The Prestige TV Podcast - Power Ranking the Streaming Services for January

Episode Date: February 1, 2021

Juliet Litman and Chris Ryan get together to rank the five most important streaming services from the month of January. Hosts: Juliet Litman and Chris Ryan Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I never thought I'd be standing here, but my city needed me. He's charismatic, open-minded, independent. You're all in on this guy? I'm very open to the idea of a robot police force. Thank you for reminding me. R.B. Meskiman is pretty worked up about the coyote population. She thinks we should pay for their birth control. I've got your number, Bremer. You're not going to last two months.

She's scary. What's your beef with me? You don't know what you're doing? You want to know the real reason I ran for mayor? My daughter. useless old man. You ran for mayor to impress your daughter. She must be over the moon. I hate that we had to move into this gross old mayor house. Your wife makes a great point, sir. She's like teenage daughter. Sorry, it is very confusing in L.A.

Some to TV concierge, the ringer's guide to the vast streaming landscape. We're here to help you figure out what to watch, catch up on the latest phenomena, and just really talk television. To do so, I'm Juliet Lippman. I host a television podcast called Bachelor Party about reality TV. a bachelor and i'm joined by my compatriot chris ryan who is a tv maestro co-host of the watch chris hello i play the orchestra that is television today we are not discussing one television show we are doing the streaming power rankings for the month of january today is february first we have 31 days to consider what of 31 days it was so much happened more cable news than i would have liked shout out to abby philip my favorite cnn anchor is your favorite cable news anchor, Chris? That's a great question. There's no competition for me. I was not familiar with any of these people until November 3rd, 2020. Panelist or host? I think it could be any cable news personality.

I've been watching a lot of CNBC now. So I have a CNBC in Bloomberg. So I've been getting really into like the various people that they bring on because they have like, they have no television training. They just start screaming up each other. It's so, it's so good. It's so raw. That sounds really great. like something, if you're missing the shouting of the Trump era, go ahead straight to CBC. That's right. Anyway, we're here to discuss the top five streaming networks for the month of January. And I made the list and Chris is going to comment on it.

We're going to count down from five to one. I just want to share some of my methodology in doing this. And kind of like the central question for me was if you have a set budget, which most living people do and it could only get three to five streaming networks per month, which are the three to five that we would say, you should have. And so that's kind of like what's guiding this list here. Of course, it takes into account new releases each month and also like the totality of that back catalog. I think, you know, we're really TV people, but of course you have to factor movies into this. Chris is also a movie

person. Yeah, now you do. Yeah. But you do, right? Like, Chris, if you're just recommending one service based on the movie catalog, like, what do you recommend? Well, if I was somebody who cared about new movies, I would get HBO Max because they're the only streaming network that's committed to releasing day and date on the service. And so this past weekend, we had little things, which started Denzel Washington and Romney Malick and Jared Lotto. Too scary for me. How was that? Yeah, but like that is, it was not good. But it was definitely like on Friday night, I could just tell that like my entire timeline was watching little things. Right. And that's a big piece of it, right? Like, what are other people watching and how do you participate in that conversation? Do you want

participate in that conversation? We try to explicate and excavate some of that on this pod, hopefully to some success. But I think that's kind of like what you think about or what I've been thinking about it as I've been making this ranking. I just want to note, Netflix is also trying to be in the movie game. It's just because they are not,

they never had a relationship to the theaters. Oh, that's not completely true, but they had a much weaker relationship to theaters with their movies. But Netflix is doing one new movie a week for all of 2020. That was like their big, big ad campaign, or 2021. A Carrie Mulligan, Ray Fein's movie came out on Friday.

It's so wild. Like, that just happened. No one's talking about it, really. Yeah. That might be because it's about British archaeology, but I still... The dig? Yeah. The dig was on my home screen on Netflix, and I just couldn't pull the trigger.

