As it gears up to be the hottest summer on record all across the U.S. (thank goodness Fox News is still there to tell us there's no climate change!), why go out when you can watch great TV at home? Besides, that way you are safe from an Arianna Grande-licked doughnut.
What could scream summer more than Shark Week? If you missed the 28th season of the Discovery Channel's Shark Week extravaganza, you can catch the videos online. One fact we learned from Shark Week is researchers estimate that 100 million sharks are killed per year by humans, a conservative estimate. Sharks gestate for at least a year and take as long as humans to reach puberty. So we are killing off the sharks for dinner and souvenirs faster than they can repopulate.
Then there's the return of everyone's favorite B-movie franchise. Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! is coming to Syfy July 22. But this year, we get more than a sequel, or son of a sequel. We get Sharknado Week, July 18-25. In addition to Sharknado regulars Ian Ziering and Tara Reid, you will also see Shark Tank's Mark Cuban as President of the United States and Fox News shrike Ann Coulter as Vice President. Michele Bachmann plays herself, of course. Make some cool drinks, sit back, and enjoy the bloodbath.
Speaking of bloodbaths, we have been watching the chum in the water as the Republican candidates for president try to out-awful each other. So far Donald Trump has a big lead, but Jeb Bush is catching up fast. We couldn't be happier that Trump's been dumped by NBC and Univision. What's creepy is that as the backlash against his racist comments grows, so do his poll numbers.
Meanwhile, Jeb Bush was quicker to defend a guacamole recipe than he was his own Mexican-born wife, which should disturb Republican women at least. And he's decided �" from the vantage point of the 1% �" that Americans aren't working hard enough, even though we work more than any other country on the planet. It was a comment reminiscent of his father's not knowing how much milk cost.
We'll have plenty of time to watch these guys self-destruct, of course, but don't forget what's said in these early days, like Bobby Jindal, whose parents are immigrants from India, claiming the Confederate flag is a symbol of his Southern heritage and as such must continue to stand in Louisiana; or Rick Santorum saying the SCOTUS decision on marriage equality proved he was right when he said it would open the door for "man-on-dog" relationships, as he famously said in 2003.
The suspension of disbelief required to listen to any of these guys and their Fox News handlers is so much more than what's required to watch sci-fi, we know which we choose. If you haven't been streaming Sense8 (and we were late to that party), you will want to check it out. This latest offering from the Wachowskis (Bound, The Matrix, V for Vendetta) was created, written and executive-produced by Andy, Lana, and Babylon 5 's J. Michael Straczynski. It's something else. Literally. The show has got a lot of hype, in part because Netflix is better at promoting their original series than any TV network ever. (If you haven't seen Orange Is the New Black, the third season of which landed for Pride month, or House of Cards, the third season of which landed in February, why not? Both Emmy-winning shows will return for fourth seasons in 2016.) A side note here about Sense8: Lana Wachowski, formerly Larry, transitioned in 2010. She was awarded HRC's Visibility Award in 2012 at the annual gala in San Francisco. There she spoke about her struggles with identity and her role as part of "the Wachowski Brothers" for years. Now, as the most successful out trans person in Hollywood, Lana is telling her story, and has said part of that story is having trans characters in Sense8.
Sense8 (a play on "sensate") premiered in June. As Netflix describes the series, "The plot revolves around eight strangers from different parts of the world who suddenly become mentally and emotionally linked: Sensates. The show aims to explore subjects that its writers felt science fiction shows tend to ignore or skim through, such as politics, identity, sexuality, gender and religion." Especially identity and sexuality. There are eight strangers, each from a different culture and different part of the global village: Mexico City, Nairobi, Mumbai, Reykjavik, Seoul, Berlin, Chicago, and yes, San Francisco. A tie that binds them is they each have a secret. But what initiates their Sensate-ism is each has experienced a vision of the violent death of Anjelica "Angel" Turing (activist-actress Daryl Hannah, returning to her Blade Runner roots in this series), who is revealed to be essential to their connection.
