Ranting On...Hank Green and the Complicated World of AI

I have made a concerted effort in the past year to genuinely reduce the amount of time I spend on my phone.  This has been a mixed bag.  Partially, it's because for the true time-killers (for me, that's Twitter and waiting for texts) I have transferred to just watching on my laptop, which is still better (because I also do other things like actual hobbies, writing, and work) on those, but still not what I wanted, which was to truly cut back on my wasted online time.  But what it did do (because I have cut well over an hour off of my average screen time compared to, say, December & January) is cause me to look at video websites like TikTok and YouTube much, much less.  In fact, for someone who used to religiously keep up-to-date on YouTube videos, for me it's pretty much just Bad Boy that I consider "appointment viewing" that I will not miss a single episode.  But that doesn't mean that I don't keep abreast with some of my past YouTube obsessions, and that includes Hank Green, one of the two hosts of The Vlog Brothers, the extremely long-running YouTube channel that launched both Hank and his brother John into an echelon of pedigreed YouTube stars and of whichI have been a viewer for many, many years (looking through the page, I have seen several in 2026 even with my cutback on screen-time).  John is a New York Times bestselling author whose books The Fault in Our Stars and Paper Towns have both been made into major motion-pictures, while Hank has become an essential part of America's classrooms, with his series like Crash Course and SciShow regularly shown by teachers in educating their students.  For a certain generation, Hank Green is a hero, and though I'm a bit too old to be calling him that (even though it wouldn't entirely be untrue), I'm definitely a fan.  I've seen his show with his brother live, and I have a framed photo of me meeting both of them on the dresser in my bedroom.

Which is why when there was a fan revolt over Green in the past two weeks, I stood up and took notice, and wanted to get an article out about it even though my To Do list right now is drowning me.  Essentially, in a recent video, Green used the phrase "I appreciate the pushback" which caused fans to wonder if Green had used an AI program to write his script for the "Future Hank" segment of the video.  Anyone who has spent much time on AI knows that "I appreciate the pushback" is a tell that you are using AI to write something, as it's a commonly used phrase by the programming when you are challenging it to create something better.  Green admitted in a Twitter post (that has since been deleted) that he had used ChatGPT for research on the script (which was about how the sounds of words help to create their construction), but did claim that "I appreciate the pushback" was something he said of his own volition.

This caused a significant amount of reaction online, something that seems to follow literally any use of AI in modern culture.  For starters, Green saying he used AI to research his video but not to write it made some viewers/followers doubtful-you can see countless people saying that they don't think he actually was being truthful here, which given that he's using words that sound like AI, well, gives cause for doubt.  But I'm going to take Green at his word, because I've watched enough of his videos (for decades) that that sentence doesn't feel out-of-character for me.  Green has a thoughtful, nerdy, and sometimes sporadic cadence when he speaks (whereas his brother is a bit more contained), and so "I appreciate the pushback" feels at home for him.

But I do think this controversy opens up some other doors.  Green, in an apology on Reddit, pointed out that some of the people who were attacking him seemed to be doing so in large part due to his use of AI at all.  Green acknowledges the environmental and ethical ramifications of the tool, but also is pretty clear that he has a more nuanced view of it, which some people may disagree with.  He then goes on to point out that he has become over-reliant on LLM's and AI in his research, which has impacted his relationships not just to his work, but to the people around him (he name checks both his wife Katherine and his brother John as agreeing with the latter statement, which makes it feel a little bit more like a family issue than one involving his fans).

This opens up two questions for me, so let's start with the first one.  I have written a couple of articles on this blog about AI and ChatGPT specifically.  I struggle with something like ChatGPT for a variety of reasons, the biggest being the environmental impact.  I also think, to a degree the "either use it or get left behind" aspect is a bit self-fulfilling prophecy (we're only being left behind because we're being forced to be left behind), but I will own that I have used AI and ChatGPT specifically, both professionally (this was heavily encouraged at my place of business) and personally, which I recounted here (I will note, as I have in pretty much every mention of the technology on this article in the past, that I will never use it for writing a blog article, as honestly I'd rather shut the place down than use AI to write an article on here-everything on here, including the mistakes, is all me).  I think, ultimately, the environmental aspects of it are hard to fault Green for, because literally everyone's using AI (just try googling without using it), so why shouldn't he too?  But the academic implications of it, particularly given how much of AI is inaccurate (which I also profiled in that article if you haven't already read it-it's a good one), is where Green gets into trouble.  Green has become a trusted source on the internet (people literally tag him in TikTok videos to see if he can explain phenomena in videos); that he's using a tool that is rife with inaccuracy (fairly or unfairly) makes people doubt the veracity of his videos.

I also think that what he says about ChatGPT being addictive (we're coming to the end, so we're bringing this back to the first paragraph about screen time...proof there's a method to my madness) is really important.  ChatGPT I have used in my personal life a few times, and it is shockingly addictive.  Partially, to Hank's credit, it's voluminous as a research tool.  You need to always double check everything if you're using it, which requires extra work that some won't put in, but if you ask it for, say, a list of movie musicals made in 1950, it's going to give you a better list than if you Google that same prompt (this is partially because Google has denigrated its quality in the past five years, a conversation for a different day).  It's also a decent brainstorming tool-I recently was working with ChatGPT to plan a trip and trying to get all of the things on my wishlist for it done, and eventually through a lot of pushback (forbidden word choice use intentional), I realized that the trip I was planning was impossible the way I was planning it, and came up with a Plan B I probably wouldn't have realized in the same amount of time on my own, and transparently maybe not at all.

But it also shapes the way you research, sometimes to your detriment.  I can type in a prompt asking for a list of all of the movie musicals of 1950, but it also gives opinions on those movies, some of which are gleaned from less-than-reputable sites where those opinions are presented as facts (and ChatGPT interprets them as facts).  This is dangerous because the human brain is not meant to constantly sort through things like that, but also because it's hard not to assume that the research & direction of that approach aren't where you need to go.  ChatGPT gave you an idea...even if it's a good idea, it's still ChatGPT's idea.  You didn't do that thinking, you are using the AI algorithm to create that idea and it is informing your research.  And because it's hard work to create ideas, having something do that thinking for you, particularly with effusive praise and lots of encouragement as if it were your idea is scary, and can make you think you can do more than you can.  This seems to be what Green is getting after-this is causing him to over-extend, and the more you over-extend, the more you think you need ChatGPT to work.  It's hard not to read those sentences, and replace it with a word like, say, alcohol or gambling, and not realize that there's an under-discussed addictive quality to AI/LLM's that we aren't allowing for in understanding its value.  That, more than anything, feels not like a scandal (I remain pro-Hank Green after this, and maybe even more so because of the honesty he brought forth in showing how challenging using this tool can be), but a wake up call.  If Hank Green, endlessly creative & boundlessly trying to make the world a better place, can fall prey to ChatGPT...anyone can.

Bad Boy: My YouTube Obsession

This blog is mostly focused on politics & film, but as we do a bit of spring-cleaning in terms of ideas I've had for the year, I occasionally remind myself (and you) that this is a personal blog, and sometimes I will write about things that I am obsessed with, even if they don't fall neatly into the category of the two things I am most obsessed with (don't worry-we'll have more film and politics next month, and if you haven't seen, we did just have the 1972 Oscar Viewing Project here if you want to catch up in advance of the 1972 My Ballot which will come in the next two weeks).  Today, we're going to therefore cover something that I watched repeatedly over the past three years, and is finishing its second season in the coming days: the YouTube comedy series Bad Boy.

