Browsing Tag

Big Little Lies

Best TV Shows of 2017

best-tv-2017

Another year, another pile of time spent watching way, way too much TV. With streaming services making big inroads and networks stepping up their game, audiences had more choice than ever before. We’ve sifted through the hours of television we watched to narrow down the shows that had the most impact on us this year.

The Good Place
I love that I have a network show on my list! We talk a lot about “prestige” cable dramas during this era of peak TV, but it was an NBC sitcom that left me wowed this year. The best part: it was a puzzle box series all along — we just didn’t know it! The season one finale (which aired in January) dropped a big twist (SPOILER ALERT): our beloved characters weren’t in the good place after all. Even more impressive than the shocking reveal: the second season has maintained the momentum by constantly re-inventing the show’s premise. Who would of ever thought that network that brought you Fear Factor would also air a show that regularly dives into deep existential and moral dilemmas? They even had a whole episode devoted to the trolley problem this year! –Jen

Big Little Lies
I found that this year was a return to appointment viewing. I watched each episode of Big Little Lies as it aired and found myself captivated. I read the novel several years ago and found it so unremarkable that I didn’t even remember who the “bad guy” was. But I thought that Reese Witherspoon, Nicole Kidman and Alexander Skarsgard were equally amazing in bringing these flawed characters to life. Reese with her daughters was especially powerful. Director Jean Marc Vallee’s vision for this beautiful town full of gorgeous people made for a strong contrast between surface and reality. The darkness hidden behind closed doors ran deep on this show and it made me wonder more than once what I might be missing when I look around my own life. There were a dozen amazing moments in this series but none as captivating for me as the first episode with Reese and her daughters sitting at the piano. I’m not sure why they’re bringing a second season to life as I’m fully satisfied with Season 1. —Nicole

The Leftovers
This show ended up on my Worst TV list during it’s first season, so imagine my surprise when it was far and away the best drama I watched in 2017. It was audacious, surreal and moving — not to mention it delivered one of the most stunning shots I’ve ever seen on the small screen. For a show that I once complained was too bleak and dour, the end of the The Leftovers was surprisingly life-affirming. There wasn’t one episode in its 8-episode final stretch that I didn’t like — which is a weird thing to say about a season that featured everything from an orgy boat to a penis scanner to a heartbreaking cameo by Perfect Strangers sitcom star Mark Linn-Baker as himself. —Jen

Master of None
I really enjoyed Season 1 of Master of None and was delighted at how different Season 2 was. I’ll admit to also overusing “allora” while in Italy much like Dev to charming effect (though I’m pretty sure we were far less charming than we thought we were). What I loved about this season was the balls-out chances Aziz Ansari took with some of the episodes. Some worked so well like “New York, I Love You” which was so different from anything I’ve ever seen on TV before and yet so amazing. I also thought that the way he integrated the romance with Francesca throughout the season while gifting us with episodes like “Thanksgiving” was lovely and less inwardly-focused than Season 1. I’ve rewatched several of these episodes and expect to come back to them many times more. —Nicole

Better Things
Being a pop culture fan in 2017 meant struggling to reconcile one’s viewing tastes with the involvement of Hollywood’s sucktastic men. I really considered throwing away Better Things due to Louis CK’s participation in it, but the truth is this season, directed entirely by its co-writer and star Pamela Aldon, spoke to me like no other show had. The episode about her mom’s rapidly worsening dementia broke me, the speech about being a “super single” felt like it was speaking to my soul, and the scene where she rejects a male friend who tries to kiss her made me howl. Like the BTS drama surrounding the show itself, season two was messy, complicated and challenging. —Jen

You’re the Worst
Yeah, I know, it wasn’t a great season for You’re The Worst but even a mediocre season of this show brings laughs, darkness and entertainment. My feelings on the entire season can be encapsulated in one episode: “Dad-Not-Dad.” I loved the Sunday Funday brunch re-creation where Jimmy is out-snobbed, and found the La Bamba dad moment for Lindsay charming and funny. This episode also had the worst, cringe-y moment when Gretchen makes sweet, sweet love to her boyfriend’s ex-wife. Yuck – I hated that for her character. The leading pair continues to live up to the show’s name and are as-ever The Worst and although it seemed more aimless than other seasons, I appreciated that the scope of the show was more focused on the main characters. —Nicole

Sweet/Vicious
People talk a lot about shows that aired “before their time” like My So-Called Life or Freaks and Geeks, both of which probably would have thrived had they premiered a few years later than they had. But Sweet/Vicious has the bittersweet tradition of not being years ahead of its time, but mere months. Just before the Weinstein scandal upended Hollywood, MTV canceled this smart, zeitgeisty teen drama that was the embodiment of the #MeToo movement. Though the premise of the show (two college girls take justice into their own hands by becoming vigilantes who track down sex offenders) sounds like it could be a downer, Sweet/Vicious was filled with a surprising amount humour and warmth. I miss it a lot. —Jen

