Ryan Murphy’s new show for Netflix indulges without excesses and fires off shots without finding a target, Sam Brooks writes. Ryan Murphy is a polarising figure in television. After a dodgy start to his career – the tonally bonkers Popular and the famously scuzzy Nip/Tuck – he achieved proper mainstream success with Glee, and pivoted … Read more
New Netflix movie The Tall Girl was roundly mocked before it even came out. Josie Adams, a tall girl herself, reviews it. “You know that really, really, really tall girl you go to school with? The one that people call LeBron, Skyscraper, Patty long legs?” That’s Jodi, the 6-foot-1 protagonist of The Tall Girl. I’m … Read more
Facing streaming giants with multi-billion dollar budgets, the state broadcaster has announced it expects a big 2020 loss. Duncan Greive goes to find out why TVNZ CEO Kevin Kenrick is still smiling. Kevin Kenrick is dreaming big. “I think our biggest competition, because of their ability to wrap their hands around the digital revenue streams, … Read more
In these days of alienation, singletons need all the help they can get. But who is doing love right? Only the hottest couple in Fountain Lakes, explains Don Rowe. There are a lot of unhealthy behaviours on the television folks, a lot of cheating, philandering, and promiscuity. From Game of Thrones to Euphoria, our stars … Read more
Terrace House is so real that it can’t be anything but fake. Uther Dean writes about what makes the Japanese Netflix dating reality show so addictive. Do you know what a parasocial relationship is? Because I promise that you’re in heaps of them. Parasocial relationships are the ones that occur between you and the people … Read more
On the back of season 3 of Netflix’s hit teen drama 13 Reasons Why, Katie Meadows argues that the show’s unremitting darkness poses real risks to young viewers. Two years after it first aired, and a month before the release of season 3, Netflix announced it was at long last cutting the painfully graphic depiction … Read more
What are you going to be watching in September? The Spinoff rounds up everything that’s coming to streaming services this month, including Netflix, Lightbox, Neon, Amazon Prime and TVNZ on Demand. Click here to read our listings for August. The Biggies The Good Place (Netflix, Season 4 weekly, September 24) It’s weird that the smartest, … Read more
If you’re a fan of thrilling skill-based reality contests, Blown Away is the show you’ve been waiting for. Tara Ward reveals why you’ll fall in love with Netflix’s latest sensation. If you think the Earth needs another reality TV show like it needs a glass light fitting that looks like a diver’s helmet, then think … Read more
One part telenovela, one part family drama, one part addictive love story. Sam Brooks reviews Jane the Virgin, the great show with an unfortunate name that should be your next Netflix binge. The following piece contains very mild spoilers for Jane the Virgin. While watching the last season of Jane the Virgin, one of my … Read more
Stranger Things owns all the oxygen for period-piece teen TV, but Ireland’s impossibly charming Derry Girls deserves as much acclaim, writes Duncan Greive. There’s a reason why high school is the backdrop to so much fantastic television. That cusp between childhood and the adult world is ripe with dramatic possibility. Relationships are made which last … Read more
Roll Red Roll is a brutal, painfully illuminating documentary on the Steubenville High School rape case, a shocking crime that made headlines worldwide. Emily Writes reviews. This review discusses rape and sexual violence August 11, 2012: two teenage boys rape an unconscious teenage girl as two of their peers watch and take photos on their … Read more
Laura Vincent explores the historic and pop cultural roots of Moira Rose, the narcissist soap actress and breakout character from the offbeat, beloved sitcom Schitt’s Creek. Who could have predicted Schitt’s Creek, that most low-key, questionably named sitcom, would bear such fruit in former daytime soap actress Moira Rose? Iconic is a word too quickly … Read more
What are all those shows you scroll through on Netflix with stars you don’t recognise and premises that are so out-there you can’t believe they actually got made? Wonder no more. We’ve all done it. We’ve all gone to Netflix for something to watch, scrolled through 102 shows that we’d totally watch if we had the … Read more
What are you going to be watching in August? The Spinoff rounds up everything that’s coming to streaming services this month, including Netflix, Lightbox, Neon, Amazon Prime and TVNZ on Demand. Click here to read our listings for July. The Biggies https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pt0QuaQ0huk Veronica Mars (Neon, Seasons 1-4 + Movie, August 2) Praise be, because our … Read more
Sam Brooks reviews the final season of Orange is the New Black and finds a fitting end to the series’ tremendous legacy. Light spoilers for the final season of Orange is the New Black. “It was maybe four percent of my life, but it was enough to change absolutely everything, and I have no idea … Read more
