Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Monday, December 9th, 2024

Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Monday, December 9th, 2024:

VOTING BEGINS IN THE FIRST ANNUAL TOO MUCH TV GLOBAL TELEVISION AWARDS
Today is the kick-off for voting in what I hope will be an annual effort to highlight and celebrate the best global television and streaming movies of the year.

Voting is limited to free and paid Too Much TV subscribers and you can only vote once. Vote in as many or as few categories as you like, odds are there are a lot of titles you haven't seen yet. And that's just fine.

The voting ends at 11:59 pm CT on Sunday, December 15th. The winners will be announced Monday, December 30th. 

Here is the link for voting for your favorites: https://tinyurl.com/globaltvawards. I am really interested to see how this shakes out.

I THINK WE CAN ALL AGREE THE GOLDEN GLOBES ARE PROBLEMATIC (HE WRITES CAREFULLY)
The Golden Globe Awards nominations were announced this morning, and if you care and happened to miss the list, you can check it out here.

One thing that popped out at me was that in a couple of cases, TV nominations went to programs that yet to officially premiere. 

Netflix's Squid Game received a nod for best drama series even though the new season doesn't premiere until the end of the month. Also, Netflix's comedy special Jamie Foxx: What Had Happened Was… also received a nomination - in the category of Best Performance in Stand-Up Comedy on Television - even though it doesn't officially premiere until tomorrow.

I am assuming the judges received screener access to the programs, given the Golden Globe rules seem to state the judges had to see the nominated titles no later than early November. 

That's not a big deal with the Jamie Foxx special, Netflix hasn't been shy about getting screeners of that program out ahead of time.

But the screeners for Squid Game are a different situation. They would have had to go out to judges at least a month ago and Netflix has been quite careful with screeners for the upcoming season. Aside from the judges and a select number of big trade outlets and South Korean press, there don't seem to be a lot of people who managed to obtain the screeners. I know that when I asked, I was told Netflix did not have screeners "available to widely share."

This is one of those situations that really sucks because the majority of the entertainment press apparently won't have access to an advanced look at the show. So we'll be pounding through the season once it drops, so we can write about it.

However, on the upside, the Golden Globe judges were able to see it.

I'M NOT SAYING THAT THE QUALITY OF LIVE FEED STORIES HAS DROPPED SIGNIFICANTLY SINCE THR GOT RID OF LESLIE GOLDBERG. BUT...



IF YOU THOUGHT THIS YEAR'S SPOTIFY UNWRAPPED KINDA SUCKED, YOU'RE NOT ALONE
Garbage Day has a good piece on what might have been the cause, and no surprise, it appears to come down to corporate greed and stupidity:

Spotify did a massive round of layoffs last year. And among those layoffs was Genn McDonald, the data scientist that managed Spotify’s massive treasure trove of genre data. He spoke to Billboard back in April about what he was able to do with all those insights, saying, “I worked on fraud detection and on the artist similarity algorithms, and on tons of editorial tools and internal metrics.” It’s likely McDonald’s departure is also why smart playlists like Discover Weekly have gone seriously down hill over the last year.

TWEET OF THE DAY



ODDS AND SODS
* One day last winter, Alison Stewart, the host of “All of It” on WNYC, was alarmed to find herself speaking gibberish.

* I wrote a review of the new Netflix series Echoes Of The Past, which is an Egyptian remake of the Netflix Mexican original Who Killed Sara? and while it doesn't quite match the brilliance of the original, it is still a entertaining ride for fans of global TV whodunnits.

* Ampere Analysis is estimating there will be more than 2 billion global streaming subs by 2029.

* When your parent company co-owns the Golden Globe Awards, it's a foregone conclusion your outlet will crank out a bunch of stories about the nominations on the day they are announced. Still, Deadline managed to crank out an impressive 20 posts with the phrase "Golden Globes" in the headline in the first 12 hours after the nominations were announced.

WHAT'S NEW TONIGHT AND TOMORROW

MONDAY, DECEMBER 9TH:
Best Christmas Movies Ever! (The CW)
Pulisic (Paramount+) - [first look video]
Sugarcane (NatGeo)
The Great British Baking Show: Holidays! Season Premiere (Netflix)
The Real Full Monty (Fox) - [first look video]
The Simpsons Funday Football (Disney+)

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 10TH:
Jamie Foxx: What Happened Was....(Netflix)
Lego Masters: Celebrity Holiday Bricktacular (Fox)
Nature Of The Crime (HBO)
Polo (Netflix)
Richard Ramirez: The Night Stalker Tapes (Peacock)
Rugged Rugby: Conquer Or Die Series Premiere (Netflix)
Secret Level Series Premiere (Prime Video)

SEE YOU ON TUESDAY!