Week-to-Week

Year-to-Year: 18 Gifts of Criticism by Episodic Medium's Contributors

And a special Gift Subscription offer for your holiday needs

This was an eventful year for Episodic Medium, as in September we made the move to Ghost. It wasn't without its challenges, and it pains me that there are whole conversations that require accessing a different platform, but I've really loved to see how much the community has adapted and grown since then.

It's a community that is, I suppose, primarily my responsibility as editor-in-chief, social media manager, and Discord moderator (for our Loyal Viewers). However, I am still only one person, and so while it may be my responsibility, it is ultimately our contributors and our subscribers who make Episodic Medium what it is: the single best value in television criticism you'll ever find.

It's a value that I try to communicate as best I can, and at the end of each year the easiest way to do this is through the great work our contributors do. As per tradition, I'm removing the paywall on one review by each of the 18 contributors to Episodic Medium this year. It is their work that your subscriptions support: over 70% of the gross income we get from subscriptions goes directly to our freelancers, helping them make a living in an increasingly volatile media environment.

As such, as we reach the end of the year, I'm offering a 10% discount on yearly subscriptions. This applies for new subscribers' first year, which you can only access by clicking this button.

10% off a Year of Episodic Medium

In addition, if you're already a subscriber, you can also make someone else in your life happy with a gift subscription to Episodic Medium for your holiday shopping needs. You can only access this gift subscription at this link.

Give the Gift of Episodic Medium

In past years, I've asked writers for their favorite reviews, but given I edit everything anyway I figured I'd just choose some representative samples that reflec the great work they've done all year. If you want to explore more, you can use the dropdown box at the top of the homepage to see our full archives.

So here's a small sample of the kind of work that our subscribers got from our contributors this year, in alphabetical order.

Erik Adams

"As much as Only Murders in the Building has leaned on its mega-wattage guest stars in recent seasons, it’s great to see that it can still balance meaty material for the guests while serving the regulars (even if some of what they’re getting is scraps) and advancing the whodunit. On that score, Camila’s ladies’ night is a success."

Donna Bowman

"In the comments, several of you have noticed Carol’s snippy entitlement, especially when it comes to the systems that keep the lights on and make her trash disappear. Isn’t it beautiful that withdrawing this service is what leads to her discovery? She may be dependent (aren’t we all) on a vast army of servants invisibly doing her bidding, but that doesn’t mean she lacks a work ethic. Indeed, it seems that her whole career of methodically churning out romantasies has fostered a doggedness that’s exactly what this strange new world demands."

Laura M. Browning

"Coming into this episode, I would have been just a little bit annoyed if Ellis had won, because he’s been more of a goof than a player. But this! Pouring half the drinks into the empty mugs was a stroke of genius, and some beautiful lateral thinking. In that moment, I would have been completely fine if he’d won. Even Little Alex Horne confessed in the studio that he hadn’t foreseen that solution (“Very frustrating”). Truly the highest compliment."

Les Chappell

"But for a show that had so many issues with its long-form storytelling in its latter half, it’s an oddly appropriate way for Mythic Quest to wrap up. Too many shows get the axe and end on unintentional cliffhangers, souring their legacy with questions that we’ll never get answers to. And if there’s still some stuff left on the table, it’s all in a neutral enough zone that we can feel all right about where we are. (Or to quote Marge Simpson, “It’s an ending, that’s enough.”)"

LaToya Ferguson

"'Please Touch Museum' isn’t a big season finale, but it’s a solid one that keeps everything on the rails and doesn’t try to bring in drama where it really doesn’t need to be. It’s a satisfactory wrap-up to a season that has placed its characters all in a pretty satisfactory position, both professionally and personally. Even when Abbott wins, it still ends up sort of losing—as getting Ava her job back seemingly doesn’t bring back the bribery goods or any of the funding Abbott was supposed to get from the district—but the characters are still working hard to keep Abbott going. And that’s enough."

