This article contains spoilers for the final episode of “One Foot in the Grave.” There’s a British sitcom called One Foot in the Grave, which I don’t believe has ever aired in the US. It’s all about a retired man who spends most of his time finding ways to get even with or teach lessons to stupid and/or selfish people. While it conforms more or [...]
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tv:Comedy
A long time ago, I reviewed Sports Night in general, and talked a little in particular about its examination of a neurotic male lead. I know the show is old, but I’ve recently re-watched it yet again, and there’s a lot more to be said about it. This article assumes you know the basics. Dana and Natalie. Sports Night passes the so-called Bechdel/Wallace test in [...]
Why yes, I am reviewing Mystery Science Theater 3000, the hilarious cult phenomenon TV show in which a guy marooned in space and two robots watched a terrible movie and made fun of it. MST3K was my first experience of someone outside my home making sarcastic and delicious fun of a movie for, among other things, portraying women poorly: “Yes, non-skinny women are inherently unhappy.” [...]
My latest favorite tv show is NBC’s sci-fi comedy Chuck, which delivers some of the things I love most in a show: an ensemble cast of quirky characters, wacky hijinks, pithy dialogue, and Adam Baldwin getting into fistfights. From a feminist perspective, the show gets points for interesting, well-developed female characters – but there are plenty of problems. One of the main characters, Sarah Walker [...]
I saw another really interesting M*A*S*H episode that tied in perfectly to our recent discussions about a guy who wrote to inform us we’ve got it all wrong: women are more picky about men’s appearances than men are about women’s. In “Hey, Look Me Over“, Hawkeye is complaining about his inability to get a date with any of the nurses. The problem is, the person [...]
The Big Bang Theory is a newish sitcom from Chuck Lorre, best known for Two and a Half Men(cue chorus of groans and growls). Like that show, it has plenty to object to, notably the two lead characters, both white male physicists. Leonard (Johnny Galecki) is the audience surrogate for the Nice Guys in the audience, with all that entails. Sheldon (Jim Parsons) clearly has [...]
I’ve been watching M*A*S*H on Netflix, and you can probably expect at least one more article on the show in the future. But for now, I want to talk about an episode called “Inga” with the assumption you’re at least passingly familiar with M*A*S*H. If you’re not, check the Wikipedia article to get the idea. The story: a Swedish female surgeon (Mariette Hartley) is coming [...]
