Category: tv

I like Ricky Gervais for the most part, but when he does non-comedy, it comes across as a little too in-your-face and pretentious. I swear, at least once every episode, the main character in After Life literally says, “I’m sad. I want to kill myself.” There are far better ways to convey your character’s struggles with depression than to have him spell it out like we’re too dumb to notice. Nothing about After Life is subtle, especially during the montages when super cheesy music kicks in to remind you, “Hey, he’s sad, remember? This is sad! Feel something!” But for as much as the show wants you to feel sorry for protagonist Tony, he never demonstrates that he is or ever was a “good guy.”

While we do occasionally see into his pre-dead-wife past via home videos and video diaries, it’s incredibly forced and insincere. He pulls a prank on her, and she laughs, or she looks at the camera and says, “You’re a good man, Tony.” But why? Because he pulls pranks? That kinda suggests he’s always been a bit of an asshole. Post-death, Tony’s mean to everyone, and everyone puts up with it, because they know he’s sad. But Tony has so much disdain for life that he even helps a local junkie overdose. So the revelation/reversal in the final episode feels completely hollow. Tony didn’t grow at all during the course of the show. Rather, the show was about to end, and we needed a sappy wrap-up, so… Tony magically got better, everyone!

Well, that was pretty great, and maybe the best show Netflix has debuted in a long time. I think I have The Good Place to thank for priming me for this type of content, though. Both are weird, existential, dark, funny, and touching all at once. While the surface story isn’t terribly original at first—imagine a raunchier Groundhog Day—the show becomes its own thing by the end of Episode 2. I gotta enter spoiler territory to explain why I started loving the show so much at that point, but here goes… Once we’re introduced to a second victim of the time loop, Russian Doll takes on a completely new journey that’s less “trying to repeat the correct steps each day” and more “how the eff did we both get into this mess.”

While Nadia was a fun character with the right amount of snark, I couldn’t see her carrying the show on her own for the entire season. So pairing her with Alan was perfect, and it was a lot of fun to see how the two of them handled their situation, dealt with their recurring deaths, and ultimately grew as people. I was worried where the show was going to end when the penultimate episode was framed like a horror story with weird and creepy things happening for no reason. But the finale more than made up for it. I really like the note it ended on, a very Good Place-esque, bittersweet sense of acceptance. Given the ending, I don’t think a Season 2 is warranted, but I do hope we start seeing more content like this on Netflix.

I really didn’t care for Season 1 of this show, but I’m always curious if bad TV can learn from its mistakes. The opening scene of Season 2 certainly seemed self-aware of its own awfulness when a character sums up the previous year as an “epic shitshow” that nobody liked. With Season 1’s big affair out in the open, the characters aren’t quite as terrible as they once were, though it’s hard to forgive/forget what the inciting incident was leading into the new season. These episodes are all about the fall-out of the affair and how it ruined pretty much everyone’s lives. Which, again, begs the question… why is this show called “Friends” From College?

Season 2 actually is better, though. I’ll give them that. There were some fairly funny sight gags and word play throughout, but when the show goes for broader humor, it’s still really cringey. Not Office or Curb cringey, just… blatantly trying too hard to be funny. This kind of humor feels even more out of place considering the rest of the show wants to be a serious drama. Some of it works, but most of the time, it’s hard to feel any sympathy for people who haven’t done much to redeem themselves. They still don’t get along with each other. They still use people and sleep around. But it’s supposed to be okay now because they’re more honest about it? Baby steps, I guess…

I was totally onboard with Happy! in its first few episodes. It struck a wonderfully weird tone of silliness and gritty violence. Further into the season, though, things got a bit too weird to the point where I don’t even understand the rules of this universe anymore. I could accept that Hailey had an imaginary friend who only she and her dad could see, but then it turns out… other people could see Happy, too. And there are actually other imaginary friends who can all talk to each other. And anyone who can see one imaginary friend can see them all. Oh, and apparently people can come back from the dead in this world? And there are possibly aliens at play, too? It’s… it’s too much, man.

