Television | 2020

That man is the relatively unknown Danish actor Claes Bang, whose electrifying Dracula channels the snarl and aesthetic of Christopher Lee and Hammer House of Horror, but is in reality something closer to a deliciously evil James Bond.

This switch is the series’ big hook, and at times “Party” feels absolutely vital, with smart writing and affecting performances to back up its weighty premise. But at other times, the series lacks depth and nuance in expanding its story beyond deportation, and the writers struggle to make the characters more than stereotypes.

But The Outsider works. Like any good King adapter, Price hews close to King’s original plot while relying on his own strengths to give the world an evocative visual palette and characters that feel truly alive within it

It’s an exquisite production, both beautiful and thoughtful. It’s adapted in ways that feel smart and human, while also pumping some helpful friction into the story. Then, at the end, Sanditon makes choices that will leave most viewers feeling, at best, extremely perplexed. At worst, it may feel like a betrayal.

Call it cognitive dissonance, call it magic, call it the divine—you can’t help but want to understand how it works. In The New Pope, Lenny Belardo’s improbable survival after heart failure is like the Church’s and like Christ’s: one of the greatest shows on Earth. That’s a title that Sorrentino’s series, in its most fully realized moments, can claim too.

Arriving in the America of 2020, however, the mere existence of this series can’t help but feel political. Simply presenting its characters as human beings worthy of consideration and empathy plays as a shot across the bow of those who want everyone like them to disappear from our soil.

It's from this perspective that Iannucci's latest HBO offering, Avenue 5, is perhaps best approached — as a comic Poseidon Adventure in space. Such a perspective might benefit the first couple episodes, which don't stumble so much as they unfold and reveal themselves in ways that aren't always quite as funny as they should be, though things become more amusing after chaos starts ensuing.