get to know some of you better.

  78. 78.

    Steve in the ATL

    @PurpleGirl:

    A knew someone who was very much like the main character. I read the book once, won’t read it again… reminded me too much of that person.

    You’re scaring me. That can’t be possible.

  80. 80.

    Brachiator

    @O. Felix Culpa:

    Try “Parting the Waters : America in the King Years 1954-63,” by Taylor Branch

    Branch wrote two more books that cover the period from 1963 to 1968, but this is good to start.

    And the movie “Selma” actually conveys the spirit of the age quite well.

  83. 83.

    Mnemosyne

    @Betty Cracker:

    … slowly I turned …

    Nah, just kidding. It looks like I may actually being doing this “restarting my abandoned novel” thing. Origuy found me a lead on a history book I need for it, so now I’m debating if I should buy it on Kindle or trek down to the library to check it out.

  84. 84.

    PurpleGirl

    @MomSense: If I may, where in Maine do you live? I’ve been watching a show on Animal Planet about Maine’s Game Warden Service (North Woods Law). I’m sort of becoming familiar with sections of Maine and thinking I’d like to visit there some day.

    Congrats on the commissioned knitting project.

  87. 87.

    MomSense

    @PurpleGirl:

    Thanks! I’m in Midcoast in Waldo County. I haven’t watched that show in awhile but I do admire the warden service. We were camping in Mount Blue State Park but missed MacDreamy by a day. Everyone was buzzing about the moose carcasses they had found. Apparently the ticks have gotten so bad that they can kill a bull moose. They find them sucked completely dry of blood. Yikes!

  88. 88.

    Ben Cisco

    Finished my first week back at work. I missed a LOT in the month I was gone. It was good to be back around my team, and everyone else was really supportive. Got through the days (mostly) unscathed; had to retreat into the datacenter a time or two. My niece moves out tomorrow into her own place, so come Monday I’ll have the house to myself. Not quite what we intended…I’m guessing the REAL work will start right about then.

  89. 89.

    Iowa Old Lady

    I’m not sure I have a favorite novel any more. What I want to read changes all the time.

    At the moment, I’m reading not a novel, but Taibbi piece on Trump in The Rolling Stone. I just laughed out loud at his referring to Scalia as a “satanic quail hunter.”

  94. 94.

    redshirt

    @MomSense: I think that show is going to the Warden’s head. I had an encounter this past summer and the dude acted like a tv star, even though there were no cameras. Admittedly, he’s probably a tv star.

  97. 97.

    WereBear

    Can’t have a favorite band and novel because I loathe hierarchies:)

    But we can start with Pink Floyd and Crime and Punishment.

  99. 99.

    Mnemosyne

    @Ben Cisco:

    Keep going. It’s your only option, and I’m sure it’s what she would have wanted for you. Be gentle with yourself and give yourself all the time and space you need to mourn.

  100. 100.

    Brachiator

    @redshirt:

    Seriously, you’ll just pick up Ulysses again and again because you sincerely enjoy the experience? As enjoyable?

    Here’s the thing. The Comic books I read as a kid led me to literature.

    And the irony is when I was a kid, I had an English teacher tell me that comic books were trash. Now I hear adults moan and groan about literature being “too hard.”

    Yeah, I pull out Ulysses now and again. And recently went back and forth about it with a friend who was doing it for her reading group. Tough critic. She had issues with Joyce’s treatment of women and the sexuality. Fair criticisms.

    I also like the fact that at a certain point in time, some of the people doing it to death in English literature were all Irish. Synge in drama, Yeats in poetry, and Jimmie Joyce in the novel. Throw in Eugene O’Neill in America, too.

    I also prefer “Dubliners” to “Portrait of the Artist.” One story in Dubliners, “Two Gallants,” includes references to historical situations in which the Irish betrayed their people for cynical, foolish, and ignorant reasons, even as one of the “gallants” brags about a woman he has seduced, another act of betrayal. The anger packed into such a short story is tremendous.

  101. 101.

    Mnemosyne

    @WereBear:

    I once got into a spat with someone because he refused to believe I was serious when I said the greatest novel written in English is The Code of the Woosters. But I am 100 percent serious when I say that.

  103. 103.

    Elie

    @Ben Cisco:

    Best to you,man….. you’ll be ok. Just move but allow yourself to feel what is happening — don’t wall it off —

  106. 106.

    redshirt

    @Mnemosyne: I think there’s a huge difference between “greatest” novel and “favorite” novel.

