Haha, I was literally adding "L.A. Confidential" to my Netflix queue when I heard him say "if you haven't seen it, add it to your Netflix queue." Have always heard it was good, just haven't gotten around to seeing it yet.

maybe i wasn't paying attention througout the entire podcast, but since you guys mentioned who directed "surrogates", did you also check out who wrote it?

if not: do so ;-)

Would like to hear what you guys have to say about Pandorum.

All art is subjective, there's no need to bring up the subjective card when discussing art, that merely serves as a redundancy.

Like I said, I don't think Community tries for any of the humor you are trying to say it does. Meta humor implies intelligent humor, while self-referential implies humor that makes a statement about ones self. Community isn't trying for smart humor, they always go for the lowest common denominator. They aren't making jokes about themselves, but rather their humor is directed, very point at and laugh style, at characters the show clearly thinks aren't worth very much.

And I'm sorry, but the cliches in Community aren't a part of the joke, they are cliches that exist because of shoddy writing. The Office and 30 Rock work with cliches, have fun with them, Community tosses cliches out there and expects people to laugh because, "Look, it's a cliched joke, isn't that cliched joke that you've seen a million times before funny."

There aren't any similarities outside of both shows having outlandish characters that can be found between 30 Rock and Community, one is an actual smart, meta comedy, while the other is a lowest common denominator series of cliches.

I could list many more ways in which the shows are radically different, it's easy to do when 30 Rock takes time to construct their style and presentation while Community is nothing more than a series of obvious cliches and old jokes that exist because of shoddy writing.

it would be cool if jaws got remade by steven speilberg

So sad to hear you guys slag off the excellent FlashForward, Matthew Fox wishes he could act anywhere near as good as Joseph Fiennes, and Modern Family while praising the beyond terrible Community. A comedy is supposed to be funny, right? Perhaps Community should look into that, and please don't even try to compare it to 30 Rock, it is about a million levels below shows like The Office and 30 Rock.

Also, quit making excuses for Polanski. Big deal, he had a hard life, he still raped a girl and then ran. The solution was simple, stay in jail and fight the system, he would most likely have won. Instead he ran and created all of his own problems. What's even worse is the sickening Hollywood petition going around asking for his release, because according to them he has served his time in France. I'm sure some French people think of their country as a prison, but it's not, and trying to label living there as his time served is pathetic on the part of every person signing the petition, a lot of whom make movies I love.

Oh yeah, know I sounded harsh, but I do like the show, so don't think I'm slagging you off, just disagreeing in vehement fashion. :)

Regardless of whether or not you think the show is terrible, the comparison to 30 Rock is still apt, since the style of comedy and storytelling is very similar.

Also, might I remind you that pretty much everyone was trashing 30 Rock after only its first few episodes. It wasn't until the second half of the first season that people started getting into it.

I don't see any similarity in style. 30 Rock is built upon outlandish yet interesting characters, and their storytelling style revolves around the inherent charisma of the entire cast. Community has a cast full of generic characters who are too annoying to ignore, and they are trying to build their show around the quirkiness of these characters, but none of them are interesting or have the charisma to actually carry the show, especially the lead female who is nothing more than a token blond chick without an ounce of charisma in her body.

I was not one of those thrashing 30 Rock, it wasn't great at first, but it was good and the potential for more was there. With Community that is the case, it has been awful and is a one note joke show where the joke isn't funny to begin with.

You clearly see things in Community that I don't, and that's cool. From my end though it was one of the few shows I was looking forward to and it's been nothing but a disappointment so far, I don't have high expectations either, all I want is to laugh.

You appear to be confusing your dislike of the show (over subjective reasons, I might add) with the intent.

Like I said, the comparison is valid, because both shows attempt to do the same things, regardless of whether or not you think they succeed.

30 Rock: Outlandish, simple-minded characters that lack any real depth
Community: Outlandish, simple-minded characters that lack any real depth

30 Rock: Wacky, cliched storylines where the cliches are part of the joke
Community: Wacky, cliched storylines where the cliches are part of the joke

30 Rock: Upbeat style and rapid-fire jokes & dialogue
Community: Upbeat style and rapid-fire jokes & dialogue

30 Rock: Self-referential, meta humor
Community: Self-referential, meta humor

Etc. etc. etc.

About the Elm Street segment:
both Adam (who like the Friday 13th remake...urgh) and Devindra are dissing the director of the new film as a "music video director". Come on, guys. Not that I think that Elm Street´s gonna be any good, but don´t diss the guy for making music videos. Need I remind you of David Fincher? Jonze? Gondry? And now Marc Webb?

Don´t act like "blog journalists" (sarcasm alert).

Point well taken. But to be fair, the criticism was made while taking into account the circumstances: another horror remake by Platinum Dunes, produced by Michael Bay. I doubt they were searching for the next Fincher, Jonze, Gondry, or Webb when hiring on a director. Those four filmmakers may be exceptions, but generally, a music video director is not a good sign.

You Polanski apologists kill me. If there was judicial misconduct, use your money and influence to get another trial. He pled guilty, and was headed to jail anyway. But, no. Polanski thought he was above that and ran off to Europe where he was embraced. Also, I notice you never mentioned specifically what Polanski did to that girl. It's indefensible, regardless of his miserable personal narrative.
I've seen parts of the documentary, and it came off as an agenda-driven film bent on garnering sympathy for Polanski.

