1800th Post: The X-Files And Consent, Part 1: Its Bad When Its A Monster of the Week, But If It's A Comedy...

 

 

Like any series made thirty years ago, there are many episodes of The X-Files that are, shall we say, problematic. No I don’t mean from a plot standpoint; every procedural has those and that’s the same with science fiction. No I mean the kind of issues that I will often try to ignore in my articles on series with the ‘different time’ scenario.

The problem is that, while that it’s applicable in the 1950s or even up to the 1980s, it starts become a real issue in my own lifetime.  When you’re a genre show, some of the better monsters are from other cultures. The problem is, no matter how well you step into them at best they come off as heavy handed and as worst not working. From the Native American wendigo story in Shapes, the illegal immigrant story in ‘El Mundo Gira’, the African who drains other African-Americans of their pigmentation in ‘Teliko’, there are quite a few episodes that really make you wish Mulder and Scully stayed in their own lane.

But the more troubling ones are those that involve sexual assault or rape as part of their storylines. There were more than a few that handled this badly but most of them were such mediocrities that was the least of their problems. It’s harder to confront when the episodes are not only among the greatest in series history but when they are also comedies in every level. Most fans – myself included – have tried to deal with the issue of that from not long after they debuted until the present day, and now I think it’s time I tried too.

The three episodes in question are well known to every fan of The X-Files and I’ve mentioned two of them in some detail in my previous articles in this series.  They are Darin Morgan’s “Jose Chung’s ‘From Outer Space’ in Season Three; Vince Gilligan ‘Small Potatoes’ in Season Four and Chris Carter’s ‘The Post=Modern Prometheus’ in Season Five.

The first one chronologically is somewhat more complicated because of the nature of Morgan’s narrative. The story deals with an incident involving two teenagers, Harold and Chrissy, who at the start of the episode are on their first date. Their car comes to a stop, a flying saucer hovers overhead, and two aliens walk to them.  The aliens make motions and Chrissy and Harold pass out. As they are walking the kids to their craft, another craft pulls up to adjacent to them, and a larger, more menacing alien gets out. One of the aliens says: “What is that thing?” One says back: “How the hell should I know?”

Trying to explain what happens in this episode is impossible because it is never clear to anybody: much of the story is told by Scully to Jose Chung (Charles Nelson Reilly) and he himself tells us that no two stories coincide. “Truth is as subjective as reality” he says before the story begins.  In that sense, Morgan gives us some cover for not taking any of what we’re about to see at face value. The problem is, a lot of it mostly in the first act, is troubling.

Chrissy wakes up in her car with bruises and her clothes on her inside out.  Chung says that these are symptoms of alien abduction (or experiences, as he prefers) but Scully makes it very clear its more likely Chrissy was raped.  Indeed they get called into the investigation because Chrissy accuses Harold of rape and Harold is brought in by the police. One of the darkest jokes of the episode is that Harold is such a nice boy people think it is far more plausible that he and Chrissy were abducted by aliens than that he raped her.  It’s one that is easy to miss (I myself didn’t get until decades later) but it’s there all the same.

Furthermore Harold sticks to his story, even taking a polygraph – until Mulder and Scully get there and he decides to say that Chrissy is right, even though he doesn’t seem so sure any more and won’t take a polygraph to prove he raped her. This is where it is troubling that Mulder decides to believe Harold’s first story than his confession.

The episode basically leaves the idea of the sexual assault behind after that story but there’s something just as troubling. After relaying ‘his version’ of what happened to him and Chrissy after they were taken (I can’t explain it to those who haven’t seen the episode; even those who have can’t truly explain it) Scully, who has been lacking patience asks Harold if he and Chrissy had sex that night. Harold pauses, and says: “If her father finds out, I’m a dead man.” In other words there’s a possibility that Harold and Chrissy might have fabricated the fact to hide from their parents that they had sex on their first date. Considering that there have been cases like this more often then we want to admit – particularly given overprotective parents – that something this implausible as a story might be used is not that strange.

The episode than (joyously) basically leaves the two kids behind for the rest of the way episode. Morgan has a delightful story to tell and it’s more than fun getting there even if we still have no idea what happened then we did at the start (Again, see this episode if you haven’t. You’ll probably love it even if you’ve never watched an episode of The X-Files.) But it takes on a touch of pathos in the final moments when it returns to Chrissy and Harold.

Chrissy seems able to move on from this experience but in the final scene Harold comes to her window and throws rocks at it.  Harold tells her despite everything: “I still love you.” Chrissy is dismissive: “Love. Is that all you men think about?”  Then Chung, whose monologue is revealing the fate of many of the characters, talks about Harold – but in a way he’s talking about Morgan’s own point of view:

“Then there are those who care not for extraterrestrials, searching for meaning in other human beings. Rare or lucky are those who find it. For although we may not be alone in the universe, in our own separate ways, on this planet, we are all alone.”

It breaks your heart to hear this. It might be problematic that the episode sympathizes most often with Harold, who might very well be a rapist. Perhaps if you look it that way, his action might have destroyed whatever they bond might have. The difference is it reverses the dynamic. The man can’t find a way through what happened but Chrissy, the bigger victim, becomes a survivor.

I think that’s why the episode is not truly that problematic (aside from the fact of the ambiguity that is at the center of it). Chrissy has no explanation for what happened to her, but she can find a way to pick up the pieces even after this violation. Morgan is clear on this the bigger crime is not what might have happened to her body, but to her mind: “He’s stealing my memories’ is in effect one of the most haunting lines we’ve heard in the entire context of the X-Files.

In that sense Morgan is dealing with trauma in the greatest form (which is a common theme of all his scripts). And while your sympathy for Harold may differ depending on what version of events you believes, there’s something tremendously sad about the image of him at the end of the episode alone with no way forward.

‘Small Potatoes’ is also problematic but in a different way, and in a sense it’s so subtle that even years after the fact people may not have picked up on it. Most of that is due the fact that Eddie Van Blundht (as he constantly reminds us ‘The H is silent’) is one of the most sympathetic monsters of the week the show has ever created.

Gilligan always had a gift for creating sympathy for the monsters, showing them as little men whose supernatural abilities just showed how human they were.  You get this very clearly with Eddie who despite being able to shape shift into anybody he can, is basically considered a loser by everybody.  Some of them are very painful. In one scene Eddie is impersonating his father, who rather than try to be nice to his son, heaps abuse on him for not being special.  It says a lot that Eddie Junior, even impersonating his father, doesn’t believe he could say anything nice about his son. It’s also done hysterically when Amanda, Eddie’s high school girlfriend, has a conversation with Eddie impersonating Mulder. Amanda, in case you had forgotten, has seen Star Wars over 400 times and is deluded enough to think that Luke Skywalker seduced her and impregnated her. She still thinks that she is superior to Eddie and has no problem telling ‘Mulder’ that. Even Mulder, who usually is astonished by everything he sees, can’t help but make a dig at Eddie.  By now shapeshifters are part of the mythology but when Scully asks if Eddie’s an alien, Mulder is quick to dismiss it: “Not unless aliens live in trailer parks. (This is clearly a dig by Gilligan as to how the show differentiated between mythology and monster of the week; Mulder seems to be insulted at the idea that a janitor would be part of a global conspiracy.)

