After tackling themes such as memory and trauma, the season finale focuses on guilt and does so with the consistency it has had in four seasons. In some way, and especially since the S2, it uses investigations to develop Ambrose's psychological wounds, one of the most complex profiles that have been created in recent years. This season is headed for a kind of healing, but one that also contains doses of ambiguity.
Season 2 is clearly inferior, much more predictable and implausible than the previous one, with frankly bad episodes like the one that takes place during the kidnapping. The series has more difficulty this time in making the main couple empathetic, and the development of false culprits is boring and predictable. Outside of the submarine, the show sinks into mediocrity.
[Disney+] If the first season brought a kind of western tonality that differentiated it from other "Star wars" stories, even more developed throughout an irregular S2 but sometimes even better than the first, in S3 the Mandalorian has completely lost the North, the story doesn't know where it is going, it looks sideways at the narrative structure of "Andor" (2022) without being able to catch up with it and only in the final episodes does it seem to return towards a plot that ends up being too much debtor of the conventional stories of the saga. This should definitely be the last season.
It is contradictory that, the worse fit they have in the MCU, the more interesting these proposals for series of lateral characters are. In this case, there is a remarkable approach to multiple personality disorder that, mixed with Egyptian mythology, offers a very striking proposal. But, when it tries to regain the connection to the MCU, it becomes conventional and uninspiring. Oscar Isaacs is superb.
[Netflix] While trying to correct the narrative mess of S1, the development of the story remains weak, supported by horrible dialogues and a script that is as lazy as usual. To the point that they need to create an episode as explanatory (and boring) as "Dear friend ..." just because they are unable to have clarity in the narration. It is a frustrating series for its good possibilities, weighed down by the showrunner's inability to bring Sapkowski's rich universe to the screen.
The second season largely maintains the interest of the first, but knows how to expand the story to other limits that pose different plots. Some characters are more blurred, such as Lee Scoresby's, and it seems like a season of preparation, of placing the pieces for a more ambitious adventure that would foreseeably come with its third season.
Although the first season had the virtue of using his lack of budget to improve his rebellious sense of humor, this second season improves on the main narrative construction, giving more prominence to characters who were basically secondary, thus broadening the horizon of threads narrative, and it is allowed to dedicate certain episodes to specific characters (Laszlo / Jackie Daytona, Colin Robinson ...).
But perhaps the character that gains in complexity is Guillermo, with his contradictions, his doubts, his double life ... You could almost create a spin-off with the development that has been built around him this season. Nandor and Nadja have taken a back seat, but they also star in some brilliant moments.
The season also begins a formula that can bear good fruit in the third season, with the participation of some guest stars such as Haley Joel Osment or Mark Hamill.
There are some seasons of tv shows that seem to have a curse on them. After a good first season, "Doom patrol" introduces new elements (Dorothy's main character arc), while the rest of the characters also have their conflicts to resolve, some more interesting (Negative Man) and others less flashy (Robotman, actually, everything that surrounds this character is histrionic and annoying).
Abruptly ended in 9 episodes when 10 were scheduled, due to the filming being interrupted by COVID-19, although the producers claimed that the filming was practically finished. So it is not understood that the 10 episodes had not finally been released, or that an episode 9 of longer duration had not been edited.
Because almost all the arguments remain unfinished, and it does not seem possible that the series had a total conclusion with one more episode. It is a season therefore less compact than the first, more chaotic at times (everything related to Crazy Jane) and that does not take advantage of the new main plot that seemed especially interesting at the beginning.
This Perry Mason has little to do with the character in the classic television series, even in the novels that made Erle Stanley Gardner a bestselling author. Fortunately. He is a more complex character, more insecure, more depressing... He is a true "noir" character, as black as the fate of his clients. Raymond Burr's Perry Mason was inventive, talkative and clever, but also manipulative and puritan.
The series has the greatness of "Boardwalk Empire", splendid in technical aspects like the music of Terence Blanchard, although the script is an incomplete story, unbalanced in some moments that, of course, has nothing to do with the stories of the original novels. Fortunately.
Jacques Audiard's participation in the last two episodes as a screenwriter and director perhaps gives us a clue as to what the path would be in a possible sixth season without Eric Rochant. And that path unfortunately doesn't have much to do with the rest of the series.
The fifth season has been erratic, with little wasted stories (Marie-Jeanne in Egypt), almost non-existent characters (Marina) and unfinished plots (everything that surrounds the character of Louis Garrel). The series maintains its personality, but it has taken a commercial shortcut that may lead it to a blind alley.
