Michael Frank

A standard-story ensemble-based study of an Irish crime family, Kin nevertheless gives a host of terrific actors a chance to shine, both individually and together.
Kin, AMC+’s new crime drama, follows in the footsteps of those underworld sagas that came before it. Set in Dublin, mostly in the homes of members of the Kinsella family, Kin focuses on warring Irish families deep in the drug trade. While its story rarely exceeds expectations for subject matter, brutality, or surprise, its performa...

Australian animator Adam Elliot is patient. Since 1996, he’s only made one feature and five stop-motion shorts (not including a 1996 hand-drawn animation, Human Behavioral Case Studies). His films—done in a style called “clayography,” a term he coined—can take up to five years to make due to the complicated process of claymation and the creation of miniature objects, cities and characters. He’s not a fan of tricks either, leaning into traditional in-camera techniques. He thrives on diligence ...

The kindness and positivity of Ted Lasso, and of its title character, shot the series into cultural consciousness as a critical and commercial triumph during a time when TV-watchers wanted an interruption from the surrounding sickness and death. A show baked in corny jokes, witty humor, and a mustachioed American football coach managing a Premier League team in AFC Richmond, the Apple TV+ comedy came into Season 2 with heightened expectations from an enormous, expanding fan base, and a lead i...

Nicole Kidman leads a capable, all-star ensemble through David E. Kelley’s take on wellness culture, even as it struggles to keep your attention.
Big Little Lies and The Undoing creator David E. Kelley returns to the small screen for another collaboration with Nicole Kidman with Hulu’s Nine Perfect Strangers, an adaptation of Liane Moriarty’s 2018 bestseller. The book received mixed reviews, though, despite its commercial success, and the series struggles with the shallow nature of its story....

Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez start a true-crime podcast in a New York-set dramedy that offers plenty of charm with room to grow.
Like its stars, Hulu original Only Murders in the Building, a 10-episode series focused on murders, podcasts, and murder podcasts, mixes the old with the new. Created by Steve Martin and John Hoffman, the often-light dramedy stars Martin alongside Selena Gomez and Martin Short, three tenants of a high-rise, upper-class New York City apartment complex...

This article discusses the ending of the Netflix film The Loud House Movie, so will contain major spoilers.
When the Loud family lands in Scotland, which consists of a single town in the scope of The Loud House Movie, they find a kind groundskeeper named Angus (David Tennant) and a housekeeper named Morag (Michelle Gomez). One becomes a hero, while the other becomes a villain, and the proof is in their names.
Angus becomes the Loud family’s biggest ally, a man that comes from generations of g...

This review of the Netflix film The Loud House Movie does not contain spoilers.
The Loud House has become Nickelodeon’s go-to animated children’s series. It’s won Daytime Emmys and been nominated for several GLAAD awards, giving the network much-needed ratings boost over the last five years. Despite six seasons of 26 episodes each and a spin-off series, the network wanted more, and so an 83-minute musical, The Loud House Movie, was born.
Following the Loud family on a vacation to Scotland to ...

This review of the Netflix film Out of My League (2021) does not contain spoilers.
The premise of Out of My League (2021), Netflix’s Italian romantic-comedy from director Alice Filippi, comes from a sick woman, Marta (Ludovica Francesconi), stalking a rich man, Arturo (Giuseppe Maggio). Marta picks Arturo based on his attractiveness and that shallowness plagues the entire film. With a script by Roberto Proia and Michela Straniero, Out of My League can’t overcome this lack of depth, headed tow...

Netflix’s Untold: Deal with the Devil was released on August 17, 2021 — Untold is part of a weekly docuseries.
Read the review of the last installment — Untold: Deal with the Devil.
The name Christy Martin most likely doesn’t ring any bells for the average American. She doesn’t hold the same esteem as Muhammad Ali, Evander Holyfield, or Manny Pacquiao, even if she left just as large of a mark. Directed by Laura Brownson, the second installment of Netflix’s Untold, aptly titled Deal with the D...

This review of the Netflix limited series Gone for Good does not contain spoilers.
Read the recap of the first episode.
From creators David Elkaïm and Vincent Poymiro, Netflix’s Gone for Good keeps the Harlan Coben train chugging along. The fourth installment of the best-selling novelist’s deal with the streamer comes in the French language, set along the coast in Nice. Bouncing from decade to decade through a series of interconnected storylines and families, Gone for Good settles in 2010 and...

This recap of the Netflix series Gone for Good episode 5, “Fred” — the ending explained — contains spoilers.
Titled “Fred,” the Gone for Good finale focuses on the brother that started this all. Flashing back to 1995 when Fred (Nicolas Duvauchelle) and Guilaume (Finnegan Oldfield) were kids, the episode chronicles the life of the older brother, from tennis star to abused teen to drug kingpin to man on the run.
Gone for Good episode 5 recap
After choking in a tennis match, young Fred covers fo...

This recap of the Netflix series Gone for Good episode 4, “Nora”, contains spoilers.
Read the recap of the previous episode.
Netflix’s French thriller series Gone for Good has a structure for each episode. Something jarring and unsuspecting happens within the first five minutes before the title card, followed by Guillaume (Finnegan Oldfield) and his group of friends attempting to investigate murders and disappearances, ending with another twist before the end credits roll. None of the first f...

This recap of the Netflix series Gone for Good episode 3, “Daco”, contains spoilers.
After two episodes focused on how the murders of Guillaume’s (Finnegan Oldfield) brother, Fred, and Inès’s (Garance Marillier) sister, Sonia, affected the two leftover siblings, Netflix’s Gone for Good turns onto a different lane. Focused on the caretaker/leader of the social work facility, episode three, aptly titled “Daco,” begins without murder or death, or grief.
Gone for Good episode 3 recap
It begins wi...

This recap of the Netflix series Gone for Good episode 2, “Inès”, contains spoilers.
In Harlan Coben’s newest adaptation from Netflix, Gone for Good, the first episode opens with a murder. The second episode, “Inès,” opens with the same murder, seen through the eyes of a neighbor, a young girl who loses her sister, her protector, her best friend. Inès (Garance Marillier), now ten years older and studying psychology, becomes the focal point, along with Guillaume (Finnegan Oldfield) of the Fren...

This recap of Netflix series Gone for Good episode 1, “Guillaume”, contains spoilers.
Gone for Good is steeped in grief and misery. More specifically, the grief and misery of a 30-something named Guillaume Lucchesi (Finnegan Oldfield), a young man who loses his ex-girlfriend and his older brother in the same night in 2010. Adapted from the Harlan Coben English-language novel of the same name, Gone for Good both advances Coben’s five-year, five-series deal with Netflix and grabs international ...