This week’s abbreviated holiday week episode is all about characters that TV shows want to make “happen.” Sometimes shows and showrunners have a character or a performer that they want us to love who we just can’t love, and that would be fine if they’d just stop trying so hard.
SHOW NOTES
Kathryn’s recaps of The Crown season two: http://www.vulture.com/tv/the-crown/
Jason Mantzoukas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Mantzoukas
Fred Armisen: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Armisen
It's holiday time, so we dedicate the entire episode to a close reading of one of Netflix's forays into the wide world of dedicated Christmas programming: the Hallmark Christmas-style movie A Christmas Prince. Strap in for lying! Mothra! Negging! Jellied meats! Birther scandals! Romance! Tokenism! Constitutional crises! And so much more!
This week, Kathryn makes a new round of TV recommendations, just in time for the holiday break. We then check in with the adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace, available on Netflix in the US.
TV recommendations!
Watch Alias Grace on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/80119411
Then read Kathryn’s piece on the ending: http://www.vulture.com/2017/11/alias-grace-lets-talk-about-the-ending.html
In the ongoing discussion about how we feel when we find out artists are jerks (or worse), we talk about separating the art from the artist. This discussion happened in the context of Louis C.K., but we think you'll find it relevant for all of your most recent #metoo-era feelings. Afterwards, we wrap up Stranger Things 2 and talk about our thoughts on Bob the Brain, the awesomeness of Dustin, and the less awesomeness of episode seven.
This week we talk about Amazon’s attempt to make the next Game of Thrones by revisiting the spring from which Game of Thrones sprang, and the kinds of Tolkien-flavored shows we’d really like to see. Then, one of our listeners and Patreon donors makes Andrew watch the pilot for Cavemen, the super-regressive short-lived mid-2000s sitcom based on the old insurance commercials.
This Thanksgiving, we're grateful for our Patreons, one of whom forced Andrew to watch an episode of Tiny House Hunters and then share that experience with us. It's pretty amazing. We continue along in our Stranger Things 2 book club, and discuss such things as: does Radio Shack still exist? And, why would you keep a baseball bat covered in nails in the trunk of your car?
Finally, stay tuned at the end for some brief yelling about motion smoothing.
This week’s episode is all about the somehow weirdly busy November TV schedule, and then we boost the work of some of our favorite women working behind the camera (and why that’s important).
Surprise! It's a new TV book club! We're returning to the world of Hawkins Indiana to talk about Stranger Things 2, and in this episode we consider the first three episodes of the new season. Before we get there, though, we run through a few personalized TV recommendations that've come in the ATV mailbag lately. For instance: what should you watch with your parents this Thanksgiving?
This week we really lean into the whole dick thing - first, we have an (admittedly couple weeks old) discussion about the ever-widening aftershocks of the Weinstein sexual assault allegations. Then, on a funner note, we talk for like half an hour about how much we love American Vandal.
This week we're continuing our "good fall TV / bad fall TV" voyage with some really, truly, exceptionally bad TV: CBS's Wisdom of the Crowd, a show so bad that it decided the best way to solve crime was to invent a worse version of reddit. Before we get there, though, we take a look at a much more promising new series - The Mayor. Who could've thought a campaign run as a joke would actually be a funny premise in 2017!
This week we jump back into the mailbag to chat about, among other things, queer TV couples and other stuff we missed in previous episodes. Then we say a fond-ish farewell to NBC’s Kings, a one-season wonder that nevertheless lasted way longer than it had any right to.
The big news this week is the launch of our patreon! We would so appreciate your support to help us continue this podcast, and let us keep improving and growing. But just as important is the first installment of our fall TV 2017 good show/bad show selection. As you may have guessed, Me, Myself & I is not a good show, but you'll need to tune in to find out how we feel about the new Trek.
Vulture editor and Kings enthusiast Jackson McHenry joins us this week for a discussion of our favorite one-season TV shows, those poor creative projects that made it to the screen but just couldn't hang. And speaking of, we move on to episodes 7, 8, 9, and 10 of our TV Book Club on NBC's 2009 drama Kings.
After some recent announcements from Amazon on its TV programming future, we talk a little about how it seems to have no idea what it's doing, and why you can't just decide to make the next Game of Thrones and expect that to happen overnight. In more successful TV news, we then chat about a series called The Lowe Files. This essentially involves us just repeating lines from The Lowe Files.
This week we spend some extra time waxing poetic about a show we've only mentioned in passing so far—the long-running Channel 4 home renovation show Grand Designs. After that, we return to the land of Gilboa for our continued tour through NBC one-season wonder Kings, a series that ran for exactly as long as it probably should have.
Outlander is back for its third season - without any spoilers for season three, we get into some of the show's flaws, what works about it, and why we're willing to extend it lots of goodwill even when it's also a bit nonsensical. Inspired by the characters from Outlander, we talk a little about what makes for a good TV couple and some of our favorite examples. Oddly they're all from Michael Schur shows?
This week we kick off with a discussion of the TV costuming that we like, the people who make it happen, and the people who write about it.
We then grant one of Kathryn’s longstanding wishes and start in on our TV Book Club about NBC’s Kings, a weird and fascinating show that never should have existed but somehow, improbably, does.
Because there just is not enough discussion about Game of Thrones in the world already, we talk a little about some of the issues we've had with the show's most recent season, and why it can be frustrating when a fantasy show doesn't have internal logic. We then turn to a show we've been enjoying much more than we expected - Freeform's new series The Bold Type.
This week we attend to our privates and yours with an extended and completely pro bono discussion of the new line of Broad City sex toys. Treat yourself.
We then move on to a significantly less sexy topic: the returning TV shows that we’re most excited about. If neither of these chats get your motor running, I’m not sure what will.
After the deep frustration of watching the Bachelorette finale, we talk about how the franchise failed its first black lead and the particular missteps of the final episode. Given the unpleasantness of that season, and of the direction of the franchise more broadly, we then share ideas for how we'd improve the series.
This week the three of us look at all the brand-new shows that are coming out this fall and pick some winners and losers—show’s we’re excited for (or at least interested in) and shows that seem determined to be as bad as they could possibly be. We’ll be revisiting all of our favorite and least favorite pitches later this fall, so pay attention!
We have a real upper of an episode for you this week. First, we discuss the controversy around the recently announced new HBO project from the creators of Game of Thrones. We are decidedly underwhelmed. In our second topic, we talk about the way television deals with stories about illness, death and grief - frequently not very well, as it turns out!
In honor of our 100th podcast episode, we're spending most of this week's show talking about 100th episodes! It has traditionally been the magic number for syndication, a phenomenon we dig into in depth; we then talk about shows that we would never, ever want to see make it all the way to 100 episodes.
Our final maternity leave episode is the wrap-up for our Please Like Me Book Club, and we talk about the final two episodes of the first season. Geoffrey is a real sports boy, Niamh continues to be *the worst*, and at the end, things get unexpectedly poignant.
This week we share our final thoughts on season one of Hulu's The Handmaid's Tale adaptation, and talk about our hopes and fears for the second season. Then, we dive headlong into the way menstruation is handled on TV - both the better, more incidental/passing references in some recent shows and the exaggerated jokey references in most others.