WHAT to watch

By Sven Incognito

I’m at a dinner party recently and Mark Reaman overheard me giving a mutual friend some streaming recommendations for him and his wife. I do have to admit that the list I gave out was pure gold. Hours and hours of entertainment customized to what I knew this couple enjoyed, no risk and no wasted time for them, just find the show (I told them the platform) and push the button. I might as well have walked into his house, turned the TV on and started the shows for them! I was happy to do this for my good friend, but it wasn’t so easy for me to come up with this “gold” list.  What I had to endure to come up with 10 or 15 high quality shows was not a walk in Rainbow Park for me or my relationship with my partner.  There’s a lot of crap out there and sometimes you have to sacrifice time and a bit of your soul to find out that what looked good in the beginning ended up being… crap.

Anyway, the newspaper guy thought it may be a good idea to give me a little column that recommends some “good stuff” for the upcoming CB prime TV-watching season. When it’s dark by 5 o’clock and the temperature plummets, there’s a lot of time for TV.

But we all know how that goes, one man’s gold is another man’s, well… crap.

I’ve almost lost friendships because of a someone’s recommendation. My partner and I have looked at each other and said at the same time, “we can’t be friends with them anymore!”

I know this could be a tough job, the type of job where I may get praised and/or accosted in Clark’s for recommending a show that one couple loved while another got a divorce over. “No thanks” was my answer to that. I’m a low-key guy who kinda likes not being recognized by an angry mob. I don’t need tomatoes thrown at me over a bad recommendation, especially when those tomatoes are frozen solid. I’m happy to do it for friends but the general public? Especially in such a small town. But Mark being Mark convinced me to give it a shot, fake name, fake mustache, glasses and all. Names and places changed to protect… me.

So, I’d like to introduce myself, I’m Sven and I’m going to give you some of my favorite shows, some big sellers and some stuff you may never have heard of. My goal is to give you a couple of hours of streaming that may not be the best but aren’t bad enough to start yelling at the screen. Which reminds me of Virgin River on Netflix. Over the past six seasons I’ve yelled, cursed, thrown things and went to bed angry more than once ranting that it’s the worst crap I’ve ever seen, how dare they put this out there, who are these writers??!!!. Why?… because it’s such a bad show. But after swearing that I’d never watch it again after every single season I see the big “New Season” on the screen and I get a little palpitated. “Honey, Virgin River has a new season, are you ready to watch?” Early 2026 for season seven, I’ll be there and I’m not proud. That’s a total of 74 hours I’ll never get back! But what else is there to do for the next six months after skiing, fat tire biking, snowshoeing, cold plunging, skinning and whatever else we do during the seemingly endless winter here.

So, here’s a little about me and my streaming history. I am a man, so being a human who identifies as… a man, I’ve loved Game of Thrones, The Sopranos, Breaking Bad. But on the other hand I’ll admit to enjoying Downton Abbey, Bridgerton and some Jane Austin shows. I’m a complicated man, mostly because besides trying to keep my own identity in my wonderful long-term relationship, I need to remember I’m in a loving sharing relationship with my partner we’ll call Suzy. Suzy needs her identity protected as well because she has some less than PC opinions and particularities that she’s already told me are NOT to be shared with the public. I am respectfully ignoring her.

That means that besides watching the newest Predator or Alien movie I need to spend some special time sharing in that alternate universe of rom-coms and shows where no one gets decapitated. Ladies, I know you’re reading this and thinking that I am the perfect man. That may be true, but you’ll never know who I really am. I could be that guy in Ace getting supplies to finish my “Honey-Do” list, I could be in the yoga class next you, or buying a vegan tea (or box of wine) before book club.

Getting back to my lucky Suzy — sex, nudity, bad language, strobe lights and smoking are all acceptable: gratuitous violence, bad dialogue, ugly people and high anxiety shows are not. My partner loves pretty places, wealthy good-looking people and family dysfunction and a good love story so my recommendations will cover the spectrum. And speaking of a spectrum, throw Love on the Spectrum on Netflix in my list of entertainment. You’ll start off feeling bad about a show like this capitalizing on autism, but you’ll end up falling in love with the characters and watching Love on the Spectrum: Australia, wondering when the heck the next season comes up and how Madison and Tyler are doing.

They’ll be some shows I like that I know Suzy won’t. Those are usually seen after my dedicated nightly one-hour of shared “couples” shows. And some shows that, if a man wants to make his wife happy, he’ll sit down, shut up, watch and tolerate happily. I do it happily because in my house “couples shows” ends early. If it’s 9:01 p.m. it’s me time and the sci-fi, horror, violence and debauchery channel turns on until I slip into my dreams. Which by the way are full of aliens, grizzly attacks, anxiety nightmares all while falling in love and cooking meals in period costumes. So much for not watching TV before bed.

Sometimes I crave the old days of three TV channels and they all went to static at 11 p.m. But no, we’re living in a time of endless entertainment, so much to watch and so little time. I’m here to help.

See you next time…