Most of what I watched this time was on Amazon Prime, since I had to mail order some stuff and it made sense to get Prime for a month to save on shipping. I generally do that about once or twice a year and catch up with some shows when I do that.
The show I watched the most was PARKS AND RECREATION, which I'd only seen a few times before. I started hearing more and more good things about it over the years since it ended in 2015, and of course I was a big fan of co-creator Michael Schur's THE GOOD PLACE over the last few years. I ended up watching about half of the 125 episodes over a month, mostly in random order. I really liked most of it, although the first two years are definitely weaker than average, and the first year in particular is almost another show (I'm pretty sure I tried it at least once in that first year when it first aired). Loved the bulk of it, oddly I find that watching it out of order worked pretty good, despite the frequent running jokes and callbacks.
In a pleasant bit of timing, about half-way through the month there was a reunion special for PARKS AND RECREATION, set in the current quarantine, written and produced from the homes of the cast and crew. When it came out I had seen just enough of the show to appreciate it (in a nice bit of timing I'd seen two episodes with Li'l Sebastian on the morning of the day of the special, which really helped to appreciate the big closing scene). This link should lead to the special in the US, or over here for some highlights and extended scenes.
Also watched a bunch of 30 ROCK episodes, as I have a few times before. It was also a show with a somewhat rough start, and is pretty uneven throughout, but there are a lot of really good episodes. A few of the characters are tough to take in large doses, so when it comes around to a show where the spotlight is on them it's not great.
3rd ROCK FROM THE SUN is a show I watched on occasion when it was new and in syndication since, but never on a regular basis. Most of it is still new to me, and it's a pretty decent diversion. After about a dozen random episodes I watched the first few and the last few, which were all new to me. It gets a bit formulaic at times, so it's good to take a break, but I think by the next time I have it available I'll be ready to watch another bunch of episodes. It's a bit odd to watch something more recent done in the multi-camera studio audience style, which dominated the older sitcoms I watched last month.
I've been watching new episodes of SUPERSTORE in the last few months, and it's pretty decent, so it was nice to have the first four seasons available. It's pretty decent, occasionally very good. I'm looking forward to watching the rest of it someday.
SCRUBS was added to the service late in the month I had it, and I've already seen every episode of the show, sometimes multiple times, but it was nice to revisit a dozen or so favourites from throughout the run.
PARTY DOWN was a short lived comedy from about a decade ago, only lasting 20 episodes over two seasons. I'd heard a few good things about it, and it was pretty entertaining for the most part. It was quite a bit of a departure from all the previous comedies that I was watching, as it was done for a cable channel and was more than liberal with the sex and swearing than any network prime-time show could be. Got through the entire short run, and really wish there were more.
BOSCH is Amazon Prime's long-running police drama. Seems every time I subscribe to the service there's another season of ten episodes, just the right length to fill a month of viewing. Nothing revolutionary, but a better acted and produced version of the standard network police procedural, with a few long running cases dominating the season and a few side trips and subplots along the way. Just checking and I see there's one more season coming, eventually, so I guess maybe next time I get the service I'll re-watch the existing episodes to get ready for it.
COUNTERPART is a recent sci-fi/espionage drama which lasted for two seasons. I was kind of slow to start it, and wasn't sure I'd keep going, but towards the end I really liked it and rushed to finish up the first season before the month was up. I might even have "binged" ::shudder:: the second season if I didn't check and see the local library has it available, so I'll get that when the shutdown ends. It's a parallel Earth's story, which could get a bit confusing at times, but I think I have it figured out.
HIGH FIDELITY is a new show, based on the book by Nick Hornby. Some background on this for me. I went to see the 2000 movie based on the book, based primarily on my love of a previous movie by the star (John Cusack) and screenwriters (Cusack, D.V. DeVincentis & Steve Pink), GROSSE POINT BLANK. I walked out of the theatre straight into a bookstore and picked up the Hornby novel, which I started reading on the subway and finished at about 4AM the next morning. So you know, you could say I liked it. I've read the book a few times over the years, and it might be the movie I've watched the most over that last 20 years. So I was kind of curious but also a bit wary about the idea of a new take on the story, with the main character changed to a woman and set in modern day New York.
For the most part I was pleasantly surprised. I'm so familiar with the source material and the prior screen adaptation that it feels, appropriately, like a cover version of the original, done in a completely different genre and with some odd choices, but also hitting all of the expected and familiar beats, sometimes in unusual places. I'd be really curious about how someone who hasn't seen the movie or read the book (or, as I just discovered, seen the stage version, which I'm listening to the Broadway cast recording of now). I'm also really curious if there'll be a second season, moving into uncharted territory, and how I'll feel about that. I definitely liked this one enough to check it out if and when.
UPLOAD is another new show, this one created by Greg Daniels, who co-created the aforementioned PARKS AND RECREATION, as well as the American version of THE OFFICE. This is quite a bit different from his previous work, almost more of a long comedy/adventure/sci-fi hybrid movie cut into half hour chunks. The story it about a near future where people can be copied on their death to a digital afterlife, where they can continue to interact with the living. I'd say I'm of two minds about it on first viewing. It can be very funny at times, and clever, but sometimes it goes for the easy joke which might get in the way of coherent world-building. The story also takes a few odd twists, and then ends setting up a second season. Which, just checking, it's going to get, although with what's going on in the world who knows when. I'll be there to check it out.
JACK RYAN is the latest version of the Tom Clancy's unlikely character of a CIA analyst who gets involved in all sorts of international conspiracies, previously appearing in five movies with four actors, now played by John Krasinski. I watched the first season, and it was okay. The second I liked far less. It's pretty much just an over-long adventure film, with too many of the usual chases and firefights of the genre, all going on far too long, but never really innovating. Eight one hour episodes is probably more than twice what the story needs, I'd love to have the option of a tight 2-3 hour cut. since that won't happen, I think I'm out for next year. Unless it comes out in the 20th month of the pandemic, in which case I'll probably be willing to watch anything.
THE CAPTURE is a British TV crime series from last year, which starts off as a fairly routine drama but become more concerned with espionage, conspiracies and technology as it goes on. It's pretty well done, but becomes a bit confusing and less than plausible by the end. Also, a bit annoyingly, I found out late in that it was six one hour episodes in the original but Amazon cuts it to eight 45-minute episodes. I thought the pacing was weird, with dramatic minutes in the middle of episodes and scenes split at odd places. Completely unnecessary bit of editing. Anyway, not sure if it'll ever continue, but I probably won't be around if it does.
A few other random bits. I saw the first few episodes of HUNTERS, the series about 1970s Nazi hunters who uncover a vast Nazi conspiracy, and it was pretty good, but I couldn't really get motivated to finish it. Just not what my mind needs right now. Maybe next time. I saw that THE NANNY was available, and remembered hearing that there was an episode where Fran Drescher played her Spinal Tap character Bobbi Flekman as well as her usual gig as the titular nanny. That episode was okay, I think they could have done a bit more with it instead of wasting time with a musical guest and other sub-plots. I ended up watching another half dozen episodes, and it was a surprisingly decent old-school sitcom, you could see the DNA of shows like I LOVE LUCY and LAVERNE AND SHIRLEY in it. Next time I have the service it might be one of my "doing something else" shows. I watched a few DICK VAN DYKE SHOW episodes, which were great, but I can get those from the library post-shutdown, as I did for a few seasons last year. ELECTRIC DREAMS, an anthology loosely based on Philip K. Dick stories, seemed decent if I was in a different mood. Watched a handful of SMALLVILLE episodes, and it's pretty amazing how far visual effects in super-hero TV shows have come since then.
