Good morning, television friends! I’ve picked up some new subscribers this week, and not all of them are people I know in real life. How exciting!

This week I have had to contemplate a new problem: a TV series is in the works based loosely on the career of someone I know through work. My boss could plausibly be the inspiration for a character. It is by far the funniest thing ever to happen in our workplace.

This also means (a) I have some unsolicited ideas for casting of that character’s personal assistant; and (b) this may represent a conflict of interest for my newsletter. But maybe it will all fizzle out. Television is a mysterious and complicated industry, after all.

Let’s watch TV!

Okay, we are now all caught up with Criminal Record, in which Cush Jumbo FIGHTS CRIME alongside Peter Capaldi. Who is also committing crime, or at least being very shady.

Cush is pursuing Billy, who was in prison for the murder of a young woman until he broke out. Or until Peter Capaldi broke him out, it’s not clear yet, but Billy seems way too gormless to pull off a prison escape on his own. Now he’s our man on the inside of an alt-right terrorist group led by a deeply annoying influencer named Cosmo, who is spreading the rumour that the death of a South Asian boy at a rally is fake news. Not just the death, but the existence of the boy at all. Cosmo is the worst and I want to punch him in the face.

Unfortunately he has access to explosives, which seems problematic. I totally get why Peter Capaldi is willing to bend and break some laws to put this whole gang away, but ALSO that is bad and he should not do it.

Separately, Cush’s personal life is falling apart: her son wants to go live with his dad, her partner is a passive-aggressive dick, she is cheating on said passive-aggressive dick with a coworker. (Not Peter Capaldi. I’m not that lucky.) But that is less interesting than the professional stuff, the internal politics and ethical compromises of modern policing. This is a good show! Even though so far this season Peter Capaldi has not stolen a single child!

This ep picks up in the days following the suicide of the local reverend, and I gotta say, as much as Matthew Rhys’s girlish scream fills me with joy, we did not have nearly enough Patricia this week. Mostly because Rhys’s Tom spent much of the episode tripping balls and blacking out, having tried a tincture of mushrooms found in the study of said late reverend. Don’t worry, they didn’t find the mushrooms and immediately ingest them, first they set up an appointment with the local drug dealer, sorry, shaman and got him to mix up the brew. Which raises questions like, is this island actually cursed, or is it simply inhabited by people with poor judgement?

I read online that this series was conceived as a Parks & Recreation sketch, and nowhere is that clearer than in the scenes with the general public, whether it’s the reverend’s funeral (“Once again, I’d like to remind everyone that it is not mandatory that you speak.”) or the town hall where Tom, still tripping, has to account for the curfew he has imposed on the island.

The real heart of the story lies in Tom’s relationship with his son, whose mother died—allegedly in childbirth—when she left the island. That’s part of the curse, you see, that if you’re born here, you can’t leave. Don’t worry, Tom and Evan weren’t born here. It’s important you know that. Evan is a sulky teenage boy, but a charming one, especially when he politely asks the local sheriff if he can yell, “Fuck you, pig” as he obeys an instruction to stop trespassing. There are girls to impress, you see.

This ep ends with the launch of the 4 July fireworks—important question, does this occupy the same universe as The Pitt and if not, can we pretend?—and I assume next week, we will see what Patricia got up to while Tom was on his vision quest.

I complained last week about structural shenanigans, but here the show surprised me in a good way: instead of holding Deb’s Madison Square Garden show until the finale, it took place here, in the penultimate episode.

Only it didn’t, because Deb’s nemesis, The Network Guy Who Silenced Her, bought up all the tickets to sabotage it. Cue shenanigans as Team Vance call in favours to get a permit to hold the show for free in Central Park.

Meanwhile, Ava’s pitch for a reboot of Deb’s OG sitcom flounders because, as the absurdly supportive network lady says, it’s not really personal? CUE PIVOT: it’s not about a bunch of Gen Zs living in the sitcom house, it’s about one young woman and her housemate, a Boomer. Genius. I feel like Deborah Vance has left acting way in her past, but let’s all contemplate the possibilities of casting for that role.

I have but one problem with this delightful episode: last week, I complained that the folding of Jimmy and Kayla’s agency felt like it was introducing a new plot thread too late in the story. Here, that plot thread is simply not a factor. The team are supporting Deb, just like always, even though Jimmy has technically been relegated to the mailroom.

So many penultimate episodes! Next Friday will see the finales of Hacks and For All Mankind and the premiere of Star City! So stay tuned for that!

This week we are mostly following the M6 invasion of Mars, of which the highlight is absolutely a bunch of US Marines accidentally massacring their allies in the MPK. Extremely accurate depiction of the US military at work, well done, everyone. Possibly we are meant to be sad that Boyd’s ex-partner Fred was among the victims, but eh, he killed a guy and punched Boyd in the face, I can’t be that sad.

On the other hand, Alex shoots his friend Marcus. I was like, “This is why you don’t give the trainee medic with no weapons qualifications a gun!” but as my flatmate pointed out, it was actually a good shot. Just. You know. Not a faceless invading marine, but an invading marine who grew up with Alex. (The earlier scene, where Alex checks the MPK corpses and confirms they’re dead, lets us know that he would be distraught even if he didn’t know the guy he shot.)

More importantly, this frenemy fire incident brings Alex and Avery together. In an ideal world, they should have grown up knowing each other, even if not in proximity, but the whole Stevens of it all got in the way. And also Alex’s grandmother having a wildly inappropriate affair with Avery’s dad.

Avery is very much not okay, what with all the violence and trauma happening, but also she is keeping it together enough to recognise right away that Alex is not her enemy. Love this for them. I need them to be friends (and I kind of also feel like they will be the protagonists of the final season).

Over on Titan, science is taking place. A mysterious glowing substance has been discovered, and I love this for Kelly, but also they’ve lost contact with mission control (on account of the invasion) and Kelly still needs to have an awkward conversation with Gormless Walt.