rab01

I hated the Morgan/Rick conversation but I don't see where Rick's supposed "hypocrisy" is coming from. Rick already acknowledged that he thought he was wrong to banish Carol when he said that the rest of them needed to join her not vice versa several seasons ago. Now, I don't really agree with Carol having been right -- she made a hard call in the prison but it was also pretty clearly the wrong call. As a plot matter, she guessed wrong because she didn't prevent the disease from spreading. As a practical matter, she was wrong because the prison had space enough to run a quarantine. As a moral matter, she was wrong to assign herself the role of judge, jury and executioner when they had a government. But ... To Rick, the character as he's been portrayed since being locked up at Terminus? Of course he now agrees with the decision and it's one he thinks he might make now. Of course, he's changed -- what else have we been watching for the past two years? Would he do actually it? Nope, he's the guy who jumped over the wall to save the idiot Spencer. But he thinks he would.

That was one of Ezekiel's crew that Morgan saved from Rick at the farm last night, right?

The lack of toothpaste was a plot point in the episode where they met Jesus - it was Michonne's specific request for Rick on the supply run.

I'd hate the selfishness of Daryl and Carol leaving like this if it wasn't so obviously a contrived piece of bullshit to get the chess pieces to the right squares on the board. I noticed two things towards the end -- (1) After she was captured, Michonne was twisting her shoulders around like she was cutting the cords behind her back. Maybe, she's how they get out of it next episode. (2) The after the fade out line from Dwight (you'll be all right) was nice and villainy but I wonder did they really do it because of all the shit they got over the Glenn fake-out? I think they wanted to forestall the same torrent of criticism this time.

100% agree with this. Eugene KNOWS (whether he's right or not) that he's no woman's first choice. He's decided that he's going to change those things about himself and change his chances. He doesn't think that he's in Rosita's league but wants to be. And, will not announce his interest until he feels he's changed or circumstances trip him up into admitting it. How many fighters is the only guy who figured out how to make ammunition worth? But he's not just doing it for Rosita, he's doing it because of Abraham too. He loves Abe in kind of the same way Daryl loved Merle. He's also sick to death of being the helpless little brother in that relationship. Abe is such an alpha-type asshole that it's wearing away at Eugene's beta instincts and showing him that he doesn't want to defer to Abe forever.

At least Hunter won't have to take anymore bullshit from May. The mission was to get Ward. She wanted him to blow the mission because her ex was being threatened and now she spends three episodes complaining about Hunter feeling the same way? If they had to lose a couple, too bad they couldn't dump Daisy and Lincoln.

Unfortunately, the writers don't care a ton about which mouths they use for the opposing sides of these set-speeches. They want to air both sides of their fake philosophical argument and pick two characters at random - they just forgot which should be which this time. I kind of liked Lincoln when he was the bland exposition deliverer with a vague Obi-Wan role. Having him follow Daisy's orders, rather than vice-versa, eliminates that role and makes him just an agreeable underling -- in other words, no tension. They need to give him independent goals or else the actor has nothing to work with. That said, it's actually logical for him and Daisy to hook up so I'm glad the show is going there quickly -- they are both pretty, have similar backgrounds, similar mild personalities ... they make a perfect (and perfectly boring) couple. Heh, I may not be nice but, in the season finale, one of them should die to give the other some tragedy and anger to fuel the next season.

Daisy was a problem with the show when she was Sky and she's still a problem now. It was fine when Kyle McLachlan was around because he was providing enough energy to fill three TV shows so putting an energy suck like Daisy in the same scene provided him a nice blank canvas. Now that she is back to interacting with people playing scenes at a normal decibel level, her inability to go beyond a teenage pout is again a problem. The actress is cute and maybe she can do good work in another setting but I'm hoping they just sideline her more.

