Katie’s Spring TV Grab Bag
This week, I’m breaking format to give you a grab bag of shows I’ve seen lately that didn’t get full reviews:
Get Even (2020)
Where I watched it: Netflix
What it’s about: A group of girls in a private school who secretly band together to expose injustice.
Why it’s on the list: I started this show because it’s PG and Netflix has it listed as “Family watch together,” but ended up giving up on it after about ten minutes.
This show could potentially start some good conversations (when do rules get in the way of justice, and how much is it okay to break unjust rules?). I realized quickly that the show centers around sexual violence (partially because I read plot summaries for the whole show). I think this topic is important for TV shows to address, but shows addressing this topic are something I can only handle in small amounts. Considering the show is also labelled “soapy,” I was concerned that the show might not handle sexual violence as carefully as it could. Regardless, the show is definitely more adult than other titles under the “family watch together” label.
Irregulars (2021)
Where I watched it: Netflix
What it’s about: It’s a Sherlock Holmes retelling (specifically centered around the Baker Street Irregulars) with some fantasy elements.
Why it’s on this list: Sometimes, it feels like British TV shows have a fixation with 1. Naked backsides, and 2. Britain's 47 unique slang terms for male anatomy (I say this with all the love in my heart for British TV). This show has both within the first ten minutes (also when I gave up on this one).
This show isn’t trying to be accurate to the book, which is fine (there are roughly a bajillion versions of Sherlock Holmes out there). Judging by the first ten minutes, the setting is a slightly (intentionally) anachronistic version of Victorian London, which is interesting, the characters are sympathetic, and the story will keep viewers guessing. Other than visual effects that look lower quality than what you’d expect, the first ten minutes of this show were well-made and engaging. But, since this is a family site (at the risk of sounding like an old woman), I figured that it’s better to review shows with clothed people who don’t spend an inordinate amount of time talking about their nether regions.
Blood & Treasure (2019)
Where I watched it: Amazon
What it’s about: A former FBI agent recruits a thief to help him repatriate various artifacts.
Why it’s on the list: I watched 40 minutes of the first episode and couldn’t bring myself to watch more.
While CBS has made some good shows, a lot of CBS productions have been criticized for homogeneity (both in terms of representation and in terms of genre, plot, etc.). I wondered if Blood & Treasure would break that mold, but it can’t escape the sameyness: its dialogue and its plot feel like pieces cobbled from other shows. Even its depiction of women, beyond being offensive, is just desperately overdone and boring. Art history and repatriation is a really good idea for a procedural. An unrealistic Indiana Jones-style procedural is also a good idea. This manages to be neither.
Hello, Me! (2021)
Where I’m watching it: Netflix
What it’s about: A down-and-out woman is visited by her seventeen-year-old self, who demands to know what happened to her ambition in life.
Why it’s on the list: When I watch shows to review them, I normally watch the first 3 episodes, take notes, and don’t do anything else while I’m watching. I didn’t do any of that with this show.
At first, my mom was watching this show by herself, and I tried to tune it out to work (like I’ve done with other shows). But Hello, Me! is so much fun that I couldn’t ignore it. It’s a heartfelt spin on a coming-of-age story that shows its characters growing through past mistakes and hurts (that makes it sound like it’s sad, but even though it’s thoughtful, the show is pretty light). Even though there are rom-com elements to this show, the friendships, family relationships, and community relationships between characters really drive the story. It’s still airing, so has the potential to have a disastrous ending, but it’s a show that I’ve really enjoyed so far.
Pui Pui Molcar (2021)
Where I watched it: Netflix
What it’s about: It’s a stop motion series of shorts that, per Wikipedia, “[focus] on a world where people drive sentient vehicles that are hybrids between guinea pigs and motor vehicles.”
Why it’s on this list: I fundamentally don’t understand this show.
I tried out the first episode of Pui Pui Molcar because it looked like a cute show about hamsters. Turns out, it’s a cute show about guinea pig car hybrids. There’s no dialogue, and each episode is three shorts combined into one. The stop motion (and the design of the whole thing) is charming. The show is strange and isn’t overly concerned with logic. I originally thought it was a show for small children, but at one point, bank robbers point a gun at a Molcar and force it to become a getaway car (spoiler, I guess). There’s also a Molcar ambulance in which a tiny person appears to be gravely ill, so mortality exists in the Pui Pui Molcar universe (also, human characters drink beer). I have no idea who this show is targeted toward, and I have so many questions. Do the Molcars get any say in which people they drive around? Is there a popemobile Molcar? How did someone come up with the idea of combining guinea pigs (why guinea pigs, specifically?) and cars? I can’t decide whether I find this show too bizarre, or if I’m obsessed with it and want to watch the rest.
Those are some of the things that have been on my screen lately: the good, the bad, and the murine. I hope you’re watching something you enjoy and are able to avoid seeing any backsides you don’t want to see.