Still, I appreciate that a TV show like this exists. In a way, it reminds me of Amazon’s The Tick in that it embraces comic book camp while still reminding you that real-world violence is a thing. The contrast between Nick Sax (aka the dumpster version of The Punisher) and Happy (an overly positive flying unicorn) is pretty great. It’s odd, then, that Happy, who has the show named after him, really isn’t in it that much. There were long periods where I forgot he was even a character. Without Happy, though, the show Happy! runs the risk of feeling like any other crime drama. Well, I suppose the occasional zombie, off-beat joke, or alien bug orgy would say otherwise. So there’s that.

I wasn’t planning on giving this show another chance after an atrocious Season 2, but I was curious to see if it had corrected course at all. To my surprise, I think it has. But that’s not to say the show is great now. While they’ve dialed down the grossness and ridiculousness, they still haven’t fixed some of the issues that have plagued the series since Day 1. The supporting cast has always been weak, and yet Season 3 introduces even more uninteresting side characters. Why is a show about family (the word “family” is in the name, for God’s sake) spending so much time following the lives of their neighbors?!

A large portion of Season 3 is dedicated to new neighbor Chet, who—in typical sitcom fashion—immediately wins over the heart of Frank while Sue sees right through his bullshit. And so a lot of Frank’s and Sue’s squabbling revolves around whether or not Chet’s a good guy. Spoiler: he’s not. His storyline unsatisfactorily wraps up in the penultimate episode, leaving the finale to scramble for some sort of theme to tie everything together. The ending, though, feels like the same ending from the last season and the ending from every other cookie-cutter sitcom. Frank realizes he hasn’t been fair to his kids and says sorry. Roll credits.

F is for Family is weird, because it pretends to be a show that pushes boundaries with free-flowing swears and traumatizing nudity, but if you take that away, the scenarios driving the plot are things we’ve seen a thousand times before. What really makes this show special is the love-hate (emphasis on hate) relationship between Frank and Sue and their children. They fight like real families. It’s so relatable, it hurts. But sitcoms gotta sitcom, yo, and the family keeps getting separated to interact with paper-thin, one-joke, grating neighbors and friends. Get rid of the side characters or actually flesh them out. Either way, something needs to change here…

Binging this show is a bit weird, since there’s no story gap between Seasons 1 and 2, making the Season 1 cut-off feel out of place. There are definitely some major shifts that take place in Season 2, though. The Kenny West character leaves, thank God. His cartoonish vulgarity was too much. And then we have Lindsay Lohan to replace him. It’s great to see her acting again, although she does seem a bit rusty. The biggest disruption, however, is the arrival of Will. I think Will would have worked better as an online-only presence that still managed to screw with Daniel. Showing us Will in real life was a mistake, mostly because Will is just as unlikable as everyone else on this show.

So Sick Note is one of those shows where every character is either a selfish asshole or unrealistically daft, making it hard to like, root for, or empathize with anyone. While I enjoy mean comedies like Always Sunny and The League, the scenarios have to be somewhat grounded, and the characters’ terribleness needs to affect them more than it does their neighbors. In Sick Note, however, the shenanigans at play—cancer fakeouts, drug deals—keep getting more and more people killed. Sure, I get that this is a dark comedy, a British Breaking Bad parody if you will, but it’s not dark enough and not funny enough to pull it off.

Sick Note is more of a comedy of errors. The only reason Daniel and Dr. Glennis get away with anything is because the universe continues to shower them with lucky coincidences that can be pretty aggravating for the viewer. I think I still enjoyed the show overall, though. It’s hard to tell, because, in the age of streaming content, this is quintessential “binge and forget it” material. It’s amusing and fast-paced and strings you along with legitimate cliffhangers, but I say that with only a hint of praise. It’s not particularly clever or particularly memorable. Rather, it passes the time when nothing else is on. And, frankly, that’s where we are with Netflix shows now.