You may be asking yourself: what is Bad Boy, and that's a fair question.  The show has gotten hundreds of thousands of views, but in today's internet (and the fact that it's been on for years), it's possible you aren't familiar.  Bad Boy is a comedy series on YouTube from the mind of Artie O'Daly, an actor you might recognize from guest spots on Gilmore Girls, Pushing Daisies, and Modern Family (all favorites of mine).  He plays Scott, frequently referred to on the show as "Daddy Scott" an exasperated LA screenwriter who is overrun by members of the Jomas family, all relatives of an offscreen (and dead) crime boss dad whose family is looking for a stable figure to share their problems with (and live off of his largesse).

The show started initially as a two-man comedy featuring O'Daly and Tony Harth (who played Mack Jomas), but has since expanded to essentially be a comic soap opera, with two seasons and (to date) 39 episodes focusing on a series of murders that at least one or more of the characters committed.  We learn in Season 1 who the killer of Paul Jomas, the head of the Jomas crime family is, and we are one episode away from learning who the killers are in the second season (to keep spoilers at a minimum, we'll wait until the end of this article before I discuss my theories).

The show is insanely watchable, and honestly rewatcable (I've seen every episode at least 4-5 times).  The slapstick humor, usually sexually-charged, is lightning fast, and you're aided by a really strong cast.  O'Daly is so much fun as Scott, the frequently tired but also horny but also confused straight man (a term not meant to be literal...like most of the characters, Scott is very much on the Kinsey Scale), but he honestly has scenes stolen from him repeatedly by a cast of almost ludicrously (seriously-everyone on this show is so hot) talented cast members.  There's Drew Canon as Jim, the himbo ex-adult film star who is infatuated with Scott.  There's Alex Dyon's James, the gorgeous ethereal beauty that might be a vampire who sardonically reminds Scott of his own mortality throughout.  There's Alina Bock's Calista Flockhart (no, not the Ally McBeal star, but instead the character's name), an FBI investigator who is obsessed with trying to figure out if Scott is involved in the many murders in the series.  Even O'Daly's former Gilmore Girls costar Vanessa Marano stars as herself, and yes, they address the controversial place that Marano's April plays in the Stars Hollow fandom.

Why am I bringing this up?  In part, because I want people to talk to about it (for a show that has a clear fandom, there's not enough places online to discuss theories), but also because you should watch it.  I'd start at the beginning, but give it a few episodes before you get into the series truly as it catches its groove a bit after the first few episodes (which are largely a will-they-or-won't-they vibe between Mack & Scott that shifts over to Jim & Scott as the series progresses).  My Top 5 favorite episodes would be:

1. "Bad Boy Murder Mystery" (1.26-27...it's a two-parter so I'm counting it together)

2. "Bad Boy's Bad Mom" (1.15)

3. "Bad Boy's Big Break" (1.17)

4. "Bad Boy's Daddy Experiment" (2.02)

5. "Bad Boy Pajama Party" (2.11)

This is a bit like picking a favorite Christmas ornament (they're all so pretty and shiny), but I tend to love the ones that lean into the mystery aspect of the show, as well as payoffs for longtime viewers (i.e. those who have watched the clear character arcs that O'Daly has snuck in for the main players), and a lot of sexy, fun comedies (I'm saying it because the show says it so often, but again-the guys on this show are SO hot, watch it at least in part for that).  Please seek it out, watch it at least until you get to some of the episodes I just listed (so you know you're rating it at its best as it's more fun once you're familiar with the 15 or so recurring characters), and report back.

And now, let's get to some of my theories headed into the finale (obligatory spoiler alert if you have not watched through Episode #2.11 Bad Boy Pajama Party.

Theories

Okay, so the main questions I have right now headed into the finale are:

1. Who killed Brian?

2. Who killed Whitney's fiancee?

3. Who is the "Jim" that is not who they seem to be?

4. Who is the mysterious person in Paris that is trying to get Scott (and Jim) to come to France?

5. Is Scott finally willing to admit he's fallen for Jim?

In the last episode, Calvin admitted that he and his girlfriend killed Whitney's fiancee at the very end, confessing to Calista after she spent the whole episode trying to trick him into confessing.  Part of me thinks this is too easy (I wonder if Calvin thinks he killed him, but didn't actually), but Calvin has kind of been set up to be the shiftiest of the Jomas cousins, and so this would make sense.  I expect the next episode, if (as O'Daly has hinted in the comments on YouTube) is the season finale, and a finale that he has implied "changes the show" that we'll have two storylines, one actually in Paris (his Instagram has indicated they actually filmed in Paris, and you can see Kelly pictured with him so you know at least she's part of the shots in Paris) and then one in Los Angeles with Calista and the rest of the crew.  So it's possible Calista solves the murder of the fiancee, while in Paris it's revealed who Brian's killer is.

Which, I'm going to be honest, I wonder if it might be no one.  Brian's death is off-screen, and similar to how Mack "died" in the first season until he hadn't, I wonder if he might still be alive, and could be behind all of this.  It's been implied that Vanessa got off for her two murders in the first season despite her being arrested, and one wonders if they faked his death as part of a deal for them both to run her film production/poison company.  It's also worth noting that Brian is both the name of Doug Rogers' character (i.e. Scott's on-again/off-again boyfriend) and also the name of Whitney's son, who has never been revealed on the series, only named.  At some point they're going to have to reveal him, and it would make sense that Brian might actually have been a Jomas the whole time.

Which brings us to the third point.  This is the big mystery right now, and indicates that at least one of the characters isn't "who they seem to be" which Suzanne realized from her widdling.  She has said the person is named "Jim" but that doesn't necessarily mean our believed Jim Jomas is the one who is "not who they seem to be."  For starters, there's fake Jim (aka Ted aka the Hooded Figure aka Target's Sexy Santa) who had an epiphany last week that he needed to be himself, and given there's a hooded figure in Paris at the end of Pajama Party (which he was wearing the first episode he's seen), it could be hinted it's him.  There's also James (i.e. a spin on the name Jim), who has been hiding Jim all season (could that be for nefarious purposes?), though James is such a fan favorite I really hope it's not him.  There's BJ, who was suspiciously missing in the last episode (and has worn a hoodie in multiple episodes), and could have the middle initial Jim (we don't know what the J stands for).  And then there's "the Third One" (played by Blase Maffia) whose name hasn't been revealed yet, and who came out of nowhere, and could be more than he seems.  The biggest clues we've had other than "Jim" is Suzanne saying in the last episode that Jim was "somewhere in this house" (which at the time we know both James & the Third One were physically in the house, as was a cardboard cutout of Jim...again, Ted & BJ were both suspiciously missing) and then Mary Kate saying in "Bad Boy Comes Clean" to Calista that "people are going to keep dropping dead around him if he doesn't cut the head off the snake...all roads lead to Paris" and that "he's sleeping with the enemy."  Again, this is pretty vague, and could indicate any of these guys (Jim, BJ, James, the Third One, Calvin, and Ted are all in some way living in Scott's house, and Mary Kate could think that Brian was literally sleeping with Scott since they were dating), but these are the clues we have to run off of.

I do think one other clue is worth mentioning before we wrap up-in the episode Bad Bachelor Boy, Whitney's fiancee (shortly before his death) said that the "Third One's" name was "Troy," because it "sounded French," which given the implications of Paris, might be an overall clue to his identity...though I do feel like Ted or BJ make more sense because they weren't in the last episode.

So my final theories?

1. I think that BJ is probably the figure in Paris, not Ted (who is a ruse), but I do wonder if we're looking at two killers, where BJ killed either Brian and/or his dad, or if Calvin/Troy killed one but BJ killed the other.  I definitely think that BJ is one of the killers, though.

2. If it's not that, I think it's Brian who faked his death and the person who "isn't who they seem to be" is the Third One being another FBI agent.  I'm convinced that the Brian name thing, the Third One's lack of a name, and the French hooded figure's obsession with finding Jim (i.e. not Scott) all lead to BJ (he's the only character really connected to all three in that way), but how that makes a "Jim" not who they seem to be continues to be tricky.

