Margherita Erdman

Mr. Lyle returns, yay! Never go away again please. I need a Mr. Lyle in my life: to tell me the truth and then provide a shoulder and hanky for sobbing, no matter how greasy my hair and face might be by then, when I am letting myself and the world around me go to shit because I have fallen so far into myself I can no longer see what's important; so practical, to find me a good therapist; to help fight deadly covens pledged to deliver my soul to Lucifer, of course, that should go without saying; oh and to escort me to beautiful balls and dance elegantly right up until I faint in the throes of a vision of the ballroom being overtaken by waves and waves of blood. The posted synopsis doesn't seem right. Do you think it means to refer to the arrival at the ranch of the sheriff/marshal (not sure exactly what his office is — maybe both so he'll have both territorial and federal authority?) along with Inspector Rusk? i confess I have an affection for the character of Inspector Rusk — I find him fascinating and well-drawn in what screen time he has, a wholly believable badass of rare tenacity and wonderfully perceptive about what truths may be found beneath surface appearances — I have been secretly hoping there will be some turn of events causing him to join forces with our merry band of misfits rather than continuing as antagonist. Because otherwise someone will need to kill him, and sooner rather than later.

Yes — as I mentioned I the other thread, that performance has so transformed my perception of him as an actor — from dully one-dimensional to "who knows how the hell he might surprise us next, and how wonderful!" — that I'd argue the thread title itself is unfair and dated at this point. Let's allow Schwimmer at least a provisional parole from the prison of his Friends persona — I think he's finally earned it as his compadres also have from their characters' limitations over the years. [Matt LeBlanc probably took the second-longest to shed his Friends skin, until Episodes comes along. He punches his way out of the suffocating Joey creature's skin with a magnificent and contradictory performance that elevates (degrades? both?) Joey's signature traits to ever more absurd "real life" extremes while honing a self-awareness almost Brechtian in its simple yet brutal self-parody.] So if we must reference Ross, may I suggest something like "Milquetoast Manchild No More: Meet the Bronx Entrepreneur Who Mostly Gives No Fucks Except for His Young Motherless Son" — too long but you get what I'm going for I think. Just a bit more dignity and acknowledgment of his acting chops than the equivalent of "The One Where Ross Opens a Restaurant." /I am not a crackpot [although I maybe took a muscle relaxant and Vicodin for a migraine because my stingy insurance company allots only 4 1/2 doses per month of the non-opioid painkillers which REALLY WORK WITHOUT SIDE EFFECTS to get my near-chronic migraine condition under control, and maybe that is making me a little more prolix and excessively passionate than strictly warranted sorry.] I look forward to seeing how restaurant worker/cheffing/foodie cultures (all of them different in substantial ways) are incorporated with the gangster throughline. Not as interested in the poor motherless boy thread.

I agree. David Schwimmer as a lead role would have kept me away from this show before American Crime Story, but he was such a revelation that now I can't wait to see what else he's got to show us. Who could imagine that Bob Kardashian might be a career-changing role?

Are these witty yellow-boxed quiz-sounding things that are showing up in many articles supposed to be interactive? They appear as flattened bulleted lists on my iPad.

I don't know exactly how properly one should characterize all the propulsive viscous splattering in the original(s) and in the trailers for the new one — Slimer's mode of, well, sliming does seem to resemble projectile vomiting, and I thought (as noted in an earlier post) that there was a scene in the first trailer for the new movie that made Kristen Wiig look like the unwilling participant in a bukkake setup, so, pick your poison. Sticky phosphorescent green protoplasm being flung around from the various orifices of ghosts — subject to interpretation per one's age, film references, and personal sensibilities, I imagine. Back to the dead (hee!) seriousness of the Ghostbusters oeuvre, I see. It can be argued (easily and well) that the original Ghostbusters movies are brilliant spoofs of a range of genres from occult classics in the Argento vein ("Gatekeeper!" "Keymaster!" OMG Rick Moranis has never been more hilarious — in fact I don't think I ever found Moranis hilarious except here), to scary horror classics like vehicles for Bela Lugosi or Vincent Price, to sci fi complete with complex sounding nonsense (TOTAL PROTONIC REVERSAL! just for instance). Bergman this ain't. Not even Hitchcock, or Wes Craven, or the directors who do the horror porn stuff that you young'uns seem to enjoy nowadays. However I've already made more of an argument than I even intended just because I've gotten a prickly feeling at the back of my neck that I've unwittingly been feeding a troll, and I'm going to stop.

