Screen & Sound · The Lori Diaries
If there's one thing I've become particularly good at this year, it's deciding to watch just one episode and then discovering that it's suddenly much later than I intended. In 2020, television has been a little bit of everything for me: a trip to Paris, a visit to Buckingham Palace, a return to familiar New York apartments, and occasionally a rather tense evening with people who make spectacularly bad decisions. These are the ten shows I kept thinking about, recommending, or coming back to this year.
I'm the kind of person who can spend far too long scrolling through Netflix, read the description of six different shows, watch two trailers, and somehow end up putting on something I've already seen.
Perhaps that sounds familiar.
I've always loved getting lost in a good series, but this year I've appreciated that feeling more than usual. Some evenings, I've wanted an interesting story that would hold all my attention. On others, I've wanted pretty scenery, a little romance, or characters I know so well that their voices feel familiar before the opening credits have finished.
And then there are the evenings when I want a crime, a secret, or a cliffhanger convincing me that going to bed at a reasonable hour is an entirely optional activity.
This isn't a list of ten shows that all premiered in 2020. Some are new discoveries, some returned with new seasons, and a few have been around for years.
It's simply a little record of what I've loved watching in 2020, and what I'd put on if you came over and asked me to choose something for us.
When I Wanted to Disappear into Another World
Sometimes the best thing a series can do is take you somewhere completely different. Not necessarily somewhere you'd want to live, mind you. Just somewhere interesting enough that you forget to check your phone.
The Queen's Gambit
If you'd told me that a drama about chess would have me quite so invested in what happened next, I might have raised an eyebrow.
Yet here we are.
The Queen's Gambit follows Beth Harmon, an orphan who discovers an extraordinary talent for chess and grows into a formidable player. Anya Taylor-Joy is wonderful as Beth, who is brilliant and fiercely determined, but also struggling with addiction and the loneliness that can come with being exceptional at something.
I love that the series makes chess feel dramatic even if, like me, you're not sitting there analysing every move. You understand what's at stake because you understand how much it matters to Beth.
And can we talk about the clothes for a moment? The coats, the dresses, the perfectly composed interiors. It has that rare combination of being beautiful to look at and impossible to dismiss as just something pretty.
I'd recommend it even if you've never once felt tempted to pick up a chessboard.
The Crown, Season Four
There's something about The Crown that makes the thought of spending an evening watching royal family drama feel like a perfectly respectable cultural activity.
This season brings us into the years of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer, with Emma Corrin playing Diana alongside Josh O'Connor's Charles. Olivia Colman returns as Queen Elizabeth II, and Gillian Anderson joins the cast as Margaret Thatcher.
I'm especially drawn to the contrast between the beautiful public image of royal life and the much less comfortable private relationships the series imagines behind it.
It's all grand rooms, impeccable costumes, and conversations in which nobody seems capable of simply saying what they mean.
Of course, it's important to remember that The Crown is a historical drama, not a documentary. I watch it for the performances and storytelling, rather than treating every private conversation on screen as something that really happened.
Still, the Diana years make for compelling television, and the cast is reason enough for me to keep watching.
Peaky Blinders
And now, from Buckingham Palace to Birmingham. Quite the change of atmosphere.
Peaky Blinders has everything I love about a period drama when it's in the mood to misbehave: sharp suits, complicated loyalties, danger, and people delivering very serious lines while looking impossibly stylish.
Cillian Murphy plays Tommy Shelby, and yes, I have a bit of a crush on him. I feel no particular need to pretend otherwise.
But Tommy's appeal as a character isn't just that he looks good in a coat. He's fascinating because he's so difficult to read. You can admire how clever he is while also being completely aware that you would not want to get caught up in his plans.
The show has a fantastic cast, including Helen McCrory, Paul Anderson, and Sophie Rundle, and I love the way it combines its period setting with such a distinctive atmosphere.
It's not what I put on when I need something soothing. It's what I put on when I want a story that takes over the room.
When I Wanted Something a Little More Ridiculous
I mean ridiculous affectionately. Sometimes I want beautiful outfits, impossible situations, attractive people making questionable choices, or a supernatural complication that nobody in real life should ever have to deal with.
Emily in Paris
I know Emily in Paris isn't exactly a documentary about moving to France.
Emily Cooper, played by Lily Collins, is an American marketing executive who arrives in Paris with an impressive wardrobe, plenty of enthusiasm, and not nearly enough French for the situation she's found herself in.
Her colleagues aren't particularly thrilled to have her there, her love life quickly becomes complicated, and she somehow manages to find herself in one photogenic location after another.
Is it full of French clichés? Absolutely.
Did that stop me from enjoying the Parisian streets, the clothes, and the romantic drama? Not even slightly.
It's a lovely bit of escapism when I don't want to think too hard. I can enjoy the scenery, roll my eyes at Emily's decisions, and spend half an episode wondering where she found a particular outfit.
If a trip to Paris isn't on the cards, ten episodes of this will have to do for now.
Lucifer
On the other hand, if Paris feels a little too sensible, there's always the Devil opening a nightclub in Los Angeles.
Tom Ellis plays Lucifer Morningstar, who has left Hell behind and settled into a rather glamorous life in LA. Through a series of events that only make sense once you've accepted the premise, he starts helping Detective Chloe Decker solve crimes.
