2018 TV review!
Dec. 17th, 2018 11:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annwfynSo, I’ve realized it’s December, which means it’s time for my TV review of the year. As is Tradition, I offer you my normal format of the good, the bad and the ugly.
There have been some winners and losers this year, with one of last year’s winners having slipping down to my ‘bad’ list this year. Yes, Gotham. You should feel bad. But more of that in a minute. First, and most cheerfully, the good:
1) Travelers. I binged watched two seasons of this earlier this year and just started season 3 on Netflix. Now, first of all, I accept that this show is so closely based around my interests it would pretty much have had to fill an episode with personal insults for me to not like it, and I’m a really soft target for this show. The premise is that time travellers from a dystopian future, living with the aftermath of some great catastrophe, are sent back in time into the bodies of people who were about to die, and then have to work to save the world while also dealing with the lives they’ve been thrown into. See! How could I not love it? But even taking that into account, it constantly surprised me by how awesome it was. Not hugely because of the overarching meta plot (AI from the future blah blah blah) which is OK I guess. But because of the characters – they are genuinely hugely varied, strongly played, nuanced, flawed, loveable, monstrous and heroic at the same time, and the dilemmas they grapple with in their newfound personal lives are genuinely compelling. One finds himself in the body of a heroin addict and has to deal with addiction. One finds herself in the body of a woman who was cognitively impaired and finds herself becoming involved with the man who was that woman’s social worker. Another finds herself in an abusive relationship with a child.
It’s amazing stuff, and I haven’t stopped wanting to spend time with those characters yet.
2) Haunting of Hill House. THIS IS THE MOST PERFECT TV SHOW EVER MADE AND I CAN’T BREATHE JUST THINKING ABOUT IT! Ahem. What was I saying? Yes. Haunting of Hill House. Both the kind of show I love in theory – a family drama set in a haunted house with a classic ghost story narrative, plus time jumps between past and present – executed with absolute perfection. I watched this show while hiding behind a pillow, as much for my desperate fear for the individual characters – Steven, Luke, Nell, Shirley and Theo – as for any jump scare.
Plus, bizarrely good depiction of living with mental illness. OK, so Nell *was* haunted, but that isn’t the point. The character was played like someone had spent time with me during a bad episode. And a good one. I don’t know. All of it. I really identified with Nell a lot.
I am currently torn between desperately wanting a second season and desperately hoping that there isn’t a second as I don’t think I could cope with those characters being put through the wringer again.
3) Unforgotten. Gritty British police drama, with each season following a cold case from start to finish. Amazing. I binge watched three seasons this year and every one was amazing and every one was completely different – the first season was really about homophobia and race relations in the 1970s, with some compelling stuff about sin, redemption, and transformation. The second season was about historic child abuse and the scars it leaves. The third season was just flat out terrifying with a twist that I wasn’t expecting at all and a sudden insight into actual evil. But each one was beautifully paced – not too fast, not rushed, completely believable – with characters that weren’t Hollywood pretty or angsty.
There’s another season coming next year, I believe. I’m chewing my nails already.
4) Westworld Season 2. A controversial choice, I know, as a lot of people didn’t like Westworld’s second season as much as the first. But I did. OK, I agree with everyone. The time jumps in this season weren’t really necessary and the big reveal at the end that they were hiding wasn’t really worth it. I could have lived with normal linear time. I also agree that the other parks were a bit of a let down – Samurai world was OK, I guess, but I had those characters! And while it’s totally consistent that the same plot lines were being repeated, I sort of found the Samurai characters made the show a bit jumbled.
But I liked the rest of it. I liked the questions that were being asked – about revolution and the price you pay, about who we really are, about what defines us. I genuinely cried at some of the deaths in this season, and I found the ending completely satisfying. Plus, Maeve and Bernard. I can’t leave Maeve and Bernard now. I will stay with them until the end.
