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Watchable Oct. 11-17, 2021

October 11, 2021 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Succession (Oct. 17, 9 p.m., HBO/Crave)

Jeremy Strong as Kendall Roy in Season 3 of “Succession.” PHOTO CREDIT: David M. Russell/HBO

In the opening seconds of Season 3 of “Succession,” as media mogul Logan Roy and his minions helicopter back from the yacht vacation ruined after son Kendall went rogue, I could imagine the accompanying violin strains being replaced by “The Ride of the Valkyries,” “Apocalypse Now” style.

Logan (Brian Cox) isn’t about to destroy a North Vietnamese village — although I imagine he would if it boosted his ego or his bottom line, and he could get away with it — but as he roars later at underling Frank Vernon (Peter Friedman), “This is war!”

Of course, the Roy family has always been at a type of war as Logan plays the kids — Kendall (Jeremy Strong), Shiv (Sarah Snook), Roman (Kieran Culkin) and Connor (Alan Ruck) — against each other, but this season the wounds they inflict seem especially vicious.

Kendall is the immediate target since, at the end of Season 2, he used the news conference at which he was supposed to take the fall for the sex assault and murder scandal plaguing the company to instead implicate his father.

Kendall seems to have irrevocably cast himself out of the family while posing as a woke defender of the women exploited by Waystar Royco’s cruise line, although obviously it’s as much about power, ego and impressing Daddy as it ever was.

And just as obviously, it doesn’t take long for his siblings to at least consider the idea of backing Kendall while trying to gauge whether the wounds inflicted on Logan are enough to take him down this time.

There’s an early scene between Shiv and Roman that perfectly demonstrates the mental calculations each character is always running to maximize their self-interest.

As they watch media coverage of Kendall’s bombshell, Roman asks Shiv what she’s thinking.

“I’m thinking that we just need to back Dad right now and I can’t believe anyone would think anything else,” she replies. Then she adds, whispering, “But what am I actually thinking? Well, I’m thinking, is he toast?” to which Roman responds, “I am thinking that maybe I shouldn’t be thinking: Is he toast?” as Shiv smiles.

HBO has asked critics not to reveal spoilers so I won’t tell you where everyone lands as the jockeying for power continues — and having seen only seven of the nine episodes, I don’t know how it ends — but some deep wounds are inflicted, not only by Logan but by the kids on each other.

Despite its concerns with power, money, politics, media and corporate arrogance, “Succession” has always been a show about family and, particularly, the damage done by an abusive, emotionally unavailable parent, a theme that Season 3 really brings to the fore.

The show’s brilliance — besides the smart scripts, the excellent acting and directing, and the fact it’s thrilling even when it’s just people in a room talking to each other — is that it makes us care about the fates of its conniving, damaged characters despite how loathsome they are.

But it’s Shiv who earns my particular sympathy this season, at least part of the time, as it becomes increasingly clear she’ll never wield real power in the company because of her gender.

The patriarchy is firmly in charge, but one suspects that even if Logan were out of the picture the rot at the core of the family would continue to spread. There is no happy ending imaginable for the Roy clan, who all seem miserable all of the time — with the possible exception of Greg (Nicholas Braun), who continues to offer some comic relief along with Tom (Matthew Macfadyen).

But this misery is well worth our company. This new season of “Succession” is as addictively watchable as the first two.

Short Takes

A re-enactment of the haunting of the Perron family from the docuseries “Bathsheba.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Courtesy of T+E

Bathsheba (Oct. 11, 9 p.m., T+E)

Whether you believe in the paranormal or you just like a good ghost story, this two-part series is scary enough to spook you. I don’t mind telling you the back of my neck prickled as I sat in my home alone after watching the first episode. It’s about the true story behind the 2013 movie “The Conjuring,” which blamed the haunting of a centuries-old Rhode Island farmhouse on a 19th-century woman named Bathsheba Sherman. It turns out the rumours about Bathsheba being a witch who killed her children are a bunch of hooey, which doesn’t help explain the frightening things that happened to the Perron family when they moved into the 1700s Richardson Arnold House in 1971, including apparitions, voices in the night and even physical injuries. Whatever it was, it still moves four of the five Perron daughters to tears all these years later. The docuseries includes the usual mix of re-enactments with witness and expert interviews, led by Indigenous paranormal investigator Erin Goodpipe, who visits the house to try to communicate with its spiritual residents. Incidentally, the house is currently up for sale by the current owners, who also claim to have experienced strange phenomena while living there.

“Bathsheba” is appropriately part of T+E’s Creep Week, which ends Oct. 17 and includes the debut of “Eli Roth Presents: A Ghost Ruined My Life” (Oct. 15, 10 p.m.), a series in which the horror filmmaker gives us not just tales of things that go bump in the night but the fallout in the lives of the people who experienced them.

Comedians Daniel Woodrow and Keith Pedro with host Ennis Esmer, centre, on “Roast Battle Canada.” PHOTO CREDIT: Bell Media

Roast Battle Canada (Oct. 11, 10:30 p.m., CTV Comedy Channel)

In this competition show based on an American original and a Quebec spinoff, Canadian comedians insult each other in a way that’s hopefully funny enough to be declared the winner by an expert panel that includes K. Trevor Wilson of “Letterkenny,” Sabrina Jalees and superstar Russell Peters. I’m not gonna lie, the judges and host Ennis Esmer were sometimes funnier than the comics onstage in the debut episode, although the competitors did get in some laugh-out-loud zingers. And it perhaps goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway, this is not stuff you want to be watching with your kids or any easily offended member of your household.

Canada’s Drag Race (Oct. 14, 9 p.m., Crave)

Yes bitch, Canada’s version of the wildly successful “RuPaul’s Drag Race” is back for its sophomore season. The 12 queens competing are not so Toronto-centric this year, with four queens from Quebec, four from Vancouver, one from Ottawa and the show’s first Calgary queen in Stephanie Prince, who’s already looking like a formidable competitor as well as a potential villain. There’s also an assortment of body types and ethnicities among the cast. Canada’s most famous drag queen, Brooke Lynn Hytes, is back to lead the judging panel alongside stylist Brad Goreski, actor Amanda Brugel and TV personality Traci Melchor. Photographer Caitlin Cronenberg, daughter of David, is guest judge in the season premiere. Time to get to werk.

Crave also has Season 2 of the Cape Cod crime and drugs drama “Hightown” on Oct 17.

The Great Canadian Baking Show (Oct. 17, 8 p.m., CBC and CBC Gem)

Ready, set, just try to watch this without running to your kitchen to find a pastry to stuff in your mouth. Ten new amateur bakers from across Canada compete for bragging rights with the often impressive results judged by pastry chef Bruno Feldeisen and pie expert Kyla Kennaley. Comedians Ann Pornel and Alan Shane Lewis have managed to evade the revolving host door to return for a second season of taste-testing, encouraging and uttering the words “Ready, set, bake!”

CBC also has “A Suitable Boy” (Oct. 17, 9 p.m.), the BBC adaptation of the 1993 Vikram Seth novel about a young Hindu woman’s search for love among three potential suitors. It’s a bit overstuffed, but beautifully shot and capably acted.

Odds and Ends

So many screeners, so little time: I didn’t get a chance to check out “Dan Brown’s The Lost Symbol,” debuting Oct. 11 at 9 p.m. on Showcase, but if adaptations of Brown’s Robert Langdon novels are your thing you might want to watch this. Ashley Zukerman (“A Teacher,” “Succession”) stars as Langdon.

Showcase also has Season 4 of “The Sinner” Oct. 13 at 10 p.m.

Netflix brings you Season 2 of the popular “The Baby-Sitters Club” on Oct. 11 and Season 3 of “You” on Oct. 15.

This week, Disney Plus has “Just Beyond” (Oct. 13), a YA horror series featuring supernatural phenomena inspired by the graphic novels by R.L. Stine.

Finally, if you’re a fan of British period drama and/or nostalgia, know that a remastered version of the 1981 miniseries “Brideshead Revisited,” starring Jeremy Irons and Anthony Andrews, drops on BritBox on Oct. 12.

NOTE: The listings here are in Eastern Standard Time, and reflect information provided to me and cross-checked where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste.

Watchable Oct. 4 to 10, 2021

October 4, 2021 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Sort Of (Oct. 5, CBC Gem)

Bilal Baig stars as Sabi, a gender-fluid millennial, in “Sort Of.” PHOTO CREDIT: CBC

Perhaps the day will come when our screens will be so full of characters of varied genders, sexualities and ethnicities that we won’t feel the need to label them.

But that day isn’t here yet, so “Sort Of” is getting attention for being the first show on Canadian TV to have a non-binary lead character as well as the first to star a queer, South Asian, Muslim actor in Bilal Baig.

If that’s all “Sort Of” had going for it, I doubt I’d like it as much as I do, but it’s also the best kind of comedy series: one in which the humour flows organically and the characters act like human beings and not punchline generators.

Baig, who is queer, brown and trans-feminine (and uses the pronouns they and them), created “Sort Of” with Fab Filippo, who is straight and white. Their common ground was the idea that everyone is in transition in their lives.

So lead character Sabi is figuring out their place in the world, not only in relation to their gender and sexuality, but the other people around them, including their boyfriend, their sister and their Pakistani mother, to whom they haven’t come out yet.

But just when Sabi decides to ditch Toronto for queer-friendly Berlin with gender-fluid best friend 7ven (a delightful Amanda Cordner), the family that Sabi nannies for has a crisis and suddenly everybody’s relationships are in transition. And Sabi decides to stay.

If that sounds earnest, trust me: it’s also fun and charming and touching.

Sabi’s deadpan demeanour belies their vulnerability and big heart. Baig, a first-time TV actor, makes Sabi someone who’s easy to care about and root for.

