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Close Reads

  1. close reads
    That Succession Moment Is About a Lot More Than Roman’s ‘Item’Once you manage to stop cringing, there’s a lot to unpack here.
    By Jen Chaney
  2. close reads
    What Is the Allure of Kendall Roy?Succession’s would-be No. 1 boy is a deeply broken soul, and the sympathy he inspires is anything but simple.
    By Jack King
  3. the long and winding show
    The Beatles: Get Back Is Too Long, But It Has to BeWhat may at first seem like a major bug in Peter Jackson’s new docuseries is actually its greatest feature — and a gift.
    By Jen Chaney
  4. close reads
    The Unbearable Sadness of Tom WambsgansAs Succession explores increasingly baroque ways to make nothing happen, one character is poised to break the cycle.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  5. finales
    What We Do in the Shadows Accepts Its HumanityA tremendous third season ends with a twist revealing just how much these idiot vampires have grown.
    By Anne Victoria Clark
  6. close reads
    Chucky Turns a Tired Horror Cliché on Its HeadAs the first Child’s Play installment with a gay lead, the new TV series is reclaiming a harmful trope that’s dogged the slasher genre for decades.
    By Louis Peitzman
  7. profile
    Writing Through the MomentThe Kings are known for making TV that captures the Zeitgeist. It’s a high-wire act that’s gotten trickier post-Trump.
    By Angelica Jade Bastién
  8. close reads
    A Game of Marbles Turns Squid Game’s Anti-Capitalist Critique Inside OutThe season’s narrative turning point fully reveals the stacked-deck nature of the game, and how it fundamentally changes its players.
    By Roxana Hadadi
  9. close reads
    Decoding The Many Saints of Newark’s Parallels With The SopranosSeven ways the new Sopranos film echoes the original series and treats its story as mythology that can be retold, reinterpreted, and revised.
    By Matt Zoller Seitz
  10. exit strategy
    The Circle Might Have a Catfish ProblemWhat was initially a perfectly legitimate tactic within the larger game has become one of the latest season’s biggest bummers.
    By Emily Palmer Heller
  11. close reads
    Ted Lasso Reveals Its Long GameWith “Man City,” season two finally addresses the trope in the room, giving the show and its characters alike a much-needed dose of reality.
    By Amma Marfo
  12. performance review
    Erika Jayne and the Runaway NarrativeWhatever sympathy the embattled Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star might have built is buckling under the expectations of being a Housewife.
    By Louis Peitzman
  13. how we spent our bummer vacation
    The Genre of the Summer Is Resort HorrorThe premise of a luxury vacation gone wrong is an ideal match for the Hot Vaxxed Summer that wasn’t.
    By Alison Willmore
  14. the discourse
    Why a Christmas Episode Supercharged the Ted Lasso DebateThat’s serial storytelling for you!
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  15. fantasy franchises
    Netflix’s Expanded Witcher Universe Is Upon UsBoth a stand-alone story and a teaser for what’s ahead, the new Nightmare of the Wolf is a proof of concept for the Witcher franchise’s next phase.
    By Scott Meslow
  16. close reads
    The Enigmatic Ending of The Green Knight, ExplainedIt’s like The Sopranos, but maybe not exactly like The Sopranos.
    By Nate Jones
  17. close reads
    When Presented With a Black Gaze, the Emmys Turned AwayThis year’s nominations struggled to recognize works that approach Black stories as three-dimensional portraits, rather than blunt, thematic hammers.
    By Robert Daniels
  18. teen drama
    Let’s Talk About That Big Gossip Girl RevealWhich is really just the new Gossip Girl premise.
    By Jackson McHenry
  19. close reads
    Infinity Train Outgrew Its Audience — and Grew Better for ItThe animated series’s cancellation over the lack of “a child entry point” underestimates what audiences of all ages are capable of enjoying.
    By John Maher
  20. bird watching
    Tuca & Bertie Are Just As Anxious As You AreThe best bird buds are back on Adult Swim and perfectly suited to our new neurotic normal.
    By Jen Chaney
  21. close reads
    Love, Victor Is Maturing Into a Better, Messier Version of ItselfSeason two of the Hulu YA series gets more explicit, yes, but it also allows its protagonist, and the series, to exist outside tidy resolutions.
    By Jackson McHenry
  22. close reads
    Hollywood’s Black Snitches Aren’t Telling the Whole StoryThe depictions of these characters fail to fully explore the forces driving their betrayals.
    By Jordan Taliha McDonald
  23. spoilers
    Let’s Talk About Mare’s Decision in the Mare of Easttown FinaleHer choice speaks to the theme of the entire HBO series.
    By Jen Chaney
  24. close reads
    The Buffy Episode That Changed EverythingTwenty years ago, “The Gift” set in motion the biggest changes Buffy the Vampire Slayer would undergo during its run — for better and for worse.
    By Rachel Simon
  25. tv after 2020
    Can a Police Procedural Change?The latest, and final, season of NCIS: New Orleans offers a glimpse of what it looks like when a show tries to.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  26. close reads
    The Real Housewives of Atlanta Bolo Leak Was a Fourth-Wall-Poking Power PlayIf you only watched the show’s version of the fallout from Cynthia Bailey’s bachelorette party, you didn’t get the whole story.
