I like comedian Jim Jefferies a lot. I saw him at The Pageant last year on the tour that became his Netflix special “Freedumb.” He offers sharp insight on a lot of issues and writes his material well. That said, I was disappointed by the first episode of his new Comedy Central series. We don’t need yet another topical TV comedy show with a guy behind a desk with a fake microphone on it, doing jokes about the week’s political news interspersed with clips of Trump absurdities and remotes dripping with irony. We already get enough of that from John Oliver, Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers, Trevor Noah, Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, James Corden, and Samantha Bee (the only one without a desk). Jefferies has plenty of his own opinions to express, but he’s allowed himself to be sucked into the same vortex as all the rest, rather than creating something truly new and interesting.
Speaking of late night hosts, Stephen Colbert has to stop interacting with his bandleader, Jon Batiste. Colbert keeps expecting him to be able to banter a la Paul Shaffer or (in a non-musical vein) Andy Richter. Batiste may be a good musician, but he has no comedy chops whatsoever. It’s as if Colbert is trying to have a catch, but the wall he’s throwing the ball against is made of molasses.
I made a big mistake with “House Of Cards.” As soon as the new season was released, I downloaded it to my iPad so I could watch it while flying to and from LA last weekend. I managed to get seven episodes into it before the plot started seeming very familiar. That’s when I realized that I hadn’t downloaded season five — I was re-watching season four, which I binge-viewed a year ago. Why did it take me so long to catch on? Because I’m an idiot. So, I deleted all of that and downloaded the new season, which I’m now five episodes into. I bet no one has this problem with “Fuller House.”