First, an overturned finish and then a jockeys horse. I really like what the show runners are doing with this season of Triple Crown.
Starting Five
Revenge Of The Nerds*
*The judges will accept “All Bran” but not “How The Westeros Was Won”
After all the swords and sex, maesters and mendacity, dragons and Dothraki, Boltons and Barratheons and incest and incendiaries, turns out no one actually gets to sit on the Iron Throne. Benioff and Weiss handed control of the Seven Six Kingdoms to a cripple and a dwarf. Perhaps there’s a message in all of that.
A dog’s journey
We were totally satisfied with the finale, loved the insertion of humor in the first cabinet meeting (as well as the commentary on democracy when Samwell had the temerity to suggest it). Loved that Arya is now an explorer (“What’s west of Westeros?”), that Sansa is Queen of the North, and that Jon quickly surmised that there’s no reason to have a Night’s Watch when there are no creatures north of the wall to fear (his greatest love was a Wilding; perhaps he’ll meet another).
Our watch has ended. Thank you, GOT.
The Kings In The West
We’re not here to say whether the Golden State Warriors are better or worse without Kevin Durant (arguably the best player in the NBA), we’ll just remind you that they’re 30-1 without him when Steph Curry plays and that they’ve now won four straight playoff games in his absence (and closed out a fifth).
“Like a wrecking ball…”
Watching the Dubs quickly and surgically erase an 18-point deficit in Portland Saturday night, we were reminded to the vintage Dubs of 2015 who moved the ball beautifully and played tenacious defense. Last week Charles Barkley declared that Golden State cannot win the NBA Finals without Durant. They’ll be more formidable with KD, but Sir Charles is flat-out wrong. The core Dubs—Curry, Klay Thompson and particularly Draymond Green—are playing with a renewed sense of purpose. They can smell it, and with or without KD they’re going to do it.
The question is whether they’ll lose another game.
Speaker of the Morehouse
Billionaire Robert B. Smith, who happens to be the richest African-American with a net worth of some $5 billion, was the commencement speaker at Morehouse College this weekend and he has laid down the gauntlet for every graduation speaker anywhere forever. Smith, a self-made man who attended Cornell and then earned an MBA from Columbia, pledged to pay off the student loans of all 400 of Morehouse’s 2019 grads.
Meanwhile at Taylor University in Indiana, dozens of graduating seniors walked out of commencement exercises as Vice President Mike Pence stood up to speak (maybe they thought it was a Colts game?). That’s the second time in three years students in Indiana, the state where Pence was governor, have walked out on his commencement speech.
Yes, But Donald & Co. Are Singing “We Are The Champions”
The 44th season of Saturday Night Live could not end without the cast (and Alec Baldwin and Robert DeNiro) taking one last shot at the president. They wrote a parody to Queen’s “Don’t Stop Me Now” and we only include it here because if you actually pay attention to the lyrics (He’s throwing stones and he lives in a big glass house/He’s cheating on every spouse), it’s very well done.
Also, less than 24 hours after the season finale, it was announced that Colin Jost and Scarlett Johanssen (JoJo?) will be married. Now what’s Michael Che going to do?
Will Roder: Iowa’s 2,800-Meter State Champ
Roder (left): “Stop Me Now!”
Someone—not us, Ruth—once said that Iowa is an acronym for “Idiots Out Walking Around” and last weekend at Drake Stadium at the state high school track meet, no one did anything to disabuse us of that notion.
In the Class IA Boys 3,200-meter final, an eight-lap race, a meet official mistakenly rang the bell signifying the final, or “bell lap,” after only six laps. Will Roder of LeMars Geylen Catholic High responded as one of Pavlov’s dogs might, sprinting that seventh lap to wha he assumed was the finish. Meanwhile Joe Anderson of George-Little Rock, a runner who can count to eight, recognized the error and continued apace.
After seven laps Anderson just kept running and was the first runner to complete the assigned 3,200-meter distance, doing so in 9:56.45. The meet officials huddled to decide what to do and guess what? They gave the championship to Roder. This is just, I dunno, colossally stupid, no?
We need to make Scott Van Pelt aware of this.
