Before I begin, let me just say that I am REALLY bad at keeping up with things. As you can see, I totally whiffed on that schedule above. I take some small solace in knowing that I’ve been able to make semi regular updates to Ask the Fatty. So what have I been up to? Catching up on the large number of TV shows that I fell behind on because of my move to CA and loss of access to a decent Internet connection and a reasonable way to watch things. What follows is a list of what I’ve caught up on as of today.

A word of warning! Spoilers follow! While some of what I’m talking about is from last year, I’m sure I’m not the only one not watching during the original broadcast, so a word of warning if you haven’t seen Homeland, Black Sails, or Da Vinci’s Demons. There will be spoilers for these shows!

• Homeland – I just finished watching this a couple of hours ago. Season 5 was absolutely fantastic! I’m not sure if I would say it was the best season so far, but that’s only because the show as a whole has been so outstanding and consistent in quality. That makes it difficult to single out a specific season. I really liked how this season seemed to be inspired by the Snowden leaks. It was a great story line with a really good payoff. I was sad to see Quinn go (because I’m pretty sure Carrie mercy kills him after the fade to black), but what a performance to go out on. He really knocked it out of the park this season. And I’m glad Allison caught a few dozen bullets at the end! What a fucking dirtbag!
• Black Sails – GODDAMN, SON! That 2nd season finale was amazing. And the start of the third was excellent as well! Season 2 was even better than season 1! Gotta say that I don’t like that one character who’s name I always forget… the current madame of the brothel and business/sex partner of Jack Rackem and Anne Bonny. I feel like she’s just waiting for an opportunity to turn on them. While the others seem to want to make Nassau a self sufficient, free state, she seems like she’s ready to cut and run at the first sign of trouble and damn anyone who gets screwed by that. You know who else I don’t like? That fucking militia corporal that shot Miranda in the head. I sure am glad he took a cannonball to the face. Speaking of which, the shelling of the Carolina colony was excellent. That whole escape sequence was epic. I’m really looking forward to seeing how this season unfolds. It’s off to a great start so far!
• Last Week Tonight – Not a whole lot to say here, other than I think its great how it manages to be hilarious while still presenting you with serious news. I also love all of the social movements they try to start, the best of which was that ridiculous and completely legal church. Too bad people kept sending them semen and they had to close it. 🙁 It would have been great to see how far they would have taken that.
• Da Vinci’s Demons – This was, from start to finish, one of the best shows I’ve ever seen. So well written and such a phenomenally acted show. Even though this was canceled before its time, I’m glad they were able to wrap up pretty much everything in the final episode and bring the series to a satisfying conclusion. I suspect that they actually edited the final episode to remove some scenes because of the cancellation. From what I understand, they got the cancellation notice after the episodes already started filming, so it was too late to make any significant changes. The last episode ended up being around 5 minutes shorter than even the shortest episode of the series to date, so I think what they did was go in and take out any scene that would have set the stage for the fourth season. While it means we got less actual show, we didn’t get screwed with a never-to-be-resolved cliffhanger, so I’m OK with that. It was a pretty satisfying ending to the series. Also, the woman who played Leo’s sister is super cute.

I’m now gonna catch up on Bates Motel, followed by Penny Dreadful, followed by the back half of Mad Men. Let’s see how much I can watch before I get tired and go to sleep tonight!