I reviewed this week’s Homeland for Rolling Stone. It continues to feel weird to like Homeland more than most of the critics I read, but it’s a good weird.

I reviewed last night’s post-twist episode of Homeland for Rolling Stone. It’s a very odd feeling to find myself on the high end of the “enjoying Homeland” curve relative to my peers.

I wrote about last night’s genuinely game-changing episode of Homeland for Rolling Stone. Well, I liked it.

In anticipation of tonight’s kinda make-or-break episode, I wrote a piece on how to save Homeland. Macro and micro alike.

I reviewed last night’s Homeland for Rolling Stone. It lived up to its title.

I reviewed the Homeland season premiere for Rolling Stone. Maybe you’ve watched it by now!

I reviewed the series finale of Breaking Bad, and by extension all of Breaking Bad, for Rolling Stone. The Heisenberg Certainty Principle.

I reviewed last night’s penultimate Breaking Bad for Rolling Stone. I focused on the last things we see of Walt and Jesse before next week’s finale, which really will be the last things we see of Walt and Jesse.

I had a few more thoughts that didn’t make it into the review:

* The casting of Robert Forster as the disappearance specialist is, I think, even better than it seemed with that first flush of “Hey, it’s Robert Forster!” Seriously, to come up with an actor with the recognition factor and gravitas necessary to play that part, yet who wouldn’t be so famous or so showy that showing up for the first time in the penultimate episode would throw the whole thing off balance? That’s miracle working is what that is.

* At first I found Todd’s demurral over murdering Skyler difficult to believe, particularly after he killed Andrea and grinned while watching Jesse tearfully talk about his murder of Drew Sharp. But the only explanation for it, that he truly does respect Mr. White so much that he wouldn’t kill his wife unless she gave him no other choice, actually works, because after all it’s the only reason Walt himself is alive right now, too. If you were Uncle Jack, you’d have killed Walt, buried him alongside Hank and Gomez, taken his $10 million, and tied off that loose end for good, right? But Jack explains to Walt that they’re not doing that because Todd doesn’t want them to. If that’s true, and apparently it is because why else would they spare him, then I can buy that Todd would threaten Skyler rather than kill her, even in the face of Lydia’s disapproval.

* A bit more of a credulity strain is the vacuum repairman’s continued contact with Walt. Wouldn’t the heat on Walt make him less likely to maintain a working relationship with him, not more? Is Walt just the richest guy he’s worked with, and the money’s what’s keeping him around? If that’s the case, what’s to stop him from killing the sick and helpless and isolated Walt and taking all the money instead of accepting it in $10k/hour installments? Is it just a sense of professionalism? Even if it is, how would word of his betrayal of Walt ever get back to anyone and affect his reputation? I guess, like Heisenberg, some people just take pride in their work.

* One of my favorite moments of the episode was Marie’s disorienting arrival at and departure from her house. I loved how tight the camera was at all times, how it took a while for it to be clear what the hell was happening, how it all happened so quickly. Part of me would love if that’s the last we see of Marie, her face full of confusion and dismay, submerged for good in the chaos Walt has wrought.

* I was glad to see Carmen’s the principal now.

I interviewed R.J. Mitte, aka Walt Jr., aka Flynn, from Breaking Bad. He told me it gets crazier. He made me nervous.

I reviewed tonight’s episode of Breaking Bad for Rolling Stone.

It was something.

I interviewed Gomie for Rolling Stone! Am I happy about this?

I interviewed Bob Odenkirk, aka Saul Goodman, and reviewed the most recent episode of Breaking Bad for Rolling Stone.

I reviewed tonight’s episode of Breaking Bad for Rolling Stone. How about that guacamole?

I interviewed Betsy Brandt, aka Marie Schrader from Breaking Bad, for Rolling Stone. I got to use the phrase “purple reign,” which is my all-time favorite pun.

Last week I interviewed Dean Norris, aka Hank Schrader, for Rolling Stone. This week I reviewed the latest episode of the show. Usually I post quotes from these things but we’re so close to the end now that I’m afraid to screw anything up for anyone, so take my word that they’re worth reading, I guess.

I reviewed tonight’s Breaking Bad premiere for Rolling Stone. I start with a Donald Rumsfeld quote and include a Red Wedding reference, because that’s me all over.

I’m back on the Breaking Bad beat for Rolling Stone during its final eight-episode run. I decided to kick things off with a list of 10 times people on this show killed other people on this show in ways I found difficult to forget. Oh, life.

I wrote about the early-’90s Marvel trading cards for Vorpalizer, explaining how for kids like me were our primary exposure to comics at all, and what that means.

I wrote about the history of Wolverine for Rolling Stone, marking the occasion of the release of the new movie The Wolverine by tracing how the Len Wein/John Romita Sr./Herb Trimpe–created, Chris Claremont/Dave Cockrum/John Byrne–developed character went from throwaway antagonist to one of the most popular in all of fiction.

And I wrote about Saman Bemel-Benrud’s webcomic Abyss for Vorpalizer, exploring its handling of information technology as a vector for the fantastic.

Over at Rolling Stone, I spoke with writer/showrunner Brian K. Vaughan about Under the Dome, his ambitious summertime 13-episode adaptation of the Stephen King novel of the same name. I’ve interviewed Brian for a pretty wide range of publications — Wizard, Maxim, a cover story for The Comics Journal, and now RS — and the local-boy-made-good feeling I got when I saw his name listed right after Stephen King and Steven Spielberg in the executive-producer credits was pretty delightful.

Was it enough to make up for the tone-deaf moments? I’m not sure. The show’s previously been careful to maintain a heterogeneous look for most of the cultures Daenerys encounters in her travels through the eastern continent of Essos, so the uniformly brown skin tone of the freed slaves worshipping the blondest possible savior figure was surprising and disconcerting – doubly so since, in the books, much is made of just how many different kinds of people had been forced into slavery by Yunkai and then freed by Dany when she took the city. This uncomfortable contrast kneecapped what could otherwise have been the most purely uplifting and cathartic moment in the series so far. Plus it gave the episode its title and was, you know, the final shot of the season – a rough one to go out on.

The “Mhysa” sequence will receive the most scrutiny, and rightfully so, but Dany’s triumph outside the gates of Yunkai came with its fair share of visual and narrative warning signs that we’re not to take it at face value. There’s that conqueror/liberator exchange between Dany and Jorah, which sounded like something you’d hear on a Meet the Press interview with Dick Cheney circa March 2003. The grinning joy on her face was carefully contrasted with Jorah’s concern; yeah, that could have been simply his regret that the khaleesi now has tens of thousands of admirers just as ardent as he, but it can also be read as fear that it won’t all be crowdsurfing and dragon flyovers forever. Add in the separate conversations between Tywin and Tyrion, and Stannis and Davos, about whether the ends (victory in the War of the Five Kings, peace in the realm) justify the means (the Red Wedding, burning some poor kid alive), and I half expected Drogon to be trailing a “MISSION ACCOMPLISHED” banner behind him.

I reviewed the Game of Thrones season finale for Rolling Stone. A compelling, sometimes stunning, sometimes troubling episode.