Call My Agent!, The Head, and the end of WandaVision
Moviemaking in France and murder in Antarctica, plus all roads lead to Marvel
Hello!
On this week’s episode of Criticism Is Dead, we discuss Call My Agent!, a French love letter to show business, and The Head, an international South Pole murder mystery.
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04:20 Call My Agent!, a series on Netflix, captures the allure and the fallacy of the "workplace family" fantasy, as framed through a talent agency in Paris.
The 24-episode show Call My Agent! (known in French as Dix pour cent, or “10 percent”) is a love letter to cinema, TV, show biz, and the people who make it all happen. It’s a surprisingly dignified — and sardonic, droll, a little absurd, but also flattering — portrait of talent agents, who scheme and manipulate in the service of their clients and the art that they believe filmmaking can be.
But what I found more interesting about this very fun series is how it portrays the blurred line between work and life. It’s comforting in the way that workplace dramas like The Office are: here are characters you like, basically acting as each other’s slightly dysfunctional family. But we know IRL that the idea of a workplace family is mostly an unhealthy myth, one that can lend itself to labor exploitation or a destroyed work-life balance. By the end of the last season of Call My Agent!, it’s almost a relief to watch characters fly free, as bittersweet as that farewell is.
20:28 The Head, a limited series on HBO Max, is a whodunit that's as much about how a group of people unravels as it is about who went on a killing spree.
An international production flex between Spain and Japan (but also featuring Danes and Brits?), The Head is the latest example of “snow noir.” It’s a bit like a classic Agatha Christie novel, whether that’s a Hercule Poirot joint or And Then There Were None. Some of the twists and misdirection are a bit sloppy, but it’s kind of a nice experience to be gripped by a story of people who are in a much worse isolated situation that you probably are!
The show does a decent job of showcasing how a group of humans can unravel and fall victim to herd mentality in the face of fear, risk, and suspicion. In that way, it’s also a bit reminiscent of survival shows like The Wilds (discussed in a previous episode here).
35:00 Plus, culture notes about WandaVision finale discourse!
(We discussed WandaVision in a previous episode here.)
Well, it’s over!
Whether you were into the ending or not, the main thing to remember is “all roads lead to Marvel,” as Pelin puts it. WandaVision is not an arthouse experiment or some work of creative genius; it is a (well-made) MCU production, and sooner or later it was always going to end up with a 40-minute-long fight sequence with different-colored lights shooting out of people’s hands. That doesn’t mean we didn’t have fun along the way!
But thank you to the weekly release schedule. We agree that it’s good and that we would like more of this traditional TV episode cadence, please.
P.S. Here are the Paul Bettany/Vision tweets we promised to link:
Bonus links
THESE YEE-HAW STEVEN YEUN PHOTOS HOLY SHIT.
Just another really great fashion moment:
Speaking of, Alan Kim won a Critics’ Choice Award and cried like the angel he is 🥺
Fascinating thread about Bridgerton’s costumes a.k.a. the historical inaccuracy of those muffin-top flat-squeezed boobs!
If you, like me, missed the Oprah/Meghan/Harry interview, this is maybe the best recap of it.
The end of Kim’s Convenience :(
Oh and here’s Lola Bunny stuff lol
Okay bye!
— Jenny
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Some credits:
Music: REEKAH
Artwork and design: Sara Macias and Andrew Liu