They’re backed by a capable group of supporting actors, including Grace Lynn Kung and Gray Powell as the couple whose children Sabi minds; Elora Patnaik and Supinder Wraich as their mother and sister; Kaya Kanashiro and Aden Bedard as the kids; and transgender actors Cassandra James and Becca Blackwell as Sabi’s mentor and boss, respectively.

Slasher: Flesh & Blood (Oct. 4, 9 p.m., Hollywood Suite)

Sabrina Grdevich, David Cronenberg and Chris Jacot in “Slasher: Flesh & Blood.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Cole Burston for Shaftesbury

If the dysfunctional family of “Succession” was out for blood as well as money, you might have something like the fourth season of this made-in-Canada horror anthology series.

It focuses on the Galloway clan, which consists of sadistic patriarch Spencer (played by horror master David Cronenberg), greedy siblings Florence (Sabrina Grdevich) and Seamus (Chris Jacot), their more altruistic half-brother Jayden (Corteon Moore), his mother, Spencer’s second wife Grace (Rachael Crawford), and the grandkids and assorted hangers-on.

There’s at least one extramarital affair, a twin kidnapped 25 years earlier who mysteriously reappears, a secret illegitimate child, a reputed family ghost and, because this is “Slasher,” gallons of blood. And that’s just in the first two episodes.

The action kicks off at a family reunion at the Galloway estate on a small island. Rapacious businessman Spencer has a couple of surprises for the clan, one of which is that he’s reviving a former family game, a sort of treasure hunt/survival of the fittest competition, the winner of which will become sole heir to his entire estate.

Florence, Seamus and Grace are particularly cutthroat competitors and the game is a cruel one, but the relations have more than each other to worry about: there’s a killer in the woods and he’s dispatching his victims in ways that suggest the show’s makeup and prosthetics department was working overtime.

Look, this isn’t prestige TV, but it’s kind of fun to watch these people being terrible to each other while waiting for the next splattering of gore. So grab the popcorn (or not, if you’re squeamish) and enjoy.

Short Takes

Rita Moreno in 1953 at the premiere of the film “Lili.” PHOTO CREDIT: Murray Garrett/Getty Images

Rita Moreno: Just a Girl Who Decided to Go for It (Oct. 5, 9 p.m., PBS)

If your only knowledge of actor Rita Moreno comes from “West Side Story” or the TV shows “Oz” and “One Day at a Time,” I’d urge you to watch this fascinating documentary. I was a little embarrassed after doing so that I hadn’t paid more attention to Moreno during a seven-decade career that includes dozens of film and TV appearances as well as theatre roles: she’s one of just 16 EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Award) winners. And it’s clear from the doc that at 89 (87 when the film was being made) she’s nowhere near done. It’s also clear that of all the things that Moreno is, she’s primarily a survivor. The doc covers a lot of ground: her childhood in Puerto Rico; her teen years dancing in New York nightclubs to support her family; the sexism and racism she endured as an MGM contract player cast in “dusky maiden” roles; her rape by her agent; a tortured romance with Marlon Brando that led to a dangerous abortion and a suicide attempt; her reinvention as a TV actor when the movie roles dried up after her “West Side Story” Oscar; her long but troubled marriage; motherhood and more. As Moreno herself says, “Did having to struggle so much take something out of me? Not me, not I.”

Among the Stars (Oct. 6, Disney Plus)

We’re a long way from the days when astronauts were household names and every NASA mission brought blanket media coverage, but that doesn’t make space travel any less fascinating a subject. This docuseries follows American astronaut Chris Cassidy in his quest to get back to the International Space Station, but it also highlights the specialists on the ground who make such journeys possible. And it reminds us that space exploration is still risky, more than three decades removed from the Challenger disaster. The opening minutes of the series follow a spacewalk that had to be aborted when an astronaut’s life was endangered. If you enjoyed the Disney Plus series “The Right Stuff” and companion documentary “The Real Right Stuff,” or Apple TV Plus space drama “For All Mankind,” consider this a worthy addition to your viewing.

Disney Plus also has the Halloween special “Muppets Haunted Mansion” debuting Oct. 8.

Ghosts (Oct. 7, 9 p.m., Global TV)

Rose McIver and Utkarsh Ambudkar as Samantha and Jay, with their paranormal roomies in “Ghosts.” PHOTO CREDIT: Cliff Lipson/CBS

I approached this American remake of the charming British comedy of the same name with both eagerness and trepidation. For every U.S. adaptation that matches or exceeds the U.K. original — think “The Office” or “Shameless” — there are clangers like “Gracepoint,” a remake of “Broadchurch” that even David Tennant couldn’t save. I’m still on the fence about “Ghosts,” in which an American couple (Rose McIver and Utkarsh Ambudkar) inherits a Hudson Valley estate from a distant relative of hers, not realizing it’s already occupied by an octet of spirits. Based on the first episode (the only one I was given to screen) I much prefer the wry, self-deprecating performance of Charlotte Ritchie in the original to McIver’s perkiness, and the ghosts’ personas didn’t captivate me as immediately as in the Brit version. But I’ve seen other clips that made me chuckle, so perhaps there’s life in this dead people comedy yet.

Odds and Ends

I didn’t get a chance to preview a couple of Crave programs that piqued my interest. “15 Minutes of Shame” (Oct. 7) is a documentary look at public shaming, executive produced by someone who would know all about that: Monica Lewinsky, with “Catfish” host Max Joseph. And the Crave original doc “A.rtificial I.mmortality” (Oct. 8) examines the idea of using technological advances to create an immortal version of oneself.

Netflix’s offerings include Season 4 of L.A. high school drama “On My Block” (Oct. 4); the docuseries “Bad Sport” (Oct. 6), an intersection of sports scandal and true crime; competition series “Baking Impossible” (Oct. 6); and sitcom “Pretty Smart” (Oct. 8).

CBC has Season 3 of its Halifax-set legal drama “Diggstown” (Oct. 6, 9 p.m. on CBC TV and CBC Gem) and Season 2 of sci-fi import “War of the Worlds” (Oct. 6, 8 p.m., CBC and CBC Gem).

NOTE: The listings here are in Eastern Standard Time, and reflect information provided to me and cross-checked where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste.

Watchable Sept. 20 to 26, 2021

September 20, 2021 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Born Bad (Sept. 25, 8 p.m., CBC and CBC Gem)

There’s been a lot of attention paid recently to the abuses perpetrated on Indigenous children in Canada’s residential schools, and rightfully so. This doc shines light on another group of children victimized by the state: the thousands who were sent to Ontario training schools as far back as the 1930s but mainly from 1953 to 1984.

The “schools” were meant for so-called “delinquent” kids who couldn’t be managed by their parents or other institutions. But the doc by Marc de Guerre (“Who’s Sorry Now?” “Why Men Cheat”) makes clear these were essentially jails for children as young as 8 and, in many cases, no crime had been committed. Children could be incarcerated for things like skipping school or, according to a former psychologist who tried to help kids at a training school in Bowmanville, something as trivial as chewing gum in church.

“The purpose of a training school shall be to provide the boys or girls therein with a mental, moral, physical and vocational education, training and employment,” says a line from the Ontario Training Schools Act of 1950.

In fact, what they got was brutality and intimidation from so-called teachers who weren’t properly trained or supervised, as well as from other inmates.

Wendy Herrell, a survivor of the Kawartha Lakes Training School in Lindsay, Ont., calls it “a beautiful hunting ground . . . What better place to work when you’re a pedophile?”

Another survivor, Rick Brown, who attended the Brookside Training School in Cobourg when he was 10, recounts how a teacher hit him so hard his eardrums burst.

Thomas Lavoie, who was also at Brookside from the ages of 11 to 15, was raped by another boy whom the guards had groomed to keep the other kids in line.

“Back then, adults could do anything they wanted to kids,” says Wendy. There was no one to tell about the violence and even if there was, “You think they’re gonna believe a bad kid?” says Shelly Richardson, another Brookside survivor.

Three of the four survivors interviewed came from grossly troubled homes where they endured physical, psychological or sexual abuse, and/or alcoholic parents. That they ended up stealing, skipping school and otherwise acting out is no surprise. But that they ended up in places where, in the words of psychologist Don Weitz, “the government of Ontario was assaulting children and calling it training” was a hideous abuse of power.

There is a class action lawsuit against the government seeking $600 million to be divided among up to 20,000 survivors. The case is expected to go to trial in 2023.

Obviously money can’t take away the pain of the abuse — we get a taste of it from the survivors interviewed in the doc and those are the ones who are traumatized but coping — but I hope they get every penny they’re asking for.

The Big Leap (Sept. 21, 10 p.m., CTV)

Simone Recasner and Ser’Darius Blain in “The Big Leap.” PHOTO CREDIT: Sandy Morris/FOX

This Fox series had me at “reality dance show.”

I have long been a devotee of “So You Think You Can Dance” so was intrigued by the fact “The Big Leap’s” comedy drama plays out against a TV dance competition.

That’s where the similarities end, though. The dance show in “Leap” is far more cutthroat and manipulative than anything I ever witnessed on a “SYTYCD” set. Also, not all of the fictional competitors are, strictly speaking, dancers.

The objective is to whip the chosen ones into shape for a gender-blind performance of “Swan Lake,” but also to exploit whatever crises and insecurities they’re experiencing for audience entertainment.

Scott Foley (“Scandal,” “Felicity”) plays Nick, the Machiavellian producer in charge of that task. Kevin Daniels (“Modern Family”) plays a sympathetic judge and Mallory Jansen (“Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.”) is the scary, mean one.

The main contestants Nick’s looking to exploit include Gabby (Simone Recasner), who left her dance ambitions behind when she got pregnant in high school and is battling body image issues; Julia (Teri Polo, “The Fosters”), a former ballet dancer whose marriage is falling apart and who’s freaked out about aging; and Mike (Jon Rudnitsky, “Saturday Night Live”), a non-dancer who lost his factory job and his wife, and is hoping to win the latter back through the show.