I just couldn't do it. I just couldn't do it. All right. Without further ado, shall we get into it? Yeah. Number five, Amazon Prime. I did not think it was a good month for Amazon Prime. Probably their biggest releases of the month were one night in Miami, which is significant.

We'll talk about it in a second. That's the movie. And Flack, which I plan to watch. But there's not been enough momentum for me to do so yet. And so I just thought it wasn't really a strong one for them. So that's the Anna Pacquins show, right? That's the Anna Pacquins show, but being a publicist. It has my name written all over it.

What was the name of the lady Lizzie something who ran someone over in the Hamptons? The infamous Lizzie Grubman, still alive, not in jail, I don't think. And, yes, she ran someone over outside a club in the Hamptons. That was about 2005, six. It was really a peak time for somebody culture. What a time to be alive. I don't want a time to be alive. One Night in Miami is on Amazon Prime,

and it is Regina King's directorial debut, capturing one night in Miami with the famous and formerly, famous and real people, Malcolm Acts, Jim Brown, and Cassius Clay before he became Muhammad Ali. And Sam Cook, excuse me. One of our favorite actors in this movie. Leslie Oatombe, or Kingsley Van Deere. Yeah.

Leslie Odom as well. And then my personal fave is Alvis Hodges because he was on leverage, which was a TBS show that I watched in the previous decade. I love that guy. He's on a city on a hill now too. Oh, right. I love him. He's like super underrated. But I think this movie will have a long life. But again, like, it's building up to the Oscars, which is not until April this year. I'm saving all of my Oscar movies this year. I can't keep it straight about when this stuff is getting released. I feel like people have been talking about Nomad Land for like three and a half months. It's still not. out on streaming. I'm just going to put together my own film festival and jam out all these Oscar movies at once. That sounds fun. Yeah. Got have stuff to look forward to.

Amazon, you know, we covered the Wilds on TV Concierge back in the beginning of January. I finished that, by the way. Yeah. Good twist, right? At the end? Amazing twist. And I just, if you got, if anybody's looking for a elevated network show right now, like watch the Wilds. It is a

super entertaining. Yeah. It's funny you say that because over the weekend, I did a lot of reading because I was like, wow, I've watched everything. And I was just thinking like, I really wish I had more of the Wilds to watch. I wish I hadn't watched it. Because I think that's the best thing to be on Prime in a while that came out in December. And I think it's really December show. It's why I don't have it on this list, but it is still available on Prime. So check it out. But nonetheless. So many streaming shows to really only get one shot and they clearly made the Wilds knowing it was going to be multiple seasons. I mean, the end is a huge

twist. If it wasn't coming back, it would be so infuriating. You know, the show is a clear descendant of Lost and the season finale twist is on the same level, I would say. All right. Let's move on. Number four. I think this might be controversial. I'm curious to hear what you think. HBO Max coming in at number four.

We happen to love HBO Max, but here's what they had in January. Lockdown. The Euphoria bonus episode. Astonishing. Loved them. Was it good? Yeah. Love both of them.

Okay. Search party. I never watched, but like I'm wondering if I should get into it. I personally think it's having a rough... fourth season. I never really cared for Alia Shackett. I'm sorry. I love Arrusted Development. She was like, maybe it was my least favorite part of the show. That would probably be a barrier to entry with Shur's party. There's a lot of her.

It's just become very, very, very out there. Like, I think it started out and it was kind of like this extension of like hipster serial podcast, like, you know, message board investigations and like what happens if that takes over your real life and that kind of obsession. and now it's just become like three or four different things at once and they don't really seem to be in agreement with one another. I remember when it was on TBS. I was like, oh, I think it was TBS, which by the way,

even the thought of like tuning into TBS, which I did regularly for quite a while in my life seems like so weird. Like who would sit down for a TBS show like 10 p.m. on a Thursday? Nobody supports cable channels that are in the 40s and 50s on the channel guide like you do. TBS, USA. You're there. From like 2008. the 2014, USA was definitely the most important channel in my TV Rolodex in my lineup. I'm not joking. I'm really not. I owned Leverage, aforementioned on DVD. I still have it somewhere.

