TV Diary
Monday, October 30, 2017
a) "Mindhunter"
David Fincher produced, and directed 4 of 10 episodes, of this Netflix series, and between Seven and Zodiac, probably nobody is better qualified to bring us a largely fact-based story of the FBI agents who interviewed serial killers to develop a psychological profile for them. Sometimes the show can be a little on the nose, particularly with musical choices (one episode ended with "Psycho Killer" and another ended with "I Don't Like Mondays"), and I thought the way the last episode concluded was a little heavy handed, but otherwise I really just loved everything about it. Holt McCallany, who was great in FX's otherwise bland boxing drama "Lights," gets a lot to chew on here, and is a perfect foil for Jonathan Groff, who I can never forget voiced Kristoff in Frozen even when he's talking to serial killers. Cameron Britton as Edmund Kemper is one of the year's best performances, and I have to admit even Anna Torv is good, though I still give her the side eye for being a member of the Murdoch family who launched her TV career with a FOX show.
b) "Ghosted"
Adam Scott and Craig Robinson reteaming for more sci-fi comedy doesn't necessarily seem like the most promising idea after Hot Tub Time Machine 2, but this show is pretty entertaining. It kind of started off like "People of Earth" with an alien conspiracy guy being vindicated with proof that aliens are real, but then it just kind of turns into a loony version of "X-Files." I feel like the quality of the show is really scattershot, but I loved the most recent episode with the office on lockdown, and I feel like Ally Walker's deadpan boss is kind of the cast's secret weapon.
c) "The Halcyon"
I feel like I've tried out so many British period shows in the last couple years and this World War II era ensemble drama is the first one that's really hooked me and feels like something I could stick with, just a really good cast and a lot of entertaining little character moments that flesh out the historical context of the show.
d) "Kevin (Probably) Saves The World"
The 'heartwarming supernatural dramedy' is a weird genre of TV, I don't really know who was looking to make the next "Early Edition" when they made this. But it's such an odd hodgepodge of broad comedy and maudlin melodrama, even the charming moments feel a little forced.
e) "White Famous"
I remember one time a few years ago I spent a few minutes backstage with Jay Pharoah because I was teleprompting a corporate event where he was hosting and doing a bit in character as Obama, and he seemed like a pretty sharp dude who probably had it in him to do something more than the smattering of celebrity impressions he was consigned to on "SNL." And this show really feels like that vehicle for him. Doing a satire of Hollywood that is basically a black comic meeting clueless and/or racist white executives and directors over and over feels a little fish in a barrel, but there have been some funny moments, it has potential.
f) "Dynasty"
When I was a kid I'd always get "Dallas" and "Dynasty" confused, and when this new "Dynasty" series was announced I was like "didn't that already happen?" because of the "Dallas" series that ran from 2012 to 2014. Elizabeth Gillies was the best thing about "Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll," so I'm disappointed that she's rebounded into an even worse show.
g) "At Home With Amy Sedaris"
I always felt kind of alone in not liking "Strangers With Candy" and thinking that Amy Sedaris's performance in that show was like nails on chalkboard. Otherwise I generally like her, though, and this show is a really good fit for her, just kind of letting her loose on a cooking show format to do whatever odd little subversive curveballs she feels like throwing.
h) "Snoop Dogg presents The Joker's Wild"
I never saw the original "The Joker's Wild" game show but apparently Snoop was a fan of it growing up and wanted to reboot it. As far as his weird little pop culture side projects, this is pretty fun, I'd much rather watch it than his show with Martha Stewart or whatever. I feel like there's so many silly little gags packed into this show, it reminds me of "Win Ben Stein's Money" in that it's as goofy as possible while still a functional game show.
i) "The Jellies"
I like Tyler, The Creator's sense of humor even less than I like his music, but his new Adult Swim cartoon is actually worse than I expected, in the 2nd episode the main character has a sex change operation that is framed as a "Pimp My Ride" parody and then, uh, gets pregnant.
j) "Superstition"
SyFy has been on a really good run of original series lately, but this is just one of the worst pilots I've seen in recent memory. The acting was just appalling, every line reading was flat and stilted, I'd compare it to SyFy's original movies but those are at least campy and silly, this was just kind of solemnly incompetent.
k) "Lore"
This show is based on a podcast and it's narrated by the host of the podcast, who has one of those really bland monotone podcast voices, which is a shame, because the subject matter is interesting, they probably could've made it work without narration but as is I just can't stand it.
l) "I Love You, America"
My favorite thing about this show is that when it was announced, Vanity Fair oh so gently destroyed Chelsea Handler with the headline "Can Sarah Silverman Launch The First Successful Streaming Talk Show"? Silverman and Handler are basically trying to solve the same problem of how to do a chill topical weekly comedy show about Trump's America with a less strident tone than, say, Samantha Bee. I've always thought that Silverman kind of started with a unique comedic voice but it calcified into this winking 'ain't I a stinker' delivery that she can't stop doing constantly, and it doesn't really wear well on the earnest "coastal showbiz professional tries to understand flyover country" angle of this show, even if some of the interviews have had thought-provoking moments. But I love Mather Zickel as the 'comforting white man at a desk' they occasionally cut to to lighten things up.