(Also, Anthony Hopkins – dear gods. Anthony Hopkins)
5) Iron Fist Season 2. The most controversial choice of the lot. Because I loved it. And I loved it because of, not in spite of, season 1. It pleased me to see the spoilt GAP year kid Danny Rand of season 1 having grown up. I liked that he and Colleen had a really warm, nuanced and *real* feeling relationship. I loved Colleen’s personal development, plus Misty Knight (and, in fact, called it ‘Daughters of the Dragon – Season 1’) for most of the show. I’m really quite sad it’s been cancelled actually, as it felt like the show had suddenly and surprisingly found its feet.
But, it wasn’t all good. Here are my mean and horrible thoughts on those shows which irritated me.
1) Gotham. Did you know that this was actually one of my ‘good’ shows once? Oh, Gotham! How have you fallen? Let me count the ways, starting with your inability to decide whether you were still actually a show about Jim Gordon or were aiming for Batman Begins, moving on to your stupid bait and switch with the Joker which we all saw coming and didn’t want but got anyway, and also speak, with feeling, about your laboured overuse of Lee Thompkins who has been through far too many character twists and turns at this point and doesn’t really serve much purpose in existing as Lee. And why is Barbara Gordon even alive? Actually, I don’t want to hear your excuse, Gotham. Because I won’t buy it. Yes, Ed Nygma and Oswald Cobblepot continued to do sterling service. And I remain deeply committed to Alfred but I can’t help but feel that my relationship with this show is like his relationship with Bruce Wayne. I’m not being treated well, it’s taking me for granted and is probably drunk and about to vomit everywhere. Just…go home, Gotham. You’re wasted.
2) The Strain. It is a tragedy I did not like this. I thought I would. I was sure I would. A modern vampire story? A retelling of Dracula? By Guillermo de Toro? Give it me now! And I did binge watch season 1 and tried season 2 and then…bleurgh. The episodes became samey. The largely unsympathetic characters never became more sympathetic. The bad guys remained entirely two dimensional. Even the ones who were meant to be developing depth. I never liked the child hostage. I also had a suspicion I was beginning to see where it was all going and read up the Wikipedia entry and discovered I was bang on the money. The show was just going to take a whole other series getting me there and I lacked the energy to watch that many hours of people running around New York in the winter shouting at the exact same staggering extras.
I watched Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula instead, which is actually further in spirit from the original book that the TV show, but does have Gary Oldman brooding magnificently.
3) Jack Ryan. So, this one wasn’t actually bad to watch. It was actually quite fun. But it was probably the single most dangerously offensive TV show I’ve seen in some time and its egregious misinterpretation of Islam and Syria and really all of the Middle East kind of destroyed it for me. ISIS have never been some kind of pan-Arab ecumenical Muslim organisation. That’s not how it works. They have always been more concerned with executing Muslims who worship the wrong way than they ever were with terror attacks in the west. The heart of the struggle was always around the Caliphate, not around blowing up New York. Presenting it as if it was all about bad Arabs blowing up nice Americans is deeply offensive, and pretty f*cking dangerous. That’s a shitty myth to push, Amazon Prime and I’m pissed at you.
4) Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. Hugely controversially, I didn’t like this. I’m still trying to unpick why, but I didn’t. I mean, a part was the teenagers who looked and acted like twenty somethings which is a Riverdale thing, of course. A part was the clunkiness of the witchcraft element – the perky Wiccan that most TV shows have done was ditched, and it was replaced with rather laboured LaVeyan Satanism, from what I could tell, and I don’t like LaVeyan Satanism. There were a few good performances, but the ‘you’re a wanker’ ratio felt higher than I like and I found myself, four episodes in, basically annoyed with the entire character base.
And Sabrina was a very special snowflake. Such a special snowflake.
5) American Horror Story. I think I just disliked this because I tried to watch the Murder House series as methadone when Haunting of Hill House finished, which was a mistake. It was like going from sipping on perfect vintage champagne to trying to glug down White Lightning cider and the experience was not pleasant. It was a show with a cluttered and not terribly well arranged back story, chock full of characters who were either unpleasant or stupid or both, and a load of jump shock moments and lashings of gore to cover up for the fact that the show was giving us no reason to give a damn about any of this nonsense.
And finally, the ugly….
