a) "Avenue 5"
I more or less assumed Armando Iannucci would continue to make shows in the vein of "Veep" and "The Thick Of It," and I can't say that "Avenue 5" isn't that at all. But setting the story in the future on a spaceship with fairly high production values is a big enough cosmetic change of pace that the familiar Iannucci themes of hapless leaders profanely squabbling behind closed doors and trying to avoid disaster at least have a new coat of paint. Zach Woods as always steals every scene he's in, and I'm amused by the meta aspect of Hugh Laurie as an American spaceship captain who's actually a British actor pretending to be a real captain who lets his accent slip when he's stressed out.

b) "The Outsider"
One of my favorite miniseries of the last few years that I really wished had become an ongoing series was "The Night Of," so "The Outsider" kind of scratches that itch by being another Richard Price murder mystery co-starring Bill Camp while also being a Stephen King adaptation with a whole eerie supernatural element to the story that is still slowly unfolding. And having Price's hard-boiled crime fiction treatment of a King story kind of grounds it in a way it might not otherwise feel like it's happening in the world we live in. As someone who's kind of been a skeptic of Jason Bateman doing dark dramatic stuff like "Ozark," he was the right person for this really ambiguous role and I was impressed by his direction of the first 2 episodes. I've loved Julianne Nicholson in everything I've seen her in so I appreciate the meaty role she's got in this, I'm really rooting for her to get major recognition and awards in the next few years. I'm more on the fence about Cynthia Erivo's very over-the-top quirky character, don't know where they're going with her.

c) "Sanditon"
I've always had a soft spot for Jane Austen and took an Austen class in college and thought I'd read all her novels, but I didn't realize there was an unfinished book she was working on when she died, which had been published in various forms with other writers trying to finish the story in her voice. So this TV adaptation continues in that spirit, using what Austen wrote as source material for the first episode, and then continuing the story from there. And it's pretty excellent so far, great production values and engaging cast, enough familiar Austen tropes and themes but the seaside resort town setting is kind of novel and distinct.

d) "Medical Police"
"Childrens Hospital" ended a long 7-season run on a few years ago, and now Netflix has an equally silly spinoff where Erinn Hayes and Rob Huebel's characters become government spies trying to stop a virus outbreak. It's pretty entertaining, although I kinda wish they'd stuck with Adult Swim-style 11-minute episodes instead of the more traditional half hour.

e) "The Stranger"
This British mystery series debuted on Netflix on Friday, and I was very amused to watch the first episode and note the subplot where an alpaca farmer named her animals after all the members of One Direction and Take That, and the Louis alpaca wound up decapitated (Louis Tomlinson's debut solo album was also released on Friday). The premise of the show, where this mysterious stranger shows up one day and tells a guy a crazy secret about his family and his whole life unravels as he tries to find out if it's true and who the stranger is, is pretty intriguing, I really have no idea where this story is gonna wind up.

f) "Messiah"
I like Michelle Monaghan and think she doesn't get enough roles that show what she's capable of. I was frustrated when she spent 3 seasons on Hulu's "The Path," a somber and somewhat dull show about a cult. But now that that's over, she's jumped to Netflix's "Messiah," another extremely serious and kind of boring show about religion. Someone get her a gig where she gets to show the personality and comic timing she had in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, please.

g) "Party Of Five"
I never watched "Party Of Five" much in the '90s, but I thought it was interesting that the new version of the show, which flips the premise where a family's parents are arrested by ICE and deported rather than dying, actually came from the same creators as the original show. I mean, it's certainly a timely concept, although I can't help but feel like it's kind of a different show simply because the kids can still Facetime with their parents and argue with them.

h) "Everything's Gonna Be Okay"
I'm not sure how deliberate it was that Freeform debuted this show, which is about a twentysomething raising his younger siblings after the deaths of their parents in a story that can't help but recall "Party Of Five," a week after their new version of "Party Of Five." But that's not really a good lens to look through too much, since they're very different shows, and I much prefer "Everything's Gonna Be Okay," which is much more a comedy from Australian creator/star Josh Thomas, whose previous show "Please Like Me" seemed to be pretty well regarded. The father who dies in the first episode was a really genuinely likable, fully realized character which made the loss really feel tragic, and I'm also really impressed by Kayla Cromer, a young actress on the autism spectrum whose character, Matilda, is also on the spectrum, just a really winning and nuanced performance.

i) "Dracula"
This is from the same creators as "Sherlock," so it continues that series' very annoying habit of a season being divided into three 90-minute episodes. British TV is just insane, c'mon, those are feature films. This isn't nearly as good as "Sherlock," which I have mixed feelings about anyway, but there are things I enjoyed, particularly when a nun argued with Dracula about the silliness of his inability to

j) "Endlings"
I feel like shows that are 'for the whole family' sometimes end up not really appealing to kids or adults, this Canadian sci-fi show is kind of cutesy and centered on young characters, but I don't think my kids would like it at all, and I find it pretty bland and boring. Some of the alien creature design is kind of cool and novel, though.

k) "The Healing Powers Of Dude"
A cute little Netflix show about a kid who takes his emotional support dog to school. I'm perturbed by Tom Everett Scott playing the generic dad/husband since he's still the generic dad/husband on a much better show that I hope isn't going anywhere, "I'm Sorry," but this show does amusingly sort of reunite him with his That Thing You Do! co-star Steve Zahn (who voices Dude the dog).