Now to be clear we have to think that Eddie is harmless for the main joke of the episode to work. One of the many reasons Small Potatoes is beloved, in addition all the other great things about it, is that in the final act Eddie impersonates Mulder, takes on his life, and attempts to seduce Scully.

 Now it’s worth noting that we are getting a sense as how Eddie has done business: he listens to Scully, he clearly pays attention and is clearly kind. That’s why when Mulder busts in at the end of the episode, he is not saving Scully from a monster but from a kiss.  This too is a poke in the ribs by Gilligan at the format.  Mulder saving Scully was even now such a tired trope that he is clearly poking fun at it: this is the first time Mulder’s busted the door down, and really wished he hadn’t been there to save Scully. Furthermore, he doesn’t  have to shoot Eddie or even threaten him: Eddie just sighs and assumes his normal face.

Gilligan wrote the episode this way for the punch line to work. But in order to do so, we have to feel an immense amount of sympathy for a sexual predator. Now Eddie isn’t one in the sense we would see on Law & Order: SVU a few years later.  Eddie did not ‘rape’ any of his five victims the way we consider it. He didn’t force them or drug them, and while he came to their houses, he was technically invited and none of the women refused him.  A good attorney might even be able to argue all five women did consent to have sex. The problem is, of course, four of them thought they were having sex with their husbands and the fifth was so mentally deluded she really thought the father was a fictional character.

We can write all of this off easier than Jose Chung because Eddie does pay for his crimes. In the last minutes of the episode, Mulder is visiting Eddie in prison.  You could also say Mulder’s final line to Scully after she tells him he ‘s not a loser “But I’m no Eddie Van Blundht, am I?” is actually a compliment.  Mulder may not be the kind of man smart enough not to have made a pass at Scully in four years, but he’s certainly not the kind of man who would lie to her in order to sleep with her. (He took far too long to get there, of course… but that’s another story.

But by far the most problematic episode of the three is ‘The Post-Modern Prometheus”. I should mention that while Jose Chung and Small Potatoes have always been considered classics by fans and critics, Prometheus has always been trickier even for die-hard fans.  No one can deny that it’s not a brilliant episode of television, and the Emmys certainly didn’t: the episode by far received the most Emmy nominations of any single episode in the show’s canon: seven, including two for Carter for both his direction and writing.  And even the viewers who despise is can’t deny it’s not one of the most dazzling technical achievements in the series history. Shot as a retelling of the Frankenstein, the story is shot in glorious black and white with some of the most dazzling special effect, cinematography and music the series would ever do.  It is one of the most brilliant technical episodes in the entire canon of The X-Files, along with episodes such as Triangle in Season 6 and X-Cops in Season 7.  It is an incredible episode to look at.

The problem with it is the plot. Because while in the previous two episodes, the possibility of rape was always secondary to the overlying story. In Prometheus, it’s basically front and center to the entire show. We see it in the teaser, it’s why Mulder and Scully are called on to the case, and its more or less the punch line to the episode.  I have a reason why I think the episode works despite this, but I have to explain why it’s so problematic.

Shaineh Berkowitz sends a letter to Mulder and Scully in which she tells them that seventeen years ago,  her house went dark, she was knocked unconscious and didn’t wake up until three days later – after which she was pregnant with her son Izzy. She’s now writing him because that same thing happened again – we saw in the teaser.  Even that’s not the weird part – not long after giving birth to her son, Shaineh had her tubes tied.  You might ask how she could have gotten pregnant again, and Carter never sees fit to answer that question. (My theory, for the record, is a better explanation.)

As the show goes on we believe that this is a stunt by Izzy to promote his comic book character The Great Mutato. We learn of a mad scientist named Dr. Polidori, who has been performing radical genetic experiments for decades in this town.  As the episode continues, Polidori’s wife is blacked out, and she too is raped.

At the climax of the episode we learn the horrible truth – and its truly horrendous. Polidori’s father rescued Mutato as a baby. He has spent his life since then trying to come up with a friend or mate for him. In doing so, he has essentially spent the past twenty years impregnating the parents of the entire down with…farm animals. (Yes, you read this write. It gets worse.) However, the last two assaults – Shaineh and Mrs. Polidori – were performed by Mutato himself.

When Mutato gives his speech at the end of the episode, he is meant to come off as sympathetic claiming ‘he has never harmed a living soul.’ We’re somehow supposed to forget that he has raped two women – and to be clear, the show makes it very clear at the end that’s happened. (Though again, I have a theory that might explain it.) Somehow everybody ignores this fact and lets him off the hook – including it’s worth noting Mulder and Scully, who actually seems depressed that they have to take Mutato to prison rather than release him to search for his mate.

Those who defend this episode argue that there is justice served to the larger plot. Polidori goes to prison for killing his father, the grandfather has paid for his sins with his life and Mutato will go to jail for his crimes and be friendless and alone. There are, to be clear, other moral ambiguities that you can read into this if you want to appreciate the episode.  But I have had a theory about Prometheus that I think makes more sense – one that in a real way, may not make the moral quandaries any easier, but might be able to help you understand why this is a different episode.

I don’t believe anything we see in ‘Prometheus’ is real. And no, I don’t just mean that The X-Files is just a TV show; I don’t think what happens falls under the purview of an X-File.

 Here is my theory. Shaineh never told the truth about how Izzy was born. Maybe she was raped; maybe she never really knew who the father was. So Izzy, in his search for answers created the legend of the Great Mutato. He heard of Mulder and Scully on TV (they have been on the news before) and in order to come up with an explanation for his childhood, he created a comic book in which everything we see in the episode takes place.

The episode, as those of you who remember it know, is framed as a comic book. But there’s more to it than that. While most episodes tell us where the show is taking place, the most we know is that it’s somewhere in Indiana. With the exception of the Berkowitz, none of the other characters have a full name. Polidori has no first name and none of Izzy’s friends are given a name at all as is even Polidori’s father (he’s just called the Old Man).  And somehow, even though he raised him from childhood, Mutato himself has no name.

When you consider that none of the characters save for Shaineh as human beings, this is fitting with the world of a comic book. It also explains the often ridiculous reactions of the characters which are more in context with a comic than reality. A prime example comes when Polidori’s wife, who has been begging for her husband for a baby, reacts to the fact of her rape not with dismay but joy because she might be pregnant. (And for the record, if my theory isn’t true, Chris Carter really has some ‘splaining to do about he views the modern woman.)

But the reason I am convinced that this episode isn’t real is the ending. Mulder, dismayed about having to lock up Mutato, seems to break the fourth wall and say: “Where’s the writer? I want to speak with the writer.”

And in the last scene Mulder and Scully and the entire town drive to Memphis to see Cher sing. (Mutato loves Cher.) We see Shaineh and Mrs. Polidori on Jerry Springer with their babies, who look like little mutatoes.   Cher sings to Mutato, and Mulder and Scully, smiling bigger than we’ve ever seen them before, start dancing. The episode closes on a drawing of the two of them, and the comic book being closed.

