Black Knight

You may have been in a jurisdiction where the State's Attorney has an internal policy of getting a victim's agreement, or they wanted you to feel like you had all the power in the situation, since that usually makes people more amenable than if they're told they can be disregarded. But while most (but not all) states generally provide for a victim to be consulted by the prosecutor about a negotiated plea deal, none of them take that to the extent of giving the victim the right to veto such. A prosecutor can move forward with the plea bargain without the victim's agreement. That's because the state is representing the general public, not the victim, and the interests of the general public and the victim do not always coincide. If the prosecutor decides to move forward with the plea bargain anyway, the only recourse the victim really has is either to hire a lawyer of their own to act as a victims' rights advocate or to speak to the judge overseeing the case and try to get them to reject the plea bargain, since a plea bargain must be approved by the court. But it's entirely up to the judge, who also has no obligation to reject the plea bargain out of respect for the victim's wishes. Around 90-95% of cases are plea-bargained out, and the usual reason defendants agree to the plea bargain rather than trying their luck in a trial is to obtain a guaranteed lighter sentence, which is obviously not particularly popular with victims. If victims' agreement was always required, the plea bargain percentage would be a lot lower.

At least it's not Victor who got stabbed so that he'd get all the tearful speeches, as a way of extending EB's anniversary celebration. I can tolerate Victoria a little better. I have a crosswords app on my phone I play, and a few days ago, I got to a puzzle that where "this is used to describe Victor Newman on Y&R" was a clue (nothing to do with the anniversary, it's just a coincidence). Of course thanks to this forum I had all sorts of nicknames etc. popping into my mind that I knew weren't the answer. The answer turned out to be "ruthless."

I'm not sure there's a trope that makes me grind my teeth more than the one where writers try to get audience sympathy for someone who should be in jail or otherwise pay for the things they've done by having him/her framed or otherwise unjustly accused of something else. This latest iteration with Ben is working no better on me than any other.

Caroline Kepnes is writing two more books - #3 and #4 - so the Netflix show can be expected to go that number of seasons. Considering the viewership for season 2, season 3 will certainly do well and that'll be enough to get the renewal for the final season.

You're going to want to re-read it anyway after you finish, to pick up on all the things that will take on new meaning after you know everything. I just finished Come Tumbling Down, the fifth and latest novella in Seanan McGuire's Wayward Children series. This one continues the story of Jack and Jill, last seen in the second novella, although unlike that one we get to see a great deal of the other children, and I found it a satisfying installment. McGuire is just so inventive.

Yes, it's not like Dorothy and Sophia had to actually define the term "lesbian" for Blanche. She knew the term. I can buy her being slow on the uptake because of the context - she didn't expect Jean would be a lesbian, since she had a stereotype that lesbians are unattractive women who can't get men. So the word made no sense to her until she repeated it a couple of times to herself. People aren't always aware how much our brains are involved in hearing. It's like, when one knows the topic of a conversation, the brain helpfully has a list of the most common words for that topic ready to go so that it can quickly match up the sounds the ears receive with words. It works great except for when the conversation takes a swerve and the brain receives a word that isn't anywhere on the list of the most likely words it expects to be receiving. Then the brain can make one sound like a gibbering idiot...rather like Blanche.

They probably would if it didn't tend to become a long-running joke about the last thing the character was seen doing, like Don Craig going to get the mail (or AMC's Bobby who went to the attic to look for his skis). That was in 1985 and viewers still mention it.