I don't know who you're referring to when you say "You Polanski apologists" because it's certainly not any of us on the podcast.

I usually really love your program but this one was an exception and left me so upset that I couldn't enjoy the remaining program.

You guys should have skipped the Polanski discussion, it was completely inappropriate. You should stick to discussions of movies and not social issues or crime and punishment. He was a 43-year old man that drugged, raped, and sodomized a 13-year old kid and didn't want to serve time for it. I don't care how talented he is, how much he paid off the victim, or what a sad life he lived. He committed a very serious crime and you are making light of it because of his talent. Most criminals serving time in jail were abused as children or grew up with a sad story. If he was an average person your feelings would be different.

Using the victim (and continuing to state her name) as as excuse for Polanski was especially low. He not only committed a crime against her, he broke our laws of civilized behavior. We are nothing but animals without these laws. I hope none of your children ever have to suffer rape at the hands of a similar "gifted" movie-maker.

P.S. the HBO "documentary" is a propaganda film and you know it. Since when does HBO movies substitute for the serious journalism of a "60 minutes", Nova or Nightline?

Anne,

Thanks for your comments. Let me respond to a few things:

-Roman Polanski drugged and raped a 13-year old child. This is a heinous and horrible crime, and nobody on our podcast thinks that anything that's happened in Polanski's life excuses this or makes this okay.

-Sometimes, people who do horrible things get treated horribly by our justice system. As a result, they often don't pay the appropriate punishment. If you've ever seen any cop shows (ever), you've heard frequently of those cases where people were "let off on a technicality"? That comes from real life.

There's a reason why, in cases where justice was miscarried, the defendant is usually given leniency: The implication is, how can we expect people to live up to the standards set by the law, when the law itself can't even abide by those standards?

-You say two things about the victim in this case. First you say I mentioned her name and "continued to state" it. Given that this is a movie podcast with a pretty specific demographic for whom her name is probably meaningless, I didn't think there's anything particularly wrong with this (it's not like I called her up and harassed her for an interview). Nonetheless, I can try to be more sensitive about this issue in the future.

As for "using her" as an "excuse" for Polanski, all I was pointing out was that this is a case where the victim actually seems less blood-thirsty than the media or much of the public towards the perpetrator. Furthermore, her attitude towards the case (i.e. she wants the charges dismissed) might actually have implications for the case itself, and the Swiss's willingness to extradite Polanski. Nonetheless, her attitude towards the case does not excuse Polanski's original actions, and if you think that's what I was trying to say, you are wrong.

- Regarding your statement that the HBO documentary is a "propaganda" film, I'd really be interested in a) Whether you've actually seen the documentary or not, and b) Why you think it's propaganda or why you think it distorts the truth.

-As a big picture issue, what is dismaying to me (although I guess it shouldn't be surprising) is that the details of this case are so inflammatory that they have inhibited intelligent, reasoned discussion about this matter from both Polanski haters and defenders.

When we can't talk about these things in a reasoned, civilized way, without resorting to accusations, that's when we've lost something of our discourse.

David, there is one flaw in you logic and it's in your paragraph where you say justice was miscarried. Polanski admitted to druging and raping a 13 year old and plead the charges down to unlawful sex with a minor. The implied miscarriage of justice is that the judge was going to sentence him to more time in prison than in the original plea. Now here is the flaw in the miscarriage of justice argument - Polanski never showed up the sentencing so we don't really know what the judge was going to do. Since Polanksi never showed up, the judge never got to sentence him so where was the miscarriage???

If Polanski thought the judge was was going to hose him, he could have fought it in the appellate court or changed his plea to not guilty and went to trial. The problem was he was guilty so a jury would have convicted him. If he would have went to appellate courts, his guilty plea would have held up, it would have been misconduct in the sentencing that was reviewed and the best he could have hope for was a new sentence hearing where the original plea was reinstated.

I don't think you guys are the audience for Barbie.

my vote is for January Jones (Betty Draper) from MADMEN for Barbie

I think they'll just end up casting a tween appeal star and it will be skewed very young. And probably won't be a clever take on Barbie (like Clueless or something) but just be this, this *thing*. I don't know what.

About Flashforward:

Why the hell did they cast 2 brits as the lead couple? Why not just make them a british couple in LA instead of making them put on terrible American accents?

I'm little bit baffled by your polanski discussion, because there was only one right thing to do and that wasn't fleeing the country. I'm from Germany so I'm not that knowleggable in the US judicial system, but even if he would have been mistreated back then, couldn't he make an appeal.

I hope Michael C Hall got paid by the yawn.

Also, as much as I love the Dollhouse premiere it ruins it to know which characters are only going to be around for just a couple episodes even though they are the more interesting characters.

Hooray for "Community"!

Not sure why Ellroy felt he needed to shoot down Chinatown but to each his own. Love L.A. Confidential, probably my favorite movie ever. I wonder who he thinks is "monumentally miscast," probably Basinger? And I'm so glad he took a verbal dump on Black Dahlia, that movie was garbage.