If you haven’t seen “Queer Eye” on Netflix, you’re truly missing out on a part of what might actually be some of the greatest reality television in history. The third season of “Queer Eye” took place right here in Kansas City, and the Fab Five truly served us all the looks and emotions that we’ve been needing.

The team of guys, consisting of food expert Antoni Porowski, grooming guru Jonathan Van Ness, fashion stylist Tan France, culture guide Karamo Brown and designer Bobby Berk swooped in to Kansas City and offered up their life changing services to eight lucky residents this season. While a lot of really great areas in the city were showcased in the show, including the Plaza and the Glam Room salon, what really stood out about this season was the connections each member of the Fab Five made with the people on the show.

“Queer Eye” is always pretty emotional, but this season really pulled at the heartstrings. If you watch it, you’re definitely going to want some tissues next to you. A lot more of the Five’s personalities and personal stories were shown, connecting them deeply to the people they helped.

In episode five self-dubbed “lumberjack lesbian” Jess from Lawrence, KS, discussed how she was kicked out her home by her religious parents after coming out, and designer Berk shared his similar experience. Berk moved out of his home at 15, largely because his parents also weren’t accepting of his homosexuality. The Fab Five taught Jess that her family didn’t have to be blood but also reconnected her with her biological sister and introduced her to her baby niece.

Episode three gave us the lovely Jones sisters, Mary and Deborah, owners of Jones Bar-B-Q in Kansas City. The funny and dedicated sisters were given the self-love and confidence they needed to further their business and teach themselves that it’s okay to take time for yourself.

In episode six viewers met Rob Elrod, whose wife passed away from breast cancer two years ago – leaving him to take care of his two young sons. This episode was a tearjerker, as Elrod’s positivity and willingness to keep his wife’s memory alive while learning to move on was not only inspiring but pushed the Five to work extra hard to make the best experience they could for him.

This season was everything good and wholesome and, most importantly, showed off all of the amazing people that live in our community. The overall focus of the show is promoting inclusivity and diversity, something done really well in this season. There’s a Japan special coming out, and rumors have it that season four might also be set in Kansas City. Watch season three, and look at all of the beauty and diversity that we have right here in our city.

This weekend, I decided to try out another Netflix film. I saw some horrible reviews of a new movie, “Velvet Buzzsaw,” on social media and thought I should judge the film for myself. It couldn’t be that bad, could it?

Oh, yes. Yes, it definitely could.

To give the film some credit, there was a fairly star studded cast – Jake Gyllenhaal plays art critic Morf Vanderwalt and Natalia Dyer plays Coco – but even that didn’t help. The film’s premise follows a largely pretentious art-type crowd that basically steals an old dead man’s art and sells it for their own profit, which results in supernaturally dire consequences for all involved.

The thriller aspect of the film was actually pretty suspenseful, and there were moments were I was intrigued, waiting for what would happen next – but overall, the plot was jumbled and fell flat. The supernatural aspect of the movie was interesting and pretty well done, but the dialog was cheesy, the acting monotonous and boring and the uncomfortable pretentiousness surrounding the whole entity of the cinematic vision was a little too much.

At the beginning of the movie the whimsical music and bright scenery leads one to believe they’re in for a kind of cutesy, artistic indie film – but the first few words from Jake Gyllenhaal’s beautiful lips really ruins it for the viewer. They’re choppy, cheesy and excessively arrogant, which makes one immediately hate his character. Morf ends up being a fairly okay guy at the end of the film, but he suffers his supernatural consequence, like everyone in the movie does.

Perhaps the overly pretentious vibes and ending of the movie is supposed to signify something about human arrogance and vision, but honestly I didn’t understand it, much like many of the characters claim not to understand the art showcased in the film.

The pace of the film was clunky, shuffling from scene to scene with what felt like no closure – and the reasoning behind most of the film’s events wasn’t explained – except in a mere two minutes that were almost missed because I was starting to check out mid-movie. My attention wasn’t truly held until the last thirty or so minutes, which arguably, is a decent artistic move to enthrall an audience, but the suspense wasn’t enough to cover the flatness and one-dimensionality of the other hour of the movie.

The last thing that might bother a viewer is that the title in almost no way corresponds to the film – besides that fact that in the first minute or so of the movie the art gallery owner talks about her Velvet Buzzsaw tattoo on her neck – but why the tattoo was relevant is not made clear.

Maybe I just didn’t understand the vision of the director, but it could’ve been made better. It definitely could’ve been better. I didn’t hate the movie, I just felt disappointed and like I had wasted a good portion of my life. Maybe this is the same feeling one has when looking at really crappy art, and this may have been the intention of the movie all along. Who knows? I’m sure none of the audience does.

Photo courtesy of Netflix

What show are you watching on Netflix right now?

This is a common question asked in our generation and, if you’re like me, your answer to this question right now is “You.”

No, I am not actually just watching people. Rather, I have been consumed by Netflix’s newest show “You” which follows the life of a stalker through his perspective.

When I was told to watch “You” I thought I would be watching the typical crime show: stalker tries to stalk and eventually gets caught. However, after watching the first few episodes of “You” I had forgotten that the main character, Joe, played by Penn Badgley, was a stalker.

“You” makes the viewer empathize with Joe. When you’re watching, you find yourself rooting for him and wanting him to get the girl he’s stalking, Beck, played by Elizabeth Lail.

