First, this is great news. I am looking forward to reading many of these reviews (Strange New Worlds, Righteous Gemstones, Justified, Only Murders, WWDITS), I am particularly glad to see the addition of Caroline as she was one of my favorite reviewers at the AVC.
re: your question about other streaming shows, shows that may generate some interest in a one-off newsletter, two I'd be interested in are:
Marvelous Mrs. Maisel's last season: technically not a binge-release, but I understand why there has been other focuses here on the site. Still, it did win the Emmy for Best Comedy and each season has been nominated.
The Great--haven't watched the new season yet, but really did enjoy the first two.
If nothing else, this last season of Maisel is taking a different enough approach with its flash-fowards that I think it would be interesting to dig into a little critically.
It reminds me a bit of the last season of Parks and Rec, which opened with a time jump and a new estrangement between Leslie and Ron that was only gradually explained and then resolved. Not quite the same approach here, but it's in that same ballpark.
I liked the roast episode as a self-contained piece, but overall the knowledge that Midge (and Susie!) absolutely will become world-famous someday has taken a lot of the wind out of the sails of the show for me. Watching them on the cusp of true fame now, everything just seems like a foregone conclusion.
Guess I hadn't thought of them being estranged as this big mystery that needed answering at that stage? Like sure there were some brief mentions here and there, but it felt like it skipped an episode ahead? Just my two cents.
I second that it would be very interesting to review Mrs Maisel, that show is always a delight and have many strong storytelling choices to discuss, in addition to fashion and sexism 😁
Me so happy to see this site continue to thrive and grow! And me just realized that if you were taking on new contributors, me missed golden opportunity to pitch self to review Mayhem! Me appreciate Muppets on deeper level than any of you!!!
so happy to see that there'll be weekly The Righteous Gemstones reviews!! such a great, ridiculous, mesmerising show. And even though I'd love to see reviews of The Bear, I totally understand why reviewing binge release shows is a zero sum game fir a newsletter like this. I wish they'd gone for weekly releases for s2, it's a show that really would have benefited from it
It's...a baffling decision, on so many levels. It may be as complex as not having the infrastructure to sustain ongoing marketing/promotion, or it may be as simple as Hulu just making a dumb decision, but this is a show that would absolutely sustain weekly engagement., and it's a real shame it won't get it.
I'm curious if you've considered doing weekly coverage for binge released shows covering 1/2 episodes of a season each week. While there are are some shows that play like extended movies, there are others that definitely benefit from weekly discussion especially if they are a big/highly anticipated series - i.e. Stranger Things.
Stranger Things ending is probably the closest we'd get to this, but we tried this with Russian Doll. It worked...fine, but just the asymmetry of the conversations kills the fundamental value of this in ways that make it hard to justify for a non-event streaming release.
Could you possibly do something along the lines of Game of Thrones' expert/newbies reviews where you have a space for people who've binged the whole thing and a space for people who are pacing themselves?
TV Club Classic started because of the 2007 writer's strike, so I do admit that it would be fitting if this fall proves to be the impetus for classic rewatches in this space. If we need to use it to fill out the schedule, I'm definitely open to it, but I do feel like 15+ years of rewatch podcasts and related activity have made this a much more saturated space, and thus hard to justify over covering new content generally.
I really liked contributing to TV Club Classic, and I would be totally into doing a revisit of something or other whenever it fits the Episodic Medium lineup.
I'm here because of how much I value your voice, and the voice of the writers you've assembled (re-assembled?), so I'd be interested in their take on things even if someone else has said something else.
I wonder if there's merit around revisiting shows that fit certain criteria, like stuff that specifically held up well (and why) or stuff that was ahead of the times (and why) or stuff that really aged poorly (and why). You could call it "...and why?" and I would continue to subscribe.
They were some of my favorite pieces of AV Club content as the crew provided tons of thoughtful discussions that were hard to find elsewhere. Plus, there's so much tv out there that you guys could probably either find something underdiscussed and/or reappraise something that wasn't well received at the time.
Quite the summer you've got lined up for us! Recent months haven't covered much that I'm watching live, so I'm looking forward to this coming bounty, which for me will be Secret Invasion, What We Do in the Shadows, Justified: City Primeval, and Ahsoka, at least. And outside your coverage, we've also got new episodes of Black Mirror, I Think You Should Leave, and (somehow) Good Omens coming up, too!
It's great to see Caroline and Dennis (re)joining the fold. I don't know if there's any room for him to cover SNL here -- or when that'll even return, given the strike -- but I always valued the perspective he would bring to his A.V. Club reviews of that, especially the context of recurring bits from older seasons that I hadn't seen.
I'm not sure what it means for your metrics and how you gauge engagement, but for the record, I turn off all the newsletters because I how I feel about newsletters; however, I come here regularly to read everything that's related to my viewing habits and will continue to subscribe if y'all keep writing.
