Benjamonster's TV

For a seventh annual year, I will be presenting an extended end of season awards show. It will have some similarities to the Emmys in terms of categories and eligibility but will of course be completely based on my preferences and what I have watched.  Here are the rules for eligibility: - Shows had to have aired the majority of its season between June 1, 2025 and May 31, 2026. - A show is considered eligible if I watched at least four episodes of it. Many of them I have watched the full season, but four episodes is the cutoff for eligibility. - I am making my own calls for whether an actor/actress fits into a leading or supporting category as well as genre categories (comedy, drama, limited/anthology). That will often align with Emmy categorizations but that is not always the case. For example, I am classifying  The Bear  as a drama and Hannah Einbinder as a Lead Actress for  Hacks . - A limited series is any series that was designed to be close-ended. An antho...

Welcome to my Monday newsletter! This week, I am looking at my Top 12 Most Anticipated Summer Shows plus the most recent episodes of Hacks and  Margo's Got Money Troubles . I am also counting down my Top 10 TV Shows starting with the letter N and taking a look at the Emmy races for Comedy and Drama Series. This will be my last weekly newsletter until September as I am taking the summer off from the newsletter. However, you can still check out my Benjamonster Awards throughout the month of July in this space and I'll continue to be contributing to  The TV Ratings Guide  on Tuesdays and Wednesdays! WHAT'S NEW TOP 12 MOST ANTICIPATED SUMMER SERIES With this being my final newsletter until September, I wanted to take a look at my most anticipated summer shows. Last year was a barren wasteland for summer programming as far as I was concerned but on paper, this summer looks better. Here are the ones that seem most interesting to me! 12. Lanterns (HBO, August 16) This comes in a...

Welcome to my Monday newsletter! This week, I am looking at the special episode of The Bear , the season finale of Rooster and the latest episodes of Margo's Got Money Troubles and Euphoria . Plus, my Top 10 TV Shows starting with M and a look at the Limited Series Emmy race! WHAT'S NEW I don't have anything new to report this week. The number of May premieres I am interested are few and far between and I'm pretty behind on some of my "background" shows (meaning broadcast network procedurals mostly). I will say that I am thrilled that NBC went back to pilot season this year and I hope the other networks follow suit. They didn't do 20+ pilots like the old days but it sounds like they were happy with the eight they made, picking up four of them. It will be interesting to see if it results in higher quality broadcast shows. LAST WEEK ON... The Bear "Gary" The Bear dropped a surprise episode this week that was a flashback focusing on Richie and Mikey...

Welcome to my Monday newsletter! This week, I am making my Tony Award predictions, looking at the finale of Imperfect Women and the most recent episodes of Hacks and Margo's Got Money Troubles . Also, I am counting down my Top 5 Shows Starting with L and taking a look at the Emmy race for Lead Actor and Actress in a Comedy Series! WHAT'S NEW TONY NOMINATION PREDICTIONS I didn't have anything new to review this week (I sampled Widow's Bay and thought there were some interesting things but it wasn't for me) so I'll use this space to give my Tony Award nomination predictions. The nominations are announced tomorrow morning and it's a light year for musicals but a stacked year for plays. Here are my predictions for the major categories: Best Musical: The Lost Boys, Schmigadoon!, Titanique, Two Strangers (Carry a Cake Across New York) Best Revival of a Musical: Cats: The Jellicle Ball, Ragtime, The Rocky Horror Show Best Play: The Balusters, The Fear of 13, Giant,...

Welcome to my Monday newsletter! This week, I am looking at Margo's Got Money Troubles , the season finale of The Pitt and the latest episode of Hacks . Plus my Top 5 Shows Starting with K and a look at the Lead Actor and Actress in a Drama Series races at the Emmys. The newsletter will be taking a one week break next week. It will be back on Monday, May 4! WHAT'S NEW MARGO'S GOT MONEY TROUBLES Apple TV's new dramedy kicked off this week with pretty solid reviews and I'm here to add to the chorus of voices saying this is a charming and fun show. Although I was excited about the cast, I wasn't totally sure about the premise which basically read as a "a young mom turns to Only Fans to make money." That is really underselling what this show is. The Only Fans story got a lot of attention (especially in conjunction with a similar story on Euphoria ) but in Margo's , she doesn't even get her first "fan" until the very end of the third episo...

Welcome to my Monday newsletter! This week is a busy one. I am looking at the newest season of Euphoria and Hacks , the new comedy Big Mistakes , the season finales of Shrinking, American Classic, St. Denis Medical and Memory of a Killer  and the latest episode of The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins . Plus my Top 10 Shows starting with J and a look at the Emmy race in the Lead Actor and Actress in a Limited Series categories. WHAT'S NEW EUPHORIA Season 3 Oh Euphoria . My experience with this show feels like a lifetime ago. I watched the first season, which aired in 2019, during the COVID shutdown in Spring 2020. I was fascinated by the visual style of it even if the story didn't work all the time for me. Then I absolutely adored the one-off special with Zendaya and Colman Domingo around Christmas 2020 as we waited for Season 2 (it was my #1 Episode of 2020). I watched the second season as it aired back in 2022 and enjoyed it but still found it to be a mess a lot of the time. An...