pasdetrois

I am loving Cush Jumbo in this. She's underplaying the personality of June - reserved, analytical - which helps make the series more realistic. Capaldi is perfect for these menacing creepy guy roles.

Annemarie works at "surgical centers." I'm guessing those are outpatient cosmetic surgery places.

Hilarious that Christina Ricci pointed out that the tile Megan chose for the remodel was an exact match for the old tile Christina had already installed in her home. Could Kate Bosworth have laid it on any thicker as she thanked Jeff? That had to be an act (although the work was lovely).

Is there published documentation on the ratings this season? Given the streaming environment, it's hard to track who's watching. I'm not; I've been sticking to this forum for the shade and notable updates. Still waiting for them to dump Erika. The fact that she's still collecting a Bravo paycheck and gloating about those fucking earrings depresses me to the core.

If jobs and reputation were in jeopardy, it's weird that Bravo allowed so much footage to make it into the episodes for the world to see. They had to explain the black eye, but they could have directed the cast to handle it differently for the cameras. "Oh, we were clowning around drunk and Jen accidentally hit me with an elbow." End of story and drama. Judges do this during Zoom court proceedings, usually to shut up an obnoxious defendant. It's fabulous. I recommend it to Bravo during the reunions, because they are unbearable to watch. Andy could have a big red Mute button next to his chair.

All the PAs I've encountered explain their training and jobs as "we can do anything an MD can do except 'cut' (surgery)." That's the key distinction between PAs and MDs.

I need to start watching earlier than I did last night, as I became lost as to what the heck was going on. Won't the defrosting corpsicles stink, even in a cold hockey rink? The whiny Malamute made me laugh. True to form and no acting there. I think the actor was cleaning the dog's ears and the dog wasn't having it.

Years ago I met him at events in Santa Fe, and we also ran into him running errands as well. He chatted with my friend who was a member of the American Indian Movement. At all occasions he was quiet yet friendly, quite dignified. He may have been resisting Gates' efforts to make him emote-on-demand. As we all know, documenting Indians' forced removal from the Southeast to the West was not a priority - it was such a difficult effort that even some of the accompanying soldiers struggled. The Cherokee were removed over an extremely bitter winter, and much of their travel was over mountains. That's why they had relatively more loss of life. I've never encountered this, but one never knows. Between the boarding schools, forced removals, and assimilation to White ways, many of their traditional names were lost to history. Or White names were forced onto them, or they married/partnered with the colonizers. Studi referred to being married to a settler, another name for colonizers and their descendants. Wikipedia says he is the son of a ranch hand named Andy Studie, but this information may be incorrect or has been discovered since the show was produced. The long pauses are very common in modern Native American communication styles. Although there are exceptions, they do not feel the need to fill dead air with talk, and they often are thinking before speaking. When I first began working with tribes, I was counseled to listen more and talk less, and not be uncomfortable with silence during conversation. To me, Studi was processing his thoughts and making a decision not to speak unless he knew what he wanted to say.

I expected him to whip out a Coke. I prefer ambient sounds in scenes, and the music really annoyed me. I liked the first episode. Skilled actors with real faces, realistic script (well, except for the supernatural stuff), great setting...I am thrilled any time we can get quality programming. Murder mystery = bonus points.

Places like that are very nice because the employers have to lure the employees away from nicer locations. They have to motivate the workforce to live and work in these pitch black, frozen, remote locations. (Similar situation - oil rigs way out in the Gulf, although they are not as nice as snazzy research and technological sites.) Also, some of the Arctic native villages are quite developed. They have many successful businesses and modern infrastructure.

I've thought this forever. I also think vanity and narcissism came into play. I think she was ambivalent (like many women) or had already decided no, but borrowed the storyline.

I love the author's use of the word "hazing," which had not occurred to me when thinking about how nasty these women are to each other. It's apt.

Just watched "Maui of Mississippi." That house has to be an investment property because the story we were shown makes no sense. Perhaps this couple intends to spend each year in multiple locations and fudged their story about living in Laurel.

Megan appears to be a kind of Jenny-replacement to balance an all-dude cast. They don't show her doing much beyond making vague design statements or agreeing with Jeff, and she has other clients. She really wants the TV exposure, probably for her own business. I think young Tyler is a better designer but he doesn't get featured in the episodes. I noticed when Jeff was yelling at her about not being with the team one day, she managed to say "Nobody told me to be there," which I suspect is true. Reality TV usually treats everyone as independent contractors. So Jeff has zero basis for ordering her physical presence at a particular time unless production specifies it. In fact a key IRS indicator of employee vs. independent contractor status is whether the contractor controls his/her own time and location. Production probably forced them to "make up" to finish out the season. Megan did not seem happy to be there. It's weird how so many of Jeff's projects fall behind schedule and/or go over budget. I think this is because the Hollywood Houselift clients want TV/promotional exposure - they can get any LA good designer otherwise - so they are content to deal with the "delays" Jeff is always going on about. I also have noticed paid-promotion stuff more frequently, such mentioning appliance brands by name. Other design shows are doing the same. Andrew was once portrayed as a flibbertigibbet, and now he's capable and reliable. I am very sad for his cancer diagnosis and hope he gets through it. I hope he has a true support system.

