REVIEW: "Harley Quinn" Season 1 / Season 2

As someone who has never been a huge fan of Harley Quinn as a character, it was a hugely pleasant surprise to find the new adult animated series based on her, created by Justin Halpern, Dean Lorey and Patrick Schumacker, to be such a joy through its first two seasons.

It’s an open question how this happened. The show begins the story with a pilot that has Harley (Kaley Cuoco) and Joker (Alan Tudyk) as a couple, but soon gets to the part where Harley decides to break free of him and become her own supervillain, amassing a crew consisting of best friend Poison Ivy (a series stealing Lake Bell), and various Batman lesser baddies, like Dr, Psycho (Tony Hale), Clayface (also Tudyk), King Shark (Ron Funches) and Sy Borgman (Jason Alexander). 

From there the show displays a remarkable devotion to serialized storytelling, continuity and character growth, along with the jokes (too many to catch each episode). It’s quite a feat to see how much the show cares about its characters, from Harley and Ivy to each supporting player, like Jim Gordon (Christopher Meloni) and Kite Man (Matt Oberg). The first season is about Harley trying to establish her independence from Joker, but never waivers in respecting the pull of that original, twisted relationship, which is responsible for the popularity of the character in the first place. It’s not long before Harley herself becomes less interesting than most of the recurring and supporting characters on the show, especially Poison Ivy- this iteration of her is the most appealing version of the Batman villain I’ve ever seen. As the wisecracking, cynical and deadpan best friend, you kind of wish the show could be about her.

Season 1 does the Joker/Harley story full justice

Or, even better, that it could be about all of Gotham or even the entire DC universe, as every cameo and episode that brings in anyone you know, from Batman to Superman to Lex Luthor, Batgirl and Bane (a fast fan favorite) is a funny, knowing, instantly appealing and winningly voiced version that’s part parody, part original creation that does its own thing with the character yet respects aspects of him/her that have been absorbed through mass pop culture over the years. The show is its own universe and yet a believable, adult, funny and graphic re-orientation of DC lore. The closest it stays to “canon” is in the origins of Harley Quinn’s own story, so tied to the Joker that it’s more or less sacrosanct, as seen in several flashback episodes exploring Harley’s psychology. The second season moves on to the development of Harley and Ivy’s relationship, from best friends to a love triangle involving poor Kite Man, who gets his most sympathetic and visible representation yet in this series, as you kind of prefer the pairing of him and Ivy over Harley and Ivy. But as fans have long wanted in comics and otherwise, the romance between the two women gets to come to fruition eventually, wrapping things up in a nice little bow in case something goes wrong with the transfer from DCU to HBO Max and it turns out these two seasons are all we get of this.

But I hope it’s not. Because given the talent and creativity of the show’s writers, I can see them expanding to a lot of areas from this starting off point (there was even an episode entirely centered on Batman in the second season, with no Harley in sight), and there’s so much they have left to play with in a DC animated world with no restraints. Keep it coming, please.

Grade (Seasons 1&2): A-/A

Season 2 gives the fans what they’ve always wanted with Harley and Poison Ivy

REVIEW: "Mrs. America"

I’m ashamed to admit that I know far more about the civil rights movement and even the gay rights movement of the 1960’s and 70’s than I do about the women’s liberation movement. It’s an oversight on my part but one that I’m sure many others share, and lucky for us, Dahvi Waller’s Mrs. America is here to educate us on the triumphs, failures, successes and turbulence of the feminist “revolution” that did indeed grow out of the social unrest of the late 1960’s and was an offshoot of the civil rights movement itself.

This limited series stars Cate Blanchett as the demonic Phyllis Shlafly, a name that I vaguely recognized as having read before- something about being a staunchly homophobic and anti-gay commentator in the late 1970’s. Little did I know her original claim to fame was as an anti-ERA activist, who launched a political group opposed to the ratification of the equal rights amendment, which was well on its way to passing in the early 70’s, when women’s lib was having its greatest influence on American politics. This series showcases Phyllis as the face of women against other women, that old, reliable roadblock that rears its ugly head to help hold the patriarchy in place whenever women attempt to band together and claim power for themselves. It’s much harder to succeed as a marginalized group when you have to fight not only your oppressors but those within your group who align themselves with them.