Now even the most devoted fan of the episode will acknowledge that last scene didn’t happen.  So if you’re going that far, why can’t the whole episode be a fiction? Mulder asks to speak the writer at the end of the episode and we all know Izzy is one.  And all teenagers want a happy ending to their stories.

I think Izzy is working through whatever trauma really happened to him the best he can and whatever the truth is, he’d prefer to believe the fiction.  And in the world of fiction, the bad guys always pay for the crimes, the monsters aren’t evil and everyone gets a happy ending.  We’ve watched The X-Files long enough by now to know that’s just not the case.  But for some people, they want to believe – even if it isn’t real. That’s part of the makeup of The X-Files too. That’s my theory as to the episode.

Of course while consent as part of the Monster of the Week is a hard enough thing to deal with, it’s infinitely worse when it comes to the mythology. And the reason for that is because how much it involves Scully. In the sequel to this installment in the series, I will deal with Scully’s abduction and how it led to some of the most problematic storylines in the entire series – which is saying a lot.

 

   

 

 

 

A New Series On Commerce And Criticism, Part 1: How the Cancellation of Cruel Summer Has To Remind Us That Hollywood is A Business First

 

Last night I endured one of the most painful cancellations of a TV series I’ve had to endure in 2023. I was planning to write in reaction to it that night, but then I learned that there were more details not only to why it was cancelled but why the network itself was doing so.

I have also been meaning to begin a series for the past several months in which I try to reconcile the divide between what critics and consumers think Hollywood is and what it actually is. As you will see when I begin this article properly, last night’s cancellation is as pertinent an entryway into subject as I could have hoped for.

So this article will be the first in what will be a continuing series on the divide between how we should view Hollywood and how most people do.

 

Those of you who have read my blog know that there are few people out there who have thought more highly of Freeform’s anthology series Cruel Summer. When it debuted in April of 2021, I regarded it as one of the great accomplishment of that year and gave the newly founded HCA TV awards full points for not merely nominating it for Best Cable Drama but actually giving in their inaugural prize in that category.  I named the series the best show of 2021 and was overjoyed when it was renewed for a second season.

I was just as ecstatic in the leadup to Season 2 and to when it actually aired. It is one of my favorite series of 2023 and will be among the top five series of this year, if not among the top three.  So you can imagine how devastated I was to learn that Freeform had cancelled it last night.

This is the kind of blow that would normally have wrecked me for days, if not weeks. However, when I was doing research for the article I was considering right I learned two things that numbed the pain in different ways.

The first was that Cruel Summer had originally just been planned to be a one-shot and that the series had been such a huge hit (the biggest success Freeform had ever had) they had decided to renew it for a second season, this time as an anthology. So, while it is still a huge blow that Cruel Summer is gone, I am at least gratified that we got the second season in the first place.

The second thing is the reason this article is being written. I was so stunned at the cancellation of Cruel Summer that I barely registered that Good Trouble, an iconic series that had been going on for nearly five seasons, had also been abruptly canceled before the writers had been able to finish it.  I imagine this will come as a blow to far more people considering that in addition to being a successful series, Good Trouble was a spinoff of another huge success for Freeform The Fosters.  This will rock a significant amount of TV fans’ worlds – though maybe it should neither it nor Cruel Summer’s cancellation should come as a shock based on another event that happened earlier this summer.

This June Freeform also cancelled two series that I was very fond of. The first was its freshman thriller The Watchful Eye, a brilliant mix of intrigue and possibly horror set in a New York Hotel involving a suspicious death and a new arrival among a prominent family. I thought very highly of this series (if you read my column you know how much I thought of it) and it bothered me that it had been cancelled before it got a chance to grow.

The bigger blow by far was the cancellation of Single Drunk Female which was a scalding comedy with Sofia D’Elia playing a millennial trying both to get sober and deal with her wrenching family and friend situation. The fact that both of these shows were canceled this spring should have been a big flashing light that more cancellations were on their way; last night’s cancellations were the other shoe dropping.

Now some inside baseball. The head of Freeform’s original programming, who greenlit all of these shows, left the network last year. The only original series left on Freeform is grown-ish which will air its final episodes in 2024.

None of this is a coincidence when you take into context an article I read in the Wall Street Journal earlier this year. Freeform’s parent company, Disney, is as we all know, in the midst of some major financial restructuring. In this article, I learned that company was starting to make hard choice as to which of its networks and services were going to continue to broadcast original program. The fact that Disney Plus and Hulu are merging was one sign of how the industry was changing; that some of its cable networks will stop making original series altogether is another.

So taken in this very large context, while the cancelation not only of Cruel Summer but every Freeform had been airing for the last three years is devastating from an artistic standpoint, it is not the least bit shocking from a financial one. And it is keeping in the general theme that has been going on for years that I myself have commented on of cable networks increasingly getting out of the business of making original programming.

Now I imagine all of you TV viewers who have been upset that so many shows are being killed are blaming either cable or the parent companies for doing so. You are grossly incorrect.  In fact, this is the inevitable consequence of why so many critics tended to think Prestige TV worked so well. Every cable network seemed to be creating a brilliant show and they seemed to be going on forever.

But the bill was always going to come due. The fragmentation of the TV audience may have been willing to lead to great creativity but it always going to come at a cost.  Any business – and lest we forget television is one – can only continue to exist as long as it is making a profit for the investors. It has always been the way since there were only three networks; it was just as true when dozens of networks were providing it.  

And eventually when it was time to cut costs or the budgets ran in the red, these networks basically had two options:

1.      They could stop making original programming altogether.

2.      They could be bought out or merge with another larger company.

 

Critics and audiences have never understood that there is no third option where they keep on making your favorite show until the network closes down and ceases to exist. To be clear, that’s happened in a few cases but most of the audiences will shrug it off when it does.

This is what critics and viewers have never truly understood or appreciated about everything that entertains them. I realize trying to feel sympathy for a corporate entity may be beneath any real progressive but an institution is not one person and it is not all the billionaires at the top.  And they are not just making a single product for you and you alone. If not enough people are going to Bob’s Big Boy, it disappears from truck stops. If no one goes to see the A’s play baseball, they have to move to Oakland. And if almost no one is watching The Winchesters or Stargirl, the CW has to start importing Canadian dramas if it is to exist in any form.

Nor am I going to blame the streaming services that have taken away jobs from cable or other services. No the fault, as always, lies not in the network but in ourselves. Really it lies in the entire nature of how life is today.  We want our food, our packages and yes, our entertainment as quick and as cheaply as possible.

So yes, it could be bad for art if there are only a handful of places where brilliant creative shows can be made. But the average American will not give a damn as long as they can pay as little as possible to get it.   This was the way when there were only three major networks to get TV from.  This has always been the way with TV, film and plays. The critics care about art, the talent and investors care about making money, and the public cares about being entertained.  The fundamental flaw of so many critics is that they think their approach is the only acceptable one and they blame the other two groups for not having the ‘intelligence’ the see it the way they do.

