Congrats on the real-life heel getting his comeuppance, LKJ.

Thank you. My current level of insatiable giddiness only further demonstrates what an unhealthy level of hatred I harbor for that ****ing guy. The very fear that my office might bring this idiot back - a fear that was rational and eventually realized, no matter how many people in my life thought I was crazy to fear it - burdened me for years. Only now do I finally feel like he has lost his status as an unkillable movie villain.

Wow, that's fantastic!


Any more detail other than complaints piling up?

Were others as happy as you?

I assume they will be. He is a hated man. My hate for him may be more intense than most since I've felt this way about him for more than a decade, but very few people have a positive opinion of him, and many share a reasonably similar intensity of disdain for him to mine. However, I haven't been able to have a meaningful conversation about it today to gather more information.

This morning I texted a colleague who I think may have landed the deathblow on him in a meeting last week, to say, "It sounds like congratulations are in order?" She said "Hahaha I can't confirm or deny. But thank you." I was very confused; the secondhand account I heard was that he got perp-walked out by security yesterday, and the source of this was someone in management in that area. But she can't confirm that he's fired? Feeling the creeping dread of "surely I won't have to go back on that business about him no longer being an unkillable movie villain," I said, "What? There isn't still an open question, is there?" She said they weren't announcing it yet and she was not allowed to tell anyone anything yet, per HR. She said the dude's (now former) boss was hoping to make an announcement this afternoon. I haven't heard anything since.

I mean, I don't see how any of this adds up to any possibility that there's a big twist coming and he's going to somehow survive. I talked to a colleague in my immediate area and ran the above convo by her, as I had told her what I knew under the assumption that I wasn't spreading anything that would still be a secret. She had already talked to people about it and said, "Oh, it has been verified by people who would know, but I couldn't get more information." I don't think there's any question that the firing happened yesterday, and I don't think this was a "Did I Stutter?" fake firing.

All very strange. Aside from the irrational impulse I have toward believing that this guy might never die because he's just too evil, I don't think there's any real danger that the result is changing. I just don't understand the secrecy at all. Once that weird veil lifts, hopefully I'll know more.

Alright, they appear to have lifted the veil of secrecy. Colleague texts me that they made an announcement over email late in the afternoon.

Alright, now I've had a chance to talk with some people. I'm getting much more of a vibe like they're still shaking off the trauma of having had to work for him than having started into immediate celebration. They seem to be much more focused on conducting post-mortems about how awful this brief but intense chapter was, with just a hint of relief on the side that the dragon has been slayed.

Apparently at least a couple of them are still paranoid that it could somehow still get reversed. I guess I'm not the only one who thinks that he has magical invincibility powers garnered through sheer evil. I don't think they're actually in any further danger here, but it's understandable to me that this is also tempering their reaction. It's like a high-stakes version of watching your team score a TD and then having the "FLAG" thing come up along the bottom of the screen.

My day today.

one year to the day after firing everyone, wwe does it again I see

1) I hold doors

2) I’ve always had precisely zero expectation to be thanked for a super basic act of courtesy

Same. I think Baldwin’s take is super weird, though I usually do value his thoughts on the world. I think it’s especially weird to expect thanks when the holding of the door is incidental to opening the door for yourself, and the person is close enough that your only choices are to hold the door for a moment or slam it in their face. I would understand the take if it was exclusive to situations where you’re actually stopping and waiting for multiple seconds with the door held.

But ever since the “ingrate” incident, I’m a lot more mindful to say thanks louder each time so that it doesn’t go unheard.

LKJ, don't know how many of the Best Picture nominees you've seen, but I'd say it's the second best lineup in the past decade (behind only the Spotlight year).

Unfortunately, the massive favorite for some reason (Nomadland) and its main competition (Trial of the Chicago 7) are two of the weakest films in the list.

Unfortunately, I've seen none of them. So clearly I won't have seen them by Sunday either. But that's good to know; I'll make a point to check them out.

You've got stuff to look forward to. 5 great films and Nomadland/Mank/Chicago 7 are at least not horrible.

Judas and the Black Messiah would be my vote if I had an Oscar ballot.

Promising Young Woman and The Father are both outstanding, but a bit unnerving to watch at times.

One Night in Miami didn't get nominated for BP, but definitely should have.

Looks like four are available on streaming. But three of those are the three that you just designated as "not horrible." Sound of Metal is the other one.

If I could just choose to dial up one to give it a go right now, it would be The Father since I'm a big Anthony Hopkins fan. Looks like I'm left to wait on future streaming options for that one though.

I've not heard of a single one of those. Maybe I'll knock one out tonight.

I watched Nomadland. I rather enjoyed it. Almost no chance I ever watch it again, but glad I saw it.

Somehow I've reached a point in life I'd much rather watch that style of movie than a comedy or Hollywood blockbuster type.

I think me saying "not horrible" isn't doing it justice.

It's a good movie. My negative tone is mostly backlash due to the fact that it seems to be a near-lock for Best Picture for reasons that I can't comprehend.

If Nomadland had come out 3 years ago, I might even support it winning. But this isn't one of those crappy years. There are extremely good movies this year.

As a huge movie buff, this is wild to me. I find this year's candidates to be relatively average/weak. I really enjoyed Promising Young Woman and Judas & The Black Messiah, and as a Sorkin fan I was always gonna like The Trial of the Chicago 7, but I could pretty much take or leave the rest.

At a bare minimum I would add 2020, 2015, 2014, and 2011 as years that undoubtedly had a better Best Picture lineup. Others are debatable.

2020 was decent, but I'd take this year in a heartbeat. Parasite, Marriage Story and 1917 were the only ones that I'd really call special.

2014 and 2015 were both good so I'm not going to fight you too much there.

2011 was before I started watching all of them, so I can't that comparison fairly.

Hopefully you agree that this year is better than dumpster fire years like when The Shape of Water won.

I think that 2018 lineup looks worse because The Shape of Water was for some reason the winner. I'm not sure I'd have put it in the top five just of that year's Best Picture nominees. Granted that it's a relatively weak lineup when you put legitimately below-average movies like Phantom Thread and Darkest Hour in the category, but I enjoyed Three Billboards and Lady Bird quite a bit.

Lady Bird was great. I wanted to like Three Billboards, but found it to be an illogical mess.

I thought that I, Tonya was pretty great that year too. No idea why that wasn't one of the Best Picture runners with crap like Darkest Hour in there; it did get nominated for its acting, and Janney won, so it's not like the Academy was just sleeping on the movie as a whole.