This isn’t high concept television. It’s pretty easy to guess, for instance, that Gabby — who’s in a triangle involving disgraced former football player Reggie (Ser’Darius Blain) and nasty, skinny ballroom dancer Brittney (Anna Grace Barlow) — will at some point get a chance to eclipse Brittney onstage. Or that Mike will eventually get romantic with executive Paula (Piper Perabo) despite his laser focus on his ex-wife. Or that Nick will probably turn out to be not as much of a jerk as he seems. And I’m spitballing here because I’ve only seen two episodes.

Still, you want to root for the show’s lovable losers to redeem themselves, especially Gabby, who shows an admirable determination not to let anyone else define her. And you do get to see some actual dancing, especially with ringers like Ray Cham Jr. in the cast.

The Wonder Years (Sept. 22, 7:30 p.m., CTV)

Dule Hill, Saycon Sengbloh, Elisha Wiliams and Laura Kariuki in “The Wonder Years.”
PHOTO CREDIT: ABC

This remake of the 1988 sitcom about a middle class family in the late ’60s and early ’70s has the task of presenting a feel-good slice of nostalgia while not shying away from the racial reality of a Black family in 1960s America.

Based on the episode I saw, the only one available for review, “The Wonder Years” manages to walk that line.

When it begins in 1968 Montgomery, Alabama, the now adult narrator (voiced by Don Cheadle) says that his parents taught him “how to handle yourself around cops” and notes that the country is facing a presidential election that creates a racial divide, but Dean (Elisha Williams) has more universal concerns the year he turns 12: how to get the girl he likes to like him, how to avoid the school bully, how to look cool despite his glasses.

Dean and his best friend Cory (Amari O’Neil) don’t even notice when a couple of white kids at their recently desegregated school back away from the water fountain after Cory takes a drink.

Dean’s family — musician and music professor dad Bill (Dule Hill), accountant mom Lillian (Saycon Sengbloh) and university-bound sister Kim (Laura Kariuki) —lives in a comfortable Black neighbourhood. Bill doesn’t see a reason to mix with white folks so is reluctant to grant Dean’s request to play baseball against a white team that includes his Jewish friend Brad (Julian Lerner).

The game seems like a prime scenario for small-scale racial conflict, but it’s not the white kids who impede Dean’s playing but the rivalry between his dad and the Black coach (Allen Maldonado). And then a real-life tragedy interrupts the game and unites the Black participants in grief.

“It felt like the world around us had changed forever,” says Dean, but “the world on the inside hadn’t.”

It remains to be seen if “The Wonder Years” can maintain that balance between its outside and inside worlds, but the cast certainly seems up to it.

CTV also has “Our Kind of People” debuting Sept. 21 at 9 p.m., a dramedy about a single mom (Yaya DaCosta) trying to break into a wealthy Black enclave in Martha’s Vineyard, as well as singing competition “Alter Ego” (Sept. 22, 10 p.m.) and “Celebrity Wheel of Fortune” (Sept. 26, 8 p.m.). Crave has Season 2 of “The L Word: Generation Q” (Sept. 20, 9 p.m.), Season 3 of “Doom Patrol” (Sept. 23, 9:30 p.m.) and the Starz crime drama “BMF” (Sept. 26).

Midnight Mass (Sept. 24, Netflix)

Zach Gilford and Hamish Linklater in “Midnight Mass.” PHOTO CREDIT: Eike Schroter/Netflix

What is it that makes islands the perfect setting for horror TV and movies? Probably the sense of not being able to easily escape, which was certainly the case in HBO’s creepy “The Third Day.”

In this series from Mike Flanagan, the creator of Netflix horror hits “The Haunting of Hill House” and “The Haunting of Bly Manor,” tiny Crockett Island is the scene of the supernatural goings-on.

The locals don’t seem as threatening as the ones in “The Third Day,” but there’s still an undercurrent of unease as native son Riley (Zach Gilford, “Friday Night Lights”) returns home after spending four years in jail for driving drunk and killing someone.

But Riley’s discomfort at being back in this insular place and his regrets over what he’s done are the least of his worries. The real trouble starts when aged parish priest Monsignor Pruitt fails to return from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land and, in his place, appears Father Paul (Hamish Linklater, “Legion”).

You don’t need to be an expert in the genre to know there’s something off about the new priest. Riley, town doctor Sarah (Annabeth Gish, “The Haunting of Hill House”) and Muslim sheriff Hassan (Rahul Kohli, “The Haunting of Bly Manor”) seem like the only people who are skeptical after Father Paul performs an apparent miracle during Sunday mass. The church is suddenly packed with acolytes and others start noticing physical changes in themselves — although one of those changes is devastating for Riley’s love interest, expectant mom Erin (Kate Siegel).

Town meanie and devout Catholic Bev Keane (Samantha Sloyan, “Grey’s Anatomy”) is fully on board, even after she discovers the secret behind the miracle.

In this case, the angel as well as the devil is in the details. I don’t want to spoil the reveal of the creature that’s hiding in the shadows of Crockett Island, but it puts a different spin on the idea of divine intervention as well as the extremes of faith.

The series is steeped in the rituals of the Catholic Church, with plenty of scenes that take place during mass and episodes named after books of the Bible. It’s hard to tell if Catholic-raised Flanagan is demonstrating reverence for the religion or the opposite, considering that the higher power to which Father Paul appeals seems more evil than benevolent.

“Midnight Mass” gets off to a slow start — it isn’t until episode 4 that the horror really ramps up — but it draws you in nonetheless.

Netflix also has Season 2 of “Love on the Spectrum” (Sept. 20); “Monsters Inside: The 24 Faces of Billy Milligan” (Sept. 22), about a serial rapist diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder; and Season 4 of “Dear White People” (Sept. 22).

Odds and Ends

Alison (Charlotte Ritchie, left) and Mike (Keill Smith-Bynoe, right) and their mansion full of spirits
are back for Season 2 of “Ghosts.” PHOTO CREDIT: Courtesy of CBC

If you’re looking for something fun to watch that’s not overly demanding of either time or brain cells, I recommend “Ghosts.” CBC Gem has Season 2 debuting Sept. 24 (with episodes running about a half-hour you can easily catch up on Season 1 there if you haven’t already). Alison and Mike (Charlotte Ritchie and Keill Smith-Bynoe) are still stuck in their haunted money pit of an inherited mansion. The normal and paranormal roomies have learned to co-exist, but the ghosts aren’t much help as Mike and Alison struggle to make enough money to maintain the house.

CBC Gem also has Season 2 of homemade web series “The Next Stop” on Sept. 24.

Hollywood Suite has “Relentless: The Kevin Porter Story” (Sept. 21) about the Ontario firefighter and paramedic who pursued a professional hockey career in his 40s.

Global TV has Season 41 — yes, 41! — of reality TV granddaddy “Survivor” (Sept. 22, 8 p.m.) and, if you think about it, the show is really the ultimate survivor. It also has the new spinoff “NCIS: Hawai’i” (Sept. 26, 9 p.m.), featuring the franchise’s first female special agent in charge (Vanessa Lachey).

You can also catch “Savage X Fenty Show Vol. 3” Sept 24 on Amazon Prime Video, featuring the latest fashion collection from superstar Rihanna.

The Watchable list will return

September 13, 2021 /

If you’ve been following this space, you know I’ve been publishing a weekly list of TV reviews since I started this blog in April 2020, and never missed a week despite vacations, stat holidays, whatever. But my editing and writing workload for the Toronto Star this week and last was just too heavy to provide time to watch any screeners. The list will return next Monday, Sept. 20. And there will be a “Bachelor in Paradise” recap this week.

Watchable Sept. 6 to 12, 2021

September 6, 2021 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Reservation Dogs (Now on Disney Plus Star)

Lane Factor as Cheese, Paulina Alexis as Willie Jack, D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai as Bear and Devery Jacobs as Elora Danan in “Reservation Dogs.” PHOTO CREDIT: Shane Brown/FX

“Reservation Dogs” is its own unique thing and also utterly universal.

The proudly Indigenous comedy is about four friends — Bear (Canadian Oji-Cree actor D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai), Elora (Canadian Mohawk actor Devery Jacobs), Willie Jack (Paulina Alexis of Alberta’s Alexis Nakota Sioux Nation) and Cheese (Lane Factor, a Creek-Seminole and Caddo actor from Oklahoma) — living on the rez in rural Oklahoma, plotting to escape to California.

That specificity, the fact that every writer, director and cast regular on the show is Indigenous, and the humorous matter-of-factness with which the series presents its Indigeneity make it groundbreaking. But Bear, Elora, Willie and Cheese could also be any bored teenagers anywhere — Indigenous or otherwise — yearning for something more without knowing what they actually want.

When we first meet them, the foursome are stealing a delivery truck full of spicy potato chips. Despite the ease with which they accomplish this, these are no hardened criminals. The theft — along with the other petty crimes they’ve been committing around the village — are a means to an end: fattening up their running-away fund.

They are mourning their friend Daniel, who’s been dead a year and whose dream it was to get to California. But Bear, Willie and Cheese all seem less keen on the plan than Elora.

Also complicating things is that another gang of teens is out to get them, the self-named Indian Mafia, which is problematic since the Reservation Dogs aren’t even really a gang and aren’t particularly tough.

In one of the funnier episodes, they visit Elora’s reclusive uncle, a notorious bar brawler in his younger days, to try to get tips on how to fight but end up driving him all over town trying to sell his skunky homegrown marijuana.

During a Television Critics Association panel, the cast members and creators Sterlin Harjo and Taika Waititi emphasized that Indigenous communities everywhere are full of humour. That humour, as expressed in “Dogs,” is subtle and situational, and the four leads deliver it with aplomb, especially neophyte actor Alexis, but even the minor characters have impact here.