Once the Sensates are viable �" that is, they have all had their vision �" they share more than telepathy. They can share their skills, which are, of course, mad. The eight Sensates are helped in uncovering their "mission" via the mysterious stranger Jonas (the super-sexy award-winning British actor Naveen Andrews of Lost ), who is trying to protect them from Whispers (Tony-nominated musical actor Terrence Mann), a Sensate who has turned against Sensate-ism and runs an organization focused on eliminating all Sensates, one way or another. Some of this is reminiscent of ABC's V, which ran from 2009-11, and is on DVD.
Among the eight Sensates are four women, two queer couples and four people of color, all with different ethnic/national backgrounds. This is more than the usual "drop in one LGBT person and one person of color, and if possible, make them one and the same" brand of multiculturalism on the tube. (Not to say there aren't a few stereotypes tossed into the mix in Sense8, like #notallAsians do martial arts.) Among the cast members is Jamie Clayton, who plays Nomi Marks, a trans woman and hacktivist living in San Francisco. Like Lana Wachowski, Nomi is a trans lesbian and has a girlfriend, Amanita (Freema Agyeman, Doctor Who ).
One of the things Lana Wachowski has brought to Sense8 is realism in the midst of sci-fi. Jamie Clayton is a trans actress, bringing verisimilitude to the role. Sense8 also includes a gay man among the Sensates, Lito Rodriguez (hunky Miguel Angel Silvestre), a closeted Spanish actor from Bilbao living in Mexico City whose boyfriend is Hernando (Mexican actor/musician Alfonso Herrera). One star to watch in this cast is British actress Tuppence Middleton, who plays Riley Blue, the Icelandic DJ with, yes, a secret. She is, as they say across the pond, ace, and figures strongly. Sense8 is a complex and sometimes meandering series (think Lost ) that could have used someone reeling it in, which no one over at Netflix seems to do, but the strong performances and mystery elements hold one's attention. If you are one of the people hanging in with Bryan Fuller's hallucinogenic Hannibal on NBC, or are addicted to BBC America's Orphan Black, then you will be cool with Sense8. It reminds the TV-watching world that there are people who aren't straight white men in it.
Cannibal rites
Speaking of Hannibal, a series we have been obsessed with since its first season in 2013, the July 9 episode featured one of the most erotic lesbian sex scenes we've ever seen on TV. This show is always out-doing itself on stunning visuals, but the scene between Dr. Alana Bloom (Caroline Dhavernas) and Margot Verger (Katharine Isabelle) was extraordinary. Borrowing from Ingmar Bergman's iconic film Persona, the scene managed to create lush, explicit images via the use of a kaleidoscope. It was amazing, and so unexpected. This episode also featured yet another sensual/sexual scene between Hannibal (Mads Mikkelsen) and Will (Hugh Dancy). Such a tease. What happens next? Previews for the remaining episodes in the season suggest a lot of nudity and cannibalistic fetishism. We are on Team #LetHannibalLive, so we are hoping NBC reconsiders the cancellation of this incredible series, or that Netflix picks it up for a fourth season.
Speaking of lesbian sex scenes, we were a little surprised at how much ABC was promoting the menage a trois between Karen (Yunjin Kim) and her friends Alec and Vivian on Mistresses. This show is one of our guilty pleasures. Seeing the tentative then sensual embrace of Karen's bi-curious experience was intriguing to watch. We're pretty sure a lot of women are DVRing this season for a reason. We guess this is what is meant by women's sexuality being fluid.
