The Week in TV, 5/18/25

It’s not often I get to talk about two series finales in consecutive weeks, but here we are…

What’s new?

I feel great shame that I completely forgot to mention Andor last week, doubly so because I knew it would be the featured show this week with its final three episodes, and triply so because last week’s trio was phenomenal, in particular the final two. The deliberate provocation and engineering of a mass slaughter on Ghorman by the empire was sickeningly reminiscent of certain real-world events, and it was astoundingly well-filmed and presented, just mass chaos breaking out all around and our characters simply trying to find their bearings and survive. And then– again, sickeningly reminiscent of real-world events– Mon Mothma speaks out about the massacre and calls what the Empire is doing on Ghorman a genocide, and the Empire immediately moves to cut the Senate feed and arrest her. So Cassian has to extract her, though they’ve never met before– because Bail Organa’s team that’s supposed to extract her is already corrupted. A thrilling set of episodes.

Now, to this week’s episodes: Admittedly, the show loses a bit of steam in the final minutes, as it has to set up the lead-in to Rogue One. But man, along the way, these episodes were fantastic. Everything from the series starts coming to a head in BBY 1, particularly Dedra’s investigation of Luthen and the first true organization of the Rebel Alliance. We get some thrilling sequences here, as some people have their lives come crashing down, and for others, of course, the true struggle is just beginning. A worthy conclusion to what was a terrific series. I want to particularly highlight Elizabeth Dulau’s work here; she had almost no credits before Andor, and she has been a total powerhouse as Kleya, just such a potent presence, completely self-possessed even as she’s had to keep her true nature secret for so long and in so many ways. This last set of episodes in particular give her a chance to really shine. (And it’s why, no offense to titular actor Diego Luna, I chose her for the header this week.)

In other shows…

The Rehearsal gave us an episode that pulled us back a bit to the actual ostensible purpose of the season. That made “Kissme” a little less surprising and not going to entirely bonkers and unexpected places (although a certain woman’s feelings for Albert Einstein may well surprise you). Nathan spends most of the episode working with Colin, a nice enough guy who actually is pretty knowledgeable about his interests but a bit shy and dull, to become more comfortable talking about his feelings and talking to women. I presume this is ostensibly part of his overall effort to get pilots and co-pilots to communicate more, although it of course goes to some strange places only Nathan’s mind could get to. Still, it’s a relatively “normal” episode compared to what we got last week.

Hacks gave us two episodes this week, first with “D’Christening”; Deborah and Ava head back to Las Vegas for the christening of DJ’s new baby, Aidan Jr. This is a great segment, with Deborah (who canonically has a rivalry with the Catholic Church) struggling to understand it, being unable to keep her attention-seeking at bay, and finally coming to a better understanding of DJ– along with a great, lovely and heartbreaking scene of DJ explaining to Ava why she chose her to be AJ’s godmother. Meanwhile, Jimmy and Kayla have to deal with Dance Mom getting completely out of control.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have a chance to get to “Witch of the Week” yet. Hacks is the one show I watch by myself, and I can’t always fit it in so close to the article time– especially in the week they drop two so that they can fit the whole season in the Emmy window. It’s a bummer, though, because this is the most consistently discussed show in our thriving comments section.

I watched Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney live, because I had the chance to, and the topic was “Why Can’t I Sleep?” Naturally, I tried to call in on this one but couldn’t get through. That may have affected my ability to pay close attention, though this was a good panel, with Patton Oswalt and Sarah Silverman, and Alanis Morrissette as the musical guest. There’s also a musical number of Lamorne Morris as Yakub, a pretty wild concept that makes me wonder how it got to air.

The Great North gave us “Jude-night Run Adventure,” which does at least live up to the name, between Wolf tracking down Judy after she’s split from a family dinner outing for Honeybee’s birthday without explanation or warning, and also a pair of handcuffs getting involved. Pretty solid; Judy gets some brutal words to Wolf she immediately regrets. That adds a nice sense of stakes this show doesn’t always have.

I didn’t really write up a review of any kind for a few of these. If I don’t write a review or otherwise mention the quality one way or the other, just assume the show is about the same quality as it usually is.

Catching up

Finally caught The Studio‘s seventh episode, “Casting,” where the studio executives basically whip themselves into an unnecessary panic about all the angles from which the Kool-Aid movie casting could be problematic– which starts with Ice Cube as the Kool-Aid Man, quickly spirals out of control in what is essentially a neurotic hell of the executives’ own making, and ends, appropriately, with Ice Cube– whose appearance here is incredibly funny. A good episode on the whole, and while admittedly nothing was quite as funny to me as Mr. Cube– sorry, Ice–’s appearance, I think the show might be funnier on the whole when the executives are just hoisting themselves up by their own collective petard than when it’s more on the cringe-comedy side.

Falling behind

Well, we’re not caught up on The Studio, or a couple of other things mentioned in the past, but we haven’t fallen further behind on anything. (I think I was even a week behind on Hacks last week. Or was it the week before? I’m not going to check.)

Old favorites

“Bart Gets Famous” was this week’s Simpsons pick, and I don’t really remember why other than just because I rather enjoy it. Something must have reminded me of it, although I don’t know what. (Maybe I’ve watched too many clips of Conan O’Brien’s podcast recently and just kept thinking “Sit perfectly still. Only I may dance.”) Homer’s insane combination poor people / gig rant is one of my favorites he ever did.

I forgot to mention previously that some time in the last couple of weeks my wife wanted to watch some Wallace & Gromit, so we watched the three short films, A Grand Day Out, The Wrong Trousers, and A Close Shave. I’d never really seen any Wallace & Gromit before– I wasn’t avoiding them, and I’ve seen Chicken Run, it just never happened– and they were simple, silly, and enjoyable. The animation and character designs are really great at immediately communicating their personalities. And the stories have the kind of slightly fantastical humor that maybe owes a tip of the cap to Looney Tunes. It probably falls in a similar vein of light family fun as that show, in that it’s suitable for children but still enjoyable for adults. Also, these entries feel like spiritually they belong here even if they’re technically called “short films” and not TV episodes.

Just ended

Andor has finished its two-season run. The Studio airs its final episode of season 1 this week.

Coming up

Next Sunday Rick and Morty returns for season 8, but there is nothing new this week, which makes sense, since we’re in mid-May and the network schedule has ended, leaving us with cable and streaming.

I have taken a little interest in the recently released Murderbot, based on Martha Wells’ The Murderbot Diaries series, but I also didn’t even know it existed until three days ago. I’ll report back if I see any of it.

And you?

Your turn in the comments!