For all its early promise, Mike Judge’s HBO comedy Silicon Valley has struggled to find its footing in any meaningful way. The past three seasons of the show have more or less featured the same arc, with the perpetually overwhelmed start-up Pied Piper shooting themselves in the foot every time they approach some form of success, […]
Crime Beat: On American Crime and the Terror of Desire
The third episode of the third season of American Crime is the best episode of this show that’s been broadcast to date and by extension one of the greatest episodes of television ever to air. For this installment of the column I’m not going to talk about what it was so much as what it […]
Crime Beat: American Crime “In the System” is a Little Too Narratively Utilitarian
“Anyone we know?” is one of the first lines of dialogue spoken in the latest episode of American Crime, regarding a fire that killed 15 workers employed by the farming company that Jeanette (Felicity Huffman) has married into. From there we begin the long arc of the episode’s central theme: desensitization from those exposed to […]
Crime Beat: Network Television’s Best Show is Off to an Expectedly Promising Start
American Crime is a jewel of a program, not only for its harrowing performances and sophisticated narratives but also for its ability to disabuse its audience of the necessity of HBO’s patented Tits-and-Viscera formula in making compelling prestige television. It flows with the purpose of classical tragedy, and as such manages to pack incredible things […]
Legion is an Enthralling, Perpetually Shifting Twist on Superheroes
Zack Snyder probably didn’t consciously rip off David Fincher’s Fight Club palette for his grim and gritty idio-epic Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice but there is some potency in that superhero work having the same asylum aesthetic as one of film’s most durable dissociative personality tales. What is Batman if not Bruce Wayne’s own personal Tyler […]
“Supergirl Lives” In A Strong Start To The Season’s Back Half
In addition to having to pick up the momentum of all of Supergirl‘s various plot threads, “Supergirl Lives” also has to deal with the show’s hiatus building up the cultural conversation around it into something a bit more than “just another superhero show.” By laying the groundwork and organically coupling up Alex and Maggie, Supergirl made a statement […]
The Young Pope is an Eerily Prescient Vision of 2017
Near the end of the first episode of The Young Pope, Jude Law’s Pope Pius XIII tersely informs his Macchiavellian advisor Voiello (Silvio Orlando) that his actual priorities are not his homily or meetings with the college of cardinals but improving the Vatican Radio broadcast and getting a full catalog of the gifts sent to the […]
Violent Delights: Westworld’s Finale and the Cycle of Abuse
Warning: this essay has spoilers for Westworld throughout Throughout its first season, Westworld reveled in the cyclical nature of storytelling (whether it did this effectively is up for debate), from the connections between the parallel timelines that split its narrative to meta elements like the literal loops the hosts are on and the “maze” some of the […]
Supergirl Goes To “The Darkest Place” in Episode 2.07
Modern superhero shows need a handful of plots to juggle and keep an audience interested from week to week, which feels like it could get a little stressful on the writers, but this past week’s episode of Supergirl — “The Darkest Place” — is an Arrow storyline, full stop. It’s not even an Arrow story from […]
Supergirl 2.06: Supergirl–And Alex Danvers–Undergo A Lot Of “Changing”
One of the unexpected surprises of this season of Supergirl has been the slow-burning subplot of Alex Danvers coming to grips with her sexuality. There was an indication the show would go into this territory when Floriana Lama was cast as Maggie Sawyer, the most visible gay character in the DCU outside of Batwoman. But staking out […]
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