3. The other theory I'm pondering is if Ted is actually Whitney's son Brian (and that Doug Rogers' character's name is just a coincidence), which would also kind of make sense, and imply Ted is a killer.

4. To answer question #5, since Artie has indicated the premise of the show will change in the final episode of the season, I have to assume that Scott & Jim are finally going to hook up or get together...we've waited years for it, and Scott finally admitted in the last episode that he missed Jim, so I think the close of the season is them saying they love each other.

5. I love all the characters so much, but if the killer is James, Jim, or Calista I'm going to be heartbroken because I love those characters the most.

6. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that Artie saved his most famous guest star (Vanessa Marano) for the finale given she's been hinted at all season, and likely is making at least one appearance given she's still a big part of the plot.

If you've watched the show, you will make my dad by sharing your own theories in the comments!

Top Ten Epic Rap Battles of History

It's about to be the weekend, so I decided it might be fun to do a totally arbitrary list of sorts as a cleanser from a very long week (I'm hoping & praying that someday soon the weeks will be a bit more manageable).  When I'm stressed out, I tend to fall into a pattern where I watch the same show over-and-over-again, and for some reason the last couple of weeks it's been just repeat viewings of different Epic Rap Battles of History face-offs, and so I thought why not make lemonade here and do a Top 10 rundown of my favorite battles from the show (I double-checked, and despite being a fan of this series I've never done this before on the blog).  I know the show has myriad fans, so counter in the comments if you disagree!

10. "Che Guevera vs. Guy Fawkes"

Why This Battle: If you get into an ERB binge, you'll notice that perhaps the show's most noticeable flaw is that they use similar beats and rhyme schemes throughout the battles (inevitable after all of these years), so it was awesome in one of the most recent videos that we saw them mix it up with a slower beat, which allowed Rob Rico (incredibly sexy as Che Guevera) come alive against Nice Peter's Guy Fawkes.

Favorite Lyric: "All the children say we will be like Che, asthmatic, but I'll take your breath away"

Who Won?: Che, by a landslide.  Guy gets some of the better insults, but Rico's Che is too smooth not to fall for him.

9. "Jim Henson vs. Stan Lee"

Why This Battle: It's hilarious to me that two of the seemingly nicest men in entertainment got pitted against each other, and perhaps ERB realized this when they had the two make up in the middle...then hilariously watched as two artists get a "clobbering" by Walt Disney as a corporate overlord 

Favorite Lyric: "I'm impressed by all the vision that it took for you to sign your name on all of Jack Kirby's comic books"

Who Won?: I'd probably give it to Nice Peter's Jim Henson, though Zach Sherwin as Walt Disney is terrifying as the proper villain of this clip, malevolent with a smile.

8. "Adam vs. Eve"

Why This Battle: Arguably the raunchiest battle of the series, we have Jenna Marbles as Eve vs. Epic Lloyd's Adam, and they spit rhymes combining both insults about the biblical figures and just general gender stereotypes.  The best part is the ending, when Adam goes too far & gets hell for it.

Favorite Lyric: "One pump chump and you're hung like a weasel, ditch the fig leaf and get yourself a pine needle" (see, wasn't kidding about the blue)

Who Won?: You don't get into a "who can give the more profane insult" challenge against Jenna Marbles and come away walking.  Eve by a mile.

7. "Romeo & Juliet vs. Bonnie & Clyde"

Why This Battle: Having two star-crossed lovers both battle seemed like a no-brainer (as does the inevitable ending), but perhaps the best meta-moment in the whole video would be having real-life best friends Hannah Hart & Grace Helbig spit ruthless flow about each other.  Hartbig shippers beware.

Favorite Lyric: "Pop a cap in the ass of the last Capulet heiress, and give miss no nights in Paris a reason to cry to her parents"

Who Won?: Probably Bonnie & Clyde, who had the better rhymes and insults (Romeo & Juliet's were less original), but my favorite work here is Grace as Juliet, playing so against type you desperately wish she'd make more movies so we could see this side of her.

6. "Rasputin vs. Stalin"

Why This Battle: Unlike, say, a superhero movie, ERB is almost always at its best when it throws in extra and surprise MC's.  Here, we get almost an entire history of Russia, with not only Rasputin & Stalin, but also Lenin, Gorbachev, and Putin.

Favorite Lyric: "If your name ends with 'in' time to get out"

Who Won?: I'm going to go with Lenin, who gets some of the best historical references into his lyrics (I am a sucker for that on this show, as you'll see while we get further down), though Gorbachev is a close second.

5. "Steve Jobs vs. Bill Gates"

Why This Battle: Of perhaps all of the videos on this list, this might be on here most because of the beat, and almost certainly from the first flow from Jobs, who doesn't even wait for the announcer to introduce him he's so eager to get started.  Throw in a Hal 9000 reference at the end, and I'm sold.

Favorite Lyric: "I make the product that the artist chooses and the GUI that Melinda uses"

Who Won?: Not even close-Nice Peter's Steve Jobs is possibly his best performance on the series.

4. "Artists vs. TMNT"

Why This Battle: This rap is also on this list  for its first verse.  Having Rhett & Link pair up with Ian & Anthony (arguably old school YouTube's most famous duos) to play the four legendary artists was clever, but having them all work SO well together was a testament to their natural chemistry with each other.  Listen to that intro-the transitions are flawless.

Favorite Lyric: "Deemed dope by the Pope and I boned til I croaked"

Who Won?: The artists-the turtles look almost winded after seeing how good the artists are.

3. "Gordon Ramsey vs. Julia Child"

Why This Battle: Perfectly succinct, and relatively evenly-matched, pitching the beloved French Chef against the irate British one feels inevitable, but they perfectly cast here with Epic Lloyd taking on none other than Mamrie Hart, sincerely the funniest person on YouTube and arguably the most-talented actress on the platform.  Her Julia Child accent is so good (not even a hint of her typical Southern twang) that I genuinely watched the behind-the-scenes video to figure out how she did it.

Favorite Lyric: "I served America dutifully and I slice lard beautifully, I reign supreme from shark repellents to charcuterie" 

(For reference, Child during World War II worked for the OSS and helped to create a shark repellent for naval ships, and eventually spaceships)

Who Won?: If you don't think I'll give this to Mamrie, we haven't met yet.

2. "Steven Spieberg vs. Alfred Hitchcock"

Why This Battle: Combining something I love (film directors) with enough references to make my movie-loving heart bounce, this is a visual delight.  Look at the way that each background matches the stylistic motifs of the actual directors (all five of them-it's an all-star battle), and you can appreciate the detail that goes into ERB and why repeat viewings are mandatory.

Favorite Lyric: "I rock the Academy and the DGA-you rock as many Oscars as that hack Michael Bay"

Who Won?: I'm going to go with Kubrick, who has the best combination of visual cues, raps, and is unique enough that it stands out against the other four.  But really-all home runs.

1. "Alexander the Great vs. Ivan the Terrible "

Why This Battle: Because it might be the best original video on all of YouTube?  Honestly, I think you should probably see a few other ERB's so you can appreciate how smart this is with a little context, but everyone is terrific in this video from ERB regulars like Nice Peter & Epic Lloyd to Meghan Tonjes getting her sing-rapping on (hiring Tonjes, an actual singer, to be Catherine the Great was choice).

Favorite Lyric: "Out of the gate first servant of state, oblique attack tactics ain't exactly straight"

Who Won?: This is Epic Lloyd's best rap-in literally 12 bars he'll leave your mouth hanging wide as Frederick the Great.

