Amarsir

Just found this when the non-renewal hit the news. I was a huge fan of eco-challenge and getting even one more season was a gift I didn't think we'd get. I really like that none of the drama seemed fake. IIRC way back in the day there was a temptation to have the race seem closer than it was or act like a team was lost at sea when all that happened was the camera lost sight of them. And I was briefly afraid they were doing that with NZ right at the end, only to learn it was a legitimate mechanical failure. Goes to show that actual competition provides better stories than anything they can manufacture.

I don't know if the people have a crossover. That would be interesting to find out. But the techniques certainly do. If you look up the term "mechanics grip" it is described in equal terms as a magicians' trick or a cheater's trick.

I think we all know the basic "math magic" that goes something like: Think of a number Add 7 Multiply by 2 Subtract 14 Divide by 2 Is that your original number??? Magic! Clearly you're doing a thing and then undoing it, The trick is in how well obscured the "undoing" is. This was similar and it worked well because most people have never thought about the mechanics of various shuffling methods. It's so effective that something like this has been used for cheating at card games, with the culprits able to do it right in front of people who had no idea.

His was the only one that disappointed me. (Although I agree on Coughlan's demeanor.) It makes me wonder if because he was the first fooler and the first double-fooler that the chance to be a triple was obligatory on both sides. Or maybe he figured a US audience wouldn't be as familiar with that first performance from when this was a UK series? Whatever the reason his trick felt like a rerun. Which is a shame because if not for that, swapping a card from a deck and a page from a book seems like a great idea. Very happy with the rest though, especially Teller's.

I was hoping for more than 3 "how to" bits, but it was nice seeing all the different magicians participating. Their YouTube channel had a similar thing a few weeks ago with The Ambitious Card. That last trick with the Fanning sisters: I imagine there was a cheat sheet off camera that would make this trick a lot harder to do live.

William forces his way into Delos in order to destroy the host replication. He encounters Charlotte and the conversation goes roughly William: I'm going to save the world. Charlotte: That's what Dolores wanted. William: I thought you were Dolores. Charlotte: I was but now I'm a little different. Then a host copy of William comes out. They're ornery at each other and Real William has his throat slit. Pan to the host creation room with all the machines at work. Then there's a silent scene of Bernard covered in dust or soot waking up from some sort of trance.

If I remember correctly, he mentions the murder and then you get the "is arrested" ending.

Alton did a stream chat on YouTube right before the finale. It's kind of weird and not necessarily worth watching. But it does explicitly reinforce what everyone here seems to have picked up on, about only doing it via bargain for Good Eats. "There isn't anything you could do to make me do Worst Cooks again. There's nothing. Don't even think about it." Interestingly, Alton said that in advance of the show he had to submit recipes. He picked ones that were good to learn and practical in the home, and then the producers rejected them for being too easy. So it was at that point he realized the premise is phony and decided to play the villain character. Which obviously didn't work. But it's quite the indictment of where this show went that they had a guy who wants nothing more than to teach about food and managed to sour him on it.

I love the worldbuilding on this show. The plot long-ago passed into overly-convoluted. And the characters, despite interesting elements, are held back by the need for secret motives and hidden personalities. But the city and it's technology are beautiful, and as starkly contrasted from the rest of the real world as Westworld itself was.

I haven’t seen anything official. But from the sound of Marcus on Twitter it seems like this might be the series finale. (I know there’s a with-commentary episode for next week which would be an anti-climax but it doesn’t contradict this being the final business.)

A really good finale. Philosophy, goodbyes, individual endings that felt individual, so many callbacks, and a couple laughs. Jason accidentally becoming a monk is my favorite part today, but I may have a different one tomorrow.

I didn't hate it, but it does disappoint me that they thought what's missing is an exit and not some sense of purpose. Since episode one I've been bothered that people in The Good Place didn't seem to care about other humans - either in The Bad Place or back on Earth. Now demons are designing tests to make humans better, but Good Place people only pursue hedonism? Seems like a miss to me. It is an interesting philosophical perspective though, that mortality is necessary to the human condition. I don't mind that they explored it. It just felt really insufficient.

I didn't like anyone in this. Except the mom. He takes them to TankFarm because I guess getting t-shirts designed without settling on a new logo first makes some kind of sense. Then he says "be honest which ones you don't like". Then Jerry says they misspelled the name and Marcus gets on him for being negative. Then the guy explained it like rebranding but to me it seems like they screwed up and tried to cover. If you want to rebrand and then make a logo that's fine. Maybe discuss that before going to the t-shirt guys though? But I'm not a "branding expert" like Marcus.

This thing is spawning some fantastic reviews. By which I mean the reviews are wonderfully-written about how much they hate this. Some of my favorite quotes: "This movie feels like a prank, but I'm not sure on who." "In full disclosure I'm not a cat person. After watching this ... I'm not sure I'm a movie person anymore either." "Congratulations to dogs."

"Who would you say is your biggest competition at this point?" "Oh everyone is so talented, any one of them could win." "But if you had to name someone, who would you guess?" "I guess ... probably so-and-so." "OK great, but remember we need an answer in the form of a complete sentence. Go again." "I would say so-and-so is my biggest competition at this point."