Welcome to my Monday newsletter! This week, I am looking at It: Welcome to Derry and the second season of Nobody Wants This. Plus the latest episodes of Abbott Elementary, Only Murders in the Building and The Lowdown. I'm also continuing my Top 25 Shows Since 2000 with #6 and doing a Pilot Re-Review on the short lived Lone Star!
WHAT'S NEW
I watched the It movie recently for the first time partly because I knew this show was coming. I was very mixed on the movie and it truthfully made me less interested for the show. But I still went in with an open mind especially because I was intrigued by the early 60s setting. After watching the pilot, I'm not sure if this is a show I'm going to stick with. Horror is a tough sell for me in general, especially when tied to the supernatural. I need some sort of thriller element that will make it feel more real to me and so when a woman was giving birth to some bat like demon in the first couple minutes of the pilot, I already had one foot out the door.
The pilot seemed real focused on setting the table and it was just easy to see how it all was diagrammed out. After capturing the audience with a high energy beginning, the show jumped forward in time and everything settled back down a bit as we were introduced to several main characters. The the jump scares started again as the show started to head toward the ending of the pilot, which of course was going to end on a creepy cliffhanger. Besides being formulaic, there were two major problems I had with this pilot. First, the aforementioned creepy birth scene, while not my thing, was definitely the most interesting part of the pilot. That first scene leaned into supernatural horror tropes but at least it wasn't dull like the rest of the pilot.
The biggest problem though was Pennywise didn't even appear. Bill Skarsgard is reprising his role from the film and he was easily the best part of the movie. Everyone knows Pennywise is going to show up eventually but him not appearing at all in the pilot gives off real "Surf Dracula" vibes (look it up if you don't know what that means). I am always a proponent of TV as a better form of storytelling so often because of the depth we can get into but situations like this, where an eight episode series is used to taunt the audience into waiting at least another week to see the reason a lot of people probably watched in the first place is just frustrating storytelling. So I'm probably out on It: Welcome to Derry. If I hear it gets way better (which I doubt), maybe I'll check back in.
I really enjoyed the first season of Nobody Wants This but it feels like forever ago that it aired. Even though it was only about a year ago, which is a quick turnaround for Netflix, the binge model of Netflix makes shows not stick with me as long as week to week shows that I invest in over a couple months. I watched the whole first season of Nobody in about a week and I'm four episodes into the second season.
But I don't want to turn this into my gripes with the binge model. I will say that Nobody Wants This came back strongly with the right kind of episode to get me back into the show. The series did a nice re-introduction of the characters and dynamics by having them come to a dinner party and very clearly reminding us of what was going on (I wouldn't have even needed the "previously on" with how effective the script was at re-establishing characters). There was still some ground-setting for the second season to happen though and I actually thought the first episode was the worst of the four I saw.
The cast remains exceptional. Kristen Bell and Adam Brody continue to have sparkling chemistry (having watched more of The OC over the summer for the first time, it's fun to see glimpses of an older Seth Cohen in Brody's portrayal). The show's MVP definitively at this point is Justine Lupe, who has really impeccable comic timing and kicked things up a notch this season. I am also enjoying Timothy Simons and Jackie Tohn more this year and I think the straightforward way they are exploring a love triangle between those three characters is interesting and different. The writing for Tovah Feldshuh and her portrayal remain a little too broad for me, but everything else was really working in what I saw. I thought the fourth episode especially, set on Valentine's Day, was really an example of the show being a very confident version of itself. I look forward to the rest of the season and fully expect it to get renewed for a third season.
LAST WEEK ON...
I feel like this season of Abbott Elementary has meandered a bit. This was the second straight where the bulk of the episode was not set at the school. Last week, it was the Phillies game which was a unique episode, especially because it was filmed at an actual Phillies game. But then this week, the plot was split between Gregory's apartment and the DMV. Both plots allowed for the worst instincts of the characters to show as they all were very much playing to their type. Gregory in particular has been getting more and more eccentric, but some of the caricatures in this episode reminded me of late seasons of The Office where they all became about their one quirk instead of fully fleshed-out characters. It will be nice to get back to the school soon. Doing something off campus is nice every once in awhile but two weeks in a row is not great.
Only Murders in the Building
This week's penultimate episode really felt like the show was coming to an end. With so much attention on "the building," and a lot of natural goodbyes, it felt like the show was gearing up for a series finale not just a season finale. But we haven't gotten any news of a renewal or ending. For a show that has run this long and been this acclaimed and is still a flagship Hulu original, I don't think it's going to get an abrupt ending after the fact. I think if this was going to be the final season, we would have heard about it by now so I'm guessing the season finale will get the group back in the building and tee up a new season. I really cared about and enjoyed the "building" part of the episode but the "murders" part was only OK. I feel a little underwhelmed by how the case is resolving even though I've liked the season overall.
