What have you been watching? Including Mulaney, Soul Mates, Jane The Virgin, Marry Me, The Affair and Forever

It’s “What have you been watching?”, my chance to tell you what movies and TV I’ve been watching recently that I haven’t already reviewed and your chance to recommend things to everyone else (and me) in case I’ve missed them.

The usual “TMINE recommends” page features links to reviews of all the shows I’ve ever recommended, and there’s also the Reviews A-Z, for when you want to check more or less anything I’ve reviewed ever. And if you want to know when any of these shows are on in your area, there’s Locate TV – they’ll even email you a weekly schedule.

After last week’s epic catch-up, things have been a bit quieter this week, thanks to not that many new shows being launched. I did manage to give you a couple of previews, though:

And I did try to find some other new shows, too. Australia’s Soul Mates (ABC2) looked moderately interesting, since it stars The Bondi Hipsters as a couple of friends who are continually drawn together across the course of human history. However, it’s really just a sketch show with a linked narrative, so slightly outside my scripted comedy remit. Here’s a trailer for you, though, in case you like the look of it.

Somehow, though, a new show that began airing a few weeks ago in the US managed to sneak in under my radar:

Mulaney
In the US: Sundays, 9.30/8.30c, Fox
Probably best described as a Seinfeld for the 2010s, since it stars comedy writer and stand-up John Mulaney (Saturday Night Live) as an aspiring comedy writer and stand-up called… John Mulaney, and details his various adventures with his female best friend Jane (Nasim Pedrad, from Saturday Night Live), slightly odd, big-haired fellow comic ‘Motif’ (Seaton Smith), and occasional nemesis Andre (Zack Pearlman of the US version of The Inbetweeners). Indeed, with each episode opening with a Seineld-esque stand-up routine, the only big differences in the set-up between this and Seinfeld are the fact that the cast is more diverse (notably for Fox, Mulaney is gay) and that Mulaney manages to get a job writing jokes for self-centered comedy legend and game show host Lou Cannon (Martin Short) in the first episode. Oh yes – Elliott Gould plays Mulaney’s ‘flamboyant’ next door neighbour.

And actually, bar the spectacularly ill-judged opening stand-up routine, which is all about Mulaney accidentally getting mistaken for a potential rapist, it’s surprisingly funny. I was expecting a multi-camera comedy from Fox* to be a dreck fest but now I’m going to do my best to catch up on the next few episodes, despite the ratings being a bit poor and the episode count being dropped from 16 episodes to 13, just as the 14th was about to be made.

* It was actually first commissioned by NBC, the former home of… Seinfeld

That’s it for new new shows, though, but after the jump, I’ll be running through: The Affair, Arrow, black-ish, The Blacklist, Doctor Who, Forever, Gotham, Gracepoint, Homeland, Jane The Virgin, Marry Me, Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD, Plebs, Scorpion and Selfie. Will I be dropping any this week?

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The Men Behaving Badly reunion was less comedy, more tragedy

For those of you who missed it, there was a minor comedy reunion on Friday night, when Neil Morrissey and Martin Clunes recreated their Men Behaving Badly characters for the charity show Feeling Nuts. Perhaps because it was a show aimed at raising awareness of testicular cancer and self-examination for men, it was never going to be the funniest of events anyway, but given the apparent fates of both Gary and Tony and despite the presence of Abbey Clancy, the reunion felt almost tragic.

What do you think?

[via]

Two new trailers for season five of Engrenages (Spiral)

Can you believe that Engrenages is now 10 years old? Ridiculous, isn’t it? Still, five seasons over 10 years isn’t the fastest of rates, so maybe that would explain why it seems so odd.

Yes, five seasons, because next month in France, the fifth season begins and Canal+ is starting to promote the show properly in preparation. On top of the poster and teaser trailer from a couple of weeks ago, now come two proper trailers, one about the lawyers and judges, one about the police. For those whose French ain’t great, don’t worry, you aren’t missing much since it’s really just a set of introductions to the characters – “Josephine Karlsson – always the opportunist” doesn’t really tell you much you didn’t know already – but there is footage from the new season at least and one or two juicy nuggets.

No word yet on a BBC4 air date, but my guess is 2015. But it might be December. BBC4’s so tricky.

News

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Film

Film casting

  • Olivia Wilde, Cillian Murphy join Ben Wheatley’s Free Fire
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  • Seth Rogen, Will Ferrell, Megan Fox et al join James Franco’s Zeroville

Australian TV

French TV

  • Canal+ to close Jimmy, Maison+ and Cusine+

UK TV

New UK TV shows

  • Trailer for Sky Alantic’s Fortitude

New UK TV show casting

  • Mark Gatiss to play Peter Mandelson in Channel 4’s Coalition

US TV

US TV show casting

New US TV shows

New US TV show casting