DramatistDreamer

The sound that comes out of Rublev's mouth is quite... something.🤐😫

Wasn't it Sony that had their files hacked by the North Koreans , only to uncover a barrage of offensive e-mail correspondence? That company has been an entire mess for ages now. This was so blatant though. The shade--I must hand it to whomever runs their social media account.

Although this gives no specifics regarding who still awaits evacuation, this is a good reminder that, despite how dire the images in Afghanistan look, things could definitely be worse.

It wouldn't do any good to try without changing the executive and writing staff first. The current group have no idea how to write for diverse characters, or well, anyone at this point. Of course not. Nor did I even expect things to change after Moonves got the boot, which is why I stopped watching a long time ago. I have to be honest. I rarely watch CBS anymore.

Okay now I am seeing the news about Mike Richards stepping down, but how on earth was he ever allowed to name himself as co-host??! How ridiculous 🙄. Now the show is conducting a new search? Even if some are recalled, it looks like a full waste of time and energy for the candidates. Aww, Abhi, had Y&R had an ounce of competence, that situation should easily been worked out. Abhi is a cute guy, seemed professional and has done good work on other shows. Y&R could have brought on Shenaz as Treasurywala as a big sister and struck gold. Instead, the same lackluster stories. If Sony did more than talk about diversity, Y&R could have had an Asian family. It should now be clear, the reasons why these shows are such a mess.

Had that man been darker-skinned like "Arab-looking" or Black, he would have never made it out of that truck alive. America claims now to understand that the biggest terrorist threat is that of white supremacists, but just seems to give lip service to the matter. Media outlets are already putting out stories of a grieving son. I expected nothing less. Not to belabor the Afghanistan departure issue, but one aspect that befuddles me is that, I could've sworn a couple months ago, it was announced that flights out of Afghanistan for diplomats and translators, U.S. and Afghani and their families would begin in the second week of July. Why are there so many people still trying to get out? Supposedly, some Americans are in that number. If this is true, how did this happen?

And not even having watched a full episode of this show since KSJ's memorial episodes, just by perusing the Y&R thread, I can figure out which actress he is referring to. They are just so predictable.

When I tell you that I am not surprised. Wow, in addition to sexual harassment of this actress, he also referred to a Black actress as having a hot body but the head of a "Chia pet". Y&R ought to clean house. They've allowed misogyny to reign over that show for too many years. The entire daytime industry has. The daytime drama genre has acutely suffered because of their misogyny and racism. No wonder daytime soaps are circling the drain.

According to his video statement, which went viral (the only reason why I even saw it as I don't follow him), he is getting the surgery to repair the knee so that he can have a good quality of life, be able to walk and play with his kids. This, according to his video, is his main concern. He said he hopes to be able to return to play but is being realistic. If overzealous fans are interpreting this statement in any other way, they are conflating the issue and misinterpreting his statement. Fans need to know when to let these players make their own decisions and stop trying to read tea leaves. Retirement is inevitable, let people come to their own awareness. At least it's not as if he's Jack Sock, doing nothing for years, while still getting WCs.🤷🏾‍♀️

Tennis has been a sh*tshow for years, it's just that the obsession with chasing records and the Big 3 or Big 4, or whatever they are has papered over this. The corporate entities in charge of the sport have been mostly concerned with which side of the bread is buttered the most than any longer term problems facing the sport. Well, you have an entire generation of tickets-selling superstars with one foot out the door, you have a game of 'hot potato' with some talented players who don't want the responsibility of taking up that superstar mantle and all the pressures associated with that (and who could blame them, really) and you have some also-rans who can snatch an occasional big title but most people couldn't pick out of a lineup of two. You have matches, of various quality, scattered among various broadcast and streaming services, with lackluster production values...you even have some long-time tennis fans rapidly losing interest, meanwhile the ATP is busy chasing down social media accounts that post...GIFs. Otherwise, everything's great.

This was put in another thread but I thought that I should place this in this thread too since it involves an actress who once appeared on ATWT decades ago. Jill Powell, who played Marcie Breen, (who, by the way, you cannot tell me wasn't an early antecedent to the Carly Tenney character), has had some struggles in recent years. Hopefully, she has since gotten help. (She could be an interesting person to interview on a podcast, if the so-called soap media actually cared enough). https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/06/nyregion/therapist-and-patient-share-a-theater-of-hurt.html

Speaking of Ms. Powell, she has been through quite a lot in recent years, to put things mildly. https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/06/nyregion/therapist-and-patient-share-a-theater-of-hurt.html

ICYMI

The last time, she was able to get the violation cleared because she stopped taking the substance before it was officially banned. The substance? Meldonium. Sound familiar? Initially, she was tagged with using a banned substance and challenged her suspension by claiming that, although it she still had it in her system when she was tested (and failed) her doping test, she technically had stopped taking meldonium before it was officially listed as a banned substance.

Lepchenko getting busted for a doping violation. Again!

Well, any subsequent writing regimes generally does something different with a character years down the road. I doubt that the writer who originally created Barbara Ryan imagined that she would be a vamp wreaking havoc on the men (and men's wives) of Oakdale while building a fashion business or even further down the road, jumping out of windows and assisting the same ex-husband who once tortured her into kidnapping people. Also, I am confused about the discussion about Carly and Luke. There was a Carly on ATWT, and a Carly on GH. There was also a Luke on ATWT, created decades after GH's Luke--all by different writers. Are we all talking about vastly different characters? Right?

Again, iterating that the biggest mistake the U.S. made was to go into Afghanistan and Iraq in the first place. A mess from the very beginning. Trump made a mess in his attempts to negotiate a "deal" with the Taliban, the way he tried to negotiate a "deal" with China, the way he tried to negotiate a "deal" with North Korea. These right-wing media outlets, and some mainstream media are derelict in their duty, as they seem to want to cherry pick examples of disastrous diplomacy. Hopefully people don't continue to fall for it. If they do, that's unfortunate for them.

It's likely that Marland created Marcy Breen (Jill Powell was the actress who was most memorable in the role), who I have always thought seemed like an early precursor to Carly Tenney.

Whenever Tsitsipas opens his mouth, he believes that he sounds intelligent. Someone ought to tell him the truth.

That seems plausible. Whatever the impetus for the diminution of the character, with each recast it seemed as if Nathan became increasingly generic. Lazare seemed talented enough but Nathan appeared to be devoid of charisma by the time Lazare had his turn. I may not have fully realized it then, but in retrospect, that final storyline was pushing Nathan off the canvas, by first making the character as unlikeable a character as one can get, so presumably when his demise came, he wouldn't be as greatly missed as he would've been had he stayed the version of the character portrayed by Nathan Purdee.

The most interesting aspect of this Op-ed is the reminder that the Taliban have already been governing swaths of Afghanistan for years.

The post above was supposed to be in the Politics thread. Too much going on today, I guess. Oh well, I am not sure it'd get read anyway and I am too tired to move it(shrug).

Africa to the rescue, I guess.

So now, the J&J vaccine which was tested by a large number of South Africans and being bottled and packaged in South Africa, is being shipped off to Europe, while Africa waits? That hardly seems fair. https://archive.is/KHWQB

Other than the Taliban and their supporters, I really don't think you can call anyone a "winner" in this. Even as some people were seeing some measure of autonomy during the occupation, there was still a whole lot of suffering in the midst of it.