I’ve had a bit of a dry spell in TV time since my son was born. Having kids does greatly limit your ability to watch non-child-friendly entertainment, but here I am doing my best. Like, sure, I can watch all I want with my infant son around, but being off work means that my daughter’s also always around, which means that it’s kid-friendly Netflix all up in here most of the time.
Nevertheless, it’s nice when I can slot in a weekend night with the husband, or spare a little late night writing time to indulge in some stuff to inspire me. So, in the spirit of my book round-ups, here’s a nice little compilation of the media I’ve enjoyed this spring.
Bonding
One of the only redeeming parts of the Heathers TV remake was Brandon Scannell’s gender-queer rendition of Heather Duke. I could not get enough of him. So I was stoked when I found out that he would be starring alongside Zoe Levin in a Netflix show about a dominatrix and her (at first) unwilling bodyguard. Honestly, this show is exactly everything I could ask for. Funny. Dark. Dirty. Candid. Tragic. Real.
Definitely an RJH certified watch.
Gay of Thrones
Yes, I watched Game of Thrones. Yes, I was disappointed.
Thre are plenty of articles that delve into the many reasons why the final season sucked it hardcore, but let’s talk about better things. Particularly Gay of Thrones, which I’ve gleefully enjoyed since its debut in GoT’s season 3. Queer Eye’s Jonathan Van Ness has been an entertaining recapper over the years, identifying each of the show’s expansive list of characters with varied pop culture nicknames. I’m gonna miss this little show more than Game of Thrones.
Hayden Thorpe
I was pretty upset when I discovered that my favourite band, Wild Beasts, split up last year. The band was something different, something special, but what struck me most was lead singer, Hayden Thorpe’s falsetto vocals. He killed me. He gave me goosebumps. So I was stoked to find that he was working on a solo album, which released this week. I’m gonna listen to it and write some sad stuff pretty soon.
Barry
With Game of Thrones over, my husband and I decided to pick up a new show, so we’re now catching up on Barry. It’s exactly what I need right now.
The Majority Report
My husband and I have been hitting the podcasts pretty damn hard as of late. It used to be I’d listen to a lot of news podcasts while getting ready for work. I don’t go out as much now, so I’ve found myself with less time for news consumption. Oddly enough, there are mornings when my daughter is alright with me casting daily live streams of The Majority Report onto the television.
It shouldn’t be a surprise to most people that I lean very left politically. What I like about Majority Report is the split in leftist viewpoints. They also dunk on Dave Rubin a lot. And I love the bashing on Joe Biden, too:
Harvey Girls Forever!
So I mentioned kid Netflix when I opened this post. I won’t lie. My daughter watches a lot of it. And she watches the same damn shows all the damn time and if I have to watch that “Squeaky Peeper Panic” episode of Abby Hatcher Fuzzy Catcher again I WILL KILL MYSELF. Toddler television is actual Hell on Earth.
One day I managed to get my kid to watch this “older kid show” instead, and it has been a joyous affair. It makes me think of Hey Arnold! or Recess or other “neighbourhood” kind of shows that I grew up with. Plus, it’s got a diverse cast and some good messages mixed in with some of the kid gross-out comedy. My daughter’s favourite character is Lotta because she thinks she’s cool and beautiful. I like Lotta because she’s a plus-sized queen who knows she’s beautiful. Honestly, I love this show for that reason alone. My daughter picked up a different attitude about size standards from TV, and I hope that attitude continues because all those Disney princess movies sure did a number on my self-esteem about my size over the years.
What About You?
Any shows you’ve been binging? Was Game of Thones’ finale a bummer for you too?
What are you looking forward to this summer? I’ve been considering Chernobyl and want to get back into The Handmaid’s Tale but I don’t know if I can handle stuff that dark at the moment.
The Comments
Emily Slaney
Game of thrones has been disappointing me for the past three to four seasons, if I’m honest, so I approached the final series expecting nothing. And even then it still proved disappointing. The final episode was so, so dull. And Bran Stark was so smug, right? Ugh. Chernobyl is good.
Rebecca
Emily SlaneyYeah, I didn’t go in with high expectations and I’m mostly bummed about the fact that a show that was such a high point of pop culture went down so lacklustre. It’s going to be hard to think back nostalgically about GoT without getting mad about GoT. Fuck DnD, honestly.