BEST LIMITED SERIES OF 2021
As ever, these are not in any particular order. It's just an opportunity for me to highlight some great content from the past year, to give everyone a chance to catch up. It's also difficult at this point to distinguish between a LIMITED SERIES and a debut season of an ongoing series at this point. "White Lotus" was originally in this category but earned enough attention to get a Season 2, so now I'm considering it a Debut Series, which will be a different list later this week. So we're doing our best here. Also note that this only includes English-language series. I'm going to have a separate rundown of the year's best INTERNATIONAL shows.
BRAND NEW CHERRY FLAVOR
[Netflix]
This horror drama series, set in an eerie and under-populated '90s Los Angeles, was frequently disgusting and ceaselessly unpleasant. It's a mean-spirited show about awful people doing abusive and even gross things to one another. It's set in a surreal and supernatural world, and between that and the LA stuff, David Lynch comparisons were obviously going to happen; but this is more early Lynch -- like "Blue Velvet" darkness-lurking-behind-every-pleasing-facade Lynch -- rather than the "Mulholland Drive"-era stuff that also sees the dark beauty and mystery of Hollywood. "Brand New Cherry Flavor" is a bit like watching a nightmare slowly unfold, and yet... I found I couldn't get it out of my mind, even months after watching it.
Rosa Salazar stars as a very ambitious young filmmaker who has arrived in town with a buzzy short, which she's determined to revisit as a feature film. After running into some trouble with a skeezy producer (Eric Lange), she puts a curse on him with the help of a mysterious witch (Catherine Keener). Keener is the real glue holding this entire enterprise together; the series is based on a novel but the snarky, jaded, yet still somehow charismatic role of "Boro" still feels written for her specifically. It's a scenery-chewing turn, very darkly funny, and she consistently finds ways to cut against this and make us like Boro in spite of all the terrible things that she's doing.
I don't know, this one's not for everybody, but if you are a fan of cult cinema, or B-movie horror, or certainly David Lynch, it's probably worth a shot.
MIDNIGHT MASS
[Netflix]
Mike Flanagan's Netflix drama series all artfully combine genuine and emotional stories about love, family, and loss with scares. I think "The Haunting of Hill House" -- using haunted house tropes to really dig deep into a dysfunctional family's dynamics over the course of several decades -- probably holds together the best out of all of three shows, but "Midnight Mass" is clearly the MOST Mike Flanagan series to date. It's a classic ensemble drama about a small town where everyone knows one another's secrets, as well as a thoughtful and even provocative consideration of faith and how easily it can be twisted or exploited, plus a genuinely effective and spooky creature feature. All wrapped up in one stylish, beautifully acted package.
But while "Hill House" was a bit lighter on its feet, keeping the pace and tone of traditional spooky haunted house stories intact, "Midnight Mass" is more serious about its ideas and less concerned with horror tropes. Many episodes feel like a stage play that's been adapted for the screen, with long scenes and monologues in which characters explain in-depth their way of thinking and perspectives, and come to terms with what's happening to them and their community in real-time. It's not always a brisk, easy binge, but it pays off your attention with a climax that's both thrilling and devastating. I don't want to reveal the specific nature of the monster at the show's center, but this is a pretty brilliant reinvention of the concept; it's done in a way I've never seen before, which was really saying something in 2021.
MARE OF EASTTOWN
[HBO Max]
"Mare of Easttown" comes from arguably the most popular Peak TV genre of them all. It's a somber drama about a troubled lady detective investigating a brutal crime in a tight-knit community where... say it with me now... everyone knows one another's secrets. I probably watched 12 shows with a similar premise this year, many of them from Scandinavia, where the Nordic Noir trend continues steaming ahead.
What set "Mare of Easttown" apart were the performances and the specificity. I didn't really so much care for the mystery plot, to be perfectly honest, and I found the "solution" ultimately kind of unsatisfying. But I really feel like, for the most part, this was beside the point. The show is about Kate Winslet as Mare Sheehan, and her journeys as not just a cop but a mom, a daughter and a friend, and on this level, it's just about perfect. Winslet and Jean Smart have one of the most natural, organic-feeling mother-daughter relationships in any TV show I can recall, Julianne Nicholson was rightly praised for her turn as Mare's close friend Lori, and Evan Peters was, I thought, pretty fantastic as Detective Colin Zabel, who comes in to town to assist Mare's investigation. Plus, everyone nailed their specific regional Pennsylvania accents that most shows and films just ignore. (Typically, the "Philly" accent in films and TV is just a slightly modified New York voice; I appreciated that everyone in "Easttown" really went for it.)
STATION ELEVEN
[HBO Max]
OK, OK, it hasn't entirely wrapped up yet, but I've already seen enough! Patrick Somerville's adaptation of the acclaimed novel by Emily St. John Mandel reinvents the epic post-apocalyptic adventure series for a new generation. While most of these shows focus on the survival thriller aspects of a world full of desperate humans with no society or civilization to restrain their basest urges, "Station Eleven" takes a more holistic approach. What would it feel like to spend your childhood in our world, but then have to totally fend for yourself as an adult? How would people decide what to take with them into this new world, and what to leave behind? Is real reinvention possible, or are we doomed to repeat our mistakes, even if all of our circumstances change?
The show follows a few storylines that intersect at key moments. Before society collapses, we meet actor Arthur Leander (Gael García Bernal) and his girlfriend Miranda (Danielle Deadwyler), who's writing a graphic novel called "Station Eleven." While the plague that wipes out most of humanity spreads, we follow Jeevan (Himesh Patel), an EMT trainee who finds himself caring for a young girl he meets at random (Matilda Lawler). Then, 20 years after the outbreak, we meet up with Kirsten (Mackenzie Davis), who's part of a traveling troupe of actors. These stories all work as individual tales of struggle and compassion, but the story is really about the connections: not just how all of these narratives link up, but how everything is connected, and everyone is really -- on some level -- largely the same. Whether we have every luxury at our fingertips, or we're barely staying alive by growing a few crops in our background and keeping a steady eye on the horizon, we all get sad and lonely, and we all crave intimacy.
DR. DEATH
[Peacock]
"Dr. Death" is a horrifying true story that has become a horrifying-yet-strangely-compelling docudrama, despite the fact that it provides absolutely zero answers about the actual crimes at its center.
Joshua Jackson stars as Dr. Christopher Duntsch, who considers himself maong most brilliant and gifted neurosurgeons in the world. After personally confronting the man's malpractice in their own operating theaters, two colleagues -- played by Christian Slater and Alec Baldwin -- start digging, and discover that many of Duntsch's patients have experienced severe complications following his procedures. Yet when they report him through all the proper channels, they receive nothing but pushback, and encounter institutions that are more concerned with protecting doctors (as a way of protecting themselves) than looking out for patients.
"Dr. Death" balances this sort of polemic approach to the health care industry -- it is, after all, a TRUE STORY -- with a psychological thriller, taking us inside Duntsch's world and ceaselessly questioning his motives. In reality, we don't have an answer to the most pressing question of all: was Duntsch actually knowledgable about how to do spinal surgery, and doing this to patients on purpose because he's a psychopath, or was he somehow just able to slip into working as a surgeon without the actual skills required to do the job? It's a tantalizing question, and Jackson does his best to give us some insight into who Duntsch is while keeping us guessing about his inner life, but it can get exhausting after a while. Just... be warned.
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