Three Must See Shows on Max

       

Photograph by Lloyd Bishop/HBO

        On October 26, 2024, Max released 'Seth Meyers: Dad Man Walking', which has earned predominantly positive reviews from critics. In the comedy special, "Known for his dry wit and sharp topical commentary as host of “Late Night with Seth Meyers,” the veteran comedian shifts his focus to his personal life – from the chaos of raising three young kids, to navigating different communication styles in marriage, to the proper way to cross the street in New York City." But what did the critics say?

       Richard Roeper of Chicago Sun-Times says, "This is a no-frills special consisting of Meyers talking to the audience as if we’re all friends and we can all relate to the stories culled from his experiences as a husband and father — stories exaggerated for comedic effect, of course."

       Sean L. McCarthy of Decider notes,  "Late Night fans, take note: There’s a lot more about his home life than his work life or the current political landscape here, so this hour is much more “A Closer Look” inward on how Meyers is managing (or not) to balance it all personally. “I am happy to inform you I have no anti-trans material,” he makes a point of saying, but not so much to weigh in on his edgelord colleagues in comedy, as much as to draw a contrast between gender identity and dietary identity. In his worldview, transitioning to veganism, as Seth’s brother has, is much more of a disruption. And yet, even in his annoyance, he’s got to hand it to his brother for looking much healthier than him as a result. Although he sounds much more annoyed with his wife and kids than he is with his brother, his parents or even his in-laws. Making himself the put-upon dad who can only find peace by lingering underneath the couch for a few extra moments after crawling to fetch the dice his kids had thrown there during a board game. He and his wife might be teaching their children not to use the word “hate” in their vocabulary, but Seth has more than a few things he hates about them (kidding not kidding), to the point where he finds himself taking pleasure out of ripping the sweaters off of his children as a substitute for actually hitting them. And when he gets into arguments with his wife, Seth finds an ally in his mother-in-law. This is all kinda classic sitcom dad material to be sure, imagining Meyers as a version of Ray Romano’s Everybody Loves Raymond, for instance."

        On November 2, 2024, Adult Swim and Max released 'Invincible Fight Girl', which has earned rave reviews from critics. In the series, "A young girl named Andy, living in Wrestling World, endeavors to become the best pro-wrestler ever and takes on the alies of "Fight Girl." Sherin Nicole of RIOTUS says, "That’s where this show dives deeper, exploring the complexities of family expectations versus personal passion. Watching Andy hide her aspirations will ring true for anyone who’s ever felt the weight of familial pressure. Every beatdown, found friend, and new challenge resonates with resilience, redefining identity, and the unapologetic pursuit of greatness." 

Photograph by Courtesy of HBO

        On November 3, 2024, 'Like Water for Chocolate' was released, receiving a mixed reception from critics at the time of this writing. In the series, which is based on the novel of the same name, one "explores the idea that sometimes traditions can become a prison, an obstacle for love. Tita de la Garza and Pedro Múzquiz are two souls deeply in love, yet unable to be together due to entrenched family customs. The protagonists navigate a world of magical realism and rich flavors as Tita struggles between the destiny imposed on her by her family and her fight for love. Along the way, the audience will witness her greatest refuge: the kitchen. For Tita, her magical connection to cooking becomes an active resistance against oppression, allowing her to channel her deepest desires and passions into her recipes, transforming those who taste them. Set during the Mexican Revolution, the series also addresses the struggle of women to control their own destinies. The breathtaking locations in Tlaxcala and Mexico City provide an authentic and powerful backdrop for this adaptation of a beloved Mexican literary classic." The ensemble cast includes Irene Azuela, Azul Guaita, Andrés Baida, Andrea Chaparro, and Ana Valeria Becerril. Read the full review round-up below.

