An intimate Q&A with tvscholar
My favourite TV mothers, the reason I don't post negative reviews, and Taylor Swift as a TV show.
Am I correct that you tend to avoid giving overly negative reviews? If so, why?
If you’re referring to my Instagram posts, for sure. There are a few reasons behind this. First, I’m conscious that a lot of television makers, including actors and producers, follow my account, and I’m not going to put a show they might have worked hard on (even one that isn’t very good!) on blast, in a short caption, for the sake of likes and engagement. I reserve my more critical thoughts for my writing, like this review I wrote of The Walking Dead: Dead City, where I have the space and time to go more in depth about why something didn’t work for me (and where I’m being paid to do so).
Another layer to this is what I’ve been calling the flattening effect of social media (there must be a better term). Any joke or critique I make on Instagram usually gets taken out of context and stans will jump down my throat. For example, I made a little joke in my post caption for The Bear’s second season about Sarah Paulson being “forced” to play a straight woman in a show released during pride month, and if you look in the comments, there must be at least a dozen folks yelling at me for saying that an actor “can’t” play a straight character, that I shouldn’t bother saying anything if I’m looking for reasons to hate the show, etc. Most of the comments are from folks who don’t follow me and some have a pretty nasty tone. A clever little joke, that of course my queer followers get within the context of my voice and the account in general, is flattened. It’s unpleasant!
So…I’ve learned Instagram posts are not spaces for discourse (although people are free to discourse respectfully in the comments) and my “negative” thoughts are reserved for spaces where I’m being paid to do so. In the end, not posting about a show ends up being a more effective commentary anyways (that’s what happened with The Idol, btw).
My question is how the fuck is your skin so good?!
Strategic lighting! Don’t worry I still get breakouts every few weeks. But I’ve always been obsessed with having clear skin so I’ve incorporated a bunch of things that have helped, like filling one of those gallon water bottles every morning and drinking it throughout the day, sleeping on silk pillow cases that I switch out every two nights, eating as healthy as I can, going to workout classes where I’m forced to move my body for stress relief and mental clarity, and using a tretinoin prescription on top of a curated skincare routine that includes some weekly light exfoliating, an occasional clay mask, and some nicely hydrating products. It all helps!
Favourite TV theme song?
“I have no underlying issues to address, I’m certifiably cute, and adorably obsessed!”
Explain SAG-AFTRA waivers please?
I would actually recommend Sarah Silverman’s latest Instagram Reel on this — she met with SAG-AFTRA to get an explanation and breaks down each side of the conflict brilliantly.
What’s your favourite TV genre?
I think I watch the most dramedies, the shows that combine both sides equally well. But when I think of the shows that have really hit home for me and have affected some very deep, human part of myself, they are dramas.
Best female spy on TV?
Obviously Elizabeth Jennings from The Americans. But I’ll give a shout-out to Carrie Mathison on Homeland and Sydney Bristow on Alias. I don’t think Eve Polastri on Killing Eve was a good spy per se (maybe just a spy in love, or maybe the mythology of the show just got too convoluted by the end I could no longer tell) but she can have a little moment too.
Any advice on breaking into criticism?
Gosh. At one point last year I tried emailing a few senior TV critics to see if I could get an informational interview for some advice of my own, and I didn’t hear back from anyone. It sort of feels like critics are barely hanging on by a thread and don’t have much to give. I was really upset when Emily St. James was laid off from Vox, it was like damn, even some of the best writers I follow are in precarious positions with no guarantees. And I’m not even sure if full time TV critics on the whole are particularly happy slogging through a million bad shows…Caroline Framke has hinted at this after she left her job at Variety, although I wish she would say more for the sake of folks (me, I’m folks) curious about what that reality is like.
My advice would be to just start writing for somewhere, and try not to get too caught up in trying to write the best thing or tied up in what your future in criticism will be. Start a Substack or find a website looking for new contributors and build up a writing portfolio. Try to write on most days, if not every day (I journal a lot). Try to close what Ira Glass calls “the gap” between your taste and your ability to write good criticism, but also don’t get too caught up in trying to be some idealized version of a critic. Read a lot. Watch a lot. Have a plethora of conversations about the medium you want to write about with friends. Send timely pitches. Eventually, find an editor who nurtures your ideas and is excited about your voice rather than one who tears your pieces apart.