That includes Lil Mike and Funny Bone, whom people will recognize from “America’s Got Talent,” as bike-riding, rapping twins Mose and Mekko; Kirk Fox (“Parks and Recreation”) as Kenny Boy, movie-loving meth dealer and receiver of stolen goods; Zahn McClarnon (“Fargo,” “Westworld”) as laid-back tribal cop Big; and Dallas Goldtooth as the ghost of a warrior from the Battle of Little Bighorn — except that he didn’t actually fight because, as he was charging Custer, his horse tripped on a gopher hole, rolled over and squashed him.

Goldtooth’s Spirit character is a particularly funny poke at the stereotypes that “Reservation Dogs” is trying to lay to rest and also a reminder that the supernatural often co-exists with the so-called normal in Indigenous entertainment.

It’s not defined whether Spirit is real or a figment of Bear’s imagination, and the same goes for the deer woman (played by Canadian Mohawk actor Kaniehtiio Horn) that Big remembers from his childhood and the Sasquatch-like Tall Man that Willie Jack’s father sees in the woods. And it doesn’t really matter; they are part of the characters’ reality.

Painful things are also part of that reality. It’s implied but not stated outright, at least not in the six episodes I screened, that Daniel killed himself. Elora lost her mother when she was three. Bear is being raised by his mother (Canadian Indigenous actor Sarah Podemski) since the rapper dad he idolizes can’t be bothered to even visit. Yet the teens are nurtured by family, friends and the larger community.

Anyway, the pain isn’t the point here, which is very much the point of “Reservation Dogs.” The “Dogs” and everyone else they know are not one thing, but many things, just like any other human being.

Impeachment: American Crime Story (Sept. 7, FX)

Sarah Paulson as Linda Tripp and Beanie Feldstein as Monica Lewinsky
in “Impeachment: American Crime Story.” PHOTO CREDIT: Tina Thorpe/FX

It seems from what the producers have said to the media that a large part of the purpose of this drama is to try to change the way the women who were part of the Bill Clinton impeachment scandal are perceived.

They might stand a chance with Monica Lewinsky and Paula Jones, but Linda Tripp? Good luck with that.

Sarah Paulson, nearly unrecognizable in the role in prosthetics and a “fat suit,” seemed defensive of Tripp during a Television Critics Association panel, bristling at a reporter’s comment that Tripp was unlikeable. But Tripp does seem unlikeable from the get-go in this 10-episode series: petty, judgmental, vindictive, self-important — and that’s before she gets anywhere near Lewinsky.

I suppose you could argue that Tripp’s decision to tape Lewinsky’s phone calls about her affair with Clinton and to turn those tapes over to independent counsel Ken Starr — whose report led to a vote to impeach Clinton in 1998 — was motivated by her respect for the institution of government and her anger over Clinton’s treatment of Lewinsky. But it also reeks of a desire to insert herself into the drama and make herself seem important. After all, she started taping the calls — as “Impeachment” tells it — at the instigation of literary agent Lucianne Goldberg (the ever reliable Margo Martindale) as material for a tell-all book she was hoping to write.

However you feel about her, Tripp is a key part of the action in “Impeachment,” at least the four episodes I had time to watch.

And what of Lewinsky, who was a producer and consultant on the show, even vetting some of the scripts?

It’s easy to shake our heads at Lewinsky’s choices. She comes off here as a bright but naive 20-something, head over heels in love with the president, blind initially to the fact that she was being used — as if the leader of the most powerful country in the world would trade his political might for sporadic, tawdry encounters in a private office. But it’s arguable she would have got a fairer hearing if Clinton’s dalliance with an intern, and its enormous imbalance of power, had come out during the #MeToo era instead of when it did.

And then there’s Paula Jones, portrayed by Annaleigh Ashford, who seems the most sympathetic of the three: a rube who got manipulated by right-wing ghouls like Susan Carpenter-McMillan (Judith Light) into a battle she couldn’t win, collateral damage in the Republicans’ vendetta against the Clintons.

If nothing else, the series is a feast for those who appreciate good acting, including Edie Falco as Hillary Clinton, Cobie Smulders as Ann Coulter and Clive Owen as Bill Clinton, although I’d say his is the least convincing portrayal.

The series doesn’t have the same crackle as “The People v. O.J. Simpson,” but I found it watchable nonetheless.

Short Takes

Priyanka during her Season 1 “Canada’s Drag Race” victory. PHOTO CREDIT: Bell Media

Canada’s Drag Race Anniversary Extravaganza (Sept. 6, 9 p.m., Crave)

This 90-minute special is meant to whet our appetites for Season 2 of “Canada’s Drag Race.” Presided over by Season 1 champion Priyanka, it’s mostly a strut down memory lane and a catch-up with the first season cast, most of them in studio aside from Rita Baga, Kiara and Kyne on video link. There’s also a meet-and-greet with new judges Brad Goreski, Traci Melchor and Amanda Brugel, and music videos from Tynomi Banks, BOA and Priyanka. It’s not all glitter and grins, with BOA calling out Priyanka for not returning her texts, and Scarlett BoBo and Ilona Verley talking about their broken friendship. Mind you, this must have been shot before Ilona went public slamming “Drag Race” producers for not letting them talk about their trans identity on the show.

Jessica Chastain and Oscar Isaac in “Scenes From a Marriage.” PHOTO CREDIT: JoJo Whilden/HBO

Scenes From a Marriage (Sept. 12, 9 p.m., HBO/Crave)

Look, I won’t bore you by bemoaning what a crazy week I had last week; just know that I didn’t get to watch as many screeners as I needed to, which means I got through only one episode of this drama, an adaptation of Ingmar Bergmann’s 1973 miniseries about a couple’s marriage falling apart. First impressions: Jessica Chastain and Oscar Isaac are excellent as the central couple, as you’d expect, and it seems like a thoughtfully made, thought-provoking drama, but it wouldn’t be fair to say more without having seen more.

Crave also has Showtime’s “American Rust” (Sept. 12, 10 p.m.), which looks intriguing in the trailer and has a cast led by Jeff Daniels and Maura Tierney.

Odds and Ends

Jenn Colella and the cast of the “Come From Away” movie. PHOTO CREDIT: Apple TV Plus

The filmed version of the theatre musical “Come From Away” debuts on Apple TV Plus on Sept. 10, just ahead of the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The musical is about how residents in Gander and other Newfoundland towns took care of the more than 6,500 “plane people” who were stranded there when the attacks led to U.S. airspace being closed. Unfortunately, reviews are embargoed until Tuesday.

Showcase has “Dr. Death” (Sept. 12, 9 p.m.), starring Canadian Joshua Jackson as the real-life Texas doctor who left his spinal surgery patients maimed or dead.

Fans of the drama “Lucifer” will be pleased to know Season 6 is coming to Netflix on Sept. 10. That same day, Netflix has “Metal Shop Masters,” a competition series for metal artists. Personally, I couldn’t be bothered with “Countdown Inspiration4 Mission to Space” (Sept. 6), which is meant to culminate with the Sept. 15 launch of SpaceX’s Inspiration4 rocket, with an all-civilian crew orbiting Earth, but if you’re a fan of billionaires like Elon Musk fiddling in space while the Earth burns, have at ‘er. There’s also the documentary “Untold: Breaking Point” (Sept. 7), about American tennis player Mardy Fish’s mental health challenges.

Disney Plus has “Doogie Kamealoha, M.D.” (Sept. 8), in which the plot line about a teenage doctor (Neil Patrick Harris in the 1989 original) has been updated with a female, mixed race lead, Peyton Elizabeth Lee, and the action moved to Hawaii.

Amazon’s main debut this week is the movie “Voyeurs” (Sept. 10), which has Sydney Sweeney of “The White Lotus” and “The Handmaid’s Tale,” and Justice Smith (“The Get Down”) as a young couple who get more than they bargained for when they spy on their sexy neighbours across the way (Ben Hardy and Natasha Liu Bordizzo). This was shot and set in Montreal.

There’s a “Days of Our Lives” spinoff series, “Beyond Salem,” on StackTV on Sept. 6.

Stop-motion comedy “Robot Chicken” is back for its 11th season Sept. 6 at midnight on Adult Swim.

If you have an appetite for new food shows, Mary Berg is back on TV with “Mary Makes It Easy” Sept. 6 at 8 p.m. on CTV Life Channel, followed by 8:30 p.m. by “Up the Dish” with Carolyn Sandler.

NOTE: The listings here are in Eastern Standard Time, and reflect information provided to me and cross-checked where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste.

Watchable Aug. 30-Sept 5, 2021

August 30, 2021 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Only Murders in the Building (Aug. 31, Disney Plus)

Neighbours Mabel, Oliver and Charles (Selena Gomez, Martin Short and Steve Martin)
in “Only Murders in the Building.” PHOTO CREDIT: Craig Blankenhorn/Hulu)

You’d already have most viewers at “Steve Martin and Martin Short in a TV comedy together,” but throw in Selena Gomez as a sarcastic third wheel, a grand old New York apartment building as a setting and an actual mystery to be solved, and you have the delightful “Only Murders in the Building.”

The septuagenarians and their 30-something neighbour form an unlikely trio when a fire alarm drives them out of their Beaux-Arts building and into a bar where they discover their shared passion for a certain true crime podcast.

Charles (Martin) is an actor who’s coasting on his fame from a decades-old detective drama. Oliver (Short) is an off-off-off-off-off Broadway director who’s still gunning for Great White Way glory. Mabel (Gomez) is an aspiring interior designer from a humble Long Island neighbourhood who’s staying in her aunt’s apartment.

When the young man they all saw in the elevator just an hour before turns up dead in his ninth-floor apartment, the “true crime nuts” band together to figure out who killed him, turning their hunt into a podcast at the urging of Oliver with the name “Only Murders in the Building” — as in they’ll only investigate crimes that happen in their building.

All three are personally and professionally adrift for various reasons and the podcast gives them a sense of purpose and the connection they’ve been missing. The fronts they’ve all put up — Charles’s reserve, Oliver’s preening and Mabel’s ironic detachment — start to crumble as they begin to care about each other. And we begin to care right along with them.

