What have we done to deserve such a blessing as the Internet? No seriously, we could still be popping in DVDs, better yet rewinding tapes in VCRs, better better yet trying to digest Anna Karenina or the latest Dickens novel, as we lay in bed on Sunday nursing a sizable coffee and a hangover to match. Somehow, though, our lazy, a$$-glued-to-the-bed rapid consumers of all things digital entertainment have been undeservingly graced with the magic of online streaming. And while there’s a sea of options out there to commit yourself to watching, we’ve come up with a few suggestions that probably haven’t been on your radar. Check out their trailers and our sales pitches— we hope you’ll become as devoted to them as you are to your instagram feed.
High Maintenance:
This show is currently only a web series on Vimeo, but if I had to place a bet, I’d wager my entire collection of beanie babies on HBO or Comedy Central picking it up within the next year or so. It follows a nameless weed dealer around New York City as he delivers his goods to various clients who all have issues of neurosis as diverse as the city they live in. As David Peisner from Rolling Stone best explains it, “Each episode incorporates a largely new set of characters that all have one thing in common with folks from the previous episodes: the same scraggly, warm-hearted weed deliveryman, known only as “the Guy,” who is played by one of the show’s creators, Ben Sinclair.” It’s kind of an offbeat comedy sprinkled with a little realism, something that’s been described as being along the lines of a lovechild between Girls and Louis CK.The first season is available to watch for free on the show’s website, here.
Hindsight:
I know, I know it’s on VH1, but TRUST ME. This show is straight crystal inside of a hideous geode rock undetectably good. Not only is it a wonderfully rewarding ode to the 90s (music, style, slang, etc.), but its plot is also rad and its characters are funny and well-crafted. Hindsight is built on a story surrounding Becca (Laura Ramsey), who as a forty-something and on the eve of her second marriage, is transported back to the year of 1995– a time just before she made all the decisions that, over the decades, had helped plunge her into mediocrity. On its most basic level, however, the show is pretty much a glorification of Becca’s twenties and all the miserable and magical experiences she gathers throughout them, but with an added twist on the fact that she knows her future and wants to avoid making some of her same mistakes. Watch it on VH1, here.
Togetherness:
Togetherness is a brand new show on HBO, written and directed by Jay and Mark Duplass (The midwives on The Mindy Project, btw). It’s about four overwhelmed adults, who more or less are figuring out that their lives are not as well put together as they had envisioned them to be. Mark plays an L.A. sound engineer; Melanie Lynskey plays his wife, and they’re joined by two unexpected house guests: the wife’s ambitious sister (Amanda Peet) and the husband’s best friend, an actor just evicted from his apartment (Steve Zissis). The stories of each episode range from the sister’s efforts to build a bouncy-castle empire to the entire gang drunkenly vandalizing her ex-boyfriend’s house with toilet paper to the least-successful attempt at sexual spanking ever. With the account of your tv service provider (ur parents will have this info) full episodes are available on HBO.com, here.
Broad City:
Good god, if there is no other show you watch from these suggestions, WATCH THIS ONE. I like to describe it as the female response to Workaholics because the humor is borderline of the same breed. The exception, however, is that the show was written, created and starred in by Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer, two superhumans with two X chromosomes(!!!!). Broad City follows the girls and their misadventures of carelessness and frivolity in New York City. Ilana seeks to avoid working as much as possible while pursuing her relentless hedonism and Abbi tries to make a career as an illustrator, often getting sidetracked into Ilana’s hijinks. The show is now into Season 2, but both seasons can be found and viewed at Comedy Central, here.