DRW50

The irony is Jeff Merkley was pilloried up and down back in 2008 for not being "liberal" enough compared to his primary opponent. Reminds you again of the danger of purity tests. Seth Macfarlane and the Modern Family producer have blasted Fox - the latter claiming he would never work for them again when Modern Family is done before backflipping faster than an entire gymnastics team. I think Paul Feig said something too. And Judd Apatow, but I automatically tune out anything he says. https://news.avclub.com/modern-family-co-creator-cuts-ties-with-fox-over-fox-ne-1826962485

Seeing the SDCC lineup reminds me of just how huge the cast was. Not sure I'll ever experience another moment like that 'live,' seeing so many faces in and out every week. It was like one last gasp of Marland-era ATWT. Someone on Twitter was asking whether Laura Dern or Naomi Watts was the better Lynch 'muse.' It's one of those questions with no answer, I suppose, although I chose Watts, mostly because I thought she was so stupendous in MD and as Janey-E.

For every one who is no longer on the cable news grind (like Stephen Lord) another takes their place. I'm sure there are a few people in cable news who genuinely are upset (Rachel Maddow, for instance) but I think most of it is a game to them, just a posturing void. I don't think CNN and MSNBC have enough integrity to genuinely move the needle on topics like this. I think the anger, while it actually lasts, is a collective effort they have no choice but to go along with.

Corey Lewandowski has been proven scum for years and yet continued to be a cable news fixture. He will still be getting booked - and if he isn't, he'll get hired somewhere by somebody rich. The solution is to stop watching cable news, as most of the people who run the show only suddenly care about children when it's time to get the ratings up and the ad revenues up. It's the same networks that bragged about the money Trump was making them and continue to give money and time to Kellyanne Conway as if she's an old friend. Rinse and repeat.

The last tweet is 100% right, but I think it's too late to stop that train of thought, sadly. The other one that stood out for me was Trump and family turning against Jeb Bush's desperate son, who sucked up to them even after his parents were viciously attacked by Trump for a year. He was the one who got such breathless hype for being the future of the Bush family. Craven and irrelevant - sounds about right. He's lucky that he's a Republican running in Texas, as he can win no matter what.

Watching Friday's episode, and I wonder if they know that the somewhat distracting camera shots where they pan from one character group to another in reactions to an event is less edgy and more dated. It doesn't really bother me as it reminds me of Knots Landing, one of the best soaps ever. I did appreciate the idea of tying all the different groups in through watching the appeal to find Amelia. This is what Emmerdale should be. The only downside is it reinforces just how heavy so many current stories are and how many of them revolve around young girls being in peril (or in the case of baby Margarita, dying in the womb). Dominic Brunt is proving again what a good actor he is when given the chance. I enjoy Rebecca in the role of unwittingly irritating people by saying the wrong thing at all times. I'm sure someone will say it's "ableist," but to me this is the type of off-kilter moment that Emmerdale used to have a lot of in its past years and which feels all too rare now. It's a better use of her than anything in 2016-17, anyway.

And this is just the beginning.

@I Am A Swede I can't remember if I mentioned this to you before but there's an Emmerdale group on Facebook that - well it has a lot of the usual generic bitching and wankery of any group, but also has a few old time cast members who comment, and in the last few days has been putting up some '70s behind the scenes photos and publicity photos I'd never seen before. https://www.facebook.com/groups/410762128980321/

@Vee @SFK thought you might like this.

Did Wynne Miller want to stay then? I wondered as there was no credits for her post-Somerset. Is this Dolph Sweet at 42 minutes? It sounds like him but I don't remember him being this slim. (I should warn if you watch the video there is a photo of massacred women and children near the start)

I agree, but I think this also creates a mentality where people are likely to resent and hate America and become lawless, become dangerous. That's why I hope this whole ugly horror will lead to some type of real change, unlikely as it is, because I have to question anyone who only cares about children treated so terribly in these specific circumstances but doesn't care about them the rest of the time. If the policy goes away tomorrow (and I hope it does), the failures and the pain are still there to be exploited and harvested, as they have been for decades.

I think what we're seeing is probably what has been going on in one form or another for a number of years - Trump is just too crass and too stupid to hide it properly, and he's also made it worse because he makes everything worse. So for that reason I'm not as shocked as I wish I could be. The reason I don't like the comparisons to the past is because I think it simultaneously minimizes what many went through (in the case of the internment camps, the media and the entirety of government as well as the average citizen fully supported these camps, and in many cases supported even more extreme measures - there was pretty much no one trying to help the way we are seeing people try to help now), and partly because I think it runs the risk of turning into some kind of atrocity Olympics and makes people shut down mentally. I think that there's a way to try to fight these groups and these people in different terms, especially since I've noticed many of them have become more and more proud of the term Nazi anyway. I don't mean to try to downplay what's going on now, because it's very dangerous, and I think it's only going to get even worse. I just try to keep it within its own sphere of history because I worry it can't be examined or dealt with otherwise. The real concern I have is less about immigrants hating America because of Trump (which, intentionally or not, I think plays into the hands of those who want to ship them all out and lock all the doors and windows) and more about who is going to help these people when there is no more President Trump. The system has failed immigrants, it has exploited them, and helped push up the rise in gangs, lawlessness, violence, alongside so many illegal immigrants being used as indentured servants. Before all of this blew up the most talk you'd hear about Trump's policies is that it was now less easy to have what amounted to dogs going around doing as they're told by their employers. Kelly Obsorne sneering "Who's going to clean your toilets, Donald Trump?" from a few years ago pretty much said it all. So do all the reports about how this crop or that factory is now suffering because we can no longer exploit illegal immigrants while granting them no rights or citizenship. Even the Dreamer debate was framed on those terms - people who have no rights and were not going to get any rights. Until we address the citizenship question, this is going to go on and on, even if people can feel better about themselves because illegal immigrants and refugees are now treated like cattle as a family instead of being treated like cattle while forcibly separated.

