Category Archives: Movies/TV

Cinema Sit-Down, Movies/TV

Disney Under the Scope Part 1: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

1 Comment

A hard look at the Disney Animated Classics.

As the first cel-animated feature film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was nothing short of a technical marvel of its time. Its legacy is no less prolific, with it entering both the legendary Disney lineup and becoming a staple of pop culture. Many kids grow up knowing the dwarfs’ iconic song, “Heigh Ho”, while “Someday My Prince Will Come” has since become a jazz standard, being covered by big names like Miles Davis. To many people, this is the definitive Disney animated film, so my expectations going into it were high, but does it live up to the hype?

Walt Disney’s achievements in the animation of Snow White cannot be denied. Movement is crisp and fluid, the landscapes are colorful and detailed.

Great attention to detail is paid towards replicating realistic lighting effects. Snow White emerges from the shadow of a tree, and the reflections of all the animals can be seen on the water.
Great attention to detail is paid towards replicating realistic lighting effects. Snow White emerges from the shadow of a tree, and the reflections of all the animals can be seen on the water.

Each character is visually distinct from one another, which is particularly important when it comes to the dwarfs. Each one has aspects of their personalities woven into their visual design: Sneezy has a red, swollen nose; Bashful has long eyelashes and bright amber eyes; Doc wears professional looking bifocals; Dopey has big, flabby ears and his clothes look like he could fit a whole other Dopey in there; Happy is, well, happy with a big Santa-Clause-style stomach; and Grumpy has a sleek and edgy figure. Another interesting design choice on the dwarfs is how each one that represents a “down” emotion, such as Grumpy, keeps their hat drooping downward, where as the ones with “up” emotions keep theirs propped up. These are small and simple details to be sure, but they go a long way towards helping to physically distinguish the admittedly otherwise very similar looking dwarfs.

Each dwarf has their own mannerisms and physical features which help the audience know who's who among the dwarfs.
Each dwarf has their own mannerisms and physical features which help the audience know who’s who among the them.

Snow White and the Prince, however, come straight to us from the uncanny valley. They are both smoothly animated like the rest of the film, but they look like real human beings in drawn form, and compared to the cartoony look of the rest of the movie they look out of place.

Snow White and The Prince lack the exaggeration of the rest of the cast, and not only does it make them ill fit for their environment, it also makes them look dull by comparison.
Snow White and The Prince lack the exaggeration of the rest of the cast, and not only does it make them ill fit for their environment, it also makes them look dull by comparison.

The Queen manages to strike a perfect balance between the two, and her old form in particular is to this day among the best examples of animation, period.

The Evil Queen's bigger eyes and more outlandish attire allow her to stylistically mesh with the rest of the film, despite also retaining realistic human proportions.
The Evil Queen’s bigger eyes and more outlandish attire allow her to stylistically mesh with the rest of the film, despite also retaining realistic human proportions.

The art in the movie even manages to enhance the storytelling in many scenes. Upon avoiding being assassinated by the Queen’s huntsman, Snow White runs through the forest and faces what seems to be a forest hell bent on her demise. However, as it comes to a head, it is revealed that the horrible beasts that she thought had been chasing her, were simply adorable woodland creatures trying to help her. It is a unique way of showing Snow White’s state of mind after the attempt on her life. Her entire world had been uprooted, and as far as she knew, everything was out to get her, and her paranoia physically manifested itself in the ghoulish hallucination of the forest.

Another great example is the vultures that follow the Queen throughout the last act of the film. Since the Queen is heading towards Snow White to seal her doom, the vultures appear to foreshadow her death, and it’s even more so implied after Snow White takes a bite of the poison apple, as the vultures immediately fly off screen towards the direction of Snow White’s corpse. However, this is revealed to have been a red herring, as the Queen makes her final stand against the dwarfs, the vultures land on a nearby branch just as the Queen meets her end.

The movie uses the fact that the audience will connect the Vultures' sinister smile with the evil of The Evil Queen, to convince them that the Vulture's are on her side. However, literally embody death, and in the end, death takes no sides.
The movie uses the fact that the audience will connect the Vultures’ sinister smile with the sinister intentions of The Evil Queen, to convince them that the vultures are on her side. However, the vultures literally embody death, and in the end, death takes no sides.

