TV Diary

Some TV I've been watching while doing nothing

As the world crumbles around us, I sit in my room helplessly wasting away, with nothing to do but watch television. So I decided to embrace my nothingness and jot down a few meaningless words about the TV that has temporarily distracted me from the end times. 

Top Chef: New Orleans

In the past week, while I scrolled news sites on my laptop, I passively watched the entire season of Top Chef: New Orleans. It was one of the few seasons I hadn’t seen of Bravo’s seemingly near-perfect cooking competition series, and after engrossing myself in Top Chef: Boston a couple of weeks back—which featured Mei beating Gregory in the finale by cooking duck with braised lettuce, kimchi jicama, and huitlacoche, and I wanted to walk through my TV screen and grab a plate—it was a no-brainer to throw on another season. But the New Orleans iteration of Top Chef reveals all of the issues hidden beneath the surface. In the season finale, Nick, a crybaby whose seasonless food had no personality, beat Nina, a chef from St. Lucia who blended island flavors with fine dining seamlessly. It was proof that Top Chef can’t be simply viewed as escapism, like many want it to be. It’s suffering from the same issue that continues to plague all reality competition television shows: Because they can’t understand backgrounds they haven’t taken the time to embrace, they crown a cultureless white dude.

Read: Joshua Alston’s more thoughtful take with “How Top Chef’s finale tarnished its brand”

Top Chef: All-Stars

Given my hate of Top Chef: New Orleans, it’s probably surprising that I’m also watching the show’s newest All-Star season. But I would never pass up an opportunity to watch Eric, Gregory, Melissa, and Stephanie cook! 

Entourage

There’s nothing like watching a bunch of bros hanging, getting drinks, picking up chicks—you can’t say girls, it has to be chicks—and hearing bad news (that quickly turns into good news). Once that happens, the drinks and chicks return, and Turtle might even cruise through the L.A. streets in a Hummer, running back The Black Album and Saigon.

Survivor: Winners at War

Watching Survivor: Winners at War, the landmark 40th season of the CBS game show, is like watching the 2015 Golden State Warriors. Yes, it’s clear you’re witnessing the game evolve in front of your eyes, but you’re also trying to fight it and not lose hold of the past so quickly. It’s halfway through the season, and the show’s new wave has made quick work of the players who have made Survivor a strategic masterpiece: Boston Rob, Parvati, and Sandra are all gone. Right now, the show is on the brink of its third evolution; it’s no longer simply about alliances and social politics but seamlessly weaving the two. Although the past is slipping away, new staples of the game will surely emerge by the time this season ends. Maybe it’ll be Sophie, who is secretly controlling the game; Michelle, who is a social butterfly like the game hasn’t seen since Parvati in Heroes vs. Villains; Denise who slayed Sandra; Wendell, who has quickly become an all-time villain; Jeremy, who can read the table like no other; Kim...Tony...Ben...OK not Ben. But, fuck it could be anyone. And whatever the result might be, it’s clear that Survivor will never be the same. 

Survivor: Cagayan 

Since, as you can see, I’m obsessed with Survivor, in my boredom I’ve even gone back to watch the show’s 28th season. The Cagayan cast is special: You’ve got Kass, Spencer, Tasha, Woo, Trish, and, of course, the season’s winner, Tony. Watching Survivor knowing who wins doesn’t take away from the experience, but it does give you a different outlook. It becomes less about who wins and more about how they win. And episode six is special. 

The Hills

I know I’m like 15 years too late, but I’ve started The Hills. Listen, when the show premiered, nothing appealed less to a 10-year-old me than 20 somethings living life in Hollywood. But there’s nothing else to look forward to, so I might as well travel back in time. More than halfway through the first season, and I’m not sure if I was really missing out on anything. I get it. Lauren works at Teen Vogue and is focused, and Heidi just wants to club and get a puppy. They date an interchangeable group of guys who all look like some form of Chad Michael Murray and say no real words besides, “Yeah, I’m sort of a model.” I don’t see the appeal, but I’ll keep going. What else have I got to do? 

On My Block

I constantly complain that the most popular television is only popular because it happens to be on the front page of Netflix. Well, sometimes I also feed into that, and On My Block is the ultimate “I can’t think, so I guess I’ll let the algorithm win.”

Curb Your Enthusiasm

It’s hard to ignore that Curb Your Enthusiasm has become a parody of itself. Like many long-running sitcoms, eventually they lean too far into the absurdities of their characters, and everyone begins to feel less like a human and more like fan-servicecy cardboard cutouts. It doesn’t mean I wouldn’t watch another season of Curb (I would; Leon is a treasure). It’s just that I wish Larry would worry less about television’s obsession with a narrative and just give us some bottle episodes. There’s nothing like watching Larry, Jeff, Richard, and Leon sit at a table and kick it—fuck a plot. 

All American

I’m going to fall in love with All American. I’ve only seen the pilot, but I can already tell. And I know how this is going to end: the show will inevitably jump the shark, and I’ll be left wondering why I ever wasted my time watching Taye Diggs as a football coach at a Beverly Hills high school. But at least I’ll have an excuse this time: 

Dear Alphonse, 

The world was falling apart, and you had nothing left to live for so you started watching All American. Remember these dark days. 

Should I keep doing this? Any TV recs? Want to talk about Survivor? Hit me up.