Emma Fraser

"It would be jarring to see the fist-pumping version of this, and each time Robby’s voice breaks as he tries to get through the debrief, it matches the show's tone. Yes, they have done brave things, but the world (and hospital) is still a mess. “This place will break your heart, but it is also full of miracles,” Robby says. He dishes out his gratitude and praise, and later struggles when Abbott tries to do the same for him on the roof. “You rocked that shit down there tonight,” says Abbott. Wyle and the entire ensemble have done just that throughout the season, and even at this early stage in the year, I feel confident that The Pitt will feature on the Best of 2025."

William Goodman

"While it’s taken a lot of utterly bizarre (and entertaining) pathways, this ultimate conclusion is no less meaningful or significant as a result. The montage of concerned pilots at the end of the episode paints everything in such stark relief that I would hope people recognize the need for a serious conversation around the topic. For as farfetched as Fielder’s methodologies are, you can’t knock the results of what we’re seeing unfold in front of our very eyes."

Zack Handlen

"It’s the same problem that’s been dogging the show ever since Ellie and Dina arrived in Seattle and learned the situation was much, much worse than they thought it would be. Why are we still doing this? And now we have Jesse (poor, doomed Jesse) to lecture Ellie repeatedly on how stupid this revenge thing is. I, as an audience member, get it. I got it before this season even started, if you want to know the truth; and I’m finding it increasingly difficult to care about what happens next in a story that keeps saying the same obvious thing over and over even as its main character refuses to accept it."

Liam Mathews

"Peacemaker is staying focuêed on Chris Smith’s emotional story—his feelings about getting a chance to live the life he dreams of—without getting bogged down in the rules of what he can do and the details of how he does it. He found a doorway in a “quantum unfolding storage area,” and that’s good enough for the story Gunn is trying to tell, which is still a redemption arc. Chris thinks he found a loophole, a shortcut to redemption, but he will inevitably discover that it’s impossible to change the past and in order to become who he wants to be the change will have to come from within."

Alex McLevy

"Thankfully, Clyde Phillips and company have learned their lesson. Dexter is at his best when confronting the evil in others, and being pulled in different directions—trying to satisfy his Dark Passenger while still doing right by his family and those he cares about. Because the character wants to have fun, just as much as we want him to; the series flies when embracing that fundamental duality in Dexter. Too much emphasis on either side of the equation, and it tips into either weightless trash or self-serious hokum."

Myles McNutt

"'Chikhai Bardo' was less monumental than I expected. Now, I want to be clear that this is a visually evocative and engaging episode of television, ably brought to life by the show’s cinematographer, Jessica Lee Gagne. It is also inarguable that it has lots of implications for our understanding of the show and its lore. However, without suggesting that I think the show’s balance of style and substance is a problem, the episode is mostly content to explore the contours of the new questions it introduces, with the “answers” providing more fuel for online theorizing than something that accelerates the story itself."

Noel Murray

"Throughout The Lowdown, Sterlin Harjo and his writers—this episode is credited to Olivia Purnell—have excelled at making sure we know all we need to about the characters’ histories, without any scenes becoming merely dry recitations of backstory. The same is true here with Wendell. Just through a few lines of bickering back and forth, we get the lowdown (so to speak) on his relationship with Lee."

Lily Osler

"But just as importantly, a bouncier, lighter-on-its-feet Stranger Things is one that nurtures the realist, teen movie side of its heritage. What I’ve called before show’s Apatowian tendency—its debt to Freaks and Geeks in particular and grounded, emotionally astute teen dramas in general—requires a wide emotional gamut from its characters to help its viewers understand just how gargantuan teens’ feelings can be. And while you’d be forgiven for forgetting this given how middle-aged some of the actors are looking, these are textually a bunch of teenagers. They’re kids. And while the show’s made it plenty clear that these kids are angsty, it seems to finally be remembering that, being kids, emotional realism demands that they also be absolute dumbasses."