Anderson has already announced that he will not run the Belmont Stakes…
Remote Patrol
Chernobyl
9 p.m. HBO
What Drogon and Dany did to King’s Landing in the land of make-believe, a team of incompetent Russian nuclear engineers nearly did to all of Europe in 1986. If you’ve missed the first two episodes, catch up. Chernobyl is utterly compelling and we have to wonder if this event is what gave Matt Groening the inspiration for where Homer Simpson would work.
Between Steph’s game-high 37 points, Seth’s career playoff-best 16 points off the bench, and an in-game interview with parents Dell and Sonya, last night’s highly entertaining Game 2 featured more Curry than an Indian restaurant (I chose not to tweet this because we live in highly ratio’d times).
Moments after Seth buried a go-ahead three in the final minute. It’s not that Mom and Pop have a favorite son, but rather it was refreshing to see kid brother knock one down. By the way, why name your only two children names that sound nearly identical?
Dubs go on a 14-3 spree to end game, overcome the majesty that is Meyers Leonard, and pull out Game 2, 114-111. It’s 2-0 now. Fans of the series blame the show runners for not letting the Blazers win.
Last Bang
The ironic thing about the Big Bang Theory—the scientific concept, not sitcom—is that it is ever ongoing. The CBS show only lasted 12 seasons. The BBT was always amusing, but given that most of us (me, too) stopped paying attention to what was on prime-time network television more than a decade ago, it was more like being Norwich City: the best team in the England’s second-best league.
We don’t know what happened in last night’s series finale but we imagine that Sheldon got off a “Bazinga!” or two. We feel as if this show is the most science—the only science—that many adults in the land have willingly exposed themselves to in the past dozen years.
A Star Is Zorn
Two weeks ago in Charleston, South Carolina, The Citadel held commencement exercises. This year’s graduation was unlike any that the military school has undertaken since it was founded in 1842 (a great year for the founding of schools!) as it was the first to feature a female regimental commander. That post, appointed by the school’s faculty leadership, is akin to being the student body’s team captain, and it went to Sarah Zorn, a native South Carolinian whose mother died when she was 16 and moved in with an aunt.
Zorn, 22, is now a 2nd lieutenant in the U.S. Army and The New York Times did a terrific photo essay of her in today’s edition (this is going to be a conundrum for some friends of ours who love the military but loathe The New York Times).
Back, But Not On Track
Erstwhile high school running sensation Mary Cain is now 23. On Sunday, in a cold and steady rain in Central Park, the Bronxville native ran her first race in 2 1/2 years—and won. Cain, who now lives in the East Village (not known as a haven for serious runners, but it’s a great spot to find cheap ramen and dive bars), ran and won the Japan 4-Miler in Central Park in a time of, as you see above, about 21:50.
Records that Cain still holds, for high schoolers: 800 meters, 1,000 meters, 3,000 meters and 2 miles. She set records in the 1,500 and 5,000 that have since been broken. The Runner’s World article does not say what else Cain, who attended Fordham, is doing with her time now.
I Stan, You Stan, We All Stan For Kyrgyzstan!
There are no shortage of -stans in the area south of Russia and west of China: Uzbeki-, Paki-, Afghani-, Kazakh-, Turkmeni- and even Tajiki-. But the most unpronounceable, and arguably the most beautiful, is Kyrgzystan. And how cool will you look later this summer when you tell your friends, “I just got back from Krygzystan!” and they’re like, “Is that even a place?”
Interested? Then watch this 22-minute film by Jenny Tough, who has a pretty interesting website. And I have no idea if that’s her real name. But it’s nice to know there are people out there like this.
Music 101
Mr. Rock and Roll
We always thought these were super-precociously wise and insightful lyrics from such a young musician. Scottish singer-songwriter Amy MacDonald was only 19 or 20 when she penned this hit that went to No. 12 on the UK chart in 2007. It’ll long outlive her, which is a testament to her.
Remote Patrol
Game Of Thrones
Sunday 9 p.m. HBO
“It’s more like 400 million chest X-rays, your grace”
When an explosion in Building 4 of the Harrenhal Nuclear Plant blows the reactor to bits and sends radioactive graphite spewing everywhere as Uranium-235 forms into a giant cloud above, all of Westeros becomes an apocalyptic hellscape. Or at least it will unless Jared Harris, Emily Watson and Peter Dinklage can use their massive crania to solve the problem and end the threat. This, my friends, will be the final episode of GOT. Either that or I’ve been watching too much HBO this month.
