The Attic

Slick, manipulative, and contrived, this second season is not as odious as the first, but still… Gorgeous scenery and lovely faces keep you watching and reward you with some depth and an occasional heartfelt scene. But in the end, I felt cheated and as “played” as the characters themselves. The whole thing was just a seven-episodeexcuse to lure viewers with plenty of sex, faux Italian culture, and the hint of murder. With not a single likable character, each shift of focus had me grimacing — “no, not THEM again.”

“Bad Sisters” starts out as a comedy but soon becomes much more grave and humorless. Don’t fall for the “black comedy” label. A black comedy would have kept up the morbid humor but, alas, this dwells on vengeance, resentment, and a relentless repeat of JP’s evil conniving. The acting is superb, the script skilled, but you get sooo sick of seeing this man humiliate, belittle, and decieve everyone, that it gets harder and harder to watch.

Disappointing. Promises to be a look at how the Internet and TV affected the remote country of Bhutan but gets lost in two characters whose stories seem anything but typical. A would-be monk seduced by online images of a young woman whose dishonesty and conniving make her entirely unsympathetic. This shallow Innocence v. Experience story cries out for depth or narration, but it just goes on, slowly, with no cultural context, no background, no sympathy. Internet is bad. We get it. But can it make a woman leave her child? Make monks play war with toy weapons?