Edwin MacPhisto

I saw Harry Potter. I'm cool, and gay.

Great. Got a little muddled in the third act, but it fixed itself up by the end. Too bad to see a lot of the Mooney, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs backstory get axed, but a zippy little picture nonetheless. Definitely the most artful of the three thus far.

I'm partial to Dumpface. It has a grittiness.

None of these for me - it's got to be Jack actually killing Nina. Incredible. Teri's death is way up there, though I knew about it since I caught the first season on DVD.

Magneto (who was possessed by the John Sublime/That Which Endures entity) zapped Jean with an ultra-powerfull electro-magnetic pulse that FUBARed Jean's body and caused her to suffer a fatal stroke. The explaination given was that Sublime made Magneto do it since Jean (who had fully tapped into the Phoenix Force and was in full Dark Phoenix/Angel of Death mode) was the only one who could sense that Sublime/TWE was pulling Magneto's strings and could free Mags from it's control. And she exits with one of Morrison's best lines, to Scott: "All I ever did was die on you." Most of Planet X was rushed, but I really liked #150. And I liked Here Comes Tomorrow, but I like a lot of Morrison's crazy-nutty Invisibles stuff too, and it still wasn't quite up to what he achieved on there with similar philosophy.

I really like this album. "Frontier Psychiatrist" is a little bit of genius, and the whole album is very chill, clever, and great for a summer afternoon or evening. Sometimes I'm in the mood for all-samples in the DJ Shadow vein, but sometimes a little warmer is better.

Well, yeah. I thought that was implied once you nominated Beverly Hills Cop.

I always thought he was a big dork.

Three people want to vote off Touch of Evil? Y'all are either dumb or haven't seen it. This tournament is like four car crashes all happening at the same time, next to a mixed-use propane and broken glass factory.

There's a lot of great music out there. Too much, in fact, for any one person to hear it all, even in a lifetime. One album, then, which most haven't heard and that I think anyone should try: The Afghan Whigs, 1965. I think this is one of the best albums of the 90's. I always see this album in used CD sections and wonder why it's there. It came out in 1998 and the Whigs (Greg Dulli's band) broke up shortly thereafter. It's probably the best thing they ever did: soulful, sex-crazed, passionate, and great. "Somethin' Hot," "66," and "Citi Soleil" are especially lush. The first is aggressive and sleazy, the second is sensitive and sleazy, and the third is enchanting, lush, and yeah, a little bit sleazy. Especially on this album, the Whigs put together some of the thickest, smoothest backing tracks I've heard on any rock music. It's black, white, a lot of everything - rock, r&b, seduction, menace, sympathy. Rolling Stones fans especially ought to give this a listen: to me, the Whigs embody a lot of the same down n' dirty but graceful spirit embraced by the '68-'72 Stones. Dulli's a great vocalist and the whole band is in their best form here. Since the Whigs broke up, Dulli has kept up his Twilight Singers project, and their latest, Blackberry Belle, is almost as good as this. But not quite. So, pick your one album. I could use some new recommendations.

It's Citizen Kane. With a K. Which should definitely be in your poll, if you can spell it right.

Sayed Ali. That still stands out as one my hugest 24 "holy shit" moments, and probably the #1 insane moment of Season 2. Course, it was staged, but still...yikes. There's some good torture for ya.

The thing that puts Morrison miles ahead of Austen is how he actually writes and the character dynamics he manages to create. When he did end up with something rushed (i.e. the entire Planet X arc), the fact that he's a marvelous writer of character and scene helped pare down the vaster problems of the arcs as a whole. You still get deliciously snarky stuff among Magneto's minions, for example. Austen flounders and really has no idea what he's doing, ever. For Morrison, the arcs might get silly, but the characters always stay true to how he's shaped them.

I totally missed that you mentioned Depeche Mode. Here goes. I agree with DCMaximo that Violator is probably their best album. Aside from about a minute of wanky scary sounds before "Enjoy the Silence," it's pretty much perfect, and it has one of the best Martin Gore-sung songs, "Blue Dress." Usually he's really, really whiny; this time out, he's just depressed. I also really like Black Celebration and Music for the Masses, the albums immediately preceding Violator. That's when Depeche Mode started getting good. 90's stuff is up and down and I haven't heard Ultra, but Songs of Faith and Devotion and Exciter are both good too. For just starting, I actually recommend 86-98: The Singles. Every song on both discs is great, you can probably find the set for 18 or 19 bucks, and in addition to having some much-improved single versions of their best songs, it has "Only When I Lose Myself," one of my personal favorites. From that collection you can figure out what era you'd like best.

It's further into the site, but it's not even really sourced. I doubt this tremendously, though I guess Dre's beats from Detox need to end up somewhere.

Why do you think the results of this are going to be different? Half the nominations will inevitably be the same.

I think - and this could be off - that the first one was the trailer for The Minus Man. I never saw the movie, but I remember seeing a trailer very much like what you describe when I saw The Blair Witch Project. The trailer was just a few characters in New York talking about the movie, and nothing from the actual film appeared in the trailer. Hey, I was right. This page summarizes the whole thing.

Here in Florida, we had a chair that set people on fire. Best death penalty ever, short of something involving alligators, which I bet we could also engineer.

Concurrently, I suppose films are just to be watched when you're bored and literature is just to be read to pass the time. I like to get the most out of anything I give my time, music especially.

On that note, I'm going to see Eddie Money for free this weekend.

I'm a bit disappointed they're using the Ultimate costume designs. New was the way to go - black leather, beeotch. Ultimate Storm is particularly goofy.

No, but if someone is keen enough to put, say, DJ Shadow's "Building Steam With A Grain of Salt" or a similarly incredible song on a mix, I'll listen to it while I'm there, sip my drink, and be overjoyed that I got to hear that song right then. You can dance to some music; you can dance to or listen in detail to some incredible music. The "music is mindless entertainment" argument is fine if that's how you yourself want to approach music, but there's no way you're convincing me that the best music is anything but great art. I listen to music both as an escape and an enrichment; I like music, and I adore great music. Figuring out what's great and why I think it's great is half the fun.

I thought that about "Intermission" too, until I listened a little more closely. The melody on that tiny track is one of the core melodies from "Jimmy," sped up and played on a silly-sounding organ. It's still a bit perfunctory, but I sort of like how it acts as an overture to the really great song that follows it. And I'm so with you on "Lateralus" the song. Since Lateralus came out, they've ended every concert with it, and it's a perfect fit. Really sums up their career thus far, and what they do best. Anyone who's seen them live knows how great they are in that setting; anyone who's a fan and hasn't seen them live really ought to the next chance he gets. I've been twice, and when they busted out "Opiate" at the second show, I just about peed myself. Superb setlists.

Sprewell is shooting Minnesota out of this game, and Rush is single-handedly keeping the Lakers in control.

Interesting. If it was the plan all year, then I'd say they fucked up, but I imagine it's because they need to slot in "The Girl In Question" to give some resolution to the love triangle. Leave that out and essentially start bringing together the Black Thorn threads one episode sooner so we can get the subtleties, and you're probably perfect on that arc. But understandable, and considering how fun the aforementioned episode was, more power to em.