BabyVegas

Just blew through the whole season and loved around 95% of it. I thought the way the show handled Schneider's relapse was really well done, even if it felt a little bit compact. I wasn't necessarily a fan of Todd Grinnell's real life wife showing up to play a love interest. I don't know why, it's just that whenever shows do that, it feels like such a "haha we get it" kind of moment to me. But if that's my biggest complaint about a season of a show, I'm a happy camper. Aside from Lydia going to Cuba, that ending felt pretty series finale-y to me. I'm hoping it's not the last season of this show because I really love it.

Among other problems with it! I'm actually learning about injunctions in school right now and I'm absolutely blown away that any court would issue that injunction in the first place. Every week I think that, when it comes to Scientology, I am incapable of being surprised and then every week Leah and Mike come along and destroy that belief. In my opinion, he looked absolutely sick last night. I can't remember exactly what she said, but Leah made some joke and they cut to Mike and he looked like he wanted to hurl. I appreciate that Mike is facing his past head on. It would be easy for him to be behind the scenes or something similar, but numerous times throughout the series he has clearly been working to own up to what he did and take responsibility. I'd be willing to bet that if someone who he hurt in his role with Scientology wanted to yell at him about what he did, he would stand there and take it. Seriously. I want to do something to help. I'm glad that Leah and Mike are doing the show, but watching it and feeling powerless to do anything is a sucky feeling.

I have an AdoreMe account and didn't see it on the site. I even clicked into the corset section. Maybe I'm just missing it, but I didn't see it. I was surprised that Jasper was auf'd. Don't get me wrong, I thought his look was terrible, but he had been in the top at least once and Cynthia had been in the bottom. I suspect it came down to the judges saying that at least she tried something while his look was just an outdated mess. I liked Christina's design, but the hemline kept bothering me. It looked wonky, like her scissors or her rotary blade slipped just a little bit and I would have thought one of the judges would have brought that up. Maybe it wasn't noticeable from a distance? On a petty note, Isaac and Georgina drive me nuts. Georgina less so than Isaac. I hated Isaac addressing all the designers by saying "hey girls." Somehow his dramatics are just never as charming as Michael Kors' were.

So I just watched this episode and my feelings are very much in line with all of yours. But I kept wondering, when Mike was talking about refunds vs. repayments, about the legality of that. I remember reading about a case, Hernandez v. Commissioner, from the late '80s, where the Supreme Court said that payments for packages of auditing were not tax-exempt because they were part of a quid pro quo and the parishioner wasn't really donating, they were buying services. A quick Google tells me that case was before Scientology regained its tax exempt status. I wonder if having been officially designated as a church by the IRS affected whether those payments would still today be considered part of a quid pro quo instead of a donation to a religious organization. I think whether the IRS takes on Scientology is probably a more complicated question than simply "yeah, this looks shady, time to investigate." It would mean overturning policy, so I'm guessing they probably have to have something new. And I'm betting such a decision would have to come out of the main IRS leadership in DC, not one of the branches or one of the line employees. So it couldn't be just any random IRS employee watching. But man do I hope that some unlikely confluence of events comes together and the IRS actually does strip Scientology of its tax exempt status. Everything we've seen is just too fucked up to be allowed to continue.

I'm currently in law school and I've generally had to skip all the law school scenes so I don't beat my head against the wall. Unfortunately I didn't skip through fast enough and caught a few seconds of Christy's mock trial. You are so right with how ridiculous this version of law school is. In addition to testifying, her so-called "know-it-all" classmate should have known to object on foundation as soon as Christy started asking about the picture of the phone without asking the witness to identify it. And probably should have at least tried to object to Christy as argumentative, while she was at it. Aside from that, if the show timeline is following approximately the real world timeline, those 1Ls should be in test mode, not goofing around with a mock trial that appears to be only for this one class that has like nine students in it (which, no). I appreciate that the show is trying to show us Christy being good at law school, not just tell us that she is, but surely there's at least one lawyer somewhere on the CBS lot who can tell them that this version of law school is just pure fantasyland? On a note that probably matters to people other than me, I think Kristen Johnson is sliding into the show nicely. And I appreciated that Bonnie actually had thoughtful and rational reasoning for withholding the pills. Also every time I watch this show I'm reminded how good Jaime Pressly is at delivering a punchline.

Now that Christy's in law school, there are quite a few alcoholic-specific story lines. I hope they're going to address the substance abuse that is rampant in law schools and the legal profession. I know it's something my professors have talked about quite a bit. I know they've already done a potential Christy relapses story, but I would at least like to see some acknowledgement of how law school impacts her sobriety and vice versa. Also, not this upcoming season, but at some point she would be subject to a moral fitness hearing to pass the bar, so I wonder if they'll spend any time on that.

