Discover Top Posts Tagged with #better things fx

12 Shows of 2022

The new (and sometimes old) series and seasons that made my year.

Law & Order (S1-12) + Law & Order: Criminal Intent + Law & Order: Los Angeles I started off the year catching the early (and Best) seasons of the mothership via cable reruns; got Peacock for CI; and then returned midyear when I was half-gone from covid and blearily endured the commercials of what was then IMDBtv for the very LA edition. While I am not technically a "geriatric millennial," I am a millennial and with geriatric interests. For me, peak television has become something that I can either focus on fully or play in the background while I do other things and be equally thoroughly entertained. That is why this franchise has become my number one comfort show.

Shrink + Michael: Tuesdays Thursdays Grouping these into one because I just so happened to watch one immediately after the other, and because they're both about moderately adept therapists who are codependent with their patients. They are also both incredibly funny! These got the biggest laughs out of me than anything else all year. (A shame I didn't get to them till December.) While they are both hilarious, each manage to sweep into very heavy topics and deep emotion without toppling over. #ReviveShrink

Big Love While I’m pretty sure I’ve watched more L&O than anything else this year, I’m deeming 2022 the year of sister wives. In my post marathon blues, I went surfing on HBO and turned on Big Love (after once trying the pilot a while ago and being turned off by its HBO-ness.) But this time it hit me right in the late-00's cable nostalgia. The melodrama, the humor, the cast - Mary Kay Place! It's a (new) classic for me.

Grand Crew (S1) With its simple if derivative set-up, this delightful sitcom got better and better every episode! The ensemble is funny and charming, and the stories silly and fun. Thank god it snagged a renewal and will return because I will need my weekly fix of Carl Tart in between his Comedy Bang! Bang! appearances.

American Auto (S1) At base level, it's just another workplace comedy with a pseudo diverse cast. And the setting of the executive floor of a car company is quite baffling. (It's not even a riff on Telsa. Neither is it too concerned with Detroit.) But it all came together during the commercial episode: During which the team spiral in heated disagreements over how to shoot a commercial that is appropriately inclusive but not too inclusive. Funny! From then on, I started to watch it from a new angle. The ensemble itself is a focus group - and every week is a new satirical debate on the weird standards of contemporary ethics. The show is at its best when it’s everyone in the conference room talking over each other in the voices of their respective demo. I still don't necessarily like it - But it does get me thinking. (About all that I wish it was!) But honestly, I'm only really including this on the list because of the perfect Cyrus played by Michael Benjamin Washington who is never not incredibly funny. He was my favorite character/performance of the year.

Severance (S1) Part Office Space, part Fringe, with the style of Legion. This trippy, beautiful, and exciting drama was a dream to watch! Especially since I watched most of it in the very very early morning with a cup of coffee - the very best way to watch something creepy.

Claws (S4/final) While, the finale was one of the worst I've ever seen (Niecy Nash's scenes were almost exclusively Facetimed!) - This show will go down as being one of the most iconic. The outfits, the colors, the insane swings. It was never not outrageous and gonzo. Did it always work? I don't know. But they had a Vision and Went For It! It was always a wild ride, and I had fun.

Better Things (S5/final) Every year Better Things airs, it automatically gets a spot on my list. And this is the last time. A beautiful show so full of humor and love and art and great music and lots of food.

Search Party (S5/final) Every season comes with a genre turn. And when this one turned, I didn't want to believe it. It wasn't until it turned to black without the Actually It Was All A Dream rewind I was expecting did it set in. I have yet to rewatch it, but when I do I'm sure I'll love it (as my experience with S3). But I do understand it. For Dory, who began the show adrift and yearning for a meaning to her life - to enact some sort of change, to literally change the world is a fitting end. (For me, S4 is the real ending and this is a bonus season.) Either way, it still earns a spot in the TV Hall of Fame. A crazy comedy with twisty mysteries. Extremely sharp and biting, confident in its hipsterness, unafraid of being unlikable - An ideal close to my heart.

Sister Wives (S17) As Elizabeth Laime so astutely put it in the Sister Wives spin-off of Bitch Sesh: There is no other show in which less time was spent making it than time spent watching it. Save for the very beginning (of the end) when Robin joined the family, nothing has happened. (Save for The Catfish, and even then nothing actually happened.) But all that nothing was for the cameras. Big Happy Family propoganda. And this was the season it all fell apart. Now, too much is happening! Cody-19! Christine leaving! Robin wants to talk! Janelle needs a truck for her trailer! (To Cody's dismay) Meri is also there! The knife to the kidneys! As I said before: This was the year of the sister wives. Incredible television.

Evil (S3) The beginning of this season had a lot of splitting up of the trio, which bummed me out. But it made the eventual reunion of the team that much more satisfying, and each of their individual crises of belief more affecting in their isolation. Every season is more weird, more tense, more absurd. I love it so very much!

My Liberation Notes Every year I have one thing that completely consumes me. This year it was My Liberation Notes. It captured me from the very first episode: A story about a introversion and anti-socialism, when to hold on to it and when to let it go. A story about adult siblings, reared together yet all very different people seemingly in different worlds. So many existential ruminations. Plus an exceedingly slow teasing romance, barely one in the conventional sense, but deeply so as a connection of souls. All about life and its disappointments and mundanity, what beats you down and how you change, how people change you and how you change others.

Thank you Better Things for the feels. Goodbye.

#feels like saying goodbye to a person #it does feel like a friend that makes you feel things every now and then #thanks pamela adlon #thanks max frankie duke phil #better things #better things fx

"Never give up. Cause if you give up on Tuesday, then Wednesday could've been the day. " - Better Things

#Better Things #Better Things FX #Actor #artist #dream #struggle #the struggle #give up #dreamer #writer #musician #passion

give this bitch a(nother) Emmy

“All I ask for is basic consideration. Like, just, common courtesy would be nice!”

“No, I don’t think that’s accurate. At all. I feel like you demand a whole lot. Too much, really, considering what you bring to the table.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah, if you wanna know the truth? You need a lot. And you give...little.”

“That is so...insulting.”

“Well, that may be true, but...I think you kinda have it coming.” “You are so mean.” “Oh my god, fine. Okay, I’m mean. Jesus Christ, why does everybody have to be so careful all the time with a man’s feelings? Oooooo, don’t hurt the man, his feelings are SO IMPORTANT. You guys are supposed to be tough? You’re SUCH pussies! The second a woman is a tiny bit mean to a man, or even just a tiny bit honest, she’s a bitch.”

#I should get the nobel prize because YOUUUU are a BUMMER....BOOOOOOOO #Pamela Adlon #Better Things fx #Sam Fox #literally queen of my heart #straight butch icon?#tv