smrou

I'm going to agree with this and extend it to wishing there were teens on TV who don't have sex not because they're not ready but because...they just don't. The opportunity doesn't present itself or whatever. The thing is, a lot of people have sex while they're in high school, but not everyone does and it's not some vanishingly small percentage of kids who don't. And for some of those people it's because they've made the personal decision to wait, but in a lot of cases it's simply that they don't date in high school. And I'd kind of like to see that more. I think this largely comes down to the fact that I get tired of storylines for teenagers revolving so heavily around romance and I'd prefer to see other things emphasized. Particularly on a show like this when there's so much other stuff to mine. Jude's relationship with Connor interests me more because it has been part of Jude figuring out his sexual identity than because of the romance (though I will admit to thinking they make an adorable couple). Callie has so much going on with her difficult past and her out-of-nowhere biodad and family and yet it's like every time we turn around she's got some other romantic entanglement. When Mariana first started interacting with Mat I really hoped she'd rebuff him (Mat has turned out to be a good guy, I think, but initially I thought he treated her in a condescending way) and keep her focus on the other things that interest her instead, but no of course they ended up as a couple. I just get so bored with it.

These clues were, like, offensively bad. I mean basically they're like, "She's real fuckable!" In general I'm frequently surprised by how long it takes the clue-givers to mention a single movie or TV credit. Don't dilly-dally, folks. Throw out race and sex and then get to listing roles (if it's an actor). Like, it would probably be better to pause for a second and try to think of a couple of roles rather than jumping right in immediately with generic descriptions like, "Really attractive" or "Great actor".

So in the discussion of how weird it is to listen to TV shows while running, I'm pretty sure that's something I've heard of people doing before. Though I do think it's pretty weird. I mean, I am almost never not on my laptop while watching TV, so I admit that for most shows I listen to them more than I watch them (I was just talking to a friend the other day about how this prevents me from watching subtitled TV shows, even though there are several that interest me, because it would require me to actually look at the screen the whole time), but as Joe said...I do actually look up from time to time. I thought the Abbey Road thing was understandable, even though for me it would have been extremely easy. It's not obscure, but at the same time it's also a know-it-or-don't thing and I thought it was obvious pretty quickly that Jay just didn't know enough about the Beatles to get it. Not getting Legoland with the clues that were given was pretty ridiculous, on the other hand. Yes, I think this is overly chaotic, too. Also, a reason I don't love that game as a viewer is that you can't really play along. I tried to look at what the people were acting out and figure out if I'd be able to guess, but since I could hear the song it didn't actually give me the opportunity to try to figure it out on my own.

Kinda like how some people aren't that familiar with Ariana Grande. Or Sienna Miller. I could list a whole bunch of Maggie Smith roles, however! Having said that, I did not recognize her in that pictures game. In general I do poorly at the visual games, I think. Well, not the ones that are like movie posters, but ones that rely on recognizing faces. The one where they mash two faces together, this one, and Lil' Picassos are all games I pretty much suck at. At least this one had the advantage that if I could work out one of the people I could use their name to figure out the other. So, for example, The Owen/Rebel Wilson one was super easy, I thought. And a couple others were pretty easy, but I didn't think the game as a whole was overly easy. Jay Pharoah was just TERRIBLE at Where Ya Goin. Holy crap. So bad.

I mean, I don't know if I'm forgetting some limitations on clues, but couldn't you just say that its capital is Stockholm? I'd probably mention Scandinavia. Perhaps gummy fish. Someone brought up massages as a possible clue. Oh! And ABBA! But of course all of this is so much easier to think of when you're not under pressure in the game. In that situation sometimes your brain gets stuck on something (like the notion that Heidi is from Sweden) and it's impossible to get it unstuck.

Dit.to.

As soon as Heather said that her canon submission was one of her favorite nighttime soap episodes, before she even named the series I yelled out, "Kimberly rips off her wig!". And obviously I was not disappointed. That was a fantastic canon submission, the clips were all phenomenal, and of course it was unanimously inducted because...how could anyone deny that it is one of the most memorable moments in TV history? So crazy. So great.

So did Rita, with the chocolate-cake-slash-habit speech! Sooo....basically, my two favorite characters on the show are the people who call Callie on her shit! :D Yeah, Jude has called Callie out on this more than once and Rita at least once. They both seem to get what Callie is about and I think they're both exactly right. Which is part of why, as possibilities said in her first post in this thread, if the writers choose now to write a Brandon/Callie romance in a way where it's supposed to be in any way good for either of them or something to be celebrated then that would feel like an enormous about-face from the story the show has been constructing to this point.

You don't actually have to drink all you can. You can just have a cup.