And like white collar is like definitely my favorite show. So whatever. Anyway. So HBO Max, they add a couple of releases, but what is the thing that you think is controversial about this pick? That it like overall has a great catalog because it has the HBO catalog. And like many other streaming networks this month picked up some like exclusives. Like there's this month really marked a lot of shows not a lot, but some big shows moving off of Netflix onto sort of like their home

mothership. And for HBO Max, that's Gossip Girl. In advance of the Gossip Girl reboot, which is coming probably I guess, I would guess in the summer. But I think like in general, I would recommend HBO Max. He does have a great catalog. It also, I believe it has the O.C.

Like, it just has a lot of great stuff and that has every HBO show. Like, I watched a succession pilot recently. I was just like, why not? I was going to say I am anticipating a Sex and the City revival coming. They're obviously going to do another season of that, but I wonder whether or not you'll start seeing people to be like, I'm doing a Sex in the City rewatch. Now, I don't know if it necessarily plays as well now as it did back when it was on,

but I could imagine, like, I can imagine more memes coming out about that, right? Oh, yeah, absolutely. I think that also with like City Life dead end shows about City Life, have a different kind of appeal because it's really nostalgic. Like, did you happen to watch the Fran Leibowitz show on Netflix? Pretended City, yeah. Pretendence City, directed by Martin Scorsese. We'll come back to it in a minute.

But that had a real bittersweet quality of, like, God, like, the type of city she's talking about not only doesn't exist because of like gentrification, but like because the pandemic. We should make a hard to watch. You and I should make a pretend it's a city, but like it's set in Scottsdale. Nothing would be different. We're in Florida. where I heard everything's open.

There's no rules. That's right. Pretend it's a city, Tallahassee. With a network like HBO Max, would you ever consider just like cutting that service for a month and coming back to it when like you let stuff accumulate?

I'm not good at like playing the margins like that. Like, you know, like I think that I just sign up for these things. I've considered somewhat of a professional obligation to kind of be aware of what's on these services. Sure, of course. So I think I'm too lazy to like, get out.

Like I always, I noticed that like, I think that conversation happened around Game of Thrones. Like, ooh, I'm gonna like unsubscribe from HBO until Game of Thrones comes back. It's like HBO typically has something decent and worth watching on all year long. Yeah. And particularly now, I mean,

when you do go through the shows that they have available to you, it's like pretty astounding. But there was just nothing, there wasn't like a big. I think it's worth noting that this has been the longest I feel like I have gone, HBO has gone without a sudden. Sunday night like Cornerstone show. Because around this time last year... Are you including the undoing

in that? Well, yeah, I am. I mean, I think around this time last year, they, I think outsider had just started right around the end of January or February because I think Andy and I were talking about it before lockdown happened. So it must have been some time in February. Kaya would probably know actually better than I would. But all I'm saying is that it's weird that there's not like a Sunday night show on HBO right now. But that just is, that speaks to the kind of glut and the pipeline. right now. It's like a little bit backed up. Yeah, because of the pandemic. And I will say, I actually like really felt that over the weekend for me. There was nothing really that I needed to catch up on and also like no appointment viewing last night and no football on. So I was just like

really nothing but books. Me on the printed word. All right, let's move on to number three. Peacock. Interesting. I think we just have to reckon with the fact that the most popular television show right now is probably the office. People fucking love. of the office and that as of January 1st moved to Peacock and there's some bonuses and some extras. And if you go to Peacock, you also get Parks and Iraq and all the other NBC shows. So I'm currently watching Mr. Mayer on Peacock every week. Oh my God. I'm really excited about it.