Dennis Perkins

"But as a plot device for Sunny, this conceit filled me with the dread you get when a show you admire appears to be making a huge miscalculation. Yet here’s where I admit something else—“The Gang Gets Ready for Prime Time” sort of kills it, mainly by keeping the garish cross-pollination to a minimum in favor of another round of Dee, Mac, Charlie, and Dennis unwittingly revealing the depth and breadth of their multifarious madnesses. It comes with a generous side dish of metatextual deconstruction of the series’ mainstream appeal—or lack thereof."

Sam Rosenberg

"Like virtually every contemporary satire now, the satire here wants to have its cake and eat it too, throwing pointed but weak jabs at influencer/transplant culture and the grindset mindset of the current workforce. It all just feels as indecisive, contradictory, and chaotic as Maia, torn between wanting to indulge in the carefree hedonism of a young, bougie LA professional lifestyle and wanting to critique it. Both attempts end up feeling too out of sync with each other to work because neither feel fully thought-out, thus making the whole endeavor a bit muddled and aimless."

Ben Rosenstock

"For some people, this might play as empty shock value, and Mike White certainly does have a taste for that. I can only admit to my own reactions watching this play out, though, and for me, the shock value is working. I can’t look away, especially because I genuinely have no idea what to expect from the aftermath. This wacky show always keeps one foot rooted in the psychological reality of its characters, and seeing how two brothers might actually work through something like this could be as compelling as it is excruciating."

Caroline Siede

"That doesn’t make “The Story & the Engine” a perfect episode. It’s corny at times and downright confusing at others. There’s probably about as much of it that doesn’t work as does. And yet it’s also distinctive and original in a way that’s thrilling to watch. When it comes to Doctor Who, I’ll take messy ambition over streamlined competence any day of the week. And “The Story & the Engine” is another example of the big, exciting swings the show is taking in this overall strong second season for Ncuti Gatwa."

Josh Spiegel

"In some ways, the concluding moments of “The End of the Road” present the possibility of a third season of Poker Face that resets to what the show was at the start. There is a woman on the run, in spite of her innocence, who is capable of detecting even the tiniest white lie, and will likely float from place to place because she can’t settle down. Streaming platforms being what they are, the fact that (as I write these words) there has been no news about a third season of Poker Face could mean nothing. The episode’s title aside, this doesn’t have to be the end for Charlie Cale. Yet if it’s soon revealed that Natasha Lyonne’s ready to move on, it would not shock me."

If you want to help me show support for our contributors, comment with your favorite reviews from this year, and let them know you appreciated the work they did this year. And if you're not a subscriber but enjoy sampling their great reviews, there's no better time than now to join in—in the short term, you'll get our continued coverage of shows like Pluribus, Heated Rivalry, and Fallout, and then in the new year we'll see new coverage for shows like The Pitt, Industry, The Traitors, and much more.

Here's those buttons once again. Thanks to everyone who's supported the site this year, and we'll have a full update on our Winter 2026 schedule after the new year.

10% off a Year of Episodic Medium

Give the Gift of Episodic Medium

Year-to-Year: 18 Gifts of Criticism by Episodic Medium's Contributors

Erik Adams

Donna Bowman

Laura M. Browning

Les Chappell

LaToya Ferguson

Emma Fraser

William Goodman

Zack Handlen

Liam Mathews

Alex McLevy

Myles McNutt

Noel Murray

Lily Osler

Dennis Perkins

Sam Rosenberg

Ben Rosenstock

Caroline Siede

Josh Spiegel

Read next

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Review: I Love LA, "Divas Down" | Season 1, Episode 7

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Erik Adams

Donna Bowman

Laura M. Browning

Les Chappell

LaToya Ferguson

Emma Fraser

William Goodman

Zack Handlen

Liam Mathews

Alex McLevy

Myles McNutt

Noel Murray

Lily Osler

Dennis Perkins

Sam Rosenberg

Ben Rosenstock

Caroline Siede

Josh Spiegel

Read next

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