Your Ten Favorite Shows Currently on Television

watched the pilot of the leftovers, liked it a lot, my wife liked it too despite the disappearing baby/shot dog combo within the first five minutes. it was weird seeing mark's boss from peep show in a big dramatic role.

It feels like a piece of theater, even a musical at times

yeah what i love about mrs maisel most so far is how much of the sensibility of bunheads carried over re: this stuff

i have a #11 for that list: The President Show, which is much better than you'd expect

― Chocolate-covered gummy bears? Not ruling those lil' guys out. (ulysses), Wednesday, December 6, 2017 8:30 AM (twenty-two minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i took an improv class taught by the guy who plays trump, it's exactly as good as i expected (he's brilliant) if... a little hard to watch regularly

anyway here are my top shows of the year

1. twin peaks
2. riverdale

the end

kantaro the sweet tooth salaryman is my new number one. only watching one a night so that it lasts longer.

i'm also enjoying Marcella, a brit crime show that has Apollo from Battlestar in it in his native Britisher! i don't think i even knew he was British. it's nice to see him. it also has my fave actress from W1A in it. Marcella is by the Swedish guy who did The Bridge.

I tried w/ Marcella but couldn't get beyond the first couple

beyond Twin Peaks, Leftovers, and American Vandal, not a big TV year for me.

Twin Peaks, Nathan For You, Decker, Desus and Mero, Vice Principals, the final mini-season of Review. Still seeing Game of Thrones through to the end. That's it, I think, besides the NBA.

NFY and Review finales were great too of course. Also excited for the Errol Morris miniseries on MKULTRA.

It's funny how amidst all the talk of "Peak TV" I look at all these end-of-year lists and it's far more circumscribed than even music or film. I feel like every top 10 list has some combination of the same 20 shows. this thread is one of the very few places where I've found any real deviation.

well, there's still a lot fewer TV shows than movies, and fewer issues of access as to who can see what when

i just cant find anything i want to watch! water water everywhere etc

(but that's just based on synopses I read, meaningless really. you've gotta give stuff a try i suppose)

if you have netflix, watch Kantaro.

also, if Godless is considered a t.v. show, that makes my top ten now. i will replace Chef & My Fridge with Godless. i would love more Godless. don't know if they are planning to do that though.

which reminds me that i need to watch season 2 of Frontier. i might be the only person here who likes that one. i'm just a jason momoa fur-trapping kinda guy.

Runaways isn't bad per se but when the fuck are these kids going to run away?

runaways is weird because it feels like something an 8 year old kid wrote and directed but its probably not the best show to watch if you are an 8 year old kid.

Parts of it are really, really good. They did capture some of what made the comic book work so well but then added so much fluff and padding onto it that all of my goodwill is starting to slip and I just want them to get on with the big showdown against their parents.

i managed three episodes and then bailed. focusing on the grown ups was such a bad idea. the awkward flirting between chase/gert, the schoolroom sequences with alex trying to get the group back together and the GANGSTA DIALOGUE at the construction site was all so painfully tin eared.

I'm late to Desus and Mero but it looks like that has a growing critical consensus here as well? When it works, it's great but they sometimes stray into bullshit that makes it difficult to not fast forward through. Monday had an extended MST3K-style narration of lions fucking that went on for what felt like five minutes.

DJP otm

Any top 10 list of shows of the year surely has to include Legion

even this year I could safely make a top 30 without it

i think i may be over noah hawley tbh

yeah I didn't even bother w/ Fargo s3 despite the presence of Carrie Coon

she was great on it! but the "look at me i am a very talky inscrutably evil bad guy"/"look at me i am the silent heavy" schtick has finally turned into a formula.
hawley's also something of a sadist about extended uncomfortable takes that are meant to inspire fight or flight and i don't need that right now.

Legion was great. Can't wait for season 2.

re: extended uncomfortable takes, I think the ASL on this season of Mr. Robot has to be around two minutes.

Legion was RAD RAD RAD

my top 10+ a few more for this year

Legion
Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency
Mindhunter
Marvelous Mrs Maisel
The Good Place
Westworld
The Deuce
Leftovers
Riverdale
GLOW
Gotham
American Gods
Big Little Lies

I need to check out American Gods

it's made with you in mind methinks

it’s pretty great. Bryan Fuller at his Fuller-iest

though at times it reminds me of just how VERY 90’s the book was, especially “i am the internet” Tecnical Boy who is a facepalm on-screen no matter how you stage him

I never read the book as it came out right at the height of my "the only good thing Gaiman ever did was Good Omens" phase

it was my favorite thing

OK I feel a little churlish. Episodes 4 and 5 of Mrs Maisel address head-on the issues about standup taking time to get good at. I still think Bornstein and Lenny are too easily wowed at the beginning but I basically take it back.

american gods might be the worst fuller thing since Dead Like Me

wut

american gods is great, though it could've benefitted from another episode

in other news, i am gilmore-agnostic, never-seen-bunheads, but i watched the first two episodes of Mrs. Maisel and omg it's so good you guys

that would be how i'd approach it, so that's good to hear.

it's a miracle of a show. we are not worthy. some scenes i feel like great playwrights would be proud to have written. the scene where papa finds out she's got a job. ".. OK." and keeps coming back in. and going out. and coming in. they find all these moments.

Everyone keeps talking about this Mrs. Maisel show! I guess I have to watch. Did anyone watch Happy?

you have to watch mrs maisel, it’s the best!

i watched the first ep of Happy & didn’t like it as much as I thought I would :/
i’ll try a couple more but it feels like it’s v forced, like everyone’s trying too hard to be kerrrraaaazy

I'm willing to try a second episode for Chris Meloni's sake

^ this

he’s v handsome

he gets to be an ex-cop, be funny, and do comedic no-stakes violence as opposed to the heavy guilt complex of his past angry cop role

seems very similar to Wilfred, which I was hot and cold on

I really wanted to like Mrs Maisel, but the plotting is just so awful and contrived.

The kids are completely. Like why even have kids in this show if all they do is move from sitter to sitter?

Are we supposed to care about her ex? I can’t tell. Does the show want us to want them back together, cuz he just seems like a doofus most of the time. But then there are these flashbacks where he’s being witty or cool or whatever...

There are also these scenes of forced hilarity that just don’t land for me. The scene where Midge takes over the city planning rally to talk about being blinded by makeup ads or whatever felt so false, with random crowd members turning to each other like “wow, this lady is on to something!” I mean, she’s a charming person, but she seems to get away with so much lame behavior. Maybe this will catch up with her at some point?

I’m still watching, for now, but my wife and I are spending a lot of the show rolling our eyes at each other.