Appointment Television

In today's episode, we discuss the last three episodes of Season One of Tuca & Bertie, a show we all love the name of which Margaret can even occasionally pronounce correctly. In the process, we also discuss: Margaret's improbable employment as a semi-professional pronunciation advisor Fauci/Verdon Mall stores we'd name after which we would name our children Future Bones Zone guest Josh Gondelman's great essay "An Ode to Speckle, a (Bird)Man for Our Times" And you can hear Margaret learn, in real time, what TCBY stands for All told, a splendid episode anyone would enjoy.

This week, film and culture critic Cate Young (@battymamzelle) joins us for a discussion of The Bold Type's uneven 4th season, and why we keep watching it anyway. Then, we dial up Netflix's The Baby-Sitters Club, just to remind ourselves what it was like six months ago when we could actually get childcare. SHOW NOTES: Cate Young on Twitter: https://twitter.com/battymamzelle The Bold Type on Hulu: https://www.hulu.com/series/the-bold-type-45c40273-0742-4324-af23-db4a484b3af3 BSC on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/81005407 More from Kathryn on BSC: https://www.vulture.com/article/the-baby-sitters-club-netflix-adaptation-review.html

We kick things off this week by talking about shows like Central Park and The Simpsons, which have announced a few significant casting changes in response to the Black Lives Matter movement. Then it's Tuca and Bertie book club time! Guess what? This show still fucking rules. 

Yes folks, that's right. As the title suggests, we tackle not one but TWO all-time ATV trash classics: Andrew watches the pilot of NBC's Smash (while Kathryn and Margaret lavishly reminisce about the fun they had watching it) and then we, as a team, discuss Netflix's new extremely dumb & incredibly fun show, Floor is Lava. Highlights: whose eyes are the deadest in all of Hollywood? What screen icon does Andrew describe as "that Susan Collins looking lady"? And, best of all, who would we cast on Celebrity Floor is Lava and how would they fare? PLUS: bonus dunking on Cancel of Dads. Pertinent links: Megan Hilty performing "The National Pastime" from SMASH Megan Hilty performing "They Just Keep Moving the Line" from SMASH No videos whatsoever of Katherine McPhee singing a single, solitary song from SMASH Andrew and beloved Overdummy Craig Getting's recommendations for how Floor is Lava can improve Vulture's interview with Floor is Lava creators wherein the making of the lava is detailed at length Where yo

This week, we continue our Tuca & Bertie TV Book Club with episodes 3, 4, and 5 of Season 1. In addition we discuss: the cancelled-before-its-time Sweet/Vicious at the behest of one of our $7-a-month Patreon supporters, and Andrew's incredible skill at coming up with perfect dumb podcast names.

In light of the surging Black Lives Matter movement, we discuss some of the major TV responses in the last few weeks, especially the cancelation of Cops and Live PD, and Bachelor's decision to finally cast a black male lead.  We also take a long walk through our mailbag, beginning with some really thoughtful critiques we received about the subject of cops on TV and our response to the Twilight Zone. Please note that eventually the mailbag gets less serious. 

This week, we lighten things up a bit by watching the first two episode of Lisa Hanawalt's Netflix animated show, Tuca & Bertie.  SHOW NOTES: Tuca & Bertie: https://www.netflix.com/title/80198137

On this week's episode, inspired by Kathryn's excellent essay on the subject, we are discussing POLICE ON TELEVISION and why, by and large, they are not doing great things for society. Along the way, we make some important stops at: Normalizing Injustice by Color of Change Hollywood  Critics' Conversation: Is TV Afraid to Tackle Police Brutality or Just Unable to Do It Well? How police censorship shaped Hollywood, and how pop culture changed policing   Opinion: Shut down all police movies and TV shows. Now.  46 Stops: The Driving Life and Death of Philando Castile from Code Switch #127, The Crime Machine, Part I -- Reply All 

In lieu of one short topic this week, we each bring a short topic and then promise to only talk about our topic for 2 minutes each. Somehow, though, the first segment is 17 minutes long.  Then it's time for the end of the Twilight Zone book club! This time we joke a lot about pool players and the system in heaven where you have to show up as a ghost to constantly defend your titles. 

hello hi yes hello guess what hi we finally did our last good one/bad one combo!!!!!! for the spring season!!!!! we put it off for so many weeks BUT THIS WEEK wasn't one of them, so here it is! OUR EPISODE! We talk about The Bachelor: Listen to Your Heart (not worse than Cancel of Dads, but LONGER) and Run (ultimately not as good a one as we hoped by god, Merritt Weaver is so beautiful, so do we even care?). Join us to learn how chamber ensemble music camp is like The Bachelor, whether Margaret's gaydar is working, and how long Margaret will attempt to communicate non-verbally before recalling she is making a podcast and must instead articulate her thoughts.

The second season of What We Do in the Shadows is one of the precious few shows left that still has new pre-pandemic episodes rolling out every week, so we talk about how great it is. Then, it’s back to the Twilight Zone, to watch some all-time series high-watermarks (S03E08, S01E08, S05E03). What We Do in the Shadows (Hulu): https://www.hulu.com/series/what-we-do-in-the-shadows-0b10c46a-12f0-4357-8a00-547057b49bac Vulture’s 50 best Twilight Zone episodes: https://www.vulture.com/article/twilight-zone-best-episodes.html

Did you know there will still be some TV this summer? There will! Not very much, but the summer won't be a complete content desert, and we're going to run through a few of the things we're hoping will give us some welcome summer distractions.  We also talk about the Parks and Rec reunion episode. We were not big fans, alas, but we use it as a springboard to talk about what we think works about this kind of sad event TV and whether anyone really wants a Very Special Covid Episode. (We think probably not.) 