    Ulysses makes many of the first, not many of the latter. Except for Brachiator.

  108. 108.

    Brachiator

    @Technocrat:

    I remember Billy Mumy from The Munsters…I had no idea he had a whole horror franchise going on.

    No, Mumy is Lost in Space, and much later Babylon 5.

    I wonder what the world would have been like had Rod Serling been able to cast Ron Howard in those Zone episodes, and Billy Mumy had been Opie Taylor.

  109. 109.

    PurpleGirl

    Over the past few months I’ve bought my some of those adult coloring books. Tonight I’m going to start coloring in one of them. I found my box of Venus Paradise colored pencils from many (mumble mumble) years ago.

    Tomorrow if the weather is nice I should go down to the Barnes & Noble on 17th Street/Union Square. (The B&N that was in Forest Hills closed at the end of 2015, to be replaced by a Target(????).)

  110. 110.

    WaterGirl

    @Ben Cisco: You have a tough road ahead, no doubt. Being alone in the house will surely bring a new layer of grief, and some healing as well. You’ve gotten this far, and I know you’ll get through the rest of it, putting one foot in front of the other.

    Big hugs.

  111. 111.

    Iowa Old Lady

    I’ve read Ulysses and admire its brilliance but for me, its appeal is purely intellectual. It makes me work too hard for anything else. I want a novel to tap into my emotions too, which is one reason that for years, my favorite novel was Pride and Prejudice. I think Joyce is also very centered on his own experience as a male, Irish, Catholic writer.

  112. 112.

    Mnemosyne

    @redshirt:

    There’s no law that says the greatest novel has to be the hardest to read. In fact, I think that being virtually inaccessible to an ordinary reader should automatically disqualify a book from being the greatest novel.

    How are you holding up after the big loss for “Mad Max”? Have they taken you off suicide watch yet?

  113. 113.

    WaterGirl

    @Iowa Old Lady: Animal Dreams was my favorite novel for a long time. Not sure what I’d pick now, haven’t thought about what’s my favorite book for a long, long time.

  114. 114.

    MomSense

    @Ben Cisco:

    You are doing really well and routine can help but please reach out for support. We are all rooting for you and honored to have you share with us.

  115. 115.

    redshirt

    @Mnemosyne: I agree with your take on novels.

    As for Mad Max, it did win the most Oscars out of any movie. Rightfully so! I was only disappointed in the Director category. How can a movie win almost all the technical categories and the Director does not?

  120. 120.

    Uncle Cosmo

    FTR the “It’s a Good Life” TZ episode was adapted from Jerome Bixby’s 1953 short story of the same name, which was selected by SFWA as one of the 20 best SF short stories published before the organization started giving out its Nebula Awards in 1970. A number of TZ classics were originally short stories published in pulp SF magazines, e.g., Damon Knight’s “To Serve Man”.

  121. 121.

    Brachiator

    @redshirt:

    I think there’s a huge difference between “greatest” novel and “favorite” novel.”

    Why?

    But then again, I don’t view Joyce or Ulysses as being “difficult.” Nor do I think it’s greatness lies in its supposed complexity.

    I also think that Waiting for Godot is some funny shit. You can see Beckett’s love of vaudeville and silent comedy all over it.

  123. 123.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @NotMax: A friend of mine warned me not to google adult coloring books. Sort of like my husband looking for the hours at Dick’s Sporting Goods and googling only the first word.

  125. 125.

    NotMax

    @redshirt

    Of course not. But editing isn’t quite a technical award, it’s a post-production award. Editing is done by a film editor (sometimes with assistance of the director, but not always, particularly for films where the studio lays on a heavy hand). Often a director has already moved on to his/her next project and is only peripherally involved in editing.

  126. 126.

    redshirt

    @Mnemosyne: Sure. Still, Mad Max winning the most Oscars (and many other film critic awards) this year is a huge victory for the film and critical recognition of what I’ve been saying: It’s a classic movie and deserves to be considered far more than just an “action film”.

  128. 128.

    Steve in the ATL

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    Sort of like my husband looking for the hours at Dick’s Sporting Goods and googling only the first word.

    If he’s a republican that was probably not an accident

  129. 129.

    WereBear

    @Ben Cisco: Having been there myself, I can tell you the adaptations just keep coming for a while. Sounds like you have a support system forming. Take full advantage of every help that is offered.

    My heart goes out to you.

  130. 130.

