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The 10 Best Episodes of the Week (and the Best Show on Television)

By Dustin Rowles | TV | February 6, 2018 |

By Dustin Rowles | TV | February 6, 2018 |


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It was a short week with a lot of reruns, so some less than desirable episodes broke into the top 10 this week (and I’m saving Altered Carbon on Netflix until I have finished it).

This Is Us — I did not like the Super Bowl episode. I thought it was shameless, Super Bowl pandering, cheap and manipulative and maybe the beginning of the end for the series, although we see exactly what they are setting up. Full rundown here.

AP Bio — I watched the first episode of the Glenn Howerton series and thought it was OK. Then I watched the second and third episodes, and it never improved beyond OK. I love Howerton. I think his cranky, mean-spirited character on the show is fun. I just don’t like what they’re doing with the character. I like even less what they are doing with Patton Oswalt’s character. Maybe it eventually finds its footing (like The Mick did), but right now, this show doesn’t know what it wants to be.

Saturday Night Live — A hit and miss episode hosted by Natalie Portman, but I loved the rap, I thought the Tina Fey and Rachel Dratch cameos were great, and “Weekend Update” was at the top of its game. For better or worse, I’ll also not be able to get that sketch with the alien with an ass for a face out of my mind for a very long time.

The X-Files — A fairly flat episode this week that may or may not have finally disposed of the William storyline. I also really don’t appreciate that Chris Carter is going back on his word, now saying that The X-Files could continue without Gillian Anderson. The show is already an echo of itself. Don’t make it an echo of the last two seasons of the first run of the series without Mulder. The X-Files IS the Mulder and Scully show. It is NOT the Chris Carter show.

9-1-1 — This show also had a subpar episode this week. In fact, the assassination of the Peter Krause character was so thorough that it may be impossible moving ahead not to consider this a hate watch. But I will continue watching it because the emergency calls are batty fun, and I actually love Tori’s rundowns of their real-life inspirations the next day.

Riverdale — We have another murder, another mystery, AND Dark Betty is back. I also like it when Riverdale leans into its pop-culture inspirations (this week, Goodfellas), but hey! Uh, what’s up with Kevin? Is he still a character on this show or what?

Counterpart — You guys aren’t watching this, and I don’t want to ruin anything for you because you should watch it, but wow! I should’ve seen that coming, but I didn’t, and then that ending! Holy shit! What the hell? Seriously, come on aboard, folks.

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend — As the season winds down, Rebecca is finally getting her shit together. I don’t know if Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is going to get a fourth season or not, but it seems to be winding its way toward a happy resolution, even if Josh has been completely sidelined. Also, you know when White Josh sees that baby, he’s going to crumble and come begging to get back with Darryl. I’m a little teary just thinking about it.

The Super Bowl — The Super Bowl’s placement here, in two images:

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(You can buy that fantastic Brady cartoon here)

The Good Place — I find it very difficult to put into words how immensely great this series is. We all do. It’s why we end up resorting to talking about how handsome Ted Danson is or how hot Manny is or what an amazing person Jameela Jamil is. It’s an impossible show to speculate upon; there are no “issues” or “problems” worth discussing, and so every Good Place post just comes off like blathering fanboyism. What can we say? It’s a perfect show with good people imparting good messages from a very bad place. It is the best show on television right now, and we will miss it until its return this fall.