The Medium is Not Enough

It’s “What have you been watching?”, your chance to recommend anything you’ve been watching this week

Spring is here, the flowers are blooming and daylight savings time has arrived in the US. That can only mean one thing. New TV programmes.

Reviews-wise, Boxset Monday has given us the entire second season of Marvel’s Jessica Jones (Netflix), while Deception (US: ABC) and Life Sentence (US: The CW) have been considered elsewhere. But there’s more.

Crackle dumped the entire first season of The Oath onto the Internet on Friday, but given I had 13 episodes of Jessica Jones to get through, I prioritised and The Oath lost. I’m not sure I’ll be able to watch all of it before the next WHYBW (unless it’s good), but I’ll certainly be reviewing the first episode. Also having aired in the past few days in the US is For The People, which I’ll be looking at, too. And in Australia, Ioan Gruffudd’s back as a forensics bod again in Harrow on Friday, so I’ll probably have something to say about that, too.

But then there’s Rise. That’s a musical and as I’m tough on musicals, tough on the causes of musicals, I’ll probably be skipping that. Meanwhile, in Australia, SBS’s asylum-seeker drama Safe Harbour has just started. However, at just four episodes, that might not really be worth my time. You never know, though.

If anything else pops up in the next few days, I’ll do my best to cover it, as well. But after the jump, the regulars: Black Lightning, Counterpart, DC’s Legends of Tomorrow, The Good Fight, The Looming Tower, The Magicians, SEAL Team and Will & Grace. I’ll also be taking a look at the final two episodes this season of Corporate, but also making a surprising return this week is Timeless. First it was cancelled, then it wasn’t – was time travel involved? No, it wasn’t. But it’s back.

And I’ve actually watched one other new show, which I didn’t have time to review separately: Champions. That’s after the jump as well.

Continue reading “What have you been watching? Including Timeless and Champions”

In the US: Wednesdays, 9pm, The CW

Remember Why Don’t You…? Maybe not. It was a 70s/80s UK kids’ activity show that almost uniquely exhorted its audience to not watch it – ‘why don’t you…?’ being short for ‘Why Don’t You Just Switch Off Your Television Set and Go Out and Do Something Less Boring Instead?’

I say ‘almost uniquely’ because I’m starting to get the impression that US TV network The CW now has a similar message for its only slightly older audience. Or maybe it’s just feeling a bit maudlin and wondering if it should set up a ‘bucket list’.

Last season, we had No Tomorrow, a pleasing little show in which a previously staid young woman discovers the fun of living life to the fullest when she meets a man who thinks the world is about to end. ‘Live life like it might be your last day on Earth – because it might be!’ the show enthused. Well, okay, but I might not be watching The CW if it was my last day on Earth. Sorry guys.

That, ultimately, did have a resolution of sorts once it was cancelled, but new CW show Life Sentence feels almost like a continuation. It sees Pretty Little Liars‘ Lucy Hale playing a young woman who had been diagnosed with cancer. Her family rallied around. Her brother encouraged her to live life to the fullest. So she did. She went on trips to Paris. She married. She’s just about ready to have her ‘living funeral’ to say goodbye to everyone she loves when she gets shocking news.

She’s going to live. Her cancer is cured.

Yay?

Apparently not. And not just for her either. Sure, everyone’s happy that she’s going to live. It’s just that to make her life as perfect as possible before she died, they may have made some sacrifices. And hidden a few things from her.

Yep, it turns out that they should have switched off their TV sets and done something less boring instead. And now they’re going to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=in3OecHvWXQ

Continue reading “Review: Life Sentence 1×1 (US: The CW)”