Wax Lion

I could see putting Josh's name on the order as an exercise similar to practicing signing Mrs Josh Chan. I'm going to spend the rest of the season guessing who will be the third person who left their spouse for a prostitute. That joke's gotta come in three, right? I do appreciate this show's willingness to resolve a story and see where that takes them. A lesser show would have dragged out stories like Paula's unhappy marriage or Rebecca lying about why she moved.

On that Bible mini-series Satan was played by a Moroccan actor, Mehdi Ouazzani (the one who looked like President Obama once in costume) but unlike Lucifer or Bedazzled I that was a clearly villainous devil and not an entertainingly roguish trickster. I can't think of a time the charming roguish trickster was played by a nonwhite actor. Maybe it'll come to me later.

Creole is also a linguistic term. Pidgin English is a form of English that's created in an immigrant community (or sometimes a community of different immigrant groups) while learning English. A Creole is what happens when those immigrants' children grow up using that Pidgin and it becomes its own dialect.

One interesting thing about The Expanse is that they did whitewash a character. Early on, fans of the book were giving the casting some side-eye because an African character was cast with a white actress but that faded once people saw the show because she dies in the first episode, making the whitewashing seem moot. (From what I hear the series has split the books up in their own ways, so maybe they expected her to have a larger role.) Then again, her boyfriend seems to be moving on to another black woman so maybe they did that to avoid jokes about him "having a type". On Crazy Ex-Girlfriend they do. There was a recent episode where Josh and Greg have a fight. Josh was really angry about Greg's tendency to be pretentious and patronizing but he did it by attacking Greg for bringing a craft beer instead of a "regular" beer for their trip to the beach.

Going back to Ronny's same-sex marriage piece, I think they missed an opportunity. Noah talked about wanting to go after clickbait and that CNN headline was pure clickbait. It looked like it was carefully phrased to be match the truth but suggest something far more extreme for attention.

I didn't finish Tuesday's show so I rewatched the whole thing. She said what happened, that Clinton campaign staffers declared victory to the press when there was a 3-4 point difference. When Clinton came out to speak, she avoided declaring victory. Rachel and Chuck Todd spent time discussing the topic. People complain that Rachel repeats herself too much but when she doesn't fill the show with different retellings of the same thing people end up getting offended that she said something that she didn't say.

I agree that I'd like that trope to be avoided but I liked the take on Velencia they had in the second episode, that Valencia is lonely underneath it all because she has a tendency to chase people away. Before Rebecca kissed her it seemed like there was a part of her who longed for some female friendship even if she didn't realize it. The group of friends she does have would probably forget about her if she broke up with Josh, unless she fought to keep them in her life. A lot of these characters are trying to cover up a deep loneliness to seem normal. Darryl doesn't know how to handle life without his family. Paula hates her family. Greg seems to just tolerate Josh, White Josh and Hector from their history, he doesn't seem to get companionship out of knowing them. It'd be interesting to explore that side of Valencia, though that's the toughest kind of loneliness to face. What did she do while Josh was in New York? Did she focus on work? Fill her time with dating other guys? (I imagine she probably dismissed men for trivial reasons, finding excuses to cover up that they're not enough like Josh.) Did she spend time with Greg, Hector and White Josh? This seems like the kind of show that wouldn't rely on such a tired shortcut like the evil girlfriend, so I want them to move on from it. I would like to see Josh and Rebecca get together. There's some great story possibilities in Rebecca finding herself dealing with Josh's incompatable traits. I don't see him going along the next time Rebecca decides on a sudden life change, like going vegan. But I also hope Valencia doesn't disappear when that happens because that's where she could get interesting.

oops duplciate

That's an interesting question. We know she was getting paid per student since she told Rebecca that she has to pay the studio 50% of what the students pay. However, Rebecca was helping her get her own retail space and came close to getting one Valencia really liked. The show never clarified if Valencia got that studio space before she got mad with Rebecca. Part of me thinks Valencia must have signed that lease. Otherwise, Rebecca would be using Valencia's business dreams as a way to get Valencia to talk to her. I rewatch this series way too much so I've absorbed those details. This might be the first DVD set I buy in years.

To be honest, I never questioned if Gabrielle Ruiz was attractive enough for Valencia but I do think Valencia is supposed to be a certain type of SoCal woman. She's not a 10 but she acts like it and demands to be treated like her good looks go to 11, which will take you farther in someplace like the Inland Empire. If she expected special treatment for her looks in the trendier parts of Pasedena she might get laughed at but that's probably why she doesn't get out of West Covina much. One of the things I'm enjoying is that this show captures the really suburban side of SoCal nicely. The cool parts are glamorous but the rest of the city leans heavily towards Applebees and Olive Gardens.

Yeah but it lasted a year on Hulu. Someone stateside probably could find another source if they're interested enough.

I always have to check the spelling to see if that's Neighbors the sitcom or Neighbours the Australian soap that had a short run on Hulu (apparently it didn't get enough views for Hulu to keep paying for it).

