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To be fair, they named him "James Olsen"

I think he needs to be killed off.  I like Mehcad Brooks as an actor, but he has zero chemistry with Melissa Benoist.  And they clearly don't know what to do with his character.

I think it'd be a lot of fun to do that.  Chaser9 (I think) and I plotted an episode guide for an entire 7-season run of Voyager at some point.  I really like my alternate season 6 of Supernatural.

There needs to be some consistency on how time works on these shows.  I don't think Supergirl did much of a time jump between seasons one and two, but Arrow definitely did.

Well, what's weird is that we're now in a third timeline.  There's the timeline where Barry became the Flash when he was older (not seen), the Season 1-2 Flash timeline where Thawne messed with everything, and now this new Flashpoint timeline.  And while they did a lot to show that things *mostly* happened the way that they were supposed to (they still took down Zoom, Reverse Flash, etc), there are still quite a few differences too. 

We're now in Fringe season 4 territory (which doesn't make me feel better) where we aren't really watching the same characters we've been watching this whole time.  Which does bother me.  I get making Barry pay for his mistakes, and hopefully this convinces him to stop time traveling.  But I thought this was a lesson Barry had learned already.  It's what makes Flashpoint so frustrating....Barry has *just* come to terms with his mother's death before he went back and saved her.

Oh absolutely.  If I were the Republicans, I'd have confirmed him yesterday.  I honestly don't know why they're not, especially with Republicans fleeing Trump left and right.  They're forfeiting the presidency, and they gotta know it's out of their hands.  Garland is their safest bet.

Okay, but embarrassment is one thing.  Would you rather send troops to Syria to fight Hillary's version of the Iraq War?  Do you want to restart the Cold War because Hillary wants to kill Putin's friend?  I'd rather be embarrassed than dead, and Hillary's more likely to get me killed.

People always use the nukes thing with Trump, but they seem to think we live in a world where the President has a big button on his desk with "NUKES" written on it.  To fire off a nuclear weapon, the president's command has to go through a handful of really smart people who are really good at their jobs.  Even if Trump wanted to nuke Paraguay because they made fun of him, there's a better chance Trump would end up impeached due to massive overuse of power than any missile would ever leave the ground.

Now restart the Cold War?  That's how nuclear devastation happens.

Well, to address some of your concerns:

- I don't know why we'd expect a guest star on a CW to show a great depth of character in one episode.  To compare Man of Steel's Henry Cavill to Superman in Supergirl is insulting to both mediums.  Of course Clark in MoS is a deeper, more structured character.  He'd absolutely have to be.  And while I agree that he's a bit cartoonish, I think that's absolutely what they were going for.  He's a fun Superman.  He's got things figured out, and he's content with it.  He's a "perfect" character that our heroine is supposed to be achieving to be.  And since he's not going to be a regular on the show (at least, not that I'm aware of), I think his role in the show is fine.

(Side note: I don't want this to turn into another psychoanalysis of Superman, but I still say Superman in this showed more personality with his one wink than he did in both movies of the DCCU.  Compare the wink to the crestfallen look he gives the people at the fire.  In both cases, Superman has saved the day - why not have some fun with it?  It's like Supergirl's Superman gets an (what I would think is a realistic) adrenaline boost from flying around, and Snyder's Superman gets a boost of painkillers.  Again, they probably went too far in this one, but there's a happy medium where a character can be layered and still be allowed to have fun).

I hated the James/Kara relationship, and I'm glad they're moving away from it.  I don't like this version of Jimmy - I think he's miscast (and not because he's black - because he's a freakin' male model.  Can they do a body-swap of James and Curtis?  I think Curtis' actor would play a better Jimmy Olsen).

The kryptonite thing is weird because it's been established in many versions of Superman that he *wants* people to have kryptonite in case he goes crazy.  It's possible that this version of Superman has never been affected by magic or red Kryptonite so maybe he's never lost control.  And I get that there's a difference between giving Batman a sliver of kryptonite and the DEO having a cache of weapons.  So while I think J'onn could've been a little bit more proactive about ensuring Superman that the weapons are safe, I think Clark was flipping out just a bit too much.

