[Short-Lived Showcase] Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future, episode 2 "The Abyss"

"I am a little more into Tim Dunigan as Captain Power this time around. His facial acting is still flat, but he's pumping up the intensity and giving a lot of gusto to his physicality, reminding me a lot of Peter Weller as Buckaroo Banzai. When Power is facing down Briggs, you feel both his confusion and anger at the nonsensical situation he's fallen into. And then you get the great sequence of him ripping a power cable off the wall to crudely recharge his suit."

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[Deconstruction is Magic] My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, episode 8 "Look Before You Sleep"

"Again, it's a very simple, by-the-numbers story on the surface, but instead of just playing the beats in the listed fashion, they subvert it by openly reading off the list the characters are trying to follow, and get in the way of the expected tropes as they have to find ways to bond outside the artificial structure Twilight is so eager to impose. This leads to some surprising twists here and there, particularly the climax where their destructive behavior leads to a genuine amount of unexpected destruction."

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[Short-Lived Showcase] Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future, episode 1 "Shattered"

"Otherwise, the sheer devastation of this world works. There's a great scene of Power looking out the window of a jet at the ruins of San Francisco which gives us scale, stories of his normal past life which shows us how much has changed for these people over such a short amount of time, the flashback to how Athena used to be, smiling across a chess board, to how she now is as she scowls at Power, shoots him, and tosses the gun at the old chess board, scattering the pieces. This is a world at war, where the humans have largely lost, and the best the heroes can hope for at the moment is to keep some semblance of a fight going while searching for a miracle that'll turn things in their favor."

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[Deconstruction is Magic] My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, episode 7 "Dragonshy"

"I get what you mean, Gerf, about how this is an episode that will grate on those who aren't fans of Fluttershy. The thing is, I do like her character, and it still grates on me, much in the same way "Applebuck Season" did, even though I also quite like Applejack as a character. What I mean by this is that both episodes take the character’s central... weakness might not be the right word, but the personality issue which often gets in their way - stubbornness for Applejack, timidness for Fluttershy - and hinges their story so heavily on that aspect, exaggerating it so far into an extreme that it starts to feel artificial.

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[Short-Lived Showcase] The Further Adventures of U.S. 1, Part 4

"Jeff hooks U.S. up with the double haul, cross country, which'll pay out a million bucks, if U.S. can find a partner... which is when Deadpool, naked except for his mask, boots, and tighty whities, drops through the ceiling after a woman in a passing helicopter flies off with his wallet. Needing money, he asks for a job."

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[Short-Lived Showcase] The Further Adventures of U.S. 1, Part 3

"Taryn says there is no escape, and it's only a matter of time before they share the same fate as the prisoner in the next cell over: Rocket Raccoon, who's been frozen as a stone statue!"

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[Deconstruction is Magic] My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, episode 6 "Boast Busters"

"I do like the Twilight/Spike dynamic this episode, where it at first seems like he’s giving into oneupsmanship by constantly prodding Twilight to show Trixie what for, but I like his statement near the midpoint where he says it’s about defending her friends from someone who’s humiliating and hurting them. She’s putting herself and the consequences she might face before the others, up until the point where a kaiju is rampaging through the town and she’s left with no choice."

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[Deconstruction is Magic] My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, episode 5 "Griffon the Brush Off"

"Overall, it’s a fun episode. There’s a nice build establishing the mindset of Pinkie’s pranks, then the dark turn as we see similar tactics now used through the lens of a bully, then the magical turn of pranks pulling down the dark prankster. I actually expected the third act would be an educational PSA about how pranks are bad overall and we should all learn from them, but I’m glad they subverted this expectation by making it more an examination of why pranks are done, and those which are constructive versus those which are destructive."

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Also, Gerf and Tessa share a video of their Bronycon 2014 memories.

[Midnight Movie Exchange] Episode 7 - Lupin the 3rd: Strange Psychokinetic Strategy (1974)

"I didn't really mind that there wasn't much plot, because it was basically just what excuse can we have for a string of gags. And some of them were really amusing, there were a few that got me to legitimately laugh out loud, like when Jigen turns and looks at him, and suddenly his hat flips open with a little visor. For no reason."

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[Short-Lived Showcase] The Further Adventures of U.S. 1, Part 2

"When they come to on U.S.'s space rig, with Al nursing some sore tentacles from Louise's initial fright, they learn the Star Stop has come under attack by clusters of meteors guided there by the gravity of cosmic mountains circling them in space. Jennifer recognizes it as the work of Spragg, the Living Hill!"

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