absnow54

Where late night still shines is in politics. There will be more urgency to get those shows back on track when the primaries get under way early next year.

Personally, it's because of the sequel trilogy. There was so much supplemental material for that, and it barely bled into the films, so you ended up with stellar exposition like "Somehow, Palpetine returned." I think most of the Star Wars shows have done a good job standing on their own (with the exception of Book of Boba Fett, which turned into Mandalorian season 2.5) Since I haven't gotten around to watching Rebels in full, it feels like I've missed a lot, because I know there's a lot of existing material for these characters, but maybe that's not the case.

I want to say the only instances of mind reading was done by Vader and Kylo Ren, and they were only vague interpretations of thoughts and feelings. Luke thinking about protecting his sister. Rey hiding the map with BB-8. It's not a photographic vision though, and I think it's more tied to the dark side of the Force. Although, obviously Ahsoka does not strictly adhere to the Jedi's rules for what is "good" and what is "bad."

I never got into Rebels the way I got into The Clone Wars. I watched a few episodes of Rebels, so I recognized most of the characters, but had no idea where that show left off. So with that perspective, I did not think they did a good job introducing this story arc. I found it relied too heavily on watching the last season of Rebels (or at least I assume it did.) They were telling us that these characters had history, but I wasn't feeling the chemistry. I think they should have used the prologue for whatever Ezra's sacrifice was (I only vaguely know the storyline) but I guess they want to save Thrawn's introduction for later. Another thing I hated was the colored contacts. I know that Hera had very striking blue eyes, but I could have lived with Mary Elizabeth Winstead's natural color. Rosario Dawson's aren't as distracting, but that's another unnecessary detail I don't think they needed. The other thing I found striking was the score. The scenes were either completely silent and then had very abrupt intense music, and then was silent again. I don't know, The Mandalorian and Andor made making Star Wars shows look effortless, but this one definitely felt rougher, like they made this show to fill the Disney+ lineup, similar to Book of Boba Fett. I'm going to stick it out, especially if but as a non-Rebel viewer, this one feels harder to get into.

The Cranky Nurse yesterday was played by Josh Swickard's (Chase) wife Lauren, so I have a feeling she'll turn into an evil accomplice in no time. I kind of hope they go with the unexpected twist of keeping her as a boring bureaucratic rule follower, and make Nice Nurse the evil one.

It honestly looks like he let Felicity cut it.

It's a grim thought, but I actually think social media/influencing might be these kids' saving grace. Joy needs to generate content, and she knows what type of content gets the most clicks. I don't agree with exploiting their children to generate content, but hopefully some good will come out it, as the kids will have access to services they wouldn't have otherwise explored, had it not been for youtube clicks.

The most obvious option for generating the most buzzworthy content would be a 100% AI generated product, but then they'll show their hand on where AI technology actually is, and how desperately they still need real writers and actors to generate content.

But aren't all the broadcast networks owned by Disney, Universal, and Paramount? They've been adjusting by airing "streaming exclusive" shows like Yellowstone on CBS.

I can't remember how the timelines overlap, but if they wanted to reach maximum troll potential, they'd make Ted the dad.

Angus Cloud has passed away.

When Solo came out and there were whispers of a Lando spinoff, that was my first thought for a series. Lando conning his way into running Cloud City, and unexpectedly starting to care about it.

I looked it up, and in 2008, Garin Wolf took over as head writer of GH during the strike. He was an active soap writer at the time, but it looks like he hasn't worked since leaving GH in 2012. Not sure if he voluntarily retired, or if working through the strike was a career ending move.

Yeah, but I'm not going to double feature Paw Patrol and Saw with my kids. The juxtaposition of the two series is funny, but not many people would actually follow up on watching the Paw Patrol movie, unless their kids made them. My kids barely got into Paw Patrol, but even just the handful of episodes we watched was enough for me. The Venn diagram of Saw and Paw Patrol fans, to me, are those who like to both watch and experience torture.