I’ve always been more of the opinion, as a TV critic, that I view my work more as the public does then as the critic has.  I don’t come to any major TV show – whether it be The Wire or Only Murders in the Building or yes, Cruel Summer  - expecting to find some great work of art. I want to be entertained first and foremost. I want to have fun. I would like to have my brain stimulated and my heart strings pulled. All of this can be done just as easily with lowbrow TV as highbrow. I’ve always felt it you get enjoyment from a program you shouldn’t be judged whether its Station 19 or Station Eleven. One group of people might think highly of the latter than the former but that doesn’t make them the final word.  I’m going to go into this in more detail in future articles but critics are not gods but human beings, capable of their own flaws and prejudices. We should never blindly follow their judgments.

Similarly we must also remember that TV has always been a business and any businesses job is to make money. As a TV critic I get reminded of this perhaps more frequently and painfully than any one else.  Year after year, you have to endure the fact that the shows you love and invested time in will not becoming back next season because while you may love them, not enough of the rest of the world does. It doesn’t get easier if shows you like survive season after season; the more invested in them you become, the larger the risk is they will end up falling by the wayside. Peak TV may have done much to improve the art of TV but its done nothing to ensure job security or that the show’s you love will keep on surviving in an era where the margin for renewal can differ depending on which network or service your on.  

In that sense, the truly remarkable shows that stand as critical classics – The Americans, Parenthood, Damages are among my favorites of these – are remarkable in the fact that they survived long enough to realize their vision.  Peak TV might have been a great time for art but there was no more guarantee the show you loved would survive any more than many of the characters on it. 

So yes it will be harder for great artistic series to succeed and thrive in the years to come. How is that different from any point in the history of television? TV has always been driven by the number of eyeballs who are on the screen. The only thing that changed in the last twenty years was that a show could be a hit with far fewer eyeballs than there were with each passing decade.

As for how I’ll deal with the loss of Cruel Summer, last night I managed to finally track down a DVD of the first season online. I paid about $30 for it. I’ll do the same when the second season comes out on DVD in some form. I’m doing this in part because this how I appreciate my art; I’m always felt that you owe it as a viewer to have both a record of your favorite shows in something that isn’t digital and you should be willing to pay some form of largesse to show your appreciation. I recognize TV is an art, but I also respect that is a business and I think we should all remember to do the same.

Lost Rewatch on VHS: Something Nice Back Home

 

This episode is considered by some as the weak link in Season 4, at least among the episodes after the strike ended.  And I’ll admit there are some weak links, including a revelation that seemed huge when it happened and in hindsight was one of the biggest letdowns in the history of the series. But looking back, this one of the most emotionally gut-wrenching episodes in Season 4, certainly among the ones involving the Oceanic 6.

We’ve been put through the ringer in the last two flashforwards when we learned that Sun made it back to the mainland and Jin didn’t and last week when we learned that Sayid had found Nadia, then lost her forever – and with it handed over to Ben the rest of his soul. But I think the flashforward we get in Something Nice Back Home will break everybody’s heart, even those of you who never had much use for Kate and had trouble standing Jack. It certainly makes my heart break every time I see it, perhaps because I was more of a shipper for those two than I wanted to admit.

It's generally acknowledged that even though Jack is considered the central character of Lost, he is also one of the most polarizing. In part this is because of how good a job Matthew Fox has done at making Jack come across season after season as someone who is sticking to the idea of rational thought, even though every season cuts a larger part of it away from him. As a result despite all the pressure on Jack to be something he never wanted to be as well as his inability to relinquish control, we tend to see his understandable frustration and confusion as unlikable. Everything that people blame him for – being judgmental, withholding information from his friends,  the refusal to accept the evidence of what he is seeing – is something that almost all of the survivors are guilty of to an extent.  I think we take it out on Jack because he wears his heart on his sleeve and therefore can’t compartmentalize it the way so many others can.

Even as the episode starts and everything is falling apart, Jack insists that they are getting off the island.  Never mind the freighter folk never came to rescue them in the first place and there’s a good chance they are here to kill all of them, Jack is still trying to paint a sunny picture.  He’s clearly been suffering from something more serious than a ‘stomach bug’ for the last day but as we know with Jack, he can never admit a sign of weakness. Only when Juliet – the other doctor – tells him she knows what happening does he concede he has appendicitis.

Juliet manages to take charge in a way and with authority that Jack never could, and everybody listens to her and does what she says for the greater good. Except, of course, Jack who is still trying to stage manage the surgery. Kate isn’t entirely joking when she says she’s surprised he hasn’t taken it out himself already; you get the feeling that if he could have done that without anybody knowing he was doing it, Jack would have done just that. Juliet allows him the illusion of control, but it’s clear that even before the surgery is underway she never had any intention of letting him talk her through the surgery. (And you know, given how their last surgery went, maybe Juliet was afraid he’d punch out Bernard and demand to speak to the freighter on the sat phone.)

I grant you the lack of suspense in the outcome of Jack’s surgery would have been pre-determined even had the flashforward not been about him; we’ve already seen he gets off the island in two other flashforwards this season. The point is encapsulated in the conversation between Bernard and Rose as to why Jack is sick in the first place. (It’s interesting that Rose talks about them leaving the island even though she was determined to stay.)  Bernard is speaking in jest when he says Jack has angered the gods of the island but we all know there’s a very good chance that’s why this is happening: Rose herself knows just how significant it is that Jack has gotten this sick and what it means now. We would know by now this is a waste of time: Jack hasn’t listened to anybody telling him that he should stay on the island; he’s certainly not going to listen to his body telling him that.

There’s rarely been such a contrast between the actions on the island and the flashes off it. We actually get to see that Jack is happy in a way we’ve never seen him before. He somehow seems to have worked through his issue with Kate being Aaron’s mother, and the two of them are happy. Jack has become a surrogate father and he is in love. He’s even able to talk about Christian with something close to fondness in one of the flashforwards.

And then everything comes crashing down when Jack goes to see Hurley. If anything looking at Hurley we’re even sadder for him then we are for Jack.  It was bad enough that Hurley went to Santa Rosa because he thought he had gone crazy. Now he seems to have gone to a worse emotional place than Michael was. Michael only wanted to die; Hurley thinks he already is. Not just him but everybody who came back. Jorge Garcia’s scene with Jack is one of the best scenes he has done in the entire series. He seems so resigned to his fate that he doesn’t seem to even care that he’s having regular conversations with the dead any more.

On a private note, I kind of think Charlie is being something of a dick when he tells Jack: “You’re not supposed to raise him.” Now to be clear Hurley has no way of knowing that Aaron is Jack’s nephew. (It’s clear given Jack’s last line of the flashforwards that he does.) One can imagine it has taken a lot for him to emotionally work past this and the fact that he can be a father to Aaron must seem more than he thought. So Charlie saying this is truly nasty. (Then again, maybe he regrets he never got the chance.)

This brings us to another question that the show has never clearly answered: how is that the dead are visiting the Oceanic 6? Jack was already seeing the ghost of Christian even before he talked to Hurley and we’ll eventually learn Hurley has been seeing more ghosts than just Charlie. Considering that Claire sees Christian on the island (we’ll get to that) the consensus was that the two were connected. Now it’s very clear they couldn’t have been.