Oh and was that the first official use of "Gotham" in the Arrowverse?  I know they've mentioned Bludhaven a few times, but I wasn't sure if Gotham was ever actually referenced.

Question, re: Clark/Kara.  When there's a major space launch or event that they might have to immediately get called to rescue....why aren't they more prepared?  Kara was super excited to watch the launch of the Venture, and it doesn't seem like Clark was even paying attention to it.  You'd think either of them (or both) would've been suited up and ready to go...just in case.

No, I get that.  But stuff happens in TV.  One of the regulars could've died.  I'm sure the writers of 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter didn't expect John Ritter to die, but he did.  And they had to adjust.  And maybe John had to be fired to leave, but what if they'd run into a situation like ST:TNG faced with Denise Crosby?  I'm sure they had great plans for Tasha Yar, but they had to adjust.

(I know none of the actors are dead, even now, but it was possible).

Not to mention the fact that the show's longevity could've changed things.  Jared and Jensen on Supernatural, staying for over a decade, is the exception...not the rule.  Mulder and Scully both left X-Files.  Everyone but Tom Welling left Smallville. 

Maybe Jerry's movie career (which started/continued while he was still doing Sliders) could've taken off earlier.  Maybe Mission to Mars could've been a bigger success, and he'd want to get out of his contract then.  Maybe Sabrina still could've wanted to leave Sliders to go get a job working with Aaron Sorkin.  Maybe nostalgia could've forced JRD to leave and create a number of Sallah-based Indiana Jones spinoff movies.

If he hates the characters because they weren't his vision, that's fine.  But if he was in the same situation, for whatever reason, he would've had to have adjusted accordingly.  If it were me, I'd be more upset at what they did with *his* characters than what they did with creations of their own.

But that's just me.

Well, I think your part about Gordon is the problem.  Take the kidnapper, for example.  These shows don't show it, but there's going to have to be an investigation into that guy's death.  In the official report, it'd have to say that he was killed by the Green Arrow.  The kill could be justified - officers are forced to kill suspects all the time (*not* looking to get political on this issue ) but the difference is that those officers have to give detailed explanations for how that person died.  There, presumably, needs to be some sort of evidence to prove that the killing was justified.

For deaths that Oliver is responsible for, there's no follow-up.  Oliver isn't giving a detailed statement.  So the police, most of the time, I'd assume, won't be able to tell the difference between a guy Oliver shot to save Thea and a guy Oliver just walked in and murdered.  I think that's the primary reason for Oliver's "no kill" policy.  He went from a guy the police were always looking to catch to a guy that the police were willing to work alongside.

The reason why I give the example of the kidnappers is that he's a guy who was no match for Oliver.  Oliver had already beaten him when Oliver killed him.  The fight was over.  His justification for the murder wasn't the fact that he was a dangerous man - it was that he knew that Oliver could defend himself (and I'm not even sure that was enough for anyone to put two and two together that he was the Green Arrow).

It's the issue I see with any hero killing.  Batman killing the Joker is justified to me because he's a psychopath who will end up doing much worse if he's allowed to live.  Killer Croc is an even match for Batman, and if Batman needs to put him down to win a fight, then it's fine.  It's why I was okay with Superman killing Zod in Man of Steel. 

But a low-level thug should be taken care of and incapacitated if no one else is in danger.  Otherwise, I think it goes from necessary to excessive.  I know that thug could grow up to be a Joker or a Captain Cold or a Lex Luthor, but I don't think that's a decision that Oliver (or Felicity's form) can make in the moment.

Well, after things were looking pretty good for him for a while, there's virtually no way he wins now.  Hillary Clinton will be president. Now I know a lot of people were anti-Trump, and I get that.  I don't like him, and I think he'd be a terrible president.  But I saw this example on Twitter, and I think it fits.  This election is like the end of The Graduate - we as a country have shown up en masse to rush out to the church and tell this woman we love her because the alternative is so terrible.  So we do it, we tell her, she comes with us, and we escape on this bus.  And, like the characters in the movie, our smiles fade as we realize the decision we just made. 

