TV

2021: The Year of TV

For many, many years I’ve been saying I’m terrible at watching TV shows and generally speaking I am but that did change in 2021. I still haven’t watched many of the “big” shows like Game of Thrones, The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, The Wire, Succession, The Boys, Outlander – you name it, I probably haven’t seen it.

But in 2021 I watched more TV shows in their entirety than I have ever before in one year. In fact, I watched 31 different shows. Only two of them were continuations of shows I’d starter before 2021; Cobra Kai and Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and one was a rewatch; W.I.T.C.H.

Here’s a list of all the shows I watched last year. they’re sort of in order of when I watched them though if there’s been a gap between when I watched various seasons of the same show, I’ve included it on the original listing. Like Cobra Kai I watched on 1 January 2021 and 31 December 2021 – started and ended the year with my new favourite disaster man Johnny Lawrence.

– Cobra Kai season 3 and 4
– Derry Girls series 1 and 2
– Brooklyn Nine-Nine season 6 and 7
– Superstore season 1-6
– WandaVision
– The Falcon and the Winter Soldier
– Loki
– 9-1-1 season 1-4
– 9-1-1: Lone Star season 1-2
– Shadow and Bone S1
– Batwoman season 1-2 and first half of S3
– The Gifted S1-2
– Ted Lasso S1-2
– Mare of Easttown
– W.I.T.C.H. S1-2
– Chernobyl
– Turner & Hooch
– Big Shot
– What If…?
– Only Murders in the Building
– Doctor Who: Flux
– The Equalizer S1
– Jessica Jones S2-3
– Luke Cage S2
– Iron Fist S2
– Daredevil S3
– The Punisher S2
– Hawkeye
– Superman & Lois S1
– The Wheel of Time
– Alex Rider S1-2

My favourites that I watched this year were Chernobyl, Superstore, 9-1-1, Ted Lasso, Superman & Lois and, of course, Hawkeye (which I reviewed over on JumpCut Online). But really, I enjoyed pretty much everything I watched this year. I will say I found the first series of Alex Rider a bit of a slog but the second series was great and more than made up for the first.

I also finally caught up with and watched all the seasons of the various Marvel Netflix shows I’d just left by the wayside. That was something I’d definitely been talking about catching up on for years and I’m pleased I’ve finally done it. It was nice to revisit those characters and stories again after so long.

I think in 2021 the pandemic sort of caught up with and it was in 2021 when I found it difficult to concentrate on things like a two+ hour film or a 400-page book. So that’s why I turned to TV. A lot of the stuff I watched is around the 45-minute mark per episode if not shorter and I just found it easier to watch a few episodes in an evening than have to focus on a film. Plus, as I was working from home for the vast majority of the year, I would also watch an episode (or two depending when I got up) before work or during my lunch hour. So that definitely helped me watch more TV than normal.

As for what my TV-watching will be like in 2022? Well, I do want to make reading more of a priority this year so naturally films and TV may take a bit of a backseat which I’m fine with. I want to carry on with the shows that I’ve started, when the next series starts here in the UK so that’s Batwoman, Ted Lasso, 9-1-1 and 9-1-1: Lone Star, Derry Girls, The Equalizer and whatever else might have a new series air at some point in 2022. I’m still kind of annoyed that the final season of Brooklyn Nine-Nine still hasn’t been aired here yet but at least that’s something to look forward to.

I’m not sure how many new-to-me shows I’ll end up watching in 2022. The thing is with the likes of Netflix, Disney+, Amazon Prime and the bog-standard TV channels, there’s so many shows out there that it is overwhelming. One new show I do have my eye on (and will maybe renew my subscription to Apple TV+ for it) is The Afterparty, that looks like fun and it has a lot of people I like in it.

Looking at what I’ve watched and enjoyed this year, if there’s any shows you’d recommend whether they’re new for 2022 or not, please do let me know. I won’t make any promises that I’ll watch them – especially if they’re in their fifth season with 20ish episodes a season (that’s super intimidating) – but as there’s so much out there it’s hard to know what’s good or not or where to begin. And who knows, I might like a show to fill my lunchbreaks again.

Why I Love… I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!

To me, the end of November/beginning of December is I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! season. I love this show and to be honest it’s the only reality show I watch religiously every year.

For those of you that don’t know, I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! is a reality show where a group of “celebrities” have to camp in the Australian jungle, without any home comforts or contact with the outside world, on basic rations and complete in trials full of creepy crawlies, crocodiles and snakes in order to win food for the camp. I put the word celebrities in quotation marks as they are usually soap stars, musicians, sportspeople and people who you would recognise if you’re under 40.