Tres' family needs to get their shit together before they damage his reputation as much as Ashley's was. Of course, it's not too much of an ask to not have sex for 6 weeks. Anyone who is married with kids knows that there are some much longer stretches than that in a marriage. But, if your partner isn't willing to experiment with being physical midway through the "experiment" you shouldn't be staying together at the end. There's a difference between going on a few dates over 6 weeks and living together (or sort of living together) for those 6 weeks. In the latter context, most people can decide whether they want to try a sexual relationship within a a week or two (and then add an extra week for the presences of cameras). If you can't figure it out that quickly, don't go on a show called "Married at First sight." Also don't go such a show if you're an introvert or want to pretend to be one.

This is the first time I've ever watched this show and it will also be the last but ... I could not turn away for a moment while watching it. It was seriously compelling. Sean's diction and vocabulary sounded highly functioning but his self-awareness and sense of responsibility seemed child-like so I think mentally disturbed more than mentally delayed. And, obviously, anyone who overeats to the point of becoming bed-ridden has serious mental issues. I feel a bit of sympathy for the mom. Yes, all us parents are responsible to some degree for what happens to our kids but we can't control all of it. Maybe she could have found a way to prevent Sean from spiraling down so far but we have no idea how they got to this place. By the time we see them, she's been dealing with him on bed rest for over 6 years and is at the end of her rope. I don't think there was much left of her. The diet was actually the strangest part of the episode. I liked the doctor except for his pretended insistence on an 800-calorie diet. At 1,000 (or "even" 700) pounds, wouldn't Sean lose weight rapidly on a 5,000 calorie diet? Also, given his size, eating some apple slices aren't really going to hurt him, eating a couple of bags of apple slices would be the problem. Apples' glycemic index is very similar to carrots actually. Speaking from personal experience, I dieted a year ago and lost a bunch of weight (from obese to normal on the BMI scale) while eating a couple apples a day. Yeesh, now to get some brain bleach to get the visuals of Sean out of my head.

Being "married" isn't really what makes it more important. What makes it more important is that it's televised so you're announcing it to the world and random reruns may come around to remind you that you slept with someone who then dumped you on TV. In that TV world, no one should sleep with someone until they are happy with it being public knowledge and how long to wait depends on the person. For the 20-year-olds on an MTV show, maybe its 20 minutes but for someone on a 6-week marriage show, I'd guess the average person would think it's around 3 weeks.

Wait, what?!? ROFL And wow were the potential women on this show starved for choices if THOSE were the best male candidates.

I don't think that Tres is the worst human on Earth even after reading the interview. Yeah there's stuff to criticize about how he handled it but ... *shrug* no one is perfect and I don't think any of us know for sure how we'd act when we knew we were being filmed for this lunacy. That said, her interview made it clear that the experiment failing and her looking clingy was all his *fault*, not hers. (Also, I really hate that he reinforced the stereotype that there are a bunch of guys out there who are only interested until they get it wet and then are out.) Look, if he's not feeling it, he's not feeling it and nothing she could have done (other than be someone else entirely or have him age a decade overnight) could have helped. I just wish that the TV program had shown us that dynamic and had trusted to show some painful discussions on air with experts who were ready to prod at the relationship. That footage might have been more entertaining than what we got and it certainly would have been more thoughtful. As for Sam on twitter, she's not good at it. She clearly doesn't know how to craft her responses to put herself in a good light and is responding to too many people but ... anyone who goes o this show wants to become famous, at least a little bit. If that's part of what she still wants, I don't expect her to abandon twitter. For her sake, I wish she got a trusted confidant to approve/disapprove everything she posted for a few months. I do believe her that seeing how she acted on TV appalled her and inspired her to try to change. Whether it works or not won't be Neil's problem. As for Dave and Ashley, feh. They never had a chance so what's left to discuss? The season 2 girls siding with someone else who got a "bad edit"? C'mon, of course they feel sympathy and solidarity with her. They aren't in the house with Dave and Ashley but know what happened to themselves on TV so it's human nature to side with a girl who looks like she's getting the same treatment. I can't say I cared for the Ashley character that appeared on screen (and don't believe that the real person is an introvert) but I bear her no ill-will in real life and would have, in theory, no problem with her being my nurse.

