Girls is the perfect title for a show featuring characters who spend most of their time in a kind of arrested development: twenty year-old adolescents, unfettered by and uninterested in responsibility. The latest episode flipped that on its head, with each character in “It’s a Shame About Ray” coming across as a child play-acting as…
Spartacus is and always has been a show drenched in violence (also sex, though that’s mostly peripheral to the narrative). This is clear from opening scenes where we see Spartacus and his men slice their way through countless nameless Romans. This is a concern for me in this final season. The violence in the first…
Justified has been pleasantly understated and understatedly pleasant over the first episodes of this already-impressive season; even moments like Boyd cleverly poisoning (and, as we found this week, killing) his preacher rival felt almost light-hearted. “The Bird Has Flown” brings some weight and consequence back with two plotlines, each wringing genuine pathos out of situations…
Essays about drug-taking are rarely compelling: they read as a kitchen list of “crazy” events that the author has experienced, undoubtedly profound when experienced but lacking resonance on paper. Hannah sets out with the express goal of trying to write such an essay, having a cocaine-fuelled night on the town with Elijah. This episode narrows…
When I first started watching Justified, it took me a while to enjoy the show. Mostly because Season 1 spent many early episodes on standalone plots, as though it were a gunfight procedural, and I always prefer some serialisation in my television. Showrunner Graham Yost seems to have found the sweet spot between standalone and…
For a show that just won a Golden Globe for Best Television Series – Comedy, it’s easy to forget just how funny Girls can be. Well, until you watch “I Get Ideas,” which is filled to the brim with laugh-out-loud moments. Most of which involve Hannah (who was largely sidelined in the premiere) – whether…
This week in Justified, Raylan and his fellow marshals investigate further the true meaning behind Arlo’s bag, discovered last episode, and find Waldo while they’re at it. This subplot was enjoyable enough, but the intricately scripted scene at the Truths didn’t feel as impressive as it ought to have been. I think this is mostly…
The premiere of Girls’ sophomore season (arriving roughly the same time as its Golden Globes win) is smart to set most of its action at a hazy apartment bash, since the episode matches the meandering, feverish feel of a drunken, crowded party. It feels a touch rushed compared to the careful pacing of Season 1…
“…Well, I guess I need to choose my words more carefully.” Justified is a show that always chooses its words carefully, particularly during the tense showdowns that occur frequently on the show. It’s like a ‘40s noir film in the way that the dialogue is carefully crafted, the relaxed Southern rhythm belying the subtle, clever…
I was skeptical coming in to Season 2 of Homeland – the first season had been excellent, but the writers had put themselves in a difficult position at season’s end. The start of Season 2 allayed my fears, with a spectacular opening batch of episodes. The early reveal of Brody’s tape was a genuine surprise,…
ccpopculture 