TV #30 of 2024: American Gods, season 3 Better than season 2, but ultimately unable to cross that elusive threshold from good to great, especially in comparison to the masterful first year of this loose Neil Gaiman adaptation. The perpetually troubled production swapped showrunners yet again for this final run, which really doesn’t feel like …
Tag Archives: TV aired in 2021
TV Review: Star Trek: Lower Decks, season 2
TV #2 of 2024: Star Trek: Lower Decks, season 2 I’m still not fully vibing with this cartoon’s irreverent tone, but it’s improved enough in this sophomore season that I’m willing to bump my rating up a notch from last time. My biggest issue in the program’s first year was the way the narrative seemed …
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TV Review: Bob’s Burgers, season 11
TV #59 of 2022: Bob’s Burgers, season 11 Maybe a slight step up from the year before? Most episodes of this family cartoon remain unchallenging comfort television with a group of characters we know and love, but there’s at least some effort here to occasionally push one or another of them into unfamiliar growth territory. …
TV Review: What We Do in the Shadows, season 3
TV #40 of 2022: What We Do in the Shadows, season 3 Another hilarious and eventful year with the Staten Island vampire crew, this time taking a page from the final season of Angel and placing the heroes in charge of the organization that had previously been opposing them (although the delta of morality between …
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TV Review: Star Wars: Visions, season 1
TV #5 of 2022: Star Wars: Visions, season 1 This anime series from last year is an anthology of short films (13-22 minutes each), from a variety of different Japanese production studios, with no particular plot or character links between episodes beyond a weird shared fixation on kyber crystals. It’s been getting some rave reviews, …
TV Review: Star Wars: The Bad Batch, season 1
TV #90 of 2021: Star Wars: The Bad Batch, season 1 My expectations weren’t high going into this recent Clone Wars spinoff, as I generally found that parent show to be of variable quality and didn’t think these particular ‘defective clone’ figures made much of an impression beyond a gimmick during their brief appearance there. …
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TV Review: Hawkeye, season 1
TV #89 of 2021: Hawkeye, season 1 The latest Marvel show on Disney+ is a flawed but fun action-comedy, taking full advantage of the Christmas setting for a festive buddy romp as Clint Barton reluctantly accepts an eager new junior partner. He’s trying to shut down a mob investigation into the Ronin, his blood-soaked alter …
TV Review: Doctor Who: Flux
TV #86 of 2021: Doctor Who: Flux Doctor Who is a franchise that thrives on change, and so I have to credit soon-to-be-former showrunner Chris Chibnall for structuring this season as basically one single six-episode story, an experiment in serialization the likes of which the show hasn’t attempted since maybe Trial of a Time Lord …
TV Review: Shameless, season 11
TV #83 of 2021: Shameless, season 11 This title has always been all over the map tonally, so perhaps it’s fitting that its closing run would be produced and set during the chaos of the COVID-19 pandemic. Although in practice, the only real impact on events seems to be that everyone is wearing masks and …
TV Review: Leverage: Redemption, season 1.5
TV #80 of 2021: Leverage: Redemption, season 1.5 If I had realized that this revival’s first season wasn’t ending after eight episodes, I probably would have waited until this second batch came out three months later to write up a review. As is, I don’t have much to say that I didn’t last time: it’s …
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