Welcome to my Monday newsletter! This week I am looking at recent premieres Manhunt, The Girls on the Bus and Apples Never Fall!
I checked out the first two episodes of Apple TV+'s Manhunt, a series about the hunt for John Wilkes Booth after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. There were some things I really liked about the show and I definitely plan to keep watching but it suffers a bit from the things that plague so many Apple TV+ shows: it is a beautiful production design wrapped around a show that's lacking a heart and a soul. The period work here is great and meticulous, but the depth of so many shows on the streamer is just lacking. It reminded me a bit of The New Look in that way though Manhunt is stronger than that show.
Manhunt is aided by a strong lead performance from Tobias Menzies as well as an interesting, albeit small, portrayal of Abraham Lincoln by Hamish Linklater. Although I am pretty well versed in US History, I realized that I didn't know too much about what happened after the assassination of Abraham Lincoln or the fact that it took so long to find Booth. Still, I am not entirely convinced that there's enough story here for a seven episode season. This might have been better off as a movie.
The show does a pretty good job of keeping it confined to its time period and not trying to be a commentary on the current world we live in (with the exception of one forced line: "we replace our presidents with elections, not with coups" - true of course, but probably not a line that would be used without a post-January 6 perspective). I'm definitely intrigued enough to keep watching but I just would like to see a little more work on the characters. Of course, that's the exact opposite problem of the next show in this newsletter.
Max's new political drama The Girls on the Bus premiered Thursday with its first two episodes. The show, which centers on four female journalists covering a fictional presidential campaign, feels a little out of place for Max and also for our current political climate. Based on a 2018 book about Hillary Clinton's two presidential campaigns, it definitely gives off Obama-era vibes which is jarring compared to what's sure to be a demoralizing 2024 election season. That was a sign that this show would be both frustrating and interesting.
There's some really good things in this show but I wouldn't say everything gelled right away. I was encouraged because I thought the second episode was much better than the first. The first episode had too many girls on the bus and too many presidential candidates to introduce. But the second episode settled in more. Both episodes, though, felt a little bit like they were made for political junkies who lived on Twitter and read Politico in 2016. They tried to modernize things a bit, particularly with Natasha Behnam's character, but her character was giving off vibes of a Gen X's idea of what a Gen Z reporter might be like.
I was mixed on the performances in the first two episodes. There were elements of Melissa Benoist and Carla Gugino that I liked but they also had some cringe moments. Christina Elmore could be an interesting character but so far, they aren't really giving her much to work with and, as mentioned, the writers have no idea how to write for Benham's character. But the candidates were more interesting. There were strong turns from Joanna Gleason and especially Hettienne Park, plus I'm sure we'll be seeing more of Scott Foley. I found the parts of the first two episodes focusing on the campaign to be much more interesting than some of the interpersonal dynamics between the main characters.
Peacock dropped the full season of its family mystery drama Apples Never Fall on Thursday, but I've only had time to watch the first two episodes. The show is very much a less glossy, less star-studded version of Big Little Lies but all the tropes of that show and the others that have followed like Little Fires Everywhere are here. And of course Jake Lacy is there. I loved Lacy in The White Lotus and thought he was the best part of A Friend of the Family but I do think it's time for him to find a role other than a put-upon wealthy white guy.
The cast is strong here with interesting performances from Annette Bening, Sam Neill, Allison Brie and more. They are doing as much as they can with a ho-hum story about a missing matriarch from a very wealthy family that built its success in the world of tennis. A constant feature of a show like this is the drip-drip-drip of information and it gets really frustrating. Especially in a world where we have a show like The White Lotus, which proves a murder mystery can be told by getting to know the characters. But here, the show seems intent on giving baby food-sized information to the viewer so as not to reveal too much of the mystery at any one time. As a result, it's a show that dabbles way too much in cliches with the family drama. Although this feels like a show that will not have a satisfying enough ending, I am going to keep watching primarily for the performances.
SCRIPTED PREMIERES THIS WEEK
There's not much premiering this week but there are some high profile premieres. On Wednesday, Apple TV+ has the premiere of Palm Royale, a star-studded comedy about high society starring Kristen Wiig, Laura Dern, Allison Janney, Leslie Bibb, Carol Burnett, Ricky Martin and more. On Thursday, Netflix has the hotly anticipated 3 Body Problem, from Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss along with Alexander Woo. The buzz out of its SXSW Festival premiere has been mixed but, being on Netflix, it could be a big thing. Thursday also has the premiere of Diarra From Detroit on BET+.
ODDS & ENDS
- It was another busy week for me so I focused on the new shows. I haven't gotten to the third season of Girls5Eva and have fallen behind on Abbott Elementary and The Regime. I should have some catch-up time this week!
- I did watch the finale of Feud. I don't have much to say except this show was severely disappointing for me after I did enjoy the campy fun of the first Bette vs. Joan season. Tom Hollander's performance in Capote vs. the Swans was excellent but that litany of huge names for the swans amounted to very little and the show was a jumpy mess.
- Since I didn't post last week, I just wanted to mention that I really loved the recent Halloween episode of Ghosts. I thought it was such a clever plot that used the premise of the show in excellent ways. I continue to be impressed by how the show finds so many stories with such restrictions on characters and space. It's such a consistently strong show.
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