Do the people suggesting Zion Williamson go back to Duke realize that the Pelicans are going to pay him money to play basketball whereas Duke will not pay him money to play basketball? It’s one of those real subtle points you can miss if you don’t pay close attention.
Every person who even suggested on Twitter yesterday that Zion could return to Duke next season instead of playing for New Orleans (because he has yet to sign an agent) will not earn in their lifetime what Zion will make next year playing for the Pelicans.
Starting Five
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey
Feeble Position*
*The judges will also accept “Crazy In Alabama,” or “The Crimson Letter”
Alabama governor Kay Ivey signs into law a bill that bans abortions “at every stage of pregnancy and criminalizes the procedure for doctors, who could be charged with felonies and face up to 99 years in prison. It includes an exception for cases when the mother’s life is at serious risk, but not for cases of rape or incest.”
Only in America could abortions get banned faster than assault rifles.
The game plan is simple. Right now progressive types could be upset by the bill, but they could simply cross state lines and have an abortion. Instead, someone’s going to sue Alabama (which is exactly what anti-abortion activists are hoping for) and then if the case goes all the way to the Supreme Court, Roe V. Wade could be overturned and there will be no federal protection for pro-choice types. And now you see why Brett Kavanaugh happened.
The legislator who drew up the bill was asked why he did not leave exceptions for rape or incest and replied, “Why not go all the way?” Isn’t it ironic?
Iran, Iran So Far Away
One cannot help thinking that for septuagenarians such as John Bolton and Donald Trump (men who found a way to avoid serving in Vietnam, by the way), the one score they’d like to settle before dying is the humiliation Iran served up to the U.S.A. in the late 1970s with the Iran Hostage Crisis (444 days of confinement for some 50 Americans….who, let’s remember, all lived).
Or maybe they just want a distraction. Or a W. Or justification for all that money ( > $700 billion) that is spent on defense every year. Whatever, the White House is suddenly intrigued by aerial photos of missiles that were loaded upon small boats in the Persian Gulf apparently by Iranian paramilitary forces.
Or, seen another way, Iranians are supposed to be cool with a foreign navy whose capitol is located 6,000 miles away sailing warships on its doorstep.
Buck Lopez
In what may have been his finest hour as an NBA player, 11-year veteran Brook Lopez scores a team-high 20 points as Milwaukee takes a 1-0 lead on Toronto. I’m sorry. Don’t ask me to “Fear The Deer” or get revved up for a “Raptor Rapture.” The Eastern Conference finals is a battle to see who gets to lose 4-1 (at best) to Golden State in June.
You know why the Dubs celebrated with such naked joy in Houston last Friday night? Because that, they understood, was the real NBA Finals.
Related, while watching the end of Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid last night on TCM: How come no one ever makes “Easterns?”
Moves Like Jagger
One month after a heart-valve replacement procedure, 75 year-old Mick Jagger is prepping to preen again. The No Filter (But One Valve) Tour, which was supposed to begin in April, is now set to launch on June 21 in Chicago. The lesson for doubters? She’ll never break, never break, never break, never break/ This heart of Stone.
Eighty-Six Happiness
*A new feature in which we periodically and pedantically provide rules for being either a better diner or a better server.
Lesson No. 1: Never, ever, ever, I mean never, when out with a group pay your bill partly with credit cards and partly with cash. Ever. Thank you.
Why not, you ask? Say the bill is $200 and there are four of you. Two decide to pay credit cards and two pay cash. Let’s say, just for argument’s sake, you all decided to split the bill evenly so that each of you is paying $50.
Here’s what happens 9 times out of 10. The two people throw down $50 each and the other two tell you to put $50 on their cards. You run the cards and you know what happens after that? The people who paid cash do not think to add a tip while the two who paid with their cards put 15% on their $50 dollars. So on a $200 table the table winds up tipping $15 dollars, or 7.5%. We see this happen all the time. Don’t be those diners, please. Thank you.
Reserves
Eddie Collins
Hall Pass
In which each day we hypothetically induct two baseball players per year in to Cooperstown, thereby eliminating the fat.
1937…
Grover Cleveland Alexander, P
1911-1930, Phillies et al
“Old Pete” won 28 games as a rookie (a modern-day record that still holds) and is No. 3 all-time in Wins with 373. In the midst of his brilliant career, Alexander spent 1918 serving in World War I in France as a field artillery sergeant and was exposed to mustard gas.
