This is the time of year my mildly OCD self starts making several Best Of the Year lists: One for movies, one for shows, one for music and one for books. I know that I consume more media than the average human person, but technically, it's my job, so I don't really feel that bad about it. In fact, I love it. I wish I could move to a planet with more hours in the day so I could fill my eyes, ears, brain and tear ducts with all of the amazing stuff I don't have a chance to watch in the normal 24-hour period of living. Until then, I suppose I'll just keep sleeping less and trying to experience more. Recently, because of all the lists, I've been checking out things I normally wouldn't have time for. Here are a few of them.
In Pod We Trust
Is it just me or does there not seem to be a bubble when it comes to podcasts? I mean, it's definitely bursting as we speak (NPR recently laid off 10% of its staff), but new ones I'm excited for keep popping up, while the old ones I love are still going strong as well. At this rate, I might have to start exercising just so I can listen to more of them while on a treadmill or a Peloton or something. Hahahahaha. Just kidding. That sounds terrible.
"Magnificent Jerk" has without comparison become my favorite autobiographical podcast. Hosted and produced by Maya Lin Sugarman, "Magnificent Jerk" chronicles her exploration of her late uncle, a screenwriter whose semi-autobiographical script about his life as a Chinese-American gangster was eventually made into a direct-to-DVD action flop starring Ice-T and Burt Reynolds. Her unpacking of her family's secrets is one of the most fascinating and moving re-contextualizations of a life I could have ever imagined.
"Grapevine" is another knockout from the same team that brought us the masterful "Southlake," which looked at a bunch of fragile white folk in Texas who were upset with Critical Race Theory being taught in schools and the school that pushed back. "Grapevine" is also set in Texas, this time focused on the LGBTQ+ community and upset parents flinging the word "woke" around without any real understanding of what it means. This breaks down the culture war in ways I had never even thought about.
Another really fantastic new podcast is "Starting a Riot," a complete history and deconstruction of the riot grrrl movement that explores the politics, the feminism, the music and the culture that still remains very relevant to this day. The episodes focused on the creation of zines in the '90s, and with a Boygenius interview are absolute bangers and should be required listening for your kids.
Now Streaming
Netflix has been breaking my heart lately with all the great shows they've been canceling before letting them have a proper ending, and it makes it harder for me to invest in anything new show they put out. I was so into "Shadow and Bone," "1899," "The Santa Clarita Diet," "The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina," "Inside Job," "One Day at a Time," "I Am Not Okay With This," "GLOW" and "The OA" that I feel like Netflix just doesn't respect me anymore. This is a one-sided relationship and it's not getting better.
Luckily, the brilliant creative team behind "The OA" (Brit Marling and Zal Batmanglij) have a new show called "A Murder at the End of the World" that has just launched and there are two pieces of good news where that is concerned. The first is that it's on FX (streamable on HULU), which tends to give their shows a bit of breathing room and an actual chance to grow an audience and second...It's soooooo good so far. Starring future Oscar winners Emma Corrin and Harris Dickenson, "Murder" follows an amateur sleuth named Darby Hart who just wrote a true crime thriller about her hunt for a serial killer and is invited (along with eight other guests) to a retreat in Iceland hosted by a tech billionaire and his reclusive and brilliant hacker wife.
As of this writing, only four (of seven total) episodes of the show have aired and I'm completely hooked on not just the mystery, but the characters as well. With this, the new season of "Fargo," "Ramy," "The Bear" and "Only Murders in the Building," FX and Hulu are on a creative high that genuinely makes me want to tune in to whatever they have in the pipeline (which, by the way, among other things, is a reboot of "King of the Hill"). I'm close to leaving you for Hulu, Netflix. Don't make it weird.
