It’s almost Valentine’s Day. Rather than add to the pile of “Best TV Couple” lists (again) or write some ode to great cinematic love stories, I’m choosing to celebrate by introducing a new series all about the L word, but not in a romantic sense. “True Love” will be a sporadic new feature in which I tell you about things in pop culture of which I’m an unabashed fan, whether it’s an embarrassing thing to admit or not. Love is how we all felt about Parks & Recreation, True Love is maintaining that Super Fun Night was the best sitcom in years even though I’ve yet to encounter a single person who agrees with me. This series will highlight all of my favourite things, no matter how silly, dated, un-news-worthy or generally maligned and/or ignored they may be.
Most entries in this series will likely be editorials focusing on one piece of pop culture (a movie, a band, etc) but to start us off I thought I’d do a list. The following are some of my favourite things on TV. They’re mostly small things- a supporting performance, a subplot, a single scene- nothing so big as to earn its own article, but all of these things are highlights of my recent or weekly TV-watching experience and, in the spirit of true love, I figured they ought to be shared.
Presented without comment:
When Leslie Jones hits on Colin Jost on SNL‘s “Weekend Update”
The Burski/Leslie subplot on Undateable
Whenever Santino Fontana sings on Crazy Ex-Girlfriend
The hall-of-fame onscreen kissing skills of Younger‘s Nico Tortorella
Any and all James/Wynn scenes on Supergirl
Eddie Kaye Thomas as Toby on Scorpion
Adam’s cracking voice on The Goldbergs
The way Trevor Noah self consciously dances to his new “hip” Daily Show intro music
The classical score on Mom
That scene in the Shameless season premiere when Mickey made Ian lie to him
Speaking of Shameless, everything about Shanola Hampton in the February 7th episode
Whenever Harry Connick Jr. talks about actual music theory on American Idol
The fact that Brooklyn Nine-Nine takes the Jake/Boyle friendship seriously
Anytime there’s “Boombastic” dancing on Fresh Off the Boat
Sometimes on Girl Meets World, Lucas gets to make a joke
Everything about the BBC War & Peace miniseries
The creative way New Girl is handling Zooey Deschanel’s maternity leave
The last 10 seconds of You’re the Worst season two