The Series Monster

Some people compile lists the way others collect records or books—not recommendation lists, not "if you liked X try Y," but taxonomic surveys of everything good that exists in a given medium, ranked and cross-referenced and maintained as a living document. I know someone like that: a twenty-three-year-old from Bremen named Lisa who goes online as Placetogo, who has been building what might be the most comprehensive catalogue of great television that exists in the German-speaking internet. The list covers decades, territories, and genres, and it is not wrong.

Her sensibility reveals itself in the shows she loves most: Weeds, Californication, United States of Tara. All three are Showtime productions from the mid-to-late 2000s, all built around a sympathetic protagonist making serially terrible decisions with complete conviction. Nancy Botwin growing weed in a McMansion suburb; Hank Moody self-destructing through greater Los Angeles in slow motion; Tara Gregson switching between personalities while her family tries to hold together around her. There’s a thesis in there about a specific era of American cable—prestige without pretension, moral chaos without nihilism—that Lisa would probably articulate better than I just did.

The thing about someone who genuinely knows a subject is that their opinions aren’t recommendations: they’re rulings. She says a series is worth watching, it’s worth watching. She says it isn’t, you’re going to waste your life on it. That kind of authority is rare and should be trusted.