In the past two days I have watched episodes from two different TV series and though the audience (I imagine) overlaps substantially, one was repellent to me and the other gripping.
The first was something called Rick and Monty, one of the (relatively) new breed of animated television series for adults. It was basically the offspring of an unholy mating between South Park and Doctor Who, with the premise being a elderly mad scientist in a lab coat goes through space and time with his idiot nephew, with crass humour, contemporary references, crass humour, those grating voices that distinguish American shows of this kind, and a barrow-load of crassness. It did have something to it, some ideas behind it, that were interesting and even well done, but the avalanche of crassness was such that I will never watch it, just as I will never watch The Office.
The second was the new Watchmen. This is based on the Alan Moore comic but was an incredible, daring riff on it that somehow felt like one was in the original comic even though most of the characters, the plots, even the world, was very different. We watched the first two episodes and they were brilliant. So immersive, so gripping. I loved it and I hope it continues like this. Such a contrast to the complete lack of understanding of the material in Zack Snyder’s film.