I think with the rise of AI we’ll start seeing a shift in what kinds of writing folks read…I’ve had editors dry out my voice to fit some sort of robotic standard suited to their publication and I always find it a bit sad. Some day the only difference we might have between our own writing or content creation and AI is a human point of view grounded in our experience — use that to your advantage.
Favourite snacks while watching TV?
Popcorn, veggies and hummus, watermelon, chocolate. Also full meals if I’m being honest.
TV you used to love and now kinda hate?
I think I’ve reached my Gilmore Girls quota.
What TV show would you make your nemesis watch on repeat?
My Brilliant Friend because I’d want to offer them the gift of taste.
If Taylor Swift was a TV show, which one would she be?
The Summer I Turned Pretty.
How do you think The Wilds would have ended had it not been cancelled?
I would’ve loved something super wacky like the boys and the girls find a way to send Rachel Griffiths and her team to an island where they’re forced to survive like they did. Or like, introduce a third group of trans and non-binary teens to find out they survive and cooperate better than both the girls and boys did on the island.
Honestly I think the show’s expanded scope (introducing the boys) diluted what could have been a promising and focused story! But it’s too bad they didn’t get the chance to wrap things up. When I interviewed Griffiths (iconic, she’s such an intellectual and super kind) she said she really wanted a third season.
When will you finally watch Shameless?
My TV list is so damn long and this feels like a huge commitment, but I am very interested in more Jeremy Allen White in my life and I know the show was huge for working class representation which I’m also interested to see.
Reason for not having watched Hannibal? The gayest-not-gay show ever?
I think I’ve always had that barrier of like, okay, I know I’m going to be watching something that is textually heterosexual but subtextually gay and I won’t ever really have that catharsis of watching something actually gay happen and so what is the point. Which is silly! I should really just watch it. I’ve seen the first few episodes but should absolutely keep going. Maybe this fall?
Top 5 romcom shows?
Starstruck, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, High Fidelity, You’re the Worst, Emily in Paris. I think? I’m probably forgetting a bunch.
What do you think is missing from the TV landscape?
A show about a gay adult group of friends and a gay Fleabag. We need a 2023 version of Looking that is better than the Queer as Folk reboot.
Is there a character from any show you’ve ever watched that you truly connected with?
Honestly I don’t know if I’ve seen my exact experience reflected back to me, but there have been pieces: in Patrick from Looking and Josh Thomas on Please Like Me, perhaps.
What are you hung up on just now, like what show is messing with your brain?
Black Bird stayed with me for a while after watching it recently, I was thinking a lot about what “ethical” true crime looks like. The show doesn’t directly depict its victims being raped or murdered, relying instead on broader emotional beats to carry the story, and I thought that was a much more enjoyable watching experience compared to the nauseating spectacle of violence on shows like The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story where every victim is depicted as they die.
Would you agree that the advent of streaming was supposed to allow for less good shows to be canned?
Hmm not necessarily! I personally don’t believe that the majority of people have good taste in TV. And unless the show is on like, HBO or maybe FX, they are rarely renewed for being good, they’re renewed because television is a business with an exponential profit growth model currently in an existential crisis and if your show isn’t being watched then it’s not making money and therefore is more likely to get canned. And that’s why the most long-running shows on Netflix are like, Virgin River. I’m not saying Virgin River is evil in any way, but shows like it capture eyeballs in numbers an objectively excellent show like Better Things or Reservation Dogs rarely does.
Which shows were formative for you when growing up?
My parents didn’t really believe in cable so we had a very limited slate of channels on TV for most of my childhood. I watched a lot of The Oprah Show coming home after school and Live with Regis and Kelly in the mornings with breakfast during the summer. There was a lot of animated TV like Arthur in the younger years and Justice League in the later years.
But in 2005, when I was in grade five, Avatar the Last Airbender started airing, and that was my first experience understanding the possibilities of serialized television. Every week my sister and I would scramble to watch the new episodes, and save our allowances to buy the DVDs and watch them over and over again. We were totally entranced, and dare I say ahead of our time considering how massive the franchise became over the years and once it was added to Netflix (yes, I am also cautiously excited about the live action adaptation).
