Category: Reviews of Television Shows
American college football coach Ted Lasso heads to London to manage AFC Richmond, a struggling English Premier League football team. This is the third and final season and honestly I’m not sure if my heart would have been able to handle any more than the 12 episodes we got. The series already had a reputation for being emotionally raw and they went all in for the ending of the show with topics ranging from anxiety to depression to thruples to racist fans to bigots on and off the field to just being plain old homesick and needing a change of...
A look at the formative years of superstar Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson as he grows up through life. This was ultimately the final season of the show, but what a great season it was. The story set in the future was pretty mediocre, but the stuff in the past was fantastic. I’ll always be grateful to the show for introducing me to both Stacey Leilua and Joseph Lee Anderson who played The Rock’s parents. Buy On Amazon!
Follows a motor-mouthed outsider offered a chance at a better life, but only if he can successfully deliver a mysterious package across a post-apocalyptic wasteland. While it’s much better than it has any right to be, it’s still a streaming only series based on a series of games that had a plot of “cars with guns shoot at each other in an arena”, so any amount of plot in the TV show is going to outshine the barebones premise of the classic games, of which I remember more for their ads than the gameplay. I honestly don’t even know if...
Men and women live in a giant silo underground with several regulations which they believe are in place to protect them from the toxic and ruined world on the surface. Based on a book series of the same name, the basic premise of a group of people living underground being lied to by the people in power is familiar enough (City of Ember, Logan’s Run) that the only real question I have is what will they find when they eventually get out of the vault? In this case it wasn’t something that I really expected but fell in line with...
After her husband leaves her, young mother of two Miriam “Midge” Maisel discovers that she has a talent for stand-up comedy. Could this be her calling? I think this series could have gone for another 5 years and still be one of the best comedies on television, but it’s nice to see them go out on an exceptionally high note. This final season wrapped up a bucket load of emotional loose ends and opened up another bucket load worth, but we had 5 good seasons that all stand on their own and make for an enjoyable and eminently watchable series....
Fury and Talos try to stop the Skrulls who have infiltrated the highest spheres of the Marvel Universe. “A six hour mini series that should have been a two hour movie” is how I’m seeing it described on the blogosphere and I agree, there’s way too much padding, too little story, and some of the action beats just didn’t make sense to me. There’s also some really open questions about who was a skrull and when they were switched out, questions that were not answered by the end of the series and will likely never be touched on by the...
Doctors and nurses at the intensive care unit of a New Orleans hospital struggle with treating patients during Hurricane Katrina when the facility is without power for 5 days. This is a series that spends 5 episodes outlining how absolutely terrible and dire the situation was at a hospital with no power, no food, no water, no real security, and no plan to get patients out locally and no real support from their corporate offices, then turns around and spends another 3 episodes vilifying a single doctor for the decisions that she may or may not have made during the...
Arnold: With Arnold Schwarzenegger, James Cameron, Linda Hamilton, Danny DeVito. Follows the life of Arnold Schwarzenegger, from his days of lifting weights to his successes in Hollywood, his time serving as governor of California, and both the joys and volatility of his family life. Told in three parts, this is a glowing documentary mini series about the trials and triumphs of Arnold Schwarzenegger, as told by Arnold Schwarzenegger, with interviews of people that were close to him during his life. It doesn’t necessarily shy away from the negatives, but they’re clearly stated, not lingered on, then moved on from. All...
Star Trek: Short Treks: Created by Alex Kurtzman, Bryan Fuller, Michael Chabon, Kirsten Beyer, Akiva Goldsman. With Anson Mount, Rebecca Romijn, Ethan Peck, Jenette Goldstein. A series of stand-alone short films featuring characters and storylines from Star Trek: Discovery (2017). I had completely forgotten about these but saw them for $20 on Amazon and boy I’m happy I grabbed them. The shorts themselves are all pretty ok, ranging from pretty silly to pretty good, but what really makes them worth my time are the behind the scenes and interviews that go along with nearly all of them. Buy On Amazon!
