September Roundup, '21
Happy fall, folks! There were definitely some duds this month, but a few gems as well. Fair warning, though: I hope you like your spook with a side of existential crisis! Anyway, let's dive on in...
Watch This Shit:
Ashley Zukerman is young Tom Hanks on the wacky-symbology-hunt for his kidnapped and behanded mentor, Eddie Izzard.
Oddly, this feels less in tone like The Da Vinci Code than it does a pendulum between Hannibal and Indiana Jones, but I'd say it manages to successfully swing between the two.
Mike Flanagan continues his takeover of the heartfelt horror genre with this series that sees an ex-con returning home to an island that has dwindled since his incarceration, but has managed to keep its commitment to Jesus very much alive. Coinciding with his return is the arrival of a new priest (who's "temporarily" replacing the old and senile local priest) and an old flame who is newly pregnant. Now, granted, none of that sounds horror enough for me to recommend anyone keep watching, however Mike's never let me down before. This one may be slow going, but, biiitch... it gets there. "There" being a dang beach full of dead cats. 🙀
Monsters Inside: The 24 Faces of Billy Milligan
Criminal DID: The Docuseries.
B. J. Novak answers the question: "What if The Twilight Zone was a comedy?"
A "Jesus Diet" cult docuseries, centering on its recently deceased leader. After her and a number of other church members died in a plane crash, HBO Max delayed the release of this series so the documentarians could make necessary changes. But I guess no one realized keeping the title the same would be, you know... gross at this point? But anyway, Gwen Shamblin was a fucking nut, so it's still worth a watch.
If you've always wanted CSI to get a Parks & Rec spin-off, then this is the true crime docuseries for you.
This reboot is set in the same era as its predecessor, but in a different neighborhood, centering a black family in the narrative. It's easily funnier and manages to tell a whole host of poignant stories (some vastly left out of the original). All in all: It's. Fucking. Important.
It's tough to judge this one based solely the first episode, which entirely consists of the lead-up to the sudden deaths of every person and animal on earth that has (or had, as it were) a y chromosome. This leaves women, trans men, a handful of animal species, and, mysteriously, one 20-something man to [presumably] tell the post-"global death" tale in the following episodes.
But I will say this: it ain't lame. Though I wish it would've dug in a bit deeper to the core plot in the first episode, it's understandable that some groundwork had to be laid. And they've done so well enough for me to be interested in where things will go.
Meh:
An adult animation about a hard partier who puts the "broad" in "City of Broad Shoulders." It's inspired by a fake twitter account, which... I guess that's just where our society's at now? But the account (and this series) was created by Chris Witaske, who I'm not mad at.
This one is... very dumb. There's no way around it. But it's got a fun '90s Nickelodeon gameshow feel, so maybe give What If Frogger Was Real Life? a try.
Remember that movie where a big-ass volcano pops up in the La Brea tar pits and the plot was realistically dealing with what would happen in that situation? Well, this show is the exact opposite of that, wherein a giant sinkhole opens up and swallows La Brea whole, sucking everyone into (wait for ittt...) a fucking alternate dimension. Add in a psychic dad in the "real" world who got his powers from a concussion and you've got yourself a right proper Meh.
Animated queer secret agent good times. It's cute, but it's not uhhhmazing.
Don't Watch This Shit:
Y'alllll 😂 I honestly just can't. The hellscape Fox wants us all to live in is just too much. Watch this show if you hate yourself.
Jesus Christ. I know I shit a lot on Fox (see directly above, re: Alter Ego), but seriously. Rather than make a 17th season of their mainstay, So You Think You Can Dance, they've decided to make a scripted series making fun of it, under the guise of positivity. Pure vom.
Honorable Mentions:
Attack of the Hollywood Clichés!
Cinema Bullshit: The Documentary.
Starting spooky season off right is this latest Airbnb horror about a couple YouTubers who end up in the right house with the wrong host. It's campy, bloody fun.