SPOILER ALERT:  This review will discuss events that occur throughout Season 2 of ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK. The second season of ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK, like the first, ends with an act of violence–and this one is (seemingly) more fatal than the first–and yet the tone couldn’t be more different.  Season 1 […]

  MISS AMERICANA (Netflix – January 31):  There are certainly areas of Taylor Swift’s life that are carefully elided in MISS AMERICANA (her actor boyfriend’s face and name are absent, for example, and there’s no mention of Cats), and Lana Wilson’s documentary culminates in an inspirational push that is very much on-message with Swift’s latest […]

    See also:  THE SKED NETFLIX REVIEW:  “Arrested Development” (Episodes 1-3) THE SKED NETFLIX REVIEW:  “Arrested Development” (Episodes 4-7) THE SKED NETFLIX REVIEW:  “Arrested Development” (Episodes 8-11) It turned out that the one thing not to expect from Season 4 of ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT was an ending.  Rather than build its intricately plotted season toward […]

  ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK may be the most tolerant show on television (or “television,” or whatever it is we’re calling distributed entertainment content in this new Netflixed world).  All the characters, even those who commit the most heinous acts–inmates and guards both–have their reasons and their frailties.  They’re miserably in love, or living […]

  See also:  THE SKED NETFLIX REVIEW:  “Arrested Development” (Episodes 1-3)                  THE SKED NETFLIX REVIEW:  “Arrested Development” (Episodes 4-7) Rounding into the second half of Netflix’s ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT Season 4, the storyline is starting to become as twisty as a John Le Carre espionage thriller–a quiz, at this point, about just who wants and […]

  House of Cards Season 2 Eps 1-3 Review Here. Eps 4-7 Review Here. At the three-quarters mark, this season of HOUSE OF CARDS has a somewhat different feel, not just from the English original but from the initial Netflix season.  While the series may never give Frank Underwood (Kevin Spacey) an antagonist who can […]

  House of Cards Season 2 Eps 1-3 Review Here. Eps 4-7 Review Here. Eps 8-10 Review Here. It’s a paradox of the Netflix version of HOUSE OF CARDS that in many ways, its least interesting character is the one at its center.  Pick the wildlife metaphor of choice:  Frank Underwood (Kevin Spacey) is a […]

  If Netflix is going to be the 21st-century version of a “network,” its content will eventually have to include all sorts of genres–and the quality, inevitably, will vary as well.  There may be high-class, award-caliber dramas like House of Cards, but there will also be crap. HEMLOCK GROVE is the crap. Horribly written (Hours […]