The fourth season of Queer Eye drops today on Netflix. Sam Brooks reflects on his difficult relationship with the show, and where it sits in mainstream culture. For depressingly many people, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy was an introduction not just to gay culture, but to real-life gay men. A makeover show featuring five gay men … Read more
After waiting almost two years for the return of the 80s sci-fi/horror Netflix hit Stranger Things, Alice Webb-Liddall binged the third season on Monday night, and still sobbing from the finale, reviewed the laughter, violence, and heartbreaking sadness. Who would have thought that there was a place with more rats than Titirangi. Luckily for the … Read more
For decades fans have argued over the best Star Trek captain. No longer. Today we present the definitive ranking of every main crew member aboard a televised Federation starship (or space station). Every Star Trek fan has wrestled with it: is Kirk a better captain than Picard? Is Archer better than both? The captain you … Read more
What’re you going to be watching throughout July? The Spinoff rounds up everything that’s coming to Netflix, Lightbox, Neon, Amazon Prime and TVNZ on Demand this month. The Biggies https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEG3bmU_WaI Stranger Things (Netflix, Season 3, July 4) For the few who don’t know, Stranger Things follows the adventures of several 13-year-old Dungeons and Dragons enthusiasts … Read more
Gwyn Easterbrook-Smith reviews Bonding, the story of a grad student dominatrix and her gay best friend whom she employs as her assistant. As an academic who researches the media representation of sex work, and who paid my way through post-grad by doing sex work, including pro-domme (professional dominatrix) work, it could have been designed in … Read more
Alex Casey talks to Brough Johnson, co-founder of Narrative Muse, about a NZ-made platform that puts the spotlight on women and non-binary creators. If you don’t think representation in popular culture matters, you should really familiarise yourself with The Scully Effect. The study, conducted across 2000 women in America, revealed that nearly two thirds of … Read more
New Zealand’s film industry has always been about location, location, location, but what about everything else? What about all the stuff that comes after filming? Jihee Junn talks to Department of Post’s Katie Hinsen at the company’s new state-of-the-art headquarters about her mission to make Auckland into a post-production powerhouse. For much of late 2016, … Read more
The pay TV giant has lost customers, it’s making less out of each one, and has cut prices. Yet Duncan Greive reckons their annual result shows they might yet find a way out of the woods. Sky has completed a highly unusual feat in legacy media – reporting an increase in underlying profit, up 2.6% … Read more
Sky’s bold new strategic plan reveals ambitions to offer unbundled content, online only access and an Apple TV-style box – all while keeping its pricey satellite service. After the commerce commission denied it permission to merge with Vodafone New Zealand, Sky outwardly appeared defeated and deflated. The merger was its technology play, its strategy and … Read more
With the coffin lid closing on the first season of The Casketeers, Alex Casey looks back at some of the greatest comedy moments from the TVNZ reality show. You haven’t truly lived until you’ve seen a makeup tutorial for a corpse. Francis Tipene is hunched over a casket, Thin Lizzy brush in hand and tongue … Read more
Alex Casey reviews The Casketeers, an ingenious documentary set within the four walls of an Onehunga funeral home. It’s only two weeks into 2018 and we might already have stumbled upon a frontrunner for local comedy show of the year. An outrageous and over-eager claim, perhaps, but who cares? If TVNZ1’s hilarious documentary gem The Casketeers … Read more
Eager to outrun the tide of media irrelevance creeping at its doorstep, TVNZ has finally come round to the new world order by going ‘big on local, big on audiences, and bigger OnDemand’. Jihee Junn sits down with some of the company’s biggest execs to hear about their plan for the future. Ever the quick-witted … Read more
Don Rowe dips his toes back in the murky waters of the Upside Down with the Stranger Things mobile game. It’s almost inevitable these days that any somewhat successful media product will be iterated across every platform and medium like some entertainment rat king – “Popular Thing: The Movie, The Boardgame, Now a Book, graphic … Read more
If you’ve seen the ‘Māori’ episode of kids show Justin Time Go, you’ll know how batshit it is. Steph Matuku breaks down the mess that is ‘Let’s Haka Dance!’ I don’t care what the experts say, telly is a great babysitter. That’s especially true in the hell zone from 5pm when my kids are tired … Read more