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Jen Chaney

TV Critic
@chaneyj
[email protected]

Vulture and New York TV critic Jen Chaney previously worked for the Washington Post and has bylines at the New York Times and Vanity Fair. She also wrote As If: The Complete Oral History of Clueless.

  1. showrunners
    How Jac Schaeffer Made WandaVision Inside the Marvel MachineLike the sitcom-superhero show itself, Schaeffer’s work on WandaVision involved a hybrid approach.
  2. tv review
    Last Chance U: Basketball Is a Riveting, Heartbreaking Sports DocThe end of the eight-episode season, now on Netflix, has a twist you’ve probably never seen in a sports documentary.
  3. keeping up with the royals
    Why We Watched Oprah Interview Meghan and HarryThe widely viewed special felt like a turning point in an ongoing TV saga that millions of Americans have been following for decades.
  4. close reads
    Allen v. Farrow’s Dylan Farrow Videos Are a Necessary Shift in FocusWhile it’s unsettling to watch a 7-year-old Dylan describe her abuse, it feels right that as an adult she’s finding healing in an on-camera context.
  5. tv review
    The Real World Homecoming Is a Welcome Revisit of a Reality-TV Time CapsuleWhat happens when seven strangers stop being polite and start getting real 30 years later.
  6. late night tv
    Fallon Takes a WandaVision Trip Through Late-Night History With Elizabeth OlsenApparently Wanda isn’t the only person who turns to old TV as a coping mechanism.
  7. moxie
    In Moxie, They Are Young Women, Hear Them (Nicely) RoarThe movie about a feminist uprising at a high school is well-intentioned but lacks the edgy spirit it supposedly celebrates.
  8. golden globes 2021
    This Year’s Golden Globes Were the Wrong Kind of MessTina Fey and Amy Poehler were fine hosts, but the ceremony overall was an exhausting reminder that this whole pandemic is really getting old.
  9. cliffhangers
    What Makes Viewers ‘Tune In Next Week"?Veteran TV writers share how they craft cliffhanger endings for everything from comedies to soaps to docuseries.
  10. golden globes 2021
    Who Should (and Will) Win at the Golden Globes This Weekend?Even in the middle of a pandemic, the Globes will go on, and so will our prognostication.
  11. wrap party in paradise
    Live Together, Party Together: The Story of Lost’s Final Wrap PartyCast and crew reminisce about the epic send-off thrown by Evangeline Lilly and featuring an unplanned guest performance by Jimmy Buffett.
  12. the art of ending things
    The 101 Greatest Endings in Movies HistoryGood finales offer catharsis. The best deny us closure altogether.
  13. gotcha! gotcha again!
    Okay, Let’s Talk About Behind Her Eyes’s Double Twist EndingThat final reveal gives some of what comes before greater context, but that doesn’t mean it’s good context.
  14. tv review
    Allen v. Farrow Places Dylan Farrow at the Center of Her Own StoryThe new HBO docuseries reexamines the familiar allegations against Woody Allen from a different perspective with context we have not seen before.
  15. tv review
    Portrait of the Rock As a Young ManYoung Rock is a sweet sitcom about the life of Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson that implies he may be president someday.
  16. tv review
    The Great North Finds Warmth in a Chilly PlaceThe new animated sitcom from the team at Bob’s Burgers is as quirky and good-hearted as … well, Bob’s Burgers.
  17. tv review
    Hello, Clarice. Good-bye, Clarice.The CBS series’s attempt to put Clarice Starling at the center of a narrative doesn’t rise to the intelligence and complexity of the woman herself.
  18. spoilers
    That WandaVision Ending Gives Deeper Meaning to a Crossover Event“On a Very Special Episode …” is indeed a very special, brilliantly layered episode of WandaVision.
  19. tv review
    The Beagle Remains a BlessingApple TV+’s new The Snoopy Show is a welcome reminder that happiness still is a warm puppy.
  20. golden globes 2021
    The Biggest Snubs and Surprises of the 2021 Golden Globe NominationsEmily in Paris was nominated for Best Comedy Series?
  21. trump tv
    What American Horror Story: Cult Got Right—and Very Wrong—About the Trump EraDebuting less than a year after Trump took office, the anthology series’ messy attempt to speak to the moment was both flawed and prescient.
  22. tv review
    The Lady and the Dale Is a Multifaceted Look at a Multifaceted Con ArtistThe HBO docuseries offers a sharp, engrossing reconciliation of Liz Carmichael’s crimes and her identity as a trans woman.
  23. tv review
    Blown Away Is a Cozy Blanket Made of Hot, Molten GlassIn its second season, now on Netflix, the glassblowing-competition series offers the warmth you crave on a cold January day.
  24. inauguration day 2021