Hillary Clinton will be president.

During this whole campaign, it's all been about Trump.  Hillary is supposed to be this policy expert, but I've seen about five different campaign ads for Hillary (I'm in Texas so I bet she has more), and only one was about her at all.  When she answers questions, she doesn't answer how she'll do it....she answers how he'll do it worse.  When Hillary supporters talk about the election, it's always about him and how horrible he is.

And he is.  But that's not the point.

Hillary Clinton will be president.

People talk about Hillary using Obama's words.  "The most qualified person to ever run."  And that's always bothered me.  For all the research that's been done into both candidate's pasts, I don't think any major news source really looked into the quote.  People are just accepting it.  I looked into it, and it's basically laughable when you dig into it.  John Quincy Adams was also a senator just as long as Hillary, was secretary of state for longer, and was also foreign minister several times under different presidents, and was a member of the House.  If you want to give Hillary extra years of experience for being the wife to the president, then you have to also give credit to Adams for being the son of one of the creators of the nation. 

Martin Van Buren has the same resume as Hillary (minus being Bill Clinton's wife), but he was also Vice President, Governor of New York, Attorney General of New York, and foreign minister to the UK. 

Is she more qualified than, say, Obama was?  Yes.  But she's also about 20 years older than he was.  I'd hope she has more experience.  In fact, as the second-oldest person to ever be inaugurated, there's almost no reason why she shouldn't have more than 12 years of experience in public office.

What's crazy is that this woman is going to be president, but she really hasn't had to sell herself.  All she's had to sell is how bad Trump is.  And she's done a good job.  But I'll repeat again:

Hillary Clinton will be president.

The same day the Trump tape came out, Hillary's Goldman Sachs speeches were leaked.  In some of the speeches, she admitted that she has a "public and private" position on certain issues.  She talked about how she's out of touch with the middle class because she's so wealthy.  So if you're looking to her to fix any issues related to Wall Street, she won't.  In fact, professionally, I'd suggest buying stock in Goldman Sachs if you can afford it.  She's going to make them a lot of money.

What about Bill helping fix the economy?  While it's true that the economy was great from 1992 to 2000, it has almost nothing to do with anything Bill did.  In 1992-2000, something you're using right now rose to public prominence.  An entire industry was literally created out of thin air overnight, and the economy boomed because of it.  If you want to look at Bill's policies, they actually led to the subprime crisis.  So if you're looking for 90s prosperity out of a Clinton White House again, you're not going to get it unless she's able to invent a new internet.

But she's great on foreign policy, right?  Well, that's also not quite true.  While Trump is an idiot for saying she founded ISIS, a lot of her work as secretary of state certainly didn't make the ISIS situation better.  Her key policy weapon in the Middle East seems to be assassination.  And that might well work in Syria under a Hillary presidency, but I don't think it fixes the problem there.  And the Russians won't like that....but we'll come back to Russia again.

Hillary Clinton is a war hawk.  Plain and simple.  More than the Bushes, if you listen to certain prominent people.  Under Hillary, war will be a weapon she uses quickly and often.  She's promised that she won't put any more troops in the middle east, but based on her record, that's almost certainly her "public" position and not her private one.  There will be troops in Syria.  She wanted to go there while she was secretary of state, and Obama is the one who kept us out.  Hillary Clinton will be president, and it'll be her call.  We're going.

If you don't believe she's a hawk, read this article.  Written by a paper that has been extremely polite to her for a really long time.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/24/magaz … -hawk.html

On ISIS, all she talks about is more of the same.  But is more of the same even working?  Is Obama making progress in defeating ISIS, and if he's not, how could she possibly make progress with the same strategy?

So what about Russia?  We can't elect Trump because he's a friend of Putin.  Or a puppet for Putin.  Trump will dismantle NATO because that's what Putin wants.  We can't elect Trump because Putin wants him.

