Worth the Watch 📺 (+ Books 📚)

It’s been a bit since I talked about some TV series that I’ve recently watched and enjoyed so here’s a bit of a catch-up.

Alice and Steve (Hulu)

6 episodes, 30ish minutes.

This is a dark comedy that gets unhinged, keeps the laughs, has family and friendship (drama) at its core, and starts with a “that’s fucked up” premise.

The title of the series refers to the main characters, Alice and Steve, who have been best friends for decades (after briefly dating). Now Steve has started dating Alice’s 26 year-old-daughter and Alice, as you can imagine, does not take this well. This goes into a bit of a War of the Roses escalation between Alice and Steve, having rippling consequences out into their personal/professional lives, and their other relationships.

After spending too many years searching for everything cozy to combat gestures wildly at all the horrors, I have been getting back to watching (and reading) things that have an uncomfortable element to them and I’m so glad I have. Not to knock down cozy things, which I do still love, but the difficult things are the ones that more often pose questions and really force that part of your brain to play “what if” and “what would you do in that situation” and we can all use a big constant dose of critical thinking.

Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed (Apple TV+)

10 episodes, 30ish minutes.

Okay, I’m writing about this one before the final episodes drop so I can’t speak for if they nail the landing but I have thoroughly enjoyed the 6 episodes that have dropped so far—and that’s saying a lot since many new things are not currently holding my attention.

It’s a thriller with the trope of “whoops, I didn’t commit the murder but I have to be shady af and commit some crimes to get myself out of being a suspect.” It stars Tatiana Maslany (an excellent actress from Orphan Black where she played all the clones herself—I also love her in She-Hulk) as a mother in a custody battle with her ex-husband, whose new wife wants to move to another state. After forming a bond with a camboy who is assaulted during a session she finds out she’s being scammed but then things really get dangerous. It’s on Apple TV so this still doesn’t reach the heights of HBO Max programming before Zaslav destroyed it but it feels closer than other Apple TV programming. My favorite thing so far is that it does not keep circling the same plot in a static way, it keeps taking hard rights and going with it in exciting (terrifying for the characters) ways.

Slip (Peacock)

7 episodes, 25ish minutes

When I heard about the premise of this series I immediately thought of the novel The Husbands by Holly Gramazio, which I loved. I have always been a fan of the trope “woke up in a different life” so I was excited to watch this. In comparison to The Husbands (this isn’t an adaptation) I found the novel lighter in tone overall, though both are grappling with bigger issues of life beyond the characters immediate issue.

In Slip Zoe Lister-Jones (also the creator) plays a museum curator who is depressed, and struggling to connect with her husband. I’m not going to go too much into the plot because the fun for me was never knowing where it was going to go, but after she [redacted], she wakes up with a totally different life, and married to a totally different person. The only constants she keeps are her best friend and her depression. This definitely took a couple WTF turns, and while it’s not in the Fleabag level of exploration/dark comedy show I’m glad I watched it, remain a fan of Lister-Jones, and am now a fan of Tymika Tafari.

With all the current slop, and so much of entertainment (and publishing) reaching for “the same”, this delivered exactly what I was in the mood for, which was anything that felt like it was breaking out of a box.

Four Seasons (Netflix)

2 seasons, 16 episodes, 30ish minutes. (Has been renewed for S3)

This is an adaptation of Alan Alda’s 1981 film with Carol Burnett with Tina Fey as one of the creators and stars. It’s 3 longtime couple friends with one of the couples splitting (Steve Carell and Kerri Kenney-Silver) and of course there’s a new, younger girlfriend (in her 30s). That’s where it starts. The first season has a gut-punch twist which is what informs the second season so I’m not going to get into specifics.

This does really well the reality of life: you will find things to laugh about during very difficult moments, and joyous occasions will still come with elements of sadness. I love the different personalities across the characters, how they’re all facing different issues in their relationships/personal lives, and that the show doesn’t rely on the boring/outdated/ridiculous theme of “men are from Mars women are from Venus.” Overall I have enjoyed the show more than I thought I would, especially the second season where Kerri Kenney-Silver really shines. I’m looking forward to what they get up to in the next season.

Hacks (HBO)

5 seasons, 47 episodes, 30ish minutes.

This is now a completed series that blends comedy and drama really well as it explores two women’s intertwined lives, as a young comedy-writer works to update a veteran stand-up comedian's work.

I’ve been a fan of Jean Smart since Designing Women—She was also great in Fargo, and there was a weird and hilarious animated series years back, The Oblongs, where I immediately recognized her voice as the mother. Anyways, she's why this show was a must-watch for me (when it premiered in 2021) and now I’m also a huge fan of Hannah Einbinder.

This isn’t a perfect series — it started off doing a thing I dislike in writing involving a repeated makeup/breakup cycle but thankfully it stopped, and it had a character that does a form of “comedy” that I hate—but it always remained very worth watching for its two leads, the on point commentary of current times, and its exploration of generational gaps and women in Hollywood/comedy (society). My final thoughts: I’m glad they brought in Robby Hoffman, I wish they’d used Poppy Liu more, and I feel that the ending of the series was honest to the characters (not sure how much “I saw it coming” affected my opinion of it).

And some recently acquired galleys I’m excited to read

The Velvet Knife by Maureen Johnson

Heart of Glass by Jennifer Hillier

Murmuration by TJ Klune

Dearly Departed by Chip Pons

A Mad Mess: Disabled Queer Femme of Color World Making by Shayda Kafai

Feminism vs. Fascism: Ten Tactics to Topple Tyrants by Mona Eltahawy