In the US: Mondays, 10/9c, AMC In the UK: Netflix. New episode every Tuesday
So before we start, let’s be clear what this isn’t. This isn’t a review for anyone who loved Breaking Bad, of which Better Call Saul is a spin-off. For starters, I didn’t love Breaking Bad, and I gave up midway through the second season. I didn’t mind it, I thought it was good, but it felt too much like hard work with not a huge amount of reward.
I don’t even really remember Saul Goodman in the original show either. All I know is what’s available in the Wikipedia article on him.
Already many of you will be getting ready to declare me “Unmutual”.
That’s fine. Because you’ll be watching Better Call Saul whatever I say and if you really need someone to tell you if the show’s any good for a Breaking Bad lover or not, you can peruse any of the dozens of reviews on the Internet by people who’ve watched every single episode and have “Bitch” tattooed on each of their biceps.
No, this is a review for people who either didn’t like Breaking Bad or never quite got round to watching it. Because there’s bound to be a whole bunch of you out there like me who are potentially interested in watching Better Call Saul but want to know if they’ll be lost and mystified and whether they’ll enjoy it or not. Those people need someone like me.
So with that out of the way, let’s go see if we’d Better Call Saul or not. I’d recommend reading that Wikipedia article I linked to first, though – it’ll help a lot.
Here’s a quick, fun little TV trivia question: when was the last time there was a sitcom about an Asian American family on TV? Or even an Asian-American*?
Have a guess. Go on.
Give in? It was in 1994 and it was Margaret Cho’s All American Girl.
There you go. Now you’ll ace it in the next pub quiz.
So that was 20 years ago. That must have been one hell of a toxic sitcom to have put US TV off Asians for 20 years. Or maybe it was something else that was responsible… However, it looks like the time is ripe for another stab at the genre.
As I may have noted once or twice, this season, ABC has been trying to up the diversity in its shows to appeal to underserved segments of the US population. So far, we’ve had black-ish, How To Get Away With Murder and Cristela, to name but a few. Coupled with that, we have the continuing efforts by all networks to have period dramas set in more or less every year since TV started. Given Fox got up to 1991 with Surviving Jack last year, it’s clear this season needed to advance things a few years to 1995, as can be seen from Hindsight.
Based on the book of the same name by celebrity chef Eddie Wong, Fresh Off The Boat – which involves no boats at all but sees an Asian-American family driving from Washington DC to Orlando, Florida to open a Wild West restaurant and trying to integrate into their new community – is both diverse and set in 1995. Which is possibly the main reason it’s being made.
And initially those are the nicest things that can be said about it, too. You could certainly, for the first episode at least, have also called it offensive, cliched, predictable, insulting, borderline if not actually racist, a Wonder Years knock-off and a whole lot else. But none of those things is especially nice.
So… diverse. And set in 1995. But that was about it.
And had I followed my gut instinct, I’d have dropped it like a hot potato straight after that. However, I noted that the showrunner/creator was Nahnatchka Khan, who also created Don’t Trust The B—–. This was a bit of a mess at first, but over time, became a whole lot better and eventually one of the funniest things on TV.
So I thought I’d stick with it for another episode. And while I can’t report that the second episode was an hysterical riot, it did at least make me laugh a few times. Which is more than the first episode did. Here’s a trailer – you may wish to report it to the Race Relations Board, though:
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 theReviews 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’sLocate TV – they’ll even email you a weekly schedule.
It’s February so time for some more new programmes, some of them quite awkwardly scheduled, given I actually went out and did things this weekend. So, I’ve already reviewed the first episode of Allegiance today, and I’ll be reviewing the first two episodes of Fresh Off The Boat tomorrow. Given that Better Call Saul aired its first episode yesterday and is airing its second episode tonight, I’ll hold off on that until later in the week, too.
However, I did have time to watch two new Australian shows, as well.
Hiding (Australia: ABC)
Criminal is arrested but won’t give up the rest of his gang – until he’s nearly murdered in prison and decides he wants to be safe and free. He agrees to snitch but he and his family have to be relocated to Sydney for their own protection – except naturally, the foreign-sounding gang boss wants to find him… Supposedly a ‘unique blend of humour and tension’, instead, for the first half at least, you’ll be wanting to sue under the Trade Descriptions Act, as it’s got neither humour nor tension (although the prison fights scenes aren’t bad). But things pick up once the relocation has happened, particularly in the university where our ‘hero’ is supposed to now work and when the family have to wrestle with concerns about whether they’ll become ’Sydney dickheads’ or not. I’ll give the second episode a try, at least.
