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We’ve got questions, and you’ve (maybe) got answers! With another week of TV gone by, we’re lobbing queries left and right about lotsa shows including Stranger Things, Big Brother, The Orville and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds!
1 | Stranger Things finale spoilers! 🅐 If Eleven was in a sensory deprivation bath, shouldn’t Mike, Will & Co. have stopped talking to her and vice versa? 🅑 Why does superpowered Vecna physically lug Max around the Upside Down? 🅒 Speaking of Max, wasn’t her “death” super slow, only to allow El time to find the will to keep fighting? 🅓 Meanwhile, for how long were Steve, Nancy and Robin being choked against the stairwell wall…? (Nearly 30 minutes passed on-screen!) 🅔 And at the end of day, with all of Season 4 now consumed, wasn’t Jason & the Jocks’ meandering manhunt a pretty disposable D-story?
2 | Evil viewers: Is there any stretch of I-95 in the New York/New Jersey/Connecticut tri-state area in which there’s nearly no traffic — even in the dead of night?
3 | On The Chi, didn’t you think it would take a little longer for Trig’s — excuse us, Victor’s — record to be cleared so he could run for office?
4 | How much residual embarrassment did you feel for Today‘s Craig Melvin when he totally biffed the intro to the pyrotechnics at the Macy’s 4th of July Fireworks Spectacular?
5 | Did Only Murders in the Building‘s “Bunny’s last day” episode throw you a bit, with how much time passed between the podcasters catching Jan and Bunny turning up stabbed?
6 | Between Hulu’s Maggie and The Boys, is My Octopus Teacher having a moment? And did you recognize Maggie’s love interest Daniel as Madison’s hubby Elijah from This Is Us?
7 | Was anything more conspicuous (and presumably cost-saving!) this week than Ms. Marvel not actually showing Kamala climb a flight of hard-light platforms to go say goodbye to Kareem, yet showing her mom watching her do so? All as “bloop-bloop-bloop” sound effects played?
8 | Did The Challenge: USA contestant Enzo really throw shade at Leo for talking about cats too much, when Enzo called himself “The Meow-Meow” in the Big Brother house?
9 | Was the premiere of Big Brother 24 perhaps one of the most boring reality-TV episodes ever?
10 | Why would The Orville‘s Charly walk into a 2025 biker bar having any of what/who she’d encounter and what currency (e.g. strength/arm wrestling) they’d trade in? (Would you feel confident strolling into a 17th-century watering hole?) And where did she take motorcycle riding lessons?
11 | Did ABC’s Generation Gap make the older folks out there want to tear your hair out? Or is it just an accepted truth that a 14-year-old wouldn’t recognize Josie and the Pussycats, or know which band sang “Surfin’ USA”? Also, was the final Toddler’s Choice bonus round delightfully silly… or, frankly, a bit weird?
12 | Is ABC’s The Fatal Flaw quite possibly the dullest, cheapest-looking true crime series ever made?
13 | Star Trek: Strange New Worlds fans, how much did you love hearing an engineer calling out to Spock with a heavy Scottish accent? And how much would you pay for a cookbook of all of Captain Pike’s delicious dishes?
14 | Could Good Trouble‘s Jenna (played by Maiara Walsh) be a doppelgänger for Zoe Lister-Jones? Are you impressed by just how much she and Joaquin (Bryan Craig) look like they could actually be siblings in real life? Finally, how pleasantly surprised were you to see guest star Michael Cassidy?
15 | For All Mankind viewers, which each passing episode this season, are you hoping more and more that Danny gets lost in space?
16 | Between the reference to Falcon Crest earlier this season and this week’s shout-out to Jane Wyman, is it fair to say someone in The Boys writers’ room is a big fan of CBS’ circa-’80s primetime soap?
Hit the comments with your answers — and any other Qs you care to share!
9 – Big Brother premiere episodes are boring every year
The fact that there is no audience anymore in the room makes it very dull.
Total waste of time with the jock storyline, I’m fast-forwarding through all those scenes if I ever do a stranger things 4 rewatch.
I think a rewatch is needed if you have all those Stranger Things questions. They were all answered in the show overall. the first question alone is answered in season one, and continues throughout.
1. I was very unclear how Hopper torching the monsters in Russia effected Vecna and the bat things in the upside down.
Also Steve was holding an Axe the whole time they were in the house and throwing the fire cocktails at Vecna in the upside down. Steve just stood there. He had plenty of time to swing it and behead or seriously injure Vecna.
Yes, I couldn’t wrap my head around why they were standing around and didn’t do more. I guess he needed to survive.
