Spoiler alert: Around Thanksgiving, the wife and I got Netflix basically so we could watch the “Gilmore Girls” reboot.
Spoiler alert: Whatever your thoughts of the chick-centric Gilmores, I am not turning in my man card, which is a concept I reject utterly, because what kind of stats would you put on the back of a man card? Career Tires Changed? Max Bench Press? Jars Opened?
Spoiler alert: Yes, it’s my first exposure to Netflix. No, I did not simultaneously upgrade from a flip-phone, Betamax or an 8-track player.
Spoiler alert: I don’t get binge-watching.
Spoiler alert: My feelings about the “Gilmore Girls” reboot aside (mini review, two thumbs down. And all my fingers. Every last appendage, down), I ripped through the first season of “Stranger Things” in about two days, and now I feel sort of cheated. No weekly episode to anticipate. No between-episode banter with fellow fans of the show. Just me, a metaphorical 4-year-old left alone in a room with a chocolate cake that has now been reduced to a plate of crumbs, and my stomach hurts.
Spoiler alert: “Stranger Things” was great.
Spoiler alert: Still, it sort of made me yearn for the days of the 26-episode season; the TV Guide with the fall season preview I’d attack with a marker, circling the new, must-see shows so I wouldn’t miss them; the summer reruns so I could see the must-see shows I missed; the variety specials I’d watch when I was sick of reruns (I mean, what else but utter boredom could explain A Very Brady anything?).
Spoiler alert: Seriously, Lorelei Gilmore, this was draining. Weren’t you sort of a plucky go-getter in the original series? I seem to vaguely recall being charmed by the original series’ screwball-meets-Sorkin pacing and the thick slabs of pop-indie-hipster talking points. Dour, bitter and humorless was Emily’s schtick. Unprofessional was the (finally officially gay) French guy’s gig. You’ve stolen their bits and topped them off with an extra dollop of shrill neediness.
Spoiler alert: People don’t read Facebook posts. Even the ones to which they respond. I asked for Netflix recommendations, “funny shows especially,” and received dozens of recommendations for programming that was anything but.
Spoiler alert: I’m talking about “Black Mirror.” And “House of Cards.” And all the Marvel Comics-based series, which seem to be lacking the playfulness of that company’s movie franchises.
Spoiler alert: Some people actually use Netflix for shows that have already been on regular, free TV. Look, if I wanted to watch (insert critically hailed ratings disappointment here), I’d have done it the first time around. You know, before it got canceled because nobody watched it.
Spoiler alert: Those of you who are using it to catch up on “The Walking Dead,” let me save you some trouble: Jeffrey Dean Morgan plays a slightly — very slightly — darker shade of Dig Me sociopath as Negan than he did while scenery-chewing his way through the last season of “The Good Wife.” This is not a recommendation.
Spoiler alert: Back to the Gilmores. Rory? In the show’s previous iteration, she was a prep-school shining star, a Yale journalism graduate last seen heading off to cover an Illinois senator’s presidential campaign. Now? Yeesh. Not one moment of concern over being a kept woman for little more than a place to bunk in London? No guilt over being the other woman?
Spoiler alert: You do not want your daughter to grow up to be either Gilmore Girl. Unless you want to see her wait for a man provide her with direction, affirmation, purpose, money or logic.
Spoiler alert: Despite what Rory seems to do constantly, freelance writers don’t make a habit of doing articles “on spec.”
Spoiler alert: “Shameless” is seven seasons in. I will not be attempting to catch up. Why? So I can understand Facebook memes I didn’t get four years ago?
Spoiler alert: At one point in “Gilmore Girls,” our detestable duo sits by the previously nonexistent Stars Hollow community pool and fat-shames passersby. Way to be in touch with current cultural sensibilities, writers.
Spoiler alert: Based on the trailer for Netfilx’s upcoming version of “One Day at a Time,” now set in a Cuban family and with no apparent Latin equivalent of Schneider, I’ll get over the fact that there’s no role for Valerie Bertinelli. But I might not get over Rita Moreno’s thicker-than-“West Side Story” accent.
Spoiler alert: You’ll have to excuse me now. I must get back to the hilarious Aziz Ansari and “Master of None.”
Spoiler alert: It’s Jess. It has always been Jess.
Phil Arvia is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.
