The Audacity is self-satisfied, but doesn't earn it.
ALSO: Cunk is back. As is the BBC.
One of the TV shows launching this year with huge expectation from within the industry is new AMC drama The Audacity.
It debuts today and I’m really not into it.
And that’s a shame because with its interest in technology, finance, and politics, it’s exactly the sort of show that should have me on the hook. But it lacks authenticity and never grows beyond self-satisfaction as it glares at the tech industry. But get through the first episode and you’ll find that self-satisfaction isn’t earned as it trades in one tired commentary of the industry after another.
Here’s my review of The Audacity, illustrated by the 1999 film Fight Club. As always, note that I am the Brad Pitt character:
I don’t want to call The Audacity a satire. That implies that there is something funny in this occasionally wry drama about Silicon Valley CEOs and the professionals that support them. The show is a commentary on the excess, distance from humanity, and self-centeredness that drives the ambitions of the new digital elites that have so much direct and inadvertent impact on our lives.
Also, once you start to refer to The Audacity as a satire, there are two expectations:
That the show, being sold as being from Succession staff writer Jonathan Glatzer, delivers witty dialogue. Again, please note… there’s nothing actually funny in this show; and
That the show actually nails the subject of its focus in a satirical way.
The tech culture as seen in this show doesn’t feel evolved or different really than the tech bros seen in HBO’s Silicon Valley from a decade ago. As I think about OpenAI buying the TBPN streaming show last week and the success of the All-In podcast, what I see missing from The Audacity is a sense that the tech CEO’s in this podcast are aggrieved by mainstream culture and politics and that they are just as thirsty as teenage wannabe influencers to have their own voices and perspectives heard.
That’s the story of Silicon Valley from 2025. The story of 2026 is likely to be about the fall-out from that as the industry struggles with the implications of supporting the horse they went all in on.
But none of that is reflected in the show.
The show debuts on AMC today and on SBS On Demand in Australia on Wednesday.
Cunk is back. And this time, she’s on cinema
Something I should have included in the newsletter late last week: Cunk is coming back to Netflix for the three-part Cunk on Cinema.
I have adored the Philomena Cunk character since Diane Morgan first brought her to the screen in Charlie Brooker’s show Screenwipe (a series that really should come back, btw). Her on-screen counterpart Barry Shitpeas has thankfully been left behind.
Like the previous Cunk shows Cunk on Britain, Cunk on Earth, and Cunk on Life, the new show will air on the BBC in the UK and Ireland, but on Netflix everywhere else.
It isn’t often that a joke quote in the media release for a comedy show gets an actual chuckle from me, but I liked this quote from Ms Cunk:
“Cinema has given the world some of the most profound, memorable and moving visual moments in its unswerving depiction of the human condition: the shower scene in ‘Psycho,’ Death playing chess in that Swedish thing, and Tom Selleck’s glistening moustache in ‘Three Men And A Little Lady,’ to name but all three of the only examples I can think of at the moment,” said Cunk. “There will, unfortunately, be some bits in black and white, but we’ll keep that to the barest minimum.”
I’ve never admitted this to anyone, but my life-long real estate dream is a Three Men & A Baby / Three Men & A Little Lady apartment replica in Manhattan.
BBC News is back on Australian television
It was good late last week to see BBC News restored to Australian TV. It is now streaming on the Channel Nine-owned 9Now, joining a collection of other BBC-owned channels including BBC Comedy, BBC Home & Garden, and BBC Food.
The BBC News service had been available in Australia via pay provider Foxtel. That came to an end in July 2024 with the BBC pulling all of its branded channels, which also included: BBC Earth, BBC First, and CBeebies. Ever since, BBC News has only been available on BBC.com for Australians to stream.
I had expected that we would have seen BBC News added at some stage to the BBC-owned SVOD BritBox, but that never happened. BBC (in Australia and other international territories outside the UK) seems committed to a strategy of selling what it can to third-party services and using BritBox as a second window service propped up by a couple of marquee titles like Death in Paradise.
News Desk
Capcom releasing the first three original Resident Evil games to buy shouldn’t be such an achievement, but in an industry where older games are vaulted for various business reasons, fans are celebrating their availability. Read: The AV Club
If Zendaya and/or Jean Smart win Emmys this year for their roles on the final seasons of their show’s Euphoria and Hacks, they will make Emmy history as the first women to win for every season of their show. Read: Variety
At the Westfield Century City mall, Apple TV is launching a two-weekend long interactive activation highlighting shows including Pluribus, Margo’s Got Money Troubles, The Morning Show, Shrinking, Your Friends & Neighbors, Imperfect Women, Slow Horses, and Stick. Meanwhile, I’m wondering how I get one of their tote bags. Read: Deadline
Backlash following Mubi receiving a $100 million investment led by Sequoia Capital saw a 200,000 loss in subscribers through 2025. Read: WSJ
Doughboy Michael Richards has been shown the door from season 3 of Twisted Metal. Read: Dark Horizons
With sets for the Star Trek TV shows all being dismantled, it’s pretty unlikely that the proposed Captain Kirk-helmed Year One series is going to happen. Read: Trek Central
RIP nepo uncle Persons of Interest star John Nolan. Read: Deadline
A faux real-time medical procedural requires meticulous planning by The Pitt production team as they strive for realism that goes beyond just having a Game of Thrones coffee cup moment on the show. Read: Indiewire
EP Warren Littlefield says they are looking at what will be at least a three-season run for The Testaments. Read: THR
Welcome To Wrexham has been renewed for three more seasons at FX. Read: thefutoncritic
Trailer Park
All seven seasons of Tales From The Crypt with its extensive who’s who list of 80s and 90s Hollywood superstar actors (and writers and directors) will start rolling out on Shudder in the US (I’m not sure if this is international) from May 1. It’s genuinely shocking to me that HBO Max didn’t license this.
Sold Out on You debuts on Netflix April 22.
A workaholic home shopping host heads to the countryside to get her sales back on top, but a mysterious farmer shakes up her plans - and her heart.
That’s the newsletter for the today.
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