a) "The Great"
The "Catherine The Great" miniseries HBO had last year was soapy and tawdry, not a particularly dry historical epic, but "The Great" is nonetheless kind of an entertainingly silly funhouse mirror version of Catherine The Great's story. I wasn't sure if it was going to be just kind of playfully irreverent 2006 Marie Antoinette vibes or something, but it's really pretty funny and over-the-top. I always thought Nicholas Hoult was kind of a dull leading man type but he really gives an entertainingly ridiculous performance. My wife's a history buff and can point out all the random points where they departed from the facts that weren't even necessary to service the plot or a joke, which is odd, but obviously they're not going for historical accuracy.

b) "Betty"
This show about girl skateboarders on HBO kind of reminds me of "High Maintenance," aimless little NYC slice of life narratives, some of the characters are likable but there hasn't been enough humor and/or plot to hook me yet or leave much of an impression.

c) "Reckoning"
"Rectify" was the most dour show in TV history, one that I couldn't bring myself to continue watching no matter how well made or well acted it was. "Rectify" star Aden Young is in "Reckoning" and it's not quite so dour, or at least it's dour but also a bit pulpy and suspenseful. The most interesting thing to me about this show is that it's produced by an Australian network and completely filmed in the Sydney area, but the show takes place in California and all the characters are Americans. It feels just the tiniest bit off to watch, whether you know that or not, that it's not really America.

d) "Gold Digger"
Julia Ormond, who's still a babe like she was in the '90s, plays a wealthy woman who starts dating a much younger man in this BBC miniseries. The one episode I watched was pretty promising, just because every character's intentions are pretty ambiguous and I don't know if her son is going to be the villain that he seems to be or what.

e) "The Eddy"
"The Eddy" is a lot like "Treme" if it was set in France rather than by the French Quarter, a gritty and rambling story of contemporary jazz musicians scraping by. Damien Chazelle executive produced it and directed the first couple episodes, and he has a great eye for filming musicians at work, there are a couple moments where Andre Holland is an intensely demanding bandleader much like Simmons in Whiplash. But over the course of the 8 episodes of the miniseries, some of which feel like a whole movie unto itself, there are a lot of tangents and character studies about different members of the ensemble cast, some of which work better than others. The idea of these underdog musicians making uncompromising jazz kind of clashed with the dippy pop jazz songs that Glen "Jagged Little Pill" Ballard wrote for the show. And (spoiler alert), the show climaxes with a terrorist attack during a concert in Paris, which, I dunno, seemed in poor taste less than 5 years after the Bataclan attack.

f) "Valeria"
This show from Spain is about the love lives of a writer and her 3 friends and has perhaps inevitably been described as 'Sex And The City in Madrid.' I don't think "SATC" has aged very well but the writing on "Valeria" feels fresher and more contemporary so the comparison doesn't loom over the show too much for me. Diana Gomez and Silma Lopez are just gorgeous, the dialogue is sharp, the stories aren't too soapy, definitely one of Netflix's better recent imports.

g) "White Lines"
Another Netflix show from Spain, a murder mystery about a DJ who disappeared in Ibiza 20 years ago, kind of interesting to have a neo noir set against the backdrop of beautiful people partying to dance music on the beach.

h) "Into The Night"
This Belgian series has a cool concept about sunlight suddenly killing people and destroying the world, and a plane that has to keep flying east to stay in permanent night. It's not bad but I kinda wish it was one as a big budget movie, and some of the dialogue is a little cheesy, particularly at the end of the first episode.

i) "Harley Quinn"
I had heard good things about this when it debuted online last year but I wasn't gonna subscribe to DC Universe, so I'm glad SyFy has started broadcasting it. And man, it's really fucking funny, and makes great use of the whole ridiculous deep bench of Batman villains for the endless voice cast of notable comedians and comedy actors. I don't compare anything to "The Venture Bros." lightly because that's one of my favorite shows of the last two decades, but at its best "Harley Quinn" gets into "Venture" territory.

j) "Solar Opposites"
This show from "Rick And Morty" co-creator Justin Roiland is really just a lesser "Rick And Morty." I don't know if it's lesser because Dan Harmon isn't involved or if there's just diminishing returns to doing a whole new show and new set of characters where the stories and jokes are 99% the same stuff, like Seth MacFarlane doing all those different samey shows at once. It's not bad at all, but I think it'll take some time to grow on me. I'm amused that the show was originally developed for FOX before it ended up on Hulu, because they really haven't toned down the language or the gore much at all, I can't imagine how much they'd have had to bland down this show to get it on Sunday nights after "The Simpsons."

k) "Rick And Morty"
I might not be as harsh on "Solar Opposites" if it hadn't debuted right at the same time that "Rick And Morty" was back with some new episodes. But I've really enjoyed these last few, maybe more than the ones last year, particularly the vat of acid episode.

l) "Dead To Me"
The second season of "Dead To Me" seemed to lean into the show's soap opera qualities right off the bat, with a character who died in the first season seeming to return but wait! No! They have a twin brother that was never mentioned before! Christina Applegate and Linda Cardellini give such great performances in this show and there are so many great moments in the second season, but I also found myself dreading whatever plot twist they were working toward to set up the third season, and was relieved that it wasn't too over-the-top (if still a little ridiculous and coincidental).