Titans: Created by Greg Berlanti, Akiva Goldsman, Geoff Johns. With Brenton Thwaites, Anna Diop, Ryan Potter, Teagan Croft. Dick and Rachel, a girl possessed by a strange darkness, get embroiled in a conspiracy that could bring Hell on Earth. Joining them along the way are the hot-headed Starfire and lovable Beast Boy. Together they become a team of heroes. A good ending for an ok series that never really hit the highs that I had hoped for, but never hit the lows that many other comic shows have fallen to recently. I was particularly impressed with the end of the...
Star Trek: Prodigy: Created by Dan Hageman, Kevin Hageman. With Rylee Alazraqui, Dee Bradley Baker, Brett Gray, Angus Imrie. A group of enslaved teenagers steal a derelict Starfleet vessel to escape and explore the galaxy. It’s only the first 10 episodes, but what a great set of episodes they are! There’s a ton of really weird stuff going on in the real world about the show’s future, but for my money this is some of the best Trek out there. Buy On Amazon!
Barry: Created by Alec Berg, Bill Hader. With Bill Hader, Stephen Root, Sarah Goldberg, Anthony Carrigan. A hit man from the Midwest moves to Los Angeles and gets caught up in the city’s theatre arts scene. This final season was good, but completely unfulfilling for me. Bill Hader took the middling concept of a ex military guy struggling to adapt to civilian life and choosing violence into realms that I don’t think that particular genre has gone before. I didn’t really care for where they ended up, but it was one hell of a journey to get there. Buy On...
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds: Created by Akiva Goldsman, Alex Kurtzman, Jenny Lumet. With Melissa Navia, Christina Chong, Anson Mount, Ethan Peck. A prequel to Star Trek: The Original Series, the show follows the crew of the USS Enterprise under Captain Christopher Pike. With season 2 starting up in just a few days, I figured I’d go back through season 1 to remind myself how utterly amazing it ended up being and how big my expectations are for the future of this franchise. It’s a short season with only 10 episodes and there isn’t a single stinker in the whole...
Star Wars: Visions: With Michael Sinterniklaas, Neil Kaplan, Adam Sietz, JP Karliak. Star Wars anthology series that will see some of the world’s best anime creators bring their talent to this beloved universe. > Sith – A former Sith apprentice, leading a peaceful, but isolated life, is confronted by the past when her old master tracks her down. This one has some really trippy visuals and a great story > Screecher’s Reach – A young girl, seeking reprieve from her days in a rural workhouse, discovers a legendary haunted cave with her friends. The cave’s dark pull will change the...
The Mandalorian: Created by Jon Favreau. With Pedro Pascal, Chris Bartlett, Katee Sackhoff, Carl Weathers. The travels of a lone bounty hunter in the outer reaches of the galaxy, far from the authority of the New Republic. The strongest season of one of the strongest science fiction series currently on tv. I loved nearly every moment of season three and really look forward to what season 4 brings. Of course, there’s going to be like two other series between now and then, so I’m looking forward to that too. Buy On Amazon!
Star Trek: Picard: Created by Kirsten Beyer, Michael Chabon, Akiva Goldsman, Alex Kurtzman. With Patrick Stewart, Michelle Hurd, Jeri Ryan, Alison Pill. Follow-up series to Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987) and Star Trek: Nemesis (2002) that centers on Jean-Luc Picard in the next chapter of his life. Season three has come and gone and while it was 100% fan service with a heaping helping of nostalgia, it worked for me in most regards. I still have some issues with the naming of the final ship seen, and it felt silly to have that “old friend” show up in the...
Primal: Created by Genndy Tartakovsky. With Aaron LaPlante, Laëtitia Eïdo, Fred Tatasciore, Imari Williams. A caveman and a dinosaur bond over shared tragedy and work together to survive in a perilous prehistoric world. I somehow never reviewed this show, and now that it’s over I fully regret not mentioning every season. It’s a show about a guy that loses everything, who then finds a companion to keep him company, a companion that had a similar loss and is a lot more bitey about the situation. I say it’s over, and maybe the main storyline is, but from what I’m hearing...