Martin and Short, having appeared together in beloved films like “Three Amigos” and “Father of the Bride,” as well as their 2018 Netflix comedy special, have their characters and their prickly relationship down pat, but Gomez holds her own against the two legends.

She even gets some of the best lines. When Oliver explains that he keeps his door unlocked to be neighbourly, Mabel quips, “A murderer probably lives in the building, but I guess old white guys are only afraid of colon cancer and societal change.”

As the trio follows clues to what looks like a viable solution to the mystery, they get a skeptical police detective (Da’Vine Joy Randolph) on side, but a twist at the end of Episode 8 — which is as far as I was given access to — makes it clear the killer is still on the loose and our amateur criminologists are at risk.

The 10-episode series was created by Martin and Brooklyn-born actor and screenwriter John Hoffman (“Grace and Frankie”), with Dan Fogelman (“This Is Us”) executive-producing.

The supporting cast is also nothing to sneeze at, including some real-life New York habitués like Nathan Lane, Amy Ryan and Michael Cyril Creighton. Sting appears as himself and there’s another cameo by a high-profile comedy star that I’m not allowed to tell you about.

“Only Murders in the Building” is appealing as a buddy comedy a trois, and as a gentle satire of both New Yorkers and the true crime genre, and at its best when Martin, Short and Gomez are all onscreen, leading us down an entertaining rabbit hole.

Disney Plus also has “The D’Amelio Show” (Sept. 3) about TikTok stars Dixie and Charli D’Amelio and their family.

What We Do in the Shadows (Sept. 2, 10 p.m., FX)

Laszlo (Matt Berry), Nadja (Natasia Demetriou), Colin Robinson (Mark Proksch), Nandor (Kayvan Novak) and Guillermo (Harvey Guillén) in “What We Do in the Shadows.” PHOTO CREDIT: Russ Martin/FX

Vampires, they’re just like us.

Or, at least, the vampires of this Emmy-nominated comedy are human-like enough in the foibles that creator Jemaine Clement and his writers mine for laughs, which is obviously the main appeal of the show.

As Season 3 begins, housemates Nandor (Kayvan Novak), Laszlo (Matt Berry), Nadja (Natasia Demetriou) and Colin Robinson (Mark Proksch) have a dilemma: what to do with human familiar Guillermo (Harvey Guillén), who saved their lives at the end of Season 2 by slaying the dozens of vampires who were about to execute them but has now been exposed as a vampire killer.

I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that Guillermo survives and even gets a promotion of sorts as the Staten Island blood suckers become default rulers of the Vampiric Council for the Eastern Seaboard, seeing as how Guillermo killed off the old ones.

Nandor and Nadja each hope to grab power for themselves — and Nadja, who’s having a smidgen of a feminist awakening, is pleased to become a “working woman” — although Nandor is beginning to wonder if there’s more to eternal life than “mindless killing and bloodlust.” Energy vampire Colin Robinson — who, in a welcome development, has become a more equal member of the household — wants to know where he came from as he turns 100. And Laszlo? He’s keen to explore’s the world’s oldest and largest collection of pornography in the Vampiric Council library.

So no, not everyone is feeling reflective.

I can’t say that the four episodes I was able to review were uniformly hilarious but, three seasons in, I’m invested enough to enjoy watching the world’s least cool vampires and their wannabe companion muddle through.

Wellington Paranormal (Sept. 3, Crave)

Mike Minogue, Maaka Pohatu and Karen O’Leary star “Wellington Paranormal.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Stan Alley/The CW

If the absurdity of “What We Do in the Shadows” tickles your funny bone, you should enjoy this show, which Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi created as a spinoff of the movie version of “Shadows.”

Lead “Wellington Paranormal” actors Mike Minogue and Karen O’Leary appeared in the film, credited only as “Policeman” and “Policewoman.” Here, they’re the main event as Officer Minogue and Officer O’Leary, put in charge of the newly formed Wellington police paranormal unit.

Minogue considers them the New Zealand version of Mulder and Scully of “The X-Files” — if Mulder and Scully had a habit of routinely overlooking clues.

I’ve only seen the first season — all three seasons to date will be on Crave, while a fourth season is reportedly in post-production — in which Minogue and O’Leary investigate demons, aliens, ghosts, werewolves, vampires and zombies, but it seems the supernatural selection expands in the subsequent instalments.

A particular highlight of the show is their true believer boss, Sgt. Maaka (Maaka Pohatu), who sets up the secret unit in a tiny office hidden behind shelves. The deadpan earnestness with which all three handle investigations and the low-budget nature of the operation, including the sometimes ridiculous looking creatures, is all part of the charm.

Short Takes

Bitchin’: The Sound and the Fury of Rick James (Sept. 3, Crave)

If your only knowledge of funk musician Rick James is the song “Super Freak” and his 1990s assault convictions, you’ll learn some things in this documentary. There’s no question that James, born James Ambrose Johnson Jr. in Buffalo in 1948, had a very dark, misogynistic side, fuelled by rampant cocaine and other drug use, but the doc also makes the case for his unique contribution to Black American music via the “punk funk” style he pioneered. His musical output went way behind “Super Freak,” including the triple platinum album “Street Songs,” but author David Ritz notes that fame “will chew you up and spit you out” if you’re not emotionally well grounded. It caught up with James in 2004 when he died at the age of 56 with nine drugs in his system.

Crave also has the movie “Promising Young Woman,” which won Emerald Fennell (“The Crown”) an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, dropping on Sept. 3 and the mid-Season 5 premiere of Billions on Sept. 5.

Odds and Ends

Nicholas Galitzine and Camila Cabello in “Cinderella.” PHOTO CREDIT: Christopher Raphael/Amazon

Camila Cabello is the star attraction in a musical remake of “Cinderella” (Sept. 3, Amazon Prime Video), which also stars Billy Porter of “Pose,” who gets bigger billing than the Prince (Nicholas Galitzine) as Fab G, a genderless fairy godparent.

The 2017 documentary “Metric: Dreams So Real” makes its broadcast premiere on Hollywood Suite (Sept. 2, 9 p.m.), capturing a 2016 concert by the Toronto band and kicking off a month of musical programming on the pay TV channel.

Netflix has the documentary series “Turning Point: 9/11 and the War on Terror” (Sept. 1), which examines what led to the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001 and how they changed history; Part 5, Volume 1 of the Spanish hit “Money Heist” (Sept. 3); the animated series “Q-Force” (Sept. 2) about an intelligence squad of LGBTQ geniuses; Season 3 of social media reality competition “The Circle” (Sept. 2) and the new series “Sparking Joy” (Aug. 31) if you’re not all Marie Kondo’ed out.

PBS “Masterpiece” has the four-part series “Guilt” (Sept. 5, 9 p.m.), about two Scottish brothers played by two Scottish actors, Mark Bonnar (“Line of Duty,” “Quiz”) and Jamie Sives (“Frontier,” “Game of Thrones”), who kill someone in a hit-and-run and try to cover it up.

On BritBox, the popular detective drama “Vera,” starring Brenda Blethyn, returns for its 11th season on Sept. 1.

NOTE: The listings here are in Eastern Standard Time, and reflect information provided to me and cross-checked where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste.

Watchable Aug. 23 to 29, 2021

August 23, 2021 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: 9/11: One Day in America (Aug. 29, 9 p.m., National Geographic)

An aerial view of Ground Zero in Manhattan burning. PHOTO CREDIT: NIST

I used to have an acquaintance who, every Sept. 11, would share her story online of escaping the World Trade Center on the day the towers fell in 2001.

I lost touch with Adrienne so it’s been years since I read her account. I no longer recall which tower she was in or what floor she was on, but I remember how her words never failed to grip me no matter how many times I read them.

Watching an episode of “9/11: One Day in America” reminded me of her story. The six-part series uses equally powerful stories from survivors to recount that horrible day minute by minute, from the first attack by a hijacked commercial jet on the North Tower of the trade centre, to the subsequent attacks on the South Tower and the Pentagon, to the crash of hijacked Flight 93 in a field in Pennsylvania after passengers and crew stormed the cockpit. Two thousand, 977 people died that day 20 years ago.

That death toll is small compared to the ongoing fatality rate of the COVID-19 pandemic, but no one who remembers that day will ever forget what they were doing when they heard the news or — for those of us who felt immune from terrorism as North Americans — how profoundly it shook their world view.

The difference between “One Day in America” and other Sept. 11 documentaries I’ve seen is that it shares survivors’ stories without any narration or expert commentary; just their words supplemented by video and audio footage of the events.

Following a virtual screening I attended of Episode 2, “The South Tower,” executive producer T.J. Martin explained that he and co-producer Dan Lindsay (“Undefeated”) wanted to present an oral history of the day, free from the “geopolitics” that had attached themselves to Sept. 11, as “a conduit for empathy.”

I can’t imagine listening to the eyewitness accounts and not feeling empathy. Consider Stanley Praimnath, whose office on the South Tower’s 81st floor was in the direct path of the jetliner. Somehow surviving after pieces of the plane flattened walls and mangled furniture, he was saved when Brian Clark, who was making his way down from the 84th floor, heard his cries for help.

Brian and nine or 10 others were stopped on the 81st floor landing by a woman who told them they had to go back up. His companions retraced their steps and died. Brian chose to stay and help Stanley. Together, they made their way to the ground, effectively saving each other’s lives.

Kathy Comerford, who was blown out of her shoes on the 70th floor, recalls how people helped each other on the way out, especially how security guard Rick Rescorla sang to calm the terrified evacuees when they reached the 44th floor. He died in the collapse of the South Tower after refusing to leave so he could make sure he hadn’t missed anyone.

That’s just a fraction of what you’ll see and hear, and I won’t pretend it’s an easy watch. I have left out the more graphic memories from emergency responders at the scene. What makes it worthwhile is the humanity that shines through.