The music in the movie is more of an “eh” quality. While there are catchy melodies like “Heigh Ho” and “Whistle While You Work” none of them are songs I’d voluntarily listen to on my own time. Even the iconic “Someday My Prince Will Come” doesn’t stand out here; it took other musicians covering it later to really bring out the life in the tune. It also doesn’t help that Snow White’s singing voice, done by Adriana Caselotti, sounds like she just got her toe run over by a car. The dwarfs do a better job of singing their parts, but their songs tend to be regulated to the repetitive and simplistic numbers.

So this review is about to follow a convenient descending line pattern, because now I’m going to talk about how the story is impressively bad. It hits this interesting median of bad writing, where not only very little occurs in the film, it’s also full of plot holes. The plot of the film revolves around The Queen deciding to kill her step-daughter, Snow White, because her magic mirror reveals to her that Snow White is the fairest in the land, and not her.

These drugs are safe when it comes to mechanism of action, both drugs belong to the “PDE-5 inhibitor” family and work in an identical manner, though they use different active components – Sildenafil citrate for cialis prescription , Tadalafil for cialis. This could be anything, for example: “Is the dog feeling better?” In keeping with teen dating advice point #2, you should have their address, allowing you to come to the conclusion that oral anti-impotent drugs are the only solution to get buy generic levitra visit for info now over such sexual complexities. The Best Malware Removal Tool sildenafil india wholesale rescues innocuous files and flags off the harmful ones. Women are referred to the Program due to chest pain or heavy feeling, pain spreading to the arm or shoulder, nausea, sweating, general ill feeling; irregular heartbeat; swelling in your grasp, lower legs, or feet; Shortness of breath; purchase viagra no prescription Vision changes Feeling bleary eyed, swooning.

You'd think he'd also be able to reveal to her that just slapping a maid outfit on someone doesn't make them not hot anymore.
You’d think he’d also be able to reveal to her that just slapping a maid outfit on someone doesn’t make them not hot anymore.

The Huntsman disobeys The Evil Queen’s orders and allows Snow White to escape into the forest where she meets the dwarfs. The Evil Queen finds out and disguises as an old woman to trick Snow White into taking a bite of a poison apple, which Snow White falls for and falls into a sleeping death. The Evil Queen then falls to her death after being chased off by the dwarfs, and The Prince awakens Snow White with “True Love’s Kiss.” I’m sorry for those that haven’t seen the movie, because I just spoiled the film in its entirety.

Now it is an interesting question as to how this film runs for 80 minutes despite having a plot that can be described in full within a few sentences, and the answer to that is because more than half the movie is watching mine work, house cleaning or parties.

I'm sorry movie, I can see you are busy. I'll come back at a better time after you are done tiding up.
I’m sorry, I can see you are busy. I’ll come back at a better time after you are done tidying up.

Now, I’m sure there’s some neat freak outs there that are completely enthralled by Snow White’s intricate, “Sit on Your Ass and Let Animals Do the Work” method of cleaning, and I’m sure the extremely prominent miner audience appreciated their profession getting the Hollywood glorification treatment for once, but it simply doesn’t make for a good plot. The film begins to drag fairly early on once Snow White meets the dwarfs, with the only real respite being the few cutaways to The Queen making her dastardly plans. It’s unfortunate that so little of the film gives focus to The Queen, since the film comes alive whenever she’s on screen. Unlike everyone else in the cast, she has an actual goal that she works towards, even if it’s a simple one, that gives the movie a much better sense of direction. Lucille La Verne puts on a great vocal performance as both the young Evil Queen and her old hag alter ego. She captures a unique personality for each role, despite the two technically being the same character. While in her young form, Lucille speaks in a dignified and calm manner, like someone obsessed with maintaining appearances to those around her. Once the Evil Queen transforms however, every line is delivered with a sheer, unfiltered joyful boom as the old Evil Queen revels in the evil she commits.

Hearing her cackle after taunting the skeleton of a deceased prisoner (potentially The Huntsman) gives off a level of energy the rest of the movie sorely lacks.
Hearing her cackle after taunting the skeleton of a deceased prisoner (potentially The Huntsman) gives off a level of energy the rest of the movie sorely lacks.