l) "Dare Me"
After "Euphoria," I find something kind of refreshing about edgy teen shows that don't feel like they're trying quite so hard to be edgy. It's good to see Herizen Guardiola land a lead role after being a breakout star on "The Get Down," and the show is entertainingly tense and soapy and at times gets pretty real.

m) "Cheer"
I feel kind of bad for "Dare Me," a decent drama about cheerleaders, because it seems to have gotten a fraction of the attention that "Cheer," a Netflix docuseries about cheerleaders has gotten. People really seem to be obsessed with this show, I kinda don't get it, I guess it's alright though.

n) "Night On Earth"
There have been so many good nature docuseries in recent years but not a lot of novelty or technical innovation in the genre, so I'm really enjoying this Netflix series filmed entirely at night with really impressive cameras that don't make everything look like infrared night vision goggles. There's still kind of an eerie 'off' quality to the colors and lights sometimes but I feel like that adds to the ambience of the show, and they've gotten some amazing footage.

o) "Pandemic: How To Prevent An Outbreak"
A Netflix docuseries that kind of happened to come out at a timely moment with all the Coronavirus news. One thing that I like about this show is that it's much more about putting a human face on the people working in this field, their day-to-day experiences in researching and dealing with viral outbreaks in their own words, my wife does work in this area so I'm interested in that angle being taken.

p) "The Circle"
A deeply weird, sort of diabolical Netflix reality show competition where people live in an apartment building but never meet while interacting on a closed circuit social media network and trying to manipulate and catfish each other into winning popularity contests for a cash prize. I kind of admire the evil genius that it took to create this show but I don't actually enjoy watching it.

q) "Alaska PD"
Maybe it's because it's on A&E, the same network where I used to watch hours of "Northern Exposure" reruns, but I was vaguely hoping "Alaska PD" would have gently quirky slice of life scenes where a moose blocks the road, but apparently they're dealing with a real crime wave up in Alaska these days, shit is no joke.

r) "Sex, Explained"
It's kind of funny to hear Janelle Monae narrate a docuseries about sex with the same blank affected voice she uses for album interludes about androids and stuff. This show is pretty well done, though, I would actually consider showing this to my kids when they hit puberty to answer some of their questions.

s) "Kipo And The Age Of Wonderbeasts"
I'm really enjoying this Netflix cartoon about a dystopia 200 years in the future where humans live underground and some kids go up to the surface and meet all the talking mutant animals that live there, the premise is kind of dark but it's really charming and the neon anime aesthetic looks pretty cool.

t) "Go! Go! Cory Carson"
A very cutesy little Netflix cartoon about talking cars, my 4-year-old likes it but unfortunately not as much as he likes the far more annoying "Blaze and the Monster Machines"

u) "Evil"
CBS's was my favorite new fall show of 2019, and last week's finale was great and set things up interestingly for the second season. After several episodes of toying with whether the possessions and miracles in the show were real or illusions with rational explanations, they've pushed further out into wilder and wilder storylines while still having these realistic, funny, observational vignettes about modern media and the legal system, such a unique balancing act this show pulls off. 

v) "Shrill"
The first season of "Shrill" ended last year with such a eye-rolling wish fulfillment storyline where the protagonist tracked down her comments section troll and he went "I just hate myself and you're such a good writer" and hit on her (I vaguely remember the creator of the show, Lindy West, feuding on Twitter a lot, then deleting her account and writing about leavng Twitter). But the second season is a little bitter, I feel like the show has kinda found its footing, and also gave more screentime to the funniest character, Ruthie (played by Patti Harrison). Julia Sweeney is on the show less now, but I feel like her time is better spent on "Work In Progress" anyway. Watching woman-centered shows like this and "Girls" and "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel," I keep seeing shows open with these male love interests start out totally unlikable, continue to be really shitty, and the lead characters keep them around and it just gets so exasperating, I guess that's realistic and fuels drama but I'd love if Annie broke up with Ryan on this show and you never saw him again, he's just terrible.

w) "Sex Education"
The 2nd season opened with a masturbation montage set to a choral Divinyls cover, I dunno if I'm gonna stick it out with this ridiculous show. The cast is charming but it's just kind of silly, and often not enough Gillian Anderson.

x) "Diablero"
Of all the dozens of foreign language shows I've watched on Netflix with dubbed dialogue or subtitles in the last few years, the Mexican series "Diablero" is by far my favorite, so I'm really glad it's back for a second season. The balance of dark, surreal storylines and dry humor is pulled off really well, would recommend it to fans of "Preacher" or "The Magicians," even the special effects have a pretty cool look to them for not being super high budget.

y) "The Good Place"
Because "The Good Place" exists in a world where the characters can shake the etch-a-sketch and start over again and again, it kinda feels like the show is an open writer's room where you get to see the architects of the afterlife keep trying new scenarios and then hit the reset button. So the final season has kind of felt like they decided to do every finale the writers proposed in a different episode, and then they'd reset and try something else the next week, which can be a little exhausting. But I thought they pretty much stuck the landing with that last episode, it leaned a bit more on emotion than comedy at times but it felt earned.

z) "Grace And Frankie"
Now that we know "Grace And Frankie" is ending after the 7th season, it feels like the 6th season is traversing a predictable arc of the title characters being driven apart a little bit by Grace's marriage to Nick, so that they'll kind of return to the way things were by the end of the series. Or maybe not, I dunno, but I'm glad the show is still going strong after this long, I really just enjoy spending time with these characters and listening to them argue.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 03, 2020 at 12:37 PM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.