Stan's TV Dump: Spring 2015

Again! Again!

New Girl: Season 4

The conclusion of Parks and Recreation leaves New Girl as the oldest (and probably best) broadcast network comedy on my plate. This was a solid season. Nothing transcendent or exceptional, but quality appointment comfort viewing.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine: Season 2

I'm a little less sure about Brooklyn Nine-Nine than I was a year ago. It's funny and it's loaded with quality performances, don't get me wrong, but maybe after ten years of The Office and Parks and Recreation I'm just a little worn down on the modern workplace sitcom formula.

Mad Men: Season 7, Part II

Great season, great finale, great show. Easily one of my all time favorites. Its departure marks the end of an era in televised dramas; there's plenty of quality out there today - perhaps more than ever before - but none of today's best shows feature characters who have entered the pop culture zeitgeist the way Don Draper or Walter White did - or even Tony Soprano before them. Prestige television is here to stay, but there's nothing out there right now that feels as significant as Mad Men did.

Modern Family: Season 6

Wait, did I say above that New Girl was the oldest broadcast network sitcom on my plate? I guess that's somewhat true, since this one has floated in and out of appointment viewing for me. I like it. I think it's gotten better these last few years, but I do wonder how much longer a show like this can last as those kids keep growing up and leaving for college one by one.

Louie: Season 5

I really enjoyed this. Louie was on hiatus for 2013 and came back last year with a weird and inconsistent season that experimented heavily with long-form storytelling and multiple-part episodes. This season, however, was a nice return to vintage Louie after a three-year absence. Tonally, the show was more or less what it's always been, and maybe there was nothing particularly great about this season compared to the first three, but the return to form was a pleasant surprise and one episode in particular was one of the most haunting things I've ever seen on television.

Community: Season 6

Another miracle comeback, another cast member gone. It seems like even the staunchest Community fans are happy to let this latest season be the show's last, and the finale seemed to recognize that it likely would be. The fanbase's rallying cry for years now has been "six seasons and a movie," which at one point represented our wildest dreams; it doesn't even feel right, in some ways, to hope for a seventh. That movie, though? Man, do I want that movie.

Bob's Burgers: Season 1

I've been putting this show off for years. Gave it a try when it first came out, liked it a lot, and just didn't have time for it. Thanks to Netflix and my adept skill at binge-watching, I'm three seasons deep now. I had actually seen the bulk of this first one before cutting bait, and, yeah, it's pretty good.

Bob's Burgers: Season 2

Short one! Nine episodes, and really no better or worse than the first season. Perhaps more well-oiled and confident in its characters, but not really in a noticeable way.

Game of Thrones: Season 5

Shit, I totally forgot about this one when I said, of Mad Men, that no other prestige drama feels as culturally significant. Can I modify that statement and say that no other wholly original prestige drama feels as culturally significant? Because Game of Thrones is extremely significant and growing more and more "problematic" to different people every season. Devout book readers are growing frustrated that the show will next year overtake the pace of the books and thus spoil the long-running story's conclusion for them. Some fans are worried that the showrunners are irrevocably botching certain characters and stories. And the gratuitous violence that was once accepted as a natural part of an HBO medieval fantasy has begun to rub some viewers the wrong way. To be sure, this wasn't the greatest season of Game of Thrones by any stretch, and with so little published material remaining that hasn't yet made it into the show, Season 6 could be horribly disappointing for so many different reasons. I still love the show, as do most people I know who watch it, but Season 5 was shaky, slapdash, and sort of disappointing. Now that it's out ahead of the books, the show may struggle even more to stick the landing in a satisfying manner. Here's hoping it does.

Silicon Valley: Season 2

I arrived a year late for Silicon Valley, but loved the first season. This second one showed no signs of slowing down. I'm not positive that it was objectively better or stronger than the first season was, but it was at least as good. It enters Season 3 with a clear sense of its characters, its tone, and its story - perhaps the only thing it really struggled to define in the first season.

Veep: Season 4

I said it last year, but Veep had an absolute breakout season in 2014. After two years as a sometimes-great political satire, it reached new heights in Season 3 as a consistently great political comedy. Season 4 was almost nearly as good, which is no small feat. I'm very excited for Season 5, which isn't something I figured I'd be saying about Veep back in its inaugural years.

Bob's Burgers: Season 3

Here's where things really got good. Some highlights here included an episode where the kids made a musical about Thomas Edison, an episode where Gene takes baseball lessons, an episode where the landlord hires the family to pretend to be his own family in order to impress an old flame, an episode where Tina wrecks the car in a parking lot, and - of course - an episode wherein Jon Hamm plays a talking toilet. Just tremendous.

The Comedians: Season 1

This was pretty terrible. I like Josh Gad just fine, and really don't mind Billy Crystal, but they each portrayed the worst possible versions of themselves here. There's usually something admirable about that, when actors willingly portray themselves as shitty people for the sake of a joke. But nothing about this show was very funny. The show within the show - a sketch comedy - was absolutely cringeworthy. But not intentionally. Like, the characters in The Comedians think the show they're making is good - and the writers behind The Comedians don't seem to understand that it isn't. Does that make sense? Bottom line, both of these actors are better than this, and usually so is FX.

That was a doozy, but here comes the long TV dead zone known as "summer." I embrace it!