What I’m Watching March Edition: Not Dead Yet, Night Court, Poker Face, Hello Tomorrow, Animal Control, Night Court

Not Dead Yet (ABC):
Capitalizing on Ghosts, Gina Rodriguez plays obituary writer Nell. During the period of her obituary assignment, she can see dead people.

It’s one of many female-centered shows about a woman who doesn’t have her life together in the vein of Dollface, Maggie, Girls, Single Drunk Female, and can trace its lineage to Mary Tyler Moore.

However, Mary Tyler Moore never looked that far down on its protagonist. One problem of this subgenre is that it casts broad labels over women based on whether they’re in a relationship or have achieved a certain career goal.

There’s also one of the autistic leads from As We See It here as the autistic apartment owner and roommate for Nell, which is an interesting wrench to throw in the works of typical sitcom character conflict.

The show is watchable but hasn’t really hit its stride yet. No relationship is really the stuff that would make lists of TV’s “Most ruthless boss” or “Most heart-warming besties” and I get the feeling the show is going for those kinds of archetypes.

It is getting closest in building a must-see relationship in the friendship-triangle between the protagonist and her frenemy boss (Lauren Ash) and the coworker (Hannah Simone) who’s allegiances are caught in the middle.

Watching the Not Dead Yet half-handle its world-building is just a reminder of how remarkable Ghosts has been at ironing the concepts of how the interaction between dead and living works.

Still watchable.

Animal Control (Fox)- McHale’s roguish devil-may-care charm that carried Community for umpteenth seasons is ready made for single camera comedy. He borrows many of the same features as Jeff Winger: In particular, he’s a slacker with a capital S. It does help to differentiate tham a little that this guy doesn’t get laid as often as Winger does.

The problem is it’s hard not to simply see this as a Joel McHale vehicle. The cast isn’t completely flat but there are no stand outs. Gerry Dee comes closest as Templeton Scruggs who appears on the right side of a couple of the best plots. He’s a Michael-Scott-type blow hard but he’s a little more substantial.

There’s also a guy with an Andy Samberg haircut who won a snowboarding bronze medal which I personally love as a character trait because I’m a connoisseur of winter sports; still, this is pretty much an informed ability. What I’m saying is I want to see discount Andy Samberg hang a flying squirrel before I invest in this guy.

There’s also a woman who looks exactly like Chelsea Peretti but has an Australian accent which is kind of jarring.

But, I’m just riffing here. It’s not the most original set of comic characters, but the chemistry between the characters and the quality of the over-arching plots makes this a far better attempt at all-out silliness than, say, Brooklyn Nine-Nine. I dig it.

Mayfair Witches (AMC)-This witch drama really aims for sex appeal. If you want to see Alexandra Daddario (the otherworldly-looking brunette with smoldering good looks from The White Lotus) get involuntarily aroused on an airplane or see an early 20th century tryst between a white-eyed woman and a ghost, this show’s got it all.

Daddario’s character, Rowan Fielding, is the typical no-nonsense heroine that populates many a procedural: She’s got brains (she’s a neurosurgeon); her vulnerability on her sleeve is visible from miles away; she’s unapolagetically sex positive (hence, more sex scenes, yay!), she’s independent, and she’s properly defiant against any and all mansplainers. What’s more, Daddario elevates the material so that the character works even better in practice.

The series takes place in New Orleans and plays well off the city’s lore surrounding the occult. That it’s based on an Anne Rice novel also adds pedigree. The show isn’t a slow burn as Rowan and a couple of the side characters (the uber-prolific character actor Beth Grant plays Rowan’s great-aunt) are interesting enough to watch.

As for the larger mythology, it’s solid but how much that hooks you will likely depend on how into witches and warlocks you are.

Night Court (NBC)-This one is reviewed over at TV Fanatic. Basically, the dialogue and the jokes are often very lazy but, hey, I’m still watching it 11 episodes in, so something about it is working.

https://www.tvfanatic.com/2023/03/night-court-flawed-as-great-tv-effective-as-comfort-food/

Poker Face (Peacock)-The short review here is that the show has serial elements which don’t work and procedural elements which are generally a delight. Riann Johnson has proven himself one of his generation’s top film makers, and especially a master of mystery in the Knives Out series, so he adds a lot of pedigree here. Natasha Lyonne’s character is 95% Colunbo impression and 5% her own thing. This slightly disappointing, but hey who doesn’t like modern-day reimaginings of Columbo in the body of a fiery redhead. The guest star roster (especially Judith Light and S. Epatha Merkerson) is epic. Some of the episodes are unbelievably cinematic. A couple are duds but that’s part for the course. The overarching serialization (she’s on the run from a Vegas mobster) is thin

Hello Tomorrow! (Apple)-Mad Men meets 50s era sci-fi. I’m unclear exactly what year the show takes place, but it hardly matters as the show is decidedly ahistoric. This is a parallel version of the 50s where we didn’t just land on the moon but were able to quickly subdue it for human colonization to the point that we were selling real estate on it.

This show reflects a 1950s era sensibility in which men are bread winners, and there’s no better way to win that bread than don a suit and sell something.

But wait! Were real estate prices as suffocating in big cities in that era as they are today? Didn’t we not go to the moon until 1970 when society was more populated with hippies with long-hair? Again, best not to think too much about historic details.

The series anachronisms’ are tied together quite well anyway under the umbrella of 50s-era sci-fi where writers were coming from uncertainty about what the space age would bring.

It’s not until the show’s 5th episode that anything crucial really happens to the plot but what drives the series is that it has a strong sense of place and time and the heavy hitters — Billy Crudup, Alison Pill, Hank Azaria, and Susan Heyward (not the Oscar-winning actress from the 40s and 50s) — infuse the drama so well.

Poker Face (Peacock)-The short review here is that the show has serial elements which don’t work and procedural elements which are generally a delight. Riann Johnson has proven himself one of his generation’s top film makers, and especially a master of mystery in the Knives Out series, so he adds a lot of pedigree here. Natasha Lyonne’s character is 95% Colunbo impression and 5% her own thing. This slightly disappointing, but hey who doesn’t like modern-day reimaginings of Columbo in the body of a fiery redhead. The guest star roster (especially Judith Light and S. Epatha Merkerson) is epic. Some of the episodes are unbelievably cinematic. A couple are duds but that’s part for the course. The overarching serialization (she’s on the run from a Vegas mobster) is thin