Welcome to my weekly newsletter! This week, I am looking at Landman, St. Denis Medical and the second season of Silo. Plus I have thoughts on Disclaimer, American Sports Story and more!
Unlike many, there hasn't really been a Taylor Sheridan show I've enjoyed. I have never seen Yellowstone. I watched a whole season of 1923 and Tulsa King but didn't love either one. I didn't finish 1883 and never even tried Lioness. But I was drawn to Landman because I thought the premise was interesting and I was particularly intrigued by the all-star cast.
This is definitely a soapy drama but I quite enjoyed the first two episodes. It definitely feels a bit like a modern day Dallas meets Friday Night Lights. It's not as focused on the fabulously wealthy oil barons as Dallas was and gives more attention to the "boots on the ground" and of course it's not as endearing as Lights, but I feel like those two shows are at least starting points for the vibe as long as you understand I'm not saying this is anywhere as good as Lights. The main reason to watch this show is Billy Bob Thornton as Tommy Norris. He's chewing scenery but doing it in a real delightful way. His interactions with his daughter, Ainsley (Michelle Randolph) and ex-wife, Angela (Ali Larter) were the highlights of the first two episodes even if the show veered a little too far into voyeuristic territory with the Ainsley character.
It doesn't end with Thornton and his family unit though. I've never disliked Jon Hamm in anything and that remains the case here. He's such a compelling actor no matter the role or show. Demi Moore did not have much to do in the first two episodes but I'm sure that will change. I was less interested in the actual "oil work" happening in the first two episodes than the interpersonal relationships. I don't know if that will sour me more on the show as it goes on or if the way these stories intersect will become more interesting. Time will tell. I don't think this is high art but I do think Sheridan fits a certain void in TV with his shows and not just geographically. He is very good at coming up with the streaming version of popcorn TV and this is a strong example. I'll definitely stick with it for a few episodes if not more.
St. Denis Medical is NBC's newest comedy and the newest entry to the mockumentary game. Set in an understaffed and underfunded Oregon hospital, the series might immediately make people think of Abbott Elementary because of the mockumentary approach and the large ensemble working in an environment with their backs against the wall. But it also shares a lot of DNA with the previous comedies from creator Justin Spitzer: Superstore and American Auto. Like Superstore, it has the loaded ensemble feel without a real "star" or main character (yes, Allison Tolman's Alex sort of fits that role but she's not a centerpiece like Quinta Brunson on Abbott). But it also feels like Spitzer has gotten a bit sappier over the years because American Auto was a bit more sentimental than Superstore and St. Denis feels a bit more sappy than Auto. It definitely seems to want to make you laugh and tug at the heartstrings.
The cast is absolutely stacked here. Wendi McLendon-Covey is playing a different type of broadness than Beverly Goldberg but she's always good at committing to a character. The aforementioned Tolman is just such an easy personality to root for. It's great to have Superstore's Kaliko Kauahi back in an ensemble comedy. And I wasn't totally sold on Josh Lawson or Mekki Leeper at first but they won me over by the end of the two episode premiere. The one weak link for me is David Alan Grier. I've never found him very funny and he was already saddled with a horribly unfunny plot in the second episode. I don't think his involvement will sink the show for me but I can already tell he won't be my favorite.
I am pretty forgiving of comedies in their early days because I know it takes time for an ensemble to gel. Given that Medical is already starting at a pretty strong place, I have no doubt it has the goods to become another strong workplace comedy. I hope NBC and audiences give it the time to do that.
I was pretty late to the first season of Silo, watching it around a year after it came out. But then I was surprisingly engrossed by it. It doesn't seem like my kind of show but I found the story and especially the world building to be quite compelling even though I found some of the performances to be inconsistent (Rebecca Ferguson, though she improved as the season went on) or bad (Common, who showed no signs of improvement).
I'm surprised Apple didn't start by releasing the first two episodes of the season because this first episode felt awfully padded and not that much happened. The first couple minutes with Ferguson's Juliette venture into another silo (and a brief look at the backstory of that silo to open the episode) was incredibly compelling. But then we spent an incredibly long amount of time with her just wandering around the silo as we jumped back and forth between the present timeline and when Juliette first joined Engineering as a kid. And then after all that, the last couple minutes were very exciting.
I am not a fan of binge drops but I do think streamers dropping a couple episodes to start a season is often a good idea. And in this case, it was a lot of waiting around for something to happen. Then something finally happened and boom, the credits roll. I also think Silo does more flashbacks than necessary. How much more do we really need to learn about Juliette at this point? The final episode moment could have been a halfway point without those flashbacks.
So, I don't think it was a great second season premiere but I still feel quite intrigued about where this season is going and I'm sure future episodes will be much more enjoyable.
SCRIPTED PREMIERES THIS WEEK
There's another busy week of premieres for mid-November. On Tuesday, Hulu premieres Interior Chinatown, a meta series based on the novel. The series drops all ten episodes on Tuesday. On Tuesday night, NBC has the third season premiere of Night Court, airing after week two of St. Denis Medical. Thursday is a busy day for premieres. Netflix drops its new Ted Danson comedy from Mike Schur, A Man on the Inside. Reviews haven't come out yet but Danson and Schur were a potent combination on The Good Place. Thursday also has the premiere of Cruel Intentions on Prime Video. There has been talk of a TV adaptation of Cruel Intentions since 1999. NBC had a pilot in 2015 and this version has been in development since 2021. Also premiering on Thursday are two returning series: Based on a True Story returns for its second season on Peacock while the underrated The Sex Lives of College Girls returns for a third season on Max. Finally on Friday, Starz has the start of the second half of the penultimate season of the long-running Outlander.
ODDS & ENDS
- It's been over a week so I didn't really want to get too deep into the end of Disclaimer. That show was a big disappointment for me. Despite good performances from Cate Blanchett and Kevin Kline, it was a mess of a show. I kept hoping it would actually start being about something but it never rose above a little sordid tale masquerading as prestige TV. Nothing really happened on the show and it definitely gave a "what's the point?" vibe throughout all seven episodes.
- Amidst many fall shows overall and quite a few from Ryan Murphy alone, it felt like American Sports Story: Aaron Hernandez flew under the radar a bit. But it was actually one of the better shows this fall in my opinion and way better than Murphy's higher profile Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story. Sports Story was led by a very strong lead performance from Josh Andres Rivera and it felt like the show had some things to say about fame, nature vs. nurture, expectations of athletes and football head injuries. I don't know that all those themes came through as clear as they could have, but it was absolutely a worthwhile watch.
- I gave a very brief try (less than one episode) to Say Nothing and Cross. Say Nothing has received a lot of positive critical notices but I'm just not interested enough in the subject matter to watch the show. As for Cross, I've never been a fan of the subgenre of "Dad TV" that Prime Video has. I know less than one episode isn't really a fair shake for a show but, again, those are the joys of not being a professional critic. Along those same lines, I didn't watch (and don't plan to watch) The Day of the Jackal and Dune: Prophecy.
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