The Underground Railroad, Couples Therapy, and Taika/Rita/Tessa
The weight of history, plus paparazzi is back!
Hello!
On this week’s episode of Criticism Is Dead, we discuss The Underground Railroad, an alt-history epic about the rotten foundation of this country, and Couples Therapy, a docuseries about excavating the past to address troubles of the present.
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02:50 The Underground Railroad, streaming on Amazon Prime Video, is one of the best works of television/cinema in recent memory.
This series, based on Colson Whitehead’s novel, demands your time and attention: to be seen, to be considered, to be allowed to breathe. There’s so much pain, brutality, and trauma, but also moments of extraordinary beauty and hope — which makes the turn of the wheel that inevitably comes next all the more devastating. It’s at times difficult to watch because of the intensity of what’s depicted on the screen, but I think it should be watched. I’m going to have a hard time forgetting this one.
I’m going to link to Angelica Jade Bastién’s review for Vulture, as it’s my favorite of the reviews for this show that I’ve read:
Jenkins’s camera captures something I’ve always recognized in the South: the particularities of the sunlight. The sun feels different everywhere you go. When I am home in Loreauville, Louisiana, it reminds me of honey — thick and sweet. It envelops your body with its heat, like wearing a wool coat in the middle of summer.
But trying to locate who Cora is — the contours of her personality and desires — feels like trying to catch smoke between your hands. By the end of the show, I had a frustrating realization: Cora is an utter cipher.
But isn’t it enough that Cora is just trying to survive? Why do I want such a specific narrative of catharsis and triumph that the show refuses? ... I suppose I wanted something in this story that life can’t provide. I wanted for a moment to pierce through the absences in the archives of cultural, familial, and historical memory in order to capture an understanding of my ancestors who the show brings to mind, who somehow survived enough for me to be here, now, writing this piece. I wanted to wrest their names from oblivion. I wanted to understand not just the horrors visited upon their bodies whose remnants have been lost. I wanted to understand their dreams, their desires, the lilt of their laughter, the feel of their skin. I wanted what no show or archive can possibly provide: a history rewritten and made whole.
28:55 Couples Therapy, available on Showtime (and with some episodes on YouTube), is so voyeuristically fascinating and revealing, it’s hard to stop watching.
The couples are real. Dr. Orna Guralnik is real. Their sessions are real. Which makes this show all the more extraordinary.
Therapy and relationships, two things that are so incredibly intimate and private, are laid bare here. Although each couple’s dilemma is specific to them, there’s a universality that this series achieves; watching each session, you’ll probably recognize elements of yourself, of your loved ones, of other people in your life. Like therapy itself, Couples Therapy very gently tries to tell you something about what lies beneath the surface. Watching and experiencing this at the same time is utterly compelling.
Shout out to therapy! Also love, I guess!
52:32 Plus, culture notes about that threesome — celeb culture isn’t dead!
Rita: She’s the Who Queen!
Bonus links
MARE!!!!
We are never watching this movie for the pod:
Reading: the booming “DEI industrial complex” in year since George Floyd’s murder a year ago.
Also: “There are market exchanges happening; people are making money because news agencies, publishers, and civic and professional organizations need interpreters of this moment. We are expected to be Black, eloquent, and knowledgeable enough to enlighten their general white audiences. Little of the money circulating within this movement ends up with the families of the victims of police killings. The vast majority goes to a professional class of spokespeople: organizers, writers, and academics. And the killings continue.” — Imani Perry + Samaria Rice
That’s it for this week. Next week, Pelin will be recording from LONDON. We’re international, baby!
— Jenny
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Inquiries, complaints, and recs for what to watch can go to criticismisdead@gmail.com.
Some credits:
Music: REEKAH
Artwork and design: Sara Macias and Andrew Liu