Phyllis was a wealthy, conservative Republican who was far more interested in foreign policy than she was “women’s issues,” and longed to run for office and be taken seriously on the topics which she was passionate about. She had a supportive husband (John Slattery) and five children who were mostly raised by her sister-in-law (according to this show), which allowed her to spend her time in activist circles, but she wasn’t taken seriously by men and not even allowed to attend law school in her younger years. As the show presents it, she was frustrated and stymied in her own (ironically feminist) desires to be involved in politics and have a career, so she seized her power by claiming the mantle of the anti-feminist, positioning herself as a woman who opposed equal rights for women (herself excluded of course), and who then received the attention from the male political establishment and the media that she so craved.

The complicated activists of the women’s movement leave a big impact today

On the other side of all this were the feminist activists, or women’s “libbers,” led by Gloria Steinem (played by Rose Byrne in a return to her dramatic TV roots), Betty Friedan (Tracey Ullmann), Bella Abzug (Margo Martinadale), and Shirley Chisholm (Uzo Aduba), among others. But the women’s movement had issues of its own having nothing to do with the Schlafly led opposition- the infighting, backstabbing, and egos involved led to personality clashes (Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan apparently did NOT get along), and conflicts with lesbians and black feminists that led to the movement being decidedly non-intersectional. The frustrations of any kind of political movement that needs to constantly decide how or how not to compromise and how inclusive or exclusive it’s going to be are documented with tremendous detail and smart, intelligent dialogue that never dumbs down the goals of the movement or the battles it fought as the political climate changed throughout the 1970’s.

This is an outstanding history lesson that never feels like one. The show is brimming with energy and recreates the 1970’s with lively, authentic flair, as each episode centers a different woman from the movement and the fantastic ensemble cast rises to the challenge in every way. Oscar winner Blanchett is of course the star and Phyllis Schlafly is more than given her due here, as the show rather kindly presents her as a sort of tragically misguided figure who fell into obscurity after helping to usher in the evangelical movement with the Reagan revolution only to shoot herself in the foot as she was used and tossed aside by the men who had no need for her divisive bullshit once the goal was accomplished. Yet, one can’t help wanting to know more about the feminists, as I can argue that Gloria Steinem, though remembered, is far too little known except by name, especially to younger women, for what she achieved and began, and the same goes for Shirley Chisholm and Bella Abzug (who I’d never even heard of). 

The women’s movement fell short of its goal, as the ERA was never ratified, the conservative realignment crushed the influence women briefly had in the political arena (which was even bipartisan!) and attempts to make crucial gains and dismantle that damn patriarchy are ongoing and still being fought on depressingly similar ground today. But the women who fought for this were revolutionary and groundbreaking, and frankly they deserve the in-depth biopic treatment more than resurrecting the deservedly forgotten Phyllis Schlafly as the villain who took it all down. I’m eagerly awaiting that Gloria Steinem movie any day now.

Grade: A

Rose Byrne captures Gloria Steinem’s effortlessly cool vibe with ease

2020 Peabody Winners Include 'Watchmen,' 'Fleabag,' 'When They See Us'

Some nice picks for the Peabody award winners this year, although I kind of question this season of Stranger Things getting recognized. Really? I mean, it was fun, but…really? I approve of all the others (aside from the three I haven’t seen- Dickinson, David Makes Man and Ramy, but I’m sure they’re good).

