What kept me going on TV in 2020
Here’s what I watched to escape despair
This is the midweek what-to-watch edition of Snarky Senior — the newsletter from Erica Manfred, which you can read about here. If you like it and don’t want to miss an issue, you can get it in your inbox by subscribing.
The pandemic sparked the longest marathon TV watching binges of all time. When you’re stuck at home with literally nothing to do but check social media, be on Zoom calls or watch TV, desperation sets in.
Here’s what I watched to escape despair in the gloomiest most locked down days of 2020.
Hamilton. If the pandemic gave us nothing else, it gave us Hamilton, Lin Manuel Miranda’s brilliant Broadway blockbuster. For me it was better than Broadway because I’m hard of hearing and closed captioning made it understandable. I would have missed half the lyrics if I’d seen it live. In case you’re wondering, yes, it lived up to all the hype. Pure genius. If I could sing, I would have been singing the tunes from it nonstop. I even watched it three times, which is a first for me. Hamilton makes it well worth it to subscribe to Disney Plus. $6.99 versus $699 (two tickets). No contest there.
Shark Tank. I still have no idea what scalability, valuation, contingency or any other Sharkspeak term actually means. Nor do I have any idea why I love this show so much. For some reason I find it infinitely relaxing. It creates a world where the only thing that matters is stuff, how to make it and sell it and how to get a Shark to be your partner. Maybe it’s because I love gadgets, and this show all about the latest gadget. Or maybe I get a sadistic thrill every time I hear Mr. Wonderful tell a hapless supplicant “you’re dead to me.” Or maybe I just enjoy the drama of hearing someone’s story of striving and invention and the suspense of whether or not they’ll get a Shark to buy a share of their company. Or all of the above. There are umpteen seasons available with the latest dropping this year during the pandemic. No hugs for contestants in 2020 is the only difference I could see. Older shows are even more fun because you can Google to see what happened to the products.
Better Call Saul. This prequel to Breaking Bad might be the best written, acted, filmed, art-directed and plotted show on TV possibly EVER (I didn’t think it was possible, but it’s even better than Breaking Bad). It’s superlative in so many ways it’s hard to know where to start. One standout is the performance of Rhea Seahorn as Kim Wexler, Jimmy McGill’s girlfriend. (Jimmy is the prequel to Saul.) The fifth season of Better Call Saul dropped in April at the peak of the pandemic. And what a season it was. I won’t give any of it away because you have to watch from the beginning, and that means start with Season 1 of Breaking Bad and work your way through Better Call Saul. If you haven’t seen either show yet I envy you. What a treat you’re in for.
Ozark. Season three of Ozark premiered in March during the pandemic, and I got hooked a few months later, bingeing all three seasons in one week. I became an instant enthusiast, mostly because of the remarkable actresses who dominate this show. Here’s my review.
The Crown. One of the juiciest shows on TV, this one quickly became my obsession. Start at the beginning and watch Queen Elizabeth destroy her family with her starchy, out of touch, passively punitive style of control and domination. Over the seasons she manages to exile her favorite uncle, destroy her sister’s life, turn one son into a playboy pedophile and the other into a cruelly unfaithful husband who totally ravages her daughter in law’s life. But she does it with such ladylike manners and innocent cluelessness that it’s really hard to hate her. Here’s my review of the latest season of the Crown which is escapist partly because it transports us inside the lives of a privileged family that’s even worse than our own dysfunctional brood.
Anne with an “E.” This is supposedly a kid’s show but I grew up with the Anne of Green Gables books. I had totally forgotten them when a friend recommended this series. I was hooked fast by the lead, a charismatic redhead played by Amy Beth McNulty. Anne, like me, was a rebel kid who is awkward and has no idea how to act. She speaks out of turn, has no filter, is outwardly needy and awkward, and is way too easy to pick on with that hair. She manages to turn her liabilities into assets in the most adorable way. The best thing about this series is there are no gorgeous young things having hot sex, and the series showcases older character actors I’d never heard of in wonderfully nuanced roles. Cancelled by Netflix after Season 3, enormous fan pressure for another season may yet give us the resolution to all the story lines left hanging.
The Durrells in Corfu. This year I desperately wanted to be swept away to another, happier, reality and this series did it. A Masterpiece Theater production, based on naturalist Gerald Durrell’s much-loved trilogy of novels, The Durrells in Corfu is about impoverished but irrepressible English widow Louisa Durrell who makes the radical decision to move her family of five to a villa on a gorgeous Greek island with a world-class view but no electricity or running water. It’s the 1930s and somehow they manage to survive with the help of the locals and a combination of pluck and sheer denial of their poverty. Two of the Durrell sons eventually became famous, one a novelist and one a naturalist, but I especially related to the youngest-- daughter Margo--who refused to conform to society’s norms from early childhood. She became an unrepentant bohemian to the end. Thank you Masterpiece Theater for allowing me to escape to a Greek Island for a week of binge watching.
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