I definitely get the sense that Jenna Elfman is very much a True Believer and there isn't anything anyone can say or any proof that they can offer that will change her mind. Also Jezebel covered the article, and looking through the commentary I see a whole lot of whataboutism and "well, it works for her" type comments. Can I get odds that Scientology has conscripted some poor Sea Org members into spamming the comments sections of various websites that mention this article?

Andy Cohen is a garbage human and the Real Housewives franchise is horrifyingly misogynistic. And it makes me think less of Anderson Cooper that he is friends with Andy Cohen. And here's one I think I might be entirely alone on: I dislike most of HBO's original programming. When I see HBO I don't think "oh, that'll be quality programming." I think "oh, that'll be sex and violence and horrible assholes." With the exception of Last Week Tonight, HBO is basically what would happen if an edgelord became a cable channel.

Holy crap, Dino was...something else. Dino was more than just a little tightly wound, he was a manipulative asshole. I felt so bad for his poor kids, especially the one at the different location. It legitimately concerned me that Dino seemed to be cutting Doug off from his siblings. That kind of isolation and stress is classic manipulation. Marcus is well shot of him and it makes me wonder why Marcus was so dead-set on going into business with him because Dino's manipulative behavior was visible from a mile away. Totally agreed. I assume it was supposed to be a focus group-type situation and it made for better TV than simply going over the numbers, but what they were keeping should have been a question of what sells vs. what doesn't. I noticed when Marcus was talking about ticking boxes and wondering why he'd been called, I think he said something about the daughter ticking a box for him, namely the family issues. I can't tell if that was Marcus admitting he just wants to be Business Oprah or if he was saying that the family called him because of their issues with each other. Either way, after the last few episodes, I'm really burning out on the "let's watch some assholes try to business" concept.

It depends on the car. Slim jims often don't work on newer cars because modern locks are designed specifically not to be vulnerable to slim jims. That being said, I would expect a police station to have several methods of unlocking a newer car. I have a newer car and I locked my keys in my car last year It took AAA like, fifteen minutes to pop my car's lock. I loved this episode. I love that Jake cares so much about making Amy happy, I love that Amy and Rosa are such kickass cops, and I absolutely adored "look at the bunny." I'm so glad this show is coming back next year.

So the joke is that a guy who is a sexist asshole should just get to go on his merry way because his friends don't feel like challenging him ever? I fail to see how that's better. And, given this show's very dicey history with women, I'm not inclined to give them a generous reading of the joke. If this show used moments like that to offer any kind of critique or comeuppance, I'd be willing to buy your argument. But the fact that the show merely depicts Sheldon being an asshole, everyone laughs, and then moves on is where I get the read that it's sexist.

I don't usually comment on this forum since I watch this show mostly as background noise, but this episode was so infuriating that I had to talk about it somewhere. The sexism and asshole behavior on this show has gotten pretty out of control. Specifically, Sheldon's behavior. It's not funny and it's not cute. Sheldon's assumption that the assistant manager didn't know anything about comic books was likely intended to be a representation of how he never thinks anyone knows as much as he does, but because this show has an incredibly shaky history with treating women with any kind of respect, I thought it came off like he was assuming that a woman couldn't know about comic books. And when he went to quiz her, it was that common moment of "nerd guys" requiring women to prove themselves to the guy's satisfaction. I think they were trying to have Howard lampshade it a little bit when he rolled his eyes at Sheldon, but that still doesn't make it okay and that Howard just didn't comment bothered me. And then there was Sheldon's refusal to sit next to the woman on the couch. Again, I assume they were going for "Sheldon hates strangers" but because the women on this show usually get made the butt of the joke, it just read as sexist. There were so many little moments of sexism throughout this episode that I'm honestly mad at myself for even finishing it.

Show, if you want me to believe that your character should actually be up for an Oscar, may I recommend hiring someone who couldn't be replaced by a relatively charismatic two by four? The guy who plays Jordan isn't an exceptionally bad actor in the context of this show (the actress playing Alexis seems to be acting mostly through flaring her nostrils), but he is not a good actor, objectively speaking. Also, what does it say about me that the most interesting (to me) relationship on this show is Alan/Nina? Probably that I'm too old to be watching this show.

