This is arguably the least practical advice in here, but also the funniest. Bonus points if you can do it to the same stranger multiple days in a row.

Probably.

I wanted a specific example more than a general one, so I’m going to go with Alamo Drafthouse. The company built its brand on being the theater chain for movie geeks, people that like the theatrical experience, but wished for something better than what megaplexes were offering. The company rode that identity until 2024, when Sony bought it out. Not coincidentally, 6 months later, they announced that they were mandating the use of QR codes to order food and drinks during the showings. Imagine my surprise when I showed up to a screening and had to dig into my phone, download their app, reset my password, and then navigate a hastily slapped together system just to request a glass of ice water at the start of the 3rd act.

That’s, admittedly, not a huge deal on the face of it. But it’s such a betrayal of the entire reason that I had preferentially chosen to see movies at my local Drafthouse that I haven’t returned since. It does not help my attitude that the underlying reason for this change in policy seems to be cost-cutting and union busting.

While the refusal to change course seems to indicate my aversion is the minority opinion, my mind still boggles at Sony’s willingness to cut off their nose just to spite their face.

I agree. As you mentioned, the quality of Statham’s filmography varies wildly, but I don’t think his performances are ever the determining factor in what the final result is. Idk, if someone wanted to call the 6th consecutive movie where he plays a gruff guy with a checkered past mixed up eith some baddies on someone else’s behalf a ‘slop movie’, I guess I couldn’t fight them on that. However, given that genre is a perennial favorite of mine, I’m not looking for a wide emotive range from that experience. I want cool fight choreography, inventive cinematography, and badass stunts. If I get that, but Statham gives a wooden performance, I’m still going to think well of the movie (not least of all because it’s largely the same performance as what he gives in his ‘good’ movies too lol).

I guess when I think of the prompt, the actor that comes to mind is like a Ben Kingsley type. Someone who won awards for their acting prowess, but who wound up shoveling out direct to video crap in the twilight of their career.

I don’t know. Blaming Statham for Ghosts of Mars feels like blaming a waiter for the Titanic: he was just along fir the ride.

In OP’s defense, I checked out both movies’ Letterboxd ratings, and Blade 1 is rated at 3.5 out of 5, and Blade 2 is sitting at 3.3, so maybe it is just an echo chamber thing. That being said, I really believe this was not the case 10, 15 years ago.

Having sat with it for awhile now, I’m kind of coming around on the notion. I’d have to do a back to back viewing to confirm, but my current hypothesis is that Blade 1 is an excellent urban action-horror picture. It does everything you’d expect it to do pretty well. Blade 2, being a product of Guillermo’s interests, has this weird, quasi-Shakespearian family drama between Nomac, lady vampire, and the patriarch serving as the emotional spine of the picture. It’s fine, but I remember a lot more about their dynamics than I remember about Blade’s arc, which is maybe not what you want from a Blade movie. Plus, all the extra vampire lore and whatnot makes the picture feel less like urban action-horror and more like a fantasy film, which just so happens to have guns and the occasional unwitting human. Not bad, but it does feel like a dry run for ideas Guillermo would do better in other movies.

I was gonna say, how is this entire thread skipping over the take that Blade 2 is a step down from the first? It’s not the craziest movie take I’ve read on here, but it definitely flies in the face of what I understood to be popular opinion.

You might like Burn Notice, depending on your tolerance for network television tropes of the mid-aughts. It’s a “monster of the week” format, rather than the serialized approach of Reacher, but it typically includes a scene or two referencing the season arc in any given episode, so you still feel like the narrative is advancing, even if the majority of the episode was a side quest.

The gist is that a US government spy gets “burned” and turned loose in Miami. He, and the few contacts he has who will still speak with him (which include his mother, an ex-gf with a bombastic personality, and Bruce Campbell at the height of his smarmy powers), attempt to figure out who burned him, while also getting wrapped up in “favors” for various folks about town that inevitably wind up more complicated than was initially let on. Antagonists run the gamut from international terrorists to con artists who target the geriatric (it is, after all, set in Florida).

It’s not high art, but it’s got a winning cast, decent action (for network television), and, on occasion, I think some pretty clever solutions for problems which leverage the “spycraft” gimmick. Worth a shot.

Full disclosure, the last time I studied chemistry was 20 years ago, and I was not a particularly good student, so take this with a heaping helping of NaCl.

It isn’t the direct reaction of Drano + PVC that causes the issue. Rather, it’s the heat given off from the reaction of the clog and the lye. Apparently it’s significant enough to be an issue. I tried looking up how much heat might be released by the reaction, but I went crosseyed reading the formula, so someone else will have to do the math on that one.

Also, I know you said caustic material doesn’t react with metal, but Google doubts you on that front, for whatever that’s worth. In fact, zinc is specifically called out as a metal with which sodium hydroxide reacts pretty strongly, which is important because many water lines are steel galvanized with, you guessed it, zinc.

I was told it was never about the size, it was about how you used it!

Lol you’re correct. Idk what happened there, meant to say fun!

Tremors is up there for me. Every couple of years I revisit it and have just as much time as the last.

I typically turn the water off if I’m brushing in the shower. Hop in, shampoo, rinse, apply conditioner, turn off water, brush teeth, scrub body, turn water on, rinse, done. Makes use of otherwise dead time I’d spend waiting for the conditioner to work, and is comfortable enough with the residual heat from the walls and steam.

It’s an Albany expression.

I don’t shop at Trader Joe’s because it’s outside of my budget, but I have friends that do. I’ll be sure to ask them. Their niche as what I guess I’d call a “boutique grocery store” would seemingly allow for coffee grinders in-shop, if for no other reason than I think it appeals to what I’d imagine their key demographic is.

Oh wow! That’s even more expensive a selection than I remember. Is this a chain, or a local store?

This is snarky, so I’m preempting this by saying this is in the spirit of a gentle tease, and not an attack on your person: The presumption that I’ve somehow simply missed the aisle which contains bulk whole bean coffee and it’s attendant grinders for the past 20 years is wild. Is this a platform 9 3/4 situation? Or must you close your eyes, spin counterclockwise 3 times, and say Arabica Kadabra?

In seriousness though, color me jealous. I’d love to have access to what you’re describing, especially the fresh nut butter.

Do you mind sharing your general location? Within the Midwestern US, they all seem to have gone the way of the dodo.

It’s always odd to me when words develop parallel but distinct meanings based on context. Like, I know “to cleave to” something is to attach to it, but it trips me up (esp. in a Warhammer context where Saltzpyre would be hanging out) since I default to “he was cleaved in twain”.

As with most other English oddities, I assume this is holdover from my ancestors treating other languages like swap meets.