    Brachiator

    @Uncle Cosmo:

    FTR the “It’s a Good Life” TZ episode was adapted from Jerome Bixby’s 1953 short story of the same name, which was selected by SFWA as one of the 20 best SF short stories published before the organization started giving out its Nebula Awards in 1970. A number of TZ classics were originally short stories published in pulp SF magazines

    I have an abiding love for “The Howling Man.”

    From a Charles Beaumont story, I think.

  133. 133.

    Technocrat

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    Oh, your poor husband…but that’s hilarious. There’s a Universal Law that states: the amount of erotica you accidentally Google is proportional to the chance of your wife walking by.

  134. 134.

    Mnemosyne

    @WereBear:

    Which is why it gets my vote for greatest novel in English. And he really slaved over every single word he published — he would line the pages of a short story up on the wall with the ones that needed more work hung slightly crooked, and re-work each individual page until he was happy.

  135. 135.

    NotMax

    @redshirt

    So what? In no way means they sat in the editing studio together for hours on end, rather it implies he may have trusted her more than someone else to operate on her own.

  139. 139.

    redshirt

    @NotMax: No doubt. I’m just saying a film that wins the award for best editing, best costumes, best production, best sound, should probably win best direction too.

  140. 140.

    NotMax

    @Iowa Old Lady

    :)

    Likely also happens to people searching for art supplies from the venerable Dick Blick company and who are too lazy to type out more than Dick art.

  141. 141.

    mclaren

    @redshirt:

    Anyone watch the Netflix series “Daredevil” and “Jessica Jones”?

    Jessica Jones was great. Daredevil? Too realistic. The beatings are close to what you’d see in real life, and seeing that guy pound and slam away at other people (realistically, getting tired, stumbling, blood spattering from him as people punch and kick him) got so sickening so fast, it proved unwatchable.

    The series Daredevil also seems to me to sum up everything that’s wrong with America as a culture: got a problem? Sure, fix it by beating the shit out of people!

    In the real world, after the first fight, a real-world vigilante would’ve gotten a Russian sniper rifle and started taking out the bad guys from 1000 yards away.

    Now, I understand that this is what the Big Bad in the 2nd season is supposed to do. But let’s get real…we are actually seriously supposed to believe that a masked vigilante thinks he can genuinely fix a corrupt slum by…beating the shit out of people?

    It’s on the level of Captain Kirk saving the galaxy with some roundhouse punches.

    Jessica Jones’ depiction of the emotional toll of Killgrave’s manipulations seemed a lot more realistic. Even though the whole fight scene stuff in Jessica was transparently fake. She was taking hits that would kill an ordinary person. But her emotional damage made the serious seem somehow more realistic, as well as far more tolerable.

    Maybe it’s just me.

    Watching guys beat each other up over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over gets to be so nauseating, after a while, you just have to put your head down between your knees and shut the TV off and breathe for a while. So you don’t projectile-vomit.

  144. 144.

    NotMax

    @redshirt

    As Mnemosyne said, rarely happens.

    All members of the Academy don’t get to vote for all awards. Directors (mostly) vote for the directing award, technical professionals vote for the technical awards, etc.

  145. 145.

    redshirt

    @mclaren: These people have super powers, you know, right? Daredevil can sense what’s coming before it comes; Jessica Jones is tougher then ten rugby dudes.

  146. 146.

    Technocrat

    @NotMax:

    Isn’t it funny how the prefix changes it?:

    adult movies – sexy
    adult diapers – not sexy

    adult coloring books – ???

    ETA: “suffix”, not “prefix”

  148. 148.

    Brachiator

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    I think Joyce is also very centered on his own experience as a male, Irish, Catholic writer.

    Which is, of course, why the protagonist of the novel is Jewish, and why Molly Bloom has the last word.

  149. 149.

    redshirt

    @mclaren: But yeah, the hallway fight in Daredevil episode 2 is the most realistic super hero fight yet filmed. He almost can’t continue due to exhaustion. Something you never see in a Batman movie, for example, but which you should.

  150. 150.

    mclaren

    @Brachiator:

    Why else would one read [James Joyce’s Ulysses]?

    For juvenile pretentiousness…for ignorance of what real literature is, as opposed to crapfest wordplay verbal masturbation below the level of the typical Bazooka Joe bubblegum-wrapper comic…for self-punishment…for a deluded mis-imagination of literature as hideous unreadable complexity…for an appreciation of a monument to stupidity and infantilism and obscurantism raised to the level of a religion…for the sake of mythomanic self-delusion more extreme than Mormonoid baptism of the dead…for an up-close-and-personal taste of the disgust properly engendered by effete literary types who have gotten so wrapped up in their bizarrely warped fantasies of so-called “serious” fiction that they’ve forgetten everything that makes real literature worth reading.

