I describe television as feminine and movies as masculine, in the sense that television wants to examine a problem from all sides and talk about it for a long time, and movies just want to hit the climax and then maybe have a smoke.

All I ask is this: Do something. Try something. Speaking out, showing up, writing a letter, a check, a strongly worded e-mail. Pick a cause – there are few unworthy ones. And nudge yourself past the brink of tacit support to action. Once a month, once a year, or just once...Even just learning enough about a subject so you can speak against an opponent eloquently makes you an unusual personage. Start with that. Any one of you would have cried out, would have intervened, had you been in that crowd in Bashiqa. Well thanks to digital technology, you’re all in it now.

Bottom line is, even if you see 'em coming, you're not ready for the big moments. No one asks for their life to change, not really. But it does. So what are we, helpless? Puppets? No. The big moments are gonna come. You can't help that. It's what you do afterwards that counts. That's when you find out who you are.

When you see these characters like Captain America or Thor, laughing at their own situation or about how strange they are, then you are able to accept more readily that it's fine to wear a cape. You can also accept that it's fine to be enormous and green, or to shoot arrows at aliens racing through the sky. It all makes sense if you've been able to laugh at it and with it.

Hillary Clinton is more in the center of things than I am, but she also knows how to work with the opposition, which is a necessary talent in politics right now.

All worthy work is open to interpretations the author did not intend. Art isn't your pet -- it's your kid. It grows up and talks back to you.

People used to laugh that academics would study Disney movies. There's nothing more important for academics to study, because they shape the minds of our children possibly more than any single thing.