Tulsa King: Created by Taylor Sheridan. With Sylvester Stallone, Andrea Savage, Martin Starr, Jay Will. Following his release from prison, Mafia capo Dwight “The General” Manfredi is exiled to Tulsa, Oklahoma, where he builds a new criminal empire with a group of unlikely characters. All the big movie stars are moving from the silver screen to the boob tube and Sly’s move has been one of the better ones. It’s essentially a wise guy fish out of water type of story, just that this wise guy isn’t really all that fishy at all and is actually pretty smart about the...
Marvel’s Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur: Created by Jeffrey M. Howard, Kate Kondell, Steve Loter. With Diamond White, Fred Tatasciore, Alfre Woodard, Libe Barer. After 13-year-old super-genius Lunella accidentally brings ten-ton T-Rex, Devil Dinosaur into present-day New York City via a time vortex, the duo works together to protect the city’s Lower East Side from danger. With animation that seems to be inspired by the Spider-verse and character designs that resemble Brats dolls, I was both interested and leery of this cartoon series, though it turns out that it’s a perfectly fine series that I’m not really in the target...
The Ark: Created by Dean Devlin. With Christie Burke, Reece Ritchie, Richard Fleeshman, Stacey Read. Follows the remaining crew of a spacecraft known as Ark One, who must become the best versions of themselves to stay on course and survive after experiencing a catastrophic event that caused massive destruction and loss of life. This feels equal parts “Origin” and “Ascension” but never really gets it’s feet under it, at least not in the first couple episodes I watched. There’s a paradox in the series with some heavy science fiction, which I appreciate, but then a complete lack of respect for...
Glimpse: Directed by Michael Robison. With Colin Ferguson, Salli Richardson-Whitfield, Joe Morton, Erica Cerra. Carter and Jo try out Zane’s new high-powered risk assessment system, but find that even it may not be a match for the dangerous level of competition among Eureka’s scientists. I bought the entire blue ray set of the show “Eureka” just to have the one episode that Stan Lee guest starred it. I had watched the entire thing back when it was originally airing and really enjoyed it, so it was nice to revisit the series and remember how good it was. The show follows...
Lexx: Created by Jeffrey Hirschfield, Paul Donovan, Lex Gigeroff. With Brian Downey, Michael McManus, Jeffrey Hirschfield, Xenia Seeberg. A group of disparate fugitives from an interplanetary tyranny find themselves in control of a massively powerful starship. I really wanted to finish this, but I just couldnt’ get through the modified version of the show that came after the first few tv movies and they swapped out the main lead actress. Not that it was the actress that was the problem, but it was the writing that just changed course completely and went from a edgy unique science fiction to standard...
Fleishman Is in Trouble: With Jesse Eisenberg, Claire Danes, Lizzy Caplan, Adam Brody. Toby Fleishman knew what to expect when he and his wife of almost 15 years separated: weekends and every other holiday with the kids, some residual bitterness, and the occasional moment of tension in their co-parenting negotiations. I honestly thought this was going to be crazier than what it ended up being, but there’s a ton of spoilers involved in talking about that situation, so if you haven’t seen it yet and you’re in the mood to really ruin your mood, watch the 8 episodes first, then...
Star Trek: Enterprise: Created by Rick Berman, Brannon Braga. With Scott Bakula, John Billingsley, Jolene Blalock, Dominic Keating. A century before Captain Kirk’s five-year mission, Jonathan Archer captains the United Earth ship Enterprise during the early years of Starfleet, leading up to the Earth-Romulan War and the formation of the Federation. I’ve struggled through yet another viewing of the entire series, this time staying 100% awake for 100% of the episodes, mostly because we were watching one or two episodes a night with dinner. It’s a shame the series never really got the resolution that I rightly deserved, as that...
Wednesday: Created by Alfred Gough, Miles Millar. With Jenna Ortega, Gwendoline Christie, Riki Lindhome, Jamie McShane. Follows Wednesday Addams’ years as a student, when she attempts to master her emerging psychic ability, thwart and solve the mystery that embroiled her parents. A tv show about a character that was in a couple movies that were based on a tv show which in turn was based on a cult comic series. It’s good though! Not as good as I was lead to believe, but still eminently watchable and entertaining. Buy On Amazon!