Eddie Collins, 2b
1906-1930, Philadelphia Athletics, Chicago White Sox
A Columbia grad, Collins is 8th all-time in Stolen Bases with 741, 10th all-time in Hits with 3,315 and 12th all-time in Triples with 187. He won six World Series as a member of the A’s and White Sox.
Charter: Babe Ruth, Christy Mathewson, Walter Johnson, Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner
If you have the time, this is really something. I don’t know if it’s sad or hilarious or what, but props to Steve Harvey. He earned his pay today. SNL and Kenan Thompson could not have improved on it.
Starting Five
ZioNOLA
The NBA has never had a team based in Mississippi, but The Magnolia State is now the epicenter of the league. The New Orleans Pelicans landed the No. 1 pick in Tuesday night’s draft lottery, presumably Zion Williamson, while the Memphis Grizzlies nabbed the No. 2 pick, most likely Zion’s erstwhile AAU teammate, Ja Morant.
The Knicks, Suns and Cavs, who all had the top chance (14%) for the No. 1 pick, will pick 3rd, 5th and 6th, respectively. Soon after neither New York nor Los Angeles failed to at a chance to land one of the two most heralded players in the draft, our sarcastic friend Brian Hamilton sent out this tweet:
The Lottery was rigged so that no one would ever think it was rigged, so it can be rigged again down the line
Alas, one man’s satire is another cable sports network jockey’s Flaming Hot Take:
Adam Silver makes it clear with the rigged lottery: we want stars to stay in small markets, we want equality among all teams, hopefully Anthony Davis signs long term to play with Zion
Here’s what is intriguing: What if Anthony Davis, who still has two years remaining on his contract, continues to adamantly refuse to play for the Pelicans? Where does he go? What will New Orleans want in return? If the Lakers wanna deal, I’d trade AD for the No. 4 pick AND Kyle Kuzma. Nothing less.
Sale Finds No Purchase*
*The judges will also accept “Not For Sale”
Before Tuesday, no Major League pitcher had ever struck out more than 16 batters through the first seven innings of a game. Then Chris Sale took the mound for the Red Socks at Fenway (he’s not the most historic Boston southpaw featured in today’s issue of MH). The lanky left whiffed 17 Rockies on Tuesday but left after the seventh inning, which eliminated any chance Sale might have to equal or top the MLB record for strikeouts in a nine-inning game (20, set by two men, one of them former Red Socks ace Roger Clemens at Fenway).
Alas, Sale got 17Ks and left with a 3-2 lead after seven (and 108 pitches), but he did not get the W. The Socks lost 5-4 in 11 innings, their first defeat in five games.
By the way, Sale began the season 0-5 and was horrible. In his last three starts he’s pitched 21 innings, allowed 3 runs and struck out 41. Yes, 41 in 21 innings. And walked just one. One is also the number of Wins he has in those three starts.
Tim Conway
Before there was Saturday Night Live in 1975, there was The Carol Burnett Show on Saturday nights on CBS. And while it was humor in prime-time that was safe for the family, there was nothing lame about the comic sketches that the eponymous host put on with the help of Harvey Korman, Vicki Lawrence and the man whom most considered the essential ingredient, Tim Conway.
Conway, who passed away yesterday at 85, was like Robert Newhart (whose sitcom directly preceded The Carol Burnett Show on Saturday evenings on CBS) a master of understatement. His characters were beta types, but they were always effortlessly funny. No better way to express it other than to show it.
Appalachian Fail
This is James L. Jordan, who last weekend on the Appalachian Trail fatally stabbed one hiker, 43 year-old Ronald Sanchez. He also stabbed Sanchez’s female companion but she will survive. This was in southwestern Virginia. Jordan had been behaving erratically on the famed trail for awhile and regulars had posted warnings about him, even bought him a bus ticket out of the area.
But Did You Laugh?
This photo of Holocaust victim Anne Frank appears in the current issue of the Harvard Lampoon, which is notorious and renowned for being tactless and irreverent and often very funny. Its alums are the people responsible for stuff like Animal House, Caddyshack and really, Saturday Night Live.
Is it in poor taste? Of course. Is it funny? You decide. The magazine’s student editors were pressured to and ultimately did issue a public apology. It’s sort of incredible to think that Mel Brooks was able to make The Producers less than 25 years after D-Day.