Cats and dogs living together, people. Cats. And. Dogs.

Can you send "KonMari-like organizer Christopher" (and Keegan-Michael Key, yes please) my way? As a Gen X contemporary of Winona/Murphy, now that you mention it, I also have SO MANY chunky black shoes. Flats, heels, wedges, clogs, oxfords, Docs, sandals, pumps, boots. Matte, nubuck, patent leather, fabric... Is that a problem?

Serious as a heart attack, sure. Real wrath of God like stuff even... Human sacrifice, cats and dogs living together, mass hysteria! Can I ask how old you are and/or if you saw the original when it first came out? Because I was 15, in no way a horror fan, and I laughed my ass off from start to finish (not to mention felt like I was getting away with something by understanding many naughty winking jokes, e.g., Bill Murray to the possessed Sigourney Weaver trying to seduce him: "No, I think you've got someone else inside you already" or something to that effect). I mean, I was a girl terrified by Gremlins, and I considered Ghostbusters pure comedy.

Yes but the source of the fury (specifically targeted at the female cast in the first and at the Charlize Theron character being the perceived main character/the treatment of the sexual slavery storyline in the second) is the same.

LOL sjohnson. But that's sort of what I meant. Our heroes include: Sir Malcolm, an exemplar of the white imperialist/Great White Explorer archetype (although he has come to be more shaded than that); Ethan the indiscriminately murderous werewolf who participated in the massacre of American native peoples as well as random Londoners; the late lamented Sembene, a slaver to his fellow Africans; Victor who is utterly without moral compass and a patronizing chauvinist of the highest order... Who am I forgetting? John Clare/Caliban the creature, who has seemingly been on a redemption arc? Kaetenay, who brutally butchered the youngest and most helpless of the Talbots? Hecate who maybe/maybe not will be pulled to the light even as she believes she is converting Ethan to the dark?

That's an interesting observation that this season is more violent — it hasn't felt that way to me — either the frogs slowly boiling in a pot effect, or maybe just that the psychological violence has always been so intense and well-done that it's difficult for me to distinguish from the physical violence in retrospect. I do think there are many different kinds of violence happening along a tonal spectrum, with the Dorian-Lily-Frankenstein axis solidly in the category of Grand Guignol grotesque and sometimes, as you note (the bloody three-way), just risible, but Ethan and Sir Malcolm are living in a world of grit and realism, where the stakes seem much higher. One thing that is really working for me this season, and this episode in particular, is that I think we are really beginning to get our Victoriana mashup payoff, beyond just the delight in geeking out over genre classics and literary Easter eggs: so much of the best of 19th century fiction forced readers to confront the difference between how society wished to see itself and how it really was (distilled especially clearly by Wilde in Portrait of Dorian Gray) . Now we're beginning to really match up the metaphorical with the literal with the impact of colonialism, manifest destiny, patriarchy, monarchism, etc., etc. Even the littlest details — Victor's and Henry's poor research subject in Bedlam, the Scottish nationalist, has essentially been locked away for refusing to participate in the Empire's worship of the Queen. It is fitting that Tennyson's death kicked off the season — as we watch the shadows and ghosts of the Victorian era that haunt us even today. Those horses were dying slow agonizing deaths of dehydration with every step. The gunshot was a mercy that I hope also was extended to the other horses discarded across that desert, and I was glad to not have to watch them drop one by one. I actually was wishing a little bit that they would get down and drag their own asses across the wasteland (which they did eventually if course), or use demonic juju, conjure up a well-watered camel, something. Of course this show is all about desperation and despair, so it all works on that level, completely. I have a feeling the "kill all the bad people" part comes after dinner next week. "Bad" as usual being completely subjective.