Saying that though, half the fun of I’m a Celebrity… is that it introduces you to celebrities you’ve never heard of and you fall in love them. A couple of years ago a series featured Superbike World Champion Carl “Foggy” Fogarty who I’d never heard of before, but he soon became my favourite campmate and I was so happy he won.

There’s been some unlikely friendships made in the jungle which are always wonderful. One of my favourites was Star Trek legend George Takei and Joe Swash, a former EastEnders actor when they were in the jungle together ten years ago. The two of them couldn’t have been more different but they bonded so much in the jungle and it was really sweet to see.

This year I actually had heard of nine out of the eleven celebrities which was a bit of a surprise as normally I don’t even know half of them. This series has been a lot of fun, and that’s in part because all of the campmates have gotten on so well and there’s been no arguments. It is kind of entertaining when there’s larger than life characters who clash, but as someone who cries as soon as someone raises their voice at me in real life, I prefer it when everyone gets along.

The thing I like about I’m a Celebrity… is that it’s so funny. I spend every evening for almost three weeks laughing. The campmates antics are hilarious and then the hosts, usually Ant & Dec but this year it’s Holly Willoughby and Dec, are also funny with their quips about what’s been happening in camp and their skits.

Tomorrow it’s the final of this year’s series and the final three are Harry Redknapp, Emily Atack, and John Barrowman. I’m happy they are the final three. I’ve loved John Barrowman since I first saw him in Doctor Who as Captain Jack Harkness so he’s kind of always been my favourite. I’d heard of both Harry Redknapp and Emily Atack before but didn’t know that much about either of them, and they’ve both entertained me over the past few weeks and made me smile. I do love John and Emily’s friendship though, them two together are so sweet and they look like they’re having the best time when they’re goofing around together. Tomorrow night is the final and I would be more than happy with whoever was crowned King or Queen of the Jungle out of those three.

Below is a video compilation of some of the trial’s campmates have faced over the years so you can see what this brilliant show is all about. It’s bonkers but I love it.

Why I love… the Autumn

Autumn is my favourite season. It’s not so warm, in fact it can get pretty cold, and that means I can wear multiple layers, jumpers and big hoodies and I like that a lot.

I’m not one that’s into fashion but I generally like the colours of clothes that are “autumn fashion.” The browns, yellows and reds are some of my favourite to wear and it’s not seen as so weird when you’re wearing darker colours in autumn.

Autumn TV is also the best TV. There is currently so many different shows I want to watch, that more often than not end up on the same day and time and I have to figure out how to record them all. Then I have to make time to catch up on them an if there’s one thing I’m not good at is catching up with TV shows. Last month, Victoria was on at the same time as Strike, the adaptation of the novels by Robert Galbraith aka J.K. Rowling, so I had to always record one of them. The Great British Bake Off is back but that often clashes with shows I need to record too. It’s kind of typical really, you can go for weeks or months without much being on TV you want to watch, and then as soon as autumn comes around there is almost too much to keep up with!

I’m not a fan of summer – I can’t deal with the heat, though admittedly in England we don’t tend to get ridiculously hot summers that often, we get three days close to 30°c then goes back to around 20°c but even that can be too hot for me. When autumn comes around it’s like a sigh of relief, we still generally get dry, sunny days but they are so much cooler.

I feel like autumn is a lot of people’s favourite season. Maybe because it’s a season where you can kind of get away with not going out as much – because who wants to leave the house when it’s already getting dark at 6pm? You can stay home in your pyjamas, curled up with a book or in front of the TV and it’s just the best.

Is autumn your favourite season too? If so why? And if not, which season is your favourite? I sometimes think what type of weather people like says a lot about them, what it says I’m not sure but it’s like a snapshot of someone’s personality.

H is for Henrik Hanssen

Henrik Hanssen is the best. He’s the CEO of a NHS Hospital so not only does he have to oversee the running of the place, making sure each department has enough funding, that the patients are safe and cared for but also make sure all the staff working there are OK and coping with the various stresses they encounter.

Hanssen is great because he comes across like an all-seeing powerful guy but he has his own demons (he canonically suffers from depression and has OCD tendencies) and he still makes time for his staff. He’s not really the sort of guy that has friends but he earns peoples respect and with his matter of fact manner he can talk to anyone. He manages to get people to talk when they’re bottling up their feelings and he’s been cried on more than once – he does look rather awkward when that happens.