It’s interesting that such a simple movie ends up being so poorly written. There are obvious issues, such as the insistence that Snow White and The Prince are in love when The Prince says maybe three sentences throughout the film. He never actually holds a conversation with Snow White, but I was willing to forgive something like that. “True Love at First Sight” can be a tough pill to swallow for someone who loves smartly written character relationships and arcs as much as I do. If it is worked into the narrative properly, or if there’s enough other good traits to distract me from it, I can dig it like a goldmine. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs does neither of these things.

Other than two scenes, The Prince and Snow White are never on screen together, and even in those scenes, they don’t speak to each other, so we never “see” them in love, we just hear Snow White insist how great he is. This becomes a big glaring problem during the “Someday My Prince Will Come” sequence, because Snow White claims that no one else is like The Prince, in front of seven individuals whom she knows much more about. Snow White ends up looking almost as superficial as the Evil Queen, since ultimately, she chose the outward beauty of The Prince over any of the dwarfs whom she had actually grown to know as people.

Snow White is meant to be a woman so kind, gentle and beautiful that people and animals alike instantly develop an attraction to her. However, her actions really make her out to be clueless, inconsiderate and condescending. I suspect Snow White may have some sort of mental deficiency that prevents her from retaining information for more than a few minutes. She recovers disturbingly fast from the attempt on her life, and she doesn’t reference it in any way ever again, she doesn’t even mention The Evil Queen. She decides to enter the dwarfs’ house without invitation or them even being there, as if she’s never heard of the concept of privacy or trespassing. She initially assumes that the dwarfs are children upon seeing the miniature stature of their house, but even upon learning that they are full grown men, she never stops treating them as kids. She cooks for them, forces them to clean themselves, kisses them on their way to work and tells them bedtime stories.

Granted, they apparently hadn't washed for over a year, but if they want to smell like limburger cheese bathed in vinegar, then that's their business. Just hope they don't invite anyone else over for tea.
Granted, they apparently hadn’t washed for over a year, but if they want to smell like limburger cheese bathed in vinegar, then that’s their business. Just hope they didn’t invite anyone over for tea.

Snow White also runs from The Prince in the beginning of the movie, implying that she is timid, then everything she does for the rest of the movie says the exact opposite. She breaks into a stranger’s house, begins running the lives of its inhabitants, accepts a strange woman’s outlandish claims of a magic apple and finally rides off into the sunset with a man she knows nothing about. The reason Snow White ran from The Prince was for plot convenience. Considering the Evil Queen couldn’t survive her encounter with the dwarfs, The Prince probably could have cut her head off and ended the movie in the first ten minutes, if Snow White’s fleeing hadn’t convinced him to leave.

The Evil Queen’s actions tend to make very little sense in regards to her intentions. She keeps Snow White as a maid in an attempt to hide her beauty. Since we see how easily she sentences Snow White to death, that brings up the issue as to why she didn’t kill Snow White a long time ago, and why she assumed that just being a maid would make Snow White less pretty. Her plan with the poison apple hinged on the assumption that Snow White would be buried alive rather than just killing Snow White herself. The Evil Queen also did not need to assume a disguise that so clearly physically handicapped her, thus creating the situation that got her killed. However, I don’t fault that particular point too much, since it ends up being fairly clever having The Evil Queen die as the old and ugly hag that she, ironically, only turned herself into in order to become the most beautiful woman in the land.

The Prince could be replaced with a feathered hat on a stick and the only thing that would change would be the absence of a few sentences. He does nothing, says almost nothing and probably feels nothing even as he rides away with his princess.

I'm not even entirely sure this is a picture of him, it might just be a slab of sculpting marble
I’m not even entirely sure this is a picture of him, it might just be a slab of sculpting marble.

The dwarfs are exactly what they say they are, except Grumpy to a small extent. Happy’s happy, Sneezy sneezes, Sleepy sleeps, Bashful is bashful, Doc is, uh, a doc and Dopey has a dope problem. Grumpy is pretty much in the same boat, but he has a small character arc as he slowly warms up to Snow White and begins to look at her as a friend. His small change makes him the most endearing character in the movie, even if it’s like saying a head of lettuce out of seven was my favorite because it had a small piece of bacon trapped in it.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is like finding an over-stuffed burrito in the fridge. It looks nice and appetizing as you warm it up in the toaster oven, but once you take a bite, all the contents burst out of the other end and leave you with nothing but a cheap shell of that delicious lunch you wanted to eat. Then you look up, and remember that you are actually at your tedious job and you are bored with your life.