5. Yep! In the finale, they made it seem like it was the very same night…
2 – I was wondering why they would pick I-95, which is a very busy interstate, for a lonely, deserted highway. This looked closer to one of the smaller parkways in upper Westchester County. I don’t think trucks are allowed on any of those anyway. This should be some fake side road instead.
11 – Generation Gap – the toddler thing at the end was ridiculous!!! The whole show disappointed and feels like it needs rethinking in order to continue. I was really looking forward to it since the concept is great and Kimmel and Ripa are usually reliable for quality. But the game play mechanics made no sense. It made no sense how the turntaking was working and who could ring in. And, the questions really weren’t a good match for the ages of the actual kids. It was such a mess! And, then, the bonus round! Insane! It implies, too, that the only eligible contestants will be ones with younger siblings. And, now that it’s been seen, won’t future contestants just coach their “toddler” to always pick the car … or else?!?!?
ps…..and by “always pick the car” I mean threaten the kid to pick the thing they do NOT want, since it seems like the running gag here is supposed to be that the toddler will always pick the opposite of what the adult would consider the better prize. That running gag would get super tired anyway.
All episodes for the season have already been recorded. But after that, I don’t know how they continue with that gimmick. My guess is they come up with something else.
@kje
Why do you go right to the “or else” option? Did you not have a good childhood. My first thought was the parents would bribe the kid to pick the car. “If you pick the car, we will buy you the other prize”.
And I think that method would be much more successful.
13. Even though the episode was technically set several years in the future, hearing Scotty yell at Spock felt weired. It was a bit too soon after loosing Hemmer. But I know he’ll eventually be there.
What exactly did Craig Melvin do? I did not watch.
1-D – I think the Russia story was the most disposable. It was a snore until the very end. The Jocks, otoh, were a necessary element to show that the Hawkins crew had to work against two forces — the human element and the monsters. Also it is worth it to see that humans can be just as bad and scary as monsters in their own way. The jocks whipped up the frenzy against Eddie with the Satanic Panic and contributed to the pathos of his death since he died without vindication. Also the one jock ran down an 11 year old girl, tackled her and threatened to break her arm all because they decided to become self styled vigilantes. Since Vecna wasn’t going to be defeated you needed a bit of a cathartic win against a bad guy and they along with Papa was it.
I miss falcon crest snd would be up for a continuation/next generation. But they would probably wsnt lamas to come back so, nah.
As for Stranger Things…
A) They’ve been communicating with El while in sensory deprivation since season 1.
B) Maybe Vecna is conserving his strength for the fight. Maybe he is still a little tired mentally from El throwing him around before. Maybe he likes to be dramatic and take his time.
C)Max’s ‘death’ didn’t occur until after El and co. had ‘defeated’ Vecna. So if you’re asking why Vecna took his time killing Max so that he basically couldn’t complete it before El fought back, you might as well ask why do villains monologue instead of simply killing the heroes? Because they just do.
D) When Hopper was being choked by the vines in Season 2, he was down there nearly a whole day so I think the vines could hold people down without choking them too much. But even if it’s implausible, they’ve already gone past the point of implausible with Hopper being choked much longer by the vines so it doesn’t matter. Also it’s never clear that just because that’s how much time passed on screen that all those moments weren’t happening at the same time. It’s conceivable that all of that happened in the span of five to ten minutes or even less with time slowing down in El’s mind during her confrontation with Vecna to allow for even more time to have the talk while the others are in danger for a shorter amount of time.
E)The point of Jason and the jocks was to keep pressure on Eddie by people outside of working for the law. Without them, he’s not exactly fearing for his life and staying hidden. Jason wasn’t looking to put him in prison, he was looking to kill him. He got a whole town to hate him enough to form a mob. Without them, it lowers Eddie’s sacrifice. Do you want to make Eddie’s sacrifice mean nothing? Some things require looking at the bigger picture before you dismiss them.
11 – I mean my 14 year olds knew that kind of stuff (heck their first concert was The Beach Boys)
At first I thought that The Orville was setting up for Scott Grimes departure and I’m glad that wasn’t the case! Even though the humor from the first 2 seasons is pretty much gone, I am really enjoying this season on Hulu. I hope they get renewed for another!!
14. Who’s Zoe Lister Jones and Michael Cassidy?
Generation Gap needs a serious retooling. It was quite maddening.
The constant incorrect answers. The age difference between the 2 kids. It’s almost a generation gap right there. They really need to be similar in age.
Leaving the choice of the final prize up to basically a toddler.
It’s got decent bones for a good show. Just wish they’d thought it out a bit more.