Seizing Power: Game of Thrones ‘The Door’ (Recap)
“Jon Snow may be the one who comes back to life, but it’s the women of Westeros who are increasingly shaping the direction of Season Six.”
The Unburnt: Game of Thrones ‘Book of the Stranger’ (Recap)
“And just like that, things are looking up for Season Six.”
Post-Resurrection: Game of Thrones ‘Oathbreaker’ (Recap)
“Will the execution weigh on Jon as he experiences life beyond the Night’s Watch?”
Rebirth: Game of Thrones ‘Home’ (Recap)
“As good as Game of Thrones can be at revealing shades of grey in ostensibly irredeemable characters, the show is equally adept (if not more so) at making its villains as detestable as can be.”
Exposition Is Coming: Game of Thrones ‘The Red Woman’ (Recap)
“There’s a lot of expository detail, and little development in the singular arcs beyond the exposition.”
Recap: Girls ‘Love Stories’ and ‘I Love You Baby’
“Season 5 of HBO’s ‘Girls’ is now done, and so it is time to bestow upon it ‘one of the all-time best seasons of TV’ accolades.”
Recap: Vinyl ‘Alibi’
“Vinyl’s sense of music history is surface-level and haphazard, and, most damning, it has yet to fully reveal why it needs to exist (over the course of 11 entire hours).”
Recap: Girls ‘Homeward Bound’
“This is the first time in what seems like quite a while that I’ll actively be looking forward to the next season at the end of the current one.”
Recap: Vinyl ‘Rock and Roll Queen’
“‘Rock and Roll Queen’, the ninth and penultimate episode of Season One, is largely a gathering together of ongoing plot threads and weaving them into a runway on which the entire season will land next week, and that’s fine.”
Recap: Girls ‘Hello Kitty’
“Girls is so fucking good this year.”
Recap: Vinyl ‘E.A.B.’
“Because, man, when Vinyl sucks, it really sucks. But when it doesn’t suck… it doesn’t suck. Read that back as early 70s Iggy Pop, it’s a better line that way.”
Recap: Girls ‘The Panic in Central Park’
“‘The Panic in Central Park’ is a richly realized half hour of television, maybe the best episode in the history of a show that’s had some awfully good ones.”
Recap: Vinyl ‘The King and I’
“Is there any point to Richie being an asshole? Is Richie even a character? What is it about Richie Finestra as a protagonist that requires this story be set in the early 70s?”
The Subversive Power of ‘Pee-wee’s Big Adventure’
“Thirty years after its release, the gender play, sexual politics and physical comedy shine as brightly as the 100-watt headlight on its star’s beloved bike.”
The Insular Visions of ‘Krisha’
“It’s too late to force her way back to a seat at the table. She should have never tried to get closer.”
Recap: Girls ‘Queen for Two Days’
“I know I say this every week, but it must be said again: this is such a good season of Girls.”
Recap: Vinyl ‘Cyclone’
“‘Cyclone’ is the most trying episode of Vinyl yet for anyone less than fascinated with Bobby Cannavale’s Richie Finestra”
Recap: Girls ‘Old Loves’
“The fourth episode of Girls’ still-terrific fifth season is the first point at which the end of the series comes into sharp focus.”
Recap: Vinyl ‘He in Racist Fire’
“There was a return this week, in grand fashion, of Horrible Coke Faces.”
Recap: Girls ‘Japan’
“Damn, this season of Girls is good.”