I tried to watch TD but it seemed like every time I turned back to the show Hardwick threw the question to the guy y'all tell me is JB Smoove and he would start a long unfunny sexist joke. (I assume he's playing a sexist character to make fun of that type of person but it's still not funny. If, however, any of that is close to how he actually thinks, yuck.) Could Alanna's better performance this time just be down to being more secure in her position on the show so she doesn't have to be so "try hard"? Also, I think that Tara and Heath are going on a separate mission so that the show had an excuse to not air footage of her if the pregnancy got too big to ignore. (In other words, I don't think that her presence on the couch is a sign that her character died (will die?) for production reasons.)

Nashville - thanks for the shout out and yes, I meant those as two completely separate benefits of families. Sure, unmarried people are perfectly fine raising kids but when there is a huge chance that at least one parent will die within a few years of birth, it is helpful to have some institution like marriage to formalize the insertion of another parent as the new parent (whether mom or dad). "My mom's friend" is not as stable as "my dad" or "my step-dad." Think about the feeling of this week's episode when Jesus said that he was waiting for "your mom and dad" to Carl and now take it another step further -- I would love to see that bond/relationship solemnized in some way at a future date (yeah, call me a romantic but if Michonne has decided that Rick is good enough for her, I want to see a ZA wedding.) As for the maintenance and transfer of property -- even if the society has paramount claim over critical items, individuals still need to own some of their own stuff or assholes like Hilltop's leader start acting like they own it all. The best way society has yet figured out to preserve and pass that property to the next generation is the family unit. Diebartdie -- Of course women aren't chattel and lord I'd hope that a ZA wouldn't resurrect that disgusting aspect of prior societies. That said, in the Walking Dead-verse there are a lot of hints that women are being treated exactly that way by some of the groups. Not everyone is going to be a Michonne or a Carol. (Hell, no one is -- those two are essentially super heroes plopped into a Zombie movie). Some men and some women will survive but won't be much good at fighting. Families are often one of the structures that protect the physically weaker. (Yes, they can also be havens for secret abuse but that's sadly true for lots of human institutions.) So, yes, on balance I'd think that families would mitigate some of those darker human impulses. I guess the way I see it is that a ZA would be so devastating that when people pick up the pieces they will fall back on things that worked in the past (even if they didn't work all that well). Families might be changed radically by the ZA but think that families will still exist and that people will try to recreate familiar patterns if they can. Also, diebartdie -- I'm really not sure how you could read support for monogamy into a post about the theoretical benefits of line marriage ;)

LynnM is right. The record does show pleading guilty to disorderly conduct. I don't see any way in the Arizona statute that disorderly conduct can be less than a misdemeanor so, if this was New York, that would qualify as a "crime." Kind of wild that speaking too loudly or using profanity can get you arrested for a misdemeanor (2-"Makes unreasonable noise", 4-"Uses abusive or offensive language or gestures to any person") but that's what the statute says. Maybe an Arizona lawyer knows some way that this record could be squared with him not committing a crime.

Yeah, I wish I could figure out how Peggy actually felt about either one of them or why she would be interested in either one. (I'm not knocking them; it's just that Jarvis was more ... specific ... than she ever was.) I also don't really like how Daniel so quickly got into engagement territory with Violet and so quickly fell out of it. To be honest, Violet might be better for Daniel than a marriage with Peggy. You love who you love but I suspect that marriage to Peggy would leave Daniel feeling inferior often, while marriage to Violet would more often remind him of his good qualities. (This isn't a criticism of Peggy. It's just that they work in the same field, she is better at it than he is, and he's shown himself to have something of an inferiority complex as a result of his injury.)

