Mostly Screen Time: January 2025
What I watched so you can watch it too.
This month: Bingeing last-year seasons I missed, checking off the Oscar-preparedness list, and other items on my screen while being told to stay indoors away from poor Los Angeles air quality and the cold-for-this-area weather.
Pop Culture Jeopardy! (Prime Video) - Do you ever watch Jeopardy! and squeal in joy when they choose the lone television category among dozens of other clues about Mesopotamia and the Chicago Bulls and the 1986 Speaker of the House? Well have I got the show for you: Jeopardy! but you can get 98% of the answers right if you have any media literacy. Having premiered in December with a tournament-bracket style game, this already had about 20 episodes to catch up with when I jumped in. And it has been so easily digestible that once can even take it in small chunks when there’s a free moment. If I was late to meeting you somewhere for a social obligation this month… definitely not because I lost track of time watching an episode of this. 👼🏻 I heard a take about this show on a podcast (not an Original Thought™) that changing it from the original Jeopardy! individual format to teams of three may be a necessary upgrade for this subject matter because of our dissolving monoculture; there’s absolutely no way any one player could know everything about movies, music, TV, internet, books, etc etc etc. I mean, I certainly can try.
Laid (Peacock) - A high concept show that was brought down to earth by these silly characters with their niche pop culture references. Now, just blurting out a pop culture reference is not a joke in and of itself (sitcoms take note) so when a show deploys them smartly and gives us character insight, we listen (see Happy Endings). Also if there’s a way you can make it to the final episode without thee cameo getting spoiled, you may be as gooped and gagged as I was.
No Good Deed (Netflix) - Stacked cast, just vibes. In no particular order: Abbi Jacobson, Lisa Kudrow, Luke Wilson, Ray Romano, Matt Rogers, Linda Cardellini, etc etc etc
Grey’s Anatomy S20 - Late to this 2024 season, but I won’t abandon this show that’s been in my rotation since high school! And due to the dual 2023 Hollywood union strikes, this was nice and short and bingeable-in-one-weekend. For those who were exhausted by then dropped off after the COVID season: the show smartly “reset” two years ago, bringing in five new medical interns as the pilot began all those years ago. Praying one of these days they’ll write out some tired characters (Owen and Teddy SNOOZE).
Abbott Elementary S3 - The hard truth is that Janelle James will never be in the right place at the right time to get an Emmy for this program (also shout out to the shortened season like Grey’s so I could catch up in a short period of time - now onto celebrating a FULL 22-EPISODE SEASON)
The Sex Lives of College Girls (Max) - Pains me to say that this season felt mid after the first two seasons made it one of my favorite comedies. The absence of original cast member Reneé Rapp is PUNGENT and it feels like so many characters faltered while one became even funnier (I wish more people knew about this show just to giggle at Kimberly, played by Timothée Chalamet’s sister).
Squid Game 2 (Netflix) - The second season takes a bit longer to launch into the action and so it isn’t until the third episode that we can sit back and get cozy and giggle and clap at bloody gratuitous bright colored silly game time.
The Brutalist (2024) [Best Picture Academy Award Nominee] - What I took away from this film is that big-nosed men deserved to be honored in museums and also that movie intermissions could be more widely utilized. The surreal experience of everyone just filing out to the restrooms and the moseying in scrolling on their phones in the dark until it was time to put them away! While we’ll hear more about this in the coming weeks re: awards success, I’ll use this space to draw attention to one line that unfortunately had us unintentionally giggling and has now entered my lexicon (Best Supporting Actress nominee Felicity Jones was not in the same movie as everyone else I must say, but she was clocked in with her melodramatic antics and bad wig):
Babygirl (2024) - I just feel there should have been one single negative consequence for one character in this movie!!! So, we here at Mostly Full are not sad about this missing the mark on the Oscar noms list. Cultural anthropologists will study the omission of Nicole Kidman’s AMC opening prayer though, as the movie launches straight into a sex scene feat Nicole.
One of Them Days - Speaking of Janelle James, it was clear by the time she cameo’d in this that the entire audience just knew she would be up to her Principal Coleman antics and she didn’t disappoint. I can’t say any negative thing about this movie though at the risk of never getting a theatrical comedy again.
Wolf Man - The whole “what if you had to turn on your loved one to save your child” premise would work better if this couple actually liked each other goddddd what a miserable partnership. Watch The Invisible Man (2020) instead, thanks!
Companion - M3GAN ran so other bot girlies could… not run!
Back in Action - Imagine needing a cohesive story when you’re the movie that brought Cameron Diaz out of retirement? Excellent counter-programming to the presidential inauguration on Monday, January 20, 2025
Nosferatu (2024) - Great gowns, beautiful gowns, Aaron Taylor-Johnson in tight pants. Shout out to the girlie who was on her phone next to me at the theater to keep me extra distracted. ✌🏻
The Substance (2024) [Best Picture Academy Award Nominee] - okay who’s gonna stop me from seeing a favorite movie of 2024 again if the theater re-releases it?????
if you can hear this image, you can be my friend
Looking Forward to February: SNL50 Special, Captain America: Brave New World, Paddington in Peru, The Monkey, Companion, The White Lotus Season 3, Yellowjackets Season 3…
Dream life: be an actor cast in a small supporting role of Grey’s Anatomy season one — and be sitting in my enormous mansion 20 years later.