From what I know about Joseph Campbell, he probably deserves less respect as a serious intellectual than John W. Campbell.
There is no direct Co$ connection with John W. Campbell. He was involved in Dianetics, but Dianetics exited before the Church of Scientology, and whatever Campbells (many) ideological and moral faults, he always saw through the Co$ and had nothing to do with it. Also, Hubbard lost the rights to Dianetics early on and then got them back later, so originally Dianetics wasn’t part of Scientology.

The extent of Campbell’s roll in developing Dianetics wasn’t know until this book came out:

https://www.amazon.com/Astounding-Campbell-Heinlein-Hubbard-Science/dp/006257194X

It’s a great book.

The extent to which all the psi-power stuff that’s all over science fiction from all the classic and contemporary literature to Star Wars and Star Trek, grows from the same Campbellian stalk as Dianetics, and that’s all pretty direct, demonstrable, and well documented.

Do I have to watch Covenant before Romulus?

the only special features on the DVD are a 20 minute interview with Peckinpah’s sister and some trailers.

The interview is with his sister. The DVD has a great commentary though.

I meant to say more about Ride the High Country, but I was in a hurry. There is some great mis en scene, in the beginning but especially the whole sequence in the mining camp, which is probably the best of a number of grim inversions of John Ford tropes that turn up in Peckinpah movies. Those two setpieces are also the things that most distinguish it from the Budd Boetticher/Randolph Scott cycle that it concluded.
I wouldn’t say that the movie “mostly about them having to help out poor young Mariette Hartley?” I’d have said that it’s about two characters with different visions of how their (deliberately kinda lame) quest is going to redeem their lives.
I’ll also stick up for the final gunfight. It’s certainly not The Wild Bunch, but would that even be appropriate here? I like that it actually looks like a real gunfight, instead of a “quickdraw duel” which is a Hollywood fantasy (not that I mind those either).
I did love the movie the first time I saw it, but there’s more I appreciate now that I’m more familiar with it in context. It’s arguably the last great Western I can think of that comfortably belongs to the genre’s golden age, aside from maybe a couple of John Wayne movies (which might fail to fit that description for different reasons, depending on the movie). Its place at the end of the actors careers also makes it more resonant for genre fans.

As to whether many people saw it, I’d point out that those kinds of movies were always part of double bills. It wasn’t a big release but it was always celebrated by auteurist critics and genre buffs. It’s comparable to alot of classic noirs. It’s less famous now because Westerns are a less fashionable genre.

But hey, most talked about doesn’t mean best, eh.

Yes, I agree that Straw Dogs gets some attention it doesn’t, but I have a hard time imagining a serious defense of that as a better movie. I think it’s pretty rare to see a discussion of Peckinpah’s filmography by someone who actually watched all his major movies that doesn’t rate Ride the High Country as one of the better films. I always assumed that more people watch Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid because it has a famous soundtrack. It’s certainly less accessible.

If I listened to that Black Sabbath album it was only once or twice. I’ve steered clear of some of those reunion albums by my favorite aging hard rock bands because I expected them to be depressing.

Black Cherry is gross, but that reconstruction sounds more like ’70s Aerosmith than almost anything on Get A Grip. I do think the first few songs on Get a Grip are passable rockers. But even if you don’t listen to the band for the lyrics, I think Eat the Rich is embarrassing. Without looking closer or reading an explanation I probably would have just thought Black Cherry was about boning a black girl.