The latest episode of the Boiled Leather Audio Podcast takes a look back at the year in television, as Stefan and I review my picks for the ten best shows of 2023. Listen here or wherever you get your podcasts!

9. The Idol (HBO/Max)

Fuck what you heard. The Idol, 2023’s most hated show, is far and away the TV I’ve thought, and argued, about the most this year. Hype and backlash cycles notwithstanding, Sam Levinson and Abel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye created a sleazy, lurid, funny, fucked-up, incredibly straightforward satire of the starlet factory à la Paul Verhoeven. Unlike, say, Succession, which spoofs the ultra-wealthy without simultaneously trying to feel like Dallas or Empire, The Idol sends up the sex-and-drugs world of pop star Jocelyn (Lily-Rose Depp in the year’s most underappreciated performance) and her grifter svengali Tedros Tedros (Tesfaye in the year’s second most underappreciated performance) while also embodying it. 

The two leads act out their intense and at times humiliating material without a net, but they’re buoyed by a Greek chorus of comedic performances by the likes of Hank Azaria, Rachel Sennott, Eli Roth, Jane Adams, and Da’Vine Joy Randolph (who turns on a dime to deliver genuinely affecting material whenever called for). All of these terrific actors perform in front of a backdrop of lush retro synths and strings courtesy of Tesfaye, Levinson, and composer and super-producer Mike Dean, appearing as himself. In a sane world this would have just been Pop Starship Troopers — gnarly, nasty, sexy, fun, appreciated by those who get it and basically ignored by everyone else. It couldn’t sustain the discourse around it, and shouldn’t have had to, when its meaning was so plain to see, and enjoy

I wrote about the ten best television shows of 2023 for Decider. I’m enormously proud of this list. The variety I’ve seen across TV critics’ best-of lists this year can be nothing but good for both TV and criticism, and I’m glad to have contributed in my own way. Anyway, I believe in all these shows and think they’re worth your time.

GOYER: We’re aware of the fact that we’ve got actors like Lee Pace and Jared Harris, and that we can’t just plunk anyone into one of those smaller roles, or it’s going to break the suspension of disbelief. That is our motto: Every one of these people has to be able to stand toe to toe with Jared Harris.

I’ve been waiting for this one for a long time: I interviewed David S. Goyer about making Foundation Season 2, the year’s most thrilling show and one of the all-time great sophomore surprises, for Decider.

Foundation Season 2 ruled. Why? Let me and Stefan Sasse explain it to you in the Boiled Leather Audio Hour’s latest Patreon exclusive Boiled Leather Audio Conversation podcast. Subscribe and listen!

It’s not until I lay it all out like that that I realize just how steep a hill the tenth and final episode of Foundation’s superb second season had to climb. To deliver on any one of these promising elements of the show would be an achievement, one that many shows, including ones I really like, would settle for. Just by way of a for instance: Silo, a sister “adaptation of a bestselling sci-fi series about the menacing future airing on Apple TV+” show, is all the better for having a narrow focus and relentlessly aiming its laser at it.

But that was not the path chosen for Foundation. Instead, writers Goyer and Liz Phang, director Alex Graves, and the entire stellar cast set about delivering on every single thing. And deliver they did. Overdelivered, actually. In fact, in terms of sheer scale and scope and daring, the last show I can remember serving up season finales this replete with emotional and visual spectacle is, deep breath, Game of Thrones. And no, I’m not tossing that comparison around lightly. In terms of SFF TV, Foundation is currently as good as it gets.

I reviewed the finale of Foundation Season 2 for Decider. What a show!

But that’s where we’re at with “Long Ago, Not Far Away,” the penultimate episode of Foundation’s second season, and the latest in a series of back-to-back-to-back home runs. Written by Jane Espenson and Eric Carrasco and directed, as was its excellent predecessor, by Roxann Dawson, it’s TV genre entertainment at its grandest, sexiest, saddest, most mysterious, most violent, most spectacular, best.

I reviewed this past weekend’s episode of Foundation for Decider.

When a television show gets on a real creative tear, something special often occurs. To me, anyway. Whether it’s a stone classic deep into its run, firing on all cylinders; a killer from jump, blowing you away right away; or — as is the case here, with Foundation — a formerly sputtering spacecraft that has achieved escape velocity and is now hurtling towards the stars, there comes a point when a regular review simply won’t do, and a litany of superlatives is all that can get the job done. 

