So much TV! We really do love to see (binge) it. Last week, a bunch of shows I have been watching week-to-week had their finales, and every single one was a doozy. So now I can recommend them all to you!
I Love LA: I've been in the tank for Rachel Sennot ever since I first saw her in
Shiva Baby, so how could I not love this ridiculous show that she has created and stars in? Sennot plays Maia, an anxious woman who moved from New York to LA to build her career as a manager of social media influencers and is finding it very difficult to figure out exactly how things work in this city. When her best friend Tallulah (Odessa A'zion) also moves to LA, Maia returns to becoming her manager, and the two of them wreak absolute chaos across the town while Maia's hapless, normie boyfriend Dylan (Josh Hutcherson) has no idea what is going on. True Whitaker and Jordan Firstman round out the cast as Maia's friends Alani and Charlie, who each have their own classic LA journeys as a nepo baby and a stylist.
This show captures the crazy world of influencers (how is this an actual job?), the difficulty of catching a break in this insanely fickle city, and the constant Gen Z hustle for things that don't matter that much but feel extremely important and vital in the moment. It probably shouldn't have been my cup of tea at all, but again, I have this fascination for anything that Sennot does, and A'zion is also a revelation. Frankly, my mouth was just agape every episode when I saw what Tallulah was wearing, so the bizarre costume design is worth the price of admission all on its own. I do not relate to these characters at all, but boy are they fun to watch. Won't you join me?!
Pluribus: Created by Vince Gilligan and starring Rhea Seehorn, we all knew from the jump that this show was going to be excellent, right? Well, the high expectations were perfectly matched. The plot is wonderfully fantastical - all of humanity has been infected by an alien virus resulting in the "Joining." Every human being is now connected as one big hive mind and can access each other's memories and experiences across the globe. They all act as one and are supposedly benevolent and non-violent, unable to even pluck an apple from a tree because they cannot kill any living thing. But for some unknown reason, thirteen human beings were immune to this event and have retained their individuality, one of whom is Carol (Seehorn), a misanthropic romance novelist, who doesn't trust the Others one bit and is desperate to figure out how she could undo the Joining.
It's twisty, it's complex, it's full of long dialogue-less sequences where you're trying to figure out what Carol is up to until her ultimate plan is finally revealed. It's all very Gilligan-esque and glorious. The first season has a lot of scene-setting and information doled out in constant drips as Carol builds up a picture of what the Others can and cannot do, but in the final episodes, she may have found a parter-in-crime to help her on this supposedly futile quest to save humanity/herself. It's a race against time as the Others are also trying to figure out a way to infect Carol and the remaining immune humans. So who will succeed? And how?! These are the questions that will keep you coming back to this show week to week, or in this case, for one big satisfying binge. I cannot wait for Season 2.
Heated Rivalry: If your social media hasn't been blowing up in the past month with people raving about Heated Rivalry, then congratulations, we are being serviced by very different algorithms. Created by Jacob Tierney, who adapted the show from Rachel Reid's Game Changers book series about a bunch of closeted gay hockey players, this small little Canadian show has become an absolute sensation. I was sick a few weekends ago and decided to get caught up on the first five episodes that were out. I'll confess, I was unimpressed after the first two episodes, as the show just came off as soft gay porn and didn't seem to have much emotion behind it. But my god. Things took a turn in Episode 3, and when I finished Episode 5, I too, like half the nation, was desperately awaiting the finale on Boxing Day. And boy did that finale not disappoint. It was a celebration of queer love, and was so deeply charming and moving and wonderful. Sigh. I couldn't get enough.
The show stars Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie as Shane and Ilya, Canadian and Russian hockey players who start having illicit (and very explicit) encounters during their rookie season and proceed to spend several years quietly hooking up while never telling anyone else what they're doing and not really acknowledging to each other if this is just one very long booty call. The time jumps are disorienting and the lack of any real communication between the two of them is frustrating, but don't worry, because that will all get beautifully resolved at the end. My social media timeline is currently full of charming interviews with these two actors, and they full deserve this sudden stardom when just a few months ago they were waiting tables and struggling with their careers. It's going to be a long wait for the next season, but get caught up on the hype now - you'll thank me later. Happy New Year!
No comments:
Post a Comment