        Cristina Escobar of RogerEbert.com praises the series, stating, "HBO’s new “Like Water for Chocolate” is sumptuously shot. And it’s not just the costumes or the sets, although they are both clearly rendered with care. Gathered skirts, wide-brimmed hats, and lace-up black boots. Colonial archways and formal sitting rooms. What makes this show feel so rich is the cinematography, framing a kiss between the young lovers, an ill-fated wedding feast, and a painful birthing scene in ways that evoke magic. It’s all emotion and beauty and that’s before we get to the food. And the food is lovely too. I stayed through the credits to catch the close ups of bowls and big wooden spoons, ingredients combining and transforming. It didn’t make me hungry so much as comforted, offering a vision of food as an end in itself. The making is an art form and the consumption is the delightful result. Now, for those not familiar with “Like Water for Chocolate,” this famous tale originated in a 1989 book by ​​Laura Esquivel before hitting theaters in the States in 1992. The HBO series is the first adaption in more than 30 years, and it faithfully renders the tale of Tita de la Garza (Azul Guaita), the youngest daughter of bitter widow Mamá Elena (Irene Azuela)." Adding, "Parts are imperfect – Nacha (Ángeles Cruz), Tita’s de facto mother and the one who teacher her how to cook, may get more of a backstory, but it is still grating that the darker-skinned woman exists solely as a vessel for Tita to learn. Yet still, it succeeds in making the decades-old story, set one hundred years ago, feel fresh and alive."

'Uzumaki' Reviews: "Adult Swim's Uzumaki does the impossible in creating a worthy anime for one of Junji Ito's scariest stories"

         On September 29, 2024, Cartoon Network premiered 'Uzumaki', which has earned rave reviews, currently holding at 100% on Rotten Tomatoes. In the animated series, "Hair twisting, bodies intertwining, spirals are developing all over the town." The ensemble cast includes Shin'ichirô Miki, Uki Satake, Mariya Ise, Mika Doi, Toshio Furukawa, and Takashi Matsuyama. But what did the critics say?

        Mat Jones of IGN Movies says, "Adult Swim’s adaptation of Junji Ito’s 1998 manga Uzumaki was worth the wait, which is probably a massive shock if you’re familiar with other attempts to put his stories into motion. Despite taking a winding path to release and emerging in a world that’s much more warped than when it began production, the anime shows a clear understanding of what makes its source material work while making necessary, perhaps rushed, alterations for the pacing of television. Fortunately, it still retains most of its twisted spirit." Adding, "Uzumaki is widely thought of as the mangaka's most important work (though it's the chilling short story The Enigma of Amigara Fault for me), a unique read that’s gruesome and tense and yet balanced with pockets of camp silliness. It’s a work that includes sickening deformations of bodies, and, inexplicably, a chapter about how sometimes your new haircut can be a little too sexy. The animated series it inspired centers on two teenagers who begin to notice strange events in their hometown of Kurouzu-cho, with Shuichi Saito especially worried about his father’s growing obsession with spirals; any lines that swoop around on themselves, wherever they’re found, gain his utmost focus and attention. The manga tackles each new weird discovery in town one by one, while the Adult Swim version threads a few of the plot lines from all over in this first episode, adapting some of the early chapters almost entirely and introducing plot points from further down the timeline. Though none of the material feels out of place, this episode is certainly trying to do too much at once. In just 22 minutes there are four separate plots, where three of them could probably make great episodes if given time on their own, and one could probably have found more breathing room further down the line. (There’s also an argument to be made that changing the chronology of some events makes for a slight plot-discrepancy, but that’s one for the video essayists.)"

       Evan Valentine of ComicBook.com notes, "Adult Swim's Uzumaki does the impossible in creating a worthy anime for one of Junji Ito's scariest stories." Continuing, "Uzumaki's plot is a strong one, in terms of Junji Ito's overall horror library. Often, the series is considered one of the horror artist's greatest works, and for good reason. While it does have its two main characters in Shuichi and Kirie, it will often branch out from them and tell the stories of handfuls of characters unfortunate enough to be cursed in rather unique ways. This works in a way to create an anthology-style tale that is also cohesive in its overall plot. Shuichi, for example, is dragged into a specific curse thanks to his father's obsession with spirals, as the young boy even explains to his girlfriend how ridiculous it sounds on the surface, while documenting how terrifying it is to see it with his own eyes. That's Ito's work in a nutshell; concepts that, on paper, sound hilarious but put into practice, make for the stuff of nightmares."