1) Absentia. Set in Chicago. Filmed in Bulgaria. It showed. It really showed. Totally bizarre. I’m still confused.
There have been some winners and losers this year, with one of last year’s winners having slipping down to my ‘bad’ list this year. Yes, Gotham. You should feel bad. But more of that in a minute. First, and most cheerfully, the good:
1) Travelers. I binged watched two seasons of this earlier this year and just started season 3 on Netflix. Now, first of all, I accept that this show is so closely based around my interests it would pretty much have had to fill an episode with personal insults for me to not like it, and I’m a really soft target for this show. The premise is that time travellers from a dystopian future, living with the aftermath of some great catastrophe, are sent back in time into the bodies of people who were about to die, and then have to work to save the world while also dealing with the lives they’ve been thrown into. See! How could I not love it? But even taking that into account, it constantly surprised me by how awesome it was. Not hugely because of the overarching meta plot (AI from the future blah blah blah) which is OK I guess. But because of the characters – they are genuinely hugely varied, strongly played, nuanced, flawed, loveable, monstrous and heroic at the same time, and the dilemmas they grapple with in their newfound personal lives are genuinely compelling. One finds himself in the body of a heroin addict and has to deal with addiction. One finds herself in the body of a woman who was cognitively impaired and finds herself becoming involved with the man who was that woman’s social worker. Another finds herself in an abusive relationship with a child.
It’s amazing stuff, and I haven’t stopped wanting to spend time with those characters yet.
2) Haunting of Hill House. THIS IS THE MOST PERFECT TV SHOW EVER MADE AND I CAN’T BREATHE JUST THINKING ABOUT IT! Ahem. What was I saying? Yes. Haunting of Hill House. Both the kind of show I love in theory – a family drama set in a haunted house with a classic ghost story narrative, plus time jumps between past and present – executed with absolute perfection. I watched this show while hiding behind a pillow, as much for my desperate fear for the individual characters – Steven, Luke, Nell, Shirley and Theo – as for any jump scare.
Plus, bizarrely good depiction of living with mental illness. OK, so Nell *was* haunted, but that isn’t the point. The character was played like someone had spent time with me during a bad episode. And a good one. I don’t know. All of it. I really identified with Nell a lot.
I am currently torn between desperately wanting a second season and desperately hoping that there isn’t a second as I don’t think I could cope with those characters being put through the wringer again.
3) Unforgotten. Gritty British police drama, with each season following a cold case from start to finish. Amazing. I binge watched three seasons this year and every one was amazing and every one was completely different – the first season was really about homophobia and race relations in the 1970s, with some compelling stuff about sin, redemption, and transformation. The second season was about historic child abuse and the scars it leaves. The third season was just flat out terrifying with a twist that I wasn’t expecting at all and a sudden insight into actual evil. But each one was beautifully paced – not too fast, not rushed, completely believable – with characters that weren’t Hollywood pretty or angsty.
There’s another season coming next year, I believe. I’m chewing my nails already.
4) Westworld Season 2. A controversial choice, I know, as a lot of people didn’t like Westworld’s second season as much as the first. But I did. OK, I agree with everyone. The time jumps in this season weren’t really necessary and the big reveal at the end that they were hiding wasn’t really worth it. I could have lived with normal linear time. I also agree that the other parks were a bit of a let down – Samurai world was OK, I guess, but I had those characters! And while it’s totally consistent that the same plot lines were being repeated, I sort of found the Samurai characters made the show a bit jumbled.
But I liked the rest of it. I liked the questions that were being asked – about revolution and the price you pay, about who we really are, about what defines us. I genuinely cried at some of the deaths in this season, and I found the ending completely satisfying. Plus, Maeve and Bernard. I can’t leave Maeve and Bernard now. I will stay with them until the end.
(Also, Anthony Hopkins – dear gods. Anthony Hopkins)
5) Iron Fist Season 2. The most controversial choice of the lot. Because I loved it. And I loved it because of, not in spite of, season 1. It pleased me to see the spoilt GAP year kid Danny Rand of season 1 having grown up. I liked that he and Colleen had a really warm, nuanced and *real* feeling relationship. I loved Colleen’s personal development, plus Misty Knight (and, in fact, called it ‘Daughters of the Dragon – Season 1’) for most of the show. I’m really quite sad it’s been cancelled actually, as it felt like the show had suddenly and surprisingly found its feet.