After Episode 1 on Aug. 29, episodes 2 and 3 air Aug. 30 at 9 and 10 p.m.; episodes 4 and 5 on Aug. 31 at 9 and 10 p.m., and episode 6 on Sept. 1 at 9 p.m.

American Horror Stories (Aug. 25, Disney Plus)

If you are a fan of the Ryan Murphy-Brad Falchuk brand of gore mixed with sex and humour, this series might be right up your alley.

Personally I was a bit blood-and-guts fatigued after four episodes.

Not to mention that the content skews very YA in that the protagonists, at least from what I saw, are mostly teenagers (well, 20- and 30-somethings playing teenagers).

Although billed as an anthology series, episodes 1 and 2 are a two-parter that takes place in the infamous “Murder House” of “American Horror Story” Season 1, while the finale (which I did not screen) returns to that venue.

The first episodes feature Sierra McCormick (“The Vast of Night”) as Scarlett, the lesbian daughter of a gay couple (Matt Bomer and Gavin Creel) who plan to turn the house into a spooky B&B. It doesn’t take much imagination to figure out those plans go awry, particularly since Scarlett has a taste for ultra-violent porn, a good fit for a house full of ghosts of murders past.

I didn’t find Scarlett particularly sympathetic, not even as the target of a group of mean girls led by her crush Maya (Paris Jackson).

The same applies to other characters like Chad (Rhenzy Feliz) in Episode 3, whose obsession with getting into his reluctant girlfriend’s pants leads him to a drive-in where a banned movie that purportedly turns its audience into killers is playing. And don’t get me started on the sociopathic social media influencer “bros” in Episode 4, who mess with the wrong mall Santa.

There’s at least some fun to be had in those episodes from seeing old pros like Adrienne Barbeau and Danny Trejo in small but choice roles.

But overall the series leaves me with an impression I’ve had from other Murphy-Falchuk efforts, that it’s style over substance.

“American Horror Story” also returns this week, with the 10th instalment, “Double Feature,” debuting on FX Aug. 25 at 10 p.m. I wasn’t able to get an advance look at that one.

Clickbait (Aug. 25, Netflix)

Zoe Kazan stars as the sister of a kidnap victim in “Clickbait” (with Kate Lister as a pesky reporter). PHOTO CREDIT: Ben King/Netflix

There are lots of excellent crime dramas out there. “Clickbait” isn’t one of them.

I presume it’s meant to be a commentary on the ubiquity of technology, albeit not a very nuanced one. The plot is driven by seemingly devoted husband and father Nick (Adrian Grenier) being kidnapped and popping up in a video holding hand-lettered signs that say he abuses women and that he’ll die when the video reaches five million views.

Cue the search, in which the Oakland police piggyback on the work of citizen investigators who create a geocaching app to find Nick, while the cops and his family follow up clues on social media sites, dating apps, CCTV footage and so on.

The actors do what they can with a weak and cliched script, but the characterizations are so shallow you’d hurt yourself if you dove into them.

Take Nick’s sister Pia, played by Zoe Kazan (“The Big Sick”), who spends most of her time stomping around being either angry or sad and not much in between. Betty Gabriel (“Defending Jacob”) plays Nick’s seemingly perfect wife Sophie and Australian actor Phoenix Raei is ambitious but caring detective Roshan Amir, who’s Muslim, which we know because we see snippets of him praying, and his mother trying to feed him and asking why he hasn’t been promoted to homicide yet. See what I mean about cliches?

Anyway, by the time I watched four of the eight episodes, I really didn’t care whether Nick was a good guy or a bad guy, or what happened to him.

You’d be better off to check out “Motel Makeover” (Aug. 25), which follows media darlings April Brown and Sarah Sklash, proprietors of the trendy June Motel in Prince Edward County, as they “Junify” a 24-room motel, plus restaurant and pool, in Sauble Beach over just five months.

April Brown and Sarah Sklash check out a dated room in the former Knight’s Inn.
PHOTO CREDIT: Geoff George/Courtesy of Netflix

If you’re not put off by the pair’s cheerful go-girl energy, there are pleasures to be had in watching them transform a mess of 1970s wood panelling and smelly carpets into the stuff that millennial dreams are made of.

Personally, I’m a sucker for a nice paint job and some thrift-store treasure hunting.

Also on Netflix this week are the animated spinoff “The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf” (Aug. 23); Part 4 of the comedy series “Family Reunion” (Aug. 24) and the film “He’s All That” (Aug. 27).

Odds and Ends

Poet Rupi Kaur in the special “Rupi Kaur Live.” PHOTO CREDIT: Amrita Singh

You can see immensely popular Indian-Canadian poet Rupi Kaur in the special “Rupi Kaur Live,” coming to Amazon Prime Video on Aug. 27. According to Amazon, the one-hour show, filmed in Los Angeles pre-pandemic, fuses poetry, humour, spoken word, music and visuals.

Attention “Mandalorian” fans, Disney Plus has a tidbit for you while you await Season 3, with “Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian,” a look at the making of the Season 2 finale and the reappearance of Luke Skywalker, dropping on Aug. 25.

Personally I’m stoked for the return of “Inspector Morse” prequel series “Endeavour,” coming to the PBS Masterpiece Amazon Prime Video channel on Aug. 23.

Speaking of PBS, if you’re a fan of TV historian Lucy Worsley, she’s back with three new episodes of “Royal Myths & Secrets,” beginning Aug. 29 at 8 p.m., delving into Henry VIII’s Reformation, England’s Regency era and the Russian Revolution.

NOTE: The listings here are in Eastern Standard Time, and reflect information provided to me and cross-checked where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste.

Watchable Aug. 16 to 22, 2021

August 16, 2021 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Nine Perfect Strangers (Aug. 20, Amazon Prime Video)

Nicole Kidman as Masha in “Nine Perfect Strangers.” PHOTO CREDIT: Vince Valitutti/Hulu

On the face of it, the Tranquillum House wellness retreat exudes comfort, luxury and exclusivity, but from the moment its nine guests arrive for their 10-day stay there are hints they’re in for more than bliss.

They’re under surveillance, for one thing. And the smiling staff members pleasantly but firmly insist they surrender their cellphones and submit to having blood drawn. There’s even a hint of menace in the way the blades of the blender pulp the fruit that goes into their individually tailored smoothies.

Ethereal guru Masha — Nicole Kidman in long golden locks, flowing pastel clothes and steely blue gaze — makes it clear that they’re not there to be pampered. “This is Tranquillum. I mean to fuck with all of you,” she says.

The guests include bereaved mother Heather (Australian actor Asher Keddie), her husband Napoleon (Michael Shannon) and their daughter Zoe (Grace Van Patten); romance novelist Francis (Melissa McCarthy), ex-pro football player Tony (Bobby Cannavale), newly rich couple Ben (Melvin Gregg) and Jessica (Samara Weaving), divorced mother Carmel (Regina Hall) and cynical journalist Lars (Luke Evans).

They’ve all been hand-picked by Masha for their traumas, which include an assortment of relationship issues, professional crises, insecurities, drug addiction and unresolved guilt over others’ deaths.

Despite the sometimes uncomfortable activities they engage in (digging their own graves, a day of eating nothing but what they can forage), defences come down, the guests warm to each other and they start to feel incrementally better. But Masha doesn’t think they’re getting to the heart of their pain fast enough and institutes a new treatment protocol over the objections of counsellor Delilah (Tiffany Boone), one that poses psychic if not physical dangers.

Masha isn’t being truthful about her own trauma, either, even though she shares with the guests that she was once a corporate CEO who died after being shot in the chest and was brought back to life by Yao (Filipino-Canadian actor Manny Jacinto), a former paramedic who is now her right-hand man at Tranquillum.

What viewers will realize — although Masha is blind to it — is that she’s still addicted to power, but rather than wielding it in the business world she’s playing god with the lives of the people who’ve entrusted her to make them better.

Having seen only six of the eight episodes, I don’t know whether she causes any of her charges lasting harm or how the death threats that Masha is simultaneously receiving play out.

Like the treatment being meted out at Tranquillum, “Nine Perfect Strangers” is itself imperfect. Some of the stories — the Instagram influencer who’s insecure about her looks, the discarded wife who resents anyone younger and prettier —are a little too on the nose.

But there are also plot twists and surprises, at least for those who haven’t read the Liane Moriarty novel. There’s also a lot to be said for watching actors of this calibre play together.

In a TV universe that often offers up junk food, “Nine Perfect Strangers” is more of a high-end meal, even if it leaves you still a bit hungry.

In the Same Breath (Aug. 18, 9 p.m., HBO/Crave)

Health-care workers during a celebration of China’s victory over COVID-19.
PHOTO CREDIT: Courtesy of HBO

It’s impossible to know for sure whether lives would have been saved if Chinese authorities had been more open with their own citizens and the rest of the world about the pneumonia-like illness being seen in Wuhan as early as December 2019.

We all know now that mystery illness was COVID-19, which to date has killed more than 4 million people worldwide.

But as Nanfu Wang admits in her documentary, even though she had seen, and archived, Chinese social media posts about overloaded hospitals and people dying in the streets, she believed American officials who said the virus didn’t pose a threat in the U.S. and scoffed when her mother, back in her hometown east of Wuhan, urged her to wear a mask outdoors.

This doc is critical of both Chinese and American authorities for downplaying COVID and, indeed, punishing those who spoke out about it — “I have lived under authoritarianism and I have lived in a society that calls itself free,” says Wang, who now calls New York home. “In both systems, ordinary people become casualties of their leaders’ pursuit of power.”

For me, the film is most striking when it’s sharing human stories, captured with the help of camera people in Wuhan: a father in tears at the bedside of his adult son, who’s unable to do much more than blink; the woman who ran a medical clinic near the infamous wet market and whose husband, having caught the virus from patients, was turned away by four hospitals after they saw CT scans of his lungs; the son and husband who have to decide on the spot whether to take their loved one back home or let her die in the street when paramedics are unable to find a hospital with room for her.