Please correct me if I'm remembering this wrong, but the way I recall this happening was that she only called Robert "Dad" as a way to essentially throw him a bone because she felt secure that her adoption was going to go through, and then it was only after the rug was pulled out from under her and she was devastated that she kissed Brandon. Which is kind of how it's always been, that what she wants is the family and she only goes to Brandon when either she feels like that's hopeless and there's nothing left to lose or when she's sabotaging herself. Every time Callie and Brandon have been together it has been very clearly depicted as them (particularly Callie) making bad, self-destructive choices. Which is why I have never believed for even a moment that the two of them have the basis for an actual healthy, long-lasting relationship (even if they weren't 16, though since they are even if the circumstances in which they've gotten together weren't epically fucked up I'd still think they have almost zero chance of lasting) and therefore cannot support choosing that relationship over the family relationship with Stef and Lena. Because it is just SO much better for her to be their daughter than to be their son's ex-girlfriend (which...I mean, let's face it). Yes. Exactly.

Well, I'm glad I made the choice to record the ep and read the thread before watching. I'm definitely not going to watch now. Yep. This is a terrible story decision, I cannot support it even a little bit, and I'm done with the show for sure. It's just unbelievably stupid and it makes me really sad that the writers decided to go that way. And man, I hope Jude finds out and flips the fuck out at Callie because she sure as hell deserves it and I can't even imagine how hurtful it will be for him to learn that she chose this self-destructive relationship with Brandon over a settled and legal family with him and Stef and Lena.

Tara mentioning that Sky was played by Carol Burnett's daughter Carrie Hamilton got me interested so I googled her and it turns out she played Pam on the XF episode "Monday". I had no idea! Of course, that little piece of trivia becomes a little less fun when it's accompanied by the information about her dying so young, but hey, I learned something interesting. Yes, this is maybe the least believable and most hilarious reason a pair of grownups would ever be ambivalent about moving their family. "Isn't going to flush" is clearly not an actual expression, but I'll admit my first reaction to it was that it's not a bad way to convey that something is a giant turd.

Wait a second...you don't think you can handle milk?! There are certain things that I consider absolute essentials at the Minnesota State Fair, and the milk and fried cheese curds are among those. I don't know if I've ever had a cookie there, actually. My dessert of choice is the mini donuts.

I really like the Wet Hot American Summer movie and I have watched all of the new series. I rewatched the movie first and then I watched all of the series in one go, and I honestly think that was a mistake because I think it was just too much of it to take in at once so by the end I was kind of tiring of it. I think I would have enjoyed it more if I'd split it up and watched one or two episodes a day, probably. I did enjoy it, but just didn't love it the way I'd hoped.

This is random and unimportant, but I've been relistening to old EHG episodes and listened to this one today, after which I went to The Canon page and noticed that Clyde Bruckman's Final Repose (which was inducted in this episode) is not listed.

Yeah, this is kind of how I feel. I will absolutely not claim to be up on pop music--far from it--and my internet reading is presumably significantly less than yours, Tara, but I spend what I think most people would consider an excessive amount of time reading and looking at stuff online almost exclusively in the pop culture realm, usually while simultaneously listening to podcasts also largely about pop culture (this, by the way, is part of why I'm not up on pop music, since I listen to podcasts almost exclusively), and I also spend most of my days surrounded by teenagers and I actually do pick up a fair bit from them. Yet until reading this thread I could have named zero of her songs. I do know "Bang Bang" quite well, but I'm pretty sure I would have described it as a song by "Jessie J and Nicki Minaj and...crap, somebody else I can't remember." So anyway, my point is really only that I would consider myself plenty qualified to be a strong contestant on this show and there's no way in hell I would have gotten Ariana Grande and therefore I consider her to be a more difficult celebrity to guess than the vast majority that they've had in that final round. That doesn't mean I think she was an unfair name to throw up there, but I do think most of the names they've had are on a level of fame at least one step above her. Having said that, I still think there's more to say about Ariana Grande than about freaking Sienna Miller.

To think, I was so convinced the show wouldn't be renewed and instead they were just waiting until their birthday to announce it. Thanks for making us all sweat, folks!

I also think there's a difference between knowing the names and being able to come up with the names from clues. I know all those names and with Renner I'd have some hope of guessing it because I do know a number of his film (and TV, since I was one of the five people who watched The Unusuals) roles. But for whatever reason his name is one that I have trouble coming up with. But for Sienna Miller and Ariana Grande they're the kinds of celebrities where I've heard of them, I know some very basic info about them, but I just never ever think of them and so they wouldn't come to mind. This as opposed to, like, Anthony Hopkins, where I think there are many ways a person could get me to guess his name (though Hannibal Lecter is the easiest and most obvious). Ditto Alan Rickman (I probably would have got him from the GalaxyQuest clue if I took the strategy of just listing the whole cast, but Snape would be the best bet for most people I think). I liked that Zachary tried to correct him.