In other words? There is simply too much shit to like in “The Last Empress.” Directed with total confidence by Roxann Dawson, working off a remarkable script by Liz Phang, Addie Manis, and Bob Oltra, it’s Foundation’s best episode to date. (Seems like we’re saying that a lot lately, no?) 

I reviewed this week’s episode of Foundation, a success on every level, for Decider.

One element worth singling out: The deft, origami-like folding of Constant and Poly, General Bel Riose and his husband Glawen Curr, and Hober Mallow and the Spacer hive into one single elegant construction. In a sort of cascading series of scenes, Hober makes Hari Seldon’s big offer to the Spacers: an unlimited supply of a synthetic version of the compound that keeps them alive, heretofore controlled by Empire, in exchange for their support. The spacer queen, She-Is-Center (Brucella Neman-Persaud), decides the risk isn’t worth it and rats him out to her daughter, She-Bends-Light (Judi Shekoni), who serves with Bel and Glawen. Hober is handed over to their custody, but escapes thanks to his sentient navigator beast Beki and makes a jump right there within Bel’s ship’s hangar, thus proving the existence of Foundation’s advanced faster-than-light travel technology. As a result, Poly and Constant are brought before the Cleons and Demerzel, taunted, tortured, and returned to prison. It’s almost elegant, the way the pieces are put together.

I reviewed last week’s episode of Foundation for Decider.

You know, when it comes to this week’s episode of Foundation, I think Tim Robinson put it best: What the fuck?! What the fuuuuuuuuck?!?!

I’ve been OOO but I cannot let the weekend pass without drawing your attention to one of the most insane things I’ve seen on TV in a long time: this week’s episode of Foundation, which I reviewed for Decider.

Foundation is funny, exciting, lyrical, dazzling to the eye, epic in scope, and horny at heart, in service of the refreshingly non-pollyannaish goal of limiting humanity’s next dark age to a mere millennium. Even its hero’s journey involves getting off a few stops early and walking. That’s just one more thing to admire about the year’s best comeback.

I reviewed this week’s episode of Foundation for Decider. More big-budget streaming-network SFF adaptations should feature plotlines in which the supreme leader is in serious diplomatic trouble because immortal robot lover never taught him that the cowgirl position exists.

I didn’t even realize Lee Pace wasn’t in this week’s episode of Foundation until after it was over. How’s that for a high compliment? 

I reviewed today’s episode of Foundation for Decider.

I’m about to say the most “I’m a professional television critic” thing I’ve ever said, so please bear with me: This week’s episode of Foundation was a hell of a good time, and I have my reservations about that.

I reviewed this week’s episode of Foundation for Decider.

If I were to construct a Prime Radiant based on all my knowledge of all the shows I’ve ever reviewed, I’d gaze into its holographic projection of the future and tell you that if things continue along their current path, there are warning signs for what might happen. It happened to Billions, for example. It happened to The Leftovers. Closest to home of all, it happened to the earlier Lee Pace starring vehicle Halt and Catch Fire. What happened, you ask? (“What happened, O Prophet?” is also acceptable.) What happened was that shaky shows with glimmers of promise in their first seasons became dynamite in their second. If I’m not mistaken, if there’s no intervening Crisis, Foundation is on that golden path. 

I reviewed the new episode of Foundation for Decider.

“Rip-roarin’” isn’t an adjective I’d use to describe Foundation, science-fiction godhead Isaac Asimov’s heady tome (is there any other kind of tome?) about a rogue mathematician’s plan to save humanity from itself. I do not mentally associate the novel with the phrase “psychedelic freak-out.” Nowhere in its pages do I recall a chapter entitled “The Emperor Fucks a Robot, Then Has a Fight Scene in the Nude.”

And yet, my friends. And yet!

Bombastic, lascivious, arch, gorgeous — “In Seldon’s Shadow,” the long-awaited return of David S. Goyer’s epic-scale adaptation of Asimov’s magnum opus, is all of the above. Written by Goyer and his fellow genre luminary Jane Espenson and directed with verve and grace by Alex Graves, it indicates that this show learned every possible lesson from its inconsistent but entertaining first season. It leans hard into its strengths, shores up its weaknesses, and provides enough beauty — both science-fictional and human-physical — to leave me as optimistic about this show as I’ve ever been. 

