CHAT WITH ROBERT
USA TODAY’s Robert Bianco chats with readers Mondays at 2 p.m. ET at facebook.com/USATODAY. Read edited excerpts below, email questions to askbianco@usatoday.com or tweet them to @biancorobert and visit him live online.
QI know you don’t like The Golden Globes, but might you concede that a Globe can give needed recognition to a show that the Emmys might overlook? Like, for example, actress awards for Jane the Virgin’s Gina Rodriguez and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s Rachel Bloom and this year’s nod to Atlanta’s Donald Glover? A Well,
perhaps — but the problem is, that attention and recognition has not, historically, done much good. Whatever influence a Globe win has on movies and the Oscars (and my guess is it’s minimal), it seems to have no impact at all on TV, either in terms of helping a show’s ratings or increasing its Emmy haul. The ratings for Jane and Crazy actually went down after their wins, and while I doubt the Globes are to blame, they also clearly don’t deserve any credit. Q I’m
not sure if you watch FXX’s Man Seeking
Woman, but I typically enjoy the show’s offbeat production and sense of humor. However, I found the season premiere incredibly offensive, making fun of the Jonestown massacre. It takes a lot to get me offended in the world we live in today, but some things just aren’t funny. AI
agree, which is one reason the show has never worked for me as a viewer. But as a critic, I’d add this: MSW launched with an old, swinger, life-of-the-party Adolf Hitler as a character. Perhaps the Jonestown joke was the
bridge too far — but a show that opens with a good-guy Hitler is a show that’s letting you know upfront that it plans to burn bridges, rebuild them and then burn them again. Q When I watched the pilot for Sneaky Pete on Amazon, everything about it screamed “This is a show tailor-made for CBS.” Then I read that the pilot was commissioned by CBS. Now the great news: Justified’s Graham Yost is on board. Have you seen any of the episodes that Yost has produced? And what a marvelous cast! A Sneaky
Pete (which I reviewed Friday) does indeed have a great cast, led by Giovanni Ribisi, Bryan Cranston and Margo Martindale. It’s a good show, make no mistake. But here’s the thing: On CBS, it would have stood out as by far the best drama the network has to offer. In the great maw that is cable and streaming, it’s just one good show among many others — and I fear it may get lost in the crowd.