In the case of Jack, it’s pretty obvious why he’s seeing his father: guilt. Jack has always carried huge burdens before he got on Oceanic 815 and he did so on the island.  We don’t know the nature of how the lie came into being yet but even if it wasn’t about that part, he would be dealing with quite a significant amount of survivor’s guilt. The burden of lying to the world has clearly been significant for him, and you get the feeling the pressure must keeping up every time he does it. I have little doubt he might have been willing to brush off what he was seeing before as guilt – and then Hurley tells him someone will be visiting him too.

That’s also what’s part of this. Jack spent much of his time on the island dismissing the talk of Locke and Ben as that of being crazy and the last thing he needs is someone in an institution passing on (from the dead, no less) that he’s seeing the ghost of his father. It’s why Jack so desperately proposes to Kate that night; he’s trying his hardest to deny the reality of what Hurley’s said. And because Jack, just like Sayid, would rather bury his guilt than share his feelings with a therapist or even his fiancée, he decides to get drunk and start taking pills.

And as we all know Jack can’t handle it when somebody he loves has a secret. We saw his fixation on with Sarah even after she left him for another man; we saw him accuse his father of infidelity rather than let things go. Jack needs to put the blame on someone for his own failings. So even though Jack is keeping several big secrets from Kate, he decides to fixate his rage on Kate for keeping a secret from him. When she tells him that she’s doing a favor for Sawyer, his jealousy of him – which he managed to keep in check on the island – boils over and he takes all of his guilt on the nearest target. (For the record, he does so completely irrationally given what we find out.) The final minute of the flashforward is gutting because we know without having to look that Jack has in two minutes destroyed his relationship with Kate beyond repair, and it’s as devastating for her as it is for him.

Jack clearly degenerates very quickly after this, though how quickly is up for debate. The next flashforward chronologically must take at least four or five months after this one and by that point, he’s lost everything else: his job, his reputation and his sanity. How this happened we never find out all the details, but I’m guessing the guilt from screwing things up with Kate as well as continued visits from Christian played a big part. (We’ll see the final blow in Season Five.)

While the surgery itself is anticlimactic, this is another in the long line of powerhouse performances of Elizabeth Mitchell. It’s interesting to compare her behavior in the midst of a life-threatening surgery to Jack’s behavior in Do No Harm. She is completely calm and in control, giving orders to a group of relative strangers and is listened to with no real argument, both when it comes to medical advice and giving orders as to control the freighter folk. (Jin just nods when Juliet gives him a gun and tells him what to do.) She has to deal with a conscious patient but given who it is that’s worse and she can control him too. And then there’s her final scene where she tells Kate that Jack kissed her and that Jack is clearly in love with someone else – and after Kate leaves, she tells Jack she knows he’s awake. Even if you don’t ship Jack and Juliet, it’s hard not to feel for Juliet at this moment. I truly believe a part of her really is in love with Jack at this moment and this whole thing has broken her in a large way. The fact that Jack didn’t trust her enough to do this surgery on her own is bad enough, the fact she has to tell Kate that Jack’s in love with her has to be worse.

I’d also say that Something Nice Back Home is the moment that everyone on the helicopter officially becomes Team Oceanic. Daniel, of course, has always been trying to help the survivors more than any of his colleagues but here he makes it very clear that he is firmly on their side. Charlotte is still being stubborn and obstinate but when Jin calls her on her knowing Korean and demands that he take Sun off the island, she doesn’t hesitate before agreeing. (The fact that Dan is clearly falling in love with Charlotte is another thing that will break your heart.) Meanwhile Miles is still somewhat creepy but given his reaction when he sees Rousseau and Karl’s bodies, it’s clear that he’s over his head and that his only chance for survival is sticking with Sawyer. And we’ve never truly doubted that Frank is on the side of the survivors but when we see him for the first time (since Ji Yeon) he makes it just as clear he wants everybody to get out alive.

But now, of course, we must deal with what is now the biggest problem of the episode and frankly, one of the biggest problems with the show’s second half. Ever since we learned that Aaron was one of the Oceanic 6, our reaction was automatic: how did Claire give up the baby she has spent three and a half seasons guarding with her life? And the answer is…she seems to have just wandered into the jungle and left him behind.

The biggest theory throughout Season 4 and well into Season 6 was that Claire was, in fact, dead.  A lot of fans came up with a lot of supporting evidence to back it up and Darlton did nothing to confirm or deny it. Honestly that would have been a better solution than what we actually got.  Because from the moment Claire wanders in the jungle after her ‘father’, as far as Lost is concerned she might as well be dead.

It is possible there is a larger reason why Claire not only left the action of series for the rest of Season 4, was written out of Season 5 and then came back in the final season. But if there was, I have yet to think of it.  And it hurts the show badly. Claire was never utilized perfectly the first three seasons but when she was Emilie De Ravin used her well. Now after being connected to so many of the survivors in the last season, Claire is essentially erased from the larger storyline. Worst still is that the show never gives a good explanation as to why she was taken off the board in the first place only to bring her back. The final season spent too much time trying to tie up loose ends that didn’t tie up well and Claire, sad to say, ended up being one of them. (I’ll get to why in the final season.)

 And it doesn’t help matters that this episode also marks the beginning of the end of Aaron as having anything to do with the series. The show spent much of Season 1 arguing that Aaron was going to be part of the overarching story and then when he left the island, he stopped being significant to it at all. There will be some good moments where he connects to some of the characters going forward but you wonder why we spent so much time making him part of the Oceanic 6 in the first place.

Those flaws, to be sure, are down the road. (Though the end of that road is quickly coming.) And we can let it go for now because next week we’re going to get one of the best episodes of the season and one of the more undervalued one of the second half of Lost.

 

My Predictions For This Year's Emmys, Week 1 Concluded: Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Et Al

 

Not only is this one of the best groupings of nominees, it’s by far the most diverse with four different African-American women representing three different shows.  Three previous winners from the past four years are in this category. All of them have a very strong argument in their favor.

Alex Borstein, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.  Odds: 13-2. For Playing: Suzy Myerson,  Midge’s long suffering manager. Pro: Borstein has long been the greatest treasure of an incredible case, as we watch Suzy try to balance her job in a tough world with her many, many flaws. We saw all of them come to light as she, like Midge, made it to the top but we learned one of the major sacrifices that cost her their relationship. We also saw Suzy comes to terms with her identity in a way that was even harder for women back in the 1960s.  Borstein has been incredible to watch and it was fun to come along for the ride. Con: Borstein has also been more than excessively rewarded for her work in Maisel, taking two Emmys and some prizes that even came as a shock to her. It’s been three years since she managed a win in this category. I don’t think she’ll prevail here.

Ayo Edebiri, The Bear. Odds: 5-1. For Playing: Sydney, the student who comes to work for Carmie and goes along with his plans, despite of who he is and sticks with him. Pro: I’m sort of surprised that Edebiri is such an overwhelming favorite in this category – though having seen her work in Season1, I really don’t blame them. Like Quinta Brunson, Edebiri is a hyphenate herself – she has written and produced many series and has been a part of such undervalued shows as Dickinson and What We Do In The Shadows. But her work on The Bear has put her in the spotlight and assured she won’t leave it for a long time. A former caterer with a deft culinary palate, she goes along with Carmie more than anyone because she loves his talent but reaches her breaking point in the incredible episode ‘Review’. As the only real outsider we sympathize with her more than any character and she can give with the best of them. (I’m not surprised she’s decided to compete in the Actress category from here on.) She already won a Spirit Award and a Dorian award this year; can an Emmy be far behind? Con: This is a very tough category and there might be some who consider that Edebiri can’t wait her turn.