Photo by Ajeet Mestry on Unsplash

        Elijah Gonzalez of Paste Magazine says, "Through sometimes wacky and always unsettling sights, we’re sucked into the swirling, hypnotic pull of what feels like a collective delusion. If the series can maintain its presentation and momentum, it has the makings of an anime horror classic." Concluding, And, of course, one of the most striking elements here is the enigma around its central spiral symbol, which continues to suck unwitting souls into its thrall. Working in the realm of “messed-up little town” fiction, these events inspire a mixture of curiosity and suffocation, not only getting across compulsive phobias and gruesome sights, but also a coiling fear of the unknown. Why does this symbol do this to people, and is any of this happening for a reason? This premiere conveys a sense of slow-build calamity around spirals that seems all but inescapable, and at one point, Shuichi asks Kirie why they don’t just get up and leave this cursed place behind. But for a reason that’s hard to explain, that doesn’t seem like an option (beyond the fact there wouldn’t be much of a story if they did), and it’s as if they’re caught up in an invisible vortex. Like many, it seems they’ll never escape the orbit of this town they were born in, and perhaps that’s the scariest detail of all. All that said, perhaps my biggest worry at this point is that, while the manga isn’t very long, adapting all of it into four short, 30-minute episodes may be difficult, especially because this premiere only covered three of 19 chapters. Related to this, there was already a touch of awkward pacing with how they spliced together the plotlines from the first two chapters and the third, so that will be something to keep an eye on. Additionally, while the series looks great so far, its detail-intensive approach could be quite difficult to maintain for the full run, something I’m wary of since it’s common for anime premieres to look noticeably better than what follows."

'Rick and Morty: The Anime' Reviews: "Even if Rick and Morty: The Anime ultimately veers toward inexplicable more than enjoyable, though, it’s never boring -- which you can’t always say about Rick and Morty itself. "

     

Photo by Peter Geo on Unsplash

        On August 15, Adult Swim premiered 'Rick and Morty: The Anime', which has received a mixed reception from critics. In the series, Rick, now not only a mad scientist but a samurai, embarks on adventures with his grandchildren, much to the chagrin of their parents. The ensemble cast includes Joe Daniels, Gabriel Regojo, and Donna Bella Litton. Read the full review round-up below.

        Slant Magazine's Niv M. Sultan writes, "Rick and Morty’s headier themes are familiar territory for writer and director Sano Takashi, who contributed two entries to the anthology of anime shorts based on the series that Adult Swim aired between 2020 and 2021. The blistering “Summer Meets God (Rick Meets Evil),” for one, is dotted with snappy scenes in which the Smith family philosophizes over meals. “I do what I want and never what I don’t,” Rick says as he forks a leaf of lettuce. “I’m not gonna have a pointless debate on whether that constitutes as free will or not.” With Rick and Morty: The Anime, Sano further explores free will, selfhood, and loneliness to exceedingly uneven but oddly beautiful results."

        Sean Boelman of Fandom Wire was less impressed, stating, "The most disappointing thing about Rick and Morty: The Anime, though, is that it does not take full advantage of the unique animation style offered by the anime genre. The only discernable difference between the look of this series and the flagship show is the character design for the human characters. The non-human characters (for example, the Gromflomites) look almost exactly the same, as do the settings. The title sequence has a nice anime energy with an upbeat J-pop soundtrack, but this does not carry over into the show itself."

       Reuben Baron of Looper.com says, "Watching the first two episodes of Rick and Morty: The Anime mostly made me long for another season of Space Dandy." Continuing, "Rick and Morty: The Anime" exists in a separate universe/continuity from the mainline series, so viewers who haven't kept up with every episode of the original could theoretically jump right in — though they'll likely have to watch every episode of the anime in order to fully make sense of it. Adult Swim only provided two episodes of the 10 episode season for review, so we can't tell you where the story leads, but we can tell you it's both very serialized and very complicated. Those who complain about the regular "Rick and Morty" sidetracking narrative development might be intrigued by this more story-driven approach. Whether this approach works is another story."

       Allegra Frank of IGN Movies notes, "Even if Rick and Morty: The Anime ultimately veers toward inexplicable more than enjoyable, though, it’s never boring -- which you can’t always say about Rick and Morty itself. If nothing else, the anime will go down as an impressive exercise." Adding, "What makes Sano’s initial shorts fun is how unlike Rick and Morty they are: They boil the franchise down to its key characters and bits of lore, with an emphasis on surreal imagery and experimental storytelling. Even without the trademark humor, that a Rick and Morty anime produced by a well-known Japanese studio exists at all proves that the franchise still has untapped, playful potential after seven seasons and nearly 11 years on the air."