After that, I’d say Grey’s Anatomy and Lost were my introductions to watercooler appointment television, and The Good Wife was highly impactful too. My parents are also huge sci-fi buffs so there was a lot of Star Trek and Stargate playing on TV at all times. Stargate was the first thing I ever binge-watched in high school. While others were watching The OC or teen-driven content, I would come home from tennis day camp and escape to my room with a plate of food and ten seasons of Stargate SG1. Nerd!
When you were a little kid, did you go around recommending TV shows too or was that only later in life?
Haha I can’t say I remember being little tvscholar! I certainly remember television being a huge topic of conversations with friends for years before it became something I thought I could write about or even study. I think peak recommending began in college, when I started growing frustrated that nobody around me was watching the niche prestige television that I felt was shifting the landscape of the medium. Someone would say Game of Thrones and I would respond with Halt and Catch Fire.
Did you go to college? If so, where?
My undergraduate degree was in art history with a minor in journalism at the University of Victoria, my master’s degree was in fashion studies with a focus on researching television and costume design from Toronto Metropolitan University, and I continued there in a PhD in communication & culture before dropping out during the pandemic.
Any reason(s) you focus on TV and not film as well?
Well for one, I’m not filmscholar! I just feel like television is the medium I’ve always gravitated toward. I like to see long-term character growth, I want to see more life breathed into a universe than a two-hour film can provide. I’m usually leaving a movie thinking damn, I could have lived with those characters a bit longer. I still watch films, I’ve seen Past Lives, Women Talking, and Barbarian recently. But they feel like a break from the work I do, something I consume for the sake of consumption and my own inner world. My academic background isn’t in film studies either, and even if television studies borrows theories and concepts, it’s distinct in a lot of ways. In some ways, it’s much harder to write about television, which is so vast and caught up in all of these capitalistic industries. I like the challenge.
Best TV mother?
This question I’m screaming…I have so many!
Sam Fox who still cooked elaborate meals for the most whiny children in television history on Better Things; Elektra’s tough love as a chosen family’s mother on Pose, Helen Solloway as a chaotic mother on The Affair; Alicia Florrick as a mother who is mothering the law but also two very annoying children on The Good Wife; Elizabeth Jennings as spy mother on The Americans; Aunt Vi as Queen Sugar’s mother to everyone on that show; Uncle Clifford as strip club mother on P-Valley; Yuki Ishii-Peters as Maya’s mother on Pen15 (and in real life!); Hiam Abbass as Maysa Hassan, playing a mother on Ramy that should have gotten her an Emmy nomination; Charlotte most recently on And Just Like That…, and don’t even get me started on characters who aren’t actually mothers but still give me life. The list can go on.
Favourite shows to rewatch in the fall?
I’m not really a rewatcher! I would say there’s maybe one or two shows I rewatch per year, usually coinciding with a return (i.e., when I rewatched Back to Life in anticipation of its second season). I rewatched Sex and the City when the remastered version of the original series came out, and at some point during the pandemic I rewatched Gilmore Girls (I think for the last time ever). But going into the fall I will absolutely be pushing spooky content further up my list, and cross my fingers that Mike Flanagan still releases his yearly scary show amidst the strike.
How do you feel about the recent rise of romance media/romance on TV?
Is it recent? I feel like if we look at the history of soaps, sitcoms, westerns…they’re all very romance-driven. We kinda have a cultural obsession! The other day a friend mentioned how we’ve solved so much as a species — created entire infrastructures to suit our biological needs, invented vaccines to prevent life-threatening diseases, and we still have yet to solve dating/coupling. But we keep trying to figure it out in media, that’s for sure.
Thoughts on The Leftovers?
Talented, brilliant, incredible, amazing, show stopping, spectacular, never the same, totally unique, completely not ever been done before, unafraid to reference or not reference, put it in a blender, shit on it, vomit on it, eat it, give birth to it.
Thank you everyone for sending in your questions! Let’s do it again sometime.
Thank you for the comment about the kids on Better Things. Sam spent her life trying to make up for hr ex husband's lack of parental involvement and her kids were beyond self centered and annoying. But THAT HOUSE! THAT KITCHEN! THE COOKING! THE ART! Wonderful production design, set decoration, whatever the correct terminology is.
If only I could watch The Leftovers for the first time again...