shapeshifter

It was interesting enough for me to watch more of it, but, for instance, next Sunday night I have to work, and I don't know whether I will bother to watch that particular episode later.

When I was a kid—before the MMR or Chickenpox vaccines were available—Let's Make a Deal was a wonderful distraction when I was home from school with "childhood" illnesses. Thanks, Monty.

I think you got it right except for: The plan was to capture the big bad so he wouldn't become a martyr to rally all the Klingon factions, and so he could be a bargaining chip/hostage. But capturing is much trickier than blowing up, especially when the target is planning on being a martyr. I'm not sure the Big Bad [now dead] Klingon's plan was to be a martyr, or if that was just Michael's assessment. It was a little unclear since Big Bad's prose about the Honor of Death and the Afterlife could have just been a funeral dirge for the dead his ship had stayed behind to retrieve. Since Michael is the star/hero, we could assume her assessment was correct, but it could also have "just" been prescient.

I suppose they might think they are going to first do a trial in a simulated environment, much like real astronauts have and are doing. But now I'm realizing the improbability of finding 160 people who are not only physically, mentally, and otherwise suited for such an existence, but that that each has something unique and important to contribute, and that they are willing to go—willing in the sense that they would want to go even if the world wasn't ending, because otherwise they'd probably get depressed pretty quickly. All this, and they were chosen in a relatively short period of time, and they were chosen by frickin' Jillian, and they weren't volunteers—or, if they were volunteers for such a mission, it seems the fruitcake quotient would be pretty high.

Will cut footage be released in some manner? I haven't seen all of the episodes. Was there no mention of the children of US soldiers and Vietnamese women?

And Aaron's hair! And I'm a sucker for Keifer's soliquies. I don't know if this will make much sense, but for me it's like Stephen Colbert's opening political bit filtered through a mashup of Mr. Rogers and Tom Selleck.

Richard Pyle, AP reporter of Vietnam War and much more, dies

Cute!

Harrison Ford may be showing his age, but his comic timing and physicality were perfection. I seriously LOLed at the ice fishing joke, which made SC's joke seem like a failure in comparison. I wonder if SC planned it that way out of deference for HF.

All valid questions, @Kel Varnsen. I guess I'm going to have to fanwank that Crocket and Tubbs of Miami Vice brought him over on a speed boat, heh.

For a L&O show, it was good enough for me. Finn had a Fish Story for why he was in Cuba in the first place. And then Finn said that he had just happened to recognize the perp (unassailable lie because his kidnapping assistants will never tell). And then finally, it seems he actually did convince the Cuban policia that the guy he had in the van was a Bad Man wanted in the States.

Yes, everytime I've heard the Koch name in the credits I wonder about what his/their influence was.

I was seriously considering bailing on this show, but I was surprised to realize how cathartic it is to watch a president like the one Keifer gets to portray. This show may be my Xanax.

I was going to quote those lines too. I took it to mean the abortion option was quickly covered and dispensed with. But then I forgot that: …which serves to support Bernadette's response. This may be the most tactfully handled social issue on the show to date.

Heh. There was a woman who flirted with him; they went into his office, and something almost happened, and I think maybe the detectives thought it did. And there was at least one other time when sparks were flying. But I recall Barney saying he was a married man. The writers kept his character on a pretty short leash of Virtue.

Wow, there were some Atlanta housewives on tonight, and what a bunch of grumps. I don't watch those shows, but it seemed like they didn't want to be near each other. Nobody shook hands. It was distracting. Steve barely managed to ham it up.

I happened to watch most of tonight's—my first episode since #2. My boyfriend was drafted in the lottery, so coincidentally they were covering the year he was there. I kept thinking I saw him in the background. When I realize how much of this I read about, saw on TV, or saw in Chicago at the time, I have to wonder if I was in some sort of fuge state, or almost a split consciousness. I never thought he was in danger or just shouldn't be there. How did I do that? I just kept sealing the envelopes and putting them out in the mailbox at the end of our driveway 6 days a week, putting the little flag up on the mailbox. In a movie, would the raising of the little mailbox flag symbolize patriotism or surrender? ETA: Oh Gød. Now I'm picturing my teenage self only raising it half way and…

That was my first thought too. And since Melissa Rauch is pregnant IRL, it would be a great fakeout for the audience. Plus: I agree. At this point the actors are so well known that it really could be hillarious. There was some of this on Seinfeld when Julia Louis Dreyfus was pregnant IIRC, big potted plants in incongruous places and whatnot. And also: It could be a great drinking game, or a pass-the-chocolates game. Anyway, since they're most likely not going with the false pregnancy test, another baby does give Stuart and Raj more to do. But they did focus a lot on that pregnancy test stick, which gives me a little Chekhovian hope.

When I heard Chance the Rapper was on, I stayed up to watch because of his financial support of Chicago Public Schools. Who knew a rapper could be such a sweetheart or that rap music could be so moving.

I wrote and mailed a letter every day, which were delivered in packets only once a week. The boxes full of weekly letters I received back were destroyed in the mid 80s, about the same time the writer committed suicide. Unintended symbolism. I've still only watched the first 2 episodes. This wouldn't be the first time I've failed to watch a show that was released in rapid succession or binge style.

My daughter had to replace hers about 8 years ago, and we first had to replace her birth certificate to get the social security card. I don't know how she managed to lose it all and not get her identity stolen. If you don't mind sharing, what state were you in, @Haleth? We were in Illinois.

My father didn't find out that what he thought was his first name was actually his middle name until he enlisted in the Army, but then he was born in 1923, so that's more understandable. I don't have a problem with knowing the moment, since I know when all of mine happened; it can depend upon what sort of birth control you use, how easily you conceive, etc. I have bigger issues with the Only On TV trope of the mother not knowing who the father is because she doesn't know the exact moment of conception.

Do you mind sharing in what town or city this was?

There was one head on shot of Abigail in this episode where I thought they were trying to make her look leonine. She either has superhuman healing capabilities, or the writers don't think it's necessary to show effects of gunshots. Didn't we find out earlier this season that she's a hybrid too?

I heard part of an interview on NPR with Ken Burns and Lynn Novick this week. She was recounting how she was at (IIRC) a viewing of their last project, and when asked what was next, she said "Vietnam," whereupon a woman came forward and said she had those tapes. Novick expressed how grateful she was for that serendipitous happenstance. If you can still locate any of your tapes, @meep.meep, they too should be digitized and preserved so that someday (whenever you and your family decide) they too may serve to, in some small way, prevent this history from continuing to repeat itself. I felt they gave an intimate immediacy that was heroic without the vain glory of accounts altered by memory and years.