ENTERTAINMENT

• Chernobyl

• David Makes Man

• Dickinson

• Fleabag

• Ramy

• Stranger Things

• Succession

• Unbelievable

• Watchmen

• When They See Us

DOCUMENTARIES

• Apollo 11

• For Sama

• Hale County This Morning, This Evening

• POV: Inventing Tomorrow

• POV: Midnight Traveler

• POV: The Distant Barking of Dogs

• POV: The Silence of Others

• Surviving R. Kelly

• The Edge of Democracy

• True Justice: Bryan Stevenson’s Fight For Equality

NEWS

• A Different Kind of Force: Policing Mental Illness

• American Betrayal

• Long Island Divided

• The  Hidden Workforce: Undocumented in America

• Unwarranted

CHILDREN’S & YOUTH

Molly of Denali

Netflix’s Unbelievable makes the cut

The Gang is Back for 'Doom Patrol' Season 2 on June 25th

Doom Patrol just barely finished filming its second season before the pandemic shut everything down, and lucky for us, because it now gets to premiere as a summer show on June 25th, airing concurrently on both HBO Max and DCU. I loved this show in its first season and can’t wait to revisit this wacky crew. I still don’t know how many episodes it got though (and I could have sworn it actually was still filming when the shutdown happened, so I’m wondering if they might have cut an episode in order to say it was completed).

The Full Trailer for HBO's 'Perry Mason' is Here

I’m still not clear whether this is a miniseries or not, but the new Perry Mason show is quickly coming up here on June 21st. This is based on the Perry Mason stories and novels by Erle Stanley Gardner, so for anyone who thinks it has direct ties to the old TV show, the answer is…not really. I’m guessing it’s more like a different interpretation of some of that material.

REVIEW: "Normal People"

I’m always part of the target audience for a good love story, and this adaptation of Sally Rooney’s novel Normal People will tick just about every box if you consider yourself a fan of romance. The book about young love in Ireland takes form with newcomers Daisy Edgar-Jones and Paul Mescal as the leads, and it is a soaring, beautifully acted, emotional story of two teenagers who fall in and out of love in high school and then through their college years. 

The show is directed by Lenny Abrahamson (Room) and Hettie MacDonald, who each did half the episodes, which are just under a half hour (unusual for a drama), making it easy to binge within a few days, if that. The show’s become notable for its sex scenes, which reminds me of the early audience reaction toward Outlander, another series known for its intense, long sex scenes, especially early on. The success of that kind of intimacy onscreen is almost entirely dependent on the chemistry of the actors, and luckily they hit the jackpot here. Mescal and Edgar-Jones make a huge impression as the two tortured teens, and the naturalistic dialogue and intense emotional longing between them feels real. Abrahamson especially directs episodes in long close ups and creates an intimate, visceral connection between the characters and the audience, bringing us along for Connell and Marianne’s coming of age journey. 

The show is just about perfect as an adaptation, and the first three episodes in particular are startling in how quickly the show hooks you into the lives of these characters. Paul Mescal’s Connell is the popular jock and Edgar-Jones’s Marianne is the smart, rich outcast, and the two begin a secret romance that is kept hidden from Connell’s friends at school due to his insecurities over her social status. The relationship goes through various heartbreaks and separations but the two cross paths again (and again) through college and can never quite detach from each other.

Some of Connell and Marianne’s inability to connect is frustrating

What problems I had with the series come more from the source material, since the show is so carefully plotted that it covers nearly all of author Rooney’s novel (she co-adapted this miniseries herself with Alice Birch). Though the first six episodes are authentic and devastating in emotional impact, the show loses something in the second half when MacDonald takes over as director, and the reasons for Connell and Marianne’s break-up and waffling reconciliation is never convincingly stated or shown. The aimless wandering and hook-ups with other people are never portrayed as satisfying to either one of them as they continue to long for only each other and you start to wonder…why is it they’re not together? The show doesn’t need to be twelve episodes, as some of the detours taken in the second half are clearly meant to draw things out, but the biggest problem with dragging out their reunion is the complete lack of development of a single supporting character.. Connell and Marianne go through various other romantic partners, none of whom are given any dimension or depth, and frankly every person on the show besides the two leads is an obnoxious, anonymous vessel. You find yourself waiting for the inevitable reunion if only to get these other people off the screen and get back to the sex scenes- and that doesn’t need to drag on for twelve episodes (this could have been done in eight).

Still, while you’re watching it you’re mainly captivated by the performances and the angst, and it’s only after it’s over that you start thinking about all the unnecessary padding (though the problems and non-explanations for their slowness to just get back together already remain, as I’m sure it does in the book as well). 