Some of the most eye-opening images, at least for those of us without exposure to Chinese media, are of news anchors parroting the same government-approved script about the lack of COVID dangers, or of health-care workers at rallies celebrating China’s victory over the virus, waving flags and singing patriotic songs about the motherland. The doc contrasts those images with footage from inside the hospitals of those workers breaking down in tears, exposing the reality glossed over by the upbeat, state-sanctioned propaganda about China’s “Angels in White.”

That, and Wang’s interviews with sad and angry nurses in New York, reaffirm there’s a secondary pandemic of trauma among front-line workers, one that will only worsen as those same workers deal with the fourth wave of COVID surging around the world.

I don’t know that any lessons will be learned from this documentary — Wang includes footage of anti-mask, -lockdown and -vaccine protests across the U.S. and we know they’re still happening even as the Delta variant rages and politicians refuse to do what’s necessary to protect their citizens — but it’s worth watching nonethless.

The Chair (Aug. 20, Netflix)

Sandra Oh, Nana Mensah and Holland Taylor in “The Chair.” PHOTO CREDIT: Eliza Morse/Netflix

I have a lot of time for Sandra Oh in whatever role she’s in and she delivers a reliably smart and sympathetic performance as Ji-Yoon Kim, a Korean-American professor who’s just become the first female and the first person of colour to chair the English department at fictional Pembroke University.

Created by actor Amanda Peet and screenwriter Annie Wyman, who’s also a lecturer at Stanford University, “The Chair” portrays Ji-Yoon as struggling with the things you’d expect a career woman to struggle with while balancing a demanding job with family. In Ji-Yoon’s case, ethnicity adds another layer as she’s a 40-something single mother to an adopted Mexican-American daughter she’s raising with the help of her father Habi, played by Ji-yong Lee, who speaks only Korean.

And of course, Ji-Yoon’s is not just any job. As chair, she has to worry about faculty egos, budgets, and keeping the dean (David Morse) and the donors happy, not to mention the students, a sometimes fickle, fractious lot. (There’s a cameo I won’t spoil for you by a well-known TV actor who’s parachuted in give the university’s marquee lecture because he’ll put “butts in seats.”)

“The Chair” touches on issues like academic freedom, conflict between traditional and modern teaching, sexism and racism in hiring and promotion, campus protest and social media censure, although not in a deep way.

The senior male professors (Bob Balaban and Ron Crawford), who are at the top of the dean’s hit list because they cost the most and attract the fewest students, are portrayed as fuddy duddies. Balaban’s character, in particular, is threatened by Yaz (Nana Mensah), a young Black female professor who teaches a popular course called “Sex and the Novel” and lets her students use rap and spoken-word poetry to interpret “Moby-Dick.”

Holland Taylor plays an equally senior professor named Joan and steals scenes as she fights against indignities like being relegated to a tiny office next to the basement gym and crudely targeted by a male student on Rate My Professors.

I didn’t love the fact that Ji-Yoon expends considerable energy trying to rescue the job of fellow professor and love interest Bill (Jay Duplass) after he does something boneheaded in the classroom that gets immortalized on YouTube. Sure, Bill is a widower and a nice guy who cooks her dinner and helps with her daughter, but he also behaves like an irresponsible man-child and I feel like we’ve had enough of those on television.

Just as Ji-Yoon doesn’t quite manage to revolutionize the Pembroke English department, “The Chair” isn’t going to revolutionize your TV-viewing experience, but at six half-hour episodes you can watch it in less time than it would take to write an essay.

Chapelwaite (Aug. 22, 10 p.m., CTV Sci-Fi Channel/CTV.ca)

Adrien Brody with Ian Ho, Jennifer Ens and Sirena Gulamgaus in “Chapelwaite.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Chris Reardon/Epix

If you like classic horror stories and you are a patient viewer, you will find things to entertain you in “Chapelwaite,” the latest Stephen King adaptation to hit screens, inspired by the short story “Jerusalem’s Lot.”

Certain elements of the original are intact here, including the creepy ancestral home that gives the show its name; a possible family curse; a mysterious, ancient book; hostile townspeople; undead folks and an obsession with worms.

But adaptors Jason and Peter Filardi have changed and expanded the story. Charles Boone, played by Oscar winner Adrien Brody, is now a widowed father of three and former captain of a whaling ship. Instead of a manservant, his confidante is a woman named Rebecca, played by Emily Hampshire of “Schitt’s Creek,” an aspiring writer and governess to his children. And there are plenty of side plots and new characters.

The town of Preacher’s Corners, Maine, to which Charles brings the two daughters and son he had with his late Polynesian wife, is a hotbed of superstition and racism. The townspeople blame the Boone family for the disease that is killing some of their children, shun Charles’s offspring for not being white, and reject his plans to expand the sawmill he inherited and bring shipbuilding to the town.

Since the series was filmed in Halifax, the cast is loaded with Canadians, including Eric Peterson (“Corner Gas”) as Charles’s chief antagonist; Gord Rand (“Orphan Black”) as the sympathetic town minister; Julian Richings (“Todd and the Book of Pure Evil”) as Charles’s Uncle Phillip; Steven McCarthy (“The Expanse”) as his cousin Stephen and newcomer Devante Senior as Able, a Black sawmill employee who’s the only worker to stand by Charles.

But all the extra faces and scenes mean the show can plod when it’s not sticking to the gothic horror plot, which it brings to life in moody, foreboding fashion.

The most successful new characters are the children, Honour (Jennifer Ens), Tane (Ian Ho) and especially sensitive middle child Loa. Toronto’s Sirena Gulamgaus, who also stars in “Transplant,” plays the part with depth beyond her years.

Hampshire, who’s second to Brody in the credits, brings energy and charm to Rebecca, but the character seems to have been parachuted in from a more modern show, with a way of speaking and behaving that doesn’t fit the 1850s time period.

Still, if you have a taste for atmospheric, supernatural horror stories you might be able to overlook “Chapelwaite’s” shortcomings.

Odds and Ends

The show that is a summer highlight for most “Bachelor” and “Bachelorette” fans, “Bachelor in Paradise,” returns for its seventh season after sitting it out last summer due to the pandemic. It debuts Aug. 16 at 8 p.m. on Citytv.

A show that I think has been trudging on for far too long, “The Walking Dead,” debuts its 11th and final season on AMC Aug. 22 at 9 p.m. Oh sure, I’ll probably hate-watch it just to see how things end.

Disney Plus has “Growing Up Animal” on Aug. 18, which features lots and lots of baby animals, so how can you go wrong?

NOTE: The listings here are in Eastern Standard Time, and reflect information provided to me and cross-checked where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste.

This post has been edited to tweak my review of “Nine Perfect Strangers.”

Watchable Aug. 9 to 15, 2021

August 9, 2021 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Brand New Cherry Flavor (Aug. 13, Netflix)

Rosa Salazar as Lisa and Catherine Keener as Boro in “Brand New Cherry Flavor.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Sergei Bachlakov/Netflix

Hell hath no fury like an aspiring filmmaker scorned.

This limited series, based on the occult novel by Todd Grimson and created by Nick Antosca and Lenore Zion of “Channel Zero” fame, takes a thwarted Hollywood newcomer-with-a-dream tale and turns it into a noirish nightmare of revenge, sex, witchcraft and death.

Rosa Salazar (“American Horror Story,” “Alita: Battle Angel”) is Lisa Nova, a young woman who’s come to 1990s L.A. to turn her short “paranoid thriller” into a full-length film with the help of Lou Burke (Eric Lange, “Narcos,” “Escape at Dannemora”), a producer who’s won three Oscars but who hasn’t had a hit in years.

But when Lou double crosses her, hiring another director and getting violent when Lisa demands her movie back, Lisa turns to Boro (Oscar nominee Catherine Keener), a mysterious woman she meets at a party, to put a curse on Lou.

Boro lives in a crumbling mansion with zombie servants, creating potions from guinea pig guts and other revolting substances, and makes Lisa pay for her services by vomiting up kittens.

But after the man who was meant to direct Lisa’s film is horribly injured and Lou’s son Jonathan (Daniel Doheny) almost dies, Lisa tries to call off the curse. Boro refuses and it’s clear that Lisa is in her power. Besides the kittens, she’s got a plant that’s taken over her shabby chic apartment, a scary, alien-like spirit that follows her and a terrifying being living beneath a trap door that suddenly appears in her floor.

Her one hope is to try to find out who Boro was in her past life and use that against her.

Likewise, when Lou demands that Boro reverse the curse, she advises him to fight back by digging into the darkness in Lisa’s past. 

Also in the mix is movie star Roy Hardaway (Jeff Ward, “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.”), who’s got a dark history of his own and becomes Lisa’s ally and romantic interest of sorts.

This could be ridiculous in the wrong hands, but Salazar, Lange and Keener, fine actors all, keep the weirdness from tipping into camp. Salazar in particular is a mesmerizing presence who brings a matter-of-fact reality to the strangeness.

And the period L.A. setting (although it was actually shot mostly in Vancouver and Burnaby, B.C.) adds a veneer of glamour-tinged sleaziness.

The series walks a line between horror, mystery and character-driven drama. It’s scary, funny, loopy and entertaining.

Netflix also has the series “Bake Squad” (Aug. 11); the comedy special “Phil Wang: Philly Philly Wang Wang” (Aug. 10); and the films “The Kissing Booth 3” (Aug. 11) and “Beckett” (Aug. 13).