But, it wasn’t all good. Here are my mean and horrible thoughts on those shows which irritated me.
1) Gotham. Did you know that this was actually one of my ‘good’ shows once? Oh, Gotham! How have you fallen? Let me count the ways, starting with your inability to decide whether you were still actually a show about Jim Gordon or were aiming for Batman Begins, moving on to your stupid bait and switch with the Joker which we all saw coming and didn’t want but got anyway, and also speak, with feeling, about your laboured overuse of Lee Thompkins who has been through far too many character twists and turns at this point and doesn’t really serve much purpose in existing as Lee. And why is Barbara Gordon even alive? Actually, I don’t want to hear your excuse, Gotham. Because I won’t buy it. Yes, Ed Nygma and Oswald Cobblepot continued to do sterling service. And I remain deeply committed to Alfred but I can’t help but feel that my relationship with this show is like his relationship with Bruce Wayne. I’m not being treated well, it’s taking me for granted and is probably drunk and about to vomit everywhere. Just…go home, Gotham. You’re wasted.
2) The Strain. It is a tragedy I did not like this. I thought I would. I was sure I would. A modern vampire story? A retelling of Dracula? By Guillermo de Toro? Give it me now! And I did binge watch season 1 and tried season 2 and then…bleurgh. The episodes became samey. The largely unsympathetic characters never became more sympathetic. The bad guys remained entirely two dimensional. Even the ones who were meant to be developing depth. I never liked the child hostage. I also had a suspicion I was beginning to see where it was all going and read up the Wikipedia entry and discovered I was bang on the money. The show was just going to take a whole other series getting me there and I lacked the energy to watch that many hours of people running around New York in the winter shouting at the exact same staggering extras.
I watched Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula instead, which is actually further in spirit from the original book that the TV show, but does have Gary Oldman brooding magnificently.
3) Jack Ryan. So, this one wasn’t actually bad to watch. It was actually quite fun. But it was probably the single most dangerously offensive TV show I’ve seen in some time and its egregious misinterpretation of Islam and Syria and really all of the Middle East kind of destroyed it for me. ISIS have never been some kind of pan-Arab ecumenical Muslim organisation. That’s not how it works. They have always been more concerned with executing Muslims who worship the wrong way than they ever were with terror attacks in the west. The heart of the struggle was always around the Caliphate, not around blowing up New York. Presenting it as if it was all about bad Arabs blowing up nice Americans is deeply offensive, and pretty f*cking dangerous. That’s a shitty myth to push, Amazon Prime and I’m pissed at you.
4) Chilling Adventures of Sabrina. Hugely controversially, I didn’t like this. I’m still trying to unpick why, but I didn’t. I mean, a part was the teenagers who looked and acted like twenty somethings which is a Riverdale thing, of course. A part was the clunkiness of the witchcraft element – the perky Wiccan that most TV shows have done was ditched, and it was replaced with rather laboured LaVeyan Satanism, from what I could tell, and I don’t like LaVeyan Satanism. There were a few good performances, but the ‘you’re a wanker’ ratio felt higher than I like and I found myself, four episodes in, basically annoyed with the entire character base.
And Sabrina was a very special snowflake. Such a special snowflake.
5) American Horror Story. I think I just disliked this because I tried to watch the Murder House series as methadone when Haunting of Hill House finished, which was a mistake. It was like going from sipping on perfect vintage champagne to trying to glug down White Lightning cider and the experience was not pleasant. It was a show with a cluttered and not terribly well arranged back story, chock full of characters who were either unpleasant or stupid or both, and a load of jump shock moments and lashings of gore to cover up for the fact that the show was giving us no reason to give a damn about any of this nonsense.
And finally, the ugly….
1) Absentia. Set in Chicago. Filmed in Bulgaria. It showed. It really showed. Totally bizarre. I’m still confused.