m) "What We Do In The Shadows"
This show has just continued to be consistently great in the second season. I particularly like how the bit from the season 1 finale where Guillermo finds out he's a Van Helsing descendant who's destined to kill vampires has become a recurring plot thread. The Mark Hamill episode was excellent, and Kayvan Novak as Nandor might be line for line the funniest character on TV right now.

n) "Run"
I've never seen a show burn off its goodwill with viewers as quickly as "Run" did, from the excitement around episode 1 to the widespread disappointment with episode 7. I didn't hate the finale like a lot of people did, but it definitely left me wanting. Like, when the last shot faded to black, I couldn't believe there wasn't going to be some kind of epilogue and the credits started to roll. Some finales go over-the-top with a big speech or action sequence or plot twist but this is the first time I've felt like something like that was coming and there was just...nothing. It was almost like they were trying so hard to set up a second season that they left nobody wanting it. I still really liked the majority of the show, though, Merrit Wever was great as usual, and I enjoyed Archie Panjabi, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, and Tamara Podemski's characters so much that I wish they were in more than 2-3 episodes apiece. It just felt like the show was full of good ideas and performances but it wasn't assembled satisfyingly.

o) "Killing Eve"
"Killing Eve" has kind of settled into familiar rhythms in its third season, perhaps the most novel thing they've done this year is have a confrontation between Eve and Villanelle in the middle of the season instead of keeping them apart until the finale. But I feel like the over-the-top Villanelle stuff, as entertaining as it is, has kind of taken over the show a little too much, would like to see the show center a little more on Eve again.

p) "Homecoming"
The first season of "Homecoming" was one of my favorite things on TV in the last couple years, and I was intrigued by the idea that they'd do a 2nd season without Julia Roberts, and with more focus on Hong Chau's character. But lately so many shows have disappointed me by becoming an anthology in the second season or pivoting to a new story or protagonist that I was a little worried that they'd just abandon the original storyline when there was still more to explore. So I'm pretty pleased that "Homecoming" picked right back up on the original story, focusing on Janelle Monae's new character and kind of working backwards to show how she fit in with everything and returning to Stephan James's character. Not quite as gripping as the first season (the new director follow's Sam Esmail's template but isn't as creative with framing and camera movement), but Chris Cooper and Joan Cusack were great additions to the cast and I love the way the story ended.

q) "Vida"
The third and final season of "Vida" has been good so far, I like how much the show has evolved and changed since the beginning. It kinda felt like you met these characters in a time of upheaval and crisis but now you're seeing them find their way and you've gone on the journey with them, it's actually oddly rare how often a TV series really gives you that feeling.

r) "The Last O.G."
This show has never really lived up to its promise, and it's still weird to me that Tiffany Haddish is just there basically playing the straight man while she's the comic relief in several movies a year. But the bits with Tray giving walking tours of Brooklyn with these funny 'hood legend' anecdotes are great, some of the best stuff the show has done to date.

s) "Workin' Moms"
Still a really consistently entertaining show in its 4th season, I don't know how much people are watching it but I really recommend it. The stuff with Jenny and the dad the playground has been hilarious, and the storyline with Anne and her daughter has gone to some interesting places that TV rarely goes about raising a teenager. 

t) "Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: Kimmy Vs. The Reverend"
I'm so glad they brought back "Kimmy Schmidt" for an interactive special in the style of "Black Mirror: Bandersnatch." I think this format is actually kind of better suited to comedy than mystery/sci-fi. The writers really seemed to delight in being able to just come up with ridiculous options and a new set of jokes for every path you could go down. The only thing I didn't like is that after we'd played the game like 2 hours, it got to an ending where we'd chosen the 'wrong' answer and it kicked us all the way back to the beginning, and tried to make us watch a lot of the same scenes all over again, which was annoying.

u) "Asian Americans"
Have only watched the first couple hours of this PBS docuseries so far, but it's pretty interesting. It's kind of crazy to think that the subject matter is migration between two of the most populous continents on Earth, like it's a really huge story with millions of participants, but they're threading the needle and putting the narrative together well.

v) "Celebrity IOU"
I don't like that this show is hosted by the Property Brothers, who in my mind are named Steve Property and Roger Property. But it's a pretty charming little show where you see celebrities do little renovation projects to surprise people they know, like Brad Pitt doing something the woman who's been his makeup artist for over 30 years, it's pretty wholesome.

w) "Alaskan Animal Rescue"
I'm just so fascinated by Alaska and may never get to see it in person so I will always check out shows like this and "Alaska PD" where you get a little slice of life in Alaska.

x) "Jungle Animal Rescue"
This is another NatGeo show that premiered around the same time as "Alaskan Animal Rescue," same basic idea in a different location, a little less inherently interesting to me but I have a lot of respect for people who work with animals, cool to see how they do it.

y) "Chico Bon Bon: Monkey With A Tool Belt"
A cute little new Netflix show that my kid is enjoying. I like the animation style, I also like saying "monkey with a tool belt" to the toon of "Girlfriend In A Coma."

z) "Mira, Royal Detective"
A charming recent show on Disney Junior about a little girl in India (or an India-like fantasy land I guess?) who solves mysteries, I wish my kid watched this show more than once.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 27, 2020 at 12:13 PM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.