Hanssen has been called a “Scandinavian Stick Insect” because of his appearance and the way he often looms behind people when they don’t realise it. He’s also incredibly sassy and witty and often leaves people speechless because they’re never really sure how to take him. Some of his best lines have been immortalised in gif form here.

Hanssen is (on of) my favourite characters in Holby City because he always tries his best for his staff and patients, he even takes a hands-on role in surgery when needed, and he can read people very well. His one-liners crack me up and even when he’s in just one scene in an hour episode it’s always a lot of fun.

B is for Brooklyn Nine-Nine

I don’t usually watch American sitcoms as the humour doesn’t normally work for me and I find them more “stupid” than funny, but Brooklyn Nine-Nine is the exception that proves the rule. Brooklyn Nine-Nine is my new favourite show and it’s near enough the definition of my un-problematic fave. It has a diverse cast and their ethnicities, genders and sexualities and are never used as the punchlines of any jokes – do you know how refreshing that is?!

All the characters are well-rounded and they have their own story arcs throughout the series’. While Jake Perelta (Andy Sandberg) may be considered the lead, he’s not your Typical Straight White Male lead – he’s feminist, loyal, understanding and once punch a homophobe in the face. Then there’s the other characters. Terry Jeffords (Terry Crewes) is super strong and super caring, Amy Santiago (Melissa Fumero) is incredibly competitive, Rosa Diaz (Stephanie Beatriz) is slightly terrifying and is very much a badass while Charles Boyle (Joe Lo Truglio) is Jake’s best friend and loves weird food. And I can’t not mention too of the best characters Captain Ray Holt (Andre Braugher) Captain of the Nine-Nine and has the driest sense of humour, it’s amazing, and Gina Linetti (Chelsea Peretti) has the most self-confidence of any character I have ever seen.

I love them all in different ways and for different reasons. Everyone is so great and funny and it’s great to see how their relationships grow and develop over the course of the seasons. They are all so different but they still make this weird family that always cares for each other.

The humour in Brooklyn Nine-Nine is so broad that sometimes I smile but more often than not I full on belly laugh. I love how quick it is, how there’s no pause for the laugh track so the dialogue comes thick and fast and it feels very natural. It’s just such a fun and funny and light-hearted show that can still hit you in the feels and I love it so much.

TOP 5 WEDNESDAY: Current Favourites that Aren’t Books

Top 5 Wednesday is a great feature created by GingerReadsLainey and hosted by ThoughtsonTomes. To find out more about Top 5 Wednesday and the upcoming topics, check out its Goodreads page. This week it’s all about favourites that aren’t books, so it could be TV shows you’ve been enjoying, makeup you’ve been wearing, food and drink you’ve loved – anything! I’ve decided my post will be about my current favourite TV shows. I’m usually pretty terrible at keeping up with TV shows but these five are the ones I’m really enjoying right now and am making the effort to keep up with.

Taboo
While I usually spend about 30% of an episode confused about who’s who and what exactly is going on I am really intrigued about this show. That’s mainly because I love the main character James Delaney (played by Tom Hardy) a lot, he’s just so interesting! He seems to have dark magic, he’s very clever and can see all the pieces on the board and is nearly always a step ahead of everyone else. He’s not a nice person, he even uses people like pawns in his game but I find him so interesting. Taboo is now a show that I actively look forward to as it gets closer to the time it airs on Sunday.

The Halcyon
The Halcyon is the other new show that I find myself looking forward to every week. It’s set in a posh London hotel during WWII and it is bit like Downton Abbey in the sense it’s about the “upstairs” or the hotel guests and the owners of the hotel, the Hamilton’s, and the “downstairs” all the staff who work in the hotel, from maids, to chefs, to the managers. It’s got some interesting characters and there’s some great relationships. My favourites are Betsey, the lounge singer, Toby the younger and often forgotten son of the hotel owner, and O’Hara an American journalist that says what he thinks.

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Why I Love… Brooklyn Nine-Nine

OK so I’m impatiently waiting for season three of Brooklyn Nine-Nine to arrive on Netflix after I binged watched the entirety of the first and second season in a matter of weeks. Brooklyn Nine-Nine is now one of my favourite shows and it has even become like a “comfort show” – if I feel a bit down I watch a couple of random episodes and I’m soon smiling and feeling better about life.

So why do I love Brooklyn Nine-Nine so much? There’s a lot of reasons. First there’s the humour. Brooklyn Nine-Nine is funny, it may not always be laugh out loud funny but it’s very quick-witted and has some smart humour. I wasn’t sure what I’d make of Brooklyn Nine-Nine when I first started to watch it, American humour isn’t always my cup of tea but I love how smart and quick the humour is.