I haven't gone to it yet, but I really am excited because I love Ted Dantzance. How is it? The last two episodes have been really, really good. So the first two, I think they're kind of like feeling it out. And now the last two have been kind of like LA 30 Rock. Wow. Oh my God. I'm really excited. Because I saw the billboard for it when I was in L.A. in December. And I was like, huh, that looks good. I'm going to give that a shot. So that's thrilling to hear. Yeah, Holly Hunter plays like a progressive, like, city council person or like she works in the mayor's office and she's always trying to like save beehives and stuff like that. And she's, she's fantastic on it. Bobby Moynihan's really funny on it. It's a really good ensemble. That's awesome. I'm really excited to watch it.

I'm glad to hear it. Thank you so much, Chris. You're welcome. I think that the other piece about Peacock is that like during these quote uncertain times, close quote, the like lighthearted sitcom fair just like really is easy to watch and very comforting and pleasant. And so like for right now, I would definitely recommend spending your money on Peacock because they just have a lot of that to offer. Yeah, definitely. They have that NBC libraries is really, really huge, although they won't have Seinfeld. Right, because that's on Hulu for a few years.

didn't make the last of this month. And Friends is on HBO Max because it's Warner. Yeah. Right. I also just want to say they have like some pretty good movies on Peacock. They starting January 1st, like just for my personal interest. Like I saw that they had, um, quite a few rom-coms, including like definitely maybe. They have the holiday. They just have like a bunch of movies. I was like, okay, cool. And I do think that like in a in a downtime and there's like no show you're dying for, like a comfort movie is very appealing to me. Yeah. It's pretty. I have now. started if like I'm in the mood for a kind of movie. So like let's say like a John Grisham courtroom thriller or something like that. You just Google like movies like the firm. Then you get like inspired like, oh, I'm going to watch this one. And then you click on that and then you can find it's like is it on Peacock? Is it on HBO Max? Is it free on prime? Like it's become like the new way I kind of watch movies rather than like renting them from iTunes or something. Yeah. Yeah. Totally. I also like I feel like I rely on the recommendations after I finish something a lot more than I

used to. Have you used the Netflix function where you just play something random? No, I haven't done that yet. Just because Netflix has a lot of crap. And on that note, number two for the month of January, Netflix. Wow. Okay. So I would just, do you, would you go into this assuming Netflix is number one, like starts out at number one every month just because of the sheer amount that they give you? They've got a lot of hits. Yeah. So Bridgeton has been watched by 82 million households, watch, meaning like at least one user on the account has played two minutes of one episode. I think that's what it is. That's a lot.

Even if they only watch two minutes, like that's a lot, a lot. They're still engaging with Bridgerton, right? Yes, Bridgetton came out on Christmas Day and it's like still still going. Also, I would say it's a real win for Netflix because I think unlike Stranger Things, I think that like Regéjejean Page is famous now. I don't think the rest of the cast is particularly famous. I think Bridgetton itself is like a phenomenon, but I don't think the actors are like, you know, swatied out offers. Yeah, like the girl from Dairy Girls hasn't quite popped yet, but I feel like maybe next season she will.

Yeah. Yeah. I think said season two is going to be about the oldest brother Anthony, we'll have the books go as well. But they clearly set it up to like be a world that can be explored and that was smart. And so I just think it's like a really big win for them. Yeah. And they have production coming back later. I also think it's important for them on like an inside baseball level is I don't know that

I would say that the Ryan Murphy shows have really, like, grabbed the attention of the population. It definitely seems like first at-bat, Shonda kind of knocked it out of the part. Totally. And it's not even the show she's most, she herself is most steeply involved in. That's the Delvey show coming later this year.

And before that, good news, they were able to share that Lu Pan, the French show, was off to a faster start than even the Queen's Gambit, which is 85 million viewers. Right. And I had a great time watching Lu Pan. What about you?