Stargirl: Created by Geoff Johns, Greg Berlanti. With Brec Bassinger, Trae Romano, Amy Smart, Luke Wilson. Teenager Courtney Whitmore joins the Justice Society of America. Based on the character from DC Comics. Yet another satisfying season, it’s a shame this is it for the show, but I’m happy they went out on top. I’ll miss seeing Brec grow as a superhero, but I’m sure she has a great career ahead of her. Buy On Amazon!
The Peripheral: With Chloë Grace Moretz, Gary Carr, Jack Reynor, JJ Feild. Set in the future when technology has subtly altered society, a woman discovers a secret connection to an alternate reality as well as a dark future of her own. The season isn’t over with yet at the time that I’m writing this, but I’m so happy with what they’re doing so far that I figured I’d throw it out there to suggest that you watch it before the end of the year. It’s included with Amazon Prime and the story is a near future / not so near...
Andor: Created by Tony Gilroy. With Diego Luna, Kyle Soller, Stellan Skarsgård, Genevieve O’Reilly. Prequel series to Star Wars’ ‘Rogue One’. In an era filled with danger, deception and intrigue, Cassian will embark on the path that is destined to turn him into a Rebel hero. Is this the best Star Wars show that Disney has done since their acquisition of the franchise? Quite possibly yes, with some small caveats: there are no Jedi, there are no Sith, just regular people getting all mixed up with the creeping bureaucratic horrors of the Empire, rebeling in their own small ways that...
Tales of the Jedi: Created by Dave Filoni. With Corey Burton, Ashley Eckstein, Dee Bradley Baker, Ian McDiarmid. It showcases animated shorts that feature Jedi from the prequel era. Entirely way too short, this is a collection of six tangentially related short stories that are all under 20 minutes in length, with quality ranging from “ok” to “oh my”. Obviously I’m head over heels about seeing Ahsoka on screen again, if you like the character as much as I do, you should check these out. Buy On Amazon!
House of the Dragon: Created by Ryan J. Condal, George R.R. Martin. With Rhys Ifans, Matt Smith, Fabien Frankel, Graham McTavish. An internal succession war within House Targaryen at the height of its power, 172 years before the birth of Daenerys Targaryen. The first season is done, and boy was I underwhelmed. The CGI was great to middling, the acting was ok to middling, and there were at least 3 massive time jumps, one of which involved replacing many of the main leads, a decision that had me scratching my head. It took me right out of the show and...
She-Hulk: Attorney at Law: Created by Jessica Gao. With Tatiana Maslany, Ginger Gonzaga, Malia Arrayah, Jameela Jamil. Jennifer Walters navigates the complicated life of a single, 30-something attorney who also happens to be a green 6-foot-7-inch superpowered Hulk. If you judge this series on what it set out to do, it did it very well and stuck the landing. I’m not here to judge that though, I’m here to judge the basic premise of the show. In a prefect world, She-hulk could stand on her own story without the meta-meta commentary that’s inherent with the character. I think I would...
See: Created by Steven Knight. With Jason Momoa, Sylvia Hoeks, Hera Hilmar, Christian Camargo. Far in a dystopian future, the human race has lost the sense of sight, and society has had to find new ways to interact, build, hunt, and to survive. All of that is challenged when a set of twins are born with sight. A glorious ending to an amazing series.. That ending unfortunately went about 20 minutes longer than it should have and introduced all sorts of things that I didn’t appreciate, but none the less I still enjoyed the entirety of the series for how...
The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: Created by Patrick McKay, John D. Payne. With Morfydd Clark, Ismael Cruz Cordova, Charlie Vickers, Markella Kavenagh. Epic drama set thousands of years before the events of J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘The Hobbit’ and ‘The Lord of the Rings’ follows an ensemble cast of characters, both familiar and new, as they confront the long-feared re-emergence of evil to Middle-earth. The first season is finally done and with a LOT of complaining from the internet, I have to sit back and ask: was it worth the nearly half a billion dollars that Amazon spent...
Resident Evil: With Ella Balinska, Tamara Smart, Siena Agudong, Adeline Rudolph. Nearly three decades after the discovery of the T-virus, an outbreak reveals the Umbrella Corporation’s dark secrets. Why they decided to split the typical Resident Evil insanity with a teenage commentary on modern society, I’ll never know, but they did themselves a disservice by doing that There was one hilariously bad episode that was a solid hour of the two teenage girls going on a scavenger hunt in their home to find clues that their dad had left them in a note, all while talking about their relationships with...