Here's the bad news.  He wants Trump because he hates Hillary.  I've read that he's *afraid* of Hillary.  Now I've thought about this a lot because it scares me.  A scared Putin scares me.  Because Putin will be in charge in Russia until he dies.  Even if he's removed from power, he'll still be in charge because he's working to make sure one of his lieutenants is in charge. 

Hillary wants to remove/kill Assad.  Putin is friends with Assad.

If you go to Hillary's website, there's sections on her policies on dozens of issues.  If you read them, they're vague one-sentence bullet points that sound great.  She's got one on gay rights, on minority rights, on the economy, on ISIS, and a ton of others.

Nothing on Russia.

She's talked a lot about Russian/American relations if Trump is president.  Nothing about it if she is.  People talk about World War 3 if Trump is president, but they don't want to talk about the very-real Cold War 2 when Hillary is president.

Everyone's thrilled that Trump's finally getting wounded.  But when the smoke clears and Hillary is in office, we're all going to be a little like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TP4MuVnS2A

Flashpoint spoilers....

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Well, I thought it was an interesting episode, but I feel like they held back.  With four shows on at the same time, I think they really could've had fun with Flashpoint.  I think they would've had to have been creative with it, but it could've been cool to have an entire episode of Arrow that took place in the Flashpoint universe (like the entire episodes that took place in the Other Side universe on Fringe or the episodes that took place in the Mirror Universe on DS9/ENT.

I get why they didn't - it's not fair to viewers of Arrow to force them to understand a plotline from Flash.  But I think they could've done it a different way.  Maybe the last two minutes of Arrow's season finale are used to set it up.  Maybe show a bit from the Flash finale and then show Oliver changing into a darker version of himself.  I don't think it'd take much explanation.

Maybe they even incorporate the Legends premiere into it.  They fix stuff like that, after all.  Flashpoint is what sets up the Legion of Doom. 

Kara is insulated from the changes, but they could've used Flashpoint to bring her into the universe.  Instead, there might be some minor ripples but it's basically already fixed.  And even then, I don't think they did that many changes.  They even had most of them working as a team by the end of the episode.  I don't even feel like the Joe stuff was justified or his "redemption" earned.  It felt rushed so that it didn't have to impact the other shows.

I understood why they tried to keep it contained, but I feel like they really missed their chance to do something cool.

http://www.superherohype.com/news/38333 … e#/slide/1

Maybe World Killer is the best example to look at. 

World Killer Quinn, like Sliders Reborn Quinn, made a massive error and worked tirelessly to fix it.  But, at some point, WK Quinn got discouraged and quit.  Season 4 (Canon in Sliders, not canon in Sliders Reborn) abandoned the correction of some of his mistakes (saving Earth Prime, rescuing Wade, etc) when he viewed those things to be out of his control.

I think we can say that Quinn is willing to do whatever it takes to fix a problem....presuming that it's a problem he thinks he can fix.  If it's a problem that becomes too frustrating, too difficult, or seemingly impossible, I think Quinn does have the capacity in him to quit.

I don't think that analysis helps either of your cases.

It's been a couple years since they've done the show.  It might take them an episode or two for them to get back into rhythm.

(Did I do that correctly?)

I actually have had this conversation recently with ireactions, but my only issue with monsters is the show's tendency to only feature worlds that seemingly branched off pretty recently.  For the most part, almost every world they featured had humans that evolved the same way as on Earth Prime.  Language evolved the same way as Earth Prime.  People tended to build buildings in the same place looking the same way, and an extraordinary amount of people had sex at the exact same time with the exact same sperm reaching the egg each time.

And it makes sense from a production standpoint.  People are easier to film as....people.  Sets are more easily redressed than rebuilt.

But when you take a step passed that (and you can when filming restraints no longer apply - like in a book/fanfic/comic), you understand that in a multiverse of infinite worlds, *most* of the worlds the Sliders would land on would feature "monsters."  Super-intelligent dinosaurs that evolved freely with no mass extinction would be monsters, but that's almost what happened.  Same with dolphins, rats, and any of the other primates.

An astronomer friend of mine told me about theories that alien worlds could have life that derives from thermosynthesis instead of photosynthesis.  So, yeah, a world with people who die if exposed to sunlight (vampires) is easily possible if you unhinge the show from the constraints of a show.