I think I faded a little bit on Lupin, like after a couple of episodes, but I will say I am really energized by the rollout of Lupon, which is like five episodes, six month break, five episodes. I want to see more of these networks do more creative things with the way they roll out shows. And, you know, Andy and I have been talking a lot about this on the watch about how we hope shows in the future take advantage of the fact that they are not confined by like expectations of a network. and can do things like, here's a 25-minute special. Here's a three-episode arc that goes up at once. You know, like, I want more stuff like that. Like, the Euphoria specials is a really good example. Like, those were born out of the fact that they couldn't shoot season two

the way they wanted to. So they decided to make these two, largely like two-hander episodes where it's like one character talking to another for the entire episode. And they're dynamite. Like, I just, I think it really deepened my appreciation for that show. I hope more shows take chances like that. I think I would like that more than the show itself. I should check it out.

I also, I just found like the Parisian setting really exciting. And I will say this is kind of the gateway. If you liked it, there's actually a lot of good French television on Netflix. Call My Agent Season 4 came out. I think there's a little bit of a call my agent buzz happening, though at least there is among our colleagues. And I thought it was just kind of like, you know, I watch a lot of British television.

I know that you do as well. It's obviously a big part of Amazon and Netflix in particular. But like there's also, there's just a lot of other television. you could be watching, and I think that opens that up. Yeah, I mean, there's obviously there's the wanderlust aspect of it. Like, you get to sort of vicariously travel to these other places and just experience Paris in a way that you won't be able to for a while.

But I would also say that when it comes to some of these TV shows from other countries, like France, like some of the Scandinavian shows and England, you're basically seeing like an elevated version of American television that American TV has struggled to make. because a lot of like the brain drain from the networks and everybody going to streamers means that you're just not getting like a really solid mystery

or a really solid kind of romantic workplace dromedy like the way Call My Agent does. There's no reason why there isn't like a network version of Call My Agent. It seems like the biggest no-brainer and I don't know whether it's entourage fatigue or something but I think it's a great, great show and it's such a great idea for show

and they could knock those out and like, tell me why you can't have like Angelina Jolie on the American version of Call My Agent. Like that would just be so good. This is I only know it about that, which is that American agencies are so much bigger and like shittier. Like they just are like,

they're like little machines like in L.A. the CIA building is like called the Death Star. And yeah, the Call My Agent Agency is like on the second floor. It's a small boutique. Yeah. It's just like totally. It's like above a Chinese takeout.

Yeah. Yeah. It's just like in some random business around DeSommel. of Paris. And so that I think is why. But, but your point is well taken. It's ultimately like a workplace comedy, right? And I love that. So let's get more of it. But I think identify like some other kind of like, even it was about like a sports agency because it actually had to be smaller. Like that would be interesting too. Um, Netflix also had Cobra Kai this month, which I, you know,

is far popular with men. I'm not one, but I've heard that. Um, and you know, Netflix is like just a poll position every month. But ultimately, I felt the most important streaming network to have in the month of January was Disney Plus. And I come to this as someone who's never, who has not seen a Marvel movie in about 10 years, but I really love Wanda Vision and now want to ingest as much Elizabeth Olson and Paul Bettney media as I possibly can. And this is a revelation for me. 10 year anniversary of margin call. Love that movie. Shout out to Bettney's accent in that movie. Yeah. This is the beginning of the end for all of us because there will not be more than two weeks without new Marvel or Star Wars content on Disney Plus for the rest of the year, I think.

And that is a game changer. The idea that essentially they are taking over the appointment viewing, you have to watch this as soon as it's up. The thing that I do not understand and the only demerit I will put on Disney Plus is why they are releasing these things at Thursday at midnight. I don't have like, there is no good explanation for why these don't either drop Thursday at 8 or Friday night. Like the weird thing where you're like, I get up in the morning on Friday and have to like avoid finding out Mandalorian or Wanda Vision spoilers until I am done work.

I guess that's my own like cross to bear. And like I should just not be a social media addict. But I don't understand why they don't have like the same way HBO max or, you know, they'll drop episodes. Like let's get back to dropping episodes a night is all I'm saying. Also, what's wrong with a Saturday night drop? Because then you really own Saturdays and Sundays. Do you have any Saturday night plans? No. Don't make me feel that. I read an entire book on Saturday because I didn't have anything to do.