The Old Man: Created by Robert Levine, Jonathan E. Steinberg. With Jeff Bridges, John Lithgow, E.J. Bonilla, Bill Heck. A former CIA officer who’s living off the grid finds himself on the run from people who want to kill him. FX continues to be a gold mine of amazing content, this time with Jeff Bridges and John Lithgow killing it in every scene that they’re in. Alia Shawkat, who I knew from Arrested Development, is way past the comedic stuff that I knew her best for and plays a serious character that I’m shocked to see playing right up to...
Alone Together: A DS9 Companion: With Alexander Siddig, Andrew Robinson, Shana Collier, Cirroc Lofton. Set 25 years after the events of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Alone Together follows Dr. Julian Bashir as he goes to visit his old friend Elim Garak on Cardassia, and uncovers a dark secret in the process. Released all the way back in July of 2020 during the absolute pit of despair that we found ourselves in after staying in our homes for several months after the covid-19 lock down began, I watched the first episode, put the others on my “watch next” list on...
The Sandman: Created by Neil Gaiman, David S. Goyer, Allan Heinberg. With Tom Sturridge, Boyd Holbrook, Patton Oswalt, Vivienne Acheampong. Upon escaping after decades of imprisonment by a mortal wizard, Dream, the personification of dreams, sets about to reclaim his lost equipment. Dare I say it, but this adaptation of the much loved comic book series by Neil Gaiman is actually quite good! Netflix has a much deserved reputation for not handling adaptations all that well and DC / WarnerBros has been failing at nearly everything they’ve done in the last couple years, with nearly every single one of their...
Blown Away: With Nick Uhas, Katherine Gray, Deborah Czeresko, Elliot Walker. A reality show featuring glass blowers from around the world competing to be the best. One artist is dismissed after each episode/challenge. Season three continues the beauty of season 1 and 2, but it also continues the same audio stingers and soundtracks, which are getting super old at this point. Buy On Amazon!
Ms. Marvel: Created by Bisha K. Ali. With Iman Vellani, Matt Lintz, Zenobia Shroff, Yasmeen Fletcher. Kamala is a superhero fan with an imagination, particularly when it comes to Captain Marvel; Kamala feels like she doesn’t fit in at school and sometimes even at home, that is until she gets superpowers like the heroes she’s looked up to. Ms. Marvel starts off slow enough and that first episode felt like it was going to be another one of those D+ shows that meanders just a bit too much or never really figures itself out, but by the third episode I...
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds: Created by Akiva Goldsman, Alex Kurtzman, Jenny Lumet, Gene Roddenberry. With Anson Mount, Rebecca Romijn, Ethan Peck, Christina Chong. A prequel to Star Trek: The Original Series, the show will follow the crew of the USS Enterprise under Captain Christopher Pike. Finally, a Star Trek series that I can get into, and boy howdy did I get into it. It took them over 6 seasons of Disco and Picard, but there’s finally a Trek for me! Anson Mount knocks it out of the park as Christopher Pike and the entire supporting cast, down to the...
Stranger Things: Created by Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer. With Winona Ryder, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, Millie Bobby Brown. When a young boy disappears, his mother, a police chief and his friends must confront terrifying supernatural forces in order to get him back. See that question mark? Did I just watch season 5 or was this 4.5, or was it 5.5? Netflix hasn’t split seasons up like this in the past, so it’s super confusing to know what you’re watching, numerically. Add to that, the ending of this 4 episode season was completely unfulfilling and felt more like an ellipse than...
Baymax!: Created by Don Hall. With Scott Adsit, Ryan Potter, Dichen Lachman, Sarah-Nicole Robles. The characters in the unique city of Big Hero 6 get their own series, packed with adventures. You know those shorts that Pixar does before every Pixar film? The ones that usually make you cry like a big dumb baby, but it’s ok because everyone in the theater is doing the same dumb thing? Well this is a series of sorta unrelated shorts starring Baymax that do the same thing. It’s not Baymax in his Iron Man-esque armor, but Baymax the automated health professional, who goes...
Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey: With Kate McNally, Nicholas Kartashov, Marco Colosimo, Jewelle Barlow. Examines the rise of Warren Jeffs in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and his shocking criminal case. A short mini series of the extremist offshoot of the already extremis Morman religion, this one chronicles the child rapist Warren Jeffs, who was the only person to actually go to jail for the organized child rape cult that he ran, which really makes me wonder about what the actual fuck is going on out where these cults are operating? Buy On Amazon!
We Own This City: Created by George Pelecanos, David Simon. With Jon Bernthal, Wunmi Mosaku, Jamie Hector, Josh Charles. Tells the story of the rise and fall of the Baltimore Police Department’s Gun Trace Task Force and the corruption surrounding it. With only six episodes to tell the story, there’s not much breathing space or time for nuance, so a couple of the ‘bad cop’ characters come off as caricatures, but from what I’ve read up on them, this is pretty much what they were like. Jon Bernthal in particular is all over the place with out he portrays the...
Locke & Key: Created by Meredith Averill, Aron Eli Coleite, Carlton Cuse. With Darby Stanchfield, Connor Jessup, Emilia Jones, Jackson Robert Scott. After their father is murdered under mysterious circumstances, the three Locke siblings and their mother move into their ancestral home, Keyhouse, which they discover is full of magical keys that may be connected to their father’s death. Another great season of a show with a unique premise based off a comic book series that I enjoyed several collections of. There’s a moment about half way through the season that the difference between a kid and an adult hearing...
The Kids in the Hall: Created by Dave Foley, Bruce McCulloch, Kevin McDonald, Mark McKinney, Scott Thompson. With Dave Foley, Bruce McCulloch, Kevin McDonald, Mark McKinney. The iconic Canadian sketch comedy troupe The Kids in the Hall return from the dead with a reboot of their ground-breaking sketch series. Remember these guys? They had a tv show back in the day, then did absolutely nothing since then. Sure, there was a fever dream in which people thought there was a movie or something, but that never happened. I’m glad they’re back, this renewed series is on Amazon is well worth...
Halo: Created by Steven Kane, Kyle Killen. With Pablo Schreiber, Shabana Azmi, Natasha Culzac, Olive Gray. Aliens threaten human existence in an epic 26th-century showdown. TV series based on the video game ‘Halo.’ The broad strokes of the franchise are here, and there’s definitely a whole bunch of stuff that I recognize from the videos games, but most of what I recognize are the long plotlines from the books, which has to be absolutely maddening for anyone that didn’t read nearly every single one of them. There’s also a ton here that’s just unique to the televison series and it’s...
The Morning Show: Created by Jay Carson, Kerry Ehrin. With Jennifer Aniston, Reese Witherspoon, Billy Crudup, Mark Duplass. An inside look at the lives of the people who help America wake up in the morning, exploring the unique challenges faced by the men and women who carry out this daily televised ritual. With the acting as good as or better than the fantastic first season, unfortunately the writing isn’t as impressive as it could have been with some well telegraphic and silly things happening towards the end of season 2. It was again only 10 episodes long, but several of...
Jimmy Savile: A British Horror Story: With Roger Ordish, Mark Lawson, Meirion Jones, Alison Bellamy. Jimmy Savile once ruled the airwaves with a quirky persona and good works. So how did this icon manage to hide his many alleged bad deeds for so long? I only heard of this guy after the news broke about his unfortunate life choices and the hundreds of people that he took advantage of. The damming part of the story is that of all the police that were contacted and were made aware of what he was doing, not a single one of them got...
Severance: Created by Dan Erickson. With Adam Scott, Zach Cherry, Britt Lower, Tramell Tillman. Mark leads a team of office workers whose memories have been surgically divided between their work and personal lives. When a mysterious colleague appears outside of work, it begins a journey to discover the truth about their jobs. Delightfully atmospheric and mind boggling weird, my only complaint is that season one doesn’t wrap up the story, so we’ll have to wait for season two to (maybe?) wrap up this strange story of people living two lives inside of one body. Buy On Amazon!
