With exams wrapping up, and the holidays so close you can taste them, its hard to stop yourself from dreaming about those long care free days ahead of you.
For me I don’t have a lot planned except spending endless hours bingeing… TV shows that is. From Netflix to Light-box I adore a good series and with all this time to spare I can’t think of anything better. So if your looking for something new and juicy to consume your time, grab the remote, huddle around your laptop screen or crash the couch, and give some of my favourite (lesser known) TV shows ago!
Peaky Blinders
One of my all time favourite’s Peaky Blinders is an amazing story based on true events. Following a 1920’s gang in post war Birmingham, we see a gypsy-Irish family stand against the Government, rival gangs and their own morals to forge their place in a corrupt society.
For the writer Steven Knight this story comes from the heart and is very personal to his family, with his uncles being peaky blinders themselves. The original real life gang were illegal book makers (Bookies – in NZ terms, they ran the TAB before it was legal). The gangs notorious name comes from the act of sewing razor blades into the peaks of their caps, and as their jobs involved a certain level of violence I’ll leave the rest up to you to piece together where the whole “blinded” part comes from.
Knight talks about hearing stories as a child of gangsters living the high life, and wanted to portray this part of history through child’s eyes, with a heavy focus on family.
With an astonishing cast; such as Cillian Murphy, Tom Hardy and Helen McCrory to name a few, passionate writing and characters that melt your heart, Peaky Blinders is my top pick for a Netflix experience.
Black Sails
For those who grew up loving Pirates of the Caribbean but are now left wondering what else can fuel your hidden pirate desires, well I have the answer for you! Black Sails is an Emmy award winning TV series based on Robert Louis Stevenson’s novel Treasure Island, and follows the life of Captain Flint, one of the most notorious, and feared captains of all the Golden age of pirates. Much like Peaky Blinders, Black Sails draws you into their characters in a way which is very rudimentary. Although Captain Flint is bad to the bone and, the writers do a fantastic job of justifying all the senseless violence, and for some strange reason after multiple episodes you keep asking yourself… “Why do i still like this dude?”
In the same breath, this show is heavily dialogue driven in the later seasons so it does make it slightly hard towards the end to binge the final season, especially with 3 of them being over an hour long!
Commonly referred to as the pirate version of a Game of Thrones, Black Sails is well worth a watch and if your like me it might encourage you to pick up the book it’s based on.
Fresh Meat
From the creators of Peep Show, Fresh Meat is a comedy-drama about six people and their intense university experience. From the onset the show is hilarious and full of classic British wit, similar to the Inbetweeners. This is by far the easiest series to get lost in, in the sense that you always find your self letting the next episode role over, and the next and the next…
After watching the hilarious milestones of Uni that took place over the numerous seasons and now moving through Uni myself the jokes only get funnier and more personal. The main theme is friendship and I think that is why you find yourself yearning for the next episode. Because of this no matter what happens the characters find themselves back together and it’s this warmth that makes this a fantastic comedy for this mid semester break, and a funny tribute to all things university.
Rick and Morty
Time travelling inter-dimensional inter-generational show ….. I can’t explain it.
But this show is a work of comedy genius. With no real plot or story line Rick and Morty is a fantastic adult cartoon which messes with your head and plays on your emotion.
Every time I recommend this series I find myself lost for words, murmuring “watch it… just watch it!”
I can’t definitively say this will be everyone’s cup of tea, but if your a fan of Family Guy, Archer or really anything else from adult swim, Rick and Morty will certainly be up your alley.
Honorable mention would have to go to my mother’s favourite show Schitts Creek Written, directed and acted by the Levy family its comedy genius and the perfect series for a solid laugh!