    That’s only the top fly off the turdpile of bad reasons for trudging through that clownfest fail parade of a book.

  151. 151.

    Felonius Monk

    We’ll throw something on the grill for dinner eventually. (Not a chicken!)

    EAT MOR CHIKIN

    /Courtesy of your Local Cows

  152. 152.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Hal: Maybe part of Killgrave’s power is that it’s hard for people to believe he exists.

  153. 153.

    Matt McIrvin

    @redshirt: When I was a kid I tended to reject hard rock/heavy metal just because the people I knew who listened to it were unpleasant bullies. It sounds better now with the kid-culture associations gone.

  154. 154.

    mclaren

    @redshirt:

    I’m just saying a film that wins the award for best editing, best costumes, best production, best sound, should probably win best direction too.

    Nay, nay, I say! Very often “best editing” is awarded precisely because the editing fixed the incompetent direction. See the original Star Wars film for a classic example. Ditto costumes, production, sound design, etc. They all serve to cover up massive fuckups by the director when done well enough.

  155. 155.

    mclaren

    @redshirt:

    That fight was painful to watch. Just awful. Very realistic. But wow, so tough to sit through. I could feel my desire to watch more of the series ebbing away as that scene went on…

  156. 156.

    PurpleGirl

    @Technocrat: Okay, all kidding aside on the “adult” descriptive I used. The actual title of the coloring book I chose to color in tonight:

    The Mindfulness Coloring Book
    Anti-Stress Art Therapy for Busy People
    by Emma Ferrarons

  158. 158.

    Tom

    @redshirt: They’re both great but definitely different in tone. Both have great casting, particularly with their villains. Donofrio actually made me sympathize with Kingpin while still be terrified of them. Tennant was just flat-out terrifying.

  159. 159.

    mclaren

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Maybe part of Killgrave’s power is that it’s hard for people to believe he exists.

    “The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist.” Another line from a great film, The Usual Suspects.

    Maybe part of the power of Jessica Jones for me was that Killgrave seemed like a very explicit call-out to evil mesmeric figures like Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. The big bad guy in Daredevil didn’t seem quite so formidable. He just basically…killed people. Okay, by beating them to death. But that’s not nearly as scary as someone who can make you do anything by just talking you into it.

  160. 160.

    redshirt

    @mclaren: Perhaps some times, but not in this case. George Miller had MM:FR planned to the actual shot 10 years before it was filmed, literally. Every single shot was on a storyboard done a decade earlier.

  163. 163.

    redshirt

    @mclaren: Fisk killed very few people with his own hands. His power resided almost entirely through financial control – he bought people. The muscle, the police, the other gangs, the lawyers and judges. That was his real power, not his muscles.

  164. 164.

    mclaren

    @redshirt:

    I was under the impression that Daredevil just has extremely sensitive hearing and superb coordination. Those aren’t superpowers. Also, the series seemed to take pains to show Daredevil as pretty human. He got tired, he bled, he got wounded. Jessica Jones…not so much.

  166. 166.

    mclaren

    @redshirt:

    Didn’t Fisk beat that guy to death personally at the start of the series, and then basically beat up Daredevil after Nobu beats the crap out of him? Then there’s that final fight where Daredevil takes really an amazingly long time to beat down Fisk (which I did not buy at all, frankly).

    Looked to me as though the series was trying to make Fisk seem as physically formidable as Daredevil. But I could be wrong.

  167. 167.

    redshirt

    @mclaren: Daredevil has super senses, so his hearing can detect muscle contractions as they are happening, for example. IE he can detect a punch as its forming but before it happens. He can hear pulse and heartbeats to detect someone lying or about to shoot him, etc.

    He can super smell too.

  168. 168.

    redshirt

    @mclaren: Fisk is very strong – whether he’s super strong is debatable in the TV show. But his violence is extremely limited. His power comes from his role as “Kingpin” – controlling organized crime.

    As for that last fight, yes, DD has no super strength, just awesome martial arts and super senses. But Fisk does pick him up and throw him a good twenty yards or so which would be impossible for any normal person. So maybe he’s super strong.

  169. 169.

    mclaren

    @redshirt:

    Yeah, I really didn’t buy that scene where Daredevil was tracking that cab through the streets of New York by the music that was playing on the stereo inside it. While he was running along rooftops.

    That’s not super hearing, that’s magic.

