TV is a writer’s medium first and foremost. Which is why so much “television” is much, much stronger than the bulk of films in theaters or on streaming. Bringing tentpole film thinking to a series is just the wrong foot to start on. TV simply doesn’t need auteurs. It needs great characters, tension, stakes, pacing and…

Problem solver!

It’s entirely fair to not like what you don’t like. But criticism that comes down to some imagined insincerity of the creator is really thoughtless and plays into lazy anti-intellectual tropes. The idea that creatives are pulling one over on people is one I hear a lot from anti intellectuals: Down-to-earth,…

Team DAG!

That’s not frumpiness. That’s just the 80s, baby!

Whether or not this show goes to s2, it’s still the end of peak TV. Every streamer is making smaller, safer bets. There will be fewer splashy, pricey things like this and, sadly, also fewer quirky shows that only could have happened on streaming. And that’s not even counting the back catalogs that will be cut back to…

Read the story, Marty! (Also, RIP.)

It would be great to do something around Sunnydale itself. Like an anthology series of life over the last 150 years in a little town above the Hellmouth. Then the direct comparisons to the highly original Buffy wouldn’t be so crushing, while giving opportunities to play in the universe. And, with aging tech you could…

Few filmakers have been so weirdly all over the place. Green Book is just insanely bad and headshakingly misguided. But then Stuck on You is a surprisingly sweet grossout film that’s truly underrated. Then you have the Heartbreak Kid remake, which is very problematic but actually does a fair job deconstructing its…

The time machine framing got down to what this show was about. Walter, in his own churlish way, pointed out the problem with a time machine premise. What use is such a device if you’re not able to make different decisions, if you cannot be a different kind of person? Jimmy got to remake his life several times over and…

This show is amazing. It’s like Succession x Euphoria but less soapy and somehow meaner. How is this not the hot show of the summer? Beautiful people. Smart writing. Great tension and suspense. Maybe US viewers get thrown by the speed and intensity of some of the accents?

“We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.” Kurt Vonnegut said that. I’d argue that the finale made the argument that Bob Odenkirk’s character wasn’t Jimmy McGill or Gene or Saul. He’s all of them. Only in prison did he achieve his final, integrated form — part Jimmy, part Gene,…

There are a lot of elements of “Joe Pera” that feed directly from Joe Pera. The persona is far from a complete fabrication or put on. So I think it’s fair to explore the ways in which there is and isn’t distance between “Nathan Fielder” and Nathan Fielder. It’s not all put on. And I suspect Nathan Fielder wouldn’t be…

I just want a talking head interview with everyone who went into the fake bar. 

Would be a bummer with no Mickey but I wouldn’t mind seeing her dragged into a gritty reboot of Room and Bored. 

DON’T READ THE REST OF THIS IF YOU DON’T WANT SPOILIERS

It was interesting to see Jesse return with the person he later dissolves. Maybe if Saul wasn’t such a good lawyer, the bathtub adventure might never have occurred. 

I think people’s reaction to this show says more about them than about the show. Fielder is not just some lazy creator coming to this process saying essentially “look at these idiots.”

*intentionally misses point, adjusts monocle, begins typing*

I wish the flashback had all been conducted with Jessie and Walt’s masks on — just to give an FU to all the BB nerds (which I am).