If throughout the two seasons it manages to be a story that uses police drama as an excuse to talk about abuse and domestic violence, the Season 3 develops the tragedy of the scars of trauma and the stigma that remains on the victims, even if the culprit is convicted. The introduction of Ryan as a character who is unaware of the drama and the danger that his father represents is a splendid way of reflecting on the external gaze of a society that can hardly understand the wounds that remain in the victims of abuse.
[Netflix] The final season closes the circle of the defense of the family unit and the power that wealth grants, whatever the cost: "Most people have the wrong idea about money." Perhaps S4 is far below S2 and S3, and shows the usual frustration caused by a series sometimes too focused on moving forward that forgets to go deeper. And the ending can be a bit disappointing, but it comes full circle in a consistent way.
[HBO Max] How a lovable comedy with standout characters can't find a way forward. Completely pointless, sometimes boring, the second season stalls in the development of the characters, not knowing what to do with them when they have already started a relationship. Tom stays in a secondary place, completely inconsequential. But there's also, surprisingly, not much evolution in Jessie's character arc.
[NRK] While S1 feels like a more conventional youth heartbreak story, S2 is radically elevated to offer one of the best portraits of youth recently produced. It is missed to go deeper into the psychological problems of young people, but the characters are so close and real that it is easy to empathize with them, and the "rånere" car culture becomes a reflection of the spirit of community and friendship.
[HBO Max] It has the honesty of being a story in which Abril Zamora reflects about herself, and talks about transsexuality with the naturalness that many other series do not achieve. But there is also an excess of dialogue and too long scenes, which does not benefit its other values. Especially brilliant is the narrator who criticizes, insults and lectures the characters, an ironic parody of generational series.
Flimsy series very characteristic of US public television that at first wants to resemble "Lost" (ABC, 2004-1010) but then takes the easy way of time travel. Of course, the influence of the past on the present depends on what the writers are interested in at each moment. One-dimensional characters, and mediocre FX for a B-series that has more ambitions than it achieves. And that's his biggest problem, although it sometimes makes some jokes about it ("I watch a lot of sci-fi and always there is a character like you").
An adaptation that has all the elements to be an interesting investigation show, but that blurs them in an unbalanced script. There is not much charisma in the new Robert Langdon, which is reinforced by the unnecessary creation of "companions", trying to expand the narrative but in reality drowning the main character. It doesn't get an addictive rhythm either, not even in a climax that here is an anti-climax.
[Movistar +] If in S1 the main theme was gentrification, S2 develops the characters more, which is one of its main virtues. The actors strike the right balance between somewhat silly humor and causticity. There are very funny episodes like "The Thomas Thorne affair" and "Bump in the night", and some of the events that led to the death of the ghosts are explored. It deserves to be one of those long-lasting BBC series.
Although from the third season Pamela Adlon took the reins of the series, in the fourth she takes that look at maturity from the female point of view further. It's less fun than when Louis C.K. participated in the scripts, but it has a much freer vision of this female universe that it builds. Personally, the plots involving teenage daughters are less interesting to me than those involving adult characters. And it is no coincidence that the best episode, "New Orleans", a wonderful almost magical tour of a city that still bears the wounds of devastation, is the one in which the daughters are absent.
There are also splendid moments like that meeting of women without men in "Father's Day", or those forays into the semi-documentary that address the sensations caused by the first period or the menopause to a series of interviewed women who hide their faces, in the upbeat final episode, "Listen to the roosters."
"Better things" is a different series from its first seasons, possibly it has less humor, but it benefits from a greater attention to detail, to the deep feeling of being a woman.
The reference to the character of Mildred Ratched seems like an excuse rather than a development. That, or the scriptwriters have not understood the character of "One flew over the cuckoo's nest" (Milos Forman, 1975). In fact, there is no similarity, neither argumentatively nor stylistically. As a season of "American Horror Story" it would be correct, even remarkable. Murphy pays homage to Hitchcock with the Doris Day aesthetic, but as usual creates an attractive universe that nevertheless gets lost in subplots that reveal the weakness of the main plot.
Season 3 raises interesting questions (the threat of modern financial society versus the survival of the cowboy idiosyncrasy). Unfortunately, the season as a whole doesn't fully develop this premise, and it seems to raise more questions than answers. The end of the season, so drastic, ends up positioning the series on a path that is closer to soap operas like "Dallas" than the more interesting path it had followed in the past two seasons.