Ranting On...Logan Paul

My relationship as a YouTube fan could be described as going from a passionate affair to a sexless marriage.  For a while there, I was hot-and-heavy with YouTube culture, having it regularly consume my evening bus rides, and I believe I was subscribed to 30+ channels at one point, but in the ensuing years have dwindled my YT channel shows that I regularly watch to just five; for the curious, I still am religious with The Vlogbrothers (I don't think I've missed an episode in four years), usually catch Mamrie/Grace/Hannah in that order of likelihood (the so-called YouTube Holy Trinity), and will binge Nerdy Nummies pretty consistently (provided it's a baking video-I'm not as wild about the challenges).  Otherwise, my YouTube subscription list has almost completely dried up, or is filled with shows like The Lean Machines that I watch once in a blue moon.

This is to say that I had never watched a Logan Paul video, though I was aware he existed as I follow a lot of Gay Twitter and they keep me abreast of such goings-on, and was largely going to avoid the conversation about his despicable video where he went to Aokigahara (the famed Suicide Forest), discovered an actual dead body, and instead of calling the authorities decided instead to use the footage for a YouTube video.  I really don't need to see the video (though I did catch clips of it in a news reel), as it feels like common sense that you don't exploit someone's painful depression and final moments to get clicks onto your YouTube channel; it in fact feels like the exact opposite of common sense.  Logan Paul, if you need a wakeup call that your life is a mess, when you have Rosanna Pansino of all people, literally the sweetest human being this side of Lin-Manuel Miranda, going after you relentlessly on Twitter you are doing something wrong.  Seriously-I've been following Ro on social media for years, and I've never heard her say anything bad about anyone (her mascot is a smiling cookie!), but she's posted about you at least four times that I've caught.  You have crossed the line into terrible person.

So, like I said, I wasn't going to say anything about Logan Paul, as it felt like most people had had their say and I agreed with it, and why bring attention to such a heinous act (and judging by some of the videos he and his brother have as their screen-grabbed titles, this is not an isolated incident).  But then I started to feel like an angle of this story was being under-exposed, and that was the power of simply boycotting a show or channel, not just saying you're going to do it, but actually quitting it and not looking back, because consistency when it comes to social media is truly a lost art.

Me talking about Logan Paul and saying I'm going to stop watching his videos is a moot point-I don't watch them now, and I never will.  But I've noticed through the years that people's calls for improvement in entertainment in some aspect, or disparaging a person's career but then continuing to follow it seems to be a hollower and hollower threat.  Public behavior in an entertainment field is not measured by the value of your love/hate ratio on Twitter.  It's valued by your worth to advertisers, which unless you reach a near-criminal level like Bill O'Reilly (which admittedly Paul may soon be at), is almost entirely driven by eyeballs.  So if you want to stop someone like Logan Paul, or someone whose artistic achievements you think are not worthwhile, you have to be willing to follow through and actually walk the walk.

This doesn't just have to be after something truly heinous like Logan Paul.  I can off-the-top-of-my-head think of several situations where I realized an entertainment culture was no longer providing value to my life or really to the world, and then simply just cut it out of my life completely.  The first would be YouTube culture.  For years I would watch channels like Marcus Butler or Zoella, thinking "this is cool"-a cheeky insight into a group of friends both individually and collectively.  It felt like harmless fun, and generally I liked some of the accent challenges and Q&A aspects of this culture.  But it continually became overtly dramatic (addressing even the most minor of slights or controversies with heavy-handed videos), uninspired (whereas it felt like previously they'd gone after unique spins on their channels, after a while it was just them doing Q&A's complaining about not getting enough time to do the videos they wanted to do), and perhaps most glaringly, insanely commercial.  I'm not aware of the monetary ramifications of being a fledgling YouTube star (I'm sure they're not the greatest), but turning virtually every video into a commercial for a different product you clearly don't use is a great way to turn off your audience.  I think the straw that broke the camel's back, though, was when Colleen Ballinger and Joshua Evans got a divorce mere months after making a fortune on their YouTube channel chronicling their engagement and marriage.  It felt phony and false, like they were the sort of people who would treat real life like a soap opera, and I don't condone that.  I'm not one of the impressionable young fans who watch this and think this is how you're supposed to behave as an adult, but millions of people are, and I said "I'm done, this is toxic," and then unsubscribed to virtually every channel that didn't have a specific purpose (like baking, fitness, or ASMR), or weren't the Holy Trinity or the Vlogbrothers (all of whom have stayed pretty grounded through the years, and in the case of the latter, is how I've ended my Tuesdays and Fridays for so long I don't know that I would be able to stop even on principle).

And unlike other people who I notice claim they're "never watching again" but then commenting on it again in a few weeks later, I just never looked back.  I've never watched any of those channels since.  In fact today is the first day in years I've checked to see if some of them still exist (and they do, in many cases doing the same tired format they did years ago).  And this is the point here-you have to be willing to actually follow-through when you say you're not going to see something of a person whose career choices you don't like or whose artistic choices you don't support.  I did the same thing 15 years ago when I decided that reality television was a cesspool.  Since that time, I have watched reality television only twice (not counting the occasional The Voice video on YouTube, as those auditions are a rabbit hole); one was Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List (which, as it's Griffin who is a comedian and an actress, was more a weekly standup act than a reality show) and Food Network Star this last year, a show I kind of liked but again because I like cooking TV shows & because it avoids the pitfalls of trying to be reality when it's really not.  I've never watched The Bachelor, Keeping Up with the Kardashians, or any Real Housewives installment.  I sometimes get side-eye over this, but I don't see the point.  I don't mind that other people do (I have a lot of friends who do), but I made a promise to myself that I wouldn't indulge in such things because it took away scripted programming hours and because what little shows I did see, I thought felt kind of stupid.  There are way too many movies, books, good TV shows, and life experiences to be had to be sacrificing hours upon hours devoted to something that's simply a guilty pleasure.  And if all you're watching is trash TV and guilty pleasures, you're neglecting yourself of art or substantive entertainment.  Stop watching Logan Paul, and take a critical look at what's actually on your subscription feeds or DVR lists or Netflix queue, and maybe add something that could challenge you a little bit as a replacement.  Some may complain that at 22 Logan Paul is too young to have his career in YouTube be over, but perhaps a better question is-has he done anything of value to warrant that career to begin with?  I suspect the answer should be obvious to anyone who's seen more than one prank video, and perhaps we should mourn less Logan Paul and instead mourn the actually talented young performers whose place in our entertainment world of whom he's taken the place.

Ten Mini Reviews

Usually at about this time each year, the amount of movies that I have gotten to has become completely overwhelming, and I am ridiculously behind on my reviews.  It's an unfortunate side effect of having my busiest time of year at work coupled with my busiest time of year in my personal life coupled with having the busiest time of the year on the blog.  Suffice it to say, it starts to get to me and while I always want to give every single movie I see its due, I also don't think I can get to all of these while the memory is still there for me to properly create a full review.  So with apologies to the filmmakers, I'm going to be doing short reviews here; we'll still have full reviews of all of the remaining Oscar nominees I haven't discussed from 2016, as well as A Monster Calls because I feel like I owe it to you to explain why I loved it so much, but these movies are going to just get the one paragraph.  If you want more of my thoughts, I'll gladly interact in the comments (incentive!)

