Considering what a boys’ club late night comedy has always been, October 12, 2017 may go down as a historic day, as two new comedy talk shows hosted by women premiered last night: Sarah Silverman’s I Love You, America, which airs on Hulu, and Robin Thede’s The Rundown on BET. About eight minutes into Silverman’s […]
Continue ReadingWhat does SNL want to be under Trump? This is the second weirdly apolitical show in a very political time. Last week’s only topical outings were the impression-palooza of a cold open and some hurricane/NFL stuff during Update. This week the cold open and part of Update were devoted to Las Vegas, but nothing was […]
Continue ReadingWhen Jordan Klepper made his debut on The Daily Show in 2014, it was clear that he had a little Stephen Colbert in him. Or, to be more specific, a little “Stephen Colbert.” He was perfect at being the guy who was arguing for the wrong things for the express purpose of showing how wrong […]
Continue ReadingSaturday Night Live began its 43rd season with a silly, silly show for a decidedly un-silly time. Puerto Rico continues to suffer through the aftereffects of a hurricane without federal aid. The president continues to wage war on professional athletes who oppose police brutality, and millions of poor children just lost their health coverage. SNL touched […]
Continue ReadingCritics were understandably put off by Fuller House’s first season, which was packed full of in-jokes and meta gags for fans of Full House who had also not matured in any way since 1995. It can be difficult to describe what was enjoyable about Full House without relying on the obvious: it was in heavy […]
Continue ReadingWriter’s note: While it seems inevitable that Ali Pfefferman (Gaby Hoffmann) will soon begin identifying as nonbinary (as creator Jill Soloway does), in this interview Hoffmann uses she/her pronouns to refer to Ali, which this review does as well. Should the character Ali begin using any other pronouns, this writer will of course respect them. […]
Continue ReadingAmerican Vandal promises satire that will puncture the self-importance of Netflix’s own entries in the true crime genre, like Making a Murderer and The Keepers. By moving the setting to a high school in California and making the central crime 27 spray-painted dicks, American Vandal seemed poised to be a great one-note joke, a self-serious […]
Continue ReadingWhile One Mississippi’s first season dealt with a number of huge transitions, like the death of protagonist Tig’s mother and Tig’s moving back to Mississippi, its second season is more focused on the questions these transitions bring up: How much can a person change, and under what circumstances will they do so? What does it […]
Continue ReadingFor better or worse — most often for better — BoJack Horseman, both the show and its titular character, have always been deeply invested in the past, and generally speaking, the idea of time itself. After all, for much of the series, BoJack is still riding the high of starring in a very famous TV […]
Continue ReadingThe new Netflix series Disjointed, which premiered its first ten episodes (of 20 ordered so far) this past Friday, is an appropriately titled mishmash of two distinct styles that never completely coalesce. Created by David Javerbaum and Chuck Lorre, it is an achingly dull CBS-style sitcom “about” weed the same way The Big Bang Theory is […]
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