Reserves
Do you know this man? He has baseball’s lowest career ERA of any lefty who pitched after 1911.
Hall Pass
A couple of nights ago we found ourselves in The Emerald Inn (some things never change, Steve). A man about 10 years older than us began peppering us with baseball opinions (“The game was better in the Eighties and Nineties” [um, no] and then he began a merciless barrage of “Should this guy be in the Hall of Fame?” Some of the names he tossed out: Dale Murphy, Jack Morris, Al Oliver (Al Oliver?!?!) and Dave Parker.
Anyway, I began to realize here were two me at a bar all alone who had lapsed into a meaningless conversation and I wondered, Am I Cliff or am I Norm? Also, we were about 5 stools apart but I wasn’t about to move closer; the effect being that other poor bastards were tortured with this chatter. I quickly paid for my beer and left, not wanting to make any more enemies than I already have.
All of which is to say that on this very blog we tackled the Baseball Hall of Fame issue five years earlier. The first point being that you cannot, in our minds, decide who should or should not be in the Hall of Fame if you have an elasticity in terms of how many people may be inducted in a given year. Our thought: keep it super-exclusive so that it truly means something to be sent to the Hall.
For instance, our new friend Mike suggested that, in terms of numbers, 2,500 hits and a .300 average should be a baseline. Then he recommended Bernie Williams (2,336 hits, .297 average) be inducted. I said, “You’ve already lowered your lower bar.”
“Yeah,” my new friend said, “but he’s close.”
“So induct him into the Hall of Close To the Hall Of Fame,” I said.
The annual batting title should be named in this man’s honor…
We thought, especially for anyone new to the blog, that we’d re-run (this is all a way of us doing less work, like a Seinfeld compilation episode) our series in which we re-induct the Baseball Hall of Fame. The proviso is that we begin with the five charter members in 1938—Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson –and then work from there, beginning in 1939. As with the actual Hall of Fame, a player (and we will only vote on players) is not eligible until he’s been retired for five seasons.
Our first ballot…
Cy Young, P
1890-1911, 5 teams, among them the St. Louis Perfectos
Most wins (yes, and losses) all-time with a record of 511-316. Cy was short for “Cyclone”, the original nickname of Denton True Young.
Tris Speaker, OF
1907-1928; four teams, among them the Boston Red Sox
“The Grey Eagle” is still baseball’s all-time leader in doubles (792) and outfield assists, and has the sixth-highest batting average (.345) of all time.
*****
A reminder: If you’re looking for something to watch on the streaming services and have yet to find Chernobyl (HBO), we HIGHLY recommend it. Like us, you probably don’t know much more beyond the fact that it was in the former Soviet Union (not in Russia, but in Ukraine, actually) and that it was the worst nuclear disaster in history. The way it has played out through two episodes, it feels like a John Le Carre thriller and we just know Jared Harris will get a Best Actor Emmy nomination, if not the win.
Music 101
I Wanna Make It With You
That’s Bread performing on The Midnight Special. Throw a Pet Rock at your Lava Lamp, kids, cuz it doesn’t get much more Seventies than this. For one week in late August of 1970 this was the No. 1 song on the Billboard charts, sandwiched between more famous No. 1’s “Close To You” by the Carpenters and “War” by Edwin Starr. It’s not often you find Bread in the middle of a sandwich.
Remote Patrol
Live From The PGA Championship
9 a.m. – 6 p.m. Golf Channel
It has actually been 13 years since the rest of the PGA Tour had a shot at Tiger Woods in the same calendar year after he has won a major. That major was the 2006 British Open in Merseyside, England, and the following one was the…PGA Championship held in Medinah, Illinois. And who won that? Tiger Woods.
Now they get a shot at newly crowned Masters champ Woods just one month after Augusta. We like that golf has moved up what had been its fourth major to May so that we get one per month, April to July. By August sports is too drunk with football to pay attention.
Last night on HBO I watched “The Game Revealed: The Bells,” a 17-minute behind-the-scenes how-to on the making of the penultimate episode of Game Of Thrones. It left me humbled and in awe. The sheer scale of the undertaking of this episode, from basically recreating King’s Landing (i.e. Dubrovnik) on a Belfast backlot to the 650 extras to lighting 22 stunt men on fire in one scene, to the tedium of filming CleganeBowl and simply creating space on that stairwell (also built specially for this one scene) to place cameras, to all the work the actors had to do with green screens and yet make it look authentic, well, it’s fair to say that this may have been the most ambitious and arduous episode of television ever attempted.