(Spoilers for the films may be ahead)

Dark Passage
Thoughts: The least viewed of the Bacall/Bogart pictures, it weirdly has the most famous gimmick of the bunch, where we have a "subjective camera" technique seeing the film almost entirely from Bogart's point-of-view as he escapes from prison.  The film is solid, if predictable (shocker-the third most famous cast member is the real criminal!), and I loved the way that Bacall's performance is both a brazen young woman and completely lovestruck (few people did that better than her).  Still, once the gimmick is over it's never quite as strong as the top half-part of me wished they'd have stuck with it, even if that would have meant Bogart only in voiceover.
Ranking: 3/5 stars

Deadpool

Thoughts: I had sworn to myself I wasn't ever going to see a Ryan Reynolds movie again, but somehow he and Jason Bateman continue to haunt me and I end up stuck with them in front of me even when I didn't want to do so.  Here it was me buying the last-minute hype that Deadpool could land in a major category (or at least Best Makeup) and I ended up stuck in a boring, tired pile of garbage that succumbs to the same cliches that it tries to disprove.  Reynolds may have found a role tailor-made for him, but that doesn't mean he's a good actor.
Ranking: 2/5 stars

Dirty 30

Thoughts: Arguably the film I wanted to review fully the most (give or take Paterson), this film, while not a follow-up to Camp Takota, is at the very least a sequel in terms of who is involved.  The Holy Trinity of YouTube come back, but this time it's Mamrie at the center and all the better for it as she's the most naturally-gifted of the actresses at the center.  Hollywood, in desperate need of a romantic comedy lead, is foolish if they aren't taking advantage of an actress who can sell even some juvenile humor with aplomb-when the script works for her, this is genuinely just a good movie-no YouTube curve needed.
Ranking: 3/5 stars

Eye in the Sky

Thoughts: A taut thriller, the last real performance from Alan Rickman before his untimely death (I'm not counting Alice in Wonderland 2), the film is intriguing and actually quite watchable; it's the rare thriller you're not entirely sure how it will end.  The film's treatment of Americans isn't kind, but considering the buffoon we recently elected...not unfair.  Mirren could do this in her sleep (in fact most of these actors could), and I thought the most intriguing parts of this movie (particularly the sly sexism that hits her harder than the other men, particularly when one of her subordinates disobeys) are skated over, but by-and-large this is imminently watchable to the point where I wonder if the director didn't notice it was happening in the script, even if nowhere near the Oscar nomination some were drumming for the dame.
Ranking: 3/5 stars

The Innocents

Thoughts: No actress in 2016 more fully landed on my list of "on the radar" in a bigger way than Lou de Laage.  Between this and her mesmerizing work in L'Attesa, I can attest that I'll be seeking her out in a big way in future years, and I suspect a Cesar is in her future.  The film is not always easy, and occasionally is very hard to sit through, but it's beautifully shot and a more complex picture than you'd normally expect from a mid-fall foreign art house hit.
Ranking: 3/5 stars

The Legend of Tarzan

Thoughts: It seems funny to review Alexander Skarsgard right now, knowing what he's capable of as an actor (is anyone else thoroughly enjoying Big Little Lies right now-I'm totally enamored?).  This film, of course, is not really an acting showcase, but Skarsgard's shot at movie stardom. The casting department could not be lazier (about the only way they could have found a more cliched set of supporting players would have been to throw Paul Giamatti in there for no reason), but the action is fun and I thought the movie itself was beautifully shot.  Still-this is silliness on-top of silliness, and oh man is Chrisotph Waltz terrible.
Ranking: 2/5 stars

The Light Between Oceans

Thoughts: I will admit that initially I had higher hopes for this movie-it was one of my most-anticipated pictures of 2016, particularly considering how much I've loved the three leads in recent years.  However, that disappointment shouldn't be confused with a bad movie, even if it's sadly a pretty predictable one.  Fassbender and Vikander are both great as the tragic romantic leads, and Weisz might under-emote as the grieving mother, but that feels more like the script's fault that she doesn't get any big scenes. Still, some of the film's best moments (particularly Vikander begging her husband to lie for her sake, to keep her from being lonely) show a movie with great unrealized potential.

Ranking: 3/5 stars

Miss Sloane

Thoughts: Sometimes it's hard to remember that not everything is about the Oscars.  This is particularly hard to stomach when a movie stars one of your favorite actors of the moment, one of whom you wish had an Oscar (hint, hint), but Miss Sloane isn't really an Oscar movie.  It's the sort of taut late-Summer thriller that used to get vacation homes for Julia Roberts or Ashley Judd but has somehow gone out of fashion (perhaps because it got completely absorbed by television?).  Either way, this is a fun movie even if it's wildly over-the-top, and is proof that if Chastain ever wants to just cash-out with big paychecks, she has that ability while still remaining watchable.
Ranking: 3/5 stars

Paterson

Thoughts: Surely the best film on this list, and the one with the best performance, I almost skipped including Paterson because I wanted to discuss it more, but that's technically true of all of these movies (I really just want to talk about movies all day long).  That being said, the comments are there if you want to go further.  Until then, remember that this is a fascinating little study of one single life, proving that you can make pretty much anyone compelling with good writing and good acting, and Driver's central performance exhibits a man that feels like he's being under-served in major movies even if he's cast almost everywhere.  That penultimate scene is a doozy, one almost every other actor would have underplayed or screwed up but Driver nails against the wall and keeps you guessing-when is he going to get some Oscar love?
Ranking: 4/5 stars

Sunset Song

Thoughts: Probably the biggest "who?" film on this list, I saw this because it was Terence Davies' follow-up to the sexy and brilliant The Deep Blue Sea. so it felt like a civic duty.  The movie shows the impossibly hard life of Scottish peasants right before World War I.  The movie is beautiful, and has that "case of the handsomes" in that it's rarely compelling, and never really lets up with the hardships even for a moment.  The central love story feels, in my opinion, to be too jumpy in the treatment of Ewan, which is a pity as there was a great movie somewhere in the pages of Lewis Grassic Gibbon's famed novel.
Ranking: 3/5 stars

Ranting On...Colleen & Joshua's Divorce (or How I Learned to Stop Watching Vlogs)

I don't watch reality television.  I quit roughly around the third season of American Idol, when I was watching in college and the idea of reality television was shifting away from being something competitive (like Survivor or Idol) and more toward the reckless, vapid stupidity of a show like Paris and Nicole.  It's something that I've largely felt good about through the years.  Yes, I missed out on a few shows that probably were pretty solid (Amazing Race and Top Chef seem like strong television), and have questionably watched a couple (Drag Race I couldn't get into, but did see an episode of, and I did watch My Life on the D-List, my only break from the sabbatical, though in that case it actually starred a talented comedian so it was easy to justify).  All-in-all, I just couldn't get into a world of Real Housewives and the like.

A few years ago, though, I had kind of found a workaround into the world of reality television with an ardent infusion of YouTube vloggers that I began watching.  First came the British invasion (an article that still stands as one of the most popular I've ever written on this blog), and then I began watching the likes of Connor Franta and Colleen Ballinger.  One-by-one through the years, though, I have become less-and-less involved with the YouTube culture, particularly with the vloggers.  It started with the British Invasion stars, particularly the likes of Marcus Butler and Zoella, becoming less about giving insight into their worlds, and becoming a pandering version of themselves.  They would do videos that felt deeply repetitive, less true to themselves, and more about getting a product placement into their video than anything else.  They would shill for products that felt less than loyal to their brand (all of the Audible.com people who weren't Grace or Mamrie or someone that authentically felt like they were reading left me less enthused about anything they were selling), and after a while it felt more like watching a Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous situation than anything else.

But I held onto a couple of vlogging channels through the years, ones that kept a happy remnant of my YouTube days of yore when I felt deeply vested in the culture and what connections everyone had to everyone else, until this morning.  And that's because, while scrolling through my subscriptions last night I found a video where Colleen Ballinger announced her divorce from Joshua Evans, and I realized that I'd had enough of this world.

