Category: TV

  • Dark Winds: AMC’s Crime Drama Set on the Navajo Nation is Back for Season Two

    “Backup. What backup? We have 50 tribal officers for over 27,000 square miles.” That captures the isolation of the Navajo Nation in 1971, the setting for AMC’s crime thriller, Dark Winds. The series is based on the Leaphorn and Chee books by Tony Hillerman. Zahn McClarnon (Longmire, Fargo #2) stars as Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn. It’s…

  • Justified: City Primeval: Marshal Givens is Back, This Time in the Big City

    Reboots continue to be the go-to for many a television studio. You name it – comedy, drama, reality, animated – no genre is safe from revisiting the well of a hit TV show. Night Court, Dexter, Beavis and Butthead, Will & Grace, and Party Down, just to name a handful, have been brought back to…

  • A Small Light: Another Remarkable Untold Saga of WWII

    I’ve marveled in previous posts about the number of unknown and unbelievable stories from our history. World War II is particularly full of heroic human accomplishments (see one example in a previous post Operation Mincemeat: Netflix’s Absurd, Extraordinary, and True WWII Drama). We all know the basics of Anne Frank’s life during wartime thanks to…

  • Black Mirror: The Dystopian Anthology Returns for Season Six

    I was late to Black Mirror, Netflix’s anthology based on the Twilight Zone. My wife and I caught up on the show during the pandemic. It launched in 2011 on the British network Channel 4 and ran for two three-episode seasons. (I’ll stick to calling them “seasons,” not the confusing term “series,” that Netflix uses.)…

  • Never Have I Ever…Imagined Liking a TV Show With John McEnroe Narrating

    (This is a re-post from 2021 to recognize Never Have I Ever’s fourth and final season which Netflix just released on June 8th. It’s a cute, satisfying show if you haven’t checked it out yet. Season four is ten episodes, each running about 30 minutes. As with some other high school shows (Sex Education, for…

  • White House Plumbers: HBO’s Satirical Take on the Watergate Caper

    “The following is based on a true story. No names have been changed to protect the innocent because nearly everyone was found guilty.” Then as you see a band of misfits failing to gain entry through a locked door, “There were four Watergate break-in attempts. This was number two.” So, begins HBO’s tale of the…

  • Dead to Me: Netflix’s Dark Comedy About Loss, Grief, and Forgiveness

    Some of you have probably seen this series starring Christina Applegate (Married with Children) as Jen Harding and Linda Cardellini (ER) as Judy Hale. For those of you who haven’t, Dead to Me is uneven at times, but the compelling and endearing lead women make it all worthwhile. They’re confounding and irresistible. James Mardsen (Robot…

  • Yellowjackets: Showtime’s Terrific Drama Returns for Season Two

    A girl being chased through a snow-covered forest is suddenly impaled by falling into a hole filled with large, sharp sticks. Fast forward 25 years and a journalist asks, “what really happened out there?” This was the enticing and foreboding opening of Showtime’s Yellowjackets, the network’s latest outstanding contribution to Sunday night TV. It completed…

  • Borgen: The Engrossing Danish Political Drama and Its Well-Deserved Encore

    “Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.” A salient quote from one of history’s great thinkers leads off each episode of the terrific Danish political drama, Borgen. Originally, a DR production (the Danish public broadcast company that previously produced The Killing), Borgen is “The Castle,” the informal name of the…

  • Perry Mason: Season Two of HBO’s Striking Revival Series is Here

    “Months after the Dodson case has come to an end, the scion of a powerful oil family is murdered. When the DA goes to the city’s Hoovervilles to pinpoint the most obvious of suspects, Perry, Della, and Paul find themselves at the center of a case that will uncover far reaching conspiracies and force them…

  • Your Honor: A Once-Respected Judge Faces His Demons in New Season

    Michael Desiato is a prominent New Orleans judge when his son kills another teenager in an accidental hit-and-run collision. Michael encourages him to turn himself in but changes his mind while walking into the police station. He overhears that the boy who was killed is the son of a mob kingpin. Michael decides to protect…

  • Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 2022 Induction Ceremony

    Dolly Parton and Judas Priest. Dave Grohl and Lionel Ritchie. Steven Tyler, Ed Sheeran and Eminem. The 37th annual inductees were probably the most diverse yet, as all these artists performed alongside each other. Once again, thanks to HBO for condensing the 5½ hour ceremony into the three-hour telecast (now streaming on HBO Max). The…