Space Enough, and Time

In all of the hubbub about the return of The Mandalorian to Disney+ this weekend, I almost missed the planned release of Truth Seekers on Amazon Prime.  The big draw, of course, is that it’s a Simon Pegg/Nick Frost series.  And while I’ve heard that Pegg plays a much smaller role than you’d hope for, Frost still does a good job owning the screen.  Here’s a trailer for the show from some time ago (which I, obviously, missed).

So even though regular TV is pretty slight for the time being, cable and streaming services are still putting out some good stuff.

My afternoon television comfort food these last few months has been Brooklyn 99.  It’s got some great one-liners but doesn’t necessarily have as much “character evolution” as other sitcoms (which is a weird metric, I know).  I think I’ve shared one of these clips before, but I just watched an episode that had a great interrogation room scene.  So here are a couple of classic moments from the show with Jake Peralta trying his hardest to get a confession or two.

And then one from that you just don’t see coming.

There’s a certain kind of dread that you feel when watching The Amazing Race on CBS.  Unlike other “reality” shows, there’s a real sense that any of us could be on the show and that any of a number of things could happen, things that could both help or hinder us.  That’s particularly true of the challenges.  While shows like Survivor create these elaborate, puzzle-like challenges, the challenges on TAR have a nice sense of history and culture along with a big dose of “you just don’t know if it will work or not.”  You felt it at two challenges this week: first at the challenge where teams had to find fish of a particular color with particular numbers (at least a little like that horrible hay bale challenge from a few seasons ago).  And then there was this challenge, which was about learning to play a well-known tune with the only instrument of its kind created in the 20th century.

Such a palpable frustration for those teams . . .

Looks like they are posting more unreleased content from each episode over at YouTube, which is a great idea.  Definitely looking forward to week two next time.

After twenty-two months since filming completed, the newest season of The Amazing Race is almost ready to air.  Good grief!  But better late than never.  After having a number of two-cycles-a-season years and being moved to one-cycle-a-season, the show’s 32nd entry was postponed two times because of Covid.  Because sometimes fresh and new TV can still be two years old.

But no complaining.  It will be nice to see the world again, a world that will likely feel “long gone.”  But maybe again, one day.  Here are the two promos for the first episode, which drops next Wednesday.