The plot lines are more contrived (Lorelai and Christopher in Paris, anyone?).
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Further, measures of profitability for purposes of the covenant compliance are getting more and more contrived.
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Then you need a fight or argument, or at least a misunderstanding (the more contrived the better).
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At times, Booksmart feels a bit more contrived and cartoonish than the very best of its teen-comedy subgenre.
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The entire idea feels incredibly artificial — even more contrived than the fictionalized reality of the rest of these films.
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Other times, I do feel like they need to have a whole 'rainbow' of talent, which is fine, but feels more contrived.
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There are other, more contrived invitations to ruminate, such as the pendulum that hangs from the ceiling and trickles sand into a shallow box.
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Perhaps more contrived, but still effective: the moment we first hear the normally silent Michael's voice, which doesn't come until the season is nearly over.
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And at times, the attempt to look at the future of ballet seems more contrived than organic, like the appearances of the street dancer Rauf Yasit.
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It felt a little slapdash for these two professionals, and it wasn't the only thing about the episode that seemed thinner and more contrived than usual.
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Though the sequence is a lot more contrived than the music, its point — this helpless, unpolished little outburst of impulsive high spirits when alone in nature — is pleasing.
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It makes for suspenseful and moving TV, and Wesley seems to find the conversation rewarding, but we argued about whether the sequence felt more contrived and exploitative than helpful.
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When you grow up in the hood, in comparison to more contrived areas like the suburbs, it doesn't seem diverse but it's more diverse because you have to accept people's differences.
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If the last of the tetralogy, "Regular Singing," felt slightly more contrived than the others, I was still sorry to say goodbye to a family who somehow turned casual conversation into catharsis.
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A Kleenex stunt, in which the company surprised a gay couple getting married with a party and a giant wall of tissues that spelled out "Love Wins," felt more contrived than heartwarming.
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Over the next few days, I came up with a list of progressively more contrived items to request, each one requiring a greater amount of effort on the dealers' part than the last.
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What began as a bare-bones series about several strangers "picked to live in a house" in a major American city became more contrived as the show aged and reality TV became its own genre, with familiar tics and beats.
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Jim Abbott ("Orlando Sentinel") called the show at the Amway Center unnatural and formulaic. He explains, "Compared with that free- spirited British group, BTR's stage presence was more contrived, more tightly choreographed even in the moments that were supposed to be spontaneous".
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Really? Could the plot to get Castiel alone with Amara be any more contrived?" Becky Lea of Den of Geek wrote, "The Devil In The Details manages to function as a deconstruction of the Supernatural formula whilst also adhering to it to a certain extent. Old dogs and old tricks are the order of the day.
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Voltaire and Catherine the Great: Selected Correspondence, trans. A. Lentin (Cambridge: Oriental Research Partners, 1974), 11. He even addressed her as "my Catherine." While Catherine also flattered Voltaire in her letters, she wrote in a more contrived manner, perhaps due to the fact that her secretary Pictet thoroughly revised the letters (unlike the letters she wrote to Frederick the Great) prior to sending them.
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Even after this had been added David Ennals, Minister for the State of Health, said "I do not wish to criticise the film as a film. But I feel it is extremely unfortunate that despite the spoken disclaimer which procedes it, this film can give the impression that there is such a link."'Mr Ennals joins critics', Our own Reporter. The Guardian 7 Dec 1968: 1 As The New York Times put it, "this is a delicate area indeed", going on to describe the film as "more unsettling than rewarding, and certainly more contrived than compassionate".
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Writing in Libération, the philosopher Michel Serres opined that The Broken Ear was "a treatise on fetishism". Literary critic Jean-Marie Apostolidès of Stanford University believed that The Broken Ear established a "tintinian" anthropology that would remain throughout the rest of the series. As part of this, Apostolidès argued, Hergé distances himself from western values and looks at his own society as an outsider, accomplishing what Roger Caillois called "sociological revolution". He felt that the comic was "more contrived" and "more superficial" than the previous Adventures, and that here Tintin loses his position as "the sole point of identification" for the reader, with the other characters becoming more identifiable.
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Computer Gaming Worlds Charles Ardai wrote that, given Castle of Dr. Brains quality, "one wonders how Sierra could have gotten everything so wrong the second time around", comparing The Island of Dr. Brain to a computer tutorial for the SAT test. He stated that "the puzzles are more contrived and less fun" and that while the game emphasized education more than its predecessor did—assuming knowledge of subjects like the periodic table, music, and literature—and its marketing claimed "We guarantee this game will entertain your child while he or she learns", The Island of Dr. Brain contained "several embarrassing, sloppy mistakes" like misspelling Jules Verne's name.
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Comparing it to previous singles "Genghis Khan" and "My Trigger", Sean Maunier of Metro Weekly opined that while the song is not as memorable as the former two, "it pulses with synths and some interesting swells". DIY critic David Beech felt "The Heart of Me", along with the two aforementioned singles, "possess a pop pomp that's been hinted at only slightly in the past". He concluded, "Though there's a definite confidence in their composition, they certainly feel less organic, more contrived than before." In a negative review, Rachel Brodsky of Spin dismissed its "cheery falseness", stating that it "sounds ready to be slapped into a Target commercial, as if its only sincere yearning is for royalty checks".
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He described it as "brave, empowering, and dusted with something that many of the indie-rock genre's more contrived acts desperately lack: an element of real danger." Rock critic Robert Christgau gave the album an A−, saying that Funeral was "...too fond of drama, but aware of its small place in the big world, and usually beautiful." Pitchfork gave the album a 9.7 out of 10 rating, and ultimately ranked the album #1 on their Top 50 Albums of 2004 list, as well as #2 on their Top 200 Albums of the 2000s list, after Radiohead's Kid A. Kludge called it a "glorious" debut album, in which Arcade Fire spins "elaborate art-rock full of passion and atmosphere." Drowned in Sound also highly praised Funeral.
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" Some media outlets and critics were more critical towards the show. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette TV critic Rob Owen wrote, "Writer/series creator Julian Fellowes weaves together an engrossing tapestry of stories, although some of them stretch credulity or peter out." Alessandra Stanley of The New York Times also gave the series moderate reviews by comparison to first series and said, "Season 2 is in many ways as captivating and addictive as the first, but this time around, the series comes off as a shameless throwback to itself." In a moderate review, Maureen Ryan of The Huffington Post said, "Your investment in the many stories spun out by creator Julian Fellowes may take longer to develop this year, because the costume drama's pace is off in the early going and it's far more contrived and inconsistent than it was in its first season.
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