    By Shamira Ibrahim
  27. close reads
    The Continued Cost of June’s SurvivalThe Handmaid’s Tale has turned its protagonist into a bulletproof dream heroine leaving a growing pile of collateral damage in her wake.
    By Whitney Friedlander
  28. switched on pop
    Only Lil Nas X Predicted How Much ‘Montero’ Would Outrage the Machine“Nas would always be like, ‘This is going to be a moment. Like you guys literally do not understand.’ And we didn’t.”
    By Charlie Harding and Nate Sloan
  29. back catalogue
    Artist Dawoud Bey on 6 of His Photos That Pushed His Work ForwardThe photographer opens up about what it took to make some of his most iconic images, ahead of his upcoming Whitney retrospective.
    As told to Sasha Bonét
  30. tributes
    DMX Took Us All to the Basement of Our EmotionsEddie Huang remembers DMX’s irresistible cameo on Fresh Off the Boat, and the man who unexpectedly nurtured a generation.
    By Eddie Huang
  31. close reads
    Demi Lovato’s Documentary Is Acutely Aware of Its ImageDancing With the Devil isn’t just a high-profile tell-all, it’s also a canny demonstration of celebrity construction in real time.
    By Zosha Millman
  32. close reads
    What Was the Asian American Character Actor?For way too long, supporting roles were both the ceiling and a devil’s bargain.
    By Alison Willmore
  33. close reads
    Farewell to Superstore, a Show That Got Representation RightFor six seasons the series cultivated a genuine picture of working-class life: wide-ranging, nuanced, and always meeting at a myriad of intersections.
    By Kovie Biakolo
  34. close reads
    This Week’s The Real World Homecoming Gets Real About RaceIt’s practically a checklist of exactly what not to do when confronted about racism.
    By Jen Chaney
  35. close reads
    The Bachelor’s Biggest Problems With Race Happen OffscreenBenching Chris Harrison is just a superficial fix for a much deeper, behind-the-scenes issue at the franchise.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  36. crossovers
    In Meghan and Harry’s Oprah Interview, Two TV Worlds CollidedWith its invocation of streaming-era giant The Crown, Oprah Winfrey’s old-school broadcast event merged two ends of the TV spectrum.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  37. close reads
    Allen v. Farrow’s Dylan Farrow Videos Are a Necessary Shift in FocusWhile it’s unsettling to watch a 7-year-old Dylan describe her abuse, it feels right that as an adult she’s finding healing in an on-camera context.
    By Jen Chaney
  38. close reads
    My Spirit Left My Body Watching This Ginny & Georgia SceneOppression Olympics … let’s go?
    By E. Alex Jung
  39. first person
    I Couldn’t Imagine Being Happy. But I Could Imagine Being Carmela.I found my model for womanhood in an unlikely place: The Sopranos.
    By P.E. Moskowitz
  40. close reads
    The Real WandaVision Big Bad Was Marriage All AlongBeneath the family-sitcom trappings, the series is wed to a legacy of superhero stories that will do anything to end marital bliss.
    By Oliver Sava
  41. tv timeline
    How TV Stories Have Shaped Our Understanding of AIDSUsing the tools of serialized storytelling, television has both reflected and reshaped our perception of the virus, one fictional character at a time.
    By Manuel Betancourt
  42. close reads
    It Is Once Again Time to Call for Chris Harrison’s Retirement From The BachelorRemoving Harrison will not fix the show’s ongoing race problems. But that doesn’t make it any less worth doing.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  43. close reads
    What Nomadland Gets Wrong About Gig WorkersThe movie features a real Amazon warehouse and real workers but leaves out real exploitation.
    By Wilfred Chan
  44. gotcha! gotcha again!
    Okay, Let’s Talk About Behind Her Eyes’s Double Twist EndingThat final reveal gives some of what comes before greater context, but that doesn’t mean it’s good context.
    By Jen Chaney
  45. close reads
    You Don’t Have to Be a SuperheroRecent onscreen depictions of autistic adults reflect the entertainment world’s growing — if still imperfect — understanding of a lifelong condition.
    By Brady Gerber
  46. close reads
    Framing Britney and the Empathy of a Simple TimelineWhat now stands out as a central, fundamental event in Britney’s life might’ve remained a footnote if not for the doc’s chronology.
    By Kathryn VanArendonk
  47. close reads
    Lupin Pulls an Adaptation Heist on Its AudienceAs Netflix’s latest international hit cleverly riffs on its titular public-domain character, it simultaneously teaches viewers what it’s riffing on.
    By Rafael Motamayor
  48. spoilers
    That WandaVision Ending Gives Deeper Meaning to a Crossover Event“On a Very Special Episode …” is indeed a very special, brilliantly layered episode of WandaVision.
    By Jen Chaney
  49. inauguration day 2021
    Inauguration Day 2021 Was a Colorful Beam of LightVisually and thematically, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s inauguration was suffused with brightness.
    By Jen Chaney
  50. close reads
    Who’s Been Lie Lie Lying? An Investigation into Joshua Bassett’s “Lie Lie Lie”What does “Lie Lie Lie” tell us about the current HSMTMTS drama?
    By Gabrielle Sanchez
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