It’s harder than ever to watch television. There’s too much out there, and to be frank, not all of it’s great. As more and more talent heads to the small screen, where original storytelling remains sacred and the closest thing to a franchise is something like Game of Thrones, we’re being bombarded with one Must Watch show after the next.
Small potatoes? Absolutely. Nobody should ever complain about having to sit down and watch something, but it does mean that some series are bound to get lost along the way. Are you surprised? With HBO, Showtime, FX, AMC, Netflix, Hulu, and every network channel providing endless amounts of content, it’s a wonder we ever leave our house.
This year has been hit or miss. It seems that for every intriguing debut (American Gods, Feud), we’ve been handed a number of misfires (Taboo, The Santa Clarita Diet), and most of them have cluttered our DVR. That’s why we’re kind of relieved that the streaming services are also cutting back, even if they might have chosen the wrong shows.
What’s somewhat troubling is how past diamonds are losing their luster (Fargo, Veep), perhaps suggesting we’re in need of another wave. Fortunately, the stronger stuff of 2017 has so far been outstanding — ahem, that little revival from the early ’90s currently taking over our Sunday nights — and while the following list can’t include everything…
Well, let’s just say we tried to be reasonable. Act accordingly.
–Michael Roffman
Editor-in-Chief
10. Silicon Valley
HBO
Showrunner (s): Mike Judge, John Altschuler, and Dave Krinsky
Best Character: Despite this being reportedly the final season with T.J. Miller’s Erlich Bachman, the real MVP of the Pied Piper team this year is CEO Richard Hendricks (Thomas Middleditch). Whether he’s trying to con a VC as a faux Lyft driver or clumsily kicking a hole through a closet door, Middleditch has brought his A-game as he slowly shifts from the rattled protagonist we know to the spiteful antagonist we’re starting to meet. Judge and his writers have wired Richard’s arc with some indelible wins (e.g. calling out Gavin’s blood bag; one-upping a bottom-feeding lawyer) and yet some questionable decisions (e.g. sleeping with a client’s wife; basically everything that happens at Hooli-Con). Middleditch has stormed through it all with a badge of pride that deceptively registers as both charming and earned.
Must-See Episode: “The Patent Troll” is all kinds of glorious, if only for Gilfoyle’s (Martin Starr) pathetic obsession with hacking Jian-Yang’s (Jimmy O. Yang) $14,000 intelligent refrigerator. The fridge’s exasperated vocal tics are straight out of Judge’s Office Space, and it’s those minor additions that have long kept his brand of comedy a shade or three above the competition. Plus, seeing Richard take down that sleazy lawyer at the end of the episode is priceless, even if it technically cost him about $20,000 in legal fees. Tsk tsk. He should have gone to Matt McCoy’s Pete Monahan.
Why Should We Binge? Silicon Valley has thrown some major curve balls throughout its fourth season. At first, Richard’s initiative to build a new Internet seemed like another exhausting sandbox for the series to carve out more predictable peaks and valleys within, but it’s actually lead to some intriguing developments. You know, like having Richard work alongside Matt Ross’ insufferable Gavin Belson, whose venomous past may have always been a harbinger of Richard’s fate. Sure, their collaboration was a little like watching Wade and Rondo play together this past season with the Bulls — intriguing albeit short-lived — but it adrenalized the story and added a hefty weight to the series. Because if Richard really is going all Walter White on his Pied Piper cohorts, Silicon Valley takes on a whole new dimension, becoming a commentary on the malice that infects the titular terrain, and that’s something nobody could have ever expected from the HBO comedy.
(On a side note, it’s been an absolute blast peeling back the layers to Zach Woods’ ever-elusive Jared Dunn, whose weird history gets more and more disturbing. Also this.)
–Michael Roffman