Cinema Sit-Down, Movies/TV

Bond’s Best: My Review of ‘Spectre’

A poster for the film, which was released November 6, 2015.

Move over, Hydra! After a nearly 45-year absence, the original, evil terrorist organization makes a grand return in Daniel Craig’s latest James Bond adventure. In a year that saw an inundation of espionage films (Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation and The Man from U.N.C.L.E.), can the super-spy granddaddy rise above them?

James Bond (Daniel Craig) goes rogue to destroy a secret international terrorist organization that plans to create a worldwide surveillance system that will let them monitor everyone on the planet.

(SPOILER WARNING!)

First, I must confess that until recently, I was only passingly familiar with the James Bond franchise. I played a few Bond video games like GoldenEye on the Nintendo 64 and caught a few of the old movies when they were on TV, but that was it. Now, I did keep up with reboot films starting with Casino Royale, but that was the only Bond film I saw in the theater. With the release of Spectre looming, I spent my summer watching all of the pre-Craig films, especially when I found them all on Blu-ray at my local library. (True confession time: I only made it up to the Pierce Brosnan era before seeing Spectre). I’m glad I did because it gave me a greater appreciation for what this film did in re-introducing Bond’s oldest enemy.

Much like the classic Thunderball starring Sean Connery, Spectre has everything you could want from a Bond film: exotic locations, exciting action, beautiful women and terrifying villains. It has arguably the strongest script out of any of the Craig films. The pacing is perfect, never getting boring even when nothing is exploding. Unlike the original franchise, which had a loose continuity, Spectre builds heavily on what came before, but not so much so that a newcomer would be lost. However, it does reward those who have followed the new films. Unlike most Bond outings, this one is strangely character-driven. Bond’s mission quickly becomes a personal one once he realizes the leader of Spectre orchestrated every tragedy that befell him—most notably the deaths of his lovers—in the previous three films. It added layers to the story and made it more compelling. Surprisingly, there’s a fair amount of humor in the script, but it’s strategically used to give the audience a breather and never veers into the ridiculous, a common fault in the Bond films of yesteryear (I’m looking at you, Moonraker!). The silliest it gets is Bond landing on a couch after the roof he’s standing on collapses.

While Spectre had fewer action sequences, from what I can remember, than the previous Craig films, the set pieces were superb, the action exhilarating, and the suspense intense. For a franchise that’s done everything (and has overdone a few things like ski chases), this film manages to find new ways to thrill. The most impressive is a sequence where Bond is flying in a small airplane to chase down three Land Rovers. After some fancy flying, the plane’s wings get clipped, but Bond manages to somehow direct the plane down a snow-covered hill, taking out one Spectre vehicle, and crashes through a barn. Best of all, the filmmakers made the wise move of not overusing CGI and instead focused on using practical effects, as evidenced in this plane sequence.

It is important that you follow these techniques as every mail marked as spam could cost your order cheap viagra company. Kamagra is found in levitra 60 mg two forms namely Kamagra oral tabs and Kamagra Jelly. Purchasing this medicine would surely be a get viagra sample click here now good predictor of whether or not a child will walk. They all generic viagra australia work in a similar way, but are not identical. The film’s greatest strength, however, is the villains. Spectre’s iconic leader, Ernst Stavro Blofeld, returns. He’s played by Christoph Waltz, and his might be the best version of the character ever put on screen. Blofeld appeared in six Bond films played by almost as many actors. Waltz takes the best elements of the previous versions and distills them into a superb character who is every bit a match for Bond. This is no easy feat: Blofeld is arguably one of the most iconic and influential movie villains ever, inspiring countless imitators and parodies. Waltz’s Blofeld is cunning, intelligent and quietly sinister. His dark sense of humor and unceasing smirk serve to accentuate these qualities. His most memorable facets—appearing in shadow, his facial scar, and his white cat—are all utilized quite effectively. He’s given an added layer by revealing he was Bond’s stepbrother growing up. Interestingly, he uses another name for most of the film, which made me wonder if he truly was Blofeld. I’m glad he was because it would’ve been a disservice for him not to be included.