The series is based on one American bomb group (100th Bomb Wing) that flew missions out of southern England (Norfolk). It was called The Bloody 100th due to unusual loss of planes and crews. That was due in part to an early history of flying low-altitude, daylight bombing missions to Germany, which made the B-17s vulnerable to flack and German fighters. They switched to night missions but still sustained many losses. Most of their missions were to Germany, but they also targeted other European countries occupied by the Nazis. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100th_Bomb_Group_Memorial_Museum

Because it moved to Magnolia, I missed several seasons of the show. HBO/MAX has it now so I've caught up. The "simple" 1923 bungalow is essentially an exact copy of my home, although mine looks nothing like Brett's work! HBO/MAX has other restoration shows, such as In With the Old, Restoration Road, This Old House, and others.

I think the forum ate my post, so repeating: I notice the trailers show the "Square D" on the B-17 wings. It is the Bloody 100th bomb group's insignia. I got a tiny tattoo when my dad passed away.

Megan's not a designer; she just pretends to be one on TV.

Also, they get a lot of attention for it. Their family's conflict is discussed endlessly on these forums, they sell books and make TV shows about it and receive income because of it.

I haven't watched the episode yet, but wonder if Monica and Angry Control Freak Jenn dreamed up this scheme. Revenge for Jenn, $$ and exposure for Monica.

I'm late to the party, watching this documentary. I've watched several similar others recently. My theory is that some seemingly intelligent people comprehend what's going on, but they need the experience so much they talk themselves in to staying. This applies to those who receive decent income from the cult and those who have nowhere else to go. Mark only left because a person smarter and stronger than he told him to do it. He simply moved his attachment and dependence from Keith to Bonnie. Also, my siblings and I were immersed - in various degrees - in charismatic Christian youth groups when we were teenagers and young adults. We see some similarities with these cults. Lots of love-bombing, affirmations, attention, belonging to a group, extremely charismatic attractive pastors, being assigned an important role, a specific belief system that appears to be positive... There's a Christian denomination, well-established in the South and Midwest, that the American Psychiatric Association has labeled a cult because of its practices. Although not publicized, it is the church that a certain reality TV family belongs to (not the Duggars). My in-laws were raised in it, left it, denounced it passionately for decades, then returned to one of its biggest and worst congregations in their last years because they were afraid "they were going to Hell for leaving it." Turning to corporations, quite a few have integrated questionable cult-adjacent practices into their recruiting and training programs. They query on emotional and psychological indicators and require new employees to enthusiastically participate in "mission" training that felt like group-think and coercion to me. Big messages of "do as we say or else." Interesting comment, because I've only watched three episodes and 1) there's too much benign explanation about the cult and 2) that explanation sounds like a friendly tutorial that will appeal to some viewers. They take too long to get to the bad stuff. They are both treating the production as a sizzle reel + a narrative re-write, and in addition Mark appears to adore the drama. He's an ass. Pam Cafritz, Keith's earlier partner who died, was the daughter of one of the wealthiest and most powerful families in Washington, DC. No wonder Keith stayed with her.

This show has become very odd. It's more personality-driven (i.e., Jeff) than design-driven. He once was a known developer, flipping significant properties at great expense and sales, with efforts to brand his own products, and now he's renovating closets and buying furniture and tchotchkes. He has fallen a long way, career-wise. He's simply playing the reality TV game. The wretched and talentless Megan boasted of taking Ozempic to lose weight, saying something like "and I don't care who knows it" with a smirk on her face. (Ozempic is for diabetics only, but people are using it to lose weight and causing a shortage of the drug.)

Random thought: Charles must bite his lips a lot, because every other scene throughout the series has him doing it. Odd that no real-life photos ever caught that little nervous tic. Like two guilty school children. Ha. As others have said, this last episode brought the series to a close in a satisfactory way. For me, it was always about "The Crown" - Elizabeth II. If one is a certain age, one relates to her emotions as she ponders her end and that of her husband.

I enjoyed the final episode less because of the violence. It's such a predictable way to pander to some viewers (for better ratings?) and is too similar to the meaningless violence we see in many movies. At least the First Desk conflict was resolved, and the Partner story moved forward a bit. Looking forward to the next season as I read Herron's latest book, which is fantastic.

I gasped, then sobbed, when I saw that painting. We have Down syndrome in our family, and she still talks about when she played an angel in a long-ago Christmas pageant at her church. And Down syndrome babies would have rarely survived when the painting was made. Perhaps the artist was memorializing a loved one. I think of tantrums as screaming, throwing toys and stamping feet. I think the writers may be trying to correct the mistaken impression the public has of Down syndrome - that of endlessly smiling placid people who never have a bad day. They show Reggie as someone who has a range of emotions, can think for himself and speak up when he thinks it's important. Mr. Sharma's story resonated with me as well, as my dad was a bomber navigator in WWII, flying missions out of England. For an idea of what these brave men endured during their missions, check out "Masters of the Air" coming to Apple TV in late January. I adore her - my favorite.