Great list! And hooray to see more awesome names join in! That said, I'm bummed that HBO Max's Warrior didn't make the cut :(
An ode to the dearly departed Cinemax, the best action scenes in television, and a tightly wrapped narrative led by Jonathan Tropper? And hey, racists get punched in the face!
Has there been any thought given to just doing one-time reviews of a whole season for binge release shows, or would that be straying too far from the episodic nature of this thing?
I'm fine to stray from the episodic nature of the thing, formally speaking, but the problem is that in a context where subscriptions are our form of revenue, a single review of an entire season can never be compensated fairly. A single article doesn't really move the needle for us in terms of generating value, but I don't think it's fair to give someone an assignment to watch an entire season and then only paying them the cost of a single review in return. We've reviewed some finales in this way, which naturally become a reflection on the entire season, but I don't want to present this as "coverage" when it won't offer the same engagement.
As someone who tried to watch Justified late in it's run, but got overwhelmed by the number of episodes and gave up, will I get anything out of watching this revival season? I really enjoy Olyphant in general, and want to give it a chance if I can.
I mean, you'll catch on quick if you just jump in but you're depriving yourself of several of the best seasons of television of the last 10-15 years by not watching the original series
I don't think we can know yet, but Justified is very much a classic and totally worth watching in my opinion. It's a lot of TV by modern standards, but it's so very good. If Justified didn't grab you, I'm not sure that a Coda by the same folks would be your jam.
Oh HELL YEAH, so glad Caroline Seide will be writing over here, love her. And also happy that there will be Clone High coverage! I'm rewatching the first season right now. I'm also gonna watch The Afterparty so glad it'll be covered here as well!
Yay Caroline! Hoping she gets to cover RTD’s return to Doctor Who, specially as this year it’d only be three posts.
First, this is great news. I am looking forward to reading many of these reviews (Strange New Worlds, Righteous Gemstones, Justified, Only Murders, WWDITS), I am particularly glad to see the addition of Caroline as she was one of my favorite reviewers at the AVC.
Looks to be a good summer.
re: your question about other streaming shows, shows that may generate some interest in a one-off newsletter, two I'd be interested in are:
Marvelous Mrs. Maisel's last season: technically not a binge-release, but I understand why there has been other focuses here on the site. Still, it did win the Emmy for Best Comedy and each season has been nominated.
The Great--haven't watched the new season yet, but really did enjoy the first two.
If nothing else, this last season of Maisel is taking a different enough approach with its flash-fowards that I think it would be interesting to dig into a little critically.
Yeah exactly. Still a bit puzzled by the roast episode that seemed to resolve a question that hadn't been asked yet.
(FWIW I've yet to watch last Friday's episode)
It reminds me a bit of the last season of Parks and Rec, which opened with a time jump and a new estrangement between Leslie and Ron that was only gradually explained and then resolved. Not quite the same approach here, but it's in that same ballpark.
I liked the roast episode as a self-contained piece, but overall the knowledge that Midge (and Susie!) absolutely will become world-famous someday has taken a lot of the wind out of the sails of the show for me. Watching them on the cusp of true fame now, everything just seems like a foregone conclusion.
What unasked question. I mean we knew they were both successful and estranged before the Roast episode.
Guess I hadn't thought of them being estranged as this big mystery that needed answering at that stage? Like sure there were some brief mentions here and there, but it felt like it skipped an episode ahead? Just my two cents.
I second that it would be very interesting to review Mrs Maisel, that show is always a delight and have many strong storytelling choices to discuss, in addition to fashion and sexism 😁
TV, right? What a time to be alive.
Keep doing what you're doing; I love the writing (and community!) here, and you can always count on my support.
(I am indeed constantly wondering when Donna Bowman will be back, for what it's worth.)
Think of it as we’re in that period where Larry David wasn’t making Curb, but the second he wanted to HBO got out their check book.
Me so happy to see this site continue to thrive and grow! And me just realized that if you were taking on new contributors, me missed golden opportunity to pitch self to review Mayhem! Me appreciate Muppets on deeper level than any of you!!!
so happy to see that there'll be weekly The Righteous Gemstones reviews!! such a great, ridiculous, mesmerising show. And even though I'd love to see reviews of The Bear, I totally understand why reviewing binge release shows is a zero sum game fir a newsletter like this. I wish they'd gone for weekly releases for s2, it's a show that really would have benefited from it
It's...a baffling decision, on so many levels. It may be as complex as not having the infrastructure to sustain ongoing marketing/promotion, or it may be as simple as Hulu just making a dumb decision, but this is a show that would absolutely sustain weekly engagement., and it's a real shame it won't get it.