I'm NOT saying that David definitely did NOT spend time in jail or definitely did NOT plead guilty to a crime. I'm just saying that what we've seen fits the alternate version of events. (That said, given that his sister appeared to deny his arrest earlier, I won't give automatic credence to stuff said by his family because they may not have known all the facts themselves.) Also, I would say that the rumors of Ashley having just left a 9-year relationship 6 months before they started filming doesn't fit the blog post that was posted up-thread unless some of its dates were misprints. Every human being leaves a computer trail behind them but those trails rarely match up with their reality. It just shows the odd intersection of person with virtual world. We can speculate all we want about what those things mean (that's the purpose of this thread after all) but we shouldn't call any of that speculation "fact" and then make further speculation from it without remembering that the first piece of fact was itself speculation.

A plea deal isn't always a guilty plea. You might be right and he might have pled guilty to a crime but he also might have agreed to a resolution where he completed the two-hour course and made restitution (for the broken phone? if so, was it his brother's or his girlfriend's?) and upon completion, he was recorded as not guilty of any crime. Alternatively, in New York, you can plead down from a crime (felony or misdemeanor) to a violation, which is definitely not a crime (think jaywalking or carrying an open container of alcohol or being too loud or disorderly conduct).

Oh, now I get it. Yeah, those court records don't mean that he was held in jail at all. That kind of arrest can easily allow for the person to be released from the station with an appearance ticket. (Disclaimer, I'm a lawyer but I don't really do criminal work and never in Arizona.) That's not to say that he wasn't jailed. I have no clue yes or no on it but nothing I've seen in what's been stated, leaked, or available on-line suggests that he served any jail time. ETA - as for the "amended" part, he might have had restrictions lifted in the "amended release order." For example, it's common to forbid people from leaving the state but that might have been lifted the next week. (If David is telling the truth about the fight having involved his brother and telling the truth that they didn't press charges, it wouldn't be surprising for some restrictions to be lifted within a week.)

Where was it reported that he spent three days in jail? That would make his statement in the interview misleading at the least ("While I was angry, I never hit anyone. I was cited for disorderly conduct, and I ended up attending one two-hour class. Neither my girlfriend nor my brother ever filed charges, and I was never convicted of any crime.") and I don't remember it showing up in the online records. Are there more details than were in the recent confirmation?

According to various law review articles, it dates back to and before the 19th century, that it's derived from Spanish Civil law and was enshrined in California's 1849 State Constitution.

I don't think that was because of any genius tactic by David; it's because, once people have chosen sides, nothing will make them change ;) As for whether he's telling the whole truth? *shrug* I've got nothing with which to judge it so I got nothing. It certainly fits the court records as well as anything else (but then he'd also have to be some kind of stupid to tell a story that didn't fit those records). I strongly doubt that anyone will ever come forward with a story that contradicts any element of David's explanation. I'm sure his brother cleared him to say it (whether because it's true or because David is his brother - take your pick). ETA - I guess a police report might add some extra bad details but I still doubt it contradicts the story. By the way, I'd guess that David smashed the phone by trying to throw it directly at someone and they ducked. Still not a hanging offense in my book but ymmv.

Cal went along with the Council's orders to shut down Isodyne's dark matter research but that doesn't mean he's Isodyne's sole owner. For all we know, Whitney might have owned title to it. In any event, since California is a community property state, Whitney co-owns it as Cal's wife. Whitney is also the genius behind it's creation and commercialization. She's allowed to remove her property from Isodyne's facility. Wilkes isn't legally allowed to remove dark matter from the facility, nor is Peggy Carter. Carter and Wilkes were thieves; Whitney wasn't. I was rooting for them of course but, yes, what they were doing was illegal. Whitney didn't intend to release the dark matter from its containment, that was a regrettable result of what Peggy started. I think Peggy was a little hard on herself when she thought Wilkes was dead but it wasn't a completely wrong view of the situation. Julia - I agree with you in general and about all the other people Whitney hurt or killed. I'm just not sure that Whitney would be held legally liable for Wilkes' death even if he had died.

Agree with everything in your post except ... is she really responsible for WIlkes' death? He was stealing her dark matter. (It really was hers in every sense of the word.) So, is she supposed to let him walk out the door of her factory with it?