With the humour comes the opportunity to not make cheap, possibly offensive, jokes. Brooklyn Nine-Nine is so great because it calls out all the sexist, racist, homophobic humour you might get in other shows and in real life. Jake could easily be the arrogant womaniser but he really does care about his female friends and never belittles them, and he calls out other peoples’ bad behaviour. This gifset shows how Brooklyn Nine-Nine calls out multiple characters and situations and it’s wonderful.

Then there’s the stories. While each episode is kind of like a crime-of-the-week type deal and they are all pretty fun and even exciting, there’s the overriding story-arcs and relationships. Characters date different people and then break-up or there’s stuff like Terry’s family or Jake and his dad. It’s small stuff that develops over the episodes and you can see how these characters grow or what’s happened in their past to make them into who they are.

And that’s the main reason I love Brooklyn Nine-Nine so much – the characters. Jake is a great detective but is also a big kid, Amy is competitive and competent, Boyle loves food and loves his job, Rosa is a total badass, Terry loves his kids – both his twin daughters and the detectives under his charge, Captain Holt is serious and hard-working but he can still have fun with his team and then there’s Gina, Holt’s assistant when she isn’t attached to her mobile phone. Oh and I can’t forget Scully and Hitchcock, they’re the older detectives and many people think they’re kind of useless but that’s not always the case.

I love all of the characters and together they become a family, which is my favourite trope in fiction. Found families, that are a little dysfunctional and sometimes a little broken but they all care about each other are the best thing in my mind. The detectives of the Nine-Nine are all friends who trust and care about each other and it’s so nice to see a show where there’s no real conflict between the main characters.

In short, I love Brooklyn Nine-Nine so much because it’s fun, smart and I love the characters and their relationships. I cannot wait to see season three and see how this brilliant show continues to be amazing.

TOP TEN TUESDAY: Ten Fictional Families I’d like to Celebrate Thanksgiving with

Top Ten Tuesday is a feature run by BrokeAndBookish each week – I’m thinking I might not take part every week but just see if a week takes my fancy. In honour of Thanksgiving (which I know nothing about really because I’m a Brit) this week I’m going to list the ten fictional families I‘d like to celebrate with, these families are going to be from books, films and TV shows and my favourite trope of “Families of Choice” will almost certainly be making an appearance.

The Pevensies – The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis
Sure the Pevensies don’t always get along but they always come together and sharing a special dinner with them, and maybe some other characters like Mr Tumnus and the Beavers, would be nice.

The O’Connell-Carnahan’s – The Mummy and The Mummy Returns
This family is #familygoals. Rick may be the only American in the family so he might have to persuade his wife, son and brother-in-law to take part in Thanksgiving but I’m sure they would and then Ardeth Bay could join in too.

The Baggins’ – The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkein
Whether it would be a small dinner with just Bilbo and Frodo, or if Pippin, Merry and Sam were there too, it would be a great meal because Hobbit’s know their food and how to party. (more…)

Why I Love… Elizabeth and Peter Burke

I’ve recently been catching up on the TV show White Collar. I’d only seen the first three seasons because after that it stopped showing it over here in the UK but now I have a gorgeous boxset of all six seasons and I’m catching up. Not only had I forgotten how much I loved this show but I had also forgotten what an awesome power couple Elizabeth and Peter Burke are. So I’m just going to take this moment to gush about why I love them so much.

Peter is a FBI Agent in the White Collar crime unit who’s partner Neal Caffery is an ex-con. He’s smart, resourceful and well respected. Elizabeth is an event planner who is supportive, smart and charming. They are the perfect team. (more…)

F is for: Favourite Fictional Families

Family is important – I have a rather small family but that doesn’t mean I love it any less – but that being said, family doesn’t stop at blood. One of my favourite things in fiction is “found families”, families where no one’s related by blood but they all care for (and fight) each other as if they were. So here are my favourite fictional families – related or otherwise:

The Pevensies from The Chronicles of Narnia
The Kings and Queens of Narnia are so wonderful because they are children. They each have different qualities, some better than others but together is when they work really well – they balance each other out. My favourites growing up and reading the books were Edmund and Lucy, in some ways they are complete polar opposites to each other so I’m not sure why I liked them both so much.

The O’Connell-Carnahan’s (with added Ardeth Bay)
From The Mummy and The Mummy Returns (there is no third film) you have probably my all-time favourite fictional family. Rick O’Connell and Evelyn Carnahan make such a believable couple and with their son Alex, Evelyn’s slightly inept brother Jonathan and their friend Adreth Bay make a family which can save the world – twice!