flight of the conchords (2007)
the first series. holds up really nicely. the songs have a pretty good hit-rate (80% maybe?) and the funniest parts are when they're just sat around talking and hamming up the flatness of their own accent. 7
eating with my ex (2017-)
one of those rare series that plays off as trash but has an interesting kernel of truth at its core. two exes sit down to dinner and ask pointed questions about where it went wrong. the couples are all exclusively under 30 so it's a heady brew of jealousy and insecurity and social media. later episodes find people using the show for brand expansion (to be fair i think bbc3 cast via instagram) and as such feels more like a performance, but sometimes those little kernels of hurt are hard to do away with and they rise to the surface. 7
line of duty (2012)
the first series. many of my friends are hooked on this and talking incessantly about the current series so i thought i would give it a chance and try to catch up. i regret my decision. the plot itself is not bad. but everything else, from the constant on the nose and tin-eared dialogue, to the easy ciphers for the writer's hatred of liberal influence in law and poor people, to the abysmal acting from a cast of otherwise very good actors from some of the best shows this country has ever produced, to the constant shakycam and over-keen musical score, and the plagiarism from the wire. at first it was merely risible but later episodes became offensive; a character who merely exists to show what a hellish mise-en-scene she lives in by punching a disabled man full in the face as another boy pisses on his belongings. hateful. 2
heimat (1984)
impossible to summarise in a glib paragraph but i feel fairly confident that this is in the upper echelon of all fictional television. the story of one hamlet (not even a village, they don't have any shops or transport connections to begin with) from 1919-1982 and all that entails re: german history. it is looser than most television: episodes vary in length and certain story threads aren't there to be resolved, rather to suggest that we're in a new era and modernity is happening whether these villagers like it or not. my only mild complaint is that certain characters are interesting enough to stand more screen-time, like the sickly brother edouard and the obsequious asshole wilfried and his huge asshole father (how did they turn out so readily acquiescent to the nazis and then corporatism when maria, wilfried's sister, is a saint?). nonetheless a show that leaves you wanting more and hoping for small revelations from characters who die or leave off-screen is a first for me. 10
meet the khans: big in bolton (2021)
i don't mean to overstate things ever but this might be the worst television show that i have seen. now i don't hate the kardashians at all (the show is competent and they are just a huge 'whatever' to me, no diss, may they live in peace) nor do i hate flashy constructed-reality (it is still structurally interesting and a weird development few could have predicted) so please understand that my problem with this is much deeper-rooted: the khans are dullards and there is nothing happening in this show. amir (pro-boxer of repute) trains and his wife has a lackey to drizzle honey over her every utterance as she attempts to prove she is a #girlboss and not simply someone who married rich (and yet is downwardly mobile as she has ended up in fucking BOLTON after being in New York). the basic 'show don't tell' rule is cast aside as there is this credulous telling of what is going on without ever really critiquing or showing the reality of it. i dunno. watch it. as lousy as there's no place like tyrone but not even charming. 1
masterchef 2021 (2021)
i'm generally ok with the format but the banalities are really getting to me, "this food is inspired by my mother", "he needs to make sure he cooks this right", gregg's reaction shots are increasingly loveless and detached, and the music and editing are still needlessly frantic, and the door that separates the kitchen from the dining room is absolutely ridiculous! 5
auf wiedersehen, pet (2002)
2 years prior awp had been voted #46 on the bfi all-time british television shows and the #1 show from itv by a poll in the radio times. this bbc revival doesn't make a good case for any of its strengths and relies on some broad carictures and dated humour. not awful but incredibly basic stuff. 4
the virtues (2019)
brutal television. stephen graham on a one way ticket to despair. the scene in episode 1 in the pub one of the most weirdly true pieces of television i've seen. the rest was stuff we've seen from shane meadows before (trauma coming back and boiling over into rage) but done with real impact. couple of minor quibbles but really something. 9
deutschland '89 (2020)
half-watched when partner had it on. complete mess of corny dialogue, (n)ostalgia, and eurotrash self-importance. shame because there's definitely something to be said about east germany pre-unification. but this isn't it. 3
tinker tailor soldier spy (1979)
excellent anti-bond rendering of spy games (sad broken men, smoky rooms, regrets and no glamour) where you can feel history changing through the actions of poker-faced men in a room. 9
world on a wire (1972)
sci-fi ur-matrix plot (is this world a simulation?) made with avant-melodrama style for very little money and tons of energy. first half an hour makes sense the second time around, i expect. 8
smiley's people (1982)
follow-up to tinker tailor (skipping over a book in the series, which hurts this a little) has alec guinness more as a travelling detective settling a score with his soviet equal untilbut at the end, despite winning, he realises he's had to stop being a lovelorn cloth cat and thus sold himself out. some good characters get shunted out for no good reason. 7
last woman on earth with sara pascoe (2020)
interesting-ish conceit (travelling to places where certain jobs exist that we don't have) ruined by ironic distantiation and unsubtle ideological shilling. the georgia episode particularly egregious as she wanders the stalin museum quipping about stalin's murders (ok, legit) to punters (maybe they're there critically?) and then in the next scene spending a pleasant 10 minutes with us-funded ethnonationalists at the border. i'm no putin fan but this was as subtle as a brick to the head. cuban episode was better. 4
back (2017)
low-key mitchell and webb sitcom shot in stroud, which means it is nice to look at. unfortunately has the same problems as late peep show episodes, where bourgeois spinelessness vs. bourgeois overconfidence is the entire basis of the farce. didn't last the entire first series. 3
it's a sin (2021)
good but too-compressed tale of the arrival of hiv/aids to the uk. russell t davies is great at shortcutting your love and sympathy for characters; when colin died i was genuinely upset. some people think the last episode a masterpiece of the dramatic arts; i'm less sure. for contemporary channel 4 it was superior. 7
fresh meat (2011-2016)
all four series of the university comedy-drama. painted broadly but there's always jokes and a little bit of pathos. all characters are flawed and all get approximately equal dramatic weight (except howard, who is the phoebe of the group) without any concomitant quality dips. probably gets extra points because i recognise most of the locations and some of the characters. 7
gbh (1991)
sold as a dramatisation of the derek hatton/militant years in liverpool but takes a right-turn into the symbiosis of two men on either side of the divide in versions of labourism; both develop strange tics and quirks as a result of traumatic recollection. michael palin (tic of compulsive nakedness clearly done without stunt double) is very good and holds this together. some of the minor characters are a bit cartoonish. that said it dares to cut deeper than most. 7
the queen's gambit (2020)
syrupy melodrama about drug addiction and institutional malfeasance sold as a glamour piece about a female chess prodigy. didn't really chime with this at all and was made in that expensive cgi-affected digital style that renders every conversation a bit leaden and obvious. obnoxious soundtrack too. 3
the bridge (2011)
at first it appears to be a contemporary update of the sjoland/wahloo type of scandinavian gumshoe melancholy with some light social critique but rapidly declines into genius vs. genius bollocks. full of narrative conveniences, a masterplan that doesn't work if you think halfway hard about it, and lame quasi-torture porn dogshit. hated it. 2
the other one (1977)
a very-much forgotten sitcom (doesn't even have a wikipedia entry) whose jokes aren't particularly funny but is compelling in other ways. partly this is down to casting the endlessly watchable michael gambon as the perpetual rube to richard briers' compulsive liar character. audiences at the time hated it and it wasn't ahead of its time in all regards, but there's definitely something here. 6