“I Know This Much Is True”
Writer/director Derek Cianfrance—known for drama like “Blue Valentine” and “The Place Beyond The Pines”—likes to make intensely bruising films often built on notions of sin, legacy, guilt, and the emotional betrayals that gut families, friends, relationships, and marriages. As difficult as they can be to bear, they are piercingly honest, raw, vulnerable, and speak to our humanist flaws, hopes, and ability to endure suffering. Much of this texture is jam-packed into Cianfrance’s first foray into television, an adaptation of Wally Lamb’s “I Know This Much Is True,” a six-episode limited series for HBO that essentially just resembles an extended version of one of his films with more epic, scope and scale, both on an emotional level, and thematic one too. ‘IKTMIT’ centers on a pair of damaged adult twins (both played by Mark Ruffalo), one, Thomas Birdsey, a schizophrenic danger to himself, the other, Dominic, a bitter, resentful man, burdened by his brother and the curse of his family melodrama. Featuring outstanding supporting performances by Rosie O’Donnell, Archie Panjabi, Kathryn Hahn, Imogen Poots, Juliette Lewis, Melissa Leo, Philip Ettinger, and Rob Huebel, an outstanding cast supports this story, but as good as they are—O’Donnell likely bound for some Emmy love down the road, for one—this series is a massive showcase for everything that Mark Ruffalo is capable of, in this case sculpting two very distinct and different performances of two brothers that have been broken by so much hardship and pain. Ambitious in its telling— ‘IKTMIT’ also weaves in many ideas about American wars, emigration, racism to discuss the legacy of sin, burden and collective trauma—Cianfrance’s emotionally epic searing series is a little harrowing at times, but damn if it isn’t an acting tour de force, and a heartbreaking gut-punch about human contradiction— resenting those we love, yet never giving up on family. – RP
“Insecure”
“Insecure” has always been HBO’s version of a hangout show: the plot only matters inasmuch as it allows us an excuse to hang out with the lovely and hilarious Issa Rae, plus her coterie of fabulous friends, and the constantly-shifting rotation of male companions that are frequently entering and exiting her life. This season, “Insecure” threw its devoted fanbase a major curveball. While the show’s fourth season made time for signature diversions like a sex-filled trip to Puerto Vallarta and a block party featuring a live performance from rapper Vince Staples, this new chapter of “Insecure” was really about the fundamentally strained nature of Issa and Molly’s friendship. Your 30s are a time where you sometimes find yourself cutting certain friends out of your life, and this season of “Insecure” was pitiless and brutally honest in its depiction of a wobbly BFF-ship laced with passive-aggressive resentment. This season also allowed Yvonne Orji to do some of the best work she’s ever done on the show; she’s phenomenal even when the choices her character made didn’t always make sense. Four years in, and “Insecure” remains one of the funniest and most buoyant comedies made for the small screen. – Nicholas Laskin
“I May Destroy You”
There has been no 2020 TV show more daringly personal than Michaela Coel’s drama about a woman trying to piece together the events of a night that she can only partially remember. Coel plays a famous young writer named Arabella, who is working on a follow-up book and having trouble meeting a deadline. Procrastinating, she goes out for drinks with friends one night and wakes up with flashes of violence and lost time in her memory. Uninterested in crafting a show that feels like a broad statement in the wake of #MeToo, Coel has instead delivered a boundary-pushing dramedy that defies simple categorization. As a writer and performer, Coel is navigating waters that TV has traveled through before, but she’s doing so in a style that feels completely, devastatingly new. – BT
“Little America”
The best reason to get an Apple TV+ subscription so far is this gentle, nuanced anthology series about the immigrant experience in America today. Based on the series from Epic magazine, this dramedy invited talented filmmakers from diverse backgrounds to tell personal stories, and the result is deeply empathetic and moving. Highlights include the story of a spelling prodigy who ends up running his family’s motel and the heartbreaking tale of a mother who wins a luxury cruise trip with her children only to watch them have fun without her. Delicate, empathetic, and surprising, “Little America” plays out more like a series of independent short films than what one typically expects from anthology television. – BT
“Mrs. America”
Most of the pre-premiere press around this FX on Hulu critical darling centered on the concern that it would go too far in humanizing with a woman that most proponents of equal rights believe did a great deal of harm in damaging the movement. The truth is that “Mrs. America” is much more than the story of Phyllis Schlafly (Cate Blanchett), as the writers find a way to use her time in the spotlight to highlight various elements of the Women’s Rights movement and how the political landscape transformed in the ‘70s. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that the razor-sharp dialogue is coming out of the mouths of the best ensemble so far this year. Blanchett may have been the face of this show, but the ambitious production allowed everyone a chance to shine, particularly Uzo Aduba as Shirley Chisholm, Tracey Ullman as Betty Friedan, and Rose Byrne as Gloria Steinem. In a massive ensemble, there’s not a weak link. (And whoever cast Bobby Cannavale as Tom Snyder deserves a raise.) – BT
“Normal People”
Let’s get this out of the way, a little bit first. Hulu’s “Normal People” is a little maddening, but that might be fitting considering the novel is a little frustrating too. Based on the book by Sally Rooney, “Normal People” chronicles the lives of Marianne Sheridan (Daisy Edgar-Jones) and Connell Waldron (Paul Mescal), and the on-off again romantic relationship that takes them through high school, college and beyond. Their relationship is complex, built on secrets, class division, but also miscommunication and the inability to express themselves properly which leads to all kinds of frustrating misunderstandings. Marianne is a bit of an enigma and some of her questionable choices and decisions are hard to fathom—it’s a criticism of the book too, that it’s an evocative novel, but the characters’ motivations and choices are exasperatingly vague at times. All that said—whew, that seems to be a lot of criticism doesn’t it?— as directed by Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Lenny Abrahamson (“Room,” “Frank”), “Normal People” is still extremely expressive, amazingly well shot, constructed and moving. Everyone is everything, but normal, obviously and some of the writing does speak to the complex contradictions and mysteries of the human condition. But mostly, newcomers Edgar-Jones and Mescal are terrific and have mesmerizing chemistry, and Abrahamson (and co-director Hettie Macdonald), know how to shoot the hell out of love scenes, bold and sweaty sex scenes and moments of heartbreak that will leave you melted on the floor. – RP
“Never Have I Ever”
Hysterical and moving, Mindy Kaling’s latest project proves that there can still be quality coming-of-age comedies in the Prestige TV era as long as they’re told with this much wit and heart. Kaling co-created “Never Have I Ever” with Lang Fisher, loosely basing its story of a young woman struggling with grief, identity, and dating in her childhood. The excellent Maitreyi Ramakrishnan plays Devi, a 15-year-old in Sherman Oaks whose father Mohan (Sendhil Ramamurthy) died suddenly during her Freshman year. Trying to manage her grief while also juggling the horror show that is being a high schooler nowadays is handled gracefully and hysterically in a show that feels both distinctly Devi’s story while also tapping into issues to which everyone can relate, even if high school ended for you long before Instagram was a thing. – BT