starvenger

What promises does he have, when the party has no real platform except bashing Liberals None that I know of, but then it's hard to follow when you're living in Houston. But considering that Day shot himself in the foot with that promise (and Rick Mercer had a field day with it), maybe not promising anything is not a bad idea for Harper. BTW, is it true that Layton is promising 2 extra holidays per year?

Svend withdrew, and Martin appointed the former BC premier to run there. The term you're looking for is Constitutional Monarchy. Myself, I'll probably vote Liberal, but I see them as a thin majority, as the Reformative Alliance seems to have some legs. But then, their leader isn't making idiotic promises like Stockwell "Doris" Day did. As for the NDP, does Layton even have a seat right now?

Yeah, Claremont's second run was rather uninspired. The mutant you're thinking of is Maggot, who got killed off over in Weapon X. I don't think that any other character has been drawn as inconsistently as Maggot. But then again, I don't think that there's been an X-Man/New Mutant who's had a lamer power. At least Cypher could hack into computers.

You like ass? I'd have never guessed... Kelly, don't like her face, but the junk in the trunk is good.

Honestly? Whedon and Austen both do the snarky stuff quite well (check out their first reloaded issues), and Nicieza and Lobdell have done tongue-in-cheek humour just as well also. And if you're excusing Morrison's last two arcs, why not just excuse most of Austen and Joe Casey's runs then? The problem is that Morrison put a lot of stock in the shock value of Magneto being Xorn, and taking over the world, but didn't have anything beyond that. So what we then got is two arcs where nothing really happens, and the stuff that does is inane enough that the writers and editors are already undoing it. Basically, that one thing managed to turn me off of his entire run. That was his attempt at making his mark on the X-books, and quite simply, it didn't work. And I'm not saying that Austen is a great writer either. He's a decent journeyman, and he CAN write a good story, but - as hehateme2k2 pointed out - he seems to manage to fuck them up by juxtaposing good ideas with bad ones. For instance, he's the first person other than Peter David to make Havok interesting, but manages to involve him with a character more annoying and hated than Stacy X. He brings in Northstar, and then doesn't use him. He gives Nightcrawler the spotlight, and churns out The Draco. He adds Juggernaut to the team... actually he hasn't screwed that up yet, amazingly.

Heh. Austen is competent enough, but certainly he's not been the greatest writer ever. He tends to be the guy who gets to do the editorial dirty work though, and with Whedon and Claremont following their own agendas, you can see why he's still writing an X-Book. Morrison's run is incredibly overrated. I think that the "E is for Extinction" arc was pretty good, but everything else was only ok, or horrid (the last two arcs, although I give the guy credit for trying to use a somewhat lame Byrne plotline from Avengers West Coast). When it comes down to it, he was really not a whole lot better than Austen, but since Morrison's is a fanboy's favourite, it's the greatest thing since sliced bread. Lobdell and Nicieza wrote some good stories, but suffered from having to work during the crossover/big event-wacky Harras era. That, combined with the fact that they wrote just about every Marvel title, gave us a decent, if unspectacular run on the title. Also, I'd say that Nicieza put a little bit more effort into his babies, New Warriors and X-Force. The best is still the end of Claremont's first run. Yes, the stories were getting staler, but they were still damn good stories. So my pick: Claremont.

Didn't like the ending. Pretty solid otherwise.

I've heard that this was made with about 10% of the original's budget, so I'm thinking that FX took up the bulk of that. It's apparently pretty good for what it is, though.

Yeah, Buffalo had what TMQ would call a "pass-wacky" offence. In fact, I'm pretty sure he had a "run, don't pass" item on the Bills every single week that he had a column up. Anyways, I can't say that I'm a Bills fan - in fact, I hate the Bills with a passion - but you gotta think that any offensive coordinator with a clue will do a better job over last year. It can't possibly be that hard to change up the playcalling from week to week, right?

Well, he was pretty much channelling the Joker and the Trickster, so it wasn't a stretch by any means for him. But that leads me to say James Earl Jones in the Star Wars Trilogy. And kudos to anyone who has to do those Twin Peaks-type scenes where you need to speak backwards so that they can play the tape backwards and have you sounding really fucked up speaking "normal". The thing was that Costner KNEW that he couldn't do one so he didn't even bother trying. So, worst accent, probably not. Worst acting, well, that's a different story. He was probably the worst Robin Hood ever, and that includes that Disney fox Robin and Rocket Robin Hood...

I might as well pimp the Astonishing X-Men comic for those needing a Whedon fix then. I have some issues with how he insisted on the return of the spandex but overall it's a pretty good first issue. Plus John Cassaday's artwork gives a "movie"-type feel to the book. Oh, and then go to the Comics forum and discuss it!!