I know I'm going to get hate for this, but I don't care at this point; some things need to be said.  I get that marriages break up, I really do, but this crossed an uncomfortable line into reality television for the sake of views and press that felt tacky and wrong.  For those unfamiliar, Evans and Ballinger were married last year in a deeply publicized wedding on their channels.  Both the engagement and the eventual wedding were shared on the YouTube site, likely to the joy of their fans but also, it has to be said, with a deep financial gain for both of the stars, as the videos enjoyed an intense popularity.  It was fun to watch their courtship go through the years, and they were a cute couple-arguably my favorite couple that actually publicized their relationship on YouTube (Grace & Chester See are still my favorite couple, but have been intensely coy about their relationship and only ever really acknowledged they were dating on SnapChat).  But it's also a relationship that became a hallmark of their marriage-something that they were still making videos together for as recently as last month.

And that's where I feel a bit cheated.  If they were struggling to stay together, then why were they still pretending in front of the camera?  It's one thing for you to acknowledge, repeatedly, that the person you're putting in front of the camera is a creation of sorts (like Ballinger's Miranda Sings, a channel I'll still tune into since it's more a TV show than anything else and I don't fault actors for their personal foibles as a general rule when it comes to creative content), but that wasn't what Ballinger and Evans had done in their relationship-they tried to show that they were being deeply authentic onscreen, to the point that it became the centerpiece of their channel.  To know how phony that had to have been-it's kind of hard to grasp.  I gave up largely on celebrity culture years ago except where it related back to a movie or TV or album-too often it felt forced, and only the best of celebrity couples (which unfortunately included Brangelina) were ones that could hold my attention.  I gave into that with YouTube because it felt so inviting and so much fun to live vicariously through, which of course is the appeal of reality television.  Watching people living preposterously wealthy lives or behaving abhorrently may be the hallmarks of reality television, but really the true appeal is we wish we were part of this universe.

That's the thing that made me click unsubscribe not to just Ballinger, but to pretty much every vlogging channel on my YouTube subscription feed this morning.  Ballinger did something that I find really cruel during her divorce video that YouTubers do repeatedly-she pointed out that she wished "only the people who truly care about Josh and I could watch this video, because I know I'm going to get criticism," as if it weren't possible that someone who has watched the videos for years and proclaimed to be a fan couldn't be turned off by a video such as this, one that felt deeply clickbait and in a lot of ways felt like it was more about preserving her fanbase than presenting anything real (the same, it has to be said, was somewhat true for Evans' video, but there it felt pretty clear that he wanted to preserve the marriage and had a level of authenticity that was lacking in Ballinger's, for me at least).  They have made their relationship, and the reality of it, a cornerstone of both of their YouTube channels.  If they truly wanted this to be a time for privacy, why not skip the video and just put out a press release like Hannah Hart and Ingrid Nilsen, instead of putting up two videos that are guaranteed to get more coverage and also millions of views?  It's hard for me to take them seriously as being authentic on their channels going forward if they give up on their relationship just a year after their much ballyhooed marriage.  At that point, it devolves into something like Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries, and while I find her interesting in a way (and wish her the best after the terrible weekend she had), I'm not devoting more than a passing glance at the supermarket tabloids to her, and the same will have to be said for Ballinger.

And with that, I also have cut down dramatically my YouTube subscription feed.  I'm still on the site, and still have a few shows I'm going to tune into, of course.  Hank and John are still a warm hug every Tuesday and Friday for me, and Rosanna Pansino is a wonderful reminder of how fun cooking shows can be (anyone else think Nerdy Nummies has been on fire this year?).  Even if they occasionally veer into vlogging, Grace, Mamrie, and Hannah are still to be treasured and are primarily there for the comedy anyway (and occasionally the actual recipes).  Pewdiepie, despite his weird journey this year on his channel (how I have not written about that yet?), will remain because I find him and his brand bizarrely watchable, and like I said I'll stick around for deeply scripted shows like Smosh, and yes, Ballinger's own Miranda Sings.  But with this announcement, I think I'm done with the vlogging angle of YouTube for good-it feels too fake to be even remotely believable, and for me the appeal disappears at that point.  I was a fan, but there are limits, and I think mine has been reached.

Clicking the Unsubscribe Button

I am currently in the process of streamlining my life, and it's a bit of a challenge.  Lately I've spent most days at work in a near constant state of busy-ness, even more so than usual, and then most evenings are spent trying to fight with every fiber of my being the urge to go to bed at 6 PM, and instead stay up longer, working through at least 1-2 projects that are on my To Do list before I inevitably give up the fight at 9 PM and go watching TV in bed.  One of my most recent tasks has been to sort through all of my closets, and just purging as I go, throwing out anything that I don't remotely need anymore and is just taking up space in my apartment.  After doing all three closets (and having a wildly large pile of clothes that need to make it to Goodwill in the next day or two), I decided I needed to start doing the same thing to my online life, getting rid of everything that was cluttering my internet world so I could focus solely on the things that are relevant (or, in some cases, mandatory).

This did not start, as one would assume, with dismissing all of the Facebook friends I don't actually like anymore.  Facebook for me at this point is one of those annoying things which I only use to reference someone I'm talking about, or to email someone I haven't talked to a while with a question.  In many ways, Facebook has become a combination of both an address book and a year-round Christmas letter, where people shamelessly brag about their lives in a way that would be insanely off-putting in real life, but since it's the internet you can get away with saying things like #blessed and talking about your family and spouse in ways that are deeply eye-rolling and would make anyone in real life never call you again.  No, what I decided to do was clean out my YouTube subscriptions page instead.

YouTube has not had a banner year, in my opinion, or at least my content creators haven't been up to the task, and I don't think it's just because I (and the content creators I enjoy) got older, as we were already well above the median age of the average YouTuber anyway.  No, I think it started when all of the YouTubers decided to write books.  This foray into print wasn't the worst idea, and in some ways it was a success.  After all, Grace Helbig's comic biography last year was an absolute delight, and Hannah Hart's hilarious cookbook was wonderfully offbeat, just like her channel.  Both were surprise hits, and as a result it seems every single YouTuber under the sun wrote a book.  The problem was that some YouTubers are not great at writing, or picking out solid ghostwriters, and so for every hilarious comic book like You Deserve a Drink, you got Miranda Sings doing a gigantic cash-grab with her oddly sketched together picture book.  By the time Tyler Oakley's Binge came out this year, I think I'd had enough and couldn't buy what would have been an easy purchase in March, and will probably just stick to the Holy Trinity's works later this year (and of course John Green).

The problem that erupted from this was not just that the YouTubers were creating shoddy product, but also that they had to sell it.  People like Alfie Deyes, whose Pointless Book is essentially just a children's activity book, were shilling these books constantly on their YouTube channels and social media, and this was in addition to the hodgepodge sorts of shilling they were already doing.  The British YouTubers (aka The Gleam Team) are sort of the most basic example of what went wrong with YouTube this year.  Like Deyes, many of them came out with rather tedious books, but they also spent at least half of their videos clearly trying to incorporate product placements into their content, and the other half are now focused on lifestyle sorts of blogs.  Whereas they used to make videos featuring challenges and seemed like a genuine insight into their world, they have now devolved into a series of adverts and highly-manufactured looks into the lifestyles of the rich and beautiful.  The voyeuristic style of their videos has vanished, and when they do attempt to be just "average Joes" they fail miserably, principally because they're in their mid-to-late twenties and yet act like they're thirteen.  This is fine when someone like Cameron Dallas or Nash Grier does this, but that's because they are actually still immature and not clearly pretending.  Watching a 26 or 27-year-old parade around with the silliness of someone at their junior prom is off-putting, and even their pushes at charity seem more highly-manufactured and yet another constant ask for money.