I don't disagree with anything in this, but wouldn't an extended amount of time sliding eventually "soldierize" anyone?  Not only would they end up getting involved in actual conflicts (which happened as early as the Pilot), but they'd be acquiring soldier-like skills on a daily basis.  They're effectively homeless hobos traveling from "town" to "town" having to scrape enough of a living, but their journey could also be that of a squadron of soldiers who have to get from point A to point B in enemy territory.  Quinn could be anti-conflict, but he'd be eventually forced to at some point.  He'd probably eventually have to use a weapon.  He'd probably eventually have to kill someone.  And then again.

Because it was a 90s show, not much really carried on from week to week, but a sliders reboot now would have to show the physical and mental toll that sliding would take.  They'd have no money and no permanent shelter, and they'd have to be very quick on their feet to get by.  They'd either have to be criminals (Rembrandt stealing from his double) or con men (falsifying or stealing an identity) just to make ends meet.

I don't particularly like any version of sliders where they end up as Navy SEALs, able to take out an army of mercenaries with ease (see The Walking Dead), but they'd definitely become more like an Army the longer they slid.

Even if they're leaving Kara in her own Earth, I don't know why they don't move her to a different city.  National City doesn't provide them anything interesting, and it'd explain why certain people (like Cat) aren't always there.  They could move Kara to, say, Coast City and keep her there if anything ever happens to move her to the Arrowverse.

He's saying that seasons 3 and 4 didn't happen because he hates them

Don't get me wrong.  I'm not mad at all, and I respect your opinion as much as anyone's.  I'm just concerned that you're allowing this whole DC/Marvel thing to cloud your judgment.  If you honestly think you aren't, then that's absolutely fine.  You're a lot better at analyzing plot/movies/characterization than me, and when you and I disagree, I *often* wonder if I'm wrong.

They were talking about this stuff on the Weekly Planet.  Both guys have really enjoyed Marvel as opposed to DC, and DC people get mad at them (even accusing them of getting paid by Marvel to bash DC.  They laugh at that because they don't think they're big enough for anyone on either side to care).

We're three movies into the DCCU.  There's one that most people like (Man of Steel), one most people don't like (BvS) and one that is in the middle.  When the MCU was at this stage, they had one that most people like (Iron Man), one that most people don't like (the Incredible Hulk), and one that is in the middle (Iron Man 2).  If the DCCU was 10 movies deep when the MCU started, we'd be saying "wow, Iron Man was pretty good but fairly standard, and their last two haven't been very good."  It's all about perspective, in a way.

Rotten Tomatoes

Iron Man - 94 (critics) 91 (audience)
Incredible Hulk - 67 (critics) 71 (audience)
Iron Man 2 - 72 (critics) 72 (audience)

Man of Steel - 55 (critics) 75 (audience)
Batman v Superman - 27 (critics) 64 (audience)
Suicide Squad - 26 (critics) 67 (audience)

Three movies in, there's not much difference in fan ratings.  It's lower for DC, but it's not much lower.  It's just, as you've said all along, a *HUGE* disparity between audience and critics. 

It's just a matter of the MCU doing it first and this perception that Marvel has their s*** pulled together and DC doesn't.  Now, to be fair, no Marvel movie had an audience rating lower than 71 (Incredible Hulk).  DC already has two.  So it's not just a conspiracy of critics. 

I'll take a look at your actual points later.  Just wanted to make sure I said something before you thought I was actually mad.  Didn't mean to put words in your mouth - I often resort to hyperbole in times like this, and for that I apologize

Informant, I honestly don't even know where to begin.  We've had our share of discussion on Marvel and DC, and I'm starting to wonder if you're allowing bias to affect your views on these movies.  I could go point-by-point, but I'm concerned we're just going to go in circles again.  I almost feel like you're doing a satire of the reviewers that torch DC movies because they aren't like Marvel.  Especially since you're using arguments that I've seen used (or that *I've* used) against movies like BvS and Suicide Squad.