Janelle James, Abbott Elementary. Odds: 13-2. For Playing: Ava Colman, the increasingly out of her depth principal at Abbott. Pro:  She sometimes gets lost under the powerhouse work of her co-nominee but James is the comic fireball that makes Abbott run. I don’t think she’s ever delivered a single line that does not make me laugh hysterically and with her perfect array of putdowns she is the most snarky character – and actually has a heart too. She has been recognize quite a bit  - I actually thought she had a better chance of taking the Emmy last year than Ralph – and she did win the Image award for Best Supporting Actress. I’d love to see her up there.  Con: Hard as it may be for anyone who’s watched her work as Ava, it has been James’ fate to be overshadowed by a brighter sun, who is immediately below her.

Sheryl Lee Ralph, Abbott Elementary. Odds: 11-2. For Playing: Barbara, the first grade teacher and rock of the school in a troubled time. Pro:  If every we needed another reason to love Abbott, it is that it has given recognition to one of great forces in entertainment Sheryl Lee Ralph.  We were in love with her when we watched the first season of Abbott; the world fell in love with her when she broke into song at her acceptance speech.  She’s already taken a Critics Choice for this year and stole the world’s hearts again.  And honestly despite the incredible talent in this category, there has been very little in the past year to make me think Ralph doesn’t deserve to repeat.  Barbara’s increasing willingness to take on the role of being Janine’s friend and maternal figure; trying to deal with the fact she’s not aging well; her relationship with everyone on the staff is always a joy to behold and her lines can be just as funny but always have heart. I want her to win again more than anything else.  Con: Borstein was the last women to win consecutive awards in this category. The Emmys very well might want to give the award to a newer face.

Juno Temple, Ted Lasso. Odds: 7-1. For Playing: Keeley, the former model finding her career path and relationship path. Pro:  Much like Janelle James it has been Temple’s to fate to be overlooked in this category for a slightly brighter sun on her own show.  But Keeley has been nearly as endearing almost since we met her, has revealed far more depths than we got from the surface and can often be far more hysterical. Most of the best relationships on Ted Lasso  - with Roy, with Jamie, with Rebecca – have run through Keeley, and Temple has gone out of her way to make this character who could have extraneous to the series always seem vital to it.  It would be nice if she won. Con: Like James, Temple has always been overshadowed by one of her fellow nominees from this show and it might very well happen here. But given the high praise for the current season of Fargo, there’s a very good chance she’ll be back next year anyway.

Hannah Waddingham, Ted Lasso. Odds: 11-2. For Playing: Rebecca, team owner coming to grips with various relationships, professional and personal. Pro: Rebecca has been on the greatest journey of any character in this series and we’ve been in love with her the longer she went on it.  Waddingham has justifiably become a phenomena in her own right for her incredible work on the series and her magnanimous nature in acceptance speeches (she always shouts out Juno Temple in her wins over much of last year). I will miss Rebecca the most of all the characters but I know very well we have seen far from the last of Waddingham and I look forward to seeing her roll on. Con: Ralph’s upset of Waddingham at last year’s Emmys was the crack against the dominance she’d had in Supporting Awards since the early winter of 2021; she has not won a single prize since.  Considering the incredible array of talent in this category, it’s going to be very hard for Waddingham to get one last Emmy before she leaves.

Jessica Williams, Shrinking. Odds: 7-1. For Playing: Gaby, a caring therapist trying to help her colleagues who keep resisting and dealing with her own problems. Pro: Ever since she broke onto the scene in the final years of Jon Stewart’s Daily Show, I have been one of Williams’ biggest fans. She has not done much work worth of it since then as an actress. This is clearly her breakout role and considering how awesome her cast, its impressive she owns every scene she’s in. She doesn’t go for the big laughs; her laughs are more out of comfort as well as dealing with her own flaws as well her divorce. I originally questioned her presence her over Lisa Ann Walter or Sarah Goldberg; having seen just three episode I fully understand not only why she was nominated but why she’s already won a special Critics Choice award. She’ll win in this category someday. Con: The critical word is ‘someday’. This is a very tough category. Next year, when Temple, Waddingham and Borstein are ineligible and Edibiri’s in the Best Actress category, I think she’s got a better chance.

My Prediction: This is a very tough call. I think it’s a toss-up between Edebiri and Ralph. Ralph will win if there’s the slightest bit of laziness; Edebiri if they recognize new blood.

Other Awards in Comedy:

Why isn’t Abbott Elementary nominated in writing or directing? My preference is the former category will be for Bill Hader to take the prize for the series finale of Barry. Directing will doubtless go to the tour de force that was the Review episode of The Bear. Guest Actor my preference is for Oliver Platt in The Bear; for Guest Actress, Taraji P. Henson for Abbott Elementary. In both cases, these performers are long overdue recognition from the Emmys.

 

Next week, I start in on Drama and I will also cover the Golden Globes for TV. Considering that the latter has expanded to six nominees per category, I’m looking forward to that.

My Usually Joyous Reactions to This Year's Critics Choice Nominations, Conclusion: Limited Series/TV Movie Et Al

 

As we conclude with Best Limited Series and TV Movie, here again we see that the Critics Choice are superior not merely to the Emmys, which is to be expected, but in some ways to the HCA. That doesn’t mean that they are perfect, but they strike a better balance between this past session and the one to come and in both cases, have a better balance.

BEST LIMITED SERIES

Yet another reason this group is as good as it gets: they are the only major group to recognize Love and Death as Best Limited Series this year, something not even the HCA did.

For the year just past, they gave more than significant recognition to Beef which is the likely winner and Daisy Jones & The Six. They also were willing to nominate the superb National Geographic Series A Small Light something the HCA wasn’t willing to go in on. For the year to come they acknowledged likely contenders Lessons in Chemistry,  Fellow Travelers and the most recent season of Fargo. A Murder at the End of the World was nominated but received no other nods.

I suppose I could be disturbed that neither White House Plumbers nor Accused received recognition but the HCA covered that so I’m fine.

In TV Movie we also have some recognition of two of the best films of the year: The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial and Reality. We also will see the presence of Mr. Monk’s Last Case and No One Will Save You. All will be present in the categories below.

BEST ACTOR IN A LIMITED SERIES

I am more than fine with the presence of Matt Bomer for Fellow Travelers and Steven Yeun for Beef. Kiefer Sutherland more than deserved recognition for Caine Mutiny and I’m fine with Tony Shalhoub getting recognition for his iconic role as Monk.  Given the success of Lawmen, David Oyelowo is a good choice.

I’m not entirely onboard with Tom Holland for The Crowded Room; I would have been happier with Woody Harrelson for White House Plumbers. But I come to accept these things.