It's worth noting that almost every single YouTuber has fallen prey to this highly commercialized, everything seems to be for a buck sort of attitude in some capacity.  Even YouTubers I genuinely love like Grace Helbig and The Vlog Brothers seem to have a product placement nearly every single week this year.  This is the nature of the beast, of course, and in some ways I like the reminder (I want to know if there are new shirts and such online).  However, Grace and the Vlog Brothers still make it feel like you're included if you don't have the money (or in my case, also the time) to purchase their products, giving their less affluent fans a way into this fun little world.  And they haven't started phoning it in-my god, the phoning it in.  Every single fun, clever challenge is instantly copied by every other YouTuber known to man, and if something is successful it's mimed over-and-over until I just can't watch anymore.  Daily vlogging is not that interesting if you can't add something unique into the mix, and I can only watch someone eat strange candy so many times before it loses all of its appeal.  I think YouTubers haven't realized that in some ways they're competing with each other.  If I've watched Joe Sugg do the Speech Jammer challenge, I don't want to also watch Alfie, Marcus, Zoe, Niomi, Caspar, and Connor all do the same challenge as well.  This combination of being highly-manufactured and not giving any real insight into the world of these YouTubers has meant it's time to purge.  And as a result, I hit the unsubscribe button on almost half of my channels this past week.  I still will be seeing Grace, Hannah, Mamrie, John, Hank, and of course Pewds on my feed, as well as new loves this year like Rosanna Pansino, but the entire Gleam Team got cut except Caspar, Louise, and Joe (all of whom at least tend to start trends rather than just follow them).  Every vlogging channel got cut (though if Pewdiepie could continue doing vlogging that would be marvelous, as it felt like an actual insight into him as a character), but while I am frustrated with their repetition this year, people like Connor Franta, Shane Dawson, and Miranda Sings are still in the lineup if only because I occasionally have videos I admire of theirs.  Even the insanely handsome guys who brought me to YouTube culture, Jacksgap, managed to bite the big one, as I just couldn't get past Jack's attempt at depth when his perspective seems skewed toward the insanely affluent, limited worldview of someone who can afford to go to non-western countries and look at them only with a camera.  As a result, I am far more likely to click most of the links in my YouTube lineup, but sad that in many ways I'm abandoning a huge chunk of my connection to YouTube culture.  It's smart in the long run (better to remove the clutter and focus on the worthwhile in every aspect of life), but it's a bummer that so many creators got stamped out by trying to be more accessible and merchandised.

Everybody's Linking for the Week

I know, it's Monday.  I'm bummed too.  Let's do this thing and hopefully feel a little better informed as we count the days until the next weekend, shall we?

In Entertainment...

-On Saturday the Governors Awards took place in Los Angeles, as the likes of Gena Rowlands, Spike Lee, and Debbie Reynolds won their long overdue Oscars.  Spike Lee urged Hollywood to embrace diversity, particularly from a business perspective, and AMPAS President Cheryl Boone Isaacs echoed these sentiments in her opening remarks.  Gena Rowlands was the major hit of the night, sharing a cute story about Bette Davis (it always pays to name-drop a Hollywood legend or two in a speech, particularly if you're a Hollywood legend yourself), while Debbie Reynolds was too ill to be able to attend, so her granddaughter Billie went in her place.  Congrats to all three, and here's to hoping both for a speedy recovery for Reynolds and for the three of them to be at the very least presenters (perhaps Best Picture?) at this year's Oscar ceremony.

-Due to the attacks in Paris, episodes of Supergirl and NCIS: Los Angeles that focused on terrorism-related plotlines were replaced by other episodes.  I do, of course, want to be sensitive to those directly affected by the tragedy but part of me becomes very uncomfortable when studios do something like this.  These episodes don't pose a security risk like the cancellation of live concerts and film premieres, but instead are just episodes of television, and as a result by not airing them aren't we giving the terrorists a victory?  I get that CBS doesn't want to suffer the backlash, but part of me wonders if a simple "we're not going to let terrorists dictate our freedom of expression" would be a better byline for the network.  In related news-should I be watching Supergirl?  I feel like it's a pretty populist hit, but no one I know is watching-is it any good, and what is it comparable to?

-Salon's Sophia McClennon wrecked Trevor Noah in an epic takedown, saying he can't hold a candle to Jon Stewart and points out that his approach will ruin The Daily Show's sharp position in the public debate and its place as a former of national opinion.  Clicking over to the link, it's easy to see her point-Noah is a voice of fresh air in the light night talk game, but more so because he's intensely handsome and has a wryness that lacks in comparison to the earnestness that dominates network late-night.  However, he hasn't really advocated for anything other than SNL level parodies, and that's SNL when it isn't acing it.  His show hasn't really done anything except cruelly malign Iowa (but not in a way that came across as anything other than regional stereotyping) and say Donald Trump was an African dictator (something that Stewart could have done in three jokes).  While McClennon is correct to point out that Stewart wasn't a great hit out-of-the-gate, in a media landscape where John Oliver is sharply gaining points and Jon Stewart is poised to be creating another show on HBO, Noah doesn't have that long to wait before he becomes old news.

In Politics...

-Politico, whose magazine may be the best thing on the web these days (their general site occasionally turns into a beltway gossip column), gives a remarkably thorough investigation into the months preceding the 9/11 attacks, particularly spelling out that (based on evidence provided by former CIA officials) President Bush had received numerous warnings about impending attacks from Al-Qaeda and hadn't heeded those warnings.  This is particularly timely both in comparison to how Bush was treated over 9/11 and how Sec. Clinton has been treated in regard to the attacks in Benghazi, as well as in the wake of the tragic events in Paris this past week.  I thoroughly recommend reading through the full article if you haven't yet.

-Speaking of Politico Magazine, Bill Scher raised yet another article wondering if Jeb Bush is still in the presidential game, but instead of calling back Sen. John McCain's triumphant return to the spotlight in 2008, he instead decided to compare him to a different comeback kid, John Kerry in 2004.  While the Bush camp would be loathe to compare themselves to the man who spent a year vilifying his brother, behind closed doors I suspect they are studying the Kerry campaign.  After all, like Bush Sen. Kerry was down in the mid-single digits before the Iowa caucuses (actually down less than a month by those kinds of numbers), and 2004 was more about a man who never had held office (Wesley Clark), a first-term senator who had become the establishment's new favorite (John Edwards), and someone from the fringe of the party that seemed to have inexplicably caught fire (Howard Dean) rather than longtime party stalwarts like Kerry, Dick Gephardt, and Joe Lieberman.  It's worth noting that Bush is actually mimicking in many ways the Kerry camp, not really succumbing to the urge to be outlandish or change his tune, but instead staying in and hoping that the others implode in a way similar to Kerry's challengers (when Dean, Clark, Edwards, Gephardt, and Lieberman, all of whom had a strong shot at the nomination throughout that campaign, ended up being unacceptable choices for a general and the establishment went to the longtime war-hero senator).  Some may mention that Kerry, of course, lost the White House (as did John McCain), but right now the goal is emerging victorious out of the primary-Bush doesn't care about Hillary Clinton until then.  He'd gladly settle for the hand that John Kerry got dealt at this point.

-While there were a number of retirements announced this past week from Congress (including Sam Farr, who is another close Nancy Pelosi ally who could be indicating that Pelosi will eventually resign from the next Congress should she lose out on the Speakership next November), perhaps no one set off a potential firestorm quite like Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming.  With Lummis, a relatively quiet Republican whom I thought would just bide her time until Mike Enzi retired in 2020, announcing a surprise retirement, we are likely to see the return of Liz Cheney, who last cycle ran an embarrassing and nasty campaign against Enzi, which she ended up withdrawing from in the wake of a 50-point voting deficit in the state.  Cheney is unlikely to have the field to herself, however, as more seasoned politicians in the state like State House Speaker Tim Stubson and House Majority Leader Rosie Berger are looking at the contest (openings in Wyoming don't come around every day, and whomever wins here will have right-of-first-refusal in 2020 when Enzi is expected to retire).  Considering the bad blood that Cheney had with the Wyoming State Republicans (as well as Lummis and Enzi, both still powerhouses in the state), and her father's still considerable profile in national politics, this could be one of the most intriguing primaries of the next House cycle.