On the one hand, I don't mind that W&G gets political. Even if the jokes hadn't been somewhat political, the show itself was always going to be inherently political because it was one of the earlier shows regularly featuring multiple gay characters. On the other hand, from a writing perspective, if the writers can't distill a very complex issue down to make it funny and fit it in a 23ish-minute episode of a sitcom, maybe it's better that they don't touch it. As others here have pointed out, the Masterpiece Cake Shop case has some nuance and I worry that this show being flip about things like that doesn't have the effect that the writers intended. This episode brings up, and this comment very much encapsulates, one of the things that this reboot has brought up for me. Sometimes this show seems to suffer from time marching on and that is never more apparent when Karen is at full throttle. For all Will's big talk a few episodes back to his young date about the battles that older LGBT+ folks fought, it REALLY sticks out that Jack and Will hang out with someone who is, at best, willing to look the other way while supporting a party that actively hurts her friends. It could have been a really good opportunity to delve into gay culture beyond what is represented by two attractive, wealthy (or mooching off of wealthy) white gay men, but instead it just came off as glib and shallow. I've actually liked more of the reboot than I've disliked, but this episode was so far off the mark for me, that it just left a sour taste in my mouth.

Marcus has done this a few times and I suspect, based on the way the deals were set up and a gut feeling, Marcus thought that the businesses could limp along long enough for him to force the problem owners out and then he could take over the brand and really push it forward, the way he did with Sweet Pete's. The few times where he's refused to get into a business because of shadiness, it seems like either the business was circling the drain and was going out any minute (thus not giving him time to force out the problem) or there was a real chance that law enforcement was going to get involved. One other possible option that I could see is that Marcus is buying these businesses as tax shelters. It would explain why he doesn't seem all that interested in knowing much about some of these loss-heavy businesses. This episode was really great because it seems like they got the drama over with pretty quickly and then moved on to the more interesting business stuff. It seems like Pete and Allison were a big win for Marcus and vice versa. They're smart to just keep going in with Marcus because I can't imagine they would have gotten anywhere near where they are without having Marcus's power behind them. And Travis was smart to look at the whole picture and see that if he just rolled with Marcus and worked his ass off, either the concept would start working or he'd have a relatively high-powered business contact. As far as the toy store area, I think the whole "forgotten gift" thing was stupid because that seems like a weirdly inconsistent place to look for revenue. But based on the fact that they were stocking so many sub-$10 toys, I imagine it's a very easy place for parents to get something to distract the kids. I thought the book stand was a great idea. It could be stocked with coloring books (cheap and exactly the sort of thing a parent would get for a stir-crazy kid) and I could even see Marcus rolling out a Sweet Pete's/Farrell's coloring book.

If I understood the explanation from that segment correctly, the FBI is only the investigatory body that looks into whether somebody has issues that pose a danger to security. The FBI then makes a recommendation to the White House and the White House is the end point that actually grants the clearance. The FBI's role is limited to advising the White House, based on its investigation, not the actual granting of clearances. Malcolm's point was that, previously, temporary clearance has been used as a short term (I want to say generally 90 days, 180 at the absolute outside) stopgap to get a new White House up and functioning. I think it was on Pod Save America that the guys were talking about how there's a general way of doing things where the high-level people who need the strictest clearance get marked to be done first and then as you go down in clearance, so you go down in priority and that's why you can end up with somebody working off of a temporary clearance. Joy's face in the Sarah/Malcolm/Naveed segment when Naveed was talking about the Russians recruiting him and having a very clear understanding that the point of a public service job is personal enrichment was priceless. Along with Malcolm nodding along and Sarah agreeing, that segment was horrifying but so necessary. I always feel better educated after watching this show, if a little horrified.

So because I am avoiding other work, I actually did go back frame by frame and whoever pushed Eleanor out of the way most definitely had white hair. I didn't think it looked like Danson at first, but I'm assuming that's because they used a stunt double. Also, they made a big deal about how everybody on Team Cockroach improved each other, Michael said they needed a push, Gen said that what they were doing set a very dangerous precedent, and in a prior episode Michael said that in every reboot Eleanor always found Chidi and tried to improve herself. So I'm guessing that this is a simulated Earth reboot to see, if they were able to get that push by finding each other on Earth, whether they can improve on "Earth" by finding each other but without the knowledge about the afterlife/possible rewards in the afterlife. I so can't wait 9 months to see more episodes. I know the limited episode run means each episode is tighter and always advances the plot, but I'm gonna miss it so much while it's on hiatus!

Watching the Frankie/Faith situation, I felt like everybody shouldered some of the blame there. Bud should have known that Frankie is flighty and likely to wander off and Frankie should have double checked that she had plenty of cash and a car charger for her phone. What confused me was that she didn't seem to have any GPS device in the car with her. I don't know if Frankie was still driving her Leaf or if she was driving Bud's car, but either way it seems unlikely that the car didn't have a nav system. If it did, Frankie should have put in a familiar address (such as Bud's or, if she didn't know that off the top of her head, her own) and then gone from there. The whole thing just felt too "we're writing Frankie to have wacky adventures because she's wacky!"