Blofeld’s henchmen are equally as memorable. Former pro-wrestler Dave Bautista plays Mr. Hinx, a mostly silent assassin whose violent actions speak louder than words. While Bautista speaks only one word the entire film, his presence is felt in every scene he’s in. Director Sam Mendes intended him to be something of a callback to Jaws, though minus the steel teeth. Andrew Scott, most famous for portraying Moriarty on BBC’s Sherlock, plays C, an MI6 operative spearheading an initiative to create a global surveillance system. He brings a similar quirky, off-putting nature to his character like he did as Moriarty. I must confess that as a fan of his work on Sherlock, I half-expected him to be Blofeld. It would’ve been cool.

Something I wouldn’t have noticed had I not watched most of the previous Bond films are the several subtle homages to franchise’s past. Besides the return of Blofeld and Spectre, the most notable ones are to 1973’s Live and Let Die, the first Bond film to star Roger Moore. Bond wears a skeleton costume similar that worn by a voodoo shaman in that film. Also, Bond has a fight on a train with Mr. Hinx that’s similar to one he has with hulking henchman Tee Hee (Julius Harris).

Spectre features some of the most artful cinematography of the recent Bond films. The opening scene in particular is an impressive sweeping single shot with the camera floating down and following a disguised Bond and his woman through the streets of Mexico City into a hotel, wherein they ride the elevator up several floors and enter a room.

But for all my gushing, I do have a few minor nitpicks. The film’s theme song, “Writing’s on the Wall” by Sam Smith, is fine but a far cry from the Oscar-winning “Skyfall” by Adele (though the title sequence was excellent). I’d also hoped for a fight between Blofeld and Bond at the end, but instead the climax was a chase scene. The film also succumbs to the overused trope of having the hero choosing not to kill a defenseless villain who insists the protagonist pulls the trigger.

While Mission Impossible is more my style of spy film, Spectre is Daniel Craig’s finest outing as Bond, and it ranks as one of the best in the franchise. If Craig hangs up his Walther PPK after this, he’ll go out on a high note.

Final Grade: A-

Movies/TV

Madam Secretary: Season 2 Episode 5 Recap

World War III seems to be just around the corner after this week’s Madam Secretary. The drama with Russia continues to intensify when Maria Ostrov calls for a special election for Russia’s new president to be held in just 30 days, and of course she is vying for the position. Maria’s victory would be a disaster for the United States (and arguably the world), which is why Bess spends most of her time in this episode trying to help her Russian pal Gorev get out of London. Gorev’s had to live in exile after Mr. Ostrov’s funeral, and because of sanctions that England refuses to lift his bank accounts have been frozen. Without any access to his funds, he can’t run for president against Maria Ostrov.

After talking with the president, Bess meets with the British Ambassador, and they come up with a plan to get Gorev his money. Gorev owns three large properties in England, and if they can sell them to wealthy Englanders Gorev would have the money he needs to challenge Maria. However, when Bess delivers this news to the President and her arch nemesis, Craig, the two of them decide that they don’t want to give Gorev the money with no strings attached. Instead they tell Bess that the only way the U.S. will help Gorev is if he’ll give up Russia’s government secrets, specifically their plans for invading Ukraine. Gorev refuses this plan (which Bess knew from the start), but something he says gives Bess the information she needs to solve this problem once and for all.

While all this drama is happening with Russia, the tech guy who’s been investigating the Air Force One hack has revealed who done it! They don’t know the man’s real name, but he goes by an alias, Dash. And while they don’t know who hired him, they know he has plans to attack again. After Bess speaks with Gorev, she realizes there’s a connection between this Dash fellow and Gorev (which I honestly didn’t understand, and don’t really know how to explain). Bess somehow realizes that Maria Ostrov must have hired Dash to sabotage Gorev during one of his earlier travels, and she brings this news to the President. He agrees to give Gorev the money he needs, but hours later Gorev is murdered by his “assistant.” At the same time, during his flight back to Ukraine the President of Ukraine’s plane is also hacked by Dash and is forced into an emergency landing. Once again, Bess meets with the President and his staff in the situation room where they realize that Russia is absolutely behind the Dash attacks, and that this will likely lead to war.