Your comment made me think of and inspired me to post this interview with the sound designer who creates the dragon noises. She talks especially about Drogon, including how & why she put her own dog's whines into the mix.

Interesting interview with the sound designer about mixing noises for the dragons, especially Drogon.

I was browsing around Drunk History videos, as one does, and discovered that Lucius Dillon narrated a segment on the Houdini-Doyle friendship in the Detroit episode, with Ken Marino as Houdini. http://www.cc.com/video-clips/af0w8l/drunk-history-houdini---spiritualism---uncensored

Thank you sjohnson, in the wake of Brian Cox's performance I forgot entirely that I expected the werewolf to be explained this episode. I thought it had been heavily implied that it was part of his Apache punishment, to live as part beast, not in control of himself, but I was looking for confirmation, and now that question is still just hanging out there... Doesn't seem to be a genetic family trait either, unless that is what's coming in the promised bloodbath/clusterfuck/dinner party next episode! Victor is utterly incompetent at relationships, I agree, but he does seem to have hit on something with his electrified lobotomy serum. My guess, watching Jekyll, is that whether or not they ever get Lily down there to try it on her, something will happen (perhaps Jekyll's father will die and he will be due to inherit?) that will cause Jekyll to beg Victor to do the procedure on him. No explicit act of rape described or implied, though all that stabbing and cutting, the penetrating bloody violence, is certainly figurative rape. A lot of imagery of Christ going on there too (particularly the brother — pierced with a lance on the altar, because lances were such common weapons in the 19th c. Southwest) and martyrdom of saints... Interesting that the Talbots seem to be Catholic, or at least very high Episcopalian. [Not for nothing, and not on topic, but I do think that it attests to the power of GRRM's storytelling (and a form of sexual violence related PTSD that I associate with Game of Thrones/Song of Ice and Fire) that I had the same apprehension about the mother and sister, and even the brother, and I also connected it to that story cycle, even though I haven't watched the show since the first season, have only read the books. Didn't need to see the rest enacted on the screen, or didn't think I could bear it.]

Absolutely, I thought if they were going the cultural appropriation route (I can find no Chiricahua origin myth that in any way resembles the story told in the cave) they might as well have a jolly rain dance while they were at it. Also, did anyone think that the snakes were a whole lot of show but not in the end very effective? All that "evil right under the sand" Hecate was talking and they couldn't even kill everyone? Please, with all the mercy killing out in the desert, someone definitely needs to put Hecate out of our misery before she conceives or whelps an evil puppy. I too was bracing myself for a far more macabre scene when Brian Cox threw back the doors — was expecting bodies mummified in place. What I did find creepy in this episode? The bedroom where Hecate found herself chez Talbot. That empty dollhouse and the row of dolls at the foot of the bed... Yikes! Did not miss Lily and her household — Dorian has pretty much literally been reduced to nothing more than a vehicle for her to dance and move about in society.

Didn't we meet Mayfair's ex-husband in one episode? IIRC they had a sweet, rueful little scene and he encouraged her to get out more? So much that is so wrong with this. A five year old is little more than a baby, still. Also, who here buys Weller as 35? And yes, finally, Taylor was a tomboy who didn't have anything in common with Sarah who loved dolls yet Taylor couldn't sleep without her "favorite doll" -- what?

The series is set in 1901; so, completely outside the timeline of Houdini and Doyle's actual friendship. And, I guess, according to your research, outside the timeline of female PCs as well! There is a Houdini blogger who has written two informative and entertaining entries relating to the show -- one on the history of the relationship itself and another on other fictional treatments of the subject.