I got the feeling they're confident they'll get picked up for a season 3, because they didn't touch upon the father mystery at all. I thought Ian was still a player, and the most likely father. Sid, Jesse, Drew, and Charlie were all technically ruled out in the Valentine's Day episode when the son pointed out the dad wasn't even in the story. Ian appears in that episode, but isn't in any of the story scenes. I do think they're foreshadowing a potential Sid/Sophie pairing, since Hannah was quick to cast her as "the other woman," though. Speaking of, I'm bummed that Val and Charlie are for all intents and purposes "endgame" because I thought Val and Sid have the best chemistry. I don't really care for any of the main pairings they've presented. Jesse and Sophie's Big Kiss fell flat for me, because of it. I was pretty ambivalent towards Ellen at the start, but started really liking her in the last three episodes. Even if the Ellen's bad haircut story was a really bizarre punchline that went nowhere. Maybe it's because she has a real, steady job, as a 30 something, and isn't playing a pretend adult like everybody else (except for Sid, who is also a fav.)

Yeah, kind of like how the bakers start each round trying to find the cake. I know this isn't a serious baking competition (the judges are always Netflix personalities or Mikey Day's friends) but it kind of bothered me that Elizabeth won (even though she was by far one of the most talented) because she picked the same style cake every time. If they had one consistent professional as a judge, I feel like she would have been forced to take more risks.

On the subject of AI, the tool is trained using existing material. Even if an actor's direct likeness isn't used (which is a slippery slope, as we're seeing a lot of dead actors come back to life on film), footage will be scraped to train the AI to capture things like facial tics or inflection in voice to emulate different emotions. They don't even need actors to voice things anymore. Deepfakes have gotten very advanced.

I’ve never heard of her outside of the show, but the way the contestants spoke of her, it seemed like she was just a ringer who was doing this for fun, and perhaps her early exit was prearranged. I don’t love this new format, especially when they have to pick multiple cakes each round. There’s no time management, so the cakes on the far end get the advantage, since they’re mostly working from right to left as they evaluate. Episode 3 with staggering every other cake evened the playing field, but given how often the judges ran out of time, and then immediately pointed out the cakes, it didn’t seem like they were tricked.

Jennifer Lawrence did seem noticeably more plastic in her latest movie/promotion. I thought she went a little heavy on her lips, and her forehead looks botoxed to kingdom come (or maybe that's the result of a lift.) I hope she doesn't mess with her face too much more. She had a baby recently, and the body changes a lot after that, and it looks like she went a little extreme trying to combat it.

Interestingly enough, not all AFTRA members would be a part of the strike. There's a separate contract for talk show hosts, gameshow hosts, variety performers, and daytime actors, so Soap stars, SNL cast members, and actors who host game shows will still be contractually obligated to work.

I thought Milo was good in Prom Pact. He's 22, so well past the child actor phase. He'll be stuck in his high school phase for another 5-10 years, though, with his bone structure.

I was thinking the same thing, but agree, Jesse Armstrong was very intent on this being a tragedy, and there's only so many times we can watch Kendall try to acquire Waystar, only for everything to fall apart. I'd love follow up on the election, and to see how long Tom stays CEO before GoJo does a re-org, and of course, Greg's lawsuit with Greenpeace.

The more I think about Shiv's sudden turn on Kendall, the more I think of the moment right before the boardroom when Karolina pulls her aside and asks her to get rid of Hugo so they can make a real change with the company. Shiv was making a series of emotional decisions. Mattson was going to screw her over, Tom was going to be named CEO, and I think that she was blinded by Kendall's luster, because although Kendall is a mess, he can channel Logan's magnetism when he needs to. I feel like Karolina's comments was Shiv's "We're all bullshit" moment, because Shiv has been given the opportunity to make a change, and she folded to Logan's way of things. Shiv herself can't fit a whole woman in her head, because she's a product of the world her father created. Shiv is bullshit, Roman already realized he was bullshit at the funeral, now Kendall had to be called out too. He's an unpredictable addict who has an involuntary manslaughter charge lingering behind him like a ghost. They couldn't make him CEO.

I’m surprised they left that plot dangling, because they should still be on the hook for that. All through the siblings bonding in Barbados, I just knew their final blowout would be brutal. You don’t give such a happy lull in the middle of an episode without wrecking it 10 minutes later.

They realized there was no topping the eulogy Connor gave for Mo, so they didn’t even try.