Fabrizio del Wrongo writes:

• Shouting Thomas is having bear troubles.
• Have you noticed how many scientific and/or academic studies are done on toys? In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that some college is offering a degree in Barbie Studies. Anyway, some group of eggheads has determined that the faces on Lego people have gotten progressively less cheery. What this is supposed to indicate, I’m not sure. One thing I feel sure of: Over the last 30 or so years, stuff aimed at kids has gotten considerably “edgier.” So I’m not at all surprised that contemporary Lego people display a bit more ‘tude.
• It’s “1984” all over again.
• Matt Forney entertainingly throws a bunch of bombs at a feminist writer, and at feminists in general.
• Pretty sure you’d get tossed in jail if you recorded this today. Question: Why isn’t Lonnie Johnson as well-known as Robert Johnson and Charlie Patton? I think he’s one of the all-time greats. Anyone have an under praised blues artist they’d like to call attention to?
• Summer camp, Hamas style.
• The tradition of the cute animal movie goes back to Edison. But it took the film medium over a 100 years to discover the wonders of dogs plus citrus.
• Foseti on Cormac McCarthy’s “Blood Meridian.” Some interesting discussion in the comments. I read it about 20 years ago and was both impressed and kind of bored by it. Our own Blowhard, Esq. had some fun at McCarthy’s expense back here.
• Armond White on a couple of long-in-coming DVD releases. I love Lubitsch’s “The Merry Widow,” which is the last operetta he made and the only one he made at MGM. On the other hand, Bogdanovich’s efforts at homage-ing classical Hollywood have never done a whole lot for me. But maybe I’ll take this as an opportunity to revisit “At Long Last Love.”
• One of the more entertaining Wikipedia bios I’ve come across. What a character Mizner was! The great Hollywood screenwriter Anita Loos, who had a bit of an affair with Mizner, claimed that Warner Brothers paid someone to follow him around and record all his wisecracks, some of which ended up in the mouths of Cagney and Bogart. His brother, Addison Mizner, was the guy who popularized the Spanish Revival style of architecture. Here’s Paleo Retiree/Michael Blowhard on his work.
• Sandwich shaming.
• Great Movie Scenes: With its movement through multiple planes, its crack choreography, and its wonderfully comic timing (the editing is spot on), this opening set-piece, from the 1961 “Hercules and the Captive Women,” feels a bit like something out of a Buster Keaton comedy or a MGM musical. You rarely see anything this lovingly put-together in an action movie today.