Vee

From the ongoing Showtime TCA press event:

Danai Guirira will play Afeni Shakur. Apologies if this was posted, but it also mentions her play Eclipsed is going to Broadway with Lupita Nyong'o.

In unrelated fun, Mädchen Amick, new co-star Amanda Seyfried and Amick's daughter Mina Tobias are out on the town:

I doubt very much she is playing Diane, as that is a recurring fan theory. But if it was to be anyone it might as well be her, she is an old, old associate of Lynch. Lynch loves Dern and uses her anywhere and everywhere so I expected her to turn up, plus Dern was hinting about being involved in "a big project" with him in 2014, just prior to the TP announcement. Inland Empire is a long, impenetrable watch but she is spellbinding in it and Wild at Heart. And her Sandy is really the proto-Donna Hayward in Blue Velvet. (I've already seen people speculate she is Donna #3...)

I knew it.

Finally. Hopefully signed and sealed for good. Fenn herself has tweeted it so it's likely done and done.

Tangential, but: Here's Matt Smith as the unmistakable Prince Philip, consort of Queen Elizabeth in this new sizzle reel for Netflix's upcoming The Crown.

THR dishes on AMC vs. Frank Darabont in Season 2, with an unsealed deposition. While I think Frank Darabont's a very talented writer and filmmaker I think the show has advanced leaps and bounds since his tenure and his run looks dated by comparison. That being said, he set the tone from the pilot, the show was/is a blockbuster, and AMC has always been very cheap and reluctant to compete with prestige cable budgets while still wanting the premium cable prestige. Tellingly, Glen Mazzara chimes in and seems to blame Kirkman, which I recall being a rumored issue. I think Scott Gimple is the one who has learned how to deal with the excitable gorilla that is Kirkman without turning the show into pure fan service schlock. In the hands of two other showrunners Michonne (a ridiculous character in the comic, IMO, and one of many others, like Morgan) would have been a joke. Abraham almost was.

Page Six claims Camille is ready to blow.

The great Xander Berkeley joins the show in what sounds like a typical role for him.

Feel free to nominate any of these losers.

The ratings were a bit lower (likely because of a poor timeslot opposite other major programming), but pretty steady. Peter Capaldi is signed for the next series, so I'm not concerned about him. I don't think it was as good as Series 8 which I thought was excellent, and I think the two-parter experiment had highlights and lesser lights but it was pretty solid overall with a great finish. I also think Maisie Williams was excellent in her latter appearances.

I haven't seen it yet but I did love the Series 9 finale. It was a reasonably solid enough year albeit weirdly structured, but I loved the desperate sort of ending on Gallifrey.

I don't pretend your thoughts are completely alone in the world, but they also sure aren't Reagan's "Silent Majority." You think it's some crusade where when the 'truth' is known everyone will turn on GOT and stop watching; in reality, no one cares. It's still the biggest show on TV. Controversy happens and there's still a lot worth talking about otherwise. People like or dislike a TV show - fine. I have a number of complaints about Season 5 but I don't think it was some horrible televisual abortion. It's just not that serious to me. I'm invested in the show I like with its ups and downs, I don't have a blanket condemnation of it and i see nuances you don't. You take that to mean everyone but you is rubberstamping it or that they're all idiots and uncritical zombies sucking at HBO's teat. And you did that from the beginning. So why should I bother with you or anything you have to say? Also, let's be clear: His "little deal with HBO" was to let them adapt his books into a TV show. It happens everyday. You don't like the TV show, that's your business. Don't try to make it about some highminded artistic issue where his books are fatefully compromised by that choice. You still have the books if you choose to enjoy them. It's not a conspiracy and it's not a war crime.

And that's just because you're a judgemental jerk who could not care less bout the integrity of the books/writing and simply want certain "things" out of the show like the countless others. I care plenty about integrity, I just like a TV show you hate. There's a vast and profound difference and it's not that serious. As for what "things" I want out of the show, feel free to clue me in because I honestly have no idea what they are. Your problem is you equate your opinion with an absolute kind of integrity, intellect and artistic appreciation superior to the rest of the audience's. And it's not just me, it's just about everyone who seriously disagrees with you who you've casually dismissed as idiots. At least when I do that on this forum I don't pretend it's all about my social or artistic conscience. Since you've been here you've been calling Martin a Hollywood whore for giving the story to HBO and "selling out" and you clearly had no real interest in the series as adapted. That's your problem, it's no one else's. I read as much as you do and I'm as sensitive to the issues of adaptation as you are, I simply don't feel GOT to be as blanket objectionable as you have for years, and I don't vilify or burn the author or the showrunners at the stake because I'm overly invested in something that's just a bunch of fuckin' books and a silly TV show. The vituperative abuse you heap on these people is hilariously over the top and it killed any possibility of my taking you seriously from moment one. Word of advice: Get over the idea that you're a truth-teller or a martyr. You're just one of thousands of geeks on the Internet reading a book and watching a television show. Your anger is not unique or different to many of them. You and this are not that important - stop acting like it's a deep offense to mankind if someone likes something you don't. If you don't like it and you can't stand that other people do, move on with your life. Nothing will ever change except you. The problem is, I think you're genuinely convinced that if you keep spewing abuse at these people that they'll actually bow to your will as though it's some civilized debate. It won't. Let it go, Indiana.

Lots of people have their issues with the show, and Season 5 in particular had its flaws. Those other people just don't condemn everything about it with the most extreme hyperbole reserved for every single person involved when even a jot is different, starting with the old man who's writing these massive books and trying to outrun the pace of a TV production. You called him an industry whore two years ago and I lost interest in you, not it.

We'll miss you!

I don't think that's really going to work. It's been a solid year of this. There are always pockets of nuts but at this point almost everything I see online is blanket condemnation.

Camille Cosby will be deposed. Happy New Year!