“‘Room 104’ Ends Its Intriguing Storytelling Experiment With A Genre-Bending Final Season”

A room with a view to horror, humor, heartache, heroism, and even horniness. Continue reading →

“‘What We Do In The Shadows’ Returns In Delightfully Funny Season 2”

Back on FX and staking its claim as pretty much the best horror show you’ll find on television. Continue reading →

“In Pop Culture, ‘The Babadook’ Is An Invasive Species”

You really, genuinely, legitimately cannot get rid of the Babadook, not as long as SNL and “The Magicians” keep making jokes about it. Continue reading →

“All Good Things Must End, Even ‘The Good Place'”

One of the last decade’s defining TV series comes to a close, and I couldn’t be more overjoyed. Continue reading →

“‘The Purge’ Creator James DeMonaco On Predicting The Future With Movie Sequels And TV Seasons”

Today’s recommendation for a good life: Talk to James DeMonaco. Doesn’t really matter the context or the topic. Just, if you ever get a chance to chat with him, do. He’s a blast to confab with. I know I had a good time as we dug into 2018, the year of The Purge franchise, from The First … Continue reading →

“How The Venture Bros. Brilliantly Blurs the Line Between Hero and Villain”

If there’s a fundamental theme in The Venture Bros., it’s failure. If there’s a fundamental dynamic that dramatizes the element of failure, it’s self-involvement: All of the major characters in the series tend to cause their own problems, and this is as true of the first two episodes of Season 7 as any other episode in … Continue reading →

Andy’s Best Things, 2018 Halftime Edition

June has arrived, and also it’s about to end, the month-long worldwide celebrations of my birthday winding down* as I settle into my new age-number and look ahead to the rest of the year**. Thus, this, my Best Things halftime report, expanded once more from merely a ranking of film and TV to include music, … Continue reading →

“Can Anyone Really Escape Westworld?”

…but really, can anyone escape Westworld? No. Not in the least. Even if you do not watch Westworld, it’s everywhere in your feeds and in your grill, so basically you’re stuck with it until it goes off the air (and even then, people still talk about it). But that’s okay! Westworld is great in the way that all dark prestige … Continue reading →

“Renew Brooklyn Nine-Nine or Bust!”

I started reviewing Brooklyn Nine-Nine for Paste Magazine way back in the day, about four years ago in fact, so if anyone is going to write an editorial about Fox’s jaw-dropping failure to renew the series for a sixth season it’s going to be me. Which is basically a convoluted way of saying that I wrote an … Continue reading →

Black Mirror Season 4 Review

Just in the nick of time: Here’s my review of Black Mirror‘s fourth season. In a word, it’s superb. In more words, well, hey now – you’re not getting my thoughts out of me that easily. In the real world, don’t have the kind of technology that lets you do that. If we lived in the Black Mirror-verse, maybe … Continue reading →

Andy’s Best Things, 2017 Edition

As usual, as I do each year (each year, at least, since first creating this blog), and as you expect me to do, I have compiled my top ten list for 2017. Also as usual, that list includes five honorable mentions. Not at all as usual, I’ve generously expanded this annual enterprise to include two of … Continue reading →

Why Even The Best TV Storytellers Need To Know When To Call It Quits

For WBUR’s The ARTery, I wrote about a too-common problem even the best TV shows face: Figuring out when to end it all, by which I mean (he said in a rush) when to wrap things up and close the series out. Certain great shows can go beyond three or four seasons of content without … Continue reading →

TV Review: The Girlfriend Experience

If you’re not already watching Starz’ The Girlfriend Experience, might I suggest you start now; now in its second season, the show has completely changed face by moving on from its season one arc, involving the great Riley Keough, to a dual-narrative that respectively involve Anna Friel and Louisa Krause, and Carmen Ejogo. It’s still a … Continue reading →

“Can ‘The Mayor’ Make Situation Comedy On ABC Great Again?”

Shocking revelation: I’m a big-time sucker for a good sitcom. My love for Brooklyn Nine-Nine is well-documented, I watched The Mindy Project religiously until it went to Hulu (because, y’know, I didn’t have Hulu at the time), I grew up on Family Matters and Full House and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and you get the idea, right?  So, basically, I’m … Continue reading →

The Defenders Proves That We Need Fewer Superhero Teamups

Maybe I’m the wrong person to write about superhero stuff in 2017. Guys, really: I just can’t watch superhero things without finding big philosophical flaws in their makeup and intent. I’m afraid to sit through the second season of Jessica Jones when it airs next year, even, though then again, Jessica is the best thing about The Defenders, … Continue reading →

TV Review: Get Shorty

There’s an internal debate raging in the pop culture center of my brain as to whether Epix’s new show, Get Shorty, is actually as good as I think it is, based on its existence as the second adaptation of Elmore Leonard’s 1990 novel (the first being, of course, 1995’s Get Shorty); I’m still mulling over whether it’s … Continue reading →

Bingeworthy Breakdown: Comrade Detective

Trust me: I really wanted to love Comrade Detective. I’m fond of most of the people involved, and if I’m naturally inclined to consider the basic conceit of dubbing comic vocal tracks over material that is not at all innately comic, I’m okay with it on the off chance that the people doing it nail the … Continue reading →

The 20 Best “Mad Men” Episodes

I don’t need to explain this one, do I? Mad Men turned 10 years old yesterday. The TV writing staff at Paste Magazine wrote about its best episodes; I specifically wrote about Pete Campbell getting knocked the fuck out by Lane Pryce, and also about the time Sterling Cooper became Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce. Nothing complicated, … Continue reading →

Bingeworthy Breakdown: Gypsy

I know it is unfashionable for men to talk about sex and arousal in context with pop culture, but I’m a big dummy who doesn’t know what’s good for him, so I went ahead and did exactly that for The Playlist’s Bingeworthy Breakdown feature, in which I say a bunch of smart stuff, and smartass … Continue reading →

TV Review: Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Episode 4.10, “Captain Latvia”

And again with the Brooklyn Nine-Nine reviewing, over at Paste Magazine as always, in which Charles Boyle taps into his inner mommy strength and goes sickhouse on a gang of gunrunners, all in pursuit of giving young Nikolaj the perfect (first) Christmas. (Content warning: Joe Lo Truglio’s chest hair.) A good way to break for a … Continue reading →