Not so fluid is HBO's True Detective, which is still holding with the straight white men meme, but season two, which debuted June 21, is doing something completely different than its first season. We aren't sure how we feel about the paradigm shift, but we've watched American Horror Story. We know this is a thing now. Gone are Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson. Gone also is the noirish landscape of Louisiana, replaced by what HBO refers to as "the scorched landscapes of California." This season's main stars are also film actors: Colin Farrell, Vince Vaughn, Rachel McAdams and Taylor Kitsch (The Normal Heart ). Farrell is compelling as Detective Ray Velcoro, a stressed single dad and a cop who walks ethical lines. Vaughn is the bad guy Frank Semyon, a career criminal or businessman, depending on who's asking. Kitsch plays California Hughway Patrol officer Paul Woodrugh. The most complex character in this multi-layered season is McAdams' Detective Antigone "Ani" Bezzerides of the Ventura County Sheriff's Office Criminal Investigation Division.
Antigone as a name is a bit heavy-handed, and the character is written that way. In a series that showcases straight white men and their propensity for violence, the women are background characters: wives, girlfriends, victims. Ani is not. She's both one of the boys �" hard-drinking and hard-partying, has a knife and is of indeterminate sexuality �" and distinctly Other. These may be the best roles McAdams and Vaughn, who have slogged through a lot of romantic comedies, have had in a while. It's worth watching to see what they bring to those roles and how this season shapes up vs. its stiffest competition, the show's previous season.
FX debuted Denis Leary's (Rescue Me ) new series Sex Drugs Rock Roll on July 16. Creator Leary also stars as Johnny Rock, lead singer of the fictional 90s band The Heathens. Johnny Rock is now 25 years older and out of cash as well as opportunities. The hard-partying 90s rocker is trying to get his aging group, which self-destructed, back together. Leary is always good, FX has a proven track record of solid series, so this is worth a look, especially if the 90s was your era. With singer John Corbett (United States of Tara) and Elizabeth Gillies (Victorious ).
The worst TV story of the week had to be the revelation that Bill Cosby really is a rapist. For many, the unsealing of court documents from 2005 in which Cosby acknowledged buying drugs specifically to give to his victims didn't alter our perceptions. You either always believed the dozens of women who came forward saying he had drugged and raped them, or you believed Cosby.
Whoopi Goldberg got into a shouting match on The View after the news broke. Backing her up was the show's ever-problematic token lesbian, Raven-Symone, who co-starred with Cosby on The Cosby Show for five years. Goldberg said, "No one has convicted him, he has not been arrested, and the bottom line is that's the law: innocent until proven guilty." She compared Cosby's accusers (over 40 women, who include the women in the sealed court documents, as well as African American supermodel Beverly Johnson, model Janice Dickinson, and more than a dozen actresses) of being liars. Goldberg asserted, "He has not been proven a rapist." Then she made some of us gasp as she joked, "As a former Quaalude user, the 80s were, they weren't fun for everybody, clearly." Yikes.
Raven-Symone added, "I don't really like talking about it that much because he's the reason I'm on this panel in the first place, he gave me my first job. But at the same time, you need the proof, then I'll be able to give my judgment."
On July 8, Centric, a BET-owned station, dropped The Cosby Show from its network "until further notice," according to a company spokesperson. Read that as "forever and ever." Bounce TV pulled Bill Cosby's other sitcom Cosby, which aired 1996-2000 and starred the comedian and Phylicia Rashad, who had also co-starred on Cosby Show . On July 9, the AP reported that a statue of Cosby was removed from Disney's Hollywood Studio theme park.
Cosby broke the color barrier on TV, was America's dad for years and one of the best-known comedians in America for decades. That his legacy will be that of a serial rapist rather than these other things is shocking. But more shocking still is that TV celebrity has such prominence in our culture that for decades Cosby was able to elude any punishment for his crimes against women, and only now, at 77, is being held to any accounting. Marc Lamont Hill, CNN commentator and host of BET News, tweeted his shock over how the Cosby scandal has played out, noting, "Some of y'all would rather believe in an international conspiracy to railroad Cosby than to believe the stories of dozens of women. Crazy."
So for the bad news and the good news, high drama and the low comedy, the sci-fi and the reality shows, you know you really must stay tuned.