Category: Television

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That Championship Season: Togetherness, Season One

Dan Seeger

I don’t think the term “mumblecore” is flung around very much any more, but there was a time, not so long ago, it was tediously unavoidable in discussions about independent film. It supposedly described a certain kind of tone — ramshackle, understated, empathetic, wry — that was ubiquitous in the offerings from United States directors that had a home in art house theaters before the occasional Sundance-born bonanza twisted independent cinema into something more eager and rambunctious. Those who derided the mini-movement (in which almost no associated filmmaker actually claimed membership) fairly identified a lack of narrative discipline as a … Continue reading That Championship Season: Togetherness, Season One

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Laughing Matters: Key & Peele, “Ray Parker, Jr. Theme Songs”

Dan Seeger

Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. There’s obviously an admirable surplus of material from the sketch comedy series Key & Peele that is engaged in the most significant political and social concerns of the current era. Much as I admire that, my true weakness when it comes to the collaborative work of Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele is for their jabs at the entertainment business. I find that material to be … Continue reading Laughing Matters: Key & Peele, “Ray Parker, Jr. Theme Songs”

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Top Ten Television, 2015-2016 season

Dan Seeger

Tomorrow morning, Anthony Anderson and Lauren Graham will take to a podium in North Hollywood and announce at least of portion of the hefty list of Emmy nominees, celebrating (ostensibly) the best in television programming for the past year or so, doggedly sticking to model that pretends the traditional broadcast season running from September to May is still reflective of how this part of the entertainment field operates. Around these here digital parts, it is tradition for me to  weigh in with my highly compromised top ten in television on the eve of that announcement. I begin with an acknowledgement of fallibility because it is … Continue reading Top Ten Television, 2015-2016 season

Comics, Film, TelevisionLeave a comment

My Writers: Joss Whedon

Dan Seeger

I was dismissive of Joss Whedon at first, needlessly so. And I probably should have known better. My first exposure — knowingly anyway — to Whedon’s writing was with the 1992 film Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which arrived with the excited promise of flinty ingenuity. It delivered far less, and Whedon was easy to dismiss as another breathlessly celebrated Hollywood wunderkind who didn’t have that much to contribute beyond a couple hooky notions. The nineties were lousy with those. As opposed to now, there weren’t a fleet of entertainment reporters prepared to dutifully transcribe Whedon’s complaints about how his original conception … Continue reading My Writers: Joss Whedon

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Laughing Matters: The Kids in the Hall, “That’s America”

Dan Seeger

Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. Happy 4th of July, everyone! Previous entries in this series can be found by clicking on the “Laughing Matters” tag. Continue reading Laughing Matters: The Kids in the Hall, “That’s America”

Television4 Comments

That Championship Season: Louie, Season Two

Dan Seeger

I recently ruminated on the vexing issue of ascribing authorship when evaluating cinema. That dilemma is even more pronounced when it comes to television programs. While we’re solidly into the era that venerates showrunners, television is undoubtedly an even more collaborative medium than film. Unless a program is being overseen by a near obsessive, such as David Milch, or a narcissistic self-sabotage artist, like Nic Pizzolatto, there’s sure to be a dizzying array of voices contributing to the creative process. One person may grab the baton and conduct, but the whole choir delivers the song. One of the satisfying pleasures of Louie, … Continue reading That Championship Season: Louie, Season Two

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Laughing Matters: “Cheers,” The Dime Bet

Dan Seeger

Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. Once, while bemoaning a generation’s regrettable reliance on television rather than books as a conduit to learning, the great novelist Kurt Vonnegut had to allow for an exception to his complaint. He famously noted, “I would have rather written Cheers than anything I’ve written.” Obviously, this is no faint praise, given than it emanates from the author of some of the most justly revered novels … Continue reading Laughing Matters: “Cheers,” The Dime Bet

Everything Else, Television1 Comment

Laughing Matters: George Carlin, “The Planet is Fine”

Dan Seeger

Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter is valuable, too. I was certain I had George Carlin all figured out. I’d been a fan since I was a little kid, when I’d do my best to blend into the furniture at adult parties I got dragged along to with the goal of listening along as the older attendees played Carlin’s comedy records. The mounting haziness and boisterous laughter of those adults thankfully prevented them from … Continue reading Laughing Matters: George Carlin, “The Planet is Fine”

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Garry Shandling, 1949 – 2016

Dan Seeger

When I suggest that boxing, like comedy, is about rhythm, he nods. “My trainer, Dave Paul, he said, ‘G’—he calls me G—he said, ‘G, you have an unusual rhythm of your own that’s sort of, uh, no rhythm whatsoever. And yet that works for you, because they can’t figure you out.’ So sometimes when I’m in the ring, it’s like you can’t tell whether I’m about to tell a joke, or throw a punch, or start a punch and not finish it, or pass out. So some guys can’t read me. They come in close—just like when an audience leans … Continue reading Garry Shandling, 1949 – 2016

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Laughing Matters: “Saturday Night Live” Bush campaign ad, 1988

Dan Seeger

Sometimes comedy illuminates hard truths with a pointed urgency that other means can’t quite achieve. Sometimes comedy is just funny. This series of posts is mostly about the former instances, but the latter matters, too. Lorne Michaels smartly maintains that everyone’s favorite Saturday Night Live cast is the one that was in place while they were in high school. The creator and longtime producer (with only a brief interruption in the early nineteen-eighties) of the venerable late night sketch comedy program is certainly correct in identifying the perception bias that compromises any individual attempt to identify one era’s superiority over … Continue reading Laughing Matters: “Saturday Night Live” Bush campaign ad, 1988