BEST ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES

This is a better group. Sydney Sweeney deserved recognition from the Emmys and Ali Wong will probably win. Bel Powley is a good mention from the year past. Brie Larson and Juno Temple both gave superb performances in Lessons in Chemistry (which I’ll be reviewing soon) and the most recent of Fargo. Kaitlyn Dever might strike as somewhat odd over Riley Keough for Daisy Jones but I’ve always been one of Dever bigger fans.

 

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR IN A LIMITED SERIES/TV MOVIE

Again mostly a good group. Jesse Plemons is a good choice and Justin Theroux more than deserved his spot here. Live Schreiber was an outside favorite for his work in A Small Light; I’m glad he’s  here. Jonathan Bailey is going to be a serious contender for Fellow Travelers next year and Lewis Pullman’s work in Lessons in Chemistry will put him up front.

I do, however, question the presence of Taylor Kitsch over any of the superb performers in Fargo, including Jon Hamm. Then again, maybe the critics couldn’t decide it he was a lead or supporting. And it is odd that there are no nominees from Beef here.

 

Best SUPPORTING ACTRESS IN A LIMITED SERIES/TV MOVIE

Camilla Morrone carries over from the Emmys and Maria Bello more than earned it for Beef. I’m inclined to think Aja Naomi King deserves it for Lessons in Chemistry and I have no problem with Billie Boulet for A Small Light.

The two nominees for Fall of the House of Usher are slightly odd; personally I would have been more inclined to nominated either Lena Headey or Judy Greer (if not both) for their work in White House Plumbers. But the Critics Choice have always had a place in their heart for the work of Mike Flanagan and I can’t truly fault them. I’d rather have seen Jennifer Jason Leigh here too, but she’ll get a chance later this year

My only real disappointment  – if you could call it that – is that there is nothing for Cruel Summer anywhere.  Still, the Critics Choice was only mild towards it two years ago so I’m not mortally crushed

Now let’s finish up with the remaining groups.

I don’t know enough about Best Foreign Language to comment on any of them as I have in years past, so I’ll leave that be. The Best Animated Series is a very good mix, with Bob’s Burgers and Bluey along side Harley Quinn and Scott Pilgrim Takes Off.  I have no problem with any of the six nominees for Best Talk Show and all six of the nominees for Best Comedy special are among my favorite: personally I hope John Mulaney wins.

In early January I will begin to try and predict the winners. As we all know the Critics Choice dances to its own drum and will just as often allow for ties. But like other groups, it is an honor simply to be nominated.

 Monday I start covering the Golden Globes for TV. Stay tuned!

My Predictions For This Year's Emmys, Week 1, Part 4: Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy

 

All things considered, with the notable absence of Harrison Ford for Shrinking, this is the best category of nominees in comedy. It’s also without question the hardest one to pick a winner based on how close it is among the choices from Gold Derby. I’ll do the best I can.

Anthony Carrigan, Barry. Odds: 13-2. For Playing: Noho Hank, the former Chechnya gangster dealing with multiple desires that end up corrupting and destroying him. Pro: Carrigan has been the secret weapon of Barry over the course of four seasons.  Starting out as a mostly comic foil in the early seasons, the trauma of the third season finale let him to try and deal with his war between his love and desire for safety – which led to him making a horrible choice at the first half. In the second half of the season, he genuinely seemed to have obtained the impossible but the residual trauma and his inability to let go let him into a climatic battle that led to the most tragic death in the entire run. Carrigan has too often been overlooked and he deserves to win. Con: It has always been Carrigan’s misfortune to be in the category with so many of his equally talented co-stars. As we shall see below, one of them gave just as brilliant a performance. Just as with so many characters on Barry, fate will likely be unkind.

Phil Dunster, Ted Lasso.  Odds: 13-2. For Playing: Jamie Tartt, the footballer who returns to his home team – and finds himself dealing with his most interior struggle yet. Pro: It is strange that in the three seasons of Ted Lasso, Dunster is the only regular who hasn’t been nominated before. To be sure, it is a very deep supporting cast and he is frequently overshadowed by brighter suns (see below for the biggest example). But even those who did not truly like the final season could not help but cheer Dunster’s work as he came to some big realization about the kind of person he’d always been, not only in terms of his sexuality but his friendships and relationships.  Jamie in many ways has come the furthest of the characters we’ve met since the journey started and it did us good to seem win. Con: Season Three was not highly regarded and Dunster faces tough competition (once again, see below.)

Brett Goldstein, Ted Lasso. Odds: 11-2. For Playing: Roy, the coach working through his relationships professionally and personally as things been change. Pro: Let’s not kid ourselves about who the breakout sensation of Ted Lasso has been it has been Goldstein who every time he swears onscreen (or you know, whenever he’s accepting an award and is bleeped out) has become one of the most beloved curmudgeons on TV in a very long time. It would be very hard to call Roy lovable (he’d snarl at you if you tried) but the world has fallen in love with a character who has truly become iconic in a way even more than Ted Lasso himself has.  As he made his final journey in football, friendship and love (maybe) we felt sad saying goodbye to Roy. (Though considering that he’s now a co-creator of Shrinking, the Emmys haven’t nearly said goodbye to Goldstein.) Con: I think even Goldstein was shocked when he took his second straight Emmy last year and that was for a season of Ted Lasso that was far more highly regarded than this one was. I have a feeling that Roy won’t enjoy a three-peat.

James Marsden, Jury Duty. Odds: 6-1. For Playing: James Marsden, who is irritated his celebrity can’t get him out of jury duty and makes a mess for everybody. Pro: What does it say about Marsden that in a season where he returned to two iconic roles on the final season of Westworld and his dual role on Dead to  Me that his best work this season would be for playing…himself? To be sure he is no more playing James Marsden than John Malkovich was in Being John Malkovich, but just as in that film that is a large part of the magic. Marsden spends all of the series playing such a temperamental, monstrous, ridiculous buffoon that you almost believe that’s really who Marsden is! It must have been difficult for him to accept this offer, but it would have been harder to turn it down. His work was some of the most fun of the year and I understand why this is the role the Emmys nominated him for. Con:  The Emmys has never been able to give recognition to these kinds of parodies of roles (Larry David has never been able to win for Curb Your Enthusiasm) and this entire show is a harder reach than that. Still wouldn’t it be fun.

Ebon Moss-Bachrach, The Bear. Odds. 11-2. For Playing: Cousin Richie, the screwup who can’t adapt to anything Carmie does. Pro: Moss-Bachrach spends most of the first season of The Bear making you absolutely hate him. He berates and mocks every single person in the shop, treats everybody horribly, and is absolutely resistant to any kind of change or improvement. But throughout it you can see just how badly the death of Richie has hurt him, and he wears his pain far less well than Carmie does. In the finale of the season he completely collapses in a horrible way and reveals to Carmie how badly he’s broken too – and slowly finds a way for all of them to move forward. Moss-Bachrach was one of the breakout performers of 2022, and I understand very well why he’s one of the favorites in this category. The fact that he also had a small but critical role on the first season of Andor shows his versatility. Con: Considering how much attention was deservedly shown on White and his other co-stars, it may be difficult for him to triumph this year.