This week we return with another mind-blowing visit to The Twilight Zone, with a special (coincidental) emphasis on stories where women are driven mad by happenstance. Also we have small complaints we just gotta get off our chests ok??? SHOW NOTES: Stumptown: https://abc.com/shows/stumptown The Last Dance: https://www.espn.com/watch/catalog/2806434b-1deb-4c5c-aae0-04b1ab8eebf7/the-last-dance The Bold Type: https://www.hulu.com/series/the-bold-type-45c40273-0742-4324-af23-db4a484b3af3 Vulture’s list of The Twilight Zone episodes: https://www.vulture.com/article/twilight-zone-best-episodes.html

Hello, fellow quaranitine madness sufferers, and welcome to the latest ATV. Is Margaret once again recording with the wrong mic this week? She sure is, and she blames Zoom. She's not sure what Zoom has to do with it, but she's still confident they're at fault. We also talk about the new Who Wants to Be a Millionare? and the myriad ways in which it's the worst. We debate if any Late Night Jimmy other than Kimmel could have saved it. Margaret's mic? It's the still the wrong on this whole segment! AND THEN we talk about Mrs. America! Margaret's mic remains bad but her ability to pronounce Schlafly and Abzug on her very first try is so impressive that maybe you'll stop noticing. At the end of the episode, Andrew suggests that we might edit part of the show so that it flows more smoothly and Kathryn, bless her shining head, says "....we'll see." You will see that we didn't, proving that once again, Kathryn is always right.  

This week we roll out a new a new TV book club, the top 10 episodes of The Twilight Zone! We definitely told you about this book club in previous episodes, and we gave you plenty of warning this was coming on our social media feeds. If you're feeling at all gaslit about that, keep in mind that it's very thematically in keeping with a book club on The Twilight Zone.  Before we dig into our first Twilight Zone episode (season 4's "On Thursday We Leave For Home"), Kathryn shares some brief thoughts on Quibi.   

This week we talk about the things we have been watching since we’ve been stuck in our houses with our televisions. And then, appropriately, we talk about the TLC reality show Dr. Pimple Popper. We also talk about Law & Order SVU a lot? Which is confusing to Andrew but clearly he's out of his element and should be forgiven for it. SHOW NOTES: Mrs. Maisel: https://www.amazon.com/Marvelous-Mrs-Maisel-Season/dp/B06VYH1GF7 Batman: The Animated Series: https://www.dcuniverse.com/videos/batman-the-animated-series/65/season-1 Evil: https://www.cbs.com/shows/evil/episodes/ The Bold Type: https://www.hulu.com/series/the-bold-type-45c40273-0742-4324-af23-db4a484b3af3 Stumptown: https://www.hulu.com/series/stumptown-70cc8703-43db-4d87-96ae-146a4ed81d3f Law & Order SVU: https://www.nbc.com/law-and-order-special-victims-unit/episodes Dr. Pimple Popper: https://www.tlc.com/tv-shows/dr-pimple-popper/

In solidarity with the many parents in our audience currently navigating the... joys... of having their children with them all the time, Margaret and Andrew handed the reigns over to Kathryn this week for Good One, Bad One Jr. We got to watch one good show that her 2-and-6-year old love and one bad show they love. We also took this as a chance to reflect on the shows of our youth, the wild origin story ascribed to the titular ghostwriter of the PBS show Ghostwriter, the myriad ways that both Muppet Babies and Ghostbusters misrepresented the more adult brands from which they were derived, why Rockapella appeared to be the only acapella group on Napster, and the two genders of childhood in the early 1990s: enormous calf-grazing baggy shorts and tiny bike shorts. 

In our first Good One / Bad One segment of the spring, we bring you a relatively thoughtful conversation about David Simon's Plot Against America and then a very, very, very silly one about NBC's new series Council of Dads. 

In today’s episode: first, we are joined by a special guest! Our pal Kamille Washington (AKA Kamillio) is tapping in again, this time to liberate Kathryn from the burden of watching Fox’s newest absurd reality TV show, Flirty Dancing. In addition to discussing this very dumb and very pure program, Andrew, Margaret, and Kamille design their own Frankenshows out of the discarded parts of reality TV shows past, and: Nearly end one dear friendship of many year's existence by means of a very bad (but also inspired???) joke Discuss how we would use an illegal knife barge Observe all the narrative theory you did NOT learn thanks to Kathryn’s absence Ponder what Jenna Dewan No Longer Tatum's hair smells like And, at the episode’s very end, hoist one's self on one's own petard by dragging a person who may have posted an episode of the show at 9 AM instead of 6 AM only to forget to post the very next day's show until 1 PM (!!!!)  Hopefully, you find all of the episode as satisfying as Margaret found the very last bit

This week, for some reason we open the episode by talking about a tweet for ten minutes (though it DOES lead to a fruitful recounting of our past juvenile delinquencies). Then, we return to one of our most reliable content mines, digging up good ones and bad ones from the spring 2020 TV calendar to watch and discuss later. SHOW NOTES: The tweet: https://twitter.com/LisaMMcGee/status/1237785183631413248 Run: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jwEiXdJGKM The Plot Against America: https://www.hbo.com/the-plot-against-america Mrs. America: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIpTIPKTOkU Council of Dads: https://www.nbc.com/council-of-dads The Bachelor Presents: Listen to your Heart: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bachelor_Presents:_Listen_to_Your_Heart Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? https://www.vulture.com/2020/01/who-wants-to-be-a-millionaire-reboot-jimmy-kimmel-host.html