Currently Watching: Week of 3/17

I'm currently watching Shrinking, Ted Lasso, Abbott Elementary, Succession re-watch and more...

It’s currently March 17th, 2023, and here’s what I’ve been watching this past week (and where I’ve been watching it):

Photo by Mollie Sivaram on Unsplash

Shrinking APPLETV+ (new)

This show is so easy to watch. Even though it's about hard stuff and messy relationships, it's such an easy simple show about people who "probably should have it all together" but absolutely do not.

I thought this was a great penultimate episode. They really put everyone in place for a great season finale. I'm glad Harrison Ford's character made the decisions he did. Letting his character not lean all the way into a 'frustrating a-hole' is really great.

I'm looking forward to seeing how they shift the pieces for season two. Where does Liz fit into all of this? Will this new catering company exist? I really want that for them. She needs to get the hell out of the house, and Sean needs something that lights him up and someone to help him along the way. But that's next season – let's see what happens in the next episode first!

Ted Lasso APPLETV+ (new)

Ted's back! The first episode made me a little sad. No spoilers, but I will say that Roy's niece is still one of my favorite characters on the show.

I love that Ted's kid got a tiny little British accent after spending the summer with his dad in London; that might have been one of my favorite parts of the episode.

Ted kept asking, "why are we still here" and I think it was a bigger question – why is the show still around? And it made me think about what do I want from this show. It started out as some tiny web-comic when we were barely making videos for the internet. And now it's a worldwide phenomenon that created individualized billboards for each of the men on the United States men's national team before they went off to the world cup last year. It's been a crazy ride, but where should it be going from here? I don't think I actually know the answer just yet. I really do like the world of Ted Lasso and spending time with the characters, but is that still enough?

Abbott Elementary HULU/NBC (new)

Photo by Jess Bailey on Unsplash

AE is a great show. All the haters can just hate away. The characters are delightful. The setting is so spot-on that it hurts. And it's wholesome. It's really great to see a wholesome, warm-hearted, and hopeful show about a public school with Black kids and Black teachers.

Not exactly show-related – Quinta has been rocking the red carpet these past few weeks. She's a small person like me, so seeing her wear these amazing styles has been a delight.

This last episode was excellent. They brought back a past guest star, and he plays the best villain. One can only hope that we get a musical episode one of these days, and he can come back for that episode too.

Party Down STARZ (new)

Photo by Tobias Tullius on Unsplash

I'm just loving the revival of this show. The addition of Jennifer Garner is amazing.

There are some shows for me that are a little more passive – I can do a little bit of drawing, writing, or organizing while watching them. I used to feel guilty like I somehow liked the show less because it was a multitasking show. But I realized it's just a different type of show for me. Some shows you need to be super active to watch (Dark, for example – complicated German time travel show with subtitles, multiple timelines, and very complicated family trees), and some shows can be super passive to watch (the re-watch of your favorite sitcom because you already know what has happened five times over).

Honestly, I think I could probably watch Adam Scott in almost anything.

Shadow and Bone NETFLIX (new)

I watched one episode of this last night before falling asleep, and I was thrilled. I'll get back to this over the weekend, I'm sure.

I love YA fantasy, and Shadow & Bone is absolutely good enough. Everyone is doing a good enough job acting; the story is good enough, the costumes are great, and everyone is super cute. It's not trying to be prestige TV, so it's not worth comparing it to prestige TV shows.

I heard they're trying to spin off the Six of Crows stories into their own show. This would be awesome because this episode already had a lot going on, and as fantasy series goes on, they tend to get more intense. So spinning off some of the outer worlds into another series instead of bloating your one show sounds like a great idea.

Succession HBO (re-watch)

Photo by Jp Valery on Unsplash

Succession's final season comes back next week. so this has been what we've been watching most nights. I can absolutely 100% understand why people hate this show.

Every time I re-watch this show, it becomes funnier and funnier to me. I think it's because each time I'm watching it, I'm watching it less like a modern television show and more like a person sitting at the Globe theater watching Shakespeare being performed when it came out when it was about politics and class issues of the time.

We're up to early season three, and man. These are some tragic humans. I cannot wait to see how we deal with them in the final season.

Shows I need to catch up on:

Ghosts, The Magicians

Here's what I'm most excited for next week:

Swarm, Succession (season 3), more Shadow and Bone, Yellowjackets, and a few other things a little further out.

What did you watch this week?