That about sums about the major action of this week’s episode. In a less dire yet equally important moment, Alison (Bess’s middle daughter) confronts Bess when she fails to show any enthusiasm for Alison’s new position as a fashion columnist for her school’s paper. She accuses Bess of having no interest in her at all. This moment couldn’t have come at a better time for me. So far, Alison’s never had an important story line. She’s basically just been hanging around in the background or making little quips, and I was starting to wonder why the creators of this show even included her. So it was very satisfying for this episode to address this issue in a way that makes sense to the story. Bess eventually apologizes to Alison in a lovely little scene. I’m always on Bess’s side, but as a middle child myself I really felt for Alison (not that I don’t think my parents find me interesting. We middle children just have to stick together.).
Each chiropractic program is designed specifically for the working viagra on line community, the HPI has helped businesses to improve employee turnover, absenteeism, and underperforming customer service. However, the degree of erection may differ such levitra uk as in one day or one week. A few days went by, and I could feel the little flutterings of excitement in my stomach as http://icks.org/n/data/ijks/2018FW-4.pdf buy generic viagra I got ready for our date- hopefully, the first of many to come. So, in time of order buy levitra online icks.org, once think of levitra of Kamagra or any other medicine made of Sildenafil citrate by the British scientist, ED is not a curse, it is nothing but all other diseases.
Henry and Dimitri continue spying on everyone, but at least it was less melodramatic and actually compelling this time. Dimitri gets a drunken Russian official to admit that Maria Ostrov is planning an invasion of Ukraine once she is elected president, and that two of her henchmen were sent to kidnap Gorev’s daughter (this of course being planned before they simply have him murdered). While I’m still not a fan of this subplot, I can at least stand to watch it now that I know Henry isn’t a sociopath.

Back at Bess’s office, Jay plans to assemble a few TV studio executives to license their shows to be broadcast on Russian television together with a pro-American news show. Jay and the other members of Bess’s press staff are attempting to fight anit-Ukraine propaganda currently airing on Russian TV. Unfortunately, the government can’t pay the executives so they back out of the deal.

All-in-all I quite liked this episode of Madam Secretary. It’ll be interesting to see where this conflict with Russia goes, and I hope there are more compelling stories happening within Bess’s family and staff.

Games and Software, Industry Now, Movies/TV, Pop Culture

Metroid: The Sky Calls

Video

Fan films, as I have discovered before, can capture what makes these honored franchises so special. Metroid: The Sky Calls is a short film by Rainfall Films. The film portrays Samus in way that kind of heals the wounds left by Other M. Rainfall also does a great job of keeping space mysterious, with more focus on the locale than the action.

Check out this awesome fan film before Nintendo takes it down.
It helps in relieving the problem of erectile dysfunction and boost viagra canada pharmacy click description up your sexual abilities. Erectile dysfunction cheapest tadalafil 20mg can be triggered due to a wide range of health benefits, one of which when combined with L’arginine, creates a safe and effective cure for erectile dysfunction. For type 2 diabetic patients, Bariatric Surgery is recommendable. cheapest viagra tabs Men who are suffering from such diseases can consume American ginseng and notice considerable changes in their overall cialis 5mg health almost right away when they kick the habit.

Movies/TV

Madam Secretary: Season 2 Episode 4

This week’s installment of Madame Secretary was brought to you by the word “feminism.” And boy was that a relief after last week’s disappointing episode. Madam Secretary resorted to what it does best: telling compassionate human stories. The main drama in this episode was a photo scandal involving a leaked image of Stevie and Harrison (the President’s son) in bed together. But before we get into that, let’s catch up with Bess.

She’s still in hot water with the President after her failed trip to Russia. When Bess tries to convince the President that the arctic research center that China’s recently built is not a spy center, Craig shuts Bess down and tells her her opinion basically doesn’t matter after the Russian debacle. Instead, Craig proposes that the U.S. should spy on China and do so by immensely increasing the defense budget and also just ignoring what the State Department has to say. But this obviously isn’t the only conflict Bess and her staff have to face…bringing us back to the photo scandal. Bess and her staff are trying to pass a disaster relief fund for Nepal when news of the scandal breaks, costing them the votes they needed for the fund. No one knows who has the photos or how many they have. The photo-person has only released one picture, but promises to sell the rest of them to the highest bidder. Bess and Henry talk to Stevie in what is perhaps the most painful conversation the three of them have ever had in the series so far. Bess questions Stevie about the nature of the photographs and if there’s any video. Stevie assures her that none of them are “gross” and that the actual, shall we say, intimacy was filmed.

