shapeshifter

I have elderly family members near there who cannot or will not evacuate and have been selfishly relieved to see the storm tracking to the west now so that there will at least not be a direct hit on the Miami-to-Ft. Lauderdale areas (at https://www.accuweather.com/en/hurricane/tracker for Location enter the city and state and click Plot, for "Select a basin" choose Atlantic, and then for Storm select Irma).

But wouldn't those character developments be in keeping with what has come before? As a bit of a wedding cynic myself (no wonder my three adult daughters are single) I might be more amused by bridezillas Sheldon and Amy than I have been by a lot of the other bits on this show in recent years.

Only slightly less superficial: I finally realized why Jennifer Finnegan doesn't look pregnant to me in her role as Grace; her face doesn't have that chubby quality that many of us get when pg, even those of us who never gained any extra weight. Part of it is just Finnegan's bone structure, but kudos also to the makeup artist for knowing to create subtle cheekbone shadows to avoid the appearance of pregnancy in her face, and also for perhaps toning down the equally common pg "glow."

All of this—fortunately—is moot in today's world of GoFundMe.com options for desperate families facing life and death health care cost decisions. I think there may have been a mention of this in a recent episode—perhaps on SVU.

So now I know that when a character sacrifices frequent flyer miles to save the world, that means the character isn't long for this world because frequent flier miles are universally understood and freighted with symbolic meaning. Maybe TPTB have finally accepted that Billy Burke is the real star of the show? IMO, one of the best decisions for this show was having the more or less offscreen IDAGF as a place to confine annoying and somewhat useless actors who play significant others to main characters. But too bad Saul Tigh is relegated to just babysitting them.

The good: Palace intrigue The bad: Fun in the park The ridiculous: Everything else

I haven't noticed that, but lately there seems to be too little of either one in American discourse except when there is an apocalyptic disaster.

Pockets? I like the episode title's double entendre, but I can't recall—did Grace have a coup of sorts?

Yeah, I guess we're supposed to surmise that Harris's son has brainwashed her into believing that her much loved mom is now just a tool of the evil state, but it sure gave me character development whiplash. *Sob* Oh how I miss Brain Dead. Life imitating art and all that. *Sigh* Anyway, if they would just do the politics on this show a tiny bit worse, it could be wonderfully campy. And Brain Dead is a perfect example of how to keep a far fetched scifi element simple so the suspension of disbelief doesn't become a chore on par with studying for a physics exam.

Heh. But I suspect a lot of writers have just never cleaned toilets and don't realize that they are missing out on great potential for interpersonal relationship exposition. For instance, I still recall having just cleaned the toilet when my drunk ex came home and vomitted in and all over it.

In other words: Even though there's a slim-to-none chance of TPTB firing Leoni and/or selling the show to Marvel with Henry as a superhero, those speculations are just as likely as anything TPTB might really do. Or something like that. </I'm-not-a-writer> Right, @Netfoot?

This reminds me of the debates about whether plots on the 70s sitcom Barney Miller were serving a public good in drawing attention to the issues presented or if they were endorsing the status quo. For example, the Barney Miller episode in which a wife accused her husband of rape had Barney pointing out that the law at the time would not permit the cops to charge her husband with rape—I wonder if the sitcom is an inherently ineffective medium to have such issues taken seriously, or if it sometimes succeeds in reaching narrow minded viewers with an almost subliminal message.

And so it is. I wonder if the writers/creators were thinking of this consciously or subconsciously.

I enjoy the mutually unrequited sexual feelings between the main characters. It's sort of like a Jane Austen novel except instead of the end game being marriage, it's how to avoid marriage—I guess.

Excellent point! Did this concept description originate with you, @Driad? End of Service Life. Like a refrigerator, when they are ready to bring out the new model, the company stops supporting the old one. Ah. My guess was End of Series Life. I think this show will get at least one more season after the one that's about to start.

Barely. Or should I say for about 3 seconds? Both of these ^^ points, plus: Isn't Darius Tanz too big of a hi-tech superstar to be jettisoned over a little opaque bookkeeping? I mean, doesn't his brand count for a lot?

There were three other moments that made me chuckle, but I couldn't stay awake through the first viewing, so I'm not about to rewatch to note them.

If the entire populace is presumably so zoned in on TMZ that none have noticed the asteroid, do they really deserve to be alarmed?

"Unusual proposal?" Probably nothing as charming as the cigar band ring from The Unsinkable Molly Brown.

Silly and soapy. Shouldn't Grace's last words have been "God help us" instead of just echoing the swearing in with "so help us God"? I mean, it would have been funny. Sorry, I like a little levity with my doomsday.

Here in CT it's 9pm, but I still rarely stay awake through an entire episode of anything at that time. I may have to record it or watch it online later. Even 3am is better than 9pm for me. Plus, I really don't like soap operas. Sigh. What have they done to my show?

[Me plaintively whining]: Whyyyy?

No wonder MF can play a believeable version of Gød. Thanks for posting this, @CooperTV.

I really appreciated the way Steve Harvey reassured her in a joking way that no answer was her best answer. I wonder if she liked what he said too or not. Evidentally it did happen on the regular Family Feud, because an episode I saw recently referred to it having happened with that same family member in the previous round of Fast Money. Sorry I don't recall the name of the family or the air date.

Or maybe recast the family? Like the two Darren's on Bewitched?