Winter (Australia: Seven)
There is, apparently, one country on Earth that still uses the tried and tested “TV movie then series” method of dipping a toe in the water and then launching a new show: Australia. In this case, Winter is a spin-off series from the 2013 Seven TV movie The Killing Field, in which former Flying Doctors Rebecca Gibney and Peter O’Brien are rival police detectives investigating crimes, which for some reason usually involve teenage girls being killed. Without having seen the movie, it’s hard to say how this stacks up against the original, but as a standalone show, it was astonishingly dull and predictable, with O’Brien a happy slapper cop, Gibney a frosty (one might almost say ‘wintery’) methodical cop who looks down on his unprofessional ways. Despite the obvious nods to The Killing and Broadchurch, the show’s saving grace is that rather than ‘the maverick cop who doesn’t play by the book’ (O’Brien) being the star, it’s Gibney’s show. But that doesn’t stop it being a waste of an hour of your life. Fans of Outrageous Fortune and The Blue Rose will notice the presence of Antonia Prebble.
I’ve not had time to watch Spiral (Engrenages), either, and my wife still hasn’t been in the mood to watch Cougar Town. But after the jump, I’ll take a look at the regulars, including 12 Monkeys, 19-2, The Americans, Arrow, Banshee, Constantine, Elementary, The Flash, Gotham, Ground Floor, Hindsight, Man Seeking Woman, Marvel’s Agent Carter, Spiral (Engrenages), State of Affairs, and Suits. Of those, one of them is being promoted to recommended and two are being cast away from the viewing list forever – but which ones!?
I also went to the theatre this week!
One Man, Two Guvnors (NT touring production)
Carlo Goldoni Commedia dell’arte-esque Il servitore di due padroni is relocated by Richard Bean (Great Britain) to 1963 Brighton, with the easily confused Francis Henshall becoming employed by two gangsters, one upper class, one working class, and having to juggle his responsibilities. Despite the fact that the role of Henshall was originally taken by James Corden, for whom every single line appears to have been personally tailored, Gavin Spokes is a great replacement and the play is actually hilariously funny, respecting and both commenting on Commedia dell’arte as it goes, complete with audience interaction. Highly recommended.
Sometimes it can seem like all the Big Four US networks do these days is watch cable TV and then develop their own poorer, tamer versions a few years later. Certainly, if you watch Allegiance, you’d be tempted to think that all NBC had done for its latest spy thriller is to watch FX’s rather wonderful The Americans and come up with a weaker, stupider version set in the present day.
Allegiance sees a young talented CIA analyst (Gavin Stenhouse) tasked with helping track down some top secret Russia intel that a defector is trying to give to the US. The only problem? Unbeknownst to him, his Russian mother (Hope Davis) is really a KGB/SVR spy who recruited her American husband (Scott Cohen) and elder daughter (Margarita Levieva) to the cause. And they’re all named in that intel. Will they be able to stop him finding out their secret or will they be forced to recruit him to the cause, too?
If that sounds familiar, it’s perhaps because that’s pretty similar to the plot of The Americans, particularly its latest season. Typical, hey? Why can’t network TV be original like cable TV is, hey?
Except this is a shining example of how cable isn’t necessarily an original source in itself. Because just as Showtime went to Israel’s Prisoners of War to give us Homeland, so Allegiance is actually an adaptation of Israel’s The Gordin Cell.
One thing’s constant though: cable’s smarter than network because Allegiance is almost offensively stupid. Here’s a trailer.
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 theReviews 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’sLocate TV – they’ll even email you a weekly schedule.
It’s February. How did that happen? Anyway, what with the Superbowl and the fact that no one launches any new shows at the end of January, it’s been a relatively quiet week in terms of new shows, with only Sky/Pivot bucking the trend to give us Fortitude. On the other hand, a few old hands have returned with new seasons…
After the break then, all the regulars, including 12 Monkeys, 19-2, The Americans, Arrow, Banshee, Constantine, Elementary, The Flash, Gotham, Ground Floor, Hindsight, Man Seeking Woman, Spiral (Engrenages), State of Affairs, and Suits. The observant will notice that neither Cougar Town nor Marvel’s Agent Carter are on that list: that’s because I’m watching them with my wife and she only watches TV – get this – when she’s in the mood. It’s just inconceivable, isn’t it? I also tried to watch Backstrom‘s second episode but failed, as it was even less engrossing than the first episode.
But that relative lull means I’ve been able to squeeze in a movie this week.
Gone Girl (2014) (iTunes, Amazon Prime) Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike meet, fall in love and get married. Then one day, Affleck returns home to find his wife gone in mysterious circumstances. But it’s not long before the finger starts pointing at him. Novelist Gillian Flynn adapted her own bestseller for this slightly meandering, variable piece, shot with the usual visual precision by David Fincher. By turns disturbing, upsetting and even comedically ridiculous, the film veers close to misogyny, but the specificity of Affleck and Pike’s characters means they can’t be generalised to All Men and All Women or even to reality itself, such are some of the ludicrous twists. It’s at its best when analysing the nature of media coverage of criminal cases and allowing the Trent Reznor/Atticus Ross soundtrack to dominate, at its worst when trying to convince the audience that This Could Happen.