Shameless Self-Promotion of the Week...

-I am loving the second season of The Leftovers (which, while lacking the wandering nature of the first season, still manages to take a look at the harshness of faith, tragedy, and dependance on others), but why do they have to make Matt so insanely stupid?  I won't share what he does (please be watching the show if you aren't-I can't lose this and Looking in the same year), but if you're watching sound off in the comments on Matt's story arch.

YouTube Video of the Week...

-The best video that Shane Dawson has done probably all year was his Fifi Fierce character (parodying the banal nature of YouTube beauty gurus), and thankfully she's back.  This is audibly NSFW, so keep the headphones on, but it's probably the sharpest satire Shane has done:

Just One More...

-HuffPo did a rundown of this past season's art auction highlights, which if you've been paying attention hasn't been particularly exciting outside of the insanity of Mondigliani's Nu Couche getting $170 million.  HuffPo is a little kinder to the auction houses than others in the art world have been, but it's definitely a worthwhile read if you're an art/museum lover and haven't been keeping up with the scene.

Everybody's Linking for the Weekend

Umm, what's that you say?  An Everybody's Linking for the Weekend on a Saturday?  This is madness!  However, in what is traditionally the weekend where I try to figure out what I want to do with the next month of my life (planning is highly-underrated), I figured I might as well start out November with a bang and scare you (see, Halloween) into thinking that I might get everything on-time this month.  Without further adieu...

In Entertainment...

-For those of you who are devoted YouTubers, nothing this week could quell your excitement over a second film from the Holy Trinity of the site, Grace Helbig, Hannah Hart, and Mamrie Hart.  The trio made Camp Takota last year, and unlike almost every other YouTube film that followed, it didn't endure horrific reviews as a result (cough Not Cool cough).  I personally am excited to see what these three bring as they're amongst my favorite YouTube content creators, particularly since the title (Dirty Thirty) seems to be about them owning their age a little bit more, which is rare on YouTube where everyone tries to be fourteen.

-I am so bummed that I missed the Leah Remini 20/20 interview last night.  I'm not wild about Remini (she was funny on an average sitcom and her brash persona occasionally rubs me the wrong way) and I find that most celebrity gossip is kind of boring these days, but man am I weirdly excited to hear the juice about Remini and her break from Scientology, considering it's one of the oddest and strangest things in Hollywood over the past several decades, and continues to be a really interesting topic considering stars like Tom Cruise and John Travolta are still involved with the church.  Remini is the biggest star to leave the organization, of course, and so likely had more access to the higher-ups in the Church.  The interview is chronicled pretty heavily in the article I linked above, so if you didn't record it or don't have access to a TV, read through as it's a fascinating look at Remini's involvement with the church and her relationships (that have spilled into the press) with Katie Holmes and Kirstie Alley.

-Every week I find Lady Gaga more and more phony and infuriating, and this week was no exception. Gaga apparently said a couple of years ago she wanted to quit music because she was tired of being treated as a "commodity."  This would potentially resonate (I'm sure celebrities get sick of being a product when they want to just create art), but Gaga made a point in her first album and every album after that about wanting to be a celebrity, and that was her primary goal.  One of her earliest hits was a song called "Paparazzi" and she demanded at the Grammys "take my picture Hollywood, I want to be a star."  Her latest sorts of comments feel just as manufactured as everything else about the singer-turned-actress, and seem to be launched more because her music career left her and not the other way around.  This sort of crap is what turned me off to her in the first place, and it isn't helping right now, and no amount of Julie Andrews musical moments are going to make me change my mind.

In Politics...

-One of the larger questions this past week has been around whether or not Sen. Marco Rubio should resign from the Senate.  I initially was going to do an article about this, but Smart Politics beat me to the punch, and it was so thorough I figured I'd just link.  I think Rubio himself did, in fact, quell this discussion with his epic takedown of Jeb Bush earlier last week, but the reality is that it's a question worth having. Rubio isn't running for reelection like Rand Paul, so it's not like he's going to be using the Senate seat anytime soon, and there is limited precedent but it's there for giving up his seat (Sen. Bob Dole resigned his seat in 1996, as the article points out).  I think it's a pragmatic question as well-look at Sen. Dean Heller who managed to gain a great leg-up in 2012 by being a temporary but real incumbent (it's likely he would have lost had it been a true open seat race, giving the Democrats a vital seat headed into 2016 where they're looking for anything they can grab to get five more).  Rubio, from a pragmatic side probably should give up his seat then, but doing so could invite comparisons to Sarah Palin when she resigned the Alaskan governorship and he wants to avoid that at all costs so I cannot fathom he will do so.  Expect Hillary Clinton to be eyeing how many votes he missed in comparison to her voting record in 2007, though, as this will be fodder in 2016 for certain as they appear to be the likely nominees.

-Speaking of the former senator, Mark Halperin did an epic takedown of the Republicans in a piece this past week for Bloomberg where he highlights that Republicans are stuck in an echo chamber on Hillary Clinton.  This is something, I think, we all are stuck in, quite frankly.  I talk with Democrats who are petrified of Clinton being the nominee because they don't think enough people like her, and yet every Democrat (and some lay people as well) seem to be willing to cast their votes for her, albeit with great fervor or a pinched nose (at the end of the day, though, they count the same).  Halperin correctly points out that Clinton's team is better at debates, and has a party that is much less likely to demand things of their nominee that could be deemed general election poison (it seems impossible, for example, for next year's RNC to not have speeches about Benghazi and email servers, which will not play well outside of a primary considering public polling on the matters).  It's also worth noting that, using the past four elections as a guide, the Democrats have more electoral college votes that seem likely to be in their corner than the Republicans (the Democrats don't need states like Florida and Ohio, for example, but the Republicans can't afford to lose them).  All-in-all, Clinton has an upperhand if you throw away the fact that historically she should have a tougher race.

-And we'll finish out the political portion of this link roundup with an excellent profile of Al Gore and his look at An Inconvenient Truth ten years later from Politico.  The article is interesting not just because of a few choice little anecdotes in the write-up (how is it possible that Al Gore has never met Jeb Bush considering they've both been on the national stage for decades and considering Al Gore is very well-acquainted with his brother).  While he didn't endorse his former rival for the President's attention (Hillary Clinton and Al Gore are hardly good friends), he did point out the Democrats have his support more than the Republicans in 2016.  It's an interesting read, particularly for those who were inspired by his powerpoint ten years ago, so check it out.

Shameless Self-Promotion of the Week..

-Democrats can hug Republicans-it'll be all right, Freedom Caucus.  You can't catch liberalism.

YouTube Video of the Week...

-I feel a little guilty every year that I don't really celebrate Halloween, particularly since I feel like I'm abandoning the quintessential gay holiday, so in deference to that, I shall put perhaps the gayest moment in all Halloween movies below.  Check it out, and I dare you to not want to change your costume to match Bette's:

Just One More...

-If there's a name you need to memorize immediately before next summer's Olympic Games, it's Simone Biles, who became the first gymnast ever to win three consecutive world championships this past week, besting Olympic champion Gabby Douglas (who became the first Olympic champion to make a medals stand since 1981 at the world championships).  At this rate, it seems Team USA will be the ones to beat come next Summer, and expect a lot of NBC promos touting a rivalry between Biles and reigning Olympic champ Douglas, who is looking to become the first woman since Nadia Comaneci to medal in two consecutive All-Arounds, and potentially the first since Vera Caslavska to win the title back-to-back.