And I’m not gonna bury the lede here: Lee Pace has a naked fight scene in it.

I reviewed the terrific season premiere of Foundation for Decider.

What does it all mean for the future of this show, thought? That, I’m less certain about. It’s already been renewed for a second season, so you don’t need to worry about that. However, there still is a certain lopsided quality to it all, with the Cleon material standing head and shoulders above the Gaal/Salvor/Hari stuff. The burst of action that punctuated the first season’s last few episodes mitigated this somewhat, but now that Gaal and Salvor are simply adrift together on the surface of a drowned world, it seems like things may get tilted in favor of the Cleons yet again. The missteps involving Hari’s big speech and the secret of Salvor’s parentage certainly don’t help.

But I think there’s much to be enjoyed and admired in Foundation overall. The commitment to far-out ideas about the flow of history (punctuated though it might be by individual actions), the emphasis on grand science-fiction vistas, the performances of Lee Pace and Terrence Mann and Cassian Bilton as the Cleons—there’s room to grow a very good show around these component parts, even as the Lou Llobell/Leah Harvey/Jared Harris segments remain hit or miss. A decent chance—isn’t that all Foundation is asking for, in the end?

I reviewed the season finale of Foundation This show wound up being much better than it had any right to be, sometimes despite itself.

Is it just me, or is Foundation getting better and better with each episode? Maybe it’s simply a case of familiarity breeding admiration rather than contempt, as more time spent with each of its storylines equals more chances to appreciate the unique things that each is doing. Maybe those storylines are legit improving week to week, particularly as the flatter elements, like the chosen-one heroes Gaal (absent this week) and Salvor, draw closer to their plotlines’ denouements and excitement builds as a result. Maybe it’s a matter of the overall Foundation aesthetic—the grand space vistas, the depiction of far-future civilizations, the cool-looking spaceships and costumes and tech and whatnot—winning us over as we get used to it. Whatever the case, the penultimate episode of the show’s first season, portentously titled “The First Crisis,” is entertaining viewing from start to finish.

I reviewed last week’s episode of Foundation for Decider.

You have to hand it to Emperor Cleon. Most all-powerful galactic overlords would have a hard time suppressing a heretical sect of their star-spanning realm’s most powerful religion, led by a priestess who’s basically called him a soulless abomination. Most would also struggle to prove her wrong by completing a religious pilgrimage that kills 50% of its pilgrims through heat, thirst, and exposure. And most would probably keep their shirts on while doing so.

I reviewed this week’s episode of Foundation for Decider.

Well now, that was certainly an episode, wasn’t it!

Despite a generic-sounding title, “Mysteries and Martyrs,” that initially had me dreading a bunch of equally generic sci-fi goings-on, Foundation Episode 7 turned out to be an absurdly jam-packed installment. With fully four engaging storylines, striking outer-space visuals, and startling deaths and resurrections, I don’t know if it’s the best episode of Foundation yet per se, but it’s certainly the most fun to watch.

I reviewed last week’s episode of Foundation for Decider.

Lee Pace shirtless. That’s it. That’s the review.

I kid, of course. If that were the review, I’d be out of a job real quick. But I do think opening with an Emperor Cleon shower scene tells us something important about Foundation: It understands that the Emperors are the most vibrant and appealing aspect of the story so far. Their sex appeal may not be the whole reason why, but it’s a part of it. Why not emphasize it?

I reviewed the sixth episode of Foundation for Decider.

We’re five episodes deep into Foundation, and from Salvor Hardin to Gaal Dornick, our heroes face what could be an insurmountable task. No, it’s not the attack by Anacrean forces that Salvor tries and fails to fend off. Nor is it Gaal’s need to figure out where the ship on which she has been stranded is going when the ship itself won’t tell her. The big challenge is this: Can the rest of the Foundation cast hold things down without the presence of Lee Pace’s beautiful, beautiful Emperor Cleon? I’d say that after this ep (“Upon Awakening”), the answer is a qualified yes. (Lee Pace hive, feel free to roast me when you link to this review.)

I reviewed the fifth episode of Foundation for Decider.