There are scores of TV shows out there, with dozens of new episodes each week, not to mention everything you can find on Hulu Plus, Netflix streaming, and HBO Go. How’s a viewer to keep up? To help you sort through all that television has to offer, Flavorwire is compiling the five best moments on TV each week. This week saw big finales, big disappointments, and a very big win.
Chuck vs. Jimmy
Better Call Saul ended a fantastic second season on Monday with a cliffhanger of a revelation: Jimmy admits to Chuck that he was right — he did doctor the Mesa Verde paperwork so it would look like Chuck screwed up, leading the clients back to Kim. Then, after Jimmy leaves Chuck’s house, we find out that Chuck had been taping his brother’s confession. Even more so than Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul never makes it clear exactly who is in the right and who is in the wrong, depicting a moral universe closer to the one here on earth — that is, disappointing and confusing as hell.
Girls Finally Sort of Gets it Together
The final two episodes of Girls Season 5 were full of moments big and small: Hannah and Tally reconnecting over a joint, Shoshanna and Hermie doing a victory dance in Ray’s coffee shop, Adam and Jessa’s epic, furniture-trashing fight. But the most satisfying moment was Hannah’s story at The Moth open-mic night: For the first time, we saw Hannah as we always knew she could be — articulate, funny, honest, insightful, and mature. She’s even got the new Eileen Fisher duds to prove it.
Martha Finds Out Philip is KGB
This week’s episode of The Americans was a particular heartbreaker, as FBI agents Stan and Dennis close in on Martha and Philip whisks her away to a safe house. Over the course of the hour, Martha starts to realize that her life will never go back to the way it was — that she’s never going home. Exhausted and wracked with guilt and remorse, Philip finally admits that he’s KGB.
A Crazy Ex-Finale
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend finished off its stellar first season with another touching and hilarious episode (was there any other kind on this show?!). I love how the episode exposed everyone’s relationship issues, not just one side of each story: Rebecca as usual craved a big, musical-style “moment” between her and Greg at Josh’s sister’s wedding. But Greg was feeling the pressure, so he just got wasted and played down his feelings for Rebecca. Valencia was fed up with Josh’s failure to commit to her, and Josh was fed up with Valencia’s lack of trust in him. It all culminated in Josh and Rebecca finally hooking up — before she ruins her big, musical moment by admitting that she moved to West Covina just for him.
TV Critic Emily Nussbaum Wins the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism!
Ok, so it didn’t happen on TV exactly, but the New Yorker TV critic’s win — not to mention the fact that last year’s winner was also a female TV critic, the Los Angeles Times’ Mary McNamara — is a boon for TV enthusiasts everywhere. As The Washington Post’s Alyssa Rosenberg points out, “It’s notable that great writing about television by women is getting recognized at a moment when female characters and artists are ascendant in a medium that seemed to break through when creators started telling a very specific kind of story about men.” Sing it, sister!