Ah yes, the Gobots. Great, die-cast toys (the regular sized ones anyways. The large ones sucked ass.), incredibly crappy cartoon. I mean, sure, you're using the cartoon to sell the toys, but c'mon, put more than 5 seconds of thought into it, will ya?

I've watched every ep so far, and I'm still amazed that any competition where Tone Loc is a judge can be taken seriously. The judge, Briggs, has some great one-liners. One of my favourites was when he called an auditioner a MILF - F standing for "Fly to Hollywood". Maybe. But Vitamin C had the best comment when she told a GOOD singer "Some day, you'll thank me for what I'm about to tell you. NEXT!!" Anyways, I thought for sure that Frank (the incredibly thin guy who wore heels) would win. Now, it's got to be Mario (the other thin guy) or Nina Diva, who I suppose is the anti-Jasmine. And as far as Much goes, they can't have Rick the Temp on 24/7 (as much as they'd like to try) so this is obviously filler for that...

I dunno, but really it depends on how well the actor ages onscreen. Like, for instance, Gabrielle Carteris, who I believe was 30 when 90210 started. The first couple of years, they could pass her off as a high schooler, but one day, it was like she aged 20 years overnight. I could say the same about Ian Ziering, but the guy looked 27 through the entire run of the show.

Yes because I always get behind the underdog and long shot to win dammit! Happens in sports to. But to Fantasia's credit, at least you could say she earned her title, unlike a certain reality TV contestant who whined, moaned and complained (and then did it some more) every time she was on camera, essentially QUIT, and yet through the sheer will and determination of her partner, STILL won. Yes, I'm still bitter about her winning The Amazing Race 3. If you don't know who I'm talking about, consider yourselves lucky...

Of course you're not. 25.7 million people (on average) watched it. There are roughly 300 million people in the US, meaning that only about 8.5667% of the watched the show. Or, if you want, about 91% of the US DIDN'T watch. It's not the end of the world, you know.

Well during the final four Simon basically said "pack your bags and head back to your island paradise, you poor, poor girl, because Hawaiians don't have enough phones to save you". Or something like that. That was probably the only time where he outright said that Jasmine should go home. John Stevens was a special case - nothing the judges could do or say would really discourage people from voting for him. I think that the producers knew that eventually he'd go, and it was just a matter of time before it happened. And if it weren't for John, Television Without Pity never could've written this: I'm sorry, I just found it hilarious, juxtaposing John, Sinatra and possibly Sid Vicious (the singer, not the wrestler)...

No, I know that. I've been vocal about the judges (Randy and Paula in particular) telling America that they've voted "wrong" (this isn't an exam - you can choose poorly, but you can't choose wrong), and maybe Paula should actually try being a bit more critical instead of playing "good cop", but overall they've done what they're supposed to do. Seriously though - either replace Paula with a mannequin, or get another critical judge in there...

The competition is about finding the (subjective) best singer, but it's NOT about the best singer. If it were, John Stevens and JPL would've been gone 2nd and 3rd, after Leah "Labelle" Vladowski, and Jennifer would've been final 6. The way the competition is set up, good singers will fall by the wayside, but generally, you will be left with 2 very good singers in the end. This is not always the case, as Ryan Malcolm won Canadian Idol despite being considered the 4th or 5th best singer in the competition. For me, there's only one judge whose opinion means anything - Simon. Since he's going to manage the winner, he has a vested interest in who comes out on top. From her first semifinal performance, he openly pushed for Fantasia to win. He's never really wavered from that and while I don't think that that was a giant factor in Fantasia winning, I DO think that it played a role in why she was in the final 2 and not Jennifer or LaToya.

Or get put into the worst timeslot possible. 8pm Friday was lighning in a bottle for Fox with The X-Files, but if it were there today, it would've been axed just like EVERY OTHER SHOW they put there.

It never was. Simply put, Sir Elton made an incredibly idiotic statement.

IIRC, there actually was a bit of that in 92 and 93, when the Jays won the World Series. The national pastime being won by a team not based in the US was a big thing.

Sometimes, when there's no pressure to perform well, you perform BETTER. That's pretty much all there is to that.

There was more filler on this show than Botox in Paula's face. I ended up watching Law & Order: SVU and playing Tiger Woods 2004, and only tuned in for the last 20 min or so, except for a brief moment where I saw Kelly Clarkson and thought "what the HELL is she wearing?" That outfit was beyond prom dress ugly. Poor girl deserves better than that. Oh yes, Fantasia. Well, Simon got what he wanted, and the right person (of the two) won. Don't know if there's anything to add to that...

Just remember that next time, qualify the statement by excluding shows that are related to the words "Joss", "Whedon" and "Mutant Enemy". (edit) Speaking of which, for the Whedon fans, Astonishing X-Men is pretty darn good (except for Beast's costume). Good dialogue, GREAT art (again, except for Beast's costume) - it's an easy recommendation for everyone to pick up.