gesundheit

Just finished last night. I quite preferred this season to Season 2, but I really hope we never see Lizzy again. (Also, seriously? She was going to go diving after a bunch of tiny individual diamonds?) I wonder if there'll be another season. This one could definitely serve as a series finale (though I'd be delighted to see it back!).

And truly, there's no reason at all he couldn't go to college locally and still live at his parents' house. Or still do the job and take night classes part-time! This was a bad way to keep the actor.

So much co-signing. They were better about this with Kat/Adena -- Kat was actually nervous and needed some... shall we say, sexual guidance when they first got together! And yes, Alex is adorable. I don't understand why they can't give him anything to do.

I love this version of NYC where literally everyone has a private entrance from outdoors to their home. All that door-knocking for the campaign only cemented the hilarity. I'm glad Kat thought better of posting the video. Patrick was right, even though he was excited about it. All that would've happened is the racist lady would've become another "Becky" internet meme and Kat would've been forgotten. Echoing everyone else's sentiments about Jane interviewing roommates at her job (as well as Kat conducting campaign meetings there), but on top of the general absurdity of that being permitted, potential roommates want to see the apartment. Pinstripe's whole deal made little sense. He wanted Jane to ask him to move in, which meant he would've had to break his lease and move homes in like the 2 days before he was leaving for 8 weeks? (I realize I'm too hung up on the realities of timing and money and moving and this is TV, but I can't help it!)\ That building they work in makes me want to live in Toronto, it's insane in its opulence. If only I liked winter.

I've noticed if you @ her in a tweet she usually at least gives it a "like," so at least you know if you're throwing love her way, she's receiving it!

I forgot to mention how great the running gag was with Justine constantly mentioning how all her friends "live in Manhattan" and "work in fashion." Poor Justine. Always trying and failing to sound cool.

Lauren Ash was so freaking good in that moment. So was Nico Santos -- that expression on his face in the back of the car. Cripey, I'm getting misty-eyed at work just remembering it. And Mateo's my favorite character so it was particularly gut-wrenching. Really well done. They do tend to end seasons by getting very serious, but I did not anticipate this serious. On the upside: return of the service goat! It'll never get old. Now I'm going to go cry in the ladies' room for a minute.... Also, Santos talked about his own relationship with the episode: https://ew.com/tv/2019/05/16/nico-santos-blog-superstore-season-5-finale-mateo/

Really? He immediately started laughing. He hammed it up like that the whole game. We even had a talking head of him pretty convinced that it was a worthless "idol" before that tribal council, but he was going to have fun with the theater of it. I'd be shocked if he were serious in that moment, especially since the jury licked the whole thing up just as anyone in his position would wish!

Not to mention, when Devens had the mini-tantrum about that (making him look bad in front of his kids, etc) at TC, he was faking it. He didn't actually think it was unfair, he was putting on a show.

The 30-minute reunion show has been standard for a few seasons now. I'm not a fan of it, but at least it means fewer lengthy promos of new CBS game shows. A lot of the women really do look much better on the island. For instance I thought Game-Victoria was very pretty, Jury-Victoria was hot as hell, and Reunion-Victoria was.... fine. I do think a big distinction, though, it that for the reunions they have pros doing their makeup and hair and is probably not a fair representation of how they normally look. (Gavin is an example of a man I thought looked way better during the game.) I don't think I understand why people are angry about the Sia award. Since they obviously cut the budget for the Fan Favorite Award and they have a celebrity just handing a player $100K that's at zero expense to production, why the hell wouldn't they include that in the reunion show? They'd be idiots not to include it!

Yep, I thought Eric and Chris were the same guy. And yep, next season looks awful. Silly concept, and Rob (who is terrible) and Sandra (who is fine but I don't need to see on a high horse either) and Survivor Mount Rushmore? Yikes. Probably a wildly unpopular opinion, but I have no problem with the general idea of seasons where players get a second chance after being voted out. However, I think it should be cut off at the halfway point or the merge (sorry, it's not okay that Chris spend a month bonding with these people and didn't have to manage any of their feelings of betrayal -- I think literally the only jury member he helped vote out was Reem), and I don't think the players should ever know about it. It was cool when they all came back to compete for the return the first time, everyone was shocked. Nobody who'd left the game knew what was coming. But after that, every single evictee knew they had a chance to return. Not a fan of that. Anyway, based on the reality of who the final 3 were and the horrible FTC arguments Gavin and Julie made for themselves, I'm not shocked. But even if Gavin and Julie had given great arguments, I think the result would have been the same because of all the points above.