I'm pretty sure at this point I love the aftershow podcast much more than Hollywood Game Night itself (because the podcast is so great not because I have any problem with HGN). I was straight-up crying from laughing during the whole "grosh" (spelling?) conversation. As some others have said, I think it was more a failing of Yvette than the civilian that she didn't get the White House, though perhaps she was just stuck on the notion that it would be cities and not more specific locations in that game. But after that the civilian sucked at that game. Seriously, there was some difficult names! I'm pretty sure there is literally nothing a person could say that would clue me in to Sienna Miller or Ariana Grande. Like...I know their names, and that's about it, so if you can't say their names I'm SOL. Renner's one where I do know who he is, but it's probably a 50/50 gamble that I'd be able to come up with his actual name on any given day. Like Joe and Tara I was so sad when Yvette said that she was trying to rein in her intense, competitive game-playing nature. That's the best thing about her! Well, that combined with the fact that she's actually good. So I was glad to see that at least by the end of the show she was as intense as ever.

I don't actually think divorce is at all likely with Stef and Lena. Yes, they're having relationship problems, but I think they're pretty far from that point. I mean, if Lena actually does start an affair with Monte then I'd retract that, but I also don't think that's likely. Even if their relationship were in worse shape than it currently is I just don't think the writers would go that far since they are so much the center and heart of the show. I suspect what will happen is that Stef will pick up on the intimacy that seems to have developed between Lena and Monte, suspect there might be an affair, and that will shock her into realizing they really do have problems in their marriage that need to be prioritized and worked on now. Because the whole issue lately has been that Lena recognizes their problems and Stef kinda sorta agrees but is willing to put them on the back burner all the time. I don't know what is going on with the Rita/Carmen/Brooke situation. The idea that Rita actually punched Carmen in the face seems so outlandish, and Rita a)was the person who said they had to call the police (if it was her I'd think she'd be more likely to try to sweep it under the rug rather than get authorities involved) and b)denied it so fiercely. So that makes me think Carmen and Brooke are lying. But if so, I can't imagine why when Carmen made such a point earlier about how much Rita had helped her. I dunno. It's just weird. And I genuinely don't know if I can stomach to watch next week to see what happens with these storylines. I'll probably wait and read what people say here before I watch.

I don't even know what to say about this episode because I'm so freaking disgusted by the promo for next week. I think I am actually done with this show.

Steven Universe stuff is constantly all over my dash on Tumblr. It definitely makes me interested in checking it out, but historically I have basically no attention span for animated shows. Maybe I actually will watch.

No joke, hearing the literally 20-second clip of Coach Taylor's motivational speech in that FNL canon submission made me tear up. That show/character has more power over me than it should. Yikes. Also, now I want to go back and rewatch it all. At least they didn't replace it with something truly disgusting like green apple *grumbleskittlesgrumble*.

Okay, I haven't listened to the whole episode yet but I had to come here immediately after the Starburst commercial to say this: Sarah is right and Tara is wrong wrong WRONG. Strawberry is clearly the best Starburst flavor. Also I had no idea there was a time when there was no Cherry (the second best flavor).

I'm the "godmother" (using quotes because we haven't had any sort of official ceremony--it's just how I'm referred to) of my best friend's child and for us that has no religious implications (I'm an atheist, her wife's an atheist, and she's non-practicing) but is just meant to denote a special relationship. To us what it basically means is that we're considered family despite not being legally or biologically related. I'm also the person who would care for the child if both parents die, but that's a whole separate thing relating to legal issues and their will. Anyway, the godparent discussion did come up in the lunchroom at work one time and one of my coworkers said that a friend (or sibling?) had asked her to be the godmother to her child and she was confused by the request because she's an atheist and figured therefore she was basically not eligible. I think in the end she declined, but I think if her friend asked her, a known atheist, to be the godmother then like my friend she wasn't actually concerned with her taking a big role in her spiritual or religious guidance. Meanwhile, another coworker is Catholic but not devout. She has three kids and they have godparents and went through the whole baptism and everything, but she said she doesn't actually expect that the godparents will necessarily be actively involved in the spiritual lives of the kids. Again, they're just people who are close to them. So I think even if people are Catholic they don't necessarily treat the godparent role the same way the Church thinks of it. Which I suppose doesn't have much to do with why the priest was okay with Mariana being godmother, but at least the way that Mariana and Ana were treating the whole issue seems consistent with what I've seen and heard outside of TV. In fact, there are two very different contexts in which I've recently heard stories about people adopting adults. One was in a rebroadcast of a This American Life episode where one of the stories was about two men who met in prison and formed such a strong bond that one of them adopted the other. Here's a link to an article about them. The other was about a gay couple who used adoption as a way to form a legal family relationship when marriage or civil union was not available to them.