I love the combination of detective story, supernatural drama, and humour. Lucifer can be utterly charming and spectacularly infuriating within the space of one conversation, which is a large part of the fun.
There's also something enjoyable about a show that knows its central idea is absurd and commits to it completely.
After its cancellation by Fox, fans campaigned to save it and Netflix picked it up. The first half of season five arrived this August, so there's plenty to catch up on if you're only just meeting Lucifer and Chloe.
Just don't expect to watch one episode and casually move on with your evening.
Chilling Adventures of Sabrina
Sabrina and I go back a long way.
I remember watching Sabrina the Teenage Witch cartoons on a German television channel when I was little. There's something lovely about coming across a familiar character years later and finding that she's grown into an entirely different kind of story.
Netflix's Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, starring Kiernan Shipka, is much darker than the Sabrina I remember. There are witches, unsettling rituals, family secrets, and the constant problem of being half-witch and half-mortal in a world that doesn't make either side particularly easy.
I love that the series has its own gothic atmosphere. It feels like the sort of show you should watch on a gloomy afternoon with the curtains drawn, even if it's perfectly sunny outside.
The fourth and final part is due on 31 December, so I have one last visit to Greendale to look forward to before the year is over.
That's one way to spend New Year's Eve.
When I Needed Familiar Faces
Not every evening calls for a new plot twist. Sometimes I just want to be around people I already know, even if those people happen to live inside a television.
Friends
I don't think I'll ever reach a point where I've watched Friends too many times.
I know the jokes. I know what's coming. I know which episodes will make me laugh before I've even pressed play.
And somehow, none of that makes me want to watch it any less.
There's Ross's sandwich, the apartment swap, the eternal question of whether Ross and Rachel really were on a break, and an entire New York apartment situation that makes absolutely no sense when you start thinking about rent.
But I don't watch Friends for realistic property prices.
I watch it because the characters feel familiar and because I can put on an episode I've seen a dozen times and still enjoy being there.
It's the television equivalent of returning to a favourite café. You don't need the menu. You already know what you're having.
Modern Family
Modern Family is another show I can turn to when I need a laugh.
On paper, it's a series about an extended family: Jay and Gloria, Claire and Phil with their children, and Mitchell and Cameron with their daughter. They're connected by family, but they have very different personalities and very different ideas about how life should work.
In practice, it's a collection of people who love one another and are remarkably good at driving one another mad.
That's what makes it feel so recognisable, even when the situations become wonderfully exaggerated.
I love the way a small misunderstanding can turn into an enormous family event, usually because nobody has thought to have one straightforward conversation.
The series ended this April after eleven seasons. There's something comforting about knowing there are so many episodes to return to, even when there won't be any new ones.
And really, sometimes watching Phil Dunphy try to get through an ordinary day is all the entertainment I need.
Sex Education
I have such a soft spot for British humour, and Sex Education manages to be very funny while also having a surprising amount of heart.
The series follows Otis, Maeve, Eric, and their classmates through the awkwardness of school, friendship, relationships, and figuring out who they are. Gillian Anderson plays Otis's mother Jean, a sex therapist whose profession makes his teenage life even more complicated.
What I like most is that the characters are allowed to be messy. They say the wrong thing, misunderstand each other, and sometimes make decisions that leave me talking back to the screen.
But underneath the comedy, the show takes their feelings seriously.
The second season arrived in January, and the series continues to be the kind of show that makes me laugh in one scene and feel unexpectedly emotional in the next.
I especially appreciate that its characters aren't expected to have everything figured out. Frankly, who does?
And When I Wanted a Story with a Secret
Dead to Me
If there's one thing that will convince me to watch another episode, it's the feeling that somebody knows something I don't.
Dead to Me understands this perfectly.
Christina Applegate plays Jen, a woman grieving the death of her husband after a hit-and-run. At a grief support group, she meets Judy, played by Linda Cardellini, and the two form a friendship that becomes much more complicated than either of them might have expected.
That's about as much as I want to tell you if you haven't seen it.
I love the contrast between the show's sharp humour and the much darker things happening underneath it. Jen and Judy can be funny, frustrating, touching, and completely impossible to look away from.
The friendship is at the heart of the series, but there's always the sense that one more piece of information could change everything.
Two seasons are available so far, and this is exactly the sort of show that makes “I'll go to bed after this episode” sound like a convincing plan until the final thirty seconds.
My ideal watchlist apparently needs a little bit of everything: a complicated woman playing chess, an impossibly stylish Parisian daydream, one charming Devil, and a sitcom I could probably recite from memory.
Looking at these shows together, I think they say quite a lot about what I've wanted from television this year.
Sometimes I wanted to disappear into somebody else's world for an hour. Sometimes I wanted a mystery that would keep me guessing. And sometimes I wanted the comfort of characters whose stories I already knew.
That's the nice thing about a good series. It doesn't have to be brand-new to be exactly what you feel like watching.
I'm looking forward to seeing what 2021 brings, but I suspect I'll still find myself returning to a few of these when I can't decide what to put on.
Especially Friends. Let's not pretend I was ever going to stop rewatching Friends.
What have you loved watching this year? Tell me which series deserves a place on my watchlist, and which one you've watched so many times that you practically know the dialogue.
I'm always looking for something new to watch. Even if I might end up choosing an old favourite instead.
xoxo,
Lori
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