Handmaid’s Tale
I had so much anticipation built up for one of my favourite books from a favourite author that I devoured this series in real time. The occasional night where my better half wasn’t around to watch live forced me to pretend during a second viewing that I was seeing the episode for the first time. (I even set up an elaborate second recording so that the PVR wouldn’t reveal my duplicity!) The season delivered everything I hoped for and I came to appreciate the second viewing each week. The episodes were tense and I walked away each week terrified and furious. I kept looking at what was happening in the real world and thinking that the Handmaid’s Tale made it feel sickeningly relevant. I didn’t mind the slight deviations from the book in the interest of building in a lead in to the second season. While Elizabeth Moss was utterly convincing as Offred, I found Alexis Bledel as Ofglen devastating. “The Bridge” is the episode that I come back to when I think of the series. It carried all of the emotions of the series and that tiny bit of hope that we need to keep us coming back. —Nicole

Jen’s Honorable Mentions: Orphan Black, The Bold Type, Review, Chewing Gum, iZombie

Nicole’s Honourable Mentions: The Good Fight, Girls, The Americans

A Second Season of Big Little Lies Might Happen After All

big-little-lies

-Because Hollywood just can’t leave well enough alone, the author of Big Little Lies says HBO approached her to work on ideas for a second season.

-The internet is convinced Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake recorded a new song together.

-This Scandal oral history reveals that ABC originally wanted Connie Britton to play Olivia Pope, and that Kerry Washington and Tony Goldwyn had this “immediate electricity” (which I’m sure is provoking much snickering in the blind item circles).

-This is an interesting peek inside the WGA talks.

Jemima Kirke and Dennis Quaid had a charming conversation about on-set boners.

50 Cent punched a female fan in the chest at a concert, but then invited her twerk on stage so I guess all is forgiven?

Zoë Kravitz‘s short, platinum cut is giving me hair envy.

Cuba Gooding Jr. and Sarah Paulson sang show tunes together on a night out in the West Village. I guess they’re both over skirt-gate.

Katy Perry and Ryan Phillippe aren’t dating, but they are exchanging cute tweets about the rumours.

-I enjoyed this take on how The Rock became our fave populist hero.

-This is a good read on how independent cinema is moving out of the art house and into every house thanks to Netflix and Amazon.

-I don’t watch Bates Motel but star Freddie Highmore directed last night’s episode and everyone loved it. In my head he’s still 12 so this is all very confusing…

Charlize Theron beats a man to death with her stiletto in new Atomic Blonde promo. This feels like something they should have not given away in the trailer but I’ll take it.

Samira Wiley on Her Instagram Friendship with Margaret Atwood

-This is a great interview with Samira Wiley, who talks about her Instagram relationship with Margaret Atwood and the importance of LGBT visibility.

Kerry Washington’s Glamour profile is a lot to process.

-Despite not really sharing a whole lot, Beyoncé has been deemed the most valuable celebrity on social media, according to a new report.

-Meanwhile, she just revealed more pregnancy shots in her new “Die With You” video.

-Beyond ratings and raves, Big Little Lies ended up being a major win for HBO on multiple levels. I loved the finale — and I especially loved the thoughtful articles that came out about it, whether it was about the show’s commentary on gender bias, praise for Nicole Kidman‘s career-defining performance, or an examination of the shared language women have when it comes to the threat of men.

-Meanwhile, I’m glad the director has squashed talk about there being a season 2. I don’t think there should be more Big Little Lies, but there should definitely be more shows like it. There are a lot of different stories about women left to tell. I mean, I’m intrigued by Prison Break’s return and will probably watch tonight’s premiere, but do we really *need* to revisit that story?

-Speaking of tonight’s returning TV, I totally forgot iZombie was coming back! The reviews are, unsurprisingly, great.

-Wait, so Daniel Craig is back as Bond? Yawn.

-It was a good news/bad news kind of day for Shia LaBeouf. The good news:  those assault and harassment charges from a January altercation in NYC have been dropped. The bad news: his latest movies sold only one ticket at the UK box office.

Drake not only saved the British series Top Boy from cancellation by buying the rights, but now he plans to star in it!

-Netflix’s first teaser for The Defenders dropped, as did the show’s release date: August 18.

-Marvel’s VP blamed women and diversity for their comic book sales slump and not the fact that, I don’t know, they turned beloved superheroes into Nazis.

No, Kendall Jenner. Just…no.

Mel B requested a restraining order against her estranged husband, and her allegations of his abusive behaviour are terrifying.

-In a new essay, the creator of Smash details her firing and the amount of rampant misogyny in typical TV writers rooms. “The guys would sit around and pitch stories, and then write everything down in great detail on little white cards. Whenever a scene with female characters showed up they would write a card that said, “girl scene here.’ ”

-So Katie Holmes and Jamie Foxx are still a thing, huh?

-I really like this piece on how Ghost in the Shell proves that Hollywood should listen to Twitter once in a while. Same could have been said about Iron Fist.

-The creator and designer of Daria drew what the characters would look like today.

Aubrey Plaza obsesses over Elizabeth Olsen in the red-band trailer for Ingrid Goes West, which got raves at Sundance.