The worst of the Captain America movies?  Worse than The First Avenger?  That's the movie, as far as I recall, that got you so mad about the MCU in the first place.  You called it a feature-length trailer for the Avengers. 

Could've been fixed by having the characters talk?  They do talk.  But the movie goes to great lengths to show that neither side is particularly right.  The Avengers do save people, but they do cause collateral damage.  They do need oversight, but the oversight could easily be just as bad as the people they're supposed to fight.  And there's tons of history to look back on for both sides.  I've said it earlier in the thread, but I felt like Tony's transformation from the guy at the Senate hearing in Iron Man 2 to the guy arguing for government oversight in Civil War is totally earned in my opinion.

Batman is the world's greatest detective but does almost no investigation into who Superman is.  A throwaway scene about a drone following Superman around in Man of Steel did more investigation than Batman did.  If Bruce had done the work that Lois did in the first movie, he'd realize that Clark Kent has been a pretty good guy his whole life.  End of movie.

Listen, I get it.  Marvel gets the benefit of the doubt and DC doesn't.  DC makes bigger effort to care about building something, and they've gotten hammered for it.  BvS and Civil War can make the same amount of money, and one is a failure and the other is a success.  It sucks to have to constantly defend these movies.  But all your reviews recently have been hyperbole - Suicide Squad is great, Civil War is crap. 

And, honestly, I don't think either of those reviews is what you really think.  Did you like Suicide Squad better?  Sure, and you're free to have that opinion.  But to give all DC movies 10/10 reviews and all Marvel 0/10 reviews makes you just as bad as the crazy people who do the opposite.

Just my $0.02.

She might just straight up stab him on national TV.

Yeah, if Hillary really cared about beating Trump, she'd drop out.  Something like 60% of Trump supporters are only voting for him to keep her out of office.  She's historically unpopular, like him, and someone blander (like Tim Kaine) would be absolutely destroying Trump.

She wants to be President, and she's worked really heard to manuever herself into that position.  This is quite literally her last chance to do it, and I'm certain she's not going to go quietly into the night if she doesn't win.

I was thinking of some of the Republican conspiracy theories (and watching the West Wing), and I have the following questions

HYPOTHETICAL (Again, I'm not a doctor and cannot judge.  This is a pure hypothetical) - If it was revealed that Hillary had Parkinson's:

1. Would she drop out?
2. If she didn't drop out, would she still win?
3. If she did drop out, would Tim Kaine replace her?
4. If she did drop out and Kaine didn't replace her, who would?

Because if she did withhold that information, I think she'd need to drop out.  Not because of the Parkinson's but because of the withholding.  Even when this happened in fiction (MS and Bartlet), he almost didn't run again.  And it affected his whole second term (and this was a guy universally loved.  Hillary ain't that).

If she still ran, I think she'd lose (for the reasons above).

If she did drop out, I think it'd need to be Kaine that replaced her.  Bernie might be a good choice for a VP (if he'd take it), but Kaine would be the best way to get the Hillary voters (since he was her choice) and keep Hillary's lead.

Honest question because Voyager gets the same criticism:

Is it possible to exploit your female characters for their sexiness (Maggie, Seven of Nine, etc) and still tell a good story?  Or is the sexual exploitation always going to distract too much from the story?

Because, honestly, I only have one image of the Breeder and it's just Maggie in a silver dress looking seductive.  I can't remember anything else from the episode, and yet I regard it as one of the worst of the series.  I don't have any other reason.

Is there an example of a show/movie doing it without hurting quality?

Well, I wouldn't make her a regular character.  Just Queen of Hell and she only makes appearances if necessary.  Outside of that, she keeps demons off their case.

The Lucifer stuff could be cool if it's grounded.  He thought he was this big badass and now he's reduced to running from Crowley.  A humbled Devil could be cool.

I don't love the costume, but I think he looks fine as Superman. 

Remember, you hated Cavill at first too

I loved every episode.  Even some of the slower, weirder ones were really really cool.  I'm hoping they can keep up the momentum with that many episodes.

I'm convinced that we'll have that "memory" tech soon, and it's gonna mess with me