A Year in Pictures – Roman Forum

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You have to understand: I am a dyed-in-the-wool Latin geek. Not the most knowledgeable one, not by a long stretch, but I did NJCL competitions in high school, up to the national level in Certamen. The origins of my Latin geekery lie even further back, courtesy of an Odyssey of the Mind project in fifth grade where the problem we chose was “Pompeii.” So for me, going to Italy was like a pilgrimage, and the Roman Forum was my shrine. To actually walk on the Via Sacra and see the remnants of all those old monuments . . . it was a dream come true.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

Supernatural Re-Watch: “In My Time of Dying” and season premieres

I never thought about it until I sat down and rewatched the episode for this project . . . but this is a really weird episode to open your season with.

Think about it. What do you want a season premiere to do? It should be a good entry point for people who are new to the show, since this is pretty much your best chance to pick up fresh viewers. That means it needs to give a good sense of the flavor of the show, while also not relying too heavily on stuff those hypothetical new viewers don’t know.

From that standpoint, this episode fails resoundingly — in fascinating ways.

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Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.