Steve Conrad brings a special atmosphere to a story that could have gone a more traditional path. That slow, thoughtful flow, which integrates a sober sense of humor, sometimes even absurd, is the best characteristic of the series. Also a cast of splendid actors, who are totally devoted to the story. Sometimes this rhythm stagnates, but at the same time offers an unpredictable, surprising development. It is a very much Epix series, to enjoy with peace of mind. Waiting for next season.
The first season of the show was really fun, without being especially groundbreaking. But the birth of this group of misfits with powers they hardly even know how to use had a special dimension that went beyond fucking entertainment.
In this second season, which follows the main plot of the second volume of the comic, "Dallas", there is a clear intention to maintain the good results of the first. But it is scattered, somewhat chaotic, with absolutely unnecessary plots that slow down the pace of the series (Ellen Page was already a casting error in the first season and seems even more lost in this second). There is also an attempt to introduce more "serious" issues, taking advantage of the fact that the action takes place in the sixties of racism (with a certain parallel with today) and political conspiracies.
It is a disappointing season, which step by step has been moving away from the comics (perhaps with the intention of making their stories independent to be able to continue in successive seasons, since the third volume is the last of the comics). But this independence is its biggest flaw.
A series canceled ahead of time, although it may possibly get a platform where it can continue with a third season, at least. Although the second season has been repetitive, with little-used characters such as the Russian spy, the possibilities open in the last episodes make us wait for a more interesting narrative development. It is as if the second season was conceived as a bridge that causes a change in the story. Now let's see if the creators have a chance to continue it.
100 episodes for a series that with only 50 episodes could have been an interesting proposal for a police series. But the interest in stretching plots that became increasingly absurd, led to make the show a joke of itself.
From the moment the main plot ended, "Blindspot" did not find the right vehicle to remain interesting. After a forgettable fourth season, the end of an aimless series seemed necessary. The final season has been, however, the worst, mediocre, with a low budget and absurd decisions (it does not make sense that if there is no budget you will take the story to "international" locations).
The last episode, however, is what it should have been all season: a nostalgic proposal that, within its scant plot (it seems that finding the bomb was the least), has offered moments of remembrances and references. But a series must end when the proposal runs out. A lesson for the future.
The Season 3 it was felt that it stretched the plots too much, losing part of the freshness of the first seasons, but Season 4 is an unnecessary continuation, with separate plots to fit with the agenda of the actors who have proven that they have more professional experience than this series, like Emma McKey and Connor Swindells. Even the final of S3 is better closed than that of S4, and in terms of the main romantic plot, not very different. Maeve's comings and goings from the United States are forced, but the story maintains a broad view of youth, although at times it seems like a diversity checklist. Seeing almost thirty-year-old actors playing seventeen-year-old boys is also creepy.
The first season was an optimistic look at a love story facing difficulties, but the lighthearted tone as opposed to the usual drama of teen stories gave it a different perspective, even in the portrayal of more understanding parents than usual. usual. For the second, the creator has renounced what made it a different series and has introduced all the clichés of the genre, at the end addressing issues such as mental problems and eating disorders to lengthen the plots, now structured in creating lovers between all the students and even some teachers. There are some interesting ideas, like the treatment of transgenderism, but also absurd character arcs, like Ben's, or artificial conflicts, like the family dinner. In the end, Charlie and Nick have ended up being two tiresome lovers.
[tv+] "Ted Lasso" has had a bad time playing in the Premier League. The ambition to want to be a prestige comedy with a checklist on social issues (refugees, homosexuality, privacy...) has resulted in a long season, with inflated episodes, lazy plots and a redemption arc that it didn't need. From a fun and enjoyable sitcom in S1, to a failed but sometimes successful S2, the story has been walking towards the precipice of a pretentious series that desperately seeks to be more transcendent than it is.
A plot of false culprits (or not) brought to a society in which images have become the main element for verifying the truth. S1 manages to be unsettling by its closeness to reality, but S2 wants to be so much like "Black Mirror" that it ends up being as silly and ineffective as it is entertaining. And it builds a script in which twists are more important than how plausible they may become, with an absurd ending.
[Netflix] From the Irish gangster genre to the embrace of fascism and the birth of the IRA, there is an interesting political reconstruction of an era. But above all an epic of the dark, violent and arrogant hero, in an S6 that closes Tommy Shelby's descent into hell in a tone of operatic tragedy. With death hovering on and off screen, the final season becomes an elegy for atonement for sins through suffering.