Grade: A-

Young Irish love

REVIEW: "Outlander" Season 5

After a problematic and frankly not great season last year that I referred to as the “Brianna problem,” Outlander now had the unenviable task of adapting no one’s favorite book in the series, The Fiery Cross (or Book 5) for its fifth season. The reason this one has never been a fan favorite is a combination of its epic length alongside a whole lot of unmemorable, uneventful descriptions of daily domestic tasks and housekeeping for Claire, while Jamie’s off doing nondescript army stuff and tangling with the pre-revolutionary colonial troublemakers who call themselves “regulators.” 

The first half of this season is roughly in line with the book, and though each episode is well directed and acted as always, it faces the same problem the book did, which is not a lot actually happens. There’s the occasional pop-up from Stephen Bonnet again (the delightfully evil Edward Speelers), but no confrontation with the main characters until much later, the wary familial bonding between Roger and Jamie, and the insertion of Murtaugh as one of the regulators in an attempt to liven this uninteresting plot up a little, but it only works to minimal effect. Finally, about halfway through the season we get to the two memorable events of Book 5, Roger’s hanging and Jamie’s snakebite illness, which produce two emotionally heavy, intriguing and creative episodes, and from there the producers take some leeway in skipping ahead to Book 6, pulling events from different points in the series, which vastly improves the course of action.

John Bell makes an early return as Young Ian, now altered

One of the best additions is the early return of Ian, now a transformed Native American adoptee, and played with immense appeal by John Bell, who adds to the newly solidified ensemble feel of the supporting cast that rounds out Jamie and Claire’s family life on the ridge. Another is the emergence of Lauren Lyle’s Marsali, whose role is crafted to inhabit a composite of characters from the book who never appeared on the show. Lyle is a tremendously likable actress whose charm leads a minor, near insignificant character from the books to become essential on the series, especially as Sophie Skelton’s Brianna continues to suffer onscreen next to the talented ensemble, although she benefits from a slightly lesser focus on her character as well as having most of her scenes with the excellent Roger Rankin and Speelers, who carry her across the finish line dramatically. 

Outlander retains its emotional and visceral stakes, never more prominent than in the season finale, which chooses to end on the most disturbing and traumatic event that happens to Claire in Book 6, and rather uncharacteristically makes changes that cause the incident to be even worse than what transpired in the novel. Yet, whether this was necessary or not, the episode is enormously effective, creating a dreamscape that Claire disassociates to as she’s brutalized, imagining her life in her own time, and we get to see glimpses of the cast in 1960’s style and dress…all except for Jamie of course, who remains her guiding light, forever the 18th century highlander who can never be displaced in her mind or soul. As the show moves forward I hope it continues to take more liberties with the timeline and events of the books, as it may in fact catch up to where Diana Gabaldon has currently placed the series, with Book 9 about to be published. I’ll be in it to the end, as my investment in Outlander, Jamie and Claire’s love story, and their 18th century family hasn’t waned yet.

Grade: B+

Claire suffers badly in the harsh, yet emotional season finale

REVIEW: "Better Call Saul" Season 5

It must be a trick of Vince Gilligan’s, to be able to pull off the escalating suspense and unbearable tension that marked each progressive season of Breaking Bad, because they’ve done it again with Better Call Saul, now having completed its fifth and arguably best season yet. It could be a natural result of the two worlds finally merging as the Breaking Bad timeline gets closer, but with nearly every episode being a fine example of perfectly executed direction, acting and character building, it stands above BB, because there’s still a hint of unpredictability involved.

That unpredictability is regarding Kim Wexler of course (played by Rhea Seehorn), who has her best season yet, practically elevated to a co-lead, as she chooses to make some fateful decisions about herself and Jimmy that put her dubious future even more in flux. There appear to be dwindling options over her ultimate fate now, but I find myself wondering if even the writers haven’t quite decided what road they ultimately want to take her down. This season Bob Odenkirk’s Jimmy McGill officially becomes Saul Goodman, changing his name at the courthouse in the premiere and more or less diving straight into the sleazeball tactics that defined the character we were introduced to on Breaking Bad, but there remains one factor to his humanity that hasn’t been jettisoned, and that is of course his relationship with Kim. That relationship deepens in several ways this season, leaving us to ponder with prolonged fear and anxiety what could possibly happen going forward, as even though Jimmy’s transformation into Saul is now complete, there seemed to be no hint that he had a wife who knew all his nefarious dealings hanging around behind the scenes. Or was there? And what’s going on in those present day Cinnabon Gene-in-Nebraska prologues? There remain some distinct pathways to bringing us to the present- the question is will Gilligan and Peter Gould take the unexpected ones that make us question what we saw of Saul when Walter White was doing what he was doing.