Viewers face the conflict of whether to keep rooting for Joe, even when he murders multiple people in order to get to Beck. It is easy to justify these actions because Joe believes that he is protecting Beck, and the viewer gets consumed in Joe’s point of view.

I was happy to find out that I wasn’t the only person having these conflicting feelings. Badgley had to remind people on Twitter that Joe was a murderer and they shouldn’t be romanticizing him – Badgley tweeted this after some viewers had expressed a desire to be kidnapped and stalked by Joe.

Shortly after watching “You,” I decided to check out another short series that everyone had been talking about – “Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes.”

“The Ted Bundy Tapes” was uncomfortable and frightening to watch seeing as it is a true story, unlike “You.” This documentary style series was a mix of interviews with people closely related to the cases and, most intriguing, recordings from interviews done with Ted Bundy after he was convicted and sentenced to death.

As with “You,” crazed fans took to Twitter to express their fascination with Ted Bundy – for instance, citing how attractive he is. Tweets expressing how attractive Ted Bundy was were met with a response from Netflix.

I ended my week by watching another trendy Netflix documentary – “Abducted in Plain Sight.” This true story follows the life of Jan Broberg who was kidnapped by her family friend as a small child.

Broberg’s abductor, Robert Berchtold, was their neighbor and close friend. He was a master manipulator who even convinced Broberg’s parents to not press charges after he kidnapped Broberg.

Berchtold crafted a plot in which he convinced Broberg, who was 12 years old at the time, that she had been in contact with aliens and she needed to save the planet by procreating with Berchtold, who was a middle-aged man.

Broberg, who was in love with Berchtold and convinced they needed to be married at the time, eventually realized the manipulation and abuse she had underwent. Other women have come forward and said that Berchtold also abused them.

The question I now ponder after watching these series is whether this is romanticization of violence and if that is a bad thing.

I think that “You” romanticizes violence by inviting the viewer to empathize with Joe, a stalker and a murderer. Joe continually commits heinous crimes but they are overshadowed by the fact that he is supposedly doing it out of love.

“You” also romanticizes violence by showing virtually no consequences for violent actions. When Joe *spoiler alert* kills Beck at the end of “You” he ends up selling her book for profit and has no repercussions for his actions.  

While “You” is just a fictional show, I think it is important to be mindful of how this portrayal of violence affects our minds. Hopefully, no one watching “You” will go out and commit the crimes Joe does, however, continual exposure to the romanticization of violence makes it more acceptable in our minds. If we see relationships portrayed in this way over and over we might become desensitized to it and be more willing to accept these types of behaviors.

I believe that “The Ted Bundy Tapes” and “Abducted in Plain Sight” both do a good job of not romanticizing the criminal. These incidents are taken from real life so they might be more likely to be cautious of how they portray the aggressors.

Disclaimer: I would not recommend watching all these shows in the same week as I foolishly decided to do. I have been afraid of being stalked or murdered by a serial killer for weeks now.

When I first saw “Russian Doll” pop up on Netflix, I was intrigued. After watching the trailer, I thought that it was going to be another “Groundhog Day”-esque reboot, where someone dies over and over and keeps waking up in the same day.

The show is produced by Amy Poehler and stars Natasha Lyonne, who some may recognize from the hit show Orange is The New Black, as Nadia. After binge-watching the whole show in a day, here’s the general premise: Nadia is celebrating her 36th birthday, dies, and then mysteriously wakes up, alive, on the same day. This process is repeated again and again. Over the course of the show, she discovers she’s not the only person this is happening to and she may need to relinquish dark parts of her past to break the chain.

Honestly, it was difficult to get hooked in the first two episodes, as most of the plot was Nadia dying, waking up in a bathroom, then dying again. But then the show began to slowly unravel – bringing in characters from Nadia’s part, present and possible future that not only shaped her character but the show’s motifs.

The show addressed subjects that could be perceived as really cliche, and made them interesting and complex without losing their appeal. For example, there is a lot of fixing relationships and addressing skeletons in her closet in order to fix the time loop, but the show introduces them in different ways using them to weave the plot together.

Oftentimes in cinematic plot, this kind of do-better to get better kind of storyline can be old and kill the mood of what could be an otherwise decent film or show, but “Russian Doll” does with subtly and builds the suspense throughout.

It’s fascinating to watch Nadia piece together the reason behind why she’s stuck in a time vortex, and even more fascinating to watch her become someone she probably wouldn’t have been otherwise.

At times, the show is really funny, although the humor is dark and cynical, but is balanced by bittersweet moments between Nadia and the other characters. The camera work is done well, which can at times make or break a show’s watchability. The aesthetic is generally pleasing, being largely real color and motions, but there is a sort of colorful ethereal quality to many episodes that lends to the alien quality a plot about dying and regenerating over and over again can give.

The music in the show is very limited, but is done well when used. The same song plays in Nadia’s reboots – signaling her dying and starting over – and to signal momentous plot points.

In general, the show is well balanced. With each episode being around 30 minutes, the plot moves quickly without seeming rushed, and remains complicated without being draggy. This is a hard balance to find, but Amy Poehler found it. Did we really think she wouldn’t, with shows as successful as “Parks and Rec”?

Russian Doll could have been cliche, boring and overdone, but the great acting, emotional pulls and balanced qualities of its production made it shine. I recommend watching it, even if it is to just satisfy the hype you see on Twitter – I know I did.