DRW50

I remember Matt Rogers getting mad because of a silly kiss between John Krasinski and Pete Davidson on SNL. It's odd he got so upset over that when this is the second project he's involved in to be heavily criticized for stereotypes and pandering and not caring about real representation. (the other was that Q-Force cartoon) I admire Bowen Yang, he had a tough life to get where he is now, but, while he is very charismatic, he relies so much on camp cliche to the point where I don't really invest. It's telling that he loves Gays in Space, to me one of the worst SNL sketches and one which mainly relied on straight actors mincing and lisping as viewers cheered the whole laugh-at-the-queers element. I also was not comfortable with how some involved with the movie dogpiled some woman on Twitter who made a stupid tweet about the film. If your film is good enough you shouldn't have to be so desperate for clout. Anyway, I will try it sometime, but as with Palm Springs, I may be better off just staying with the trailer.

I see that NPR, one of the more reliable corporate media mouthpieces, is still focusing on the leak rather than the ruling itself. I have mixed feelings as if the recall had not gone the way it did, then she likely would have been replaced by a Republican. For the time being, I agree her staying in office is harmless, but I do think when it gets to a point of the person having to rely so much on others to get through, a question about responsibility and genuine care for her well-being starts to come to mind.

Thanks. I was curious as I wondered if Wally might have been part of Irna's plan to refresh/purify ATWT, if this is around the time Penny's Vietnamese daughter was there, Tom and Carol trying to live off the land, etc.

I think there's a certain nuance which the online left refuses to appreciate and makes them easier to ignore. As a result, their complaints about Feinstein, and also about Merrick Garland and how his ties to the establishment have been detrimental to our democracy, fall on deaf ears.

Is this before or after her phantom pregnancy?

Sounds like fun.

RTD ruined Torchwood for me with Children of Earth...not interested in seeing any of those characters again.

@Soapsuds

I read through the Feinstein article. I'm glad they at least took time to try to have an interview with her, which made the piece less heartless than most of the hellish Nation/Jacobin op-eds tend to be. Speaking of hellish, this man is among the worst of humanity so I am not surprised he's on the comeback trail.

More warring and toxicity at the Washington Post. A lot of right wing figures like Greenwald and Jesse Singal are rallying around Weigel, likely due to him always trying to carve out a dudebro lane on Twitter that tends to defend or turn a blind eye toward that circle jerk. It should be easy to say don't use your official account to shitpost and try to avoid the realities of aging, but instead it has to become an oasis of martyrdom. Meanwhile, the New York Times, at a time when they know the GOP is pushing to limit or ban divorce, pushes op-eds trying to shame and guilt people into staying in unhappy marriages. Oh and the woman writing this is a member of a virulently anti-gay breakaway Anglican church.

I think it would have been a mistake recasting Mike, especially with the shaky recast of Ed not long before, but I am sorry we didn't get a Mike/Alex pairing. That could have provided so many layers and so much family drama, especially if Hope returned. Alex ended up feeling much more aged than she should have been, between the pairing with Warren (who always seems very gay to me), then HB, and all the obsessive focus on Lujack and later Simon.

@Vee You'll definitely be getting a lot of Lisa singing in future. It works very well as Ciji - there's one coming up that closes out an episode which is one of my favorite Knots scenes (it's not the more famous scene along these lines). I never knew that about Dunne either. It's a shame Melrose ended up having such a poor ending. I need to revisit some of that season and see if I can get over the visual of Rena trying to play nutty in a cheerleading uniform.

@Vee I'm very happy you are still doing these, especially as they have little details I'd long forgotten (like Rusty returning). I grow to loathe Mack around season 9 and that never fully goes away, but he was very important to allowing both Karen and Knots to grow into a more confident place at this point, and the show really needed his energy. He and Michele clicked instantly and Knots wisely did not do what a lot of shows did and set him up as a heavy antagonist before telling us to like him. Regarding your thoughts on Richard and the community, especially Karen, I think where Richard benefited is that he was easy to understand. A go-getter who went bust, someone to pity, someone to take under their wing. Karen liked that because it made her feel good and she could help someone who needed help and would be clearly appreciative of that help. Laura was more complicated, much more guarded, and complexity is something a lot of people do not have time for. Laura tends to be "othered" for much of her time on the show, drawn more toward other damaged people than the designated heroines, which is one of the more realistic elements of Knots for me, and why I think the show loses a lot of its soul without her.

It's difficult for me to articulate, but the main difference for me in the first two seasons and afterwards is the couple-centric format. The women in the first two seasons are strong and relatively complex in the definition of their marriages and traditional family structures. Starting with season 3 the tables are turned with a female narrative becoming more prominent, and male characters (like Gary, and later, Ben and Mack) tending to be most compelling or active in story when defined through the women in their lives. KL tries, repeatedly, to bring in more dynamic male characters who have more of their own narrative, but the only one who ever really takes is Greg Sumner.

@Vee So glad you have stayed with the show through writing up these key episodes. I'm thrilled you liked Silver Shadows. Night is one of KL's best and is only enhanced by your thoughts. I hadn't thought about the contrast between this episode and the hostage episode until you brought it up, and how much more female-centric the narrative became between the two seasons. I feel like it's the difference between KL being strung along through melodramatic cliches and KL having character-driven drama. The late '80s has another nigh-based episode that is also very plot-driven melodrama (no spoilers), which just makes this period of the show even more special.

Scanned through this just now. By this point I was no longer watching Rosie's talk show on a daily basis as she was utterly exhausting, so I have no real memory of this episode. It's a full leadup to her interview with Barbra, talking about her lifelong devotion to Barbra, family memories, going around getting beauty treatments in preparation of the interview, etc. The interview is not in this episode, but is on Youtube.

Watching the opening credits and I still don't get Robin Sachs as Adam. He looks more like Odo.

Someone put this up. I think this may have been on Youtube before but I don't see it now. Not sure of the date, beyond January or very early February.

https://abc7.com/brad-johnson-actor-obituary-melrose-place/11923142/