I'm curious if you've considered doing weekly coverage for binge released shows covering 1/2 episodes of a season each week. While there are are some shows that play like extended movies, there are others that definitely benefit from weekly discussion especially if they are a big/highly anticipated series - i.e. Stranger Things.
Stranger Things ending is probably the closest we'd get to this, but we tried this with Russian Doll. It worked...fine, but just the asymmetry of the conversations kills the fundamental value of this in ways that make it hard to justify for a non-event streaming release.
Could you possibly do something along the lines of Game of Thrones' expert/newbies reviews where you have a space for people who've binged the whole thing and a space for people who are pacing themselves?
Know you guys are relatively new, but are there any plans to do coverage of older shows like in the AV Club days?
TV Club Classic started because of the 2007 writer's strike, so I do admit that it would be fitting if this fall proves to be the impetus for classic rewatches in this space. If we need to use it to fill out the schedule, I'm definitely open to it, but I do feel like 15+ years of rewatch podcasts and related activity have made this a much more saturated space, and thus hard to justify over covering new content generally.
I really liked contributing to TV Club Classic, and I would be totally into doing a revisit of something or other whenever it fits the Episodic Medium lineup.
I'm here because of how much I value your voice, and the voice of the writers you've assembled (re-assembled?), so I'd be interested in their take on things even if someone else has said something else.
I wonder if there's merit around revisiting shows that fit certain criteria, like stuff that specifically held up well (and why) or stuff that was ahead of the times (and why) or stuff that really aged poorly (and why). You could call it "...and why?" and I would continue to subscribe.
They were some of my favorite pieces of AV Club content as the crew provided tons of thoughtful discussions that were hard to find elsewhere. Plus, there's so much tv out there that you guys could probably either find something underdiscussed and/or reappraise something that wasn't well received at the time.
Quite the summer you've got lined up for us! Recent months haven't covered much that I'm watching live, so I'm looking forward to this coming bounty, which for me will be Secret Invasion, What We Do in the Shadows, Justified: City Primeval, and Ahsoka, at least. And outside your coverage, we've also got new episodes of Black Mirror, I Think You Should Leave, and (somehow) Good Omens coming up, too!
It's great to see Caroline and Dennis (re)joining the fold. I don't know if there's any room for him to cover SNL here -- or when that'll even return, given the strike -- but I always valued the perspective he would bring to his A.V. Club reviews of that, especially the context of recurring bits from older seasons that I hadn't seen.
Should Paste no longer require Dennis' services, a conversation can definitely be had about SNL.
I'm not sure what it means for your metrics and how you gauge engagement, but for the record, I turn off all the newsletters because I how I feel about newsletters; however, I come here regularly to read everything that's related to my viewing habits and will continue to subscribe if y'all keep writing.
Dr Who, definitely. And as John L stated older shows are a possibility.
Really excited for the return of Justified and delighted the site will be covering it.
Great list! And hooray to see more awesome names join in! That said, I'm bummed that HBO Max's Warrior didn't make the cut :(
An ode to the dearly departed Cinemax, the best action scenes in television, and a tightly wrapped narrative led by Jonathan Tropper? And hey, racists get punched in the face!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bp8Lfq5rV0
Damn! I was not sure that I would watch The Secret Invasion but if Caroline is reviewing, it instantly becomes a must watch 😍
So no "American Born Chinese?"
Binge release. (I'm confused about it, too)
Has there been any thought given to just doing one-time reviews of a whole season for binge release shows, or would that be straying too far from the episodic nature of this thing?
I'm fine to stray from the episodic nature of the thing, formally speaking, but the problem is that in a context where subscriptions are our form of revenue, a single review of an entire season can never be compensated fairly. A single article doesn't really move the needle for us in terms of generating value, but I don't think it's fair to give someone an assignment to watch an entire season and then only paying them the cost of a single review in return. We've reviewed some finales in this way, which naturally become a reflection on the entire season, but I don't want to present this as "coverage" when it won't offer the same engagement.
As someone who tried to watch Justified late in it's run, but got overwhelmed by the number of episodes and gave up, will I get anything out of watching this revival season? I really enjoy Olyphant in general, and want to give it a chance if I can.
I mean, you'll catch on quick if you just jump in but you're depriving yourself of several of the best seasons of television of the last 10-15 years by not watching the original series
I don't think we can know yet, but Justified is very much a classic and totally worth watching in my opinion. It's a lot of TV by modern standards, but it's so very good. If Justified didn't grab you, I'm not sure that a Coda by the same folks would be your jam.
Oh HELL YEAH, so glad Caroline Seide will be writing over here, love her. And also happy that there will be Clone High coverage! I'm rewatching the first season right now. I'm also gonna watch The Afterparty so glad it'll be covered here as well!