Hey, just what you need: More TV to watch! Here's what we're watching right now at Mercury HQ, which is another way of saying here's what we think you should be watching right now.
Ned Lannamann, Senior Editor
I recently finished season three of True Detective on HBO, whose slow squandering of the promise of its excellent first episode culminated in a spectacular face-plant of a finale. The intriguing mystery turned out to be a dumbass twist on Escape to Witch Mountain, literally everybody got away with murder, and the ambiguous final shot suggested that nothing that preceded it actually mattered. Creator Nic Pizzolatto didn’t merely drop all the plates he’d been attempting to spin—he diarrhea’ed all over himself and everyone who was watching.
Jenni Moore, Copy Chief
I’ve been watching Jada Pinkett Smith’s therapeutic Red Table Talk on Facebook. It’s three generations of women having honest and open dialogue about tough subjects. Jada Pinkett Smith, her mother Adrienne Banfield-Jones, and daughter Willow Smith host different guests who unpack their experiences and perspectives on things like forgiveness, sex, identity, mental illness, interracial marriage, substance abuse, domestic violence, and white privilege. Sometimes you’ll get a lighthearted episode about fitness, or a tell-all about the union that is Will and Jada, but my favorite episodes have been the ones that tackle things like the divide between WOC and white women or the aftermath of the Surviving R. Kelly doc. The show shines light on Willow Smith’s impressive emotional intelligence, and Pinkett Smith leads every conversation with compassion, wisdom and curiosity.
Bobby Roberts, Calendar Editor
Season thee of The Expanse on Amazon, which is basically just shiny, profane candy in space. It makes for an interesting pairing with CBS All Access' Star Trek: Discovery, which was shiny, profane (dull) candy in season one and is now something a lot more humanistic and thoughtful—which is what you want Star Trek to be, ideally.
Alex Zielinski, News Editor
I just watched Boy Erased on an airplane and was blown away. Nicole Kidman and Russell Crowe are unexpectedly convincing as God-fearing Southern Baptists raising a good-ass kid in Arkansas. Lucas Hedges, who plays their son, masters the tricky role of being a 19-year-old Baptist who is quickly disenchanted by the gay-conversion camp his preacher dad (Crowe) forces him to attend after he'S raped by a male student at college (what the actual fuck, Russell Crowe). So impressed with this kid's acting chops. I demand an emotionally complicated teen act-off between Timothée Chalamet and Lucas Hedges! And, because I never get emotional watching movies UNLESS I am 40,000 feet off the ground, this movie made me cry next to a stranger in a Panama hat who was five Jack Daniels into the four-hour-flight to a Mexico resort town.
Tonya Hise, Operations Manager
Am I the only one watching Workin' Moms on Netflix? (Probably.) I kinda hate that I love it, but It’s funny, dark, and relatable even though it’s Canadian. (Oh, boo-hoo with your fucking NINE MONTH maternity leave!) They also curse at random brats on the street: “Shut it, you monster! Your mother’s a goddamn angel!" I was crying.