Now, true, as a viewer, you are not obligated to approve of an episode based solely on its budget or the effort required to make it. Still, as we sit on our collective asses funneling salty snacks and alcohol down our gobs on Sunday nights, I feel we might sound a little less like spoiled children if we actually knew the colossal headache that creating this show must have been for Benioff & Weiss. It’s a little like parenting. You never really can appreciate how massive and unappreciated a job it is until you become one yourself. But maybe we can at least try.
All that said, let’s get to Twitter’s major beef with “The Bells,” which seems to be either 1) Daenerys’ “heel turn” or 2) the very fact that she committed mass murder when it was unnecessary. I don’t get it (the criticism, that is), and I’ll defend her, from a story-telling perspective.
First, Dany is her father’s daughter. The Mad King, Aerys Targaryen, planned to burn King’s Landing and its inhabitants before he was assassinated by Jaime Lannister. She’s a Targaryen. She’s not Jimmy Carter.
Second, this is a woman who was raised, at least militarily, with the Dothraki. They are known for being outstanding and ruthless warriors, the Westerosi version of Genghis Khan’s mongol hordes. Whatever your views as a Judeo-Christian viewer of the show may be, they are not shared by the Mother of Dragons.
Third, as I was reminded by @AuburnElvis yesterday, this conversation (below) between Olenna Tyrell and Dany at the end of last season. Recall, it was Olenna who successfully murdered a previous malevolent ruler of Westeros, Joffrey, and who got away with it. And here it is Olenna giving Dany the best military advice she’d ever receive, certainly better than anything Tyrion or Varys gave her: “Be a dragon.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XnNnebJkK44
Finally, over the course of Season 5 we have seen Dany detour away from her own wishes in order to save the North (losing two dragons in the process), then losing the love of her life to a 23AndMe technicality, then losing her most trusted advisor (Jorah) and her closest female friend (Missandrei). She feels alone and betrayed (which she was) and all she really has left is her sweet ride (Drogon) and her own indomitable will.
So yes, and as the show’s creators acknowledge, Dany goes full Dresden on King’s Landing. Was it absolutely necessary? Of course not, but then neither was Dresden. That World War II bombing, by Allied air assault (including U.S. planes) resulted in the deaths, by fire, of more than 22,000 German civilians. Dresden was not an attack on important Nazi industry or rail lines or anything of the sort. The bombing of Dresden was a huge “F___ You” aimed at Germany, a release of a couple of years of frustration and vengeance for all the pain and suffering that Great Britain, specifically London, had endured.
Dresden wasn’t necessary. But it was cathartic—even if it was mass murder on a grand scale.
In Game Of Thrones, specifically “The Bells,” we have the unique scenario of a medieval battle with 20th-century aviation, via Drogon, thrown in. Benioff & Weiss had the unique opportunity, and responsibility, to create a 14th-century battleground while adding 20th century destruction, and tactics. Hence Dany launches her attack on the Iron Fleet by flying right out of the sun, which is what Japanese kamikaze fighters in the Pacific did in World War II and was also a popular tactic in World War I dogfights over France.
Was it a little inconceivable that Dany and Drogon were able to take out all the Scorpions, both in the Iron Fleet and mounted on the walls of King’s Landing, based on that opening gambit, without a single scratch? Sure it was. Was it a little inconceivable that the Millennium Falcon survived Darth Vader’s entire armada of TIE fighters plus an asteroid field? Uh huh.
As an avid fan and viewer, you’re welcome to feel any way you want about the episode. And even the final season. I’m with Scott Van Pelt on all this. I appreciate the monumental amount of work that went into making this final season, possibly unlike anything in television history. More than that, though, I appreciate that you have to tie up a plethora of story lines and that some may not be dealt with in a more brisk manner. I spend six days a week watching three cooks magically prepare dozens of meals for satisfied customers simultaneously; I realize what they’re doing and what I do when I cook for myself are not to be compared and also that they don’t get the chance to drink a glass of Pinot Noir and check the Yankee game while doing so.
