I hope you all enjoyed your second Friday the 13th of the year. Feels like a certain franchise definitely missed out on an opportunity, especially the Camp Crystal Lake series in development at Peacock.

TV Shows Watched: Age Of Attraction: S1E1 (Netflix) with audio description, Pluribus: S1E6 (Apple) with audio description, School Spirits: S3E3 (Paramount Plus) with audio description, Shifting gears: S2E11 (Disney Plus) with audio description, The Burbs: S1E2 (Peacock) with audio description, The Greatest Average American: S1E3 (Disney Plus) with audio description, Landman: S2E? (Paramount Plus) with audio description

Age of Attraction- A new reality dating series where everyone is open to dating people of an indeterminate age, presumably, and no one is allowed to know each others names.I found the premise intriguing, as someone who dates outside my own age bracket, but more importantly in how the AD functions at all. There is an attempt at telling us what everyone looks like, if a guy has some salt and pepper hair, but for the most part, it becomes a super generic show for us blind folk, since the big question is somewhat subjective. The draw initially is in being able to see someone and guess their age based on looks, which is what these contestants will do when partnering. I suppose, you can still try and guess from a voice, but we don’t know enough really about them to know for sure. For example, one girl says she’s been divorced twice already. there’s no reason she couldn’t still be young, and have had two brief and shitty marriages. For the people who have kids, they don’t mention their ages, and people can ahve kids at a really young age, or older. The effect of the show is effectively neutralized, and while the AD is technically proficient, there’s that added factor here it just can’t make up for. An interesting case study though.

Pluribus- Carol finds out why their milkshakes don’t bring the boys to the yard, and her shocking revelation leads to her driving out to Vegas and learning a bit more from one of the other survivors. Because he’s nice to them, he’s more well informed. Also, a cool cameo from John Cena. The AD here is nice, and I appreciated it more toward the end when our loner down in South America started to get his act together.

School Spirits- IDC is doing a nice job with the show, which certainly throws the gauntlet at the end. It’s funny to think that Simon’s ghost form needs to be lowered using a rope. Is it a ghost rope? I’m not a fan of Maria Dizzia, who plays Maddies mom. Her acting just falls short of the ensemble around her. Sorry. This episode was too much for her. I think they cast er based on her ability to play an alcoholic in Season 1, and now that she’s trying to be better, it all feels very amateur. She lacks the emotional depth her character now requires.

Shifting Gears- Excellent AD, especially in some of the jokes, like when Kat Dennings says the trick to getting tips is to show a little skin, so her son starts to unbutton the top of his shirt. There’s another Santa Claus joke here, and it looks like Jesse Williams might be sticking around for a bit.

The Burbs- this AD track is lackluster, and while it does have some stuff described well, it also leaves large gaps where I’m positive something could have been described, but wasn’t.

The Greatest Average American- An AD track on life support. I’d love to earn the paycheck the narrator is getting for what I truly believe are less spoken words than allowed in one tweet. The show is funny, especially if you like Nate.

Landman- I’m not sure much happened this episode, except a proposal, and Rebecca being upset about her relationship status affecting her job. Tommy also backed down from Nathan pretty quickly, for a character that rarely backs down… ever.