    Inauguration Day 2021 Was a Colorful Beam of LightVisually and thematically, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s inauguration was suffused with brightness.
  25. hbo
    In Tiger, a Portrait of a Phenom Who Was Never Allowed to Be a KidA two-part HBO documentary shows the toll of an overbearing father and life as a golf prodigy.
  26. tv review
    Marvel’s WandaVision Is a Time-Traveling DelightElizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany hopscotch through sitcom history in a new Disney+ series.
  27. close reads
    Cobra Kai Season 3 Sends Mixed Nostalgia MessagesThe series argues that nostalgia is toxic but also can’t stop reminding us that the ’80s rule.
  28. 2021 preview
    48 TV Shows We Can’t Wait to See in 2021There’s still a whole lot of TBD ahead, but also some definitive promise of great things to come.
  29. tv review
    Mr. Mayor Is a Nice Political Comedy at a Very Not-Nice TimeComprising a sitcom dream team, Tina Fey and Robert Carlock’s latest is amusing, if not exactly dialed into the current climate.
  30. 🤬tv review 🤬
    Seven Not-So-Dirty Reasons to Watch History of Swear WordsAlthough, truly, you don’t need our damn permission.
  31. close reads
    Let’s Talk About Bridgerton’s Finale Reveal of You-Know-WhoLady Whistledown is … not who I thought she would be.
  32. our streaming future
    Is It a Movie or Is It TV? And Does Anyone Really Care?After nearly a year of watching everything on the same damn screen, four critics attempt to talk through an unkillable debate.
  33. spoilers
    The Force and the Nostalgia Were Strong in The Mandalorian FinaleThe season-two finale’s big cameo is a perfect example of what Star Wars, as a franchise, often tries to do and only occasionally succeeds at.
  34. bless the child
    The Continuing Adventures of the Artist Formerly Known As Baby YodaAre you there, Force? It’s me, Grogu.
  35. spoilers
    The Flight Attendant’s Murder-Mystery Reveal Succeeds Where The Undoing’s FailedBoth series center on whodunits that go to the wildest of places, but only one asks us to take what it’s doing seriously.
  36. vulture investigates
    So, Is There a Pandemic on Big Sky or Not?The answer seems to be: Yes, technically, but no one is acting like it. Which is confusing!
  37. tv review
    The Stand Is Both Too Real and Too Unreal for 2020A new adaptation of the Stephen King novel may be more than you can handle at the end of this hideous year.
  38. spoilers
    Let’s Discuss That Big Mandalorian RevealIt may not be the first time we’ve seen [redacted], but it’s the first time we’ve seen it like this.
  39. tv review
    HBO’s New Bee Gees Documentary Does More Than Just DiscoThe Bee Gees: How Can You Mend a Broken Heart smartly contextualizes the story of one of the most successful groups in pop history.
  40. best of 2020
    The Best TV of 2020These aren’t just very good TV shows. These were our escapes from despair.
  41. close reads
    Zendaya Captures 2020 in Her Extraordinary Euphoria PerformanceThe series’ one-off Christmas special finds Zendaya’s Rue in a different mode that feels distinctly of this moment.
  42. tv review
    Bryan Cranston Makes Your Honor’s Crime Story Clichés CompellingThe performances elevate this Showtime series, but the focus on plot thickening gums up the works.
  43. tv review
    Big Mouth Is Still Going Through ChangesBoth the series and its eighth-grade protagonists display a growing sense of self-awareness in a season that aims to hold itself to higher standards.
  44. hammer time
    We Have Many Questions About That The Undoing FinaleMost of them are about dishwashing hammers.
  45. close reads
    The Undoing’s Fall From GraceThe whole show was a red herring, and we, like its inscrutable protagonist, got duped.
  46. chat room
    Tracey Wigfield Talks Making a New, Socially Conscious Saved by the BellWigfield always planned to use satire to highlight class divisions in the new version of the series, and the past year has made that even more timely.
  47. tv review
    Saved by the Bell Reemerges As a Self-Aware Satirical DelightA send-up of the original show and white privilege, the new Peacock series is much smarter than you may have assumed.
  48. close reads
    Princess Diana Exposes The Crown’s Great Uncrossable ChasmSeason four brilliantly illuminates, through the arrival of Diana, how impossible it is to connect with the royal family, even for those within it.
  49. tv review
    Big Sky is David E. Kelley LiteHis new ABC series is filled with mysteries, perhaps one too many.
  50. tv review
    The Lego Star Wars Holiday Special Isn’t Bad, But It Isn’t Interesting, EitherDisney+’s latest franchise expansion is competent in a bland, expected way that almost makes one yearn for the specific awfulness of the 1978 special.
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