The Lowdown
After I talked about The Lowdown not really caring much about the plot, we got a very plot-heavy episode. Although there were strong moments (an impressive performance from the late Graham Greene and a chilling appearance by Paul Sparks), I didn't like this episode as much as the previous three. I felt like the structure of the last two in particular, which really allowed Ethan Hawke to be on one adventure while the plot advanced slowly elsewhere was effective. I guess that sort of happened later in the episode when Hawke was with Greene but it felt like they were paying the price for their laxadaiscal approach to the plot by packing too much into this episode. I wouldn't change the last three episodes though so I can live with an episode like this. It was still good.
TOP 25 SHOWS SINCE 2000
If you take The Office at its very best, it's as good as any show on this list. It could make a serious argument for #1. But The Office was certainly not at its best all the time and the lows were a lot lower than any other show in the Top 10 which is why it only managed to come in at #6. After finding its footing during the first season, it soared for the next couple years and then stayed serviceable until it tried to soldier on without Steve Carell where things completely fell apart. But for most of its run, they had one of the best TV characters of all time in Carell's Michael Scott. Anyone who thinks he's just a politically incorrect buffoon or disaster are not giving Carell his proper respect for the character he created. The many unique personalities that rounded out the cast and the show's ability to mix sweetness with cynicism changed TV. After an inauspicious start, it became one of the biggest and more influential TV shows this century, and all about a midsize paper company in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
PILOT RE-REVIEW
This season, I am traveling back in time to the 2010-11 season, the first season I did this blog. I will be re-reviewing the pilots from that season, at least as many as I can find!
Original Review: Click Here!
What I Think Now: I've been looking forward to re-watching this pilot since I decided to include this section in my newsletter. This show is one of TV's great "what ifs." I have not watched this pilot in the 15 years since I first reviewed it and it definitely holds up. It's a very compelling drama that sets up the series many great stories and characters. The problem was it was a prestige drama masquerading as a network drama. If only this show had waited 5-10 years. It could have definitely thrived as a streaming drama that does 8-10 episodes every season. But it was never going to fly as a network drama. Heck, it could have probably been an awards player on something like FX or AMC even then. Network dramas were at least a bit more ambitious in 2010 than they are now, but this was still too far off the beaten path. That's not to say it wasn't accessible. It was just the nature of the story they wanted to tell. James Wolk was charming in the lead role and the pilot did a great job of setting up both of his worlds and the characters in each of them. I was impressed with how little exposition was needed and how the show effectively gave us all the information we needed. The only thing I bumped a little bit against watching it back was how much the show hit us over the head with how conflicted Wolk was about his father (Keith David). But that was a small complaint.
What Happened to the Show: Lone Star was an infamous flop. It was one of the best reviewed shows heading into Fall 2010 but pretty much everyone acknowledged it would be a tough sell on FOX on Monday nights. The show premiered to 4.1 million viewers and a 1.3 demo. While those numbers would make a network giddy today, that was not the case in 2010. It was a dead show walking the second those ratings came in. FOX aired it for one more week where it dropped to a 1.0 demo and then it was promptly cancelled, the first cancellation of the 2010-11 season. The rest of the filmed episodes never saw the light of day. Kyle Killen had another couple intriguing dramas that didn't live to see a second season with 2012's Awake and 2014's Mind Games. He was then involved with the first season of Halo on Paramount+. Despite seemingly being made for the streaming environment, he hasn't done much in that arena.
COMING UP
It's a fairly quiet week for premieres before a busy beginning of November. On Wednesday, Prime Video debuts the second season of Hazbin Hotel, which has developed somewhat of a cult following. Also premiering Wednesday is Down Cemetery Road on Apple TV+. The show is sort of a companion piece to Slow Horses as it is also based on a book by Mick Herron. This series features Ruth Wilson and Emma Thompson among others. On Thursday, Netflix premieres the fourth season of The Witcher, which has Liam Hemsworth taking the lead role from Henry Cavill. The series has already been renewed for a fifth and final season. Finally on Sunday, HBO has the premiere of the Rachel Sennott comedy I Love LA. HBO has continued to have a steady stream of dramas but it's been awhile since they've successfully premiered a comedy. Also premiering Sunday is the TV adaptation of Robin Hood on MGM+. This would probably have a lot more buzz if it was on something other than MGM+.
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