Sorry - I've always understood "get woke" to be a phrase within the context of racial/social injustice as a shorthand way of saying "see all of this injustice around you, stop closing your eyes and sleeping through it." If I had to take a blind guess as to why Tonya picked that particular phrase, I would wonder if Carrie had maybe said something about racial/social justice earlier in the competition (not necessarily filmed) and Tonya was referencing that? That would make it personal, but it would also explain why Tonya said "get woke" and why she said it the way she did.

I don't want to delve too deeply into this because, not having been there and only having seen an edited version, I can't speak to what might have honestly happened. But I don't necessarily consider it personal because I think Tonya would have snapped at anyone who got in front of her at that moment. "Getting personal" to me would have been taking digs at something about Carrie's person, not just snapping at her. I can't account for the "get woke" comment, whether that was Tonya insinuating some kind of race element or whether that was just Tonya snapping back with a common phrase that pretty much means "open your eyes." Parsing it any further without real knowledge of what happened outside of the edited version seems irresponsible to me. I will say that I find Carrie's insistence that Tonya listen to or otherwise make Claudette feel better when Claudette had just finished throwing Tonya under the bus, at absolute best, a total dick move. Carrie should have stayed the Hell out of that one.

Yeah, Tom was...not subtle with that scoring. I think we're all aware that kind of mess goes on in the background, but it's really hard to ignore when Tom out and out says it like that. Can't be said enough: Claudette suuuuuuuuuuuuucks. She didn't ask Chris hardly at all for help. And at JT when Claudette put her hand on Tonya and did that pitying smile thing while she was blaming Tonya for her own fuckups? I wanted to dive through my TV and yell at her. Claudette basically said that she couldn't cook her dish on her own when she insinuated that Tanya was at fault for her dish missing acid. I'm assuming that part of the reason Tanya was over it by JT was that she was tired and JT can drag on for hours, so she probably had to listen to a whole bunch more of Claudette's nonsense than we did. On the whole, Claudette reminded me of Josie from TC: Seattle and that is not a compliment. Right before that comment, Carrie said that Tanya should let Claudette finish because Tanya was making Claudette feel bad. I'd bet money that Carrie's guilt-tripping had already worked Tanya to the end of her rope. After the shady shit that Claudette was pulling and having Carrie adding onto it, I can absolutely see how Tanya would have snapped. Then again, I've found Carrie irritating this whole time, so I probably also would have had no patience for her.

Judge Judy as The Judge would be hilarious, but Mary Steenburgen would be a fun way to keep getting cast members' spouses to guest. Or The Judge could be some weird half and half Bad Janet-Good Janet hybrid. Like a redhead Janet or something. Also I watched Will and Grace on my DVR before this because I wanted to save TGP for last, like a little dessert, and I saw Michael sacrificing himself so I was sad-laughing through the entire episode and then I was sad AGAIN even though I knew it was coming. How is this show so good at making me like a literal demon?!

Huh, I have no idea how I got those two confused. But now I'm unconflicted about hating the commercial because I have a grudge against VW. (I used to own one of their cars.) Either way, that commercial sucks. The Peyton Manning ones are the ones that make me want to scream. I mean, I understand the man has gotta do something with his days now that he's retired, but must they show those commercials every ten minutes?!

Ok, I've been waffling back and forth on whether to post this one, but it's been bugging me for days. Usually I like Subaru's ads, or at least I don't hate them. But I felt like their latest Outback ad was kind of tasteless, for lack of a better word. In the ad, there's a couple evacuating their house from something. The grab a bag, throw it in the car, realize they have more room, and start going back for useless crap, like an exercise ball. When people flee and they can only take very little with them it's not because their car won't fit more, it's because there is no time. I get that the point they're trying to make is that the car is roomy, but there are plenty of other ways to make almost that exact commercial without setting it as an emergency. Perhaps I'm overreacting a little bit because of the recent events in Hawaii, but, at least for me, this felt like a major misstep for Subaru. ETA: I feel like I should clarify - the reason it annoys me is that I feel like the commercial is implying "if you'd bought a Subaru, you wouldn't have lost all those family photos and other still-meaningful non-essentials" which is the part that I think is tasteless.

I've noticed that when Joy has conservative guests on her show, they always try to smile and play jolly and gaslight her and I LOVE that Joy doesn't play that. I watch Joy's show for two big reasons: 1) I get a different perspective on politics that is sorely lacking and 2) Joy knows her shit inside and out. She doesn't let her guests get away with trying to change the facts and she doesn't get mad, she just calls it out. Note to MSNBC, more Joy Reid, please!