I didn't do anything on Saturday. I think also, you know, I have seen some Marvel movies. It really not for a while. It just became like too unwieldy for me. And I was like, I don't really feel like having to be a part of this. So I kind of dropped out. I have no problem with it. And like I like that people have something to be passionate about. And it's like cool when there is a monoculture, especially when you cover culture. But what I find so exciting about Wanda Vision is it's really smart television. Like there's just a lot to parse. And also, I'm astonished at what a good actress Elizabeth Olson is. Like, that's on me for not knowing sooner. But I'm

like really surprised. She's really good. Do better. Do better. It's also a great time to get in because they've obviously closed the chapter of that ends with endgame. And I feel like, weirdly, like, this is a perfect, you're a perfect example of,

I didn't know that there were any more people out there that could be converted to Marvel fandom. But this is actually like a pretty decent time to do it because that whole 10-year run from Ironman to Endgame has kind of completed. And yes, they'll make references to it. And there will be obviously Wanda Vision has a lot to do with what happened in Infinity War and Endgame.

But which I didn't know while I was watching the show. And I read about it on the ring. But obviously that's not like that big of a deal. Yeah. It didn't matter. And I will say it's actually kind of fun. Like one of our colleagues, Daniel Chin, is writing kind of explainers about Wanda Vision that go up after the episode comes out.

And you don't need much more. Like just find your source. find your shaman and like go. Like you don't need to go back and watch all the movies. It's almost like I have to say I find the creativity of the show and like it's investment in television as a as a medium. So invigorating that actually don't want to watch the movies. So I'm sort of like I'm more interested in what this is a commentary on as it relates to

television and like the adaptation of like movie IP and TV IP. And there's just a lot there. But it's also like a really entertaining show with great actors. I love Randall Park. I was thrilled to see him. I did not know he was part of the MCU. You're in the pocket of big Chepeck. Big Chepec and Big Eiger.

Let me ask you one question before we go. I know, I've never met anybody who loves Hulu more than you. I've been using... I've been using Hulu to watch of the week. I've been using Hulu to watch a bunch of things. I actually have been watching old Mary Tyler Moore episodes.

I'd never seen them before. And I find me very, very soothing. Yeah, it's great, really, really good. Mary Tyler Moore is probably, like, I know she's really, like, admired and beloved. She's still underrated. She is incredibly talented. And then the cast of characters around her is so, so moving and charming. I actually feel emotional thinking about it. And I die for Rota. Maybe we should do a special Mary Tyler more like top 10 episodes once I've watched more.

I'd love to. And if you've ever been like a young woman who just move somewhere on a whim, like hoping that your job will will fill enough time to like figure everything else out, like the opening credits are just like so incredibly moving. And it's just great. I don't know. It's just a great show. But you don't have, so Hulu, I don't think, has released anything particularly new this month. So when we do this again, let's say in a month or whatever, will you be using the criteria is time spent on app or new content that caught your eye? I think it's time spent. I will say, I watched the Yotam Adelengi show on Hulu, which was delightful. But just sort of like not something I had consciously like urge someone to go out and watch. I love Otolengi and I long for going to an Otolingi sometimes soon.

But I can't really be like Chris cancel your plans and stay home to watch this. Similarly, like Vanderpump rule, season eight just hit Hulu, which is exciting. But it was not even a great season. So I don't know. Like I love Hulu and there's a lot to like about it, but I just didn't think January was this month. I would recommend you check out the sister, which is also new on Hulu. It stars Russell Tovey. And you and I love a trashy British mystery.

I think we both enjoy it. Harlan Coben's The Stranger. It has some of those vibes, but it's like kind of a supernatural murder mystery. Well, I'll check it out. Thank you so much for listening. Hope this is helpful. If you want to catch up on any TV, now you have a recommendation. We'll be back later in the week. And of course, it will happen again at the end of February. Thanks for listening. And check out the watch and Bachelor Party.