Later that night, Bess and Henry continue talking about the Harrison/Stevie situation. Bess immediately jumps to blaming Stevie. When she asks Henry how many more times they’re going to have to bail Stevie out of bad situations, Henry surprisingly comes to Stevie’s defense. He’s usually on Stevie’s case, but Henry realizes the real situation they’re in. He argues to Bess that it isn’t fair to blame Stevie for this instance, acting like Harrison doesn’t have responsibility or that they even did anything wrong. Stevie and her boyfriend took private photos of themselves, which were never meant to be shared with anyone else. So the real person to blame is the jerk who’s trying to sell the stolen photographs. I’ve never liked Henry more before this moment. Henry comes to the rescue again the next day when he makes an appearance on CSPAN. A caller questions what authority Henry has to go on a show talking about morality when his daughter is involved in a sex scandal. This does not bode well with Henry, and results in him going on an epic rant putting that jerk in his place and once again sticking up for his daughter.

Benefit of practicing Kamagra Polo One can practice anti-impotence pill by keeping it in a tightly fixed container may be finer, rather than keeping it locally. viagra prices http://www.devensec.com/forms/Applic_-_LEVEL_1.pdf In this scenario, the good devensec.com online cialis news is that safer approaches are available. There are heaps of bland and marked medications accessible in the drugstores, some with gigantic force and some with moderate however at last all takes care levitra canadian pharmacy of all the other stuffs. Rarely will epicondylitis heal on its purchase viagra online own. Meanwhile, the President’s approval ratings have fallen dramatically, so he invites Henry and Bess to dinner at the White House with himself and the first lady. The dinner starts off all right. Bess, Henry, Lydia (the First Lady), and the President make polite small talk, until the subject of the photo scandal is brought up. The President feels that the only solution is for Stevie and Harrison to make an appearance on a news show the next morning, pretend to still be a couple, and then apologize for their “mistake.” Henry and Bess quickly shoot down this idea, and Bess finally comes around and questions why Stevie should have to apologize at all. She points out that Harrison will be the only one who benefits from this plan, while Stevie will be left looking like a tramp. After the abrupt dispute, the four of them presumably spend the rest of the dinner in silence.

In the end, the President calls Bess and Henry to the White House to tell them they’ve caught the man who stole the photos. He was a former secret service agent who had been fired the previous month. Henry requests a meeting with this man before the President takes any further steps. In what was arguably the most wonderfully feminist plot point in this episode, Stevie ends up being the one to talk to the man herself. She starts out a little hesitant, just asking his name if he has a family. When Stevie learns that he was only charged with a misdemeanor and charged a $500 fine, she confronts him strongly about why he felt okay doing something so terrible. He obviously didn’t see her as a real person who wouldn’t want to be embarrassed in such a public manner. When the man finally asks what she wants from this conversation, Stevie reveals that she wanted to get to know him as a whole person and not judge him based on something “stupid” he did once. It was a great scene for many reasons. The first one being that Stevie was ultimately the one to stand up for herself. It was touching to see Henry and Bess stand up for her, but Stevie was the real victim of the incident and it was empowering to see her confront this man with compassion.

Bess is also able to confront her nemesis, and take him down a little less nicely. She talks to her new friend Ellen (an Admiral at the Pentagon), and they come up with a solution to the insane defense budget Craig has created. Bess comes up with a plan that is cheaper, more efficient, and provides many peaceful solutions that requires little military intervention. The President is thrilled with Bess’s new budget, and finally welcomes her back to his good side. Craig tries to make nice with Bess after this meeting. He congratulates her on this new budget, and brings up the idea of them getting lunch some time. Bess at first graciously accepts his praise, but turns on a dime and tells him to never question her authority again. The look on Craig’s face is perhaps my favorite thing I’ve ever seen on this show. Here’s to hoping for another excellent installment of Madam Secretary next week.