Danny Franks

I think Holt was just disapproving of such outlandish frivolity in the workplace. 'A flute in the office? Why, that's so insane that it would surely only happen in the Wonka factory.'

Better than him dropping his trousers again, I guess. I have no interest in seeing him do either.

I've read some quotes from Allen's book, where he talks about Scarlett Johansson, Penelope Cruz and other women. It's about as gross as you'd expect. In fact, here's an excerpt from the NYT review: He's a real charmer, isn't he?

Supply Side Jesus strikes again.

Excellent. I wonder how it will tie into Marvel's other cosmic properties. Will we see the Guardians appearing? I could see Adam Warlock being in this movie, either as a villain or an ally for Carol.

So Reddit has a post of some woman trying to return a huge trolley full of toilet paper that she bought - presumably to try and price gouge by selling it on - but now doesn't want. There will be a lot of that in the coming weeks, as well as a lot of people throwing out food they panic bought but realistically wouldn't ever eat.

Yeah, that plus the ICE reference has some people online very upset. Predictably. I even saw someone say 'when did the show start doing this virtue signalling stuff? They never used to.' Talk about oblivious. This show has been socially aware and openly progressive from the outset, and has never shied away from topics like this.

The cold open was cute - acknowledging the various half-arsed ways that the show attempted to hide Melissa's pregnancies. Heh. I guess they also decided to half-arse keeping job roles straight as well, because I don't think a uniformed sergeant would be assigning cases to detectives. But they have Amy up on their floor all the time anyway, and now Terry's a lieutenant, they should just put Amy back in civvies and have her take Terry's old job. Bradley Whitford was looking very distinguished. That's a good look for him. I can't believe we've now met Jake's estranged grandfather and his weird, criminal half-sister, but *still* only met one of Amy's brothers. But at least Amy wasn't relegated to 'supportive spouse' while Jake dealt with his family issues. Gender reveal parties are terrible, but at least this was just a cake and not people littering or putting themselves in danger just to be the centre of attention. But storylines like this really highlight the limitations of a TV show - where was Jake's mother? Where were all of Amy's family? None of them would miss this, I'd assume. But because they're played by guest actors who may not be available, they're just not present. I kind of wish shows would avoid falling into the trap of exposing the artificiality of their world. Holt asking Terry if he thinks he's "William Wonka" was very funny. Because of course, the frivolity of playing the flute at work is akin to all that nonsense. They have JK Simmons on the show one episode, then riff on his Whiplash character the next. The reference to ICE and Hitchcock and Scully being enlightened enough to side with an undocumented immigrant was surprising, and really nice. Amy and Rosa 'punishing' them was a sweet moment. Also, the baby should have been a girl.

Definitely dysfunctional. But a walk in the park compared to Lee Adama/Kara Thrace. There's just something so dispiriting about Carter's character journey in E.R. He goes from that wide eyed, bouncy puppy of a med student to a sad, lonely man too scared to reach out to his wife in case he has to come to terms with the fact she doesn't care. I guess it all started to go downhill with Abby. What could have been, if Maria Bello had stayed, or if they'd cast and written Lucy better. Or if they'd just let Carter and Chen get together.

I was a little surprised that they actually stated Jake's age. Everyone in the show just seems indeterminate and ageless. Also, thirty-nine seems quite old, even though I'm turning that age myself next month. "I wouldn't care if they were playing actual music!" I'm totally taking that as a jab at Bruno Mars. Rightly so. Jake really sounded like Herr Flick when he did his 'Belgian' accent. Nice callback to Dillman being the best detective Holt has ever worked with. I guess poor Montez was always a close second... or not even that, if Minkoff is now Holt's number one. I feel like the show has used the 'Captain Holt discovers someone he admires has feet of clay' thing a few times, so I was disappointed that Dillman ended up being a fraud. That just fell flat. Boyle's parenting of Nikolaj is starting to depress me. But I guess you need the life stamped out of you to become a true Boyle. But this was a nice chance to show him being a good cop, and not being caught up in the drama like everyone else.

Anybody who wants to read something weighty and educational, give The Silk Roads: A New History of the World by Peter Frankopan a look: He abandons the Euro-centric history of the world that most of us are taught and focuses on the areas of Asia traditionally thought of as being the old silk road routes linking the 'civilised' worlds of China and Europe. Learning about Persian history, the rise of Christianity in the Middle East and its clashes with Zoroastrianism then Islam, the empires and nations that rose in areas we usually ignore unless things explode there, is really satisfying.

Yeah, I don't like watching these cancer stories at all. Just hearing the stories told by their loved ones was bad enough, but now that they're showing ones where the sufferers themselves have chronicled it on their phones, it's even tougher. That 'stand up comedian' on the third episode? I don't see how he makes a living at all.

So this isn't about a specific actor, but more an observation on the rise of a certain type of actor - the skinny, floppy haired, slightly nebbish, beta guy who is not relegated to 'best friend' roles. Timothee Chalamet, Finn Wolfhard, Alex Wolf, Wyatt Oleff, you could almost think these guys were brothers. It's interesting because they don't fit the established model of leading men, but all look like they have big careers ahead of them. I guess Jesse Eisenberg was the prototype.

This was fun. Not particularly weighty, despite the content, but fun. I do think they'd have been better with longer episodes and/or a longer season, to establish the relationships more. A lot of the relationship dynamics seemed very rushed - Syd/Stan, Syd/Dina, Dina/Brad - and I'd have liked more time devoted to them, particularly Syd/Dina if they're the central relationship of the show. The scene between Syd and Stan at the dance was very sweet. If Dina is dressing up like that for Syd then I think the girl's got a shot. I appreciated Syd's nice, girly dress coupled with Doc Marten boots. This show had a great soundtrack. Lots of fantastic 80s songs, capped off with Roxette. That end really was mindblowing, wasn't it? Damn.

I find it hard to believe that the high school QB would suffer such a loss in standing just because he had sex with an incredibly messed up, but incredibly hot girl. Like Lila Garrity once said, "it's different for girls." I feel like the school guidance counsellor should have long since realised she's not equipped to help Syd, and refer her to a psychiatrist. So she probably got her powers from her dad, somehow. But how did he get them? Military experiments?