Tyler James Williams, Abbott Elementary. Odds: 6-1. For Playing: Gregory, settling in as  a teacher and trying to deal with his crush on Janine.  Pro: Williams has already won the Golden Globe and the Image award for his performance in Season Two and honestly, he more than deserves to win this year. Williams is, in many ways, the secret weapon of Abbott Elementary, sometimes by what he says, just as often by what he doesn’t say but we read on his face. Not since Jon Krasinski’s days on The Office has a man been able to express so much by saying absolutely nothing. And we have been rooting for Gregory and Janine as they do everything in their power to move one step forward, two steps back, trying to make it work and screwing it up for everyone else.  Williams is one of the great pleasures of one of the most incredible shows on television and he is my favorite in this category. Against: A lot of great shows have premiered while Season 2 was airing.  And while Williams is clearly more qualified than some, it’s hard to argue his early wins count for as much anymore.

Henry Winkler, Barry. Odds: 7-1. For Playing: Gene Cousineau, trying to deal with the horrors of Barry’s arrest – badly as always. Pro: In what was a very dark season, Winkler provided most of the comic highpoints of Season 4 as Gene’s desire to promote himself got in the way of his desire for justice.  His attempt in the second half of the season to redeem himself came undone due to that fact – and then in a way no one could have foreseen, he became the scapegoat for everything that had happened to him. His final moment in the series was incredibly painful – even more so when we saw what his legacy was in the aftermath. It was the capper in what has been four years of incredible work. Con: Winkler has received, if anything, more love from the awards show circuit than Hader did: he took Supporting Actor prizes from the HCA and the Critics’ Choice last year. I wouldn’t object if he won a final Emmy – no one would really – but I think it’s a long shot.

My Pick: This is the toughest category to handicap with no bad performances in it. I’m giving the barest of edges to Williams.

Tomorrow, I wrap up the week with Supporting Actress in a Comedy as well as my preferences for the Writing, Directing and Guest Performances.

My Predictions For This Year's Emmys Week 1, Part 3: Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy

 

Again, a problem with quantity over quality.  Having seen all five of performers, I don’t deny that they are extraordinary actresses who are great at what they do and none of them don’t deserve to be here. My problem is why they couldn’t have opened the door to at least one more. Why is their nothing for Applegate’s sister in arms, Linda Cardellini? Why is there still nothing for Selena Gomez for Only Murders in the Building. I’d be upset about Bridget Everett, but she’ll get more chance. Still guys, next year maybe go up to six? Anyway, let’s get to it.

 

Christina Applegate, Dead to Me. Odds: 4-1. For Playing: Jen, a widow dealing with the latest in a long line of a series of crises.  Pro: If there was any justice in the world, Applegate would win the Emmy hands down this year. (Of course, if there were any justice in the world this would not be the last role Applegate would ever have to play.) It’s not just that she’s the sentimental favorite in this category; it’s that this is one of the greatest roles in a long line of incredibly great roles this gifted talent has played over an incredible career, spanning more than thirty five years. Jen is one of the most complex, darkest and hysterical characters in a long line of brilliant female characters at the center of comedy in this century. But unlike so many of them (the ones that were at the center of so many Showtime comedies) Jen is a good person coming out of so many tragedies and acts out of love more than any other darkness in her and is no mastermind but just someone trying to make good even as things just spiral. The last image we have of Jen is incredibly sad, but it’s also one of triumph. It’s as good an image for both her and the series we’ve loved. Con: It has been Applegate’s misfortune during the run of Dead to Me to constantly be facing some of the greatest female comedic performances in the history of the medium; indeed, the group this year is actually the least formidable of the bunch. (Which as you will see is saying a lot.) And the Emmys has not been sentimental in any major category for a very long time.

Rachel Brosnahan,  The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. Odds: 39-10. For Playing: Midge Maisel, the stand-up comic who finally makes it big – and finds out that success can be as lonely as failure. Pro: We’ve spent so much time in love with Brosnahan for four wonderful seasons that we have been blind to her flaws. The final season made it very clear that eventually all those flaws would come at a cost. In the flashforwards we saw that Midge did achieve the success she had longed for – but it turned out not to be as rewarding as she thought. She suffered through failed marriages; she was isolated from her children, her husband went to prison, and she ended up estranged from the manager who had helped her climb to the top. Midge spent as much time rising to success as a comedian as she did apologizing for her failures as a mother, a daughter and a friend throughout the final season and it is a credit to Brosnahan that we remained with her throughout. Con: Brosnahan has already received more than her share of recognition from almost every major awards show the past several years. Jean Smart’s absence from this category raises an opportunity, but it is far more likely the Emmys will recognize a newer face.

Quinta Brunson,  Abbott Elementary. Odds: 17-5. For Playing: Janine, the devoted first grade teacher trying to move on from the breakup of her long-time boyfriend.  Pro: She should have won last year, in my opinion. She has also won the Golden Globe in this category as well as almost every major other award in some form. It’s likely she’ll win in one or more other categories, but her performance is another one of those perfect accomplishment in creating one of the most cheerfully enduring characters in this decade. We met Janine’s sister and her mother, which explained a lot about who she is. We saw her struggle with a new relationship and begin to realize her flirtation with Gregory – who let’s face it, we all ship. And we saw our hearts getting broken as Janine realized that she needed to find a way to be by herself.  Janine deserves this. So does Brunson. Con: Everyone thought she was going to win in this category last year and she didn’t.

Natasha Lyonne, Poker Face. Odds: 9-2. For Playing: Charlie Cale, who knows when everyone’s lying and who is always running into death. For: I was overjoyed that Lyonne received the TCA prize for Best Comedic Performance. Lyonne has been one of the great talents in TV comedy for more than a decade and she is absolutely wonderful as Charlie, on the run for the mob and who keeps running into death every time she stops for gas. The series is in every respect an homage to Columbo and Lyonne clearly sounds more and more like Peter Falk with every stop she makes and each murder she solves. But we never forget just how dark the road she is traveling is, and how she seems to be running to trouble rather than running from it – something that was made very clear in the Season One finale. Lyonne has deserved an Emmy since Orange is the New Black. Con: How many people are even willing to acknowledge a show on Peacock is quality, much less deserving of Emmys? I think Lyonne will win in this category and for this show, but not yet

Jenna Ortega, Wednesday. Odds: 9-2. For Playing: Wednesday Addams, sent to a boarding school full of misfits trying to solve a mystery. Pro: Ortega is Wednesday in a way that even Christina Ricci could not quite master. Ortega has in many ways become the major ‘it girl’ of this year, getting recognition for pop culture for her performance and going viral in all the best ways. Ortega’s deadpan delivery is unmatched in a way that very few actresses can match (that’s why everybody laughed when she and Aubrey Plaza, the previous master presented together at the SAG awards this February.) This show is a good one but it would not work without the brilliant work of Ortega in every single scene. She will win some day. Con: Unfortunately, she’s become the flashpoint of a lot of controversy, particularly due to backlash against the show as well as some comments she made about writing her own dialogue that the WGA in particular did not like. I think they’ll forgive her eventually but this is not the year for it.

 

My Prediction: I really want Applegate to win, but I still am absolutely fine with Brunson taking the grand prize that’s she more than earned.

 

Tomorrow, I will deal with Supporting Actor in a Comedy where it gets more complicated.