I think if someone is going to be outed as a neo-Nazi it's less likely to come from "what does this tattoo look like" and more from real efforts to look into it, as the threads just end up with people saying "How awful!" and arguing over when an iron cross is or is not appropriate. Oh and a lot of people telling Ron Perlman how much they love him. I think that people who focus so much on Nazi Nazi Nazi above all else are just turning people away from the real issue because many people automatically tune out that word now. I think the same happens when people mention the Japanese internment camps and act like it's all just the same. People would be better off focusing attention on what is happening now rather than what feels like a self-absorbed history course to show everyone how shocked and upset they are. That's pretty heavy. I had wondered why he was still staying around...

Didn't he go by David Cherrill? He does look pretty good for 73. Was he on any other soap?

I wish we could see any of that time period. I know the show was still very conservative, but you had very attractive actors like Judith Chapman, and the guy who played Tom at that time (C David Colson or whatever his name was), and I think someone here said Marie Masters also played Susan in a vulnerable/sexual manner, etc. It sounds very different to how dry the show felt by the late '70s.

I think the people who were upset remained upset, but many were momentarily upset and went back to their business (and either didn't vote or voted GOP). I assume the same will happen here. Social media makes it more difficult to shake off but social media also turns to other topics and turns on itself in the blink of an eye. I saw a bunch of tweets earlier with Ron Perlman asking people to identify whether someone working for ICE had a Nazi tattoo. I don't even know what people are supposed to do with that or how it's going to actually help anyone. It's the same navel-gazing rabbit holes that keep consuming many who should know better. As awful as Sarah Sanders and her droning voice are I'm glad she did point out that all this started with W. Karl Rove tried to play games about immigration, completely clueless as to the simmering tensions of the base on this topic. Something ugly was unleashed when their fantasy plans to pass "comprehensive immigration reform" went down in flames, and it has steadily consumed the GOP, including the people that we were told and told and told by the press were supposed to be "sensible" or "moderate" conservatives, like Romney, Rubio and McCain. I have a feeling the same policies will still be there, in one form or another, after Trump. I hope they won't, but I just feel like so many, outside of activists, are going through the motions on this topic.

Ratings losses, and likely P&G wanting to push the show in a younger direction. I know some fans have also said that it was a struggle for some to accept John Colenback again after the dynamic John Reilly had taken over the part.

The hate is cultivated with or without these policies, based on generations of mistakes and people using immigration as a political football and not actually caring about helping immigrants. Even all the bluster we're seeing now from many in power is likely more about how disgusting Trump is and how blatant his abuse of immigrants is than about actually wanting to help anyone. As soon as this story dies down, and the worst of the ugliness fades from memory, people will move on, just like with the Abu Ghraib stuff in 2004, which was also supposed to be a watershed moment. The 'civilized' countries of the world, while certainly doing a better job than we are at the moment, are also struggling to know what to do and I wish the media would not just glibly give statistics like they are about Germany. Paranoia and anger over migrants helped stall out Merkel forming a new government and that government is now on the verge of collapse for the same reasons. Yet all we're hearing is "lowest crime rate since (fill in the blank)." I just hope when Trump and his dead-eyed VP have retired, or lose, or whatever, people in power actually try to do something about this issue, because this has been building for a long time.

If only Laura Bush or her husband had said something when it mattered (2006, 2008, 2010, 2012, etc. - 2012 in particular was a big one), although better late than never, I suppose.

It might have been interesting if Craig and Margo had both been his kids, as Craig might have worked with John in his scheming, while Margo resisted. The only time I remember seeing Bart (?) Montgomery on the show, he was in story with Margo anyway, not Craig or Cricket. Thanks.

What was Stephen's ATWT role at that time? IMDB only has him as a flashback of Martin Guest a decade later.

Sad to say I was surprised they even mentioned Cricket's name. That whole thing was so stupid, such a waste.

He always skeeved me out on there. I generally liked him on Talking Dead, even if he was a bit self-involved. I should have trusted my instincts. There were also, as I've seen people say over the last few days, some unpleasant undertones in how Danai Gurira was treated and how Michonne was talked about on Talking Dead (Michonne was a very popular character, but you would never have known it if you watched TD), so some of the other claims about him don't surprise me as much as they should.

I feel like they had no idea what to do with Cricket beyond "hey she's having a baby!" It's always weird to watch later years and get brief reminders of Lyla and Bob being a couple. I think they missed a beat not re-exploring this while he and Kim were separated.

A Bob/Margo pairing would have made sense, on some level (especially if she still ended up with Tom). I'm half-surprised the ATWT of that era didn't put him with Cricket... I didn't know that Miranda was created before the Bob pairing. That makes sense too. The '79 clips seem to imply a growing bond between them that does make me wonder if the show toyed with the idea and then decided against it for the reason you describe.