Flint knows whom to credit for this story. And I have to believe there is a Peabody award in Rachel's future for this. That is the gold medal standard in broadcast news! That would be amazing. Not just because Rachel has totally earned it but I do think a lot of MSNBC still doesn't value Rachel because she didn't get her show through the same paths as most cable anchors (especially the ones who get on TV by schmoozing the right kind of people as Scarborough and Halperin do). When I look at articles about the politics within MSNBC, I do get the impression there's a faction (one that frequently leaks to the media, hence all the stories about All In being on the verge of cancellation in the past few years) that sees Rachel and Chris as these dirty partisans who damage the network's respectability.

Plenty of people (in different jobs) have talked about how if a casting notice says "All ethnicities" only a small number of agents will share if with their nonwhite clients. I often wonder if "colorblind" casting is a matter of "We said the role was open to all ethnicities, not our fault only white people auditioned."

One of the nice things about Netflix is that they're bringing back full opening sequences. Degrassi: The Next Generation had a great one-take-style (is there a term for something that mimics the one-take but wasn't filmed on one take?) opening that gave each character a moment that summaried the character but the last few seasons saw it cut down to a short version. The new series, Next Class has brought back the "Whatever it takes" song with a social media themed montage of the characters that nicely express who they are. https://youtu.be/6qDHoKxhoeU

At the time of Law & Order dominance, NBC would also fill their saturdays with a repeat of each L&O. I hung out with a friend as she watched them. Put together I thought it was really clear how formualic the three were (though I feel like SVU has gotten more rapey since then) but she enjoyed them so I did bit my tongue. I don't understand how one can marathon it.

With The X-Files, Dutchovny had a more notable resume when he started but by the time it came to renegotiate contracts Dutchovny and Anderson were equal draws. For The X-Files movie they were paid the same (though I think I read they both took a big pay cut for the second one, in exchange for the back end).

With One Day at a Time getting a reboot I finally looked up the lyrics for the theme song since I was pretty sure it didn't actually go "Whomp on you knees, do it please for your blue eyed baby" (The actual lyric is "Get up on your feet, (get on your feet) somewhere there's music playing")

The only reason it came up in the Democratic debate was because two of the candidates brought it up when asked if there was anything else they wanted to bring up. The media doesn't seem to care, either... aside from Rachel.

Two popular UK soaps Coronation Street and EastEnders have a similar sensibility. There's a few really good looking people but overall the cast looks like people you'd see in a regular neighborhood. I think UK broadcasters care less about fandoms popping up over an actors' looks. (OTOH, there's another UK soap, Hollyoaks, where the cast is very young -- it's focused has varied between a college and high school -- and plays up the sex like a US soap would, except that the older characters are allowed to look their age and the heavier characters aren't made into sidekicks for their thinner friends.) As for Coupling, while I do find Jay Harrington and Colin Ferguson hot, they can't compare to Richard Coyle and Ben Miles for me.

Ah! Some good examples! I was thinking of shows like Breaking In and The Naked Truth that turned into different shows with several cast members gone and new ones added, but I suspect that's not done as much nowadays. More likely, they'll do what 30 Rock did and let a cast member sink into the background. Maybe big changes aren't done so much these days. Even Mork & Mindy went through those kinds of changes (the second season got a whole new supporting cast, as did the third) despite being a hit. I can never remember which show was Cashmere Mafia and which one was Lipstick Jungle. I remember Lipstick Jungle had a theme song that had "Read my lips" Otherwise, I know I liked the one that had Kim Raver (I think that's the one with Brooke Shields, Paul Blackthorne and Lindsay Price?) better of the two, it was the show that made me learn Raver's name because her performance was seriously great.

Along those lines... has there been a show that was barely renewed and put through a bunch of changes for its second season and improved? As a general rule, that leads to disaster, can anyone think of a case where the show wasn't better off cancelled after one season?

I was going to wonder if L&O's streaming rights are in a similar spot as The Simpsons were a few years ago, where they had to wait for syndication deals to run out but if it was on Netflix, that can't be the case.

The CW/Netflix deal ends soon and presumably the parties involved are renegotiating. However, The CW's owners are making noise about creating a streaming service just for CW shows: http://www.businessinsider.com/cbs-and-time-warner-are-working-to-create-a-cw-streaming-service-2016-1 This follows a NYT report (unfortunately the link I had is now dead) where the Warner CEO suggested he wanted to keep DC's shows off of streaming services for a few years so that people will watch on TV or on DVD. And now, Hulu has all 8 episodes of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend online. While that makes sense as a way to promote the show, I think this is the first time Hulu has offered more than five current episodes of a CW show at a time. (IIRC, Hulu promoted Jane the Virgin last winter by making the first five episodes available then rotating later episodes in.) That might be another sign that CW plans on pulling away from Netflix since the five episode limit makes The CW's shows more valuable to Netflix (the more people who didn't get the chance to watch the show when it aired, the more people might want to watch it on Netflix). http://www.vulture.com/2013/10/fx-turner-netflix-battle-for-tv-streaming-rights.html

Eh, the Emmy voters are people who work in TV and don't have time to watch TV. They vote for stuff they're sure is respectable like period dramas and movie actors who have dignified TV with their presence. (Seriously, Ellen Burstyn was nominated for what was basically a cameo role one.) Anyway, Hulu previously teased a CXG catchup but that seemed to be a mistake. However, they now have all 8 episodes, no subscription required.