We’re on the final stretch of our Stranger Things marathon (nth time to rewatch the whole series, actually) in preparation for Volume 2 of Season 4. For the nth time, I commented what a wonderful actor Jamie Campbell Bower is as Henry Creel / One / Vecna.

We know his name now, the actor’s. When we first saw him in Season 4, we referred to him as Anthony. He was Anthony on Sweeney Todd and I recognized him at once on Stranger Things. While he wasn’t required to do a lot as Anthony, his performance on Stranger Things is simply magnificent.

He reminds me a little of Eddie Redmayne. Neither possess the stereotypical good looks by which most people judge screen actors, but when they are performing, they command your total attention. Consummate artists.

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Only the most diehard Marvel fan will heap praises on this movie. It’s nothing but an assault on the senses, and watching it was visually exhausting. A far cry from its predecessor.

But at least I made it through the end of the film. Even stayed for the mid credits and after credits stuff. I didn’t last that long watching Everything Everywhere All at Once.

Free Guy was a much better experience for me. I’m not a fan of Ryan Reynolds but after enjoying The Adam Project tremendously, I was excited to watch Free Guy. Reynolds seems to have finally found his groove.

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We watched Season 5 of Somebody Feed Phil in two tranches. Some episodes were better than others, as expected. And some scenes I just can’t forget. Curiously, the most memorable scene has nothing to do with my favorite food in the entire season.

Episode 2 is about Maine. Phil was served four kinds of lobster rolls and, as he went about devouring each, he had an accident. The sauce dripped on his pants. And he called it a crime scene.

Alex and I laughed out loud. We use that term at home too. Not for food spilled on clothing but crumbs, sauce and grease left by her father on the tabletop. He’s the only one that consistently leaves that much evidence of a meal that had been viciously attacked and thoroughly demolished.

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Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore is streaming on HBO. My younger daughter, Alex, wanted to see it and asked if it could be last night’s movie.

We do that, you see — propose and counter propose until we finally agree on a movie or episodes of a series that we’d watch before bedtime. I wasn’t exactly gagging to see another Fantastic Beasts movie. To say that I didn’t enjoy the two previous ones would be a huge understatement.

But, with all the fuss about Johnny Depp’s replacement as Gellert Grindelwald, I thought it would be interesting to watch Mads Mikkelsen take on the challenge. It’s not that I was preparing to laugh at him. He’s a damn fine actor. I have yet to see a movie where he didn’t deliver with panache. Truth be told, he’s a better actor than Johnny Depp.

So, I agreed that Fantastic Beasts would be our movie of the night.

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We’re done watching the first part of Season 4 of Stranger Things. I have to admit that it was a struggle at first. The introduction of new characters didn’t sit well with me. Mean Girl Angela and the basketball jocks led by Jason are a waste of screen time.

They’re just stereotypes, I know. The likes of Angela… Pretty and popular in high school, their life’s goal is to snag the best-looking jock in school and not much more. S-H-A-L-L-O-W.

And the jocks like Jason are straw dogs. Revered in their youth but throwaways as adults. Jason egging on the community to hunt down Eddie, the outcast, for the death of his girlfriend even when there’s no clear evidence of guilt made me think of Gaston in Beauty and the Beast. Strong, virile, good-looking and utterly stupid.

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