Coming up this week, the HBo MAX premiere of They Will Kill You on Jun 12, the return of Interview With A Vampire (which AMC Plus does not offer audio description for), and a few new shows like Alice and Steve (Hulu) and Every Summer After (Amazon), plus the return of Sweet Magnolias for anyone who is excited for that. Also, the FIFA World Cup and Stanley Cup, along with NBA finals. So, if you are into sports, this is very much your week. And if you’re into Broadway, the TOny Awards are Sunday with live audio description on CBS. They are also doing a Part 1 (no idea what that means), that will air on Pluto hosted by Laura Benanti and Titus Burgess. My guess would be, all the costume, directing, choreography categories are getting pushed, to leave room for actors, and live productions in the CBS broadcast.
TV Shows Watched: Daemons Of The Shadow Realm: S1E1 (CrunchyRoll) with audio description, The Night Agent: S3E9 (Netflix) with audio description, Monarch: S2E7 (Apple) with audio description, Scrubs: S10E5 (Disney Plus) with audio description, The Comeback: S1E7 (HBO MAX) with audio description, Among Us: S1E1 (Paramount) with audio description, Pop Culture Jeopardy: S2E2 (Netflix) with audio description, Running Point: S2E5 (Netflix) with audio description
Daemons Of The Shadow Realm- Blobal3 hires exceptional writers who elevate AT voices. The voice is no different than a handful of droning flat humans, a warning signal I keep trying to shoutout, paired with some of the best writing out there. The show itself has a confusing pilot that throws a lot of lore at you really fast, with a ton of characters, but basically there’s a chosen one, and evil forces are out to get him and his people, so he has to activate his powers to see his Daemons… of the Shadow Realm. Witch Hat Atelier is better, but as I’m almsot done with that, I wanted to find proof of life for AD on another series.
The Night Agent- Peter is on alert, Chelsea swings by to help, Adam is on the wrong side, Isabelle is processing, and Jay figures out the cypher. That about sums that up. Also a terrorist attack is stopped, and Peter gets threatened personally by the President over a cell phone call.The AD here is fine, though there was something in one of the action sequences I didn’t quite understand, but I can’t remember what it was. I think it was the mechanics of Peter driving the truck in the water, and that fight.
Monarch- The penultimate show seems willing to risk the sole reason to watch a show that is “what if the humans from those big monster movies were the focus”, which is interesting in theory, but also just has you waiting to see the fleeting moments of Titan action. The AD here is solid though, and I love the casting of Kurt and Wyatt.
Scrubs- Not the worst reboot revival, but I feel about the same with this as I did with the Frasier revival, which started to get better as they added Peri Gilpin, because everyone wants to see the legacy characters. Scrubs is doing a decent job of platforming the old characters while slowly investing in the new ones, and not kidding itself about why people are here. The AD just is insufficient, but always will be. There are so many sight gags, and not enough time to discuss them. What happened with the mugger? No idea. We didn’t have the time.
The Comeback- Antoher show with very little time for AD, and I’ll entertain that perhaps there is a better writer out there for both of these, but they are never going to get great AD. Their format, without extended audio description, will always leve jokes on the floor. There’s another show I’m watching in this format, and I know the writer has done some great work, but this (and mother show in a challenging format) are at the bottom of their resume, because they just are. However, that show has better AD than Scrubs or The Comeback, so you can squeeze a bit more out, if you invest in the writers. This episode was kinda beautifully melancholic, as there’s this running Tom Selleck joke that lands in an unexpected way, giving credence and emotional weight.
Malice- Forgot to list this one above, so it’ll be a surprise for you, but I didn’t like the finale anyway. I think the producers thought the ends justified the means, but Adam did a lot of caked up shit, and for him to walk away at the end is deeply unsatisfying. I don’t even mind putting thatt spoiler out there, because I think the choices made in the finale collapse the show. Adam does some truly nasty shit to people and animals that had nothing to do with the collapse of his father’s company, and his failure to have perspective at all makes him a challenged lead, so when the series absolves him, for a lot of deeply troubling and unnecessary shit, it feels like the writer wasn’t quite sure if he knew his own character. Adam isn’t Tom Ripley, and I don’t need to see him sneak away to threaten another day.
Among Us- PAramount quietly dumped this animated adaptation of the video game. It has an excellent voice cast, and has audio description. I wasn’t going to watch any new shows right now, but since Paramount seems to not want anyone to watch it, I ahve to mention it. It is better than what they’re giving it.
Pop Culture Jeopardy- Wierd format change, where the team that wins advances. Like a returning Jeopardy player, though the chance for more money is higher. The AD here is and should be the standard for game shows. If they can do it here, they can do it anywhere. Especially the deeply inept Celebrity Jeopardy. Listening to the AD of Celebrity Jeopardy, while knowing what Pop Culture Jeopardy pulls off, is like watching your child failing English, their native language, while being fully literate, and having no learning disabilities to stand in their way. it’s just a head scratcher, like they are trying to fail.
Running Point- Of the half hours, putting this just against Scrubs and The comeback, Running Poin does the most with what it has.It is the example of squeezing every drop out you can. In this episode, they debate over a pre-nup, and make a big decision about the wedding.
