MovieManifesto

We’re ranking every TV show that we watched in 2023. If you missed Part I, you can find it here.

80. The Continental (Peacock, Season 1). I get the idea. The John Wick universe is appealing in part for its intricate mythology, so it’s theoretically possible to derive further entertainment from its lore, even without the grounding presence of Keanu Reeves. The problem with The Continental is that, aside from Mel Gibson’s shameless scenery-chewing, nothing about it is remotely memorable. Its cast feels second-rate, its plotting is perfunctory, and its action, while occasionally kinetic, never comes close to approaching even a third-tier set piece from the Wick flicks. Those movies are about one man’s desperate attempts to fight back against the High Table—the invisible institution that inflexibly dominates his world and restricts his autonomy. Yet The Continental feels like a servant of the Table itself: a piece of corporate property, fulfilling its duty without deviating from its superiors’ instructions. It isn’t a revolutionary, it’s a slave. Read More

Is TV getting worse, or am I just getting grouchier? This is my tenth straight year conducting this exercise, which has typically functioned as an opportunity for me to flaunt my indecent enthusiasm for television. Movies and TV aren’t a zero-sum game—it’s possible to admire both forms of storytelling without denigrating one in favor of the other—and while I spend the vast majority of my time writing about cinema, this is the one week where I can pay proper homage to the small screen.

So why, in assessing the TV of 2023, am I gripped by a powerful sense of malaise? It hasn’t been for lack of viewing options. True, from a certain self-loathing perspective, the amount of television I consumed this past year was substandard: a mere 94 shows—my lowest figure since 2018 and down dramatically from my pandemic peak of 124 in 2020. That said, watching every episode of nearly 100 different TV shows in a single year probably seems outrageous to your average, healthy, not-completely-obsessed-with-art individual. What’s relatively meager for me is surely obscene for most. Read More