Funny, I had the opposite thought with poor little Kingsley -- I felt bad for him but figured at least he hasn't been packed off to an awful public school where he'd constantly be bullied by fellow students and beaten by staff. I still think this show is quite weak, couldn't care less about the constable's melodrama, and am also annoyed by the play-coy attitude toward mystery-solving and the supernatural, but I did think that this episode gelled better than any yet in terms of cast chemistry, pacing, etc. Whatsisname as Houdini didn't annoy me half so much this episode, nor the ahistorical liberties taken with his character.

Everything Lisa Schmeiser said, x100

The implication was that it was the "blue flu," cops refusing to come in because they resented what Lex did by quarantining the officer who cut his arm (on purpose, secretly, in cahoots with the police chief for some obscure reason I do not trust we will ever fully understand) inside the cordon. So much happened in this episode, and with so little sense or purpose. OttoD summarized most of the stupid. I thought I'd at least be in for the duration, but I'm not sure I can make it.

I can't tell you whether snuff films exist or not, now or at the dawn of cinema, but violent pornography most certainly has a long and well-documented history, and Victorian pornography was particularly varied and lurid. The sex trade of the time was equally colorful, or dark, if you wanted it — as it is in Asia now — and as it ever is, whenever and wherever there are huge gaps in power and income. And I think it is no accident that the new addition to Dorian and Lily's ménage is named Justine, who is also the titular character of a Marquis de Sade novella, a girl who goes from utter victim to something like the protagonist of her own story, in typical Sade-ian fashion. You can Google it if you want — I'm not linking because I just don't feel like going down that particular literary sewer at the moment.

Does anyone else remember the elaborate plan/heist/scheme arc that was unspooling under Red's direction with the lawyer played by Fisher Stevens, in order to "clear Liz's name for good"? Did that plotline just get dropped without notice or mention, or did I miss something? Yes, I thought she looked glowing and serene and beautifully styled in her white sundress, but then in the scene with Ulrich Thomsen when she was captive and tied to a chair, I thought: whoever did wardrobe and makeup that day is just as pissed about her return to the show as we are — newly delivered moms, God bless (and I've been one), are lumpy and bumpy and mushy, and the last thing you want to be seen in by anyone, much less on national TV, is clingy knits. And you definitely need a structured brassiere — poor MB looked like her boobs were headed in different directions. Speaking of Ulrich Thomsen — as a fan of the batshit crazy and ultraviolent Banshee, I thought he'd be perfect as the sine qua non of Blacklisters, the bad daddy from whom Reddington was trying to protect Liz all this time — and yet somehow the show managed to drain all the reptilian menace right out of him. Is it the hairstyle? Or perhaps it is the bad acting juju of Megan Boone that no one but Spader can withstand for long?

She's been honing those skills to a fine edge on How to Get Away With Murder

It was Katarina's not Liz's — there has been no contact between "Mashable" and her grandfather, remember? — which made it all the more poignant to me and made Grampa Dennehy's outrage more earned (i.e., if we're right that Katarina was Red's great love, his father not only considers that his claim to her memory — especially her childhood — is greater than Red's, but that Red is to blame for his loss). I did think Dennehy was great, but as with other well-cast guest stars, the acting between him and Spader really had some lovely moments... And the coda, when Dennehy was ready to make peace with the requested single malt, only to return to an empty house, a ticking metronome, and a restored piano — well, that worked for me, but I am a sentimental soul I, too, love glitter, and Aram (see sentimental, above). It was to my great regret I never had a daughter and therefore no excuse for craft boxes full of glitter as an adult — in fact quite the opposite, a son with autism who has such a sensory aversion to glitter that he can't tolerate even greeting cards or wrapping paper with glitter because the residue might get on his clothes or bed linens or furniture :p So no glitter magic for me Totally agree. That harbor master and his sweet wife. Plus, props for bilge, boat, harbormaster, hee! No, I think you were right the first time.