Finally, I keep hearing how dissatisfied fans are with the ending of GOT. Here’s a helpful reminder: IT HASN’T ENDED YET. Let it at least finish first before you decide you didn’t like the finish. In short, please try to avoid being the worst example of everything that is wrong with Twitter. I know that you can.
Finis
Sure, this works, and it only took an afternoon to install
A word or two more on television endings, by the way. In my experience the show most impervious to criticism, at least on Sports Twitter, is Breaking Bad.
While I loved the series, too, and have watched it start-to-finish twice, I’d argue that Vince Gilligan wussed out on the ending. The perfect ending to that series should have taken place out in the desert, about 20 minutes into the third-to-last episode, “Ozymandias.” Hank has just been killed, Jesse has just been discovered by the gang, and Walter has had to reveal the hiding place for all of his money in exchange for his life. He gets to walk out, strolling past the khakis he’d lost in the pilot episode, and leave with nothing else but his life and the eternal guilt of being responsible for the death of his brother-in-law. A bleak ending, but a fitting one.
Instead, we get the escape to New Hampshire, followed by the miraculous getaway without explanation (the car keys drop into his hand, there’s a police car in his rearview mirror, then voila, the next thing you know he’s in Santa Fe). I’ve always liked to think that Walter White died in that car and the remainder of the series, that final episode, is simply a posthumous dream sequence.
If it is not a dream, then the most wanted criminal in America somehow returns to Albuquerque undetected, visits his wife at her home in broad daylight, then rigs up a semi-automatic weapon in the trunk of his car in a single afternoon as if he’s Macgyver. Never mind that the gang allows him to drive his own vehicle right up in front of their home and park it the way he sees fit, that the angle on the machine gun firing into the home just happens to be perfect, that he and Jesse are allowed to have a face-to-face, which gives Walter the opportunity to warn Jesse that the bullets are about to fire, that Walter was able to keep the firing device in his hands even after being frisked….you get the picture.
Gilligan sketched the perfect closing scene, but then he reached for more. He didn’t need to.
The final episode of Breaking Bad was simply audience wish-fulfillment from a show runner who opted not to end the series as mercilesssly as he’d ended most characters’ stories in the series. But it isn’t just Breaking Bad. Mad Men had to duct-tape a final season together that, because its stars had gotten to be too successful and had too many side projects going, meant that we never got a face-to-face scene between Don Draper and any significant co-stars for the final three or four episodes. The Wire‘s entire final season was an epic letdown.
It’s funny. The Sopranos was the first classic show on HBO, the forebear to all the terrific programming on Netflix, AMC and HBO that has followed. And its creator, David Chase, may not have been able to anticipate the impact social media would have on how audiences hive-minded their opinions on shows and their endings, but the manner in which he chose to end his show was both genius and prescient.
Chase ended The Sopranos abruptly and without explanation. Fans can attempt to decipher the final scene as much as they want, but there’s absolutely nothing definitive about it. It’s almost as if Chase was thumbing his nose at Twitter before Twitter even existed, in effect saying, “You can’t criticize something if you don’t actually know what you saw.”
In hindsight, and having read all of the criticism about GOT the past two days, a genius move by Chase, the man who started it all.
Music 101
Mouth Almighty
In the summer of 1983 Elvis Costello and the Attractions released their seventh album in a six-year span. Punch The Clock may not be his masterpiece, but it did produce his first Top 40 hit. This isn’t it, by the way. But we’ve always felt this tune deserved more frequent spins.
Remote Patrol
NBA Draft Lottery
8:30 p.m. ESPN
Cleveland, New York and Phoenix all have the same 14% shot of landing Zion Williamson the No. 1 overall pick. Chicago is next at 12.5% and then Atlanta at 10.5%, etc. The point being, Zion to the Manhattan is not a certainty (except with the conspiracy theorists). Some folks will tell you that Zion may not be all that and personally, we hope our sons land Ja Morant.
Our biggest concern with Zion, and this was the topic of a convo we had with a sporty sports guy the other night, is length. He’s not a stretchy-type guy like, say teammates R.J. Barrett or Cam Reddish, which is what NBA teams crave now. He’s more of a bull-in-a-china-shop type like Larry Johnson. It’s still impossible not to love his energy, his charisma and his legitimate talent. He’s a total gamer. You take him first, is our final verdict, and worry about the rest later.