Also, who the heck wears an outfit like Jane's to her first day at her grown-up job? Sure, they clearly have a very casual workplace, but you don't put on garbage like that for your first impression.

But she's Jane! She's nothing if not special and entitled. Clearly she can spend hours not reporting to anyone and trying on dresses.

Well, she certainly should have won an Oscar, but alas. That was a fun finale. Shannon's forgotten already!

Yeah, that barely jogs my memory. Must've been one of those episodes I had on in the background while getting dressed or doing dishes or something. Guess it's time for a rewatch!

I certainly hope they can still incorporate Sandra into the show next season somehow even after her firing. (I'm sure they can -- pretty much everyone has made a fire-able offense and they stick around or come back.) Kinda knew it would make her a folk hero, and we know how she's jumped on rumors as truth before to make herself sound cool!

I was so excited to see the service goat return! Hilarious. One time I was leaving a restaurant in Penn Station and the hostess was like, "I just saw a service goat, look!" and I ran after it because I just had to see it. But once I got close up, it was just a goat-sized white service dog with a completely insane haircut. (I never went back to tell the hostess the reality, I wanted her to have a fun story to take home!)

Can someone remind me of the Rob Miller case? I know I saw it but I'm blanking on details. This was okay. There was an actual mystery to be solved, complete with twists. I did think they went overboard by basically making the victim actually anti-semitic instead of just opposed to Israeli policy, they sure seemed to be taking a side on Ilhan Omar with that. Yikes. Meow Mix 2.0. Ha. First of all, I wish! Meow Mix was great! But it cracked me up that they went into the bar and had the ominous closeup on the women's embrace and then had Carisi and Finn all "oooooo lesbians" like it was 1991 or something. (Same with the idea that a Muslim councilwoman could hang out in there and it'd be their little secret. Gay bars aren't private places behind unmarked doors anymore, SVU writers room! Anyone can go there! Good grief. That shit would be all over Twitter and Instagram.) That poor defense attorney having to actually give a "he didn't rape her!" closing argument after his ridiculous outburst on the stand about how he should have killed her.

I agree with this 100% in terms of real life, but the writers are choosing what to show us here. The contrast between Raf's lashing out and Michael's "I just want you to be happy" is stark. If we saw more of Rafael's vulnerability (not in front of Jane, but just on the show) and less of the anger and disgust, it would be helpful. The total dismissal of Michael's former relationship with and love for Mateo is also irritating to me. I just don't know what the point of this was. I've often been grumpy with this show but held on because the writers tend to pull it off in the end and impress me, but this has just been a full season of frustration. In this storyline. If Jane could just be Single Jane for a while and participate in other characters' stories I'd be okay, but the previews suggest quite otherwise. And as for Brogelio, I just... Rogelio's child is named after Michael and they still didn't get a five-second reunion scene? Come on.

My guess is they'll spin it with some "he'll always love her, of course! Just like she'll always love him! They're just not in love anymore!" business.

My question is: why was Rafael so broken up about Michael being alive and feeling obliged to bring him back if Jane being torn about it makes her a terrible person? I don't blame him for having trouble accepting that he's all of a sudden the one true love of her life/destiny (because frankly that's absurd -- she can have two loves of her life). But the fact that he's been so mean about her having to deal with residual Michael feelings when that's precisely what he anticipated (in fact, I'm pretty sure he anticipated worse) is a bit much. I miss Zen Rafael. Also, Hybrid Michael is pretty lazy storytelling. He has all of his education and life lessons and memories that formed his personality. Yet somehow his 4 years in Montana have given him a full personality transplant (and accent to boot!). Sure, that time would influence him, but once his amnesia was over he'd be more Michael than Jason. And he'd sure as hell want to spend time with Rogelio.

Good lord. Everything this season with Michael/Jane/Rafael has been completely pointless. That was ridiculous. Thank goodness there are other characters I care about.

Yep. I love Jacqueline but she is Jane's biggest and worst enabler. It gets old.

Seriously, she is in her mid-20s, she should know better. I get it if some 62-year-old employee might screw up like that, but Jane grew up in "but her emails!" culture.

I thought we heard something where he just identified as "queer," which could mean many things. Frankly I thought Sutton's shock and hurt at someone implying that she's in a "phase" was hilarious. Girl's only wanted to be a designer for like 3 weeks. I love her, but come on now. This is her third big career plan shift in a year. Kat, Kat, Kat. I know the reverse situation happened to you and it turned out differently, but if someone tells you they're straight, don't push it. Yes, Tia was flirting, but straight women tell other straight women they're hot all the time. Oh poor Jane, completely missing a work meeting and not getting first dibs on stories! Her sense of entitlement is insane.