Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

It is not hopeless, and we are not helpless.

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

Not all heroes wear capes.

the 10% who apparently lack object permanence

The willow is too close to the house.

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

I’m more christian than these people and i’m an atheist.

Cancel the cowardly Times and Post and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

In after Baud. Damn.

When I was faster i was always behind.

You passed on an opportunity to be offended? What are you even doing here?

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Bark louder, little dog.

He wakes up lying, and he lies all day.

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42Comments

  4. 4.

    What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?

    He did one of the early Iron Man movies and that worked out well. That probably started him down the path to the rest though how he got picked for that first one I don’t know.

     

    He also did Elf, which is great.

  12. 12.

    Barbara

    Just dropping in to say that I watched a documentary on Hulu called Never Let Him Go, which is a true crime story but is really about the search for justice and equal treatment for LGBTQ people. It doesn’t just help, but really, it was essential, that the victim’s brother was a tech millionaire who could never stop trying to find out – for 30 years – what happened when his brother was found at the foot of a cliff in Sydney harbor Australia. Worth watching, but warning that there are flashbacks and discussion of the early days of HIV.

  14. 14.

    Anonymous At Work

    Favreau loves making movies.  It’s what separates a lot of good films makers from mediocre or flash-in-pan ones.  It’s the difference between Airplane! or Super Troopers from bad parody movies.

  15. 15.

    Alison Rose

    John, this will be of interest to you. From my friend and former coworker David Lemieux, the Dead’s archivist:

    Perhaps the most unlikely and unexpected record in the history of recorded music, the Grateful Dead have tied Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley with the most Top 40 albums in music history. The Dead now have 58 Top 40 albums in their history, with Dave’s Picks Vol. 48 debuting this week at #33.

    And considering there will be more to come, I assume they’ll take the lead soon!

  16. 16.

    Manyakitty

    @sab: yes, and I think he owned the 50s diner where she had to wear the poodle skirt and fake boobs.

    And the wrestling thing is because Monica overheard him talking to a (fighting) ring designer and hilarity ensued.

  17. 17.

    trollhattan

    Loved Swingers and found Jon Favreau utterly annoying in that role, so…good acting? Naturally, the beautiful babies loved him.

    As touchstone, is Swingers to the ’90s what Repo Man is to the ’80s?

  18. 18.

    BethanyAnne

    My more nervous kitty is sleeping within arm’s reach. I always love that. Starting up Fallout: New Vegas just to listen to Benny’s intro speech again. RIP Matthew Perry.

  19. 19.

    ChasM

    The deal is Swingers at that time was such an insiders hit that it basically made him early. Every young punk trying to get into the business at that time could not only recite every line, get every awkward joke, but also go have mojitos at the Dresden and sing along with Marty and Elaine on Saturday night (and then head over to The Olive hoping for a glimpse of part owner David Lynch).

    And then he went about perfecting his craft. Quietly, persistently, brilliantly. 

     

  20. 20.

    MomSense

    I think my favorite role of his is Chef and the cooking series he did, The Chef Show, with Roy Choi is fantastic.

  21. 21.

    Yarrow

    @ChasM:  Yeah, it kind of seems like he is where he is because he’s worked hard at it and loves it. That’ll take you a long way.

  22. 22.

    Marmot

    @trollhattan:

    As touchstone, is Swingers to the ’90s what Repo Man is to the ’80s?

    Oooh, good question. I’m not sure what it means, though. Anyway, Dude, Where’s My Car? is the Repo Man of the ‘90s.

  23. 23.

    Jeffro

    I haven’t read much about him but he’s listed as “executive producer” on most everything Marvel puts out these days (and some Star Wars/Disney stuff, too)

    So he’s gettin’ a cut of everything.  It’s like being the first person to ever sell Amway, only better!  ;)

    (only person with a better job imho is Adam Clayton of U2)

  29. 29.

    phein64

    @MomSense: Chef is a great small movie.  He has a number of very notable costars (Downey, Vergara, Platt, Leguizamo, Johannson, Hoffman, Cannavale), and the kid is not only great but a dead ringer for a friend of my sons.  Truly a labor of love, in the best possible way.

  33. 33.

    Martin

    Basically, Marvel was trying to make the movie transition work, and it wasn’t working. Their early films mostly sucked. Favreau was executive producer and director for Iron Man, and made a good decision in picking the writers for the film, and managed to land Downey Jr for the role.

    So producing/directing a film in a franchise where everything before either sucked or was so-so (Spiderman) wasn’t that hard to get. Downey Jr wound up being the *perfect* actor for the role, and it’s unclear to me if the script was equally well suited or if that really didn’t come together until Downey Jr was on board (his suitability for the role suggests that the character was to some degree rewritten for him). But my understanding is that Downey Jr was a fan of the comic as was Favreau, and they fought the studio pretty hard for the film we got – which isn’t really what the studio was thinking. And well, it was a massive hit so when Disney bought Marvel the next year, they put the people who got it in charge and wiped out the folks on the stuff that sucked. Marvel was this kind of bolt-on studio to Disney, and really relied on Feige to work it out. Favreau got it, so he was kept, and that opened doors to doing The Mandalorian. But he’s not that big of a figure in Marvel – he never directed again after Iron Man 2. Whedon came in and did it bigger and better, Gunn did the goofier Guardians films but kept them close enough to integrate into the big mashup blockbusters, Waikiti pulled the films to be even quirkier. Tim Miller did Deadpool.

    MCU is Feige, with a LOT of other directors, some better than others. Favreau is really just part of that soup, but he was the first that really nailed it, and as a result was probably instrumental to that Disney deal going through.

  38. 38.

    artem1s

    @Martin:

    Whedon came in and did it bigger and better,

    do NOT diss the Russo brothers. Fabreau was responsible for making Iron Man a reality, the Russos crafted Cap and The Avengers. I love watching Winter Soldier. They took over downtown Cleveland for a whole summer. It was fun.

  41. 41.

    strange visitor (from another planet)

    @trollhattan: no. swingers is nothing like nor has nearly the cult following repo man has.

    also. no fans of PCU?

    imo, chef is one of the greatest things he’s ever made, but yeah, he does great star wars work. him and filoni

    @Martin: most of iron man is ad-libbed. they more or less made up the dialogue on the spot.

  42. 42.

    Mike S

    I’ve had a few conversations with Favreau and what struck me the most was how when he decides he wants to do something he puts everything he has into learning everything about it.

    But my favorite thing about him is his complete lack of pretentiousness.  He has around nine billion in box office receipts and still shows up to interviews by himself. Not even his pr person, let alone an entourage.

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