Tony Dalton’s Lalo is a new kind of threat

In the bifurcated part of the storyline, this season we see Mike (Jonathan Banks) experience his own final transformation into the coldblooded taskmaster we knew him as, as he decides to ally permanently with Gus Fring (Giancarlo Exposito) and his quest for personal revenge against the Salamanca’s. This leads to the development of Lalo Salamanca, played with gleeful joie de vivre by Tony Dalton, and the luckiest possible outcome they could have gotten, given that Lalo’s existence stems from a singular throwaway reference of Saul’s in his first episode of Breaking Bad. Lalo however turns out to be both menacing and cheerfully devil-may-care, the most memorable villain introduced in the BB world after Gus himself. The fight between Lalo, Mike, Gus, Saul and eventually Kim (!) seamlessly merges the two worlds that have been co-existing since Season 1, priming us for the final season that will presumably take us right up to Breaking Bad and beyond. I can’t wait.

Grade: A

Gus and Mike face new problems this season

Matthew Rhys is the New 'Perry Mason'

Oh wow, a miniseries starring Matthew Rhys AND Tatiana Maslany, the Emmy-winning leads of two of my favorite shows of the last decade (The Americans and Orphan Black)? I’d have to watch this no matter what. Luckily it looks good anyway. June 21st. I’ll be there.

REVIEW: "Elite" Season 3

I enjoyed the first two seasons of Elite quite a bit, but I think you have to admit that stretching out one murder plot for three years is a bit of a reach. And creators Carlos Montera and Dario Madrona apparently know this as well, which is why the show is now jettisoning its main cast and coming back for Season 4 with a brand new one (ala Skins, which had to have been one of this series’ biggest inspirations), but I think they probably missed the boat by a season. As it is, this final one with the original cast feels like it’s going in circles, and with no satisfying conclusions by the end of it.

We pick up with our outed murderer Polo back at school after having had the evidence disposed of by his cunning new paramour Cayetana (who remains the show’s worst addition from last year), and the rest of the group pretty much hating his guts and/or scheming to do away with him, with yet another new death serving as the show’s flashback premise, which took place on graduation night. This time around though, plots start getting recycled, which is always a bad sign. Even with Polo himself, who literally relives his threesome storyline from the first season, this time with Cayetana and Valerio. In other pairings, more new characters are introduced, as ice goddess Carla gets stuck in a horrid storyline with her father pimping her out to new guy Yeray, while Samuel uses and double-crosses the faux tough girl Rebeka even though he remains hung up on Carla for some reason, in an ongoing carryover from last year, though the two never had an ounce of chemistry and was the show’s least interesting pairing by far. 

The show could never decide what it wanted to do with Guzman and Nadia

Guzman of course is still obsessed with making Polo pay for his crime and avenging his sister, but it stunts his ability to develop as a character on his own, while he and Nadia remain star-crossed til the end. And poor Ander gets the obligatory terminal illness that always strikes one major character on a soap eventually, causing more problems for him and Omar, but the issues with these two are so repetitive now that it makes you question whether they’re stuck in a time loop. Ultimately, the show spins its wheels until the highly unsatisfying conclusion to the mystery posed in the premiere gets revealed, and the result is so baffling and makes everyone so hypocritical in their choices that it renders the entire season redundant and pointless. And yet…even with all these irritations there’s something about the pace and tone and all around slickness of Elite that keeps it highly watchable, because you don’t start asking yourself these questions until the episodes are over, which are some light points in its favor. Still, a disappointment in the end, but perhaps a new cast can rejuvenate the series, as it tended to do on Skins. I’ll keep checking in.

Grade: C

More fighting in the hallways