Short Takes

Roselyn Sanchez as Elena Roarke in “Fantasy Island.” PHOTO CREDIT: Laura Magruder/Fox

Fantasy Island (Aug. 10, 9 p.m., Global TV)

Look, I barely remember the original “Fantasy Island,” other than Ricardo Montalban in his white suit and Herve Villechaize and “The plane! The plane!” but it would not have topped my list of TV shows that deserved remakes. In this version, Elena (Roselyn Sanchez), the great-niece of the original Mr. Roarke, is the one charged with making dreams come true, dressed all in white like her great-uncle, natch. I could only stand to screen one episode but, other than offering a more diverse, female-heavy cast, it didn’t feel to me like it had anything worth revisiting in 2021. My advice if you want to see a show about rich people in a facsimile of paradise is to watch or rewatch “The White Lotus.”

Odds and Ends

T+E is trying to do for UFOs what it did for ghost stories with the new series “Encounter: UFO” (Aug. 10, 9 p.m.). It has the usual mix of eyewitness accounts, re-enactments and talking heads in eight episodes’ worth of tales that go beyond UFO sightings to cover alleged alien encounters and abductions.

CBC and CBC Gem have the documentary “Terry Fox: The Power of One” (Aug. 9, 8 p.m.) 41 years after Fox’s Marathon of Hope and 40 years after his death from cancer.

Amazon has Season 2 of the anthology series “Modern Love” dropping Aug. 13.

If you’re a fan of the gaffer on “Line of Duty,” you might enjoy “Adrian Dunbar’s Coastal Ireland” (Aug. 9, Acorn), in which the actor takes us on a tour of his native land.

Disney Plus has “What If . . . ?” (Aug. 11), which reimagines events from Marvel Universe films.

Wrestling fans might enjoy the new Starz series “Heels,” which debuts on Crave Aug. 15. The drama is about a community of pro wrestlers in a small Georgia town. Stephen Amell of “Arrow” and Alexander Ludwig of “Vikings” star.

NOTE: The times listed here are in Eastern Standard Time, and reflect information provided to me and cross-checked where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste.

Watchable Aug. 2 to 8, 2021

August 2, 2021 /

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Mr. Corman (Aug. 6, Apple TV Plus)

Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars as the title character in “Mr. Corman.” PHOTO CREDIT: Apple TV Plus

Meet Joshua Corman, a grade school teacher with a perfectly human imperfect life.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who wrote, directed, executive-produced and stars in “Mr. Corman,” created his lead character as a kind of alter ego to himself: a man who, like him, grew up in the San Fernando Valley with aspirations to become a rock star, but whose life didn’t take the fortunate turns that Gordon-Levitt’s did.

Gordon-Levitt, obviously, never became a rock star, but he’s a highly respected TV and movie star as well as a director, producer, songwriter, and a husband and father of two.

Joshua hasn’t had it quite as good: he gave up on music to become a fifth grade teacher, split up with his fiancee and lives in a modest L.A. apartment with his high school friend Victor (Arturo Castro, “Narcos,” “Broad City”).

It’s not that Joshua has a bad life. He himself acknowledges how lucky he is, especially compared to the street person he’s forever noticing as he moves around L.A.

But if perfect is the enemy of good, Mr. Corman is often the enemy of his own good in his reluctance to accept the imperfect.

“It just feels like I blew the whole thing, like I suck as a person,” he tells his mother, Ruth, played by Debra Winger.

Joshua suffers anxiety attacks, which are signified onscreen by a loud clanging noise and a flaming CGI meteor speeding toward Earth. (The series mixes sometimes whimsical animation and special effects with its live action, including a gravity-defying dance number between Winger and Gordon-Levitt.) 

Even when he’s not having attacks, Joshua is apt to find fault with whatever’s going on, which pisses off the people around him, including his mother, his sister Beth (Shannon Woodward), his ex Megan (Juno Temple) and the women he half-heartedly attempts to date. This contrasts with his roomie Victor, a divorced dad and UPS driver who always finds the glass half full.

By series end, there is some hope for Joshua; not that his life is likely to change in earth-shattering ways (although he does commit to making music again and to giving romance a shot) but that he stands a better chance of embracing its imperfection.

“Mr. Corman” has its subtle comic moments, but it’s also a modest, thought-provoking drama, one that might have you reflecting on the paths your own life took.

Small Town News: KPVM Pahrump (Aug. 2, 9 p.m., HBO/Crave)

Missey Kohler, Deanna O’Donnell, John Kohler, Vern Van Winkle, Eunette Gentry and Ronda Van Winkle, the stars of “Small Town News: KPVM Pahrump.” PHOTO CREDIT: Gilles Mingasson/Courtesy HBO

I confess I started watching “Small Town News” expecting it to be a real-life version of TV comedy “WKRP in Cincinnati” or even “SCTV” with its Melonville TV network. And in some ways it did not disappoint.

KPVM, the privately owned TV station in Pahrump, Nevada, that is the subject of the docuseries, has its share of unusual characters and comic situations. 

Certain scenes will put you in mind of the Les Nessmans, Earl Camemberts and Ted Baxters of the TV world, like station owner Vern trying repeatedly to pronounce “Deepak Chopra”; or weatherman John, a former member of the “Portly Presleys,” giving the forecast in an Elvis costume; or customer Barbara, who has her own show, singing about spaceships and her supposed fling with Michael Jackson. 

(News director Deanna says of Barbara: “I have kind of a personal relationship with her ever since she was kidnapped by aliens.”)

But the show also highlights a serious issue in journalism: the dwindling of independent news sources as tech giants like Facebook and Google continue to hog advertising dollars while media conglomerates gobble up the outlets that have managed to survive.

KPVM is just one of 95 independently owned news stations that still exist in the U.S., the series tells us.

What’s more, as unintentionally funny as the employees of KVPM can be, they clearly care about their jobs and about getting out the news in their little corner of the world.

Sure, there are small dogs lounging under the anchor desk during broadcasts, and John wears shorts with his suit jacket and tie, and the station-made ads have catchphrases like “When’s the last time you had a mouthful of Big Dick’s pizza?” but the workers endure, for the station and for each other.

We follow them from January to November 2020, through the COVID-19 pandemic and the presidential election — Trump fan Vern is convinced the election of Joe Biden will sink the business. But when we leave them, they’ve just expanded into Las Vegas an hour away, reporting news from the larger city and opening a second station there.

“You don’t see this from individuals as much anymore,” says Vern. “This is all done by big corporations who have large funding and we’ve really worked hard to get to this point.

“The fact that Pahrump, Nevada, a small town of this size, has a TV station, it’s very rare,” he adds. “The thing of it is we’re still succeeding at KPVM-TV because we have a lot of great people who work for us, to cruise through the difficult times.”

Short Takes

Richard Harrington as Tom Mathias and Mali Harries as Mared Rhys in “Hinterland.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Warren Orchard/Acorn TV

Hinterland (Aug. 2, Acorn TV)

With its austere landscapes and sometimes impenetrable accents, “Hinterland” often feels more like a Scandinavian than a British crime drama. Set in Aberystwyth, Wales, it stars Richard Harrington (“Poldark,” “Gangs of London”) as DCI Tom Matthias, a good detective with a messy personal life (aren’t they all?), a tendency to put himself in harm’s way and a keen sense of justice. He alternately impresses and frustrates his colleagues — including Mali Harries as DI Mared Rhys, Hannah Daniel as DS Sian Owen and Alex Harries as DC Lloyd Ellis — and his shadowy boss, Chief Superintendent Brian Prosser (Aneirin Hughes). In case those names don’t give you a hint, the main cast are all Welsh and the series was filmed in Wales. It presents an interesting selection of homicides that go beyond the run-of-the-mill young woman raped and murdered plots of so many crime dramas as well as an ongoing mystery involving the abuse of children at a residential school.

Then president Barack Obama and vice-president Joe Biden, as the House passes
the health care reform bill in March 2010. PHOTO CREDIT: Pete Souza/Courtesy of HBO

Obama: In Pursuit of a More Perfect Union (Aug. 3, 9 p.m., HBO/Crave)

I watched the first part of this three-part docuseries trying to figure out why this biography of former U.S. president Barack Obama is coming out now. The best answer I can venture, based on pre-release publicity, is that it’s meant to add to the conversation about America’s racial reckoning by looking back at the political career of the country’s only Black president. But based on what I saw, and I confess I didn’t have the time or inclination to watch the other two parts, it feels like standard bio-doc territory. There doesn’t seem to be anything here that anyone interested in Obama wouldn’t already know about. Nor did doc maker Peter Kunhardt get fresh interviews with Obama or wife Michelle, although he does feature commentary from influential Black Americans like Ta-Nehisi Coates, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson.

Crave also has the doc “Street Gang: How We Got to Sesame Street” premiering on Aug. 2; the British drama “Anne Boleyn,” a re-examination of Henry VIII’s most famous wife, on Aug. 6; and Season 2 of “The L Word: Generation Q” on Aug. 8.

Odds and Ends

Netflix has the Israeli American crime thriller “Hit & Run” (Aug. 3), which I was all set to tell you about until I realized that reviews are embargoed until Tuesday. It also debuts “Cooking With Paris” (Aug. 4), as in Paris Hilton, who makes food with celebrity friends like Kim Kardashian and Demi Lovato.

Amazon Prime Video has the documentary “Val” (Aug. 6), about actor Val Kilmer, which brought renewed attention to the “Top Gun” star when it recently debuted at the Cannes Film Festival.

If you missed the marijuana-dealing dramedy “Weeds” in its original eight-season run, Super Channel Fuse has the whole thing on demand as of Aug. 4 or if you want an old-fashioned pre-binge experience you can watch four episodes every Tuesday beginning Aug. 3 at 9 p.m.

BritBox has Season 2 of the Bath-set crime drama “McDonald & Dodds” (Aug. 3), starring familiar face Jason Watkins and Tala Gouveia.

NOTE: The times listed here are in Eastern Standard Time, and reflect information provided to me and cross-checked where possible, but it’s always best to check listings for your own area. The selection of programs reviewed reflects what I’m given access to by networks and streamers, whether reviews are embargoed, how many shows I have time to watch and my own personal taste.

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