Is Lola someone who can be in a relationship with someone like that though? I figured that's what Mariah meant. Lola's attracted to bad boys but I don't see her being able to tolerate it in a relationship for long. Mariah has proven she can stick it out with Tessa, and although I don't recall Mariah behaving badly during the time Tessa's known her, Tessa does know a certain amount of her history - although Tessa certainly isn't the type who would have an issue with that anyway. My assumption with the Teriah/Tanner/Lindsay thing is one of Teriah will come across the other in a compromising position, run off in tears and sleep with her own sidepiece, only to find out her girlfriend didn't actually cheat. Which woman cheats, that's really up in the air but I would guess Mariah because her having a meaningless ONS with a random woman does less damage to the Teriah relationship in their fans' eyes than if Tessa has sex with her ex-husband. The writers' problem with Teriah is that by this point - given the pace of soaps nowadays - they should be married, but CBS is too chicken to do a wedding. We never got to see or even hear about their first time; it wasn't until they moved in together that we even realized that they had had sex. Months and months later, they were finally allowed a short love scene, and now one or two more, and the kisses have also been allowed to get a bit longer...but given the glacial pace of all that, I can't imagine CBS being ready to sign off on a wedding. But they're not going to bring on another contract regular to play a lesbian and do a real triangle, and I'm sure they know the shitstorm that would hit them if they broke Teriah up to put Mariah with a man. (Tessa is a secondary character; if she weren't with Mariah she'd just be gone.) So we've got this quad of sorts, to manufacture some drama that helps kick the "f/f wedding" can down the road.

This is apples and oranges, though, because of duration. A song is typically a few minutes; a sculpture or painting is one image. There are many poems and short stories that are simply happy and beautiful. The brevity means it's okay to just have the one thing. But if, for instance, the music is taking the form of an opera or musical, then there's some type of conflict, even in the comedic ones. It's not so much about negativity as it is about being realistic about change: Nothing stays static, the one constant is change. Now if something is short, then change doesn't need to be included, but if something is longer, then it has to be. Or the static element will eventually get old. There's a reason we don't just play our favorite song on loop or just eat our favorite food endlessly and to the exclusion of any other. I'm an atheist too, and quite happy in my atheism, completely fine with the idea that this life on earth is all that there is. And I never took this show to be a metaphor; I accepted it as an exploration of (the show's concept of) an afterlife. But I was very interested throughout the series and loved the finale even though I don't think it's what actually happens after we die. I mean, if one takes it broadly enough, pretty much any fiction could be said to be pointless because none of the characters are real, the story didn't really happen, it's set in a world that doesn't exist, or things happen that aren't possible in the real world. My own personal take was that Jason, Chidi and Eleanor ultimately felt sated, rather than suicidal. They were ready for the next thing, which was not ceasing to exist, but becoming part of the greater universe, like a wave's water going back into the ocean. Eleanor changing into sparks of light will remain with me for a long time.

I love Tana French's Dublin Murder series, and I'm looking forward to watching the TV adaptation, but I find it so random how some of the books have supernatural elements, which aren't ever explained, and others don't. I'm also wondering when she's going to release another installment. She's been pretty consistent in publishing a book every two years, but for 2018 it was a standalone (which I haven't read yet).

Maggie is in her late 70s (Suzanne Rogers is 77). Killing someone while driving drunk is vehicular homicide, which carries a sentence of 3-15 years (more if it's not the first DUI). Regardless of spine, she'd likely die in prison. From that POV, I understand Victor. He's gotten away with so many crimes of his own, so he certainly has no qualms about his wife getting away with one.

Quite a few times, when I know the person on an ongoing basis. The only times I've never felt even a shred of anything other than total loathing is for assholes I encountered once and never again, because then I've only seen a snippet of them and know pretty much nothing about their lives. I don't have to like someone or find them admirable to be capable of sympathy for them at times.

I really liked that about Station Eleven. I read it the year it came out, and I've been thinking of giving it a re-read this year, particularly for one of the scenes near the end.

Agreed. It also smacks of "We don't care to give Katie an actual storyline, but we have to give Heather Tom some screentime somehow."

Not that it's plausible either way, but I expect we're to believe he built a new glass cage. He left NYC too fast, since he was desperate to escape Candace, to take care of disassembling and shipping the glass cage himself, and he certainly wouldn't give anyone a LA address and the task of doing this for him, since he was in hiding from Candace.