m) "The Rundown with Robin Thede"
The same day Silverman's show debuted, she got some help from BET in raising the paltry number of talk shows hosted by women. Robin Thede was the headwriter and a frequent panelist on "The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore," a show I have dearly missed in the year since its cancellation, so I like that she's brought a little of that show's sensibility back to late night. I have mixed feelings about her as a host, though, I feel like she oversells a lot of jokes.
n) "Valor"
I liked Christina Ochoa on SyFy's recent horror comedy series "Blood Drive," it's a shame that show got cancelled and she wound up on this CW show about Army pilots, which is not as bland as NBC's "The Brave" or CBS's "SEAL Team" but still feels like part of this big boring chunk of new military dramas.
o) "Suburra: Blood On Rome"
Italian-American crime families take up such a large space in pop culture that it's interesting that we so rarely see the Italian crime families they're descended from outside of, like, The Godfather Part II. So this show is refreshing in that respect, although as usual I don't think I have the patience to watch an ongoing series with subtitles.
p) "The Mayor"
This show about a rapper running for mayor of a California town as a publicity stunt and unexpectedly winning feels like a preemptive satire of Chance The Rapper's possible future political aspirations. But for every timely joke there's something that feels really hokey and stereotype-driven. The dynamic between Brandon Micheal Hall and Lea Michele is the funniest part of the show but I don't think the show has figured that out yet.
q) "9JKL"
I think of myself as pretty old fashioned in my affection for traditional sitcoms, but then CBS keeps putting this incredibly hacky laugh track shows and I'm like uh maybe not. I feel bad for everyone involved in this, but especially Elliott Gould.
r) "Tin Star"
I feel like Amazon's original programming is kind of the retirement home for a lot of prestige TV tropes that other networks have moved on from, and "Tin Star" feels like a lot of those tropes wrapped up in one show. Tim Roth is the antihero cop who moves to a small town to try, in vain, to save his family from consequences of his violent double life, and his double life is so literal that he has an alter ego who sometimes talks to him in the mirror, it's all really dark and gritty and kind of stupid.
s) "Wanted"
An Australian series that U.S. Netflix just picked up about two women who kind of fall into a violent criminal underworld when they get abducted together. The first episode seems pretty promising but again, it features so many familiar cable drama tropes that it feels a little redundant.
t) "The Deuce"
I love the rhythm of this show and how David Simon basically gives you this granular view of sex work and pornography much as "The Wire" did for the war on drugs. But I really never get used to James Franco with a hat arguing with James Franco without a hat, it's just too annoying. And them hanging around Chris Bauer just makes it feel like Franco is playing both Nick and Ziggy Sobotka, which made me disappointed that neither character had a violent downfall at the end of the season. A lot of the minor characters really make the show worth it as an ensemble show, though.
u) "Better Things"
Sam's British mom was one of the oddest touches on this show that didn't really work for me in the first season, but the recent episode that was kind of partly from her perspective was pretty great.
v) "Vice Principals"
The description of the upcoming series finale of this show implies that the school itself will be closed or possibly destroyed, which feels a bit extreme even for "Vice Principals," but I suppose they've escalated the premise so much at this point that that's the only place it can go. But the show hasn't improved that much since it moved from the discomforting "white guys try to destroy a black woman's life" plot.
w) "Stranger Things"
I tried a couple episodes of the new season but I still don't totally understand how it became such a big phenomenon, there's something really blank and charmless to me about pretty much all the characters. And it feels like they're really doubling down on the "story about characters who are obsessed with the same '80s pop culture that they're living in a pastiche of" concept.
x) "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend"
The first two seasons of "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend" were some pretty special television, partly because they were willing to keep moving the story forward and letting each season have pretty different personal dynamics between the characters. But that means they've once again thrown everything into emotional disarray for a darker storyline before, which feels a little weird, but it kind of makes for a nice contrast with the show's default silly musical format. "I Go To The Zoo" from last week's episode belongs on the short list of the show's funniest songs.
y) "Broad City"
I guess season 4 is about the point where a show that seemed ahead of the curve can start to feel like a relic, but mostly I think the problem is this show really just doesn't make me laugh nearly as much as it used to. Peri Gilpin as Abbi's mom was as good a casting choice as Susie Essman was as Ilana's mom, though.
z) "The Mindy Project"
As this show's 6th and final season approaches its conclusion and its weird amorphous rotating cast of supporting characters still refuses to cohere, I think Ike Barinholtz deserves some credit as the glue of the show. It's cool that he's directed quite a few episodes of the show, too, I feel like he may have the most promising future after the show other than Mindy Kaling.