    The scenes where he can tell if people are lying by listening for their heartbeats…iffy. But that cab tracking scene, nope, not buying that one at all.

  170. 170.

    mclaren

    Best novel? The Tale of Genji written circa 970 A.D. in Japan.

    What, no love for non-Western literature here?

  171. 171.

    redshirt

    @mclaren: Well, that’s the character, believe it or not. Every sense but his sight is to the Nth degree, and that’s the extent of his super powers. Couple that with a lifetime of ninja training and he’s the superhero Daredevil.

  173. 173.

    Technocrat

    @mclaren:

    I think magic is probably a good definition for any superpower. Iron man gets punched by the hulk, makes a crater in a wall, and his suit protects him. From inertia, apparently.

  176. 176.

    Matt McIrvin

    The Guardian profiles Guardian readers who support Trump. Keep in mind that a Guardian reader who supports Trump is probably neither a typical Guardian reader nor a typical Trump voter. But the prevalence of people who are voting for Trump precisely because he is horrible and unfit for office, as a heighten-the-contradictions move or an attempt to punish society, is striking.

  177. 177.

    redshirt

    @Felanius Kootea: It is an awesome novel. If you haven’t read it, do so. It’s a fun and quick read too, unlike most Russians.

    I guess at this point my “favorite” novel is literally and actually 1984 . I’ve read it several times in the last ten years and it seems to get better everytime. It’s terrifying. Claustrophobic. And so literal to the times we are actually living in, and will continue living in.

    I urge everyone to reread 1984 ASAP if they haven’t recently. It’s never been more fitting.

  178. 178.

    redshirt

    @Matt McIrvin: It’s an odd phenomena. For example, I like Trump quite a bit myself. Never would have expected that. But he’s speaking a lot of truths that NO ONE else is saying, and I find that beyond intriguing. I’d never in a million years vote for him but to be honest, I like him as a politician and would answer a poll thusly.

  179. 179.

    Matt McIrvin

    @redshirt: I can’t like anyone who spews ethnic bigotry like that guy does; I believe he’s driving the United States in the direction of Holocaust- or Rwanda-style mass murder and I know many people who he might get killed. But I can see the appeal of his shtick, and it’s satisfying when he sticks the knife into somebody I already hate, because he’s really good at that.

    I get the impression that for some of these people it’s all a big game. They don’t really believe anyone is going to get hurt who doesn’t deserve it. Or they think everyone deserves it. Some may be trying to punish themselves.

  180. 180.

    Felanius Kootea

    @redshirt: I had to read “1984” and “Animal farm” in boarding school in Nigeria, which was somewhat painful for me, even though I see the appeal. I got to read “The Master and Margarita” on my own and it was truly magical. My favorite books tend to be from the geographical south (“One hundred years of solitude,” “The famished road,” “The god of small things,” “Half of a yellow sun”, “Chronicle of a death foretold,” etc.), and magical realism appeals to me. My mom taught African-American and Victorian literature at a university in Nigeria so I also came to love “Pride and prejudice,” “The bluest eye,” “The color purple,” and “Go tell it on the mountain.” I also like books by Milan Kundera even though no one else seems to.

  184. 184.

    Felanius Kootea

    @Steve in the ATL: Oh wow! I’ve never actually seen the US embassy in Lagos though because I grew up in a different city (Ibadan). It’s the focus of an O. Henry Prize winning short story by Chimamanda Adichie called “The American Embassy,” which captures the humiliations Nigerians go through in their quest to leave Nigeria for greener pastures. I disliked Lagos intensely as a child – too noisy and crowded for me. I would get stomach-aches every time we had to visit relatives there. As an adult, though, I’ve come to appreciate its madness.

    @WereBear: All right! One other person who appreciates Kundera :-).

  185. 185.

    Felanius Kootea

    @redshirt: I “blame” my mom :-). All her kids decided to be scientists but at least we can quote literature.

  187. 187.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Steeplejack (phone): Thanks for your suggestions as well. I love the book discussions here, especially as a break from the Hillary/Bernie neener neener stuff.

    With the customary disclaimer that I will crawl over broken glass to vote for the Democrate nominee, whoever s/he might be.

  189. 189.

    Groucho48

    Ulysses is quite readable and enjoyable if you don’t tackle it as a project. Parts of it require knowledge of the times and of Dublin and of mythology and such that most of us, nowadays, don’t possess. Just skim those parts or any parts that you feel are boring. Because there really are some great set pieces in it and, overall, it is a very humane and optimistic work. It is also beautifully written.

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