Welcome, dear readers, to our regular letter column; a series of missives from and to the internet, delivered by a series of tubes. We welcome your comments and questions. About anything! We’ll answer it, and at least one of us will take you seriously. Maybe.

Your questions can be about comics. This is a site about comics, so I SUPPOSE we should occasionally do some lip service toward that. After all, if all Ebert did was talk smack about video games, you’d think he was your grandpa! And kids, I’m not your grandpa. YOU SHOULD BE SO LUCKY. But since you’re not, just ask us about other stuff, too! TV! Movies! The upcoming baseball season! The unbearable lightness of being! As an example of a specific question, how about why Brooklyn Nine-Nine is so good? The answer may surprise you!

(Note: the answer is just working backwards from “Terry Crews is insanely charming.”)

You’re welcome, internet.

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Well, let’s get this one out of the way as Cody (@codyfschmidt) asks: Why does my back hurt? Why can’t I sleep? Did you guys watch Cosmos yet?

James: First off, Cody, you should take better care of yourself. Your back hurts? Take a bunch of muscle relaxants and start lifting heavy objects with your back to stretch it out! Your torso is where all the strength is! And as for your sleep, well, did you know I don’t have any trouble sleeping? It’s true! I can usually fall asleep within a minute of laying down in my bed or, if we’re being honest, any position where I am reclined around 45 degrees or more. And what’s that, you say? How do I achieve such amazing results? Through my patented (note: not patented) process of a decade of systematic sleep deprivation! For only $29.95 plus shipping and handling, you too will be able to stay up as late as you want, go to bed when you want and still get up in time to go to work for an early shift. Sure, there’s the occasional side effect (unforeseen crash), but if you try to listen to the rhythms of your body, you’ll be a-ok!*

*May actually shorten your lifespan a not-insignificant amount

As for Cosmos, I have indeed watched it! I haven’t caught the first episode yet, but I recorded and watched the second episode, “Some of the Things That Molecules Do,” last night. In short, I really liked it. My qualms from last week about Neil deGrasse Tyson were put to rest, at least as far as this series goes. He’s amiable and articulate, and more importantly, there are these moments where he gives into the feeling of the moment, looks at the camera and expresses his Tina Feynian desire to “go to there.” In a series about the mysteries of life and the universe, explicitly framed as a voyage of the imagination to the frontier between knowledge and ignorance, it’s important that deGrasse Tyson exudes a childlike wonder from time to time. It reinforces our own wonder at the beauty on-screen.

I actually wasn’t certain about how this episode would go, because it’s all about evolution and natural/artificial selection, and that’s a very tense subject from time to time. And while I definitely come down on deGrasse Tyson’s side of things, I was worried the topic would bring out his more obnoxious side. Instead, I admired that he was willing to go to the mat for science and state, bluntly, that we know for a fact evolution happens. But I was even happier that he did it in a non-confrontational way, without deliberately alienating one. It helps the series stay true to its core: helping educate people. People tend not to be receptive to information when you’ve called them stupid first. Hint, hint, atheists on Twitter.

It’s still weird to me to see the Fuzzy Door Productions card at the end of the episode, because I don’t really think of Seth MacFarlane as a dude who really cares about the wonder of the universe or, for that matter, being diplomatic about it. I mean, you’ve seen his terrible TV shows, right? Or his terrible movie, Ted? The fact that this guy has managed to put forward his best qualities and foster genuine excitement for STEM impresses me, if I’m being honest.

Also, that Neil deGrasse Tyson line, “We are, all of us, a little universe,” is unspeakably baller.

Brandon: Now if my Central Alberta education taught me anything about this so-called “science” you boys are going on about, it’s that Satan left building blocks for his followers and that when put all together, it will make a faith breaking machine that will doom each and every one of us. I should note, I learned this in English class, and not Bio or Chem or Physics.

You probably think I’m joking.

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Laury (@OTOC_Laury) asks: What is the one word you use often but sometimes wonder if you really understand what it really means?

James: There isn’t one, Laury. If I’m using a word, it’s because I genuinely believe I am using it correctly. When I throw down “obstreperous,” son, you’d best believe I know exactly what I’m calling you. Of course, confidence doesn’t actually mean correctness, and for all I know, I’m using words incorrectly frequently! My ego won’t really allow me to entertain that for longer than a second or two at a time, though, and the timer just went off.

All this said, I literally looked down at the word “should” last week and spent about five seconds wondering why it looked wrong.

Brandon: The word James often uses, but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t quite understand is “correct” - most commonly heard when he’s voicing his opinions. Mine is “indicative”, probably.

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Marc (@dasnordlicht91) asks: With the changes made to Wrestlemania XXX, is it now a must watch for you?

James: Definitely. But really, I was going to watch it anyway, and while my personal excitement has gone up following last week’s additions of:

• Bray Wyatt facing John Cena;
  
• An Andre the Giant memorial 30-man over-the-top-rope battle royale;
• Daniel Bryan vs HHH, with the stipulation that if Bryan wins he gets added to the main event to compete against Batista and Randy Orton for the WWE Heavyweight Championship;

It’s not like I wasn’t going to watch it anyway. Because really, while I didn’t foresee the Bryan/HHH stipulation or the battle royale, I was confident that more interesting matches were going to be added to the card. A day or two after the launch of the WWE Network, some friends of mine were grousing about how the Network’s launch was stymied because there weren’t any exciting matches at Wrestlemania, when only two matches were set up, period. And none of them featured heavy hitters like Bryan, the Wyatt Family, the Shield or (ugh) even John Cena. Like, we had to know more was coming, so I mostly just played it cool and assumed there would be matches I wanted to see, even if the main event wasn’t one of them. And now they’ve potentially made the main event great, too! Let this be a lesson to you, smarks: complaining about something that’s not announced yet is silly.

Brandon: As always, it’s shaping up to be one of the biggest shows of the year - as it should. The addition of the Daniel Bryan stipulation is one of the most wonderful bits of storytelling they’ve done all year. In hindsight, it makes all of their shots of disappointed crowd members prescient - which of course is why they did it at the time. They used the meta-narrative outside of the ring and turned it into fodder, and built it up to their biggest show of the year. Now it becomes a question of which type of ending they are going to go with as an “ending” to this particular run. There’s almost no chance they go with “Orton wins” at this point. But does the company do what’s best for the company and give Batista the title until, say a Summerslam loss, just after the Guardians of the Galaxy press is over, netting some free contractually obligated exposure as Big Dave drags the title around from show to show? Or does the company do what’s best for the company and finally give Bryan the belt proper, having the end of XXX be a huge, huge pop? Or do they cut both ways and have Bryan lose the belt within the next month or so to Batista? Hmm. Hmmmmmmmmm.

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That’s it for the one hundred and thirtieth instalment of Um, Actually. Check in every Monday and Thursday for a brand new column. If you have anything you’d like answered, hit up our contact page! If you submit anything via Twitter – to @blogaboutcomics, @Leask, or @soupytoasterson